WEBVTT - Ep. 340: People Getting Confused By Animals 0:00:08.920 --> 0:00:13.320 This is me Eat podcast coming at you shirtless, severely 0:00:13.440 --> 0:00:17.680 bug bitten, and in my case, underwear. Listening to hunt podcast, 0:00:18.239 --> 0:00:23.360 you can't predict anything presented by first, like creating proven 0:00:23.640 --> 0:00:27.880 versatile hunting apparel from Marino bass layers to technical outerwear 0:00:27.960 --> 0:00:36.199 for every hunt first, like go farther, stay longer. I 0:00:36.280 --> 0:00:41.080 spent five hours teaching my nephew how to play cribbage. 0:00:41.880 --> 0:00:43.800 You don't have to spend five hours teaching me because 0:00:43.840 --> 0:00:47.599 he's six years old. That is not no, you know, 0:00:47.680 --> 0:00:49.360 but he was just like, I want to learn this 0:00:49.479 --> 0:00:51.879 everybody else's playing at because it was dumping rain the 0:00:51.880 --> 0:00:57.720 whole time, and ma'am okay, Tannon five, Tanon five? What's 0:00:57.720 --> 0:01:05.080 tanon five? Like a cribbage become the We're in a cabin, 0:01:05.240 --> 0:01:09.800 we have nothing to do. Everybody, it's the best two 0:01:09.920 --> 0:01:13.080 person card game out there. That's really my old man, 0:01:13.880 --> 0:01:15.679 you might as well run it, turn it the machine 0:01:15.680 --> 0:01:20.320 on in my old man. In my old man's old age, 0:01:20.400 --> 0:01:24.160 him and his friends were very into taking any kind 0:01:24.200 --> 0:01:29.360 of oddball item and drilling whatever hundreds of holes you 0:01:29.360 --> 0:01:33.800 need to drill into it to make a cribbage score card. 0:01:34.840 --> 0:01:38.720 So if like someone found an antler, right, you do 0:01:38.840 --> 0:01:41.120 that with it. If someone's like, look at this old 0:01:41.120 --> 0:01:45.240 bowling pin at a heart at a yard sale, they 0:01:45.280 --> 0:01:48.280 would band saw the bowling pin and a half and 0:01:48.320 --> 0:01:50.720 then I want to take it home, and my dad 0:01:50.760 --> 0:01:53.520 would take his home and they'd go up and drill 0:01:54.760 --> 0:01:58.279 holes in it. Yeah, hunters, and they would have a bowl, 0:01:58.680 --> 0:02:02.600 a bowling pin, crimpage board. Yeah, it didn't matter what, 0:02:02.920 --> 0:02:06.240 anything that would accommodate one on it. I know you're 0:02:06.280 --> 0:02:08.520 not a card game enthusiast, and if either of you, 0:02:08.560 --> 0:02:11.919 if your brothers aren't either, Oh no, we played cards 0:02:11.919 --> 0:02:16.160 like a madman growing up. Yeah, but I've offered to 0:02:16.160 --> 0:02:21.200 to play with you since we've known each other. Well, 0:02:21.240 --> 0:02:26.000 I just want to saying around, I'd be honored to 0:02:26.160 --> 0:02:28.200 take it and keep it, you know, alive. When I 0:02:28.280 --> 0:02:31.280 go home. When I go home to visit my mom 0:02:31.480 --> 0:02:35.560 soon here, I will bring you back. I'll probably bring 0:02:35.560 --> 0:02:40.240 you a bowling ball, one bowling pin, one which I 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:42.720 feel still laying around. I'll definitely find some antler ones 0:02:43.040 --> 0:02:45.600 and I'll bring him to you. We played. We used 0:02:45.600 --> 0:02:47.640 to throw craps on an army blanket because that's how 0:02:47.680 --> 0:02:51.560 my dad did it in the army we would, Um, 0:02:51.680 --> 0:02:54.120 he'd like pin He'd lay the blanket on the ground 0:02:54.240 --> 0:02:59.240 and pin it up the wall as the backboard. She said, 0:02:59.240 --> 0:03:00.959 when you're throwing apps in the army, it needs to 0:03:00.960 --> 0:03:05.079 be quiet, so you it wouldn't make any noise. You 0:03:05.160 --> 0:03:06.840 threw the dice and it hit a wall, a wool 0:03:06.919 --> 0:03:10.880 blanket hanging on the wall, and would be like silent crabs. Um. 0:03:11.120 --> 0:03:14.720 We played a lot of poker, a lot of poker, 0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:18.799 and everybody had like a sock follow change, Mm hmm, 0:03:19.840 --> 0:03:23.240 go get your sock, dude. I could tell you, like 0:03:23.320 --> 0:03:27.119 a very great story about one of those socks. Will 0:03:27.120 --> 0:03:29.400 the change if I couldn't do it on this show 0:03:29.840 --> 0:03:36.640 doesn't involve violance, it was. I would absolutely tell a 0:03:36.720 --> 0:03:39.200 violent story. It's not a violent story. It's a sexy story. 0:03:39.800 --> 0:03:43.680 But yeah. Joined today by John Mollem, who's been on 0:03:43.680 --> 0:03:47.320 the show how many times? Once twice twice, at least twice. 0:03:47.520 --> 0:03:50.960 He has a brand spickitty new book out, Serious Face 0:03:51.960 --> 0:03:56.240 Essays by John Wellem, several of which pertained to the 0:03:56.240 --> 0:03:59.240 stuff we like to talk about. That's right, because you, um, 0:03:59.320 --> 0:04:01.120 you have a things you're right about. One of the 0:04:01.160 --> 0:04:03.080 things you write about. I don't know if you describe 0:04:03.120 --> 0:04:06.480 it this way, but you write a lot about human 0:04:06.760 --> 0:04:10.800 relationships with nature, especially when they get a little they 0:04:10.840 --> 0:04:12.800 go a little haywire. I think that's like, how do 0:04:12.840 --> 0:04:15.160 you put it? I like to think of it as 0:04:15.360 --> 0:04:18.200 I like to write about people who are getting really 0:04:18.240 --> 0:04:24.320 confused by animals, you know, because the there's lots of 0:04:24.360 --> 0:04:27.920 stories where a bunch of people are doing very confusing, 0:04:29.080 --> 0:04:33.200 nutty things, trying to accomplish something, and there's an animal 0:04:33.320 --> 0:04:35.320 right in the center of the story, and the animal 0:04:35.640 --> 0:04:37.360 can't tell its side of the story, so you just 0:04:37.400 --> 0:04:40.400 get to deal with all the people acting crazy. And 0:04:40.520 --> 0:04:43.960 something about that really scratches an itch for me. Like 0:04:43.960 --> 0:04:46.120 if you could go to a monk seal and say 0:04:46.160 --> 0:04:48.040 what do you think about all of this? You know what, 0:04:48.080 --> 0:04:50.039 I think he'd say. I think he wouldn't know that 0:04:50.040 --> 0:04:54.440 it's going on, absolutely not. I always say that the 0:04:54.480 --> 0:04:57.760 animals always have no comment, you know, and that in 0:04:57.800 --> 0:05:00.320 some ways I think that that brings the crazyness of 0:05:00.360 --> 0:05:03.559 people into higher reliase because they get to speak for it. Yeah, 0:05:03.600 --> 0:05:05.400 because if you they get to speak for it, and 0:05:05.440 --> 0:05:07.960 it turns out that it says many different things to them, 0:05:08.040 --> 0:05:10.039 to many different people. And if you have a story 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:13.839 where there's some kind of controversy among people, then you 0:05:13.920 --> 0:05:15.760 have to go around as a journalist and talk to 0:05:15.800 --> 0:05:19.200 all of those people and align their accounts and somehow 0:05:19.240 --> 0:05:21.760 makes sense of all their different stories. But if one 0:05:22.000 --> 0:05:24.440 the main character in the story is an animal and 0:05:24.480 --> 0:05:28.800 they're not talking, then you can just show the nuttiness 0:05:28.839 --> 0:05:31.359 of people. It's a very pure way I think to 0:05:31.400 --> 0:05:34.159 show how dysfunctional we are as a species is to 0:05:34.160 --> 0:05:36.720 show us kind of colliding up against some other species. 0:05:37.800 --> 0:05:39.680 I can't tell if I'm gonna beat your ass in trivia? 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:41.479 Are you staying for trivia? You're definitely gonna beat my 0:05:41.480 --> 0:05:44.200 ass in trivia without a doubt. No, I think that 0:05:44.200 --> 0:05:45.800 you don't know. I think you're going to be a 0:05:45.800 --> 0:05:48.320 strong player. I think you're gonna be a very strong player. 0:05:48.360 --> 0:05:51.320 I think you've already gotten in my head where I'm 0:05:51.320 --> 0:05:56.840 feeling like you're gonna beat my ass trivia. So my 0:05:56.880 --> 0:05:59.320 game is collapsed. Okay, well we'll see, we'll see my 0:05:59.360 --> 0:06:03.160 game is so I started out strong. Um, we'll have 0:06:03.240 --> 0:06:07.320 already talked about this, but our trivia show has gone weekly. Um. 0:06:07.400 --> 0:06:11.279 It's a weekly release hosted by Spencer new heart. I 0:06:11.320 --> 0:06:13.200 think you'll do good, but I think I'll beat you 0:06:13.720 --> 0:06:16.359 because here's the deal. You'll do good on all the 0:06:16.360 --> 0:06:20.320 geography like history stuff, you'll do good on, but there's 0:06:20.320 --> 0:06:23.600 gonna be some like technical there's gonna be some technical 0:06:23.800 --> 0:06:26.520 archery question or something that I might be like, oh, 0:06:26.560 --> 0:06:28.400 I remember what that is, and you're just not going 0:06:28.440 --> 0:06:30.800 to know. I mean, am I the only guest you've 0:06:30.800 --> 0:06:35.440 ever had on the show who's never hunted? So I'm 0:06:35.480 --> 0:06:40.320 already a disadvantage. I feel you're of a very small few. No, 0:06:40.480 --> 0:06:44.359 that's not really true. Okay, As a casual listener to 0:06:44.360 --> 0:06:47.200 the show, I definitely feel like I'm I'm not qualified 0:06:47.240 --> 0:06:50.320 to be here. But like, but that's gonna come out 0:06:50.320 --> 0:06:54.040 in the trivia. But I know for a fact that 0:06:54.080 --> 0:06:57.040 you almost hunted, that's right, because you got real curious 0:06:57.040 --> 0:06:59.040 about the deer in your yard. Well, you've got me 0:06:59.040 --> 0:07:01.120 a real curious about it. I did go hunting once. 0:07:01.680 --> 0:07:03.159 We may have talked about this once. I did go 0:07:03.240 --> 0:07:05.640 hunting once, but we did not see an elk the 0:07:05.640 --> 0:07:07.719 whole time I was out there, and that sharpened my 0:07:07.720 --> 0:07:10.240 appreciation for hunting for sure. Where are you at with 0:07:10.280 --> 0:07:12.120 the deer in New yard right now, you haven't eaten one. 0:07:12.320 --> 0:07:14.720 Well know, the where I'm at with the deer in 0:07:14.760 --> 0:07:16.960 my yard is I spent a lot of the pandemic 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:22.480 building a deer fence, and it became like, you know, my, my, 0:07:23.440 --> 0:07:25.520 what's what like? It was like my Vietnam. You know. 0:07:25.600 --> 0:07:29.000 It was like me just like in an intractable situation, 0:07:29.800 --> 0:07:32.120 biting off more than I could chew, trying to protect 0:07:32.160 --> 0:07:34.520 your garden, trying to protect my garden. I mean mostly okay, 0:07:34.520 --> 0:07:40.400 so it mostly started as I was really a yes, no, 0:07:40.520 --> 0:07:42.920 I mean I was so I had I had the 0:07:43.000 --> 0:07:45.640 last book I had come out, came out on March, 0:07:47.840 --> 0:07:49.640 I think, so I had all this time blocked out. 0:07:49.640 --> 0:07:50.920 I was gonna go on a big book tour, you know, 0:07:51.000 --> 0:07:52.160 it was going to be like a big deal. And 0:07:52.160 --> 0:07:55.440 then it all got crushed. And I was home doing 0:07:55.880 --> 0:08:00.960 Zoom second grade with my daughter, just hating life. And 0:08:01.000 --> 0:08:03.000 I got real mad one day and I went out 0:08:03.040 --> 0:08:05.120 and there's I live on Bambridge Island. There's not much 0:08:05.160 --> 0:08:06.960 to do there. So I drove out of my driveway 0:08:06.960 --> 0:08:08.600 in a in a huff, and I went and I bought. 0:08:09.120 --> 0:08:10.960 I went to the garden center because that was like 0:08:11.080 --> 0:08:13.360 the only place you could go to blow up some steam, 0:08:13.720 --> 0:08:16.120 and I impulse bought four little fruit trees. And then 0:08:16.160 --> 0:08:17.720 I got home and I realized the deer are gonna 0:08:17.760 --> 0:08:19.600 tear these things apart. So I decided I would just 0:08:19.640 --> 0:08:22.360 build a fence around the little fruit trees. And then 0:08:22.360 --> 0:08:23.840 I was like, well, why don't I just build a 0:08:23.880 --> 0:08:27.680 fence around everything? And that really spiraled out of control. 0:08:27.720 --> 0:08:29.800 So I built like it's something like six hundred feet 0:08:29.800 --> 0:08:33.360 of fence, and um, it took me, I mean many 0:08:33.440 --> 0:08:36.839 ups and downs, psychological as well as logistical. I think 0:08:36.840 --> 0:08:38.680 I did all right for someone had never done it. 0:08:38.679 --> 0:08:41.200 Be like what you put in a wooden post and yeah, yeah, 0:08:41.200 --> 0:08:43.360 and then deer netting through some of the woods and stuff. 0:08:43.640 --> 0:08:48.480 So I finally finished in July, and I had an 0:08:48.480 --> 0:08:51.360 opening ceremony two for all the people would help me. 0:08:51.360 --> 0:08:53.880 I invited them, I gave some some remarks, I gave 0:08:53.920 --> 0:08:55.360 a little speech. In front of the fence. We had 0:08:55.400 --> 0:08:57.800 like red, white and blue bunting on the fence. We 0:08:57.800 --> 0:09:00.800 had a cake, we had a fence cake. And since then, 0:09:00.880 --> 0:09:02.840 I'm happy to report there's only been like one or 0:09:02.880 --> 0:09:05.920 two occasions when I've seen a deer inside the fence, 0:09:05.920 --> 0:09:08.079 and I think it's because my fence butts against my 0:09:08.120 --> 0:09:11.079 neighbor's fence and they're jumping over that fence. So the 0:09:11.400 --> 0:09:15.520 next summer's project could be that's that's your Cambodia, that's 0:09:15.559 --> 0:09:23.240 that's right Vietnam. It said the right thing. Um. So 0:09:23.280 --> 0:09:25.160 that's the situation where the deer is that there. We've 0:09:25.200 --> 0:09:28.000 sort of reached an understanding. I think, um that is 0:09:28.040 --> 0:09:32.000 becoming uh, it's ZEITGEISTI in a way, because that's becoming 0:09:32.040 --> 0:09:36.000 a thing um where I grew up is they are 0:09:36.080 --> 0:09:42.280 taking orchards um, and I mean hundreds of acres of 0:09:42.480 --> 0:09:47.960 orchard and building exclosures, which was just not a thing 0:09:48.280 --> 0:09:50.520 as a kid. And I think this is going to 0:09:50.600 --> 0:09:55.160 have We're talking about major reductions in habit deer habitat 0:09:55.880 --> 0:09:59.800 in that instead of trying to protect individual saplings, these 0:09:59.800 --> 0:10:03.400 are orchards around my buddy Maths place. They're a bunch 0:10:03.400 --> 0:10:06.280 of them. Now they're doing it with state funding, like 0:10:06.440 --> 0:10:10.400 state offsets, because it's just pist and match about it's 0:10:10.400 --> 0:10:14.840 the state's deer, right. They're building these deerproof fence around 0:10:14.880 --> 0:10:19.160 like several hundred acre farms and being like there are 0:10:19.200 --> 0:10:22.800 no deer on this chunk of land anymore. Yeah, that's 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:26.400 what I did with my not several Yeah, that bumbs 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:28.600 me out that you did that. Well, I left half 0:10:28.679 --> 0:10:31.360 to write an article about that. I left half the property. 0:10:31.480 --> 0:10:34.319 The deer can go there. They just you know you 0:10:34.679 --> 0:10:36.960 you did the same thing with your garden. No, I 0:10:36.960 --> 0:10:39.679 didn't do my yard, and in my garden he didn't do. 0:10:41.360 --> 0:10:45.560 I did about it's probably like two and a half acres. Yeah. Yeah, 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:48.400 that's a sizeable fans. Yeah, and what do you think 0:10:48.800 --> 0:10:51.320 birds come in there? No, as soon as I see 0:10:51.320 --> 0:10:55.960 a bird, um. No, But you know, the coyotes still 0:10:56.000 --> 0:10:58.959 come through. They still come in because the wooden panels 0:10:58.960 --> 0:11:01.760 of the fence, the openings are fairly large. Build the fence, 0:11:01.800 --> 0:11:04.600 then we got a dog. The dog goes right through 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:07.000 the fence. That was dumb, you know, get the dog first, 0:11:07.000 --> 0:11:08.880 then build a fence. But yeah, the deer, you know, 0:11:08.920 --> 0:11:10.920 there's plenty of room for the deer on Bainbridge. I'm 0:11:10.960 --> 0:11:14.560 not worried about them. John joined us on episode two 0:11:14.600 --> 0:11:18.240 sixty six. Okay, threre times a charm. Creane calls you 0:11:18.280 --> 0:11:23.120 a brilliant writer. Thank you, I love this. Um Okay, 0:11:23.160 --> 0:11:25.320 we're gonna getting all that. Oh we just we just 0:11:25.360 --> 0:11:27.800 reminded everybody that the podcast is not weekly. Is there 0:11:27.840 --> 0:11:29.440 anything in here and I need to say about that 0:11:30.160 --> 0:11:34.360 wherever you listen to podcast, Apple, Spotify, et cetera. But 0:11:34.559 --> 0:11:37.320 do you don't have to subscribe to like another show 0:11:37.440 --> 0:11:39.840 its Feet, It serves on this feed. You don't need 0:11:39.880 --> 0:11:42.679 to do ship right, So stay if you are. If 0:11:42.679 --> 0:11:45.560 you have not subscribed to the Meat Eat podcast feed 0:11:46.400 --> 0:11:50.680 on the various platforms that you listen on, please subscribe, 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:54.880 and Trivia will just slide in on my phone. I 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:56.880 have a little thing in my notes on my phone. 0:11:56.880 --> 0:11:58.680 I have a thing called podcast, and I just write 0:11:58.679 --> 0:12:00.480 down things that I feel like I should talk about 0:12:00.520 --> 0:12:04.199 on the show. I was in the Fort Myer, Florida 0:12:04.280 --> 0:12:07.040 airport and there was two I was like by two 0:12:07.040 --> 0:12:08.640 girls that sort of like ran it, knew each other 0:12:08.679 --> 0:12:12.120 and ran into each other unexpectedly. I love when that happens. 0:12:12.559 --> 0:12:16.040 One of them said, this is a quote where you 0:12:16.200 --> 0:12:23.640 headed end quote quote to Durango to stay in a yurt. 0:12:26.440 --> 0:12:28.600 I had pointed out that like your stairs were they 0:12:28.720 --> 0:12:31.559 very hipsterish like the rs so like I feel that 0:12:31.640 --> 0:12:35.560 yours are very left wing and it's like staying in 0:12:35.640 --> 0:12:38.840 a year has become like a thing in and of itself. 0:12:39.760 --> 0:12:42.640 You would never say, I'm going to Durango to stay 0:12:42.679 --> 0:12:46.800 in a tent. Do you know what I'm saying. You'd 0:12:46.800 --> 0:12:50.160 be like, I'm going to Durango to stay in a camper. 0:12:50.880 --> 0:12:55.880 It's like a market. It's like you're defining yourself. You know, 0:12:55.880 --> 0:12:58.679 you're attaching yourself to that type of person who goes 0:12:58.800 --> 0:13:02.280 around and stays in another thing. I might not. I 0:13:02.280 --> 0:13:03.800 gotta hit a couple of these things. And does this 0:13:03.840 --> 0:13:10.400 person even though that your is a ubiquitous term. That's 0:13:10.440 --> 0:13:13.520 a lot of different structures like, um, yeah, I didn't. 0:13:13.520 --> 0:13:16.600 I didn't interview that. John would have been in their interviewing, 0:13:17.840 --> 0:13:21.480 But no, I didn't even know that. Um My, buddy, 0:13:21.559 --> 0:13:24.040 ron he's telling me about his pet crow as a kid, 0:13:24.559 --> 0:13:27.400 like Seth had a crow and Ronnie had a crow, 0:13:27.480 --> 0:13:30.240 and he when he was little, he got it out 0:13:30.240 --> 0:13:32.480 of the cemetery him his buddies each took one, climbed 0:13:32.520 --> 0:13:33.800 up and got him out of a nest, and he 0:13:33.920 --> 0:13:37.200 raised it up and the crow would like to go 0:13:37.280 --> 0:13:41.560 out with him hunting other birds. He was little, he 0:13:41.600 --> 0:13:46.360 had a pellet gun, and he'd shoot a bird okay, 0:13:46.679 --> 0:13:51.120 and the crow would Peckett's eyes out, and then the 0:13:51.160 --> 0:13:55.040 crow would eat the bird's liver. And I knew that much, 0:13:55.040 --> 0:13:57.560 but I didn't know this. One day, Ronnie and this crow, 0:13:58.960 --> 0:14:03.040 we're out and Ronnie dropped a pellet while he was 0:14:03.120 --> 0:14:09.440 loading his pellet gun. The crow ate it and died 0:14:09.520 --> 0:14:14.040 right in front of him. That's some lived by the sword, 0:14:14.080 --> 0:14:18.840 died by the sword ship right there. Last one, Cal, 0:14:18.920 --> 0:14:21.960 I had a dream in which you said, and this 0:14:22.040 --> 0:14:25.840 is the greatest line you've ever said. You said that 0:14:26.000 --> 0:14:32.800 you hold on in your dream dream state. The only 0:14:32.880 --> 0:14:35.240 good thing Calls said is something that's the best thing 0:14:35.320 --> 0:14:38.320 your version of Cal. You imagine it's you using cow. 0:14:38.360 --> 0:14:40.840 It's like a ventrilo because dummy in your sleep, he said, 0:14:41.200 --> 0:14:44.480 he said he's so tired that his nose hairs are 0:14:44.560 --> 0:14:54.160 hanging straight down. That's like, that's so tired. Your nose 0:14:54.200 --> 0:14:57.480 hair has lost their curl. You know that type of 0:14:57.760 --> 0:15:01.920 that type of tired. It's great. That should be on 0:15:02.000 --> 0:15:05.880 the shirt. Oh, tune in right now because tomorrow tune 0:15:05.880 --> 0:15:09.320 to the meat Eater YouTube channel. Go on YouTube, subscribe 0:15:09.320 --> 0:15:12.200 to meat eater and you'll see Uh, a very own 0:15:13.640 --> 0:15:19.160 Jannis to tell Us and Kevin Gillespie preparing a dish 0:15:19.160 --> 0:15:23.440 with Yanni's special big horn. Ram, Yanni can't remember what 0:15:23.440 --> 0:15:27.280 it was delicious. I have all the ingredients to make 0:15:27.360 --> 0:15:32.520 more of it. I'm trying to Masala. No, wasn't Massala. 0:15:34.680 --> 0:15:37.600 I feel like I heard like vind like something that's spicy. 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:42.280 What We're losing a lot of lists. They're not listening 0:15:42.360 --> 0:15:47.680 to this. Uh. We just had the Dustin Hoff shooter 0:15:47.800 --> 0:15:50.360 of the huff Buck, so he was on the show. 0:15:50.400 --> 0:15:54.360 If he were listening, Um, Dustin Hoff from Indiana killed 0:15:54.360 --> 0:15:57.960 a giant buck. Realize pretty quickly that it must be 0:15:58.000 --> 0:16:00.320 the biggest buck ever killed in Indiana. Turns was the 0:16:00.360 --> 0:16:06.000 biggest typical white tail ever killed in the U. S A. 0:16:06.000 --> 0:16:08.360 As a joke, kind of as a joke, he was 0:16:08.400 --> 0:16:11.200 giving away so much information about where the buck was 0:16:11.480 --> 0:16:13.920 that kind of as a joke. We were bleeping out 0:16:14.840 --> 0:16:21.880 names of surrounding landowners. Doug rode In, Doug durn Our, beloved, 0:16:21.920 --> 0:16:25.400 Dug durn bubbly Doug rode In. The bleeping of the 0:16:25.480 --> 0:16:28.040 names of the landowners near where this guy killed that 0:16:28.080 --> 0:16:30.560 big giant buck is funny and adds to the story 0:16:30.600 --> 0:16:33.080 in a great and humorous way. But it makes me 0:16:33.120 --> 0:16:38.800 think of two things. One that Buck is dead. The 0:16:38.840 --> 0:16:42.440 odds of another like him being around is unlikely. So 0:16:42.840 --> 0:16:46.440 that's chasing a ghost. This from a man that killed 0:16:46.440 --> 0:16:53.440 the standard, which remains. He was shocked when he found it, 0:16:54.680 --> 0:16:58.560 killed it, and never another one. Right, but a lot 0:16:58.600 --> 0:17:03.680 of nice knocks and ye like, maybe not, maybe they're 0:17:03.720 --> 0:17:08.240 not the freak, but nice but right his second comment, 0:17:09.080 --> 0:17:12.800 it reminds me this is Doug talking again. It reminds 0:17:12.800 --> 0:17:15.160 me of what the wise and beautiful Pat Dirkin said 0:17:15.160 --> 0:17:19.719 to me when I brought up my concerns about drawing 0:17:19.800 --> 0:17:23.560 hunters from out of the area to the Casanovia Northeast 0:17:23.680 --> 0:17:28.320 Richland County by saying where I killed the standard In 0:17:28.359 --> 0:17:32.520 an article he was writing for the national publication Quality 0:17:32.560 --> 0:17:37.040 White Tails. He goes on to say, I'm paraphrasing Pat 0:17:37.119 --> 0:17:39.480 and my experience, So this is this is him paraphrasing 0:17:39.520 --> 0:17:44.919 Pat Dirkin says, in my experience, people from outside the 0:17:44.960 --> 0:17:48.639 area don't become a problem. It's the locals that were 0:17:48.640 --> 0:17:51.600 and are the problem. And they already know all about 0:17:51.640 --> 0:17:55.280 the big deer on your place and the area Doug 0:17:55.320 --> 0:17:57.639 then goes on to say my experiences that Pat was 0:17:57.720 --> 0:18:02.080 spot on with that assessment. Dustin Huff pointed out in 0:18:02.119 --> 0:18:04.440 the podcast episode is me talking, not Pat or Doug. 0:18:05.200 --> 0:18:07.720 Dust Huff point out the podcast episode that since that 0:18:07.760 --> 0:18:10.399 he killed this big giant buck, they have found a 0:18:10.440 --> 0:18:18.159 few bucks dead with their heads cut off, decapitated um. 0:18:18.240 --> 0:18:20.119 And he was talking about that, and he was attributing 0:18:20.160 --> 0:18:23.040 it to people coming to that area now with big 0:18:23.080 --> 0:18:27.280 buck fever. Doug says, I guarantee you the bucks found 0:18:27.280 --> 0:18:29.520 dead with the heads cut off after this fella killed 0:18:29.520 --> 0:18:33.240 that big giant buck was the work of locals, not 0:18:33.440 --> 0:18:38.000 some poacher's drawn to the area. About hearing about this 0:18:38.119 --> 0:18:43.600 b G B and three. If you've got kids around, 0:18:43.640 --> 0:18:48.000 plug their ears and three this Doug talking. When I 0:18:48.080 --> 0:18:57.560 heard he killed it with a crossbow. I said, fuck yeah, 0:18:59.119 --> 0:19:01.480 uh yeah, need do this. He's also he's also really 0:19:01.480 --> 0:19:06.800 happy that a mostly casual hunter killed that deer. Yeah, 0:19:07.000 --> 0:19:09.200 I was too. I was happy about that. It was 0:19:09.280 --> 0:19:11.639 kind of like the I don't want to say it 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:16.840 was the focus of the interview. Yeah, you give everybody 0:19:16.840 --> 0:19:19.119 the story about bighorn sheep tags in New Mexico. This 0:19:19.160 --> 0:19:21.840 is interesting This is a trend that I don't think 0:19:21.920 --> 0:19:26.959 is going away. I'm not prepared for this, but I'll 0:19:27.000 --> 0:19:28.440 give it a go. What the hell were you doing 0:19:28.480 --> 0:19:30.400 when you got she sent you the stuff? You don't 0:19:30.400 --> 0:19:34.320 starty the song and do all ancillary research and yeah, 0:19:34.320 --> 0:19:37.000 I do, I do what I can. I do what 0:19:37.040 --> 0:19:40.440 I can. Yeah, I just picked you up all night 0:19:40.520 --> 0:19:45.040 like reading, like prior finding. I see how it goes. 0:19:45.080 --> 0:19:47.399 So that way, when Steve doesn't do what he just 0:19:47.440 --> 0:19:50.240 suggested I do, he can just throw it. I've seen 0:19:50.280 --> 0:19:54.600 this for the first time. Uh. It sounds like there's 0:19:54.600 --> 0:19:57.440 some folks that want to locals in New Mexico want 0:19:57.520 --> 0:20:00.040 to have more opportunities to hunt big horn sheep in 0:20:00.080 --> 0:20:03.560 their own state, and one of the options they're throwing 0:20:03.560 --> 0:20:07.000 around to figure that out is to um take away 0:20:07.080 --> 0:20:10.200 all of the big horn sheep tags that are available 0:20:10.200 --> 0:20:13.880 to non residents. There's only seven permits available for non 0:20:13.960 --> 0:20:18.080 residents in New Mexico. Um. But that's an idea of 0:20:18.119 --> 0:20:20.640 getting thrown around, and it's going to be heard by 0:20:20.760 --> 0:20:23.199 I don't know some you know New Mexican game and 0:20:23.240 --> 0:20:29.520 fish the commission and whatnot. Person wrote in well, I 0:20:29.520 --> 0:20:32.000 was gonna hit this point. Okay, go ahead. Well I 0:20:32.040 --> 0:20:34.200 was just gonna we're gonna tag team the story Steve. 0:20:34.200 --> 0:20:38.359 Steve read up as I was giving you that. So 0:20:38.440 --> 0:20:41.120 here's a perspective on it. Residents of New Mexico would 0:20:41.119 --> 0:20:42.879 be like, it doesn't make sense that I have to 0:20:42.920 --> 0:20:44.480 try to get a sheep tag my whole life and 0:20:44.520 --> 0:20:48.160 never get one, and it's stayed owned wildlife, and I'm 0:20:48.440 --> 0:20:51.600 just I'm here in state. And and then when they 0:20:51.600 --> 0:20:57.080 give a ram take out it's some hoser from wherever. Yeah, 0:20:57.160 --> 0:20:59.840 some holes are from Minnesota draws the sheep tag and 0:21:00.000 --> 0:21:03.000 and this you know, yeah, Yanni's a nonresident big horn 0:21:03.080 --> 0:21:06.080 hunter because he he used to live in Colorado, moved away, 0:21:06.480 --> 0:21:09.520 drew a tag. And now here's an example of you know, 0:21:09.640 --> 0:21:12.919 he should have liked by some people's perspective, Um, he 0:21:12.920 --> 0:21:14.919 should have when he moved away. That should have been 0:21:14.920 --> 0:21:17.239 the end of him trying to get a tag there 0:21:17.240 --> 0:21:20.040 because he doesn't live there. This guy points this out, 0:21:20.080 --> 0:21:23.880 This is a fallure rights in from Texas. Um never 0:21:23.960 --> 0:21:28.640 hunted big horns as a Texas resident, he has We'll 0:21:28.680 --> 0:21:30.680 just say he has zero chance because they give out 0:21:30.720 --> 0:21:33.840 a tag. I think Texas does one like only do 0:21:33.960 --> 0:21:36.360 one general draw tag a year in Texas. I think 0:21:36.359 --> 0:21:38.479 it's something like that one or two. Yea. It's like 0:21:38.960 --> 0:21:43.160 there's like uh tag in Texas. So it's never gonna 0:21:43.200 --> 0:21:45.359 happen for me. Yet he's a supporter of the Wild 0:21:45.400 --> 0:21:50.400 Chief Foundation because he dreams of someday hunting a ram. 0:21:51.920 --> 0:21:56.800 This trend word to catch on and continue. Um, he 0:21:56.880 --> 0:22:03.440 doesn't see in his view residents Uh, you know, aspiring 0:22:03.560 --> 0:22:07.160 sheep hunters from outside of New Mexico are gonna have 0:22:07.320 --> 0:22:11.520 zero incentive to give two ships about what's going on 0:22:11.760 --> 0:22:14.320 with sheep or sheep in New Mexico if this were 0:22:14.359 --> 0:22:17.879 to become a trend. The guy in Florida who is 0:22:17.920 --> 0:22:21.080 a big wild Sheep supporter, but the Western states all say, like, 0:22:21.119 --> 0:22:24.240 no non residents, what is that? What are the implications 0:22:24.240 --> 0:22:28.840 for that? His relationship to sheep and sheep conservation? Good question. Yeah, 0:22:29.359 --> 0:22:32.320 the sheep thing is an amazing deal. Right. You go 0:22:32.400 --> 0:22:36.959 to Wild Sheep Foundation, which raises an unbelievable amount of 0:22:37.240 --> 0:22:41.919 cash at their annual banquet sheep show, and if you 0:22:42.119 --> 0:22:47.080 really wanted to do the math, it is the tiniest majority, 0:22:47.320 --> 0:22:50.120 your tiniest minority of people in that room have killed 0:22:50.160 --> 0:22:54.399 the greatest majority of sheep, and the vast majority of 0:22:54.440 --> 0:22:58.159 people there at this point will likely never draw a 0:22:58.280 --> 0:23:02.240 sheep tag, but their cough up cash too. What was 0:23:02.280 --> 0:23:04.840 that was that sort of like club they have the 0:23:04.920 --> 0:23:09.720 less than one is the So there's multiple clubs in there, 0:23:09.760 --> 0:23:12.080 but there's the less than one club, which is if 0:23:12.160 --> 0:23:15.800 you have never drawn a sheep tag or I'm sorry, 0:23:15.800 --> 0:23:19.280 you've never successfully harvested a sheep, then you can pay 0:23:19.359 --> 0:23:24.480 some cash to uh ideally up your odds for a 0:23:24.520 --> 0:23:28.960 series of drawings that you must be present to win, 0:23:30.680 --> 0:23:33.480 which is pretty cool. I drew a sheep tag. Remember 0:23:33.560 --> 0:23:40.440 it was in the wrong continent. No, No. The outfitter 0:23:40.520 --> 0:23:44.600 was like, oh god, you're not seventy and they kind 0:23:44.600 --> 0:23:48.520 of like refused to call me back. And I got 0:23:48.520 --> 0:23:50.959 ahold of sheep wild Sheep, and I was like, hey, 0:23:51.680 --> 0:23:53.480 you guys paid a lot of money for this hunt. 0:23:53.920 --> 0:23:58.439 This isn't working out and it just kind of died 0:23:58.560 --> 0:24:01.399 from there. Yeah, and they're like, well, you know you 0:24:01.440 --> 0:24:05.040 could sell that uh hunt. I said, So this outfitter 0:24:05.080 --> 0:24:07.800 that I'm having all sorts of good luck with, you 0:24:07.840 --> 0:24:12.720 want me to sell the to somebody else. I'm like, 0:24:13.040 --> 0:24:15.000 I don't want to go on it. Why would I 0:24:15.040 --> 0:24:18.160 sell it to somebody. I think you're right, though, Steve, 0:24:18.160 --> 0:24:20.480 that states are going to continue to clamp down on 0:24:21.520 --> 0:24:24.520 the number of like once in a lifetime tags available 0:24:24.600 --> 0:24:28.080 to non residents. I'm pretty sure Wyoming's working something. I 0:24:28.160 --> 0:24:31.360 know Wyoming is working on half of its residence. When 0:24:31.359 --> 0:24:35.359 we were talking about the like recent issues around you know, 0:24:35.400 --> 0:24:39.840 the conversation around lead non lead, and I all I said, 0:24:39.920 --> 0:24:43.840 I said one day on this same digital radio program, 0:24:44.000 --> 0:24:48.720 I said that conversation ain't going away, and that got 0:24:48.760 --> 0:24:55.480 people mad to observe that a conversation ain't going away. 0:24:55.840 --> 0:24:59.680 This conversation is not going away. But one thing that's 0:24:59.680 --> 0:25:03.359 confus using to me is from the Wild Sheeps the 0:25:03.400 --> 0:25:08.159 Wild Cheep Foundation's website, even though they seemed well, I 0:25:08.200 --> 0:25:10.600 don't know what their position is, but at the at 0:25:10.600 --> 0:25:13.720 the end of their notes as bottom line, this discussion 0:25:13.760 --> 0:25:16.320 over New Mexico big horn sheep would be dramatically different 0:25:16.359 --> 0:25:18.359 if it were not for the decades of support brought 0:25:18.359 --> 0:25:22.280 by nonresident hunters that have significantly contributed to successfully growing 0:25:22.320 --> 0:25:25.800 the state's sheep population. The discussion would be why don't 0:25:25.840 --> 0:25:28.320 we have more sheep? Real conservation work is growing the 0:25:28.359 --> 0:25:32.480 pie for everyone, not fighting over the slice. The point 0:25:32.680 --> 0:25:35.440 this is a proposal to this is not so then 0:25:35.480 --> 0:25:38.680 I so that kind of seems to be in the 0:25:39.240 --> 0:25:44.560 spirit of what the listener is. For sure, you have 0:25:44.640 --> 0:25:47.600 this argument of like, well they're paying more money, you 0:25:47.600 --> 0:25:50.320 guys should like that. And then you get into this 0:25:50.359 --> 0:25:53.679 whole other world of auction tags and governors tags, and 0:25:53.680 --> 0:25:56.439 he's like, well, these people are paying the most money, right, 0:25:56.720 --> 0:25:59.240 so should we give them more to it? Sure? And 0:25:59.280 --> 0:26:01.880 then you got res in so they're like, what the hell? Yeah, 0:26:02.200 --> 0:26:04.760 And you know, it's like when it used to be 0:26:04.800 --> 0:26:11.280 able to what did prior in the nineties here in Montana, 0:26:11.400 --> 0:26:15.040 what were your special draw applications? What was the cost 0:26:16.000 --> 0:26:19.000 prior to the big bump up to two? It was 0:26:19.080 --> 0:26:22.239 something I know that not for non residents it was 0:26:22.440 --> 0:26:26.119 six hundred bucks a pop. And I think for residents 0:26:26.160 --> 0:26:28.680 it was like twenty bucks a pop or fort sub 0:26:28.760 --> 0:26:38.840 twenty not more something like that. Oh no, no no, I'm wrong, 0:26:38.880 --> 0:26:45.000 I'm wrong. I think it was seventy five bucks. I 0:26:45.040 --> 0:26:50.240 don't know anyway, when that jump, how about not a shipload? 0:26:50.400 --> 0:26:53.160 Not a shipload would be great to what most people 0:26:53.160 --> 0:26:56.679 would consider a shipload when that jump occurred here. I 0:26:56.720 --> 0:26:59.879 can't tell you how many people. We're like, well, that 0:27:00.040 --> 0:27:03.440 prices me out of the Game's weird because the ones 0:27:03.520 --> 0:27:07.119 in a lifetime tag, like in Colorado, residents kicking like 0:27:07.240 --> 0:27:10.520 two for once in a lifetime tags, and it's ten 0:27:10.640 --> 0:27:13.720 times that for a nonresident. But it's still like Montana 0:27:13.800 --> 0:27:18.440 is cheap for ye sheep. It is, but it's it's 0:27:19.880 --> 0:27:21.720 you know, we we talked about it all the time. 0:27:21.760 --> 0:27:24.919 It's like that, what are you getting for that cost 0:27:25.000 --> 0:27:29.119 at the pump? It's like, well, I do burn a 0:27:29.119 --> 0:27:30.879 lot of gas, but I go here and I do 0:27:30.960 --> 0:27:33.879 all this stuff and it makes me super happy. But 0:27:33.960 --> 0:27:37.000 a lot of people are like, I'm not driving. Here's 0:27:37.000 --> 0:27:41.280 a little tidbit some people might appreciate different states that 0:27:41.359 --> 0:27:45.280 do like nonresident tag draws. They run different programs where 0:27:45.359 --> 0:27:49.760 in some states you have to pre pay. I don't 0:27:49.800 --> 0:27:50.920 know what it is now, but it used to be 0:27:50.960 --> 0:27:55.840 in Montana you had to prepay for any tag that 0:27:55.920 --> 0:27:58.760 you applied for. So if you applied for Moose, sheep 0:27:58.840 --> 0:28:03.199 and goat as a nonresident, you had to send a 0:28:03.320 --> 0:28:07.560 cash year's check. I think it was eight hundred bucks 0:28:07.560 --> 0:28:09.000 a piece because you had to send a cashiers check 0:28:09.000 --> 0:28:11.520 I think for dollars if you're gonna do all three. 0:28:12.240 --> 0:28:15.800 Oh and then because the problem they would run into 0:28:16.240 --> 0:28:18.200 is people would apply for stuff they had no way 0:28:18.240 --> 0:28:21.840 of paying for, and then you do the draw, and 0:28:21.840 --> 0:28:24.240 then you got all these these people that then they 0:28:24.240 --> 0:28:25.920 can wait all these months for they buy the tag. 0:28:26.000 --> 0:28:28.280 They never come up with the money, so then they're like, Okay, 0:28:28.280 --> 0:28:30.800 you gotta pay up front. Some states do it where 0:28:30.840 --> 0:28:33.959 you submit a credit card number and they're like, you 0:28:34.000 --> 0:28:36.439 need to make sure that credit card is active and 0:28:36.440 --> 0:28:39.000 that your credit card company is aware that there could 0:28:39.000 --> 0:28:43.440 be a ding, because if that credit card is rejected, 0:28:43.480 --> 0:28:45.520 we go to the next name. And so they do 0:28:45.560 --> 0:28:48.200 their draw, It spits out names, they run the credit card. 0:28:48.200 --> 0:28:50.440 If that credit card has any problem, it's onto the 0:28:50.480 --> 0:28:53.120 next name. And I've heard from people over the years 0:28:53.120 --> 0:28:57.360 who like, for whatever reason, head over, didn't pay overdrawn 0:28:58.080 --> 0:29:02.040 and miss their chance because their credit card got no 0:29:02.160 --> 0:29:04.720 second chance. It's like when that thing goes, it goes. 0:29:04.760 --> 0:29:07.600 And the remember when Chris Denim used to do from 0:29:07.640 --> 0:29:10.120 Western Hunter, when he used to do tag draw stuff, 0:29:10.480 --> 0:29:14.400 he said, I keep a credit card only for this purpose. 0:29:15.760 --> 0:29:18.200 And I know that there's no problem with that credit card. 0:29:18.360 --> 0:29:21.680 There's nothing on it. Does he make like ten dollar 0:29:21.880 --> 0:29:27.080 charges like you know soda pop at the cast and 0:29:27.160 --> 0:29:30.680 on time? Uh? And I heard someone won't say that. Um, 0:29:30.760 --> 0:29:33.520 the reason States made you prepay is they're making all 0:29:33.520 --> 0:29:36.360 this money on interest, and so they like to have 0:29:36.480 --> 0:29:39.320 this two months where they're holding hundreds or millions of dollars. 0:29:40.360 --> 0:29:44.560 Someone said, man, when you and someone said the interest 0:29:46.840 --> 0:29:48.880 if you, if you think about the time, the interest 0:29:48.960 --> 0:29:52.640 wouldn't pay for the return postage to send that person's 0:29:52.720 --> 0:29:55.560 check back, not counting like the banking fees and all 0:29:55.560 --> 0:29:58.280 that for how long they're actually holding this pile of money. Yeah, 0:29:58.280 --> 0:30:01.280 that's why they all went digital now, is because they 0:30:01.280 --> 0:30:05.160 were losing money with the amount for what it costs 0:30:05.200 --> 0:30:09.680 to deal with the processing of the checks and then 0:30:09.840 --> 0:30:14.480 and then mailing back refunds, et cetera very costly. Watch 0:30:14.560 --> 0:30:22.680 this transition. You're ready, I'm ready. The guy tam Van 0:30:22.800 --> 0:30:28.360 Tron is a licensed commercial fishermen in the region of 0:30:28.640 --> 0:30:33.320 San Francisco, California. He goes out into a protected marine 0:30:33.480 --> 0:30:40.800 preserve at the Fairy Lan Islands, sets traps in the 0:30:40.840 --> 0:30:43.720 marine preserve. The Fairy Island Marine Preserve where he's not 0:30:44.080 --> 0:30:50.640 you dassn't set your traps there, says traps catches nearly 0:30:50.680 --> 0:30:58.200 three hundred dungees, Dungeoness craps, two sixty Dungeoness crabs in 0:30:58.240 --> 0:31:07.120 those traps. Dungeoness crab. Right now, it's going for a 0:31:07.200 --> 0:31:09.840 dead middle price. So we're we're assuming, like you know, 0:31:10.000 --> 0:31:15.520 it's a varied price. We're saying about it's about pound okay, 0:31:16.520 --> 0:31:19.800 the middle of the road Dungeoness crab. Wait, it's two pounds. 0:31:19.800 --> 0:31:23.440 This all your math? Grin, No, this was a podcast listener. 0:31:23.520 --> 0:31:26.120 But I think I think I bought Dungeoness crab for 0:31:26.200 --> 0:31:31.400 like before. But I spent some time in San Jose 0:31:31.760 --> 0:31:35.240 and um, you know what's funny. Oh no, we were 0:31:35.240 --> 0:31:37.040 eating shrimp last night, but I gave away a bag 0:31:37.040 --> 0:31:39.400 of Dungeoness crab last night. I realized I gave away 0:31:39.440 --> 0:31:44.440 probably the dungeons last night. But um, uh no, I 0:31:44.760 --> 0:31:46.760 know last night I gave away twenty four dollars for 0:31:46.840 --> 0:31:51.720 the Dungeoness crab. So I remember buying it when it 0:31:51.760 --> 0:31:53.760 would come in, and I remember buying it that you 0:31:53.800 --> 0:31:59.920 could buy, uh, Dungeoness crab for seven dollars. Oh huh 0:32:00.160 --> 0:32:04.479 in California. That's like live crab, probably coming right off 0:32:04.520 --> 0:32:05.880 the boat. You know, I used to buy it because 0:32:05.920 --> 0:32:09.600 I liked it. So this guy has seven thousand dollars 0:32:09.600 --> 0:32:13.000 worth of illegally caught crab more or less more rounding 0:32:13.040 --> 0:32:21.600 off figures the fine for doing such the fine million 0:32:21.640 --> 0:32:28.120 bucks fair excessive. I think that the rub is that 0:32:28.160 --> 0:32:30.600 he was in, not that he like overcapped in an 0:32:30.640 --> 0:32:33.520 area he was supposed to be in. It's like intentionally 0:32:33.560 --> 0:32:37.680 went to a marine preserve. Oh, he's claiming that he 0:32:37.720 --> 0:32:41.400 didn't know the waters were closed. Come on, according to 0:32:41.480 --> 0:32:44.120 the right. And then they and then they also said 0:32:45.200 --> 0:32:51.200 don't touch your traps, don't retrieve anything, don't move them nothing, 0:32:51.320 --> 0:32:56.160 leave them alone. And after he was told this by 0:32:56.160 --> 0:32:59.480 the authorities, the authorities did find that some traps were 0:33:00.160 --> 0:33:02.760 they were pulling traps and letting crabs going. They knew 0:33:02.760 --> 0:33:04.760 where they all were, and while they're pulling them, they 0:33:04.800 --> 0:33:08.040 realized that two dozen were missing. What are they were 0:33:08.120 --> 0:33:11.360 doing that just to kind of gay estimate how many 0:33:11.600 --> 0:33:15.800 crabs could have been caught? That wasn't really explained in 0:33:15.840 --> 0:33:17.720 the arm. They probably wanted to seize them all. I 0:33:17.720 --> 0:33:21.280 would imagine, can we get that broken. The traps, well, yeah, 0:33:21.760 --> 0:33:25.040 they were leaving them like pulling traps, throwing the crabs 0:33:25.040 --> 0:33:27.480 back and then leaving them in the water, even in 0:33:27.520 --> 0:33:31.520 the water the traps. Let's say, get by the cops 0:33:31.520 --> 0:33:34.120 for a d y right then go okay, this is 0:33:34.160 --> 0:33:37.240 the thing you're yeah, okay, now go park your vehicle 0:33:37.840 --> 0:33:41.160 and we'll take you to jail. That's what's happening here 0:33:41.320 --> 0:33:43.680 right there. Like you stay away from all this stuff 0:33:44.800 --> 0:33:47.719 because you you can no longer fish. That's the situation 0:33:47.760 --> 0:33:50.680 that you're in. And then they got to go go 0:33:50.800 --> 0:33:52.560 deal with it. I don't think there's much like a 0:33:53.040 --> 0:33:55.360 like they come out, here's all his traps. They say, 0:33:55.480 --> 0:33:57.719 you're in restricted waters. Don't mess at the traps. We're 0:33:57.720 --> 0:34:00.880 gonna pull up traps. Many crabs you caught, and then 0:34:00.880 --> 0:34:04.080 they're not putting the traps back down. The area is 0:34:04.160 --> 0:34:06.920 closed because of whale migrations, is not closed as like 0:34:06.960 --> 0:34:13.360 a crabbing protection area anyways. In California, UM, the Dungeoness 0:34:13.400 --> 0:34:19.200 crab industry UH drove thirty million dollars in revenue. One 0:34:19.239 --> 0:34:23.640 million dollar fine can break that down per crab a 0:34:23.680 --> 0:34:32.600 million dollars. The one million divided by two sixty, that's 0:34:32.760 --> 0:34:37.359 going to be more. I don't know, caviar, Hey, have 0:34:37.480 --> 0:34:39.560 anything we talked about? Strike your fancy? Can you see 0:34:39.560 --> 0:34:48.120 any big features about anything we've talked about? Six bucks? Yeah? Crap. 0:34:57.160 --> 0:35:01.839 Now I'm gonna titillate folks with something. Uh. They in 0:35:02.080 --> 0:35:04.880 big game poaching a lot of states. I think this 0:35:04.920 --> 0:35:06.640 is more and more common all the time, in big 0:35:06.680 --> 0:35:11.440 game poaching a lot of states. Uh, they do a 0:35:11.480 --> 0:35:13.600 thing where they have to value the wildlife. Are you 0:35:13.640 --> 0:35:17.280 famor with this? And then if you, like, for instance, 0:35:17.320 --> 0:35:19.719 if you killed like a dull white tail, they're gonna 0:35:19.800 --> 0:35:22.080 sign a value to that dull white tail, and it's 0:35:22.080 --> 0:35:24.960 gonna be like a modest value. If you were to 0:35:25.040 --> 0:35:28.560 kill like the huffbuck, like the biggest typical white tail 0:35:28.600 --> 0:35:31.640 ever killed right in Indiana, and you poach that, they're 0:35:31.640 --> 0:35:37.040 gonna assign a very different value to that dear and 0:35:37.080 --> 0:35:39.920 they're gonna look at like what it's market value would be, 0:35:41.040 --> 0:35:44.920 Like what would some two they have a formula, have 0:35:44.920 --> 0:35:47.440 a math formula for it. What would some two inch 0:35:47.520 --> 0:35:53.560 white tail costs someone to go shoot it? In a 0:35:53.640 --> 0:35:58.080 high fence operation? And like your dear that white tailed 0:35:58.080 --> 0:36:00.399 dough was worth a hunter box to hunter box, dear 0:36:00.440 --> 0:36:04.799 you shots worth, we're gonna say that's worth. But this 0:36:04.880 --> 0:36:09.520 is this is this is crab crab. I mean, I've 0:36:09.520 --> 0:36:11.560 got a transition, but then I also wanted to ask 0:36:11.640 --> 0:36:14.640 John something before we transition, but he's not interested in that. 0:36:14.680 --> 0:36:21.319 He just told me he doesn't if we transition to 0:36:21.480 --> 0:36:26.160 his monk Seal story. They're all kinds of numbers listed 0:36:26.360 --> 0:36:32.280 for like rewards given to people who have uh information 0:36:32.719 --> 0:36:38.280 on as you know, killed animal. You have a whole list, 0:36:38.840 --> 0:36:41.040 but I think yeah, but I think too, you're dealing 0:36:41.040 --> 0:36:43.200 with two separate things, right, because you're dealing with the 0:36:43.280 --> 0:36:48.440 value of the wildlife. But also it's penalizing, right, it's 0:36:48.440 --> 0:36:51.640 a deterrent right to say this guy went out there, 0:36:51.719 --> 0:36:55.120 he's going to spend a million dollars now for his mistake. 0:36:56.120 --> 0:36:58.480 That's a deterrent. That's not because they can claim he 0:36:58.520 --> 0:37:02.160 did a million dollars worth of damage. So and the rewards, 0:37:03.000 --> 0:37:06.440 to my knowledge, are often put up not by the 0:37:06.520 --> 0:37:11.680 government but by like humane society. These are like for killings, 0:37:11.880 --> 0:37:17.320 you know, like um not as assassinations to call them assassinations. 0:37:17.480 --> 0:37:19.799 We're not talking about hunting violations. We're talking about you know, 0:37:19.920 --> 0:37:24.000 someone you know, wrenching the head off a pelican because frustrated. 0:37:24.000 --> 0:37:26.680 Are sure over in Idaho like that. There's a group 0:37:26.760 --> 0:37:30.840 that pays bounties you know to uh two trappers and 0:37:30.840 --> 0:37:35.360 two wolf hunters, private order that kicks in money. Yeah. 0:37:35.400 --> 0:37:37.040 I think that's pretty but you gotta be a member. 0:37:37.680 --> 0:37:39.520 Just sign up ahead of time. It's like joining the 0:37:39.560 --> 0:37:43.200 Turkey Derby, I think. So. Yeah. I do like to 0:37:43.480 --> 0:37:47.040 see a fine, though, that seems like more than less 0:37:47.080 --> 0:37:49.719 because I always feel like when I hear about wildlife, 0:37:50.239 --> 0:37:54.080 uh finds given out for you know, wildlife crimes or 0:37:54.200 --> 0:37:59.520 public land sort of infractions or whatever. Really well, if 0:37:59.560 --> 0:38:01.680 that's all cause, let's all go and do it, and 0:38:01.680 --> 0:38:03.719 when we get caught, we'll just pay the fine and 0:38:03.800 --> 0:38:05.919 keep on doing it, you know. I sometimes I feel 0:38:05.960 --> 0:38:08.239 that when you're reading about a poaching thing and then 0:38:08.400 --> 0:38:13.960 you you know, it's like this elaborate, premeditated deal, and 0:38:14.080 --> 0:38:16.600 you know, and and uh, it winds up being like 0:38:16.600 --> 0:38:18.680 like even more like people are selling stuff, you know, 0:38:18.760 --> 0:38:21.480 and it winds up being not well. This was also 0:38:21.880 --> 0:38:25.480 a commercial fishing violation, which I'm sure factored into that 0:38:25.560 --> 0:38:29.120 fine too. It's not like some recreational fisherman went out 0:38:29.160 --> 0:38:32.400 and was over the limit. Be a higher standard of regulation. 0:38:32.560 --> 0:38:35.040 If people want to talk about monks, he was last summer, 0:38:35.040 --> 0:38:37.160 Well we're gonna talk about them big time. Well I'm 0:38:37.160 --> 0:38:40.080 gonna start it right now. Then last summer, you gotta woman, 0:38:40.440 --> 0:38:43.239 you gotta set the whole thing up. Man, Can I 0:38:43.280 --> 0:38:47.439 give you this little anecdote just like this is right 0:38:49.120 --> 0:38:52.960 last last summer? So then it sounds like a natural transition. 0:38:53.200 --> 0:38:56.880 Last summer, you had a woman I think from Louisiana 0:38:57.120 --> 0:39:00.600 who was on in Hawaii and was you know, there's 0:39:00.600 --> 0:39:02.799 a monk seal hauled out on the beach and she 0:39:03.400 --> 0:39:08.279 filmed herself going and touching the monk sealift fine for that. 0:39:08.600 --> 0:39:10.600 You know, the video went viral, and I think that's 0:39:10.640 --> 0:39:14.120 all de terrence. She did not she did not cause 0:39:14.200 --> 0:39:16.960 fifty dollars. She ever actually pay it that, I do 0:39:17.040 --> 0:39:19.000 not know. You never hear these things after the fact, right, 0:39:19.120 --> 0:39:21.040 But but that was the fine they level on the 0:39:21.120 --> 0:39:23.200 last did her lawyer get away down and you don't 0:39:23.200 --> 0:39:25.520 know what happened. What happened? It was levied against her. 0:39:25.520 --> 0:39:28.160 I mean, that's a Dangerous Species Act violation, right, that's 0:39:28.200 --> 0:39:32.480 harassment quote unquote is defined by the law. Yeah, so, 0:39:32.560 --> 0:39:35.520 and that's why they have they have seal exclusion zones 0:39:36.440 --> 0:39:43.360 where they have volunteers and back me up, Steve, backed 0:39:43.440 --> 0:39:46.920 me up because this is fast nating. But I want 0:39:46.920 --> 0:39:51.520 to get to this um in your new book, Serious 0:39:51.560 --> 0:39:55.000 Face is a what's that one called about the monk seals? 0:39:55.120 --> 0:39:57.040 I can't believe this is happening? Yeah, can you even 0:39:57.040 --> 0:39:59.320 believe this is happening? And you even believe this is happening? 0:39:59.320 --> 0:40:02.440 And it tells the story of the It's kind of 0:40:02.440 --> 0:40:06.799 an endangered species story. It's like a like a C. 0:40:07.080 --> 0:40:16.600 S I endangered species of um. Targeted intentional targeted killings 0:40:17.640 --> 0:40:21.000 of an endangered species. That's right. I call them assassinate. 0:40:21.080 --> 0:40:23.319 You called want to fight about that. I wanted to 0:40:23.320 --> 0:40:27.400 fight about it because when when a hunter shot pedals 0:40:27.440 --> 0:40:32.440 the bear, So there was a bear was just itching 0:40:32.480 --> 0:40:38.920 to get right back to that. There there was a 0:40:38.920 --> 0:40:44.239 bear in New Jersey that had had some deformity at bird. 0:40:44.320 --> 0:40:46.640 People debate whether it had a deformity at birth or 0:40:46.680 --> 0:40:49.960 it had been injured, but it would it's it's front 0:40:50.000 --> 0:40:52.000 feet weren't very functional. It would spend a lot of 0:40:52.000 --> 0:40:57.600 time walking around on its back feet. Some guy during 0:40:57.600 --> 0:41:01.920 the Bear season, Um, I don't know if anyone. We 0:41:01.920 --> 0:41:03.279 should try to get him on the show, but he's 0:41:03.280 --> 0:41:06.560 tryably not talking. We have been identified, but he's he 0:41:06.640 --> 0:41:08.920 talking to he's doing interviews. Know that the hunter has 0:41:08.920 --> 0:41:11.399 never been identified. There was a lot of everyone thought 0:41:11.520 --> 0:41:15.359 was one guy, and he started receiving death threats, but 0:41:15.400 --> 0:41:17.319 I think it's pretty clear it wasn't actually him. Well 0:41:17.360 --> 0:41:20.360 here's the deal, Um, he would get a sympathetic audience. 0:41:20.400 --> 0:41:23.959 I'm sure he would. I don't have anything I would want. 0:41:24.200 --> 0:41:26.120 I would I would look like the first question I 0:41:26.120 --> 0:41:30.040 would be like, did you see it coming walking on 0:41:30.120 --> 0:41:32.400 its back feet? And if so, did you wonder what 0:41:32.480 --> 0:41:35.279 it was doing? Did you know there was a bear 0:41:35.360 --> 0:41:38.239 hereabouts that walks on his back feet and has the 0:41:38.320 --> 0:41:41.640 name Pedals? Or would he say I had no idea 0:41:41.640 --> 0:41:43.200 to do what it was on It's all four ft 0:41:43.200 --> 0:41:45.080 when I saw it, I had no idea about any 0:41:45.080 --> 0:41:49.200 of this. It was just right. But when when Pedals 0:41:49.400 --> 0:41:53.440 was killed, it was billed that he had been assassinated? 0:41:54.719 --> 0:41:57.040 Was it now? Yes, dude? And I could we could 0:41:57.080 --> 0:42:00.040 find the article. I did not say that one. And 0:42:00.160 --> 0:42:03.640 when you wrote in a bit you were doing a 0:42:03.680 --> 0:42:07.040 recap of like important deaths throughout the year, and you 0:42:07.080 --> 0:42:09.640 did a thing about because you're interested in when wildlife 0:42:09.640 --> 0:42:14.520 makes people nuts. You recap the pedals story. I don't 0:42:14.560 --> 0:42:18.200 remember you using assassinated in it. But then and talking 0:42:18.200 --> 0:42:22.600 about the killing of monk seals by Hawaiians, you said, 0:42:23.120 --> 0:42:27.200 you say, I struggle to find the right word for 0:42:27.280 --> 0:42:31.720 what it is, and you say it's like an assassination. 0:42:32.080 --> 0:42:33.799 And I wanted to take I wanted to be like, oh, 0:42:33.840 --> 0:42:35.839 come on, but I'm like no, because it is a 0:42:35.920 --> 0:42:39.319 political yes, right, like assassination is like a it's a 0:42:39.320 --> 0:42:43.160 political killing. It's a statement, the golden to achieve. It's 0:42:43.200 --> 0:42:45.200 to achieve a goal. I would say. I mean, I 0:42:45.200 --> 0:42:49.040 haven't looked up and it's a statement. It's meant to 0:42:49.080 --> 0:42:53.239 be perceived in political terms. I think that guys are 0:42:53.440 --> 0:42:55.280 really good because I just looked it up on Merriam 0:42:55.320 --> 0:42:58.640 Webster and it says murdered by sudden or secret attack, 0:42:58.960 --> 0:43:02.759 often for political core reasons. So in that way, in 0:43:02.800 --> 0:43:06.719 the story you're going to tell um, I think, does 0:43:06.719 --> 0:43:12.799 it say people? It doesn't even specify who's doing well, Um, 0:43:13.719 --> 0:43:17.000 the it's it was comma the act or an instance 0:43:17.040 --> 0:43:20.720 of an ass of assassinating someone such as a prominent 0:43:20.760 --> 0:43:26.239 political leader. But that's why I'm an innovative writer. I mean, 0:43:26.280 --> 0:43:28.680 that's the beauty of what I'm doing in that piece. 0:43:28.800 --> 0:43:30.880 Is I'm applying that, you know, I'm I'm seeing it 0:43:30.960 --> 0:43:32.600 for what it is is that we have built up 0:43:32.640 --> 0:43:37.320 such a political controversy over this species the other species 0:43:37.640 --> 0:43:40.959 that we can only really understand it's killing in political terms. 0:43:41.000 --> 0:43:43.279 And this is crazy, right, It's crazy to say that 0:43:43.320 --> 0:43:46.360 I'm not That's what I'm acknowledging is it's crazy to 0:43:46.440 --> 0:43:49.640 think that a marine mammal can be assassinated. But when 0:43:49.640 --> 0:43:52.440 you see the facts, that's exactly what's been going on. 0:43:52.560 --> 0:43:54.200 In a way, I decided where I want you to start. 0:43:54.360 --> 0:43:57.600 There's a tinge of anthropomorphization there too. There's more than 0:43:57.600 --> 0:44:00.600 a tingion. I'm just going to back up for hot second. 0:44:00.680 --> 0:44:03.879 A lot of the headlines that I'm seeing just say 0:44:04.000 --> 0:44:10.719 killed from like Washington Post, et cetera. Just says killed petals. 0:44:10.840 --> 0:44:14.719 But I see it the Newsweek. God Newsweek is infamous 0:44:14.760 --> 0:44:21.160 for their like beheaded elk headline real quick in Rocky 0:44:21.160 --> 0:44:24.840 Mountain National Park was a huge bowl and it died. 0:44:25.239 --> 0:44:27.359 They think it got killed by what do you killed by? 0:44:27.480 --> 0:44:30.879 Mountain lined mountaine, and so some guy took its head 0:44:31.640 --> 0:44:35.600 in the headline was that it was They don't say 0:44:35.640 --> 0:44:41.000 like the famous decapitated, no beheaded, no famous behaded in 0:44:41.080 --> 0:44:43.000 Rocky National Park And you're like, oh, that's weird. Like 0:44:43.040 --> 0:44:48.200 someone walked out to the broad It's like, oh, no, 0:44:48.440 --> 0:44:50.799 it died and then someone like took the head home. 0:44:52.760 --> 0:44:55.800 Oh but the newswork headline says the the shameful slaughter 0:44:56.600 --> 0:44:58.759 of petals the bear crant. If you want to make 0:44:58.760 --> 0:45:03.040 a cash bet. Hmm. That word was used. It was 0:45:03.160 --> 0:45:05.279 used in the Pope, not the post. It was used 0:45:05.320 --> 0:45:10.719 in like one of those digital huff post. Just you 0:45:10.800 --> 0:45:13.799 go ahead and follow that up up on that. Um, 0:45:13.880 --> 0:45:15.280 here's what I want you to start, the Monk Seals. 0:45:15.640 --> 0:45:17.359 I want you to start the Monk Seals story one 0:45:17.400 --> 0:45:22.279 thousand five years ago. Sure, one thousand five. Look good, 0:45:22.320 --> 0:45:24.080 this guy, look at good. This guys he's like, no problem. 0:45:24.200 --> 0:45:28.680 It was a Wednesday. Um no, I mean that's when. 0:45:28.840 --> 0:45:34.160 So that's when Polynesians reach Hawaii, right and everything ecologically 0:45:34.160 --> 0:45:36.719 starts to change, and so you had monk seals, which 0:45:36.719 --> 0:45:39.359 are because we all know what monk seals are there, 0:45:39.719 --> 0:45:42.840 giant ass seals. Yeah, I wouldn't say we all know, 0:45:42.960 --> 0:45:45.040 come on a little bit. I think they're about eight 0:45:45.560 --> 0:45:48.200 hundred pounds. That's what blows my mind when we get 0:45:48.200 --> 0:45:49.920 to the part about the kid that killed one of 0:45:49.920 --> 0:45:54.640 the rock Yeah, hundred pounds. Yeah, but they're you know, 0:45:54.760 --> 0:45:58.040 they're sort of defenseless, right, they're not meant so they 0:45:58.080 --> 0:46:01.560 spend a lot of time. We'll get back to years ago, 0:46:01.600 --> 0:46:05.040 but well, years ago, they also spent a lot of time. 0:46:05.800 --> 0:46:08.840 You know, they swim around, they're eating octopus, they're eating stuff, 0:46:08.840 --> 0:46:10.440 turning over rocks, and then they come out on the 0:46:10.480 --> 0:46:14.320 beach and they lay there for hours just digesting, hauled 0:46:14.360 --> 0:46:16.759 out fully out of the water on the beach and 0:46:16.760 --> 0:46:19.320 they'll spend hours and hours like that. And their native 0:46:19.400 --> 0:46:22.640 to them, their native to the islands, and so no, 0:46:22.840 --> 0:46:25.600 they are there. Yeah, you'll get to that. Yeah. But 0:46:26.520 --> 0:46:30.760 so once the Polynesians come, it's pretty fast. It seems 0:46:30.800 --> 0:46:34.239 that the monk seals disappear, at least from the main 0:46:34.320 --> 0:46:37.480 Hawaiian islands. Right. They probably have retreated like up into 0:46:37.480 --> 0:46:40.799 the Leeward Islands. You know, they like frigate shoals, all 0:46:40.840 --> 0:46:42.279 the ones that we don't really talk about when we 0:46:42.280 --> 0:46:44.480 talk about Hawaii, the little archipelago that's off to the 0:46:44.480 --> 0:46:47.680 west toward Fiji, and that's where they stay. Right. So 0:46:47.760 --> 0:46:50.640 then you fast forward, uh to you know what, I 0:46:50.680 --> 0:46:53.400 think a thing that people do that annoys me a 0:46:53.440 --> 0:46:56.520 little bit, and you just did it. What bring it, Steve? 0:46:56.680 --> 0:47:01.440 Bring it? There is this thing. There's this thing people 0:47:01.480 --> 0:47:03.480 say or they're like, you know, there used to be 0:47:03.480 --> 0:47:06.319 a lot of elk in the Great Plains. Okay, there's 0:47:06.320 --> 0:47:10.840 this idea that that they retreated from the Great Plains 0:47:11.520 --> 0:47:14.680 and went into the mountains. What I think happened is 0:47:14.840 --> 0:47:17.400 they were in the mountains, they were on the Great Plains, 0:47:17.840 --> 0:47:20.720 and now they're gone from the Great Plants. That's absolutely true. 0:47:21.360 --> 0:47:24.520 So I don't think that these monk seals moved there. 0:47:25.080 --> 0:47:27.720 I think they were eliminated from parts of their range 0:47:28.800 --> 0:47:32.759 and remained in other parts. So you're saying the word 0:47:32.840 --> 0:47:36.759 retreat implies that there was a conscious group decision, like 0:47:36.800 --> 0:47:39.520 a movement, rather than they were like killed off here 0:47:39.800 --> 0:47:41.840 but not here. You're absolutely right. I mean, that's a 0:47:42.000 --> 0:47:43.960 monk seals story. I mean, no, I think that's we 0:47:44.040 --> 0:47:46.400 know that. And thank you for I don't want to 0:47:46.400 --> 0:47:49.720 come in hot. You know, you're very particular about language. 0:47:49.719 --> 0:47:53.279 I appreciate it, so thank you. So they remained in 0:47:53.360 --> 0:47:55.759 the Leeward Islands, which I didn't know we're a thing 0:47:55.880 --> 0:47:59.640 till I didn't. I mean I knew, I knew they 0:47:59.640 --> 0:48:01.760 were there. I didn't know that we call them Hawaii. 0:48:01.920 --> 0:48:08.120 I didn't know that. And um, and then what started 0:48:08.120 --> 0:48:10.239 happening was so basically then in nineteen seventy six, So 0:48:10.320 --> 0:48:14.000 that's three years after you know, fast forward a thousand 0:48:14.120 --> 0:48:16.680 years and change, and the three years after the Endangered 0:48:16.719 --> 0:48:20.640 Species Act has passed UM in nineteen seventy six, the 0:48:20.640 --> 0:48:23.520 federal government protects the monk seals. They are at that time, 0:48:23.560 --> 0:48:27.640 I believe, the most endangered um marine mammal in terms 0:48:27.680 --> 0:48:31.960 of their numbers. We absolutely, like I think in the 0:48:32.040 --> 0:48:34.440 like the low hundreds, like maybe two. So I don't 0:48:34.480 --> 0:48:36.239 know at that moment how many there were. And they 0:48:36.320 --> 0:48:38.960 launched this project that even at this point I think 0:48:39.080 --> 0:48:42.799 is still projected to take forty five years and close 0:48:42.840 --> 0:48:45.640 to four hundred million dollars to recover the species. According 0:48:45.680 --> 0:48:50.400 to the government's plan, and at first nothing's happening, and 0:48:50.440 --> 0:48:53.480 then slowly, like starting in the you know, nineties, mid 0:48:53.560 --> 0:48:57.279 nineties or so, the monk seals start to appear in 0:48:57.320 --> 0:48:59.840 the main Hawaiian islands, mostly in Kauai because that's the 0:49:00.040 --> 0:49:03.479 you know, the westernmost island, and people who have grown 0:49:03.560 --> 0:49:06.600 up in Hawaii, whose families have been there for generations 0:49:06.840 --> 0:49:10.360 have never seen monk seals, start to see monk seals. 0:49:10.480 --> 0:49:12.080 You know, they're out fishing or whatever. They see monk 0:49:12.120 --> 0:49:15.920 seals taking their fish, scaring away their fish, and uh 0:49:16.880 --> 0:49:20.120 eight eight hundred pound fish eater. Yes, yeah, yeah, but 0:49:20.160 --> 0:49:24.560 the tiny, charubic little face with whiskers, very beautiful little 0:49:24.600 --> 0:49:29.080 face as a button. Most biologists would describe the very 0:49:29.800 --> 0:49:34.239 cute face really kind of disgusting, lovery body, you know, 0:49:34.400 --> 0:49:38.200 just with that cute little button face attached to it. Yeah, 0:49:38.320 --> 0:49:42.200 not only had they not only had native wines not 0:49:42.320 --> 0:49:48.240 seen them, but the animals must have disappeared so quickly 0:49:48.320 --> 0:49:51.920 upon colonization that they point out that they don't have 0:49:51.960 --> 0:49:54.759 a word for them. But you could also you know, 0:49:54.800 --> 0:49:55.800 I don't know if you talk with this your but 0:49:55.920 --> 0:49:58.440 but you could also argue that there was but in 0:49:58.480 --> 0:50:01.680 the eight hundred years or whatever of non use, it 0:50:01.760 --> 0:50:04.520 hasn't needed to be carried out. Yeah, and the and 0:50:04.560 --> 0:50:06.360 the federal government. So, I mean a lot of what 0:50:06.400 --> 0:50:08.719 I'm writing about in that in that piece is that 0:50:08.880 --> 0:50:13.719 just the complete breakdown, like the bungling breakdown of communication 0:50:13.840 --> 0:50:17.319 between the government and the people. Because you, right, you 0:50:17.360 --> 0:50:20.160 have you have Native Hawaiian saying, what is this thing? 0:50:20.480 --> 0:50:22.960 You know, we don't and it's getting in our way. 0:50:23.200 --> 0:50:26.120 You're giving it all this money. Meanwhile, you're the same 0:50:26.160 --> 0:50:28.919 government that stole our land, right, and we don't get 0:50:28.960 --> 0:50:31.520 anything from you, right, So there's a lot of resentment 0:50:31.560 --> 0:50:34.000 towards this animal. And they say, and we don't even 0:50:34.040 --> 0:50:35.800 have a word for it, which it's not in any chance, 0:50:35.840 --> 0:50:38.320 it's not in there's no you know, carvings of it anything. 0:50:38.600 --> 0:50:41.080 And the government does some research and they say, well, 0:50:41.120 --> 0:50:43.800 we think it's this this word, which I think translates 0:50:43.840 --> 0:50:47.919 something like dog, right, And and that doesn't go over 0:50:47.960 --> 0:50:52.319 too well, you know, I think that's the translation. Yeah, 0:50:52.520 --> 0:50:55.360 And so so that goes on. You know, there's about 0:50:55.800 --> 0:50:59.240 a decade of that of that kind of intractable conflict. 0:50:59.239 --> 0:51:01.400 By the time show up in Hawaii, tell about the 0:51:01.440 --> 0:51:04.960 protect protect people. Yeah, so these are you know, like 0:51:05.000 --> 0:51:09.480 a lot of endangered species. They have um gathered a 0:51:09.640 --> 0:51:13.040 constituency around them, right fan club, Yeah, fan you know, 0:51:13.080 --> 0:51:17.640 people people who want to do right by this vulnerable animal, 0:51:17.800 --> 0:51:20.320 you know, for whatever reason, because they love the animal, 0:51:20.320 --> 0:51:22.040 because they see it as a symbol, you know, the 0:51:22.120 --> 0:51:24.920 way to help in the larger mess of human society, 0:51:24.960 --> 0:51:28.319 whatever you want to say. And the government has mobilized 0:51:28.320 --> 0:51:33.480 these people, um to create seal protection zones or exclusion 0:51:33.560 --> 0:51:36.720 zones so that when a seal hauls out on the beach, 0:51:37.440 --> 0:51:39.719 you you know, a call goes out and you immediately 0:51:39.719 --> 0:51:44.919 get you know, half a dozen mostly white people, uh, 0:51:45.080 --> 0:51:48.200 putting you know, yellow tape around them and steaks and 0:51:48.360 --> 0:51:52.560 protecting the seal. So you can understand that that also 0:51:52.600 --> 0:51:55.000 doesn't look so good to the people who do not 0:51:55.280 --> 0:51:58.319 like the seals, do not want the seals around is 0:51:58.440 --> 0:52:02.240 um all maybe like air is one of those around 0:52:02.360 --> 0:52:07.680 this island? Right to have kept everybody? And the title, 0:52:07.760 --> 0:52:09.759 the title of the piece, can you even believe this 0:52:09.800 --> 0:52:13.000 is happening? Is actually comes from a native Hawaiian guy 0:52:13.040 --> 0:52:14.480 who I spent you know a couple of hours with 0:52:14.520 --> 0:52:17.600 where he was basically just you know, shouting his side 0:52:17.600 --> 0:52:20.600 of the story at me increasingly, you know, frustrated by 0:52:20.600 --> 0:52:23.440 the whole situation. And I say in the piece that 0:52:23.520 --> 0:52:25.000 was kind of the look in his eyes the whole 0:52:25.000 --> 0:52:26.920 time was like can you even believe this has happened? 0:52:26.920 --> 0:52:30.000 You know, just like complete disbelief that this government would 0:52:30.040 --> 0:52:32.160 do this. So, you know, I'm simplifying a little bit. 0:52:32.200 --> 0:52:34.360 I don't mean to generalize that like all Native Hawaiians 0:52:34.360 --> 0:52:38.560 don't like whatever, but to point out that this is 0:52:38.600 --> 0:52:43.640 a very long piece of investigative reporting collected in the 0:52:43.680 --> 0:52:48.160 book serious face, and we are doing a abbreviated yes, 0:52:48.480 --> 0:52:50.400 now it's not as bad as coming on NPR and 0:52:50.440 --> 0:52:53.480 have to do it in four minutes. No, I appreciate that. 0:52:53.560 --> 0:52:56.040 Does you can't even remember saying and make it like 0:52:56.040 --> 0:52:59.640 the main thing you said, that's right. Um. So, anyway, 0:52:59.680 --> 0:53:03.600 so that the situation when I go to Kauai in 0:53:03.719 --> 0:53:10.560 two thousand twelve early two thousand and exacerbated by the 0:53:10.560 --> 0:53:14.560 fact that the previous year in in about the six 0:53:14.600 --> 0:53:22.279 months prior, there have been for assassinations of steals um 0:53:22.320 --> 0:53:27.280 a string of assassinations that started with one on Molokai, 0:53:28.400 --> 0:53:30.480 which is a you know, the least populated of the 0:53:30.800 --> 0:53:35.120 of the islands, and then also on kauai Qui favor too. 0:53:36.400 --> 0:53:37.960 There's a piece, there's a part of your story that 0:53:38.000 --> 0:53:41.719 you probably don't think is that important. But the what 0:53:41.760 --> 0:53:43.840 were the birds that were showing up with the broken wings? 0:53:44.960 --> 0:53:48.239 Newles sheerwaters. So this is another people were just like 0:53:49.080 --> 0:53:51.680 it seems like fishermen when these birds are coming down 0:53:51.760 --> 0:53:55.399 the Oh sorry, those are pelicans. Yeah, so they were, 0:53:55.440 --> 0:53:57.320 so in the piece, I kind of do a roundup 0:53:57.360 --> 0:54:01.480 of assassinations. Well I would, I'd say those are all assassinations. 0:54:01.520 --> 0:54:03.680 I'd be careful about qualifying them all. Some of those 0:54:03.719 --> 0:54:06.720 I think are just you know, people losing their ship 0:54:06.760 --> 0:54:09.560 momentarily and hurting an animal, you know, but because there 0:54:09.600 --> 0:54:13.560 isn't necessarily the political you know, discourse around those animals. 0:54:13.560 --> 0:54:15.759 But yeah, I mean kind of the the point of 0:54:15.760 --> 0:54:17.520 the piece in my mind, what was interested in me is, 0:54:17.600 --> 0:54:19.759 you know, we talk a lot about conservation. We talk 0:54:19.800 --> 0:54:23.319 a lot about bringing species back to levels approaching what 0:54:23.360 --> 0:54:27.799 they maybe once were. But we because conservation doesn't have 0:54:27.880 --> 0:54:31.600 a lot of you know, it's mostly failures. You know, 0:54:31.600 --> 0:54:33.799 when you look at the whole of the endangered Species Act. 0:54:33.800 --> 0:54:35.479 I mean, I wouldn't say failure because it's not done, 0:54:35.880 --> 0:54:38.520 but it's not like you know, it's very hard work. 0:54:38.960 --> 0:54:41.120 And so there's only a handful of cases where we 0:54:41.160 --> 0:54:44.360 really have these animals introduced back to levels where now 0:54:44.440 --> 0:54:46.719 they're starting to be in people's way again. I think 0:54:46.719 --> 0:54:51.439 it's sub two that go on the Endangered Species Act 0:54:51.480 --> 0:54:53.760 come off due to recovery. I think you're more likely 0:54:54.200 --> 0:54:58.200 to come off because they realize that they find another 0:54:58.320 --> 0:55:02.040 population they didn't know about, or you come off because 0:55:02.080 --> 0:55:05.040 you're extinct, right or another little interesting wrinkle is that 0:55:05.120 --> 0:55:08.080 is you're more likely to go extinct I believe before 0:55:08.160 --> 0:55:10.120 you even get on the list because you're you're held 0:55:10.160 --> 0:55:13.400 in this kind of like holding area called the warranted 0:55:13.400 --> 0:55:18.160 but precluded where then yeah, where the government says like, yeah, 0:55:18.520 --> 0:55:21.399 you're at you know this, this species deserves protection, but 0:55:21.480 --> 0:55:23.759 we just we just can't. Right now. We're gonna put 0:55:23.800 --> 0:55:27.320 you on this category called warranted but precluded and a 0:55:27.440 --> 0:55:29.640 species of God, we can't because we can't afford it. 0:55:29.760 --> 0:55:32.840 We can't, you know, I don't know whatever, you know, 0:55:32.920 --> 0:55:35.960 just saying like we we recognize this is worthy and 0:55:36.000 --> 0:55:37.799 we're going to get to it. But we just have 0:55:37.880 --> 0:55:40.080 to hold off on giving you the protection that it 0:55:40.120 --> 0:55:42.680 deserves right now. Um. But anyway, but yeah, So the 0:55:42.840 --> 0:55:44.440 upshot for me of this whole story they think I'll 0:55:44.480 --> 0:55:46.799 be interested in is what happens. You know, the monk 0:55:46.840 --> 0:55:49.439 seal is not a success story, but it's the fact 0:55:49.520 --> 0:55:52.200 that they're now appearing in places that they haven't appeared 0:55:52.320 --> 0:55:55.279 has been enough to raise this problem of you know, 0:55:55.360 --> 0:55:58.680 some of these animals disappeared because we didn't want them. 0:55:58.680 --> 0:56:02.840 They're right, people. People gotten mad at intentional. It was intentional, 0:56:03.280 --> 0:56:05.560 and now they're coming back, and so we've never really 0:56:05.600 --> 0:56:07.320 you know, there's a there's an environmental lawyer in the 0:56:07.360 --> 0:56:09.439 piece who says, you know, we put all this energy 0:56:09.440 --> 0:56:12.839 into saving wildlife and wildness, but we never really talked 0:56:12.880 --> 0:56:15.440 about how much wildness we want and how much we're 0:56:15.440 --> 0:56:18.000 willing to live with. And that's what was happening with 0:56:18.040 --> 0:56:22.000 the monk seals. So you had this clash right between 0:56:22.480 --> 0:56:25.200 the government and the people who wanted them to rebound, 0:56:25.680 --> 0:56:28.520 and then the people who were who's lived experience was 0:56:28.560 --> 0:56:31.359 being upset by their rebounding. I still want to hit 0:56:31.400 --> 0:56:33.680 the thing. I'll just do it myself, Okay, it's just 0:56:33.680 --> 0:56:36.680 a kind of horrific details. The birds. Yeah, there was 0:56:36.719 --> 0:56:39.239 a bird were like they would mess with fishermen. Yeah, 0:56:39.280 --> 0:56:42.680 they'd laying on the boats pelicans and it seems as 0:56:42.719 --> 0:56:46.120 though they were just reaching up and snapping their wingbones. Yeah, 0:56:47.320 --> 0:56:51.239 so you're finding dead pelicans with two broken wings, like 0:56:51.280 --> 0:56:56.839 someone just going snap. Yeah, which is like worse than 0:56:58.040 --> 0:57:01.800 just cutting its head off. Yeah, do you know what 0:57:01.840 --> 0:57:05.680 I mean, it's like so like to do that, to 0:57:05.880 --> 0:57:10.439 snap its wingbones and then be like so long, buddy. Yeah, 0:57:10.640 --> 0:57:13.320 it's just casualness of it. It's just it's like disgust. 0:57:13.960 --> 0:57:17.120 It's just it's just keep a little sharp machete on. 0:57:17.200 --> 0:57:20.760 But like, I don't know. Yeah, there's all kinds of examples, 0:57:20.880 --> 0:57:25.800 like people that are like fishing for a living treating 0:57:25.840 --> 0:57:30.240 other stuff really badly. Like I mean, in Southeast Alaska 0:57:30.320 --> 0:57:33.720 they hate those sea otters, right, sea lions too. Yeah, 0:57:34.320 --> 0:57:38.480 and now, and uh isn't in Washington like they're allowing 0:57:38.920 --> 0:57:41.680 the killing of a certain number of sea lions to 0:57:41.720 --> 0:57:46.640 protect salmon they've been doing in the Columbia for a while. Yeah. 0:57:46.760 --> 0:57:50.520 Go on, Well, so yeah, so I show up and 0:57:50.560 --> 0:57:53.200 I think I'm in the right You know cs I 0:57:53.280 --> 0:57:58.240 monk seal. Right, they've got four assassinations, they've got investigators 0:57:58.680 --> 0:58:03.120 looking at the evidence, quote unquote, and they've got rewards 0:58:03.280 --> 0:58:07.120 ten thousand dollar reward for each seal. Information about each 0:58:07.120 --> 0:58:09.240 seal killing, describe how they're killed or what they know 0:58:09.320 --> 0:58:11.480 about the killings. Well, when I arrived, all I knew 0:58:11.600 --> 0:58:15.560 was one had been shot and I believe three for 0:58:15.680 --> 0:58:19.000 what they were calling blunt head trauma. And one had 0:58:19.040 --> 0:58:22.360 a spear fishing spear starter that happened while I was there, 0:58:22.440 --> 0:58:25.840 but survived and but survived. Yeah, and um, that's a 0:58:25.880 --> 0:58:34.480 hail Mary. Yeah, you can imagine that person cut the line, yeah, 0:58:34.680 --> 0:58:38.000 rather than reeling it in. I think that's right. Um, 0:58:38.200 --> 0:58:39.919 that one was a juvenile though, so it was even 0:58:39.920 --> 0:58:41.680 more adorable, you know when they put it on the 0:58:41.720 --> 0:58:46.240 evening news. Um. But yeah, So I show up and 0:58:46.360 --> 0:58:49.439 the first thing I realized is this is not there's 0:58:49.440 --> 0:58:52.160 no police work when it comes to dead seals. You know, 0:58:52.280 --> 0:58:55.840 like they've got Noah has its investigators and they're they're 0:58:55.840 --> 0:58:58.200 trying their best. But what do you do? You know, 0:58:58.240 --> 0:58:59.720 as one of the cops says, is like, you can't 0:58:59.760 --> 0:59:03.200 talk to the seals friends, right, And you don't even know, 0:59:03.720 --> 0:59:06.120 you know, if it washes up somewhere, has it been 0:59:06.720 --> 0:59:09.160 killed in that spot? Was it killed somewhere else? Did 0:59:09.200 --> 0:59:12.160 the did the head trauma happen just from bouncing around 0:59:12.200 --> 0:59:14.480 on rocks after it's been you know, killed in some 0:59:14.520 --> 0:59:17.760 other way or died in natural causes. So immediately realized like, 0:59:17.960 --> 0:59:19.400 this is a mess. You know, this is not a 0:59:19.440 --> 0:59:22.360 police procedural for me to for me to follow, and 0:59:22.400 --> 0:59:26.880 I start reporting on the clash itself, right and yeah, 0:59:26.880 --> 0:59:30.600 but you gotta get like how hard could the police 0:59:30.600 --> 0:59:32.480 work of Ben? Because you ended up talking to the 0:59:32.480 --> 0:59:35.280 guy that did it? Well, I saw, I saw the crime. 0:59:36.320 --> 0:59:38.840 I solve the crime. So that's what's so funny. But 0:59:39.040 --> 0:59:40.760 like you're not there that long and here you are 0:59:40.800 --> 0:59:44.560 having coffee with the guy who's got a reward on 0:59:44.600 --> 0:59:46.360 his head. Yeah, did you collect the money? I did 0:59:46.440 --> 0:59:48.920 not collect the movie? And it was funny because after 0:59:49.040 --> 0:59:53.040 the peace published, I got a call from the same 0:59:53.040 --> 0:59:55.760 Noah cops, you know, the investor who is it? Yeah? 0:59:55.760 --> 0:59:57.960 There and no, I mean he knew. His whole tone 0:59:58.000 --> 1:00:01.000 of voice was listen, I got a this call. You. 1:00:01.160 --> 1:00:02.920 I know you're not gonna tell me anything, but any 1:00:03.000 --> 1:00:04.800 chance you're gonna tell me, because I'm sorry I can't 1:00:04.800 --> 1:00:07.360 tell you. But but yeah, basically I had met a 1:00:07.360 --> 1:00:09.720 guy named Walter Riddy who I've hung out with him 1:00:09.800 --> 1:00:13.640 you have. Yeah, he's a phenomenal guy, and um I 1:00:13.720 --> 1:00:16.320 met him sort of by chance when I was you know, 1:00:16.360 --> 1:00:19.240 when I first arrived in Hawaii on that trip, and 1:00:19.360 --> 1:00:23.080 he had told me that he knew the person. He 1:00:23.120 --> 1:00:26.160 called him the kid who had killed the first monk seal, 1:00:26.480 --> 1:00:28.439 the one that had set off this you know, quote 1:00:28.520 --> 1:00:31.560 unquote set off the string of killings, and that he 1:00:31.680 --> 1:00:35.240 was you know, very remorseful about it, YadA YadA, And 1:00:35.280 --> 1:00:37.440 I kind of kept after him and eventually I was 1:00:37.480 --> 1:00:40.720 invited to meet this guy and by that this Walt 1:00:40.880 --> 1:00:43.680 like I I met him, I should say, But anyway, 1:00:43.840 --> 1:00:48.160 he's a like not spiritual leader, but I mean he's 1:00:48.200 --> 1:00:50.960 a he's an active he's an organizer. I'd says. He's 1:00:50.960 --> 1:00:54.040 done a lot of activism against um, you know, military 1:00:54.800 --> 1:00:59.000 testing in in Malachai, against development, and he he was 1:00:59.080 --> 1:01:01.560 counseling to kill He's very revered in the community, so 1:01:01.600 --> 1:01:03.840 that when he found out that he was he was 1:01:03.880 --> 1:01:06.280 not one of the people who was anti monk seal. 1:01:06.520 --> 1:01:08.560 You know, he understood that the monk seals were supposed 1:01:08.560 --> 1:01:10.040 to be there, that there should be this kind of 1:01:10.080 --> 1:01:13.920 coexistence and an actual affinity between native Hawaiians and a 1:01:14.040 --> 1:01:17.760 native Hawaiian species. And so when he found out who 1:01:17.800 --> 1:01:20.520 this this kid was, he just went knocked on his 1:01:20.560 --> 1:01:21.800 door and he said, I want to talk to you 1:01:21.840 --> 1:01:23.760 about the seal. And you know, for the kid, that 1:01:23.840 --> 1:01:25.800 was a big deal for Uncle Uncle Walter to show 1:01:25.840 --> 1:01:28.439 up at his house. And you know, I had spent 1:01:28.440 --> 1:01:31.920 a week just talking to both sides of this debate, 1:01:32.200 --> 1:01:35.440 and everyone on both sides, you know, you just get 1:01:35.480 --> 1:01:37.200 the impression that anyone who kills the seal is going 1:01:37.280 --> 1:01:39.920 to be this kind of burly, angry native Hawaiian fisherman 1:01:39.960 --> 1:01:43.120 who you know, lost his ship at a seal and finally, 1:01:43.200 --> 1:01:46.440 you know, snapped and killed it. And um and that 1:01:46.520 --> 1:01:49.680 was Uncle Walter's assumption too. And when I met the kid, 1:01:49.720 --> 1:01:52.240 what I found out was that essentially it was was 1:01:52.280 --> 1:01:55.320 an accident. Um. I mean that's a generous way of 1:01:55.320 --> 1:01:57.720 putting and not a fisherman, not a fisherman at all. 1:01:57.720 --> 1:01:59.120 That was the only time he had been fishing that 1:01:59.160 --> 1:02:01.720 hole that whole season. But he was with some friends 1:02:01.720 --> 1:02:03.880 and it was a pure pressure situation because they were 1:02:03.920 --> 1:02:06.480 looking for a spot to fish. Every every place they 1:02:06.520 --> 1:02:08.320 went there was a monk seal there, and they've been 1:02:08.360 --> 1:02:10.240 hiking and hiking and hiking. Finally they got to this 1:02:10.280 --> 1:02:13.160 one spot and there was a big male seal there 1:02:13.800 --> 1:02:16.200 and he was kind of goaded by his friends to 1:02:16.400 --> 1:02:18.360 you know, he thought he'd scare it away by throwing 1:02:18.360 --> 1:02:21.480 a rock at it and a court His story, which was, 1:02:21.840 --> 1:02:24.400 you know, I ran past the Noah investigators they said 1:02:24.400 --> 1:02:27.080 it sounded incredible based on injuries, was that he hit 1:02:27.160 --> 1:02:30.240 this thing square in the head with a rock. It 1:02:30.320 --> 1:02:34.800 went unconscious and was dead. So that was he was 1:02:34.840 --> 1:02:37.480 broken up about it. This kid was broken up about it, 1:02:37.840 --> 1:02:40.480 and he was more broken up about it when the 1:02:40.520 --> 1:02:42.880 next seal was killed and the seal after that and 1:02:42.880 --> 1:02:45.160 the seal after that, because he felt, oh, I started 1:02:45.160 --> 1:02:47.960 this whole chain reaction. You know, I uncorked all this 1:02:48.080 --> 1:02:51.560 frustration that's been going on, and I sort of showed 1:02:51.560 --> 1:02:53.240 it a way to deal with it right away, to 1:02:53.240 --> 1:02:55.400 take it out on the seals um And it was 1:02:55.480 --> 1:02:57.000 not I mean, that was one of those moments. I mean, 1:02:57.000 --> 1:02:58.280 there's a lot of moments like this in the book, 1:02:58.320 --> 1:03:00.440 but that was one of those moments where I just 1:03:00.440 --> 1:03:02.560 could not believe. I mean not to me is like 1:03:02.560 --> 1:03:04.640 the privilege of doing this work is if you can 1:03:04.680 --> 1:03:07.680 spend enough time and attention on these stories and you 1:03:07.760 --> 1:03:10.640 just keep kind of scratching layer after layer of understanding 1:03:10.640 --> 1:03:12.640 away from it until you actually get to what happened, 1:03:12.960 --> 1:03:15.880 you find the most surprising things. And that's the This 1:03:15.960 --> 1:03:18.320 was the epitome of that for me, is that I 1:03:18.360 --> 1:03:23.200 could not have invented this situation. One of the one 1:03:23.200 --> 1:03:24.960 of the early things that happened to me as I 1:03:25.000 --> 1:03:27.200 was like training to be a writer that made me 1:03:27.240 --> 1:03:32.200 appreciate the work of good journalism was after the murder 1:03:32.280 --> 1:03:39.160 of Matthew Shepard and Laramie Wyoming that it was immediately 1:03:39.400 --> 1:03:45.120 it was that some cowboys found a gay kid and 1:03:45.200 --> 1:03:50.480 out of just pure unbridled hatred, dragged him out of 1:03:50.520 --> 1:03:54.640 a bar and killed him. And that story ran and 1:03:54.760 --> 1:03:59.640 ran and ran, and then a journalist from Harper's went 1:03:59.800 --> 1:04:03.400 in just hung out in the town and met everyone involved, 1:04:03.440 --> 1:04:05.240 and when she wrote her piece about it, it it was like, 1:04:05.440 --> 1:04:11.480 that is not at all what happened at all. No 1:04:11.520 --> 1:04:15.600 one had gotten it right, like the relationship between all 1:04:15.600 --> 1:04:19.840 the individuals involved, the lack of cowboy noess that it 1:04:20.040 --> 1:04:26.080 not being motivated by that, it being like financial entanglements. Yeah, 1:04:26.120 --> 1:04:27.720 I mean, I don't know, like they got for people 1:04:27.760 --> 1:04:30.480 that will going to spend three weeks somewhere and be like, 1:04:30.480 --> 1:04:32.680 so what happened now that night? I mean, I don't 1:04:32.680 --> 1:04:35.680 know that story in particular, but that's the phenomenon that 1:04:35.720 --> 1:04:38.040 I've encountered again and again. It's weird because I think 1:04:38.040 --> 1:04:40.880 that we It's interesting cause I was having this conversation 1:04:40.880 --> 1:04:42.320 with someone the other day, and I think it's like 1:04:42.360 --> 1:04:46.200 we're wired to kind of just snap everything into like 1:04:46.240 --> 1:04:48.880 a tidy story so that we can make sense of it. 1:04:49.160 --> 1:04:51.360 You know. Otherwise we'd just be walking around this like 1:04:51.440 --> 1:04:54.640 incoherent cloud of facts all the time, having to use 1:04:54.640 --> 1:04:57.360 our brains all the time. Yeah. Yeah, you need things 1:04:57.400 --> 1:04:59.320 that you can just take for granted, right, And I 1:04:59.320 --> 1:05:01.160 think that's how we kind of walked through the world, 1:05:01.160 --> 1:05:04.600 just metabolizing everything that's happening, you know. The writer Joan Didion, 1:05:04.680 --> 1:05:07.080 of course, Yeah, in her in her book, I think 1:05:07.080 --> 1:05:10.840 it's in Slouching towards beth Lehem she talks about and 1:05:10.840 --> 1:05:13.720 this is pre Internet. When she wrote this, she's like 1:05:13.720 --> 1:05:19.240 there's so much information, right that, Like you get people 1:05:19.280 --> 1:05:22.400 where there's so much information they can't deal with it all, 1:05:23.320 --> 1:05:27.360 and they're thirsty for just something very simple, and all 1:05:27.400 --> 1:05:29.200 the better if they're the only one that knows it. 1:05:31.160 --> 1:05:33.480 I was gonna say, it's nice, right when you can 1:05:33.520 --> 1:05:37.560 repackage it and and and tell it farther, right, Yeah, 1:05:37.600 --> 1:05:39.200 I mean I think that's like that. Yeah, that's I 1:05:39.200 --> 1:05:41.560 think what the realization I was having talking to this 1:05:41.600 --> 1:05:43.400 other person was, like I guess that's sort of what 1:05:43.600 --> 1:05:45.520 I see myself as doing now. Is like it's like 1:05:45.640 --> 1:05:50.360 Jiu jitsung the storytelling instinct, you know, to unravel the 1:05:50.440 --> 1:05:53.920 stories you know that we that we lock onto and 1:05:53.960 --> 1:05:56.640 then kind of see all of the parts laid out 1:05:56.760 --> 1:06:02.200 and put them back together into something a little more real, right, Um, 1:06:02.240 --> 1:06:04.760 And it's it's when they click back into place, like 1:06:04.800 --> 1:06:08.120 with this kid on Malakai that that I just I 1:06:08.160 --> 1:06:11.240 mean it like it almost feels like a spiritual experience, 1:06:11.280 --> 1:06:13.080 like to see like, oh my god, like the world 1:06:13.200 --> 1:06:16.040 is very very complicated and it's so much more than 1:06:16.120 --> 1:06:18.360 we understand, And what else do I walk around not 1:06:18.600 --> 1:06:21.880 appreciating the complexity of That's the thing I appreciate and 1:06:21.920 --> 1:06:25.200 all the stuff you've written and then again in this story, 1:06:25.480 --> 1:06:30.760 is that, um Like, I know your wildlife advocate, a 1:06:30.760 --> 1:06:37.000 conservation advocate, right like you. You like to see intact, 1:06:37.080 --> 1:06:39.680 healthy habitat and like a clean planet and that means 1:06:39.720 --> 1:06:42.480 a lot to you. Um, But you're able to go 1:06:42.520 --> 1:06:44.560 into a thing like this and not be like, I'm 1:06:44.560 --> 1:06:48.240 gonna root these assholes out and it's horrible, but you 1:06:48.320 --> 1:06:51.080 give like a very fair and I'm not I'm not 1:06:51.120 --> 1:06:53.680 native Hawaiian, I don't know, but you give what seems 1:06:53.680 --> 1:06:56.760 to me like a very fair recounting of how we 1:06:56.840 --> 1:07:00.840 got here. Yeah, it isn't like isn't like the whole 1:07:00.840 --> 1:07:04.120 point is to like make people bleed. Yeah, And it's 1:07:04.120 --> 1:07:07.760 also not to make people have some kind of simplistic 1:07:08.200 --> 1:07:10.960 sense of hope. You know. I think both those things 1:07:11.040 --> 1:07:16.160 are pretty boring, right, And and I think that's why 1:07:16.200 --> 1:07:20.080 I never really read a lot of you know, quote 1:07:20.160 --> 1:07:25.240 unquote in nature writing about conservation before I started doing 1:07:25.320 --> 1:07:28.120 it myself. Is it? It seemed like it was very 1:07:28.120 --> 1:07:30.320 easy to just you get the sense of what's happening 1:07:30.320 --> 1:07:32.680 in these stories pretty quick. In a lot of tellings 1:07:32.720 --> 1:07:35.400 of them that were you know, thank God for the 1:07:35.400 --> 1:07:39.720 people who are protecting the seal or you know, against 1:07:39.720 --> 1:07:43.320 the nasty you know whoever it is, hunters, landowners, whatever, 1:07:43.400 --> 1:07:45.840 you know. Um, I just feel like that's really a 1:07:45.840 --> 1:07:50.400 case where you see stories snapping into those those outlines 1:07:50.440 --> 1:07:52.840 pretty quick. You know, where you wouldn't do well as 1:07:52.840 --> 1:07:58.800 a writer where writing animated children's movies. No, because you're 1:07:59.600 --> 1:08:02.840 the bad guy. Let me guess it's the evil logging 1:08:03.000 --> 1:08:06.880 or mining consortium. Yeah, yeah, I would not. I don't 1:08:06.920 --> 1:08:10.120 think with a sadistic tinge. Yeah. I also I just 1:08:10.160 --> 1:08:12.480 don't really do morals either. I think I think the 1:08:12.520 --> 1:08:15.640 morals of the story always escaped me. You know, John, 1:08:15.720 --> 1:08:18.920 what what happened after? Like how long ago did you 1:08:19.040 --> 1:08:20.960 did you do this? Well? So that was about ten 1:08:21.040 --> 1:08:24.160 years ago that I was there, and and the story 1:08:24.240 --> 1:08:26.960 since then it's kind of just been more of the same. Honestly. 1:08:27.040 --> 1:08:31.680 The the monk seal numbers are up, um modestly, but 1:08:31.720 --> 1:08:34.559 I think they still getting assassinated. There were four killings 1:08:35.160 --> 1:08:39.240 last year, I believe, and there were two this year 1:08:40.240 --> 1:08:44.200 on Molokai. And there was a study, yeah, and there 1:08:44.280 --> 1:08:49.439 was a study recently that as I read it this morning, 1:08:49.520 --> 1:08:51.479 after you phoned me to tell me i'd better have 1:08:51.560 --> 1:08:55.920 some contemporary monk seal facts, Steve. As I read this study, 1:08:55.960 --> 1:09:01.440 it was showing that what I would call assassination, um, 1:09:01.479 --> 1:09:06.200 intentional killings are the leading cause of monk sealed deaths 1:09:08.360 --> 1:09:11.960 by well, you know, anthropogenic monks that more than more 1:09:12.000 --> 1:09:17.120 than tanglings, more than exactly um that there are now 1:09:17.160 --> 1:09:20.679 more more seals have died because they've been intentionally killed 1:09:21.160 --> 1:09:33.840 rather than other human calls. Uh, tell quick about that 1:09:33.920 --> 1:09:35.720 island I had never heard of. And the brothers that 1:09:35.800 --> 1:09:41.920 own the island, Knee How. I that was an interesting 1:09:42.439 --> 1:09:45.840 It sounds a good fishing spot. Yeah. Yeah, you can 1:09:46.280 --> 1:09:48.080 put up with an old man yelling at you from 1:09:48.080 --> 1:09:52.320 the shore all the monk seals. Yeah, so Knee How, 1:09:52.600 --> 1:09:56.720 which I had never heard of. Um, is a it's 1:09:56.720 --> 1:09:59.760 an island. Um. I mean it's big, it's you know, 1:10:00.240 --> 1:10:03.920 they think it's about seventies square miles and it's right 1:10:04.200 --> 1:10:11.000 across from Kauai and uh. In eighteen sixty four, King 1:10:11.040 --> 1:10:13.839 Kamaya May has sold the island to a ranching family, 1:10:13.840 --> 1:10:18.720 a white ranching family. I don't know. Yeah, it was 1:10:18.760 --> 1:10:21.960 cheap I'm sure and uh, and that descendence of that 1:10:22.000 --> 1:10:24.360 family still own it's it's now under the control of 1:10:24.360 --> 1:10:29.400 two brothers, Keith and Bruce Robinson. They're both getting up 1:10:29.400 --> 1:10:32.160 there in years and it's known as the Forbidden Island 1:10:32.240 --> 1:10:35.200 because the Robinson's do not like to have people on there. 1:10:35.240 --> 1:10:37.320 You can, they will. They've taken a limited number of 1:10:37.320 --> 1:10:42.200 tourists there. I guess you can hunt there hot tip um, 1:10:42.240 --> 1:10:44.160 but you know, it's very expensive to get there, and 1:10:44.200 --> 1:10:46.880 they control the helicopter company that takes you in and out, 1:10:47.439 --> 1:10:50.320 and it's very very difficult to access, very very difficult 1:10:50.320 --> 1:10:52.000 to know what's going on there. There are some Native 1:10:52.080 --> 1:10:55.519 knee howandsh or Nee How people who live on the 1:10:55.520 --> 1:10:57.760 island and have lived there for generations. There's been like 1:10:57.880 --> 1:11:01.400 and they've been entangled with that family for years. I mean, 1:11:01.520 --> 1:11:03.479 as Keith Robinson put it to me, they are a 1:11:03.479 --> 1:11:09.040 feudal landlord. Those people are their tenants. Feudal landlord. Yes. Um, 1:11:09.080 --> 1:11:12.080 it's a very bizarre situation to exist in the Centurion. 1:11:13.120 --> 1:11:17.080 You point out that they use it for training down 1:11:17.200 --> 1:11:20.960 the pilots and evasion. Uh, they have in the past. Yeah, 1:11:21.080 --> 1:11:23.040 So there and in the Native Nie How when they 1:11:23.160 --> 1:11:26.880 run them down down in the training and they said 1:11:26.880 --> 1:11:30.720 that they they get them pretty easy. Yeah that's there. 1:11:30.840 --> 1:11:34.680 That's their only extra mural sport. Um. So yeah, so 1:11:34.680 --> 1:11:36.120 they you know, the robin doesn't have just had to 1:11:36.160 --> 1:11:38.040 find ways like that to make money. They do a 1:11:38.120 --> 1:11:40.559 lot of military you know, they have a radar station there, 1:11:40.560 --> 1:11:42.920 I believe, on on the mountain side. And I was 1:11:42.960 --> 1:11:45.920 able for some reason, uh you know, which wasn't clear, 1:11:46.040 --> 1:11:47.760 which only became clear to me later, I was able 1:11:47.760 --> 1:11:50.679 to talk my way on to knee How flew over 1:11:50.720 --> 1:11:54.479 with Keith Robinson because knee How happens to be one 1:11:54.520 --> 1:11:56.840 of the best places for monks seals right now. The 1:11:56.920 --> 1:11:59.120 Robinson's out of a kind of like very right wing 1:11:59.160 --> 1:12:02.160 anti government, um, you know, wanting to stick it to 1:12:02.160 --> 1:12:05.720 the government instead of killing the seals, they've saved the seals, 1:12:05.760 --> 1:12:09.880 so they're they're conservation proms. It's great. The rub being 1:12:10.360 --> 1:12:12.160 they won't let the government come look at them. No, 1:12:12.360 --> 1:12:14.840 not at all, not at all. And it's like, oh, 1:12:15.000 --> 1:12:19.920 you're interested in these seals? Are you plethora of endangered 1:12:20.040 --> 1:12:24.200 seals that we have here? You can't, you can't and 1:12:24.479 --> 1:12:26.719 you don't want you counting them. And the reason, according 1:12:26.760 --> 1:12:29.040 to Keith, is because they don't have to put up 1:12:29.040 --> 1:12:31.960 with any you know, fussy community meetings and hearings and 1:12:32.200 --> 1:12:34.360 and stuff like that. They just tell the people living there, 1:12:34.439 --> 1:12:37.200 who are their tenants again, their feudal tenants and employees, 1:12:37.360 --> 1:12:40.320 we're going to protect the seals, so and then and 1:12:40.400 --> 1:12:43.000 then then they do it. Um and so, Yeah, the 1:12:43.040 --> 1:12:45.200 government has been you know really, I mean, I think 1:12:45.240 --> 1:12:47.559 they may have made a little more progress. But at 1:12:47.600 --> 1:12:49.280 the time I was there, they were they were definitely 1:12:49.560 --> 1:12:51.640 just like really, I mean, they were like fascinated, what 1:12:51.840 --> 1:12:53.360 what did you see there? You know, like I was. 1:12:54.560 --> 1:12:57.040 But but when I got there, it also became apparent 1:12:57.160 --> 1:13:00.919 that um, the Robinsons that were really upset that fisherman 1:13:00.960 --> 1:13:03.439 from Kauai. We're coming too close to knee how and 1:13:03.560 --> 1:13:07.160 they I think as I interpreted it, and I'm you know, 1:13:07.320 --> 1:13:09.640 Keith Robinson was not very happy with me after this 1:13:10.040 --> 1:13:11.720 this story because he didn't I don't think he liked 1:13:11.760 --> 1:13:13.439 this interpretation. But he was trying to broke her some 1:13:13.560 --> 1:13:16.080 deal with the with Noah to set up a marine 1:13:16.120 --> 1:13:18.320 preserve around his island so that the fisherman could not 1:13:18.439 --> 1:13:22.800 come anymore and his quiver. Yeah, he was using the seal. 1:13:22.920 --> 1:13:24.519 So he when he took me there, he really wanted 1:13:24.560 --> 1:13:26.799 to show me how there weren't actually that many seals 1:13:27.120 --> 1:13:28.880 and they were suffering and it was all because of 1:13:28.960 --> 1:13:32.040 these intruding fishermen from kwaiet and to to you know, 1:13:32.120 --> 1:13:34.639 create this atmosphere where it's like now and even knee 1:13:34.680 --> 1:13:37.160 house seals are are in trouble. Yeah, that's what he 1:13:37.680 --> 1:13:42.479 John's explained. Like in this navigation of this the owner 1:13:42.720 --> 1:13:44.839 is like where they all go, this is a disaster, 1:13:45.120 --> 1:13:48.920 but his drivers like seems like it's about and then 1:13:48.960 --> 1:13:52.080 he just he just stormed off, stormed off. You know. 1:13:52.240 --> 1:13:55.160 It was like so yeah, it was a wild day. 1:13:55.280 --> 1:13:56.640 It was a wild day. I mean, Keith is a 1:13:56.760 --> 1:13:59.360 very interesting character. And you know when I met him, 1:13:59.439 --> 1:14:02.200 he was wearing in a uh, you know, work clothes 1:14:02.240 --> 1:14:04.200 and a green hard hat and he handed me a 1:14:04.280 --> 1:14:08.240 self published book about the apocalypse, which had a painting 1:14:08.360 --> 1:14:10.880 of mushroom clouds and fires and then a little figure 1:14:10.920 --> 1:14:13.040 in the corner wearing the same work clothes in a 1:14:13.120 --> 1:14:16.160 green heart hat. And so that was like some reading 1:14:16.200 --> 1:14:19.200 material for the helicopter flight over See, I don't want 1:14:19.320 --> 1:14:21.920 this to be taking because I I would like nothing 1:14:21.960 --> 1:14:24.760 more than the foster friendship with this individual. Yeah, so 1:14:24.880 --> 1:14:26.519 I don't want if he's listening, I don't want to 1:14:26.600 --> 1:14:29.519 take listen. I want to be friends. Okay, I want 1:14:29.560 --> 1:14:33.200 to hang out on the island. I want to hunt. 1:14:33.560 --> 1:14:36.920 I'll interview about the book. Anything mean John saying I 1:14:37.120 --> 1:14:40.200 wanna be really tight? Yeah? And I was very tight? 1:14:40.600 --> 1:14:42.240 Would I would say? I mean, he's in a very 1:14:42.320 --> 1:14:45.599 untenable position, you know, So I don't think there's any 1:14:45.760 --> 1:14:47.880 right way to be Keith Robinson right now? You know 1:14:48.080 --> 1:14:51.240 it's John. When you sat down in the helicopter and 1:14:51.320 --> 1:14:53.720 he thumbed open the first page of the book, did 1:14:53.760 --> 1:14:56.400 it say something along the lines of, so you're in 1:14:56.479 --> 1:15:02.479 my helicopter, things you know about me? Yeah? No, I 1:15:02.520 --> 1:15:04.720 do remember that he was like nagging the pilot to 1:15:04.840 --> 1:15:08.519 fly in a perfectly straight line to save money on gas. Um. 1:15:08.600 --> 1:15:11.160 You know, he's very cash poor. He owns this island, 1:15:11.200 --> 1:15:13.600 but he's he's really having some cash fallow problems. That 1:15:13.640 --> 1:15:16.640 seemed so, but in all fairness, is like, do you 1:15:16.720 --> 1:15:20.960 feel that he's legitimately interested in the ecology of the island. Oh? Absolutely, 1:15:21.080 --> 1:15:24.000 He's like one of the most successful conservationists in America 1:15:24.120 --> 1:15:26.960 right now. I mean he's done, he's you know, bred 1:15:27.000 --> 1:15:30.320 a lot of endangered native plants. Oh and he I 1:15:30.439 --> 1:15:32.800 forgot he had that tree. Yeah, he had a He 1:15:32.920 --> 1:15:36.160 had a one was it the last one of the 1:15:36.320 --> 1:15:40.320 of the native a particular native Hawaiian hardwood tree. This 1:15:40.520 --> 1:15:42.320 was in the nineties, that he kept from a seed, 1:15:42.800 --> 1:15:44.439 that he kept from a seed. And and as I 1:15:44.560 --> 1:15:47.080 understand this was this was something I could not definitively 1:15:47.120 --> 1:15:49.360 get to the bottom of. But as I understand it, 1:15:50.000 --> 1:15:51.800 and this this is a little bit speculative, but it 1:15:51.960 --> 1:15:55.479 seems like he had misread a Fish and Wildlife Service 1:15:55.600 --> 1:15:59.840 document about about his tree that made it seem to 1:16:00.080 --> 1:16:02.720 him that they were going to come and claim his 1:16:02.840 --> 1:16:08.879 tree by imminent domain. And he just implied very strongly 1:16:08.960 --> 1:16:12.240 to me that he then killed the tree rather than 1:16:12.360 --> 1:16:14.919 let the government take it because it was against his principles, 1:16:14.960 --> 1:16:16.880 and that he told them that if they were going 1:16:16.920 --> 1:16:18.920 to come take his tree, there'd be like another Ruby 1:16:19.000 --> 1:16:22.479 Ridge on Nihow. Because the headline to the thing or 1:16:22.520 --> 1:16:25.560 somewhere in it said something about like the containment and 1:16:26.000 --> 1:16:29.360 I believe it was like support and protect. And then 1:16:29.400 --> 1:16:31.160 in the bottom it was like, we really need to 1:16:31.200 --> 1:16:35.080 work with this guy, yeah, to keep his tree happy. Yeah. 1:16:35.160 --> 1:16:37.519 And he would not be very specific about the story, 1:16:37.560 --> 1:16:39.559 although he wanted to tell me that story many times. 1:16:39.640 --> 1:16:42.320 He told you three days later the tree was dead. Yeah, yeah, 1:16:42.840 --> 1:16:46.160 so that was his That's why I said, strongly implied, 1:16:47.160 --> 1:16:50.559 strongly implied that he killed that tree rather than let 1:16:50.600 --> 1:16:52.120 the government take it. I'd love to get this guy 1:16:52.160 --> 1:16:56.160 on the show. Don't tell him, you know me that 1:16:56.280 --> 1:16:58.680 helicopter pilot better find out a straight asked way to 1:16:58.760 --> 1:17:01.519 fly over here. It out as you say, tell them, 1:17:01.560 --> 1:17:07.120 we'll find a very efficient means of travel. Okay, you're 1:17:07.120 --> 1:17:09.760 ready to move on to the macaques. Hold on, you 1:17:10.160 --> 1:17:15.040 gotta cover just because it is the cutest thing. Monks 1:17:15.120 --> 1:17:19.320 seals with eels coming out of their noses. It's so sad, 1:17:24.920 --> 1:17:27.360 like big slimy boger. You didn't see this happen. This 1:17:27.560 --> 1:17:31.160 is a frequent thing. And that's what job of the 1:17:31.200 --> 1:17:39.680 hut was created off of man eating the seals and 1:17:39.760 --> 1:17:43.320 then like a spaghetti noodle when your kid tells one 1:17:43.320 --> 1:17:45.960 of those funny jokes, the seals eat the seals eating 1:17:46.000 --> 1:17:51.200 the eel. Yeah, and then like a lugie. You know 1:17:51.439 --> 1:17:55.920 they hack up the seal or the eel through their 1:17:55.960 --> 1:18:00.960 little seals. Yeah, it is. That's that's your first kid's book, John, 1:18:02.120 --> 1:18:05.040 Which ones are the bad guys exactly? And then at 1:18:05.080 --> 1:18:07.960 the end you can be like you tell me they 1:18:08.800 --> 1:18:21.080 Pixar is not gonna pick that one up anyways. Is 1:18:21.120 --> 1:18:24.240 it a live when it comes out? No, he's got 1:18:24.320 --> 1:18:27.040 a dead heel hanging out his nose. Yeah. People, these 1:18:27.240 --> 1:18:30.360 these folks that protect the seals get very concerned over 1:18:30.439 --> 1:18:35.280 the well being of the seal and uh, I think 1:18:35.400 --> 1:18:40.719 maybe one of one has died from some blockage and stuff. 1:18:40.800 --> 1:18:43.960 I think, Yeah, it's been a few years since I 1:18:44.640 --> 1:18:47.600 research that one. Yeah, there's a lot of there's a 1:18:47.640 --> 1:18:49.640 lot of I mean it's not just killing, you know, 1:18:49.760 --> 1:18:53.160 like we're talking before, they've they've got a toxic plasmosis 1:18:53.360 --> 1:18:56.400 threat from feral cat species that they think are affecting 1:18:56.439 --> 1:18:59.519 the seals. Now we've covered that very heavily on the 1:18:59.560 --> 1:19:03.760 show Eels. Yeah, how does that because all he's got 1:19:03.880 --> 1:19:05.640 to do is get out there and that when he's 1:19:05.680 --> 1:19:09.000 because cats like ship in the sand and are out 1:19:09.040 --> 1:19:11.880 in the sand. But I think it's a great point 1:19:11.960 --> 1:19:16.160 to bring up right, it's like we always protect animals 1:19:16.200 --> 1:19:19.519 on our terms. Then they're living this entire other life, 1:19:19.960 --> 1:19:23.120 in this case in the ocean, which is a giant 1:19:23.240 --> 1:19:26.560 place that is full of dangers that they have to 1:19:26.560 --> 1:19:29.439 conquer on their own, and it's you know, then they 1:19:29.479 --> 1:19:31.479 show up and they got a eel dangling out of 1:19:31.520 --> 1:19:33.439 their nose and people are like, well, that's not part 1:19:33.520 --> 1:19:35.560 of the plan. He's like, listen, but you know what 1:19:35.640 --> 1:19:42.439 my main problem is this eel hang out. If you 1:19:42.520 --> 1:19:44.880 want to help me, let me tell you yanked a 1:19:44.960 --> 1:19:48.599 some bitch out of my nose kills me. You ready 1:19:48.600 --> 1:19:51.799 for mccaques? Which what was I calling this morning? Macause? 1:19:51.840 --> 1:19:53.760 And I had you all confused? Yeah, I thought you 1:19:53.840 --> 1:19:57.840 were talking about that little monkeys called him maccaque. Now 1:19:58.439 --> 1:20:03.800 I thought it was a macaw. And it's also apparently 1:20:04.200 --> 1:20:09.759 a tribe. Yeah, is it mccoq or maccaque maccaque friends 1:20:09.800 --> 1:20:15.600 of s Chaster. Yeah, yeah, it sounds right, it sounds wrong, right, 1:20:15.840 --> 1:20:18.480 It sounds like mccoq would be a little more civilized. 1:20:18.520 --> 1:20:21.280 But you know it's m a who's looking at it? 1:20:21.680 --> 1:20:33.000 A yeah? Alright, already want to start. You don't need 1:20:33.000 --> 1:20:37.519 to go back hundred years, hundred years ago. They were 1:20:37.560 --> 1:20:40.000 not they were non Florida. I mean we can go 1:20:40.080 --> 1:20:44.599 back a hundred years. That's yeah, okay, go ahead, picture 1:20:44.640 --> 1:20:52.000 it Ferris Wheel, well a lot more fish it was. 1:20:52.920 --> 1:20:55.800 It was a land of amusements, the land of the 1:20:55.880 --> 1:20:59.120 vacation land already, and a New Yorker named Colonel Twoey, 1:20:59.360 --> 1:21:02.439 Colonel being his first name, not a rank, started a 1:21:03.800 --> 1:21:08.680 tourist name it is. It's pretty badass, colonel dog want 1:21:08.680 --> 1:21:10.439 to name him? Why not name your kid general? He's 1:21:10.439 --> 1:21:13.559 got to earn admiral. He starts at colonel. See how 1:21:13.600 --> 1:21:17.080 he does? How does he get how does he get advancement? 1:21:17.400 --> 1:21:20.559 Maybe he started his private video. It was spelled CEO 1:21:20.880 --> 1:21:25.680 L not k R K E R. Yeah, like like 1:21:26.040 --> 1:21:30.800 uh popcorn colonel, Yeah, yeah, yeah, sorry, not like the 1:21:30.840 --> 1:21:34.479 popcorn colonel, like the military colonel. So Mr Colonel Tooey 1:21:34.960 --> 1:21:37.960 had some kind of tourist attraction going in the middle 1:21:37.960 --> 1:21:41.559 of Florida in a town called Akala on a silver river, 1:21:42.240 --> 1:21:45.160 and he decided he wanted to up his game a notch. 1:21:45.200 --> 1:21:48.240 And he brought over six macaques from somewhere I don't 1:21:48.280 --> 1:21:50.280 know where, and decided he was going to put them 1:21:50.320 --> 1:21:53.320 on a little island in the river and you'd get 1:21:53.360 --> 1:21:55.080 to be able to see monkeys. When he came to 1:21:55.160 --> 1:21:57.760 visit his place, he did not realize that mccas are 1:21:58.000 --> 1:22:01.200 tremendous swimmers. This is my favorite detail story. Within minutes, 1:22:01.280 --> 1:22:05.639 certainly by some accounts, they were off the island. Um, 1:22:06.960 --> 1:22:14.400 so that was that was in the thirties. You'd like 1:22:14.479 --> 1:22:16.400 to imagine I'm kind of standing there, you know, feeling 1:22:16.520 --> 1:22:18.840 very proud, just gazing out at his little monkey island, 1:22:18.880 --> 1:22:22.639 and then sort of dawning on him. Um, tell some kids, Okay, 1:22:22.680 --> 1:22:26.360 now go feed the monkeys, and they're like, which ones? Yeah, yeah, Well, 1:22:26.400 --> 1:22:28.200 I just imagine he's still standing there. Just they're just 1:22:28.280 --> 1:22:32.400 slashing toward him. It's like normandy, you know. Um. But yeah, 1:22:32.439 --> 1:22:35.120 and then but so then you've got wild monkeys in Florida, 1:22:35.680 --> 1:22:39.000 and by the eighties there were about four hundred of 1:22:39.080 --> 1:22:43.639 them each separate troops. Yeah. I mean, I'm gonna preface 1:22:43.640 --> 1:22:47.280 all this by saying this, the census, the monkey censuses 1:22:47.400 --> 1:22:52.759 in Florida are very fuzzy. Several recounts. We never write 1:22:52.760 --> 1:22:56.320 a lot of hanging chads. We never really have very 1:22:56.360 --> 1:22:58.760 good information. It seems about how many monkeys there are 1:22:58.840 --> 1:23:02.320 in Florida any given time. But you know, there's wild 1:23:02.400 --> 1:23:04.760 monkeys living in Florida, something I did not know, so 1:23:04.920 --> 1:23:09.880 pause that story. In two thousand twelve, the summer of 1:23:09.920 --> 1:23:14.519 two thousand twelve, I went to Tampa to um look 1:23:14.600 --> 1:23:17.920 for the mystery Monkey of Tampa Bay, which was a 1:23:18.280 --> 1:23:23.400 maccaque that had first appeared behind the Bennigan's um in 1:23:23.560 --> 1:23:26.519 two thousand nine, I believe a hundred miles away from 1:23:26.600 --> 1:23:29.680 the very far away. Yeah, yeah, this is way out, 1:23:29.840 --> 1:23:32.200 you know, Tampa. It's like way out on the coast. Um. 1:23:32.280 --> 1:23:34.960 So it's crossed the whole interior of the state. And 1:23:35.240 --> 1:23:38.439 the theory was when they called out um a gentleman 1:23:38.520 --> 1:23:42.519 named Vernon Yates, who's a renowned freelance animal trapper in Florida, 1:23:43.160 --> 1:23:46.719 to come corral this monkey behind the Bennigan's, he was floored. 1:23:46.760 --> 1:23:48.680 He could not believe that this thing was, as he 1:23:48.760 --> 1:23:53.240 put it, very streetwise because when a pet maccaque um, 1:23:53.400 --> 1:23:57.240 of which there apparently are many licensed pet maccaques in Florida, 1:23:57.280 --> 1:23:59.679 when they escape, they tend to just fry themselves immediately 1:23:59.680 --> 1:24:01.680 on a our line or get hit in traffic or something. 1:24:01.760 --> 1:24:04.599 But this thing, this thing could boogie, this thing could 1:24:04.680 --> 1:24:07.040 get through, it could read your mind. Yeah, it was. 1:24:07.800 --> 1:24:10.040 It had a kind of a ninja like a nimbleness 1:24:10.240 --> 1:24:14.599 that was evading both Vernon and the Fishing Wildlife Commission 1:24:14.640 --> 1:24:17.280 officers who were sent out to travel. And he darted 1:24:17.360 --> 1:24:19.960 it like multiple time to get away before it fell. 1:24:20.560 --> 1:24:24.559 He's like, look and pull out the dark the line 1:24:24.640 --> 1:24:30.599 where he looks him in the eye and like pulls. Yeah, 1:24:32.720 --> 1:24:36.160 that that detail we work. We used to work a 1:24:36.240 --> 1:24:37.760 lot with a guy named Mo and he was a 1:24:37.840 --> 1:24:40.960 cameraman and he described being in the jungle in South 1:24:41.040 --> 1:24:44.760 America and he's with some guys. This wasn't working with us, 1:24:44.800 --> 1:24:47.000 working with someone else. He's with some guys that were 1:24:47.040 --> 1:24:49.960 blowgun hunters. They were in Columbia and they're blowgun hunters. 1:24:50.479 --> 1:24:52.040 And he's said one of these guys was his monkey 1:24:52.120 --> 1:24:53.360 up in a tree. He said, it's kind of the 1:24:53.400 --> 1:24:56.200 most disturbing thing you've ever seen in his life. These 1:24:56.280 --> 1:24:59.920 guys like with that blowgun and that dart hits the 1:25:00.080 --> 1:25:02.519 monkey in the back. He said, that monkey reaches around 1:25:02.560 --> 1:25:05.599 behind his back pulls the dart out. Yeah, he said, 1:25:05.640 --> 1:25:07.800 just not what you expect like a game animal to 1:25:07.880 --> 1:25:11.080 do right right, because they don't have a possible he said, 1:25:11.160 --> 1:25:14.639 just seemed like at that moment, he's like everything was wrong. 1:25:16.680 --> 1:25:19.280 My other favorite details. Apparently there was a moment because 1:25:19.320 --> 1:25:22.000 this was this Bennigan's pursuit was just the first of many, right, 1:25:22.000 --> 1:25:23.840 So I think Vernon, by the time I saw Vernon 1:25:24.080 --> 1:25:25.519 in two thousand talking, this has been going on for 1:25:25.600 --> 1:25:28.080 three and a half years, and he had said he 1:25:28.160 --> 1:25:30.160 had more than a hundred occasions he had gone out 1:25:30.280 --> 1:25:32.200 after this monkey. On one of them, there was a 1:25:32.240 --> 1:25:36.280 fish and wildlife officer caught it in three years. He 1:25:36.360 --> 1:25:38.600 hadn't caught in three and a half years. And he 1:25:38.760 --> 1:25:39.920 was you know. I went to his house and he 1:25:40.479 --> 1:25:42.800 he took a map of Florida out to show me 1:25:42.960 --> 1:25:45.960 kind of where the monkeys travels had taken him. And 1:25:46.040 --> 1:25:48.080 he just kept having to flip the map over, like 1:25:48.120 --> 1:25:49.880 bring out a different map at a bigger scale. He 1:25:49.920 --> 1:25:52.240 just kept getting more and more elaborate, you know. Um, 1:25:52.600 --> 1:25:54.320 And he was sure it was the same monkey, like 1:25:54.400 --> 1:25:56.559 he was marked somehow, he would They were, well, they 1:25:56.600 --> 1:25:58.120 were very sure it was the same monkey, just by 1:25:58.160 --> 1:25:59.920 its behavior, I think, And that's what I guess that 1:26:00.000 --> 1:26:02.240 an open question, but there it seemed to be consensus 1:26:02.280 --> 1:26:07.639 of very long causeway, probably in the back of a truck. Yeah. Yeah, 1:26:07.880 --> 1:26:10.160 And it started. It was in different neighborhoods. It was 1:26:10.240 --> 1:26:13.559 eating fruit off people's roofs um, it was getting around 1:26:14.200 --> 1:26:16.600 and uh. And what happened again in a in a 1:26:16.920 --> 1:26:21.760 similar and yet extremely different Yeah, he's abounds. Yeah, yeah, yeah, 1:26:21.880 --> 1:26:24.240 he's he's a little guy. He's pretty adorable, I think 1:26:24.600 --> 1:26:27.360 he Uh. And he became known as the Mystery Monkey 1:26:27.400 --> 1:26:28.960 of Tampa Bay. And in the same way as this 1:26:29.120 --> 1:26:32.040 Monk Seal story unfolded, but in a very different version 1:26:32.120 --> 1:26:36.200 of it. A there was a political dynamic around the 1:26:36.280 --> 1:26:39.880 Mystery Monkey in that here you had um Vernon Yates. 1:26:39.920 --> 1:26:42.360 It was sort of caricatured as this you know, dopey 1:26:42.479 --> 1:26:46.120 small town sheriff animal, trapper guy out to you know, 1:26:46.479 --> 1:26:49.120 trap this innocent creature, and the state, you know, the 1:26:49.200 --> 1:26:53.639 power of the state clamping down on the the animal. Yeah. 1:26:53.920 --> 1:26:56.880 And the populace wanted the monkey to be free. You know. 1:26:57.080 --> 1:26:59.559 They were they were t shirts stay free Mystery Monkey, 1:26:59.720 --> 1:27:03.880 they were billboards, um, you know, social media accounts, and 1:27:04.120 --> 1:27:08.479 it became again another intractable kind of um, you know, 1:27:08.600 --> 1:27:11.320 disagreement about what this monkey was all about and what 1:27:11.479 --> 1:27:13.840 we what we should do with it, right, you know, 1:27:13.920 --> 1:27:15.840 you had the state saying it's a danger to people. 1:27:16.439 --> 1:27:20.720 It's probably um suffering itself because they're communal animals, they're 1:27:20.760 --> 1:27:23.200 social animals, and this one's been you know, outside of 1:27:23.240 --> 1:27:25.840 its troop, and they have hepatitises over there. They all 1:27:25.960 --> 1:27:29.360 have herpies, not all, a lot of them have herpes 1:27:29.560 --> 1:27:32.840 b I believe, which is was used as a as 1:27:32.920 --> 1:27:35.080 kind of scare tactic as I see it by the 1:27:35.600 --> 1:27:37.560 state to say, this is another reason we have to 1:27:37.600 --> 1:27:39.720 get this monkey. Although when you kind of dig into 1:27:39.760 --> 1:27:41.799 the science, because everybody will make love with the monkey 1:27:41.880 --> 1:27:45.000 and wind up yeah you know, yeah, people love and 1:27:45.120 --> 1:27:48.280 the monkeys with herpes are definitely telling the monkeys without 1:27:48.360 --> 1:27:53.240 herpes like, hey, everybody's got it. Yeah, you know, it's yeah, 1:27:53.960 --> 1:27:57.600 um so yeah, so so uh so I was, and 1:27:57.680 --> 1:28:02.080 I was there, um right before Republican Convention, you know, 1:28:02.160 --> 1:28:05.280 in two thousand and twelve. This was the Romney in 1:28:05.320 --> 1:28:08.880 their freedom was in the air, the Tea Party was ascendant. Um, 1:28:08.960 --> 1:28:10.439 there was a lot of you know, in a way, 1:28:10.520 --> 1:28:15.000 the monkey debate really mirrored the American debate of like, 1:28:15.120 --> 1:28:18.800 you know, what is the line between tyranny and lawlessness? 1:28:19.240 --> 1:28:21.880 And you know what is the government for? And um, 1:28:22.120 --> 1:28:25.280 you know, shouldn't we all just be free? And uh, 1:28:25.560 --> 1:28:28.559 it was fascinating. It was fascinating. I mean, the characters 1:28:28.600 --> 1:28:31.080 involved were fascinating. This guy Vernon shown, you know, he 1:28:31.200 --> 1:28:34.360 had like seventeen tigers at his house and uh, a 1:28:34.520 --> 1:28:38.360 big pile of alligators in the concrete pool. And uh 1:28:38.800 --> 1:28:42.200 and again in in just as I solved that monks 1:28:42.760 --> 1:28:46.400 monksil crime, I managed to find the monkey, um, living 1:28:46.800 --> 1:28:50.479 very happily in someone's backyard. They had sort of reached 1:28:50.520 --> 1:28:53.479 a kind of daytent with the monkey, and we're letting 1:28:53.479 --> 1:28:56.920 it hang around their property. Um. It was actually through 1:28:57.000 --> 1:29:00.880 some reporter from the Tampa Bay Times had had had 1:29:00.920 --> 1:29:04.519 found this out, and I knew another source who had 1:29:04.520 --> 1:29:07.000 been working with the family to kind of take care 1:29:07.040 --> 1:29:10.040 of the monkey and keep the monkey, you know, close 1:29:10.160 --> 1:29:12.920 and and well cared for, but also not bring it 1:29:13.000 --> 1:29:14.599 too close to you know, everyone bringing into their house 1:29:14.640 --> 1:29:17.559 or anything like that. It seemed to be working out 1:29:17.680 --> 1:29:19.240 in a weird way. It was a weird kind of 1:29:19.320 --> 1:29:24.040 compromise happening between the monkeys rights and the humans need 1:29:24.120 --> 1:29:27.240 to keep the monkey a monkey. Did you ever get 1:29:28.439 --> 1:29:32.120 Vernon's like personal opinion on whether or not the monkey 1:29:32.160 --> 1:29:34.160 should be caught, like, aside from the fact that it's 1:29:34.240 --> 1:29:37.240 his job, he absolutely thought the monkeys should be caught. 1:29:37.439 --> 1:29:41.000 He thought, I mean, like like this, like the wildlife officers, 1:29:42.760 --> 1:29:47.439 imagine your job is to keep wildlife healthy and keep 1:29:47.520 --> 1:29:50.360 people safe from wildlife, and now you've got a monkey 1:29:50.439 --> 1:29:53.479 running around and everyone's more concerned about the monkeys rights. 1:29:54.840 --> 1:29:58.519 So Vernon was was adamant that, um, you know, he 1:29:58.760 --> 1:30:01.559 was doing this for the monkey, that the monkey needed 1:30:01.600 --> 1:30:04.040 to be captured. And we can jump ahead because the 1:30:04.400 --> 1:30:07.240 you know, some stuff happened after I did this story, 1:30:07.760 --> 1:30:09.640 but that it was in the monkey's best interest to 1:30:09.760 --> 1:30:12.559 be brought into captivity where it could be with other 1:30:12.640 --> 1:30:15.280 monkeys of its kind and live out its life there. 1:30:15.320 --> 1:30:17.559 It was safer for the monkey and was safer for people. 1:30:17.640 --> 1:30:20.200 Was there any talk about putting the monkey back on 1:30:20.320 --> 1:30:23.920 the river. No, because that's a I don't know that 1:30:24.040 --> 1:30:27.040 this is why, but the monkeys on the river themselves 1:30:27.120 --> 1:30:30.280 have been a huge source of controversy and aggravation because 1:30:30.439 --> 1:30:33.280 at different times the state has tried to um trap 1:30:33.479 --> 1:30:37.240 that population and extinguish that population, which doesn't go over well, 1:30:37.280 --> 1:30:39.800 which does not go over well with people who like adorable, 1:30:40.200 --> 1:30:45.280 anthropomorphized monkeys. Um, so there was I don't think there 1:30:45.360 --> 1:30:47.800 was any sense that they were going to like relocate 1:30:48.600 --> 1:30:52.839 the mystery monkey. Everyone knows about the non native situation Florida, 1:30:52.880 --> 1:30:55.040 but very few people know about the non native monkeys 1:30:55.080 --> 1:30:57.240 in Florida. Yeah, I had no idea. And there's other 1:30:57.360 --> 1:31:01.280 there's another monkey population. Apparently there's a very monkeys by 1:31:01.280 --> 1:31:05.200 the lad that. Yeah, that's been there for as long 1:31:05.439 --> 1:31:09.200 as I was interested in monkeys in Florida, popular popular 1:31:09.320 --> 1:31:13.599 uprisings around monkeys in Florida. Ever, did they ever get him? Oh? Sorry, Oh, 1:31:13.680 --> 1:31:16.000 I guess I was just wondering about Vernon's opinion too, 1:31:16.080 --> 1:31:19.719 because in his role, right, he's got a pool full 1:31:19.800 --> 1:31:25.439 of alligators, he's got tigers, he knows that so much 1:31:25.520 --> 1:31:29.519 of that exists in the state of Florida. It just 1:31:29.640 --> 1:31:33.759 crossed my mind that he could possibly have an opinion 1:31:33.880 --> 1:31:37.599 of like, I'm glad I'm getting paid to go try 1:31:37.680 --> 1:31:43.599 to capture the monkey. But doesn't matter. No, he doesn't 1:31:43.640 --> 1:31:48.320 matter because there's already so many exactly. Well, I mean 1:31:48.400 --> 1:31:50.439 he the reason why he has those animals is that 1:31:50.520 --> 1:31:53.360 those are animals that have that he has offered to 1:31:53.479 --> 1:31:58.559 read home from licensed or unlicensed owners in the state 1:31:58.600 --> 1:32:00.880 of Florida who did not you know, who were not 1:32:01.240 --> 1:32:04.719 keeping their animals humanely. He complained to John about losing 1:32:04.920 --> 1:32:07.519 a hundred thousand dollars or the tortoises, and a divorce 1:32:07.560 --> 1:32:13.560 settlement that's right, came after my turtles. Yeah, he loves tortoises. 1:32:13.680 --> 1:32:15.400 Was his sweet spot. I think he had a special 1:32:15.560 --> 1:32:18.960 special place in his heart for tortoises. Um. Yeah, one 1:32:19.040 --> 1:32:21.480 of his five divorces, he got cleaned out of his tortoises. 1:32:22.240 --> 1:32:27.120 So so the mystery monkeys settled down and lived his life. 1:32:27.160 --> 1:32:29.040 Well that was where my story. That was where my 1:32:29.120 --> 1:32:33.519 story ended. And then a few months later, um, the 1:32:33.680 --> 1:32:39.080 monkey was you know, everything was still peaceable at the house. 1:32:39.400 --> 1:32:43.800 And then the monkey jumped on the woman the homeowners 1:32:43.840 --> 1:32:49.640 back and startled her classic monkey on your back, absolutely 1:32:50.600 --> 1:32:53.800 that you know, startled her. She reacted, that freaked out 1:32:53.840 --> 1:32:56.360 the monkey, and the monkey bit her on the shoulder 1:32:56.760 --> 1:32:59.360 and then it was game over. So at that point 1:32:59.720 --> 1:33:02.960 the monkey had to be caught to be I guess 1:33:03.080 --> 1:33:04.600 tested in the same way you know you get bit 1:33:04.680 --> 1:33:07.439 by a stray dollar or something. I don't know the 1:33:07.520 --> 1:33:11.120 ins and outs of it, and involves decapitations often. Well, 1:33:11.200 --> 1:33:16.160 this monkey was not decapitated, were beheaded. Um so Vernon 1:33:16.280 --> 1:33:20.360 came back in with this the state will Vernon was 1:33:20.400 --> 1:33:22.400 probably the first call. I mean, you're not gonna at 1:33:22.439 --> 1:33:23.880 the time he had sunk into this, do you think 1:33:23.880 --> 1:33:25.720 they're gonna give it to someone else? And this time 1:33:25.760 --> 1:33:27.960 they were able to get him. They trapped the monkey, 1:33:28.560 --> 1:33:32.760 who was then named Cornelius after the monkey and Planet 1:33:32.800 --> 1:33:34.040 of the Apes, which I think I could take a 1:33:34.080 --> 1:33:35.600 little bit of credit for because there's a part in 1:33:35.640 --> 1:33:37.559 the piece where I sort of have this delusional fever 1:33:37.680 --> 1:33:39.360 dream while I'm reading Planet of the Apes at a 1:33:39.600 --> 1:33:43.200 La Quinta in in Ocala. But they named him, uh, 1:33:43.720 --> 1:33:47.320 they named him Cornelius. They brought him to a kind 1:33:47.320 --> 1:33:50.479 of like a roadside attraction type zoo thing where he 1:33:50.600 --> 1:33:54.640 was paired with another monkey named Cora. Settled down, he 1:33:54.720 --> 1:33:58.519 had children, seemed to be living a happy life until 1:33:58.800 --> 1:34:04.280 until his hours ago he developed as they had given 1:34:04.320 --> 1:34:06.200 him a cyanide pillow to keep in his cheek and 1:34:06.360 --> 1:34:09.800 when Um, no, until a few years ago. I guess 1:34:09.920 --> 1:34:13.280 that that facility where he was had come under fire 1:34:13.400 --> 1:34:17.240 from Peter and some other organizations and they started, um 1:34:18.320 --> 1:34:22.200 they had a dozen or more tigers at this place, 1:34:22.680 --> 1:34:25.679 and there were some complaints and they started offloading their tigers, 1:34:26.720 --> 1:34:29.880 driving them out to Oklahoma to the guy in that 1:34:30.080 --> 1:34:35.560 Netflix show. Yeah, and Somes got tangled up with a 1:34:35.640 --> 1:34:38.360 tiger king. Well, that's where this So there was a 1:34:38.479 --> 1:34:42.680 follow up report in the Tampa Bay Times trying to 1:34:42.760 --> 1:34:45.480 figure this out, and it seems like in the confusion 1:34:46.000 --> 1:34:50.120 over all of this, Cornelius, the trail on Cornelius went cold. 1:34:50.200 --> 1:34:53.040 We don't know where he is and where he wound up, 1:34:53.680 --> 1:34:57.200 and uh, there's really no paper trail or anything. Yeah, 1:34:57.360 --> 1:34:59.559 are you going back down? I mean, I think it's 1:34:59.600 --> 1:35:02.719 been it's been covered to death, but I'm curious. I'd 1:35:02.760 --> 1:35:04.439 like to know where he is. But if the trail 1:35:04.520 --> 1:35:07.679 is cold, then it's obviously just right for John Well. Yeah, 1:35:07.680 --> 1:35:11.479 I don't know. I'm gonna crack that one. But what 1:35:11.640 --> 1:35:15.040 you found the monks, the little sass in days, you 1:35:15.120 --> 1:35:17.720 will find that monkey. Feel like it's like a lethal weapon. Lie, 1:35:17.720 --> 1:35:22.120 I'm getting too old for this. One last time. I 1:35:22.240 --> 1:35:25.680 think it's hilarious how you're staying at a Laquinta too, 1:35:25.880 --> 1:35:29.599 you know, because they're claimed to fame is they're always 1:35:29.680 --> 1:35:36.080 pet friendly. There's no chance you have that monkey. I mean, 1:35:37.160 --> 1:35:39.200 I'm not gonna say they were getting into and they 1:35:39.240 --> 1:35:42.120 were getting into Netflix documentary territory. If it turns out 1:35:42.160 --> 1:35:46.439 that you have pretty well, there's a whole dome. Turn 1:35:46.520 --> 1:35:50.720 your friend in or not for reward, you know. But 1:35:50.800 --> 1:35:53.400 that's actually the weird thing is that the monkey is 1:35:53.479 --> 1:35:55.920 not the reason why we don't know where the monkey 1:35:56.040 --> 1:35:59.240 is is because there's really no regulation that would require 1:35:59.280 --> 1:36:01.160 them to stay where the monkey is there. As this 1:36:01.720 --> 1:36:03.400 there was a quote in this Tampa Bay Times to 1:36:03.439 --> 1:36:06.280 followup where the someone from the state was basically, it's 1:36:06.320 --> 1:36:07.840 just like a TV. You don't have to tell us 1:36:08.000 --> 1:36:11.439 when you sell your TV to someone, right, So that 1:36:11.640 --> 1:36:15.280 person who has the monkey should theoretically have papers for 1:36:15.360 --> 1:36:18.920 the monkey, but there's no database where you can look 1:36:19.000 --> 1:36:24.760 up who has what monkey, so they're just property. M Um. 1:36:26.400 --> 1:36:29.640 In my Buffalo book, I wrote about uh, you know 1:36:29.720 --> 1:36:33.960 the buffalo from the buffalohead Nickel. Not long after the 1:36:34.200 --> 1:36:40.160 artist Um did his sculpture, which became the buffalo head nickel. 1:36:40.720 --> 1:36:45.000 That buffalo's name is Black Diamond. He was sold um 1:36:45.080 --> 1:36:49.640 in the meatpacking district in Manhattan and butchered and um 1:36:50.200 --> 1:36:55.720 yielded an incredible eleven pounds bones meat. The guy that 1:36:55.880 --> 1:36:58.680 owned the meat pack was a guy named Sills. I 1:36:58.720 --> 1:37:02.360 think it was his last name. S I LZ got stuffed. 1:37:03.920 --> 1:37:08.360 So he for years had Black Diamond's head stuff from 1:37:08.400 --> 1:37:16.559 the buffalo head nickel. He sold it right now someone. Ah, 1:37:17.240 --> 1:37:23.679 it's speculated that someone has that stuffed head and doesn't 1:37:23.680 --> 1:37:26.840 know what it is, because no one's ever come forward 1:37:27.800 --> 1:37:30.680 to be like, oh, I have Black Diamond's head. So 1:37:30.800 --> 1:37:33.160 unless it got lost in the house firedever, it likes 1:37:33.439 --> 1:37:35.600 like someone's like, I don't know where. It's just the 1:37:35.720 --> 1:37:37.800 thing I got from my grandpa. Yeah, there should be 1:37:37.920 --> 1:37:40.720 some way, like you could get an alert on your phone, 1:37:40.760 --> 1:37:42.320 like an Amber alert and it would just be like, 1:37:42.400 --> 1:37:44.200 do you have a buffalo head? Can you send a 1:37:44.280 --> 1:37:46.960 picture of it to this? Can you know we just 1:37:47.040 --> 1:37:50.160 did it, just large buffalo head that looks like the 1:37:50.200 --> 1:37:53.720 buffalo head nickel. Yeah. Yeah, we keep cracked this in 1:37:53.760 --> 1:37:56.040 thirty seconds if we had a will to do it. 1:37:57.040 --> 1:38:00.080 UM so working on next. I know you can't you 1:38:00.120 --> 1:38:02.920 say not not that you're working on like a murder mystery, 1:38:02.960 --> 1:38:04.240 but you don't want to talk about it because you're 1:38:04.240 --> 1:38:06.840 waiting on some permissions. But what what can you tell us? 1:38:06.880 --> 1:38:08.880 Can you say what it involves without saying where it 1:38:08.960 --> 1:38:12.160 involves it? This is my favorite subject. Yeah, well we've 1:38:12.200 --> 1:38:15.360 talked about neandertals before, right, So yeah, so I got 1:38:15.439 --> 1:38:17.680 really after I did a story about Neandertals, I got, 1:38:18.400 --> 1:38:21.880 you know, just kind of reawakened to how cool deep 1:38:21.960 --> 1:38:25.120 time is that there were there were people so long ago. 1:38:25.439 --> 1:38:28.960 So yes, I've been really interested in writing about Paleolithic 1:38:29.040 --> 1:38:31.920 cave art and I've been trying to find a way 1:38:31.960 --> 1:38:34.840 to do it. Um. What I didn't understand is that 1:38:35.560 --> 1:38:39.120 these caves are like, um, the people who study these caves, 1:38:39.160 --> 1:38:42.840 it's very proprietary, so like it's you know, this person 1:38:42.960 --> 1:38:45.320 will they're the person for that cave, you know, and 1:38:45.400 --> 1:38:48.320 then yeah, kind of if you're an up and coming researcher, 1:38:48.360 --> 1:38:51.080 you have to wait until that person retires or to 1:38:51.160 --> 1:38:53.040 get your hands on a cave. Yeah. They're sort of 1:38:53.040 --> 1:38:57.680 like Supreme Court appointments or something. So yeah, so I've 1:38:57.680 --> 1:38:59.880 been talking to a lot of people, you know, all 1:39:00.080 --> 1:39:02.880 spring about trying to trying to talk my way into 1:39:02.960 --> 1:39:06.000 a into a cave because I think it's um. I 1:39:06.080 --> 1:39:08.960 think there was this feeling in the past that the 1:39:09.479 --> 1:39:13.280 people studying cave art we're we're trying to over interpret 1:39:13.640 --> 1:39:15.559 what they were seeing, you know, so they would everything 1:39:15.640 --> 1:39:19.360 had to have like the biggest mediat possible explanation, like 1:39:19.560 --> 1:39:21.640 you know, we see X on a cave wall, and 1:39:21.680 --> 1:39:26.160 therefore it means this about the Testament to the extinctions. Yeah, 1:39:26.479 --> 1:39:30.240 they were you know, they revered the elk because here's 1:39:30.280 --> 1:39:33.360 a you know, and I think that that's that's kind 1:39:33.400 --> 1:39:36.599 of that approaches in my mind from what I've learned, 1:39:36.680 --> 1:39:39.640 is it's kind of being deflated a little bit and 1:39:39.720 --> 1:39:42.280 people are studying more like the material culture of it, 1:39:42.400 --> 1:39:44.200 like how was this actually made? What do we know 1:39:44.280 --> 1:39:46.120 about the moment that it was made? And things like that. 1:39:46.520 --> 1:39:50.800 There was a lot of comments is that you kind 1:39:50.840 --> 1:39:53.519 of down like the religious spiritual side of things too, 1:39:53.640 --> 1:39:59.400 Like the people who painted were very special and because 1:40:00.680 --> 1:40:02.479 because they had to be. There's no way it was 1:40:02.840 --> 1:40:05.320 There's no way it was like fourteen fifty year old 1:40:05.400 --> 1:40:08.480 kids dicking around in the cave but it was predominantly 1:40:08.600 --> 1:40:14.560 male also, but they did some I think fingerprint analysis 1:40:14.960 --> 1:40:18.560 something something pretty cool. And there's a lot of surprisingly 1:40:18.920 --> 1:40:24.320 a lot of small children, females get out of my 1:40:24.400 --> 1:40:27.160 way and go paint on the wall. You're telling me 1:40:27.320 --> 1:40:30.080 kids drew stuff on walls. Well, yeah, And that one 1:40:30.080 --> 1:40:31.720 thing that I didn't realize either is like so many 1:40:31.760 --> 1:40:33.640 of these sites because you know, you see, I've never 1:40:33.680 --> 1:40:36.040 been in any of these caves, but you see, you know, 1:40:36.080 --> 1:40:38.680 the photographs of the walls. But I didn't realize is 1:40:38.720 --> 1:40:40.720 that a lot of these places where the biggest they 1:40:40.760 --> 1:40:43.240 call them galleries, where the biggest galleries are actually like 1:40:43.680 --> 1:40:47.560 really deep inside caves so that you like, you know, 1:40:47.600 --> 1:40:52.240 they're they're through narrow passages, like they're very purposeful places 1:40:52.600 --> 1:40:54.560 that you had to try to get to, you know. 1:40:54.640 --> 1:40:56.360 They didn't just walk in the cave and start drawing. 1:40:56.720 --> 1:40:59.800 And so that suggests like little crawls, like crawl spaces 1:41:00.040 --> 1:41:03.040 your crime and understuffing around it and exactly so they 1:41:03.040 --> 1:41:05.000 were very specific about where they wanted to do this. 1:41:05.080 --> 1:41:06.840 I don't know what that means, but that just seemed 1:41:06.880 --> 1:41:09.280 like an interesting fact. I mean, I think that one 1:41:09.320 --> 1:41:11.800 points to little people like children going in there and 1:41:11.920 --> 1:41:13.880 doing it. Yeah, that's actually an interesting thought. I hadn't 1:41:13.880 --> 1:41:15.960 thought about that yet. You know, Uh, you've no doubt 1:41:16.000 --> 1:41:18.920 seen her Zog's movie about cave paintings, so I'm big 1:41:19.000 --> 1:41:23.960 her Zog. I was deeply disappointed with that movie. I 1:41:24.040 --> 1:41:27.080 want to see that movie with another writer who's been 1:41:27.120 --> 1:41:29.479 on this podcast. I would almost regard you guys as 1:41:29.560 --> 1:41:33.800 peers and contemporaries. Ben Wallace Um. I went to see 1:41:33.800 --> 1:41:38.000 it with him and we laughed and I said, I 1:41:38.120 --> 1:41:41.439 don't know how you could make a bad movie about 1:41:41.560 --> 1:41:44.879 cave paintings, And he said, I was just wondering myself 1:41:45.280 --> 1:41:51.040 the exact opposite. What did you what didn't you like 1:41:51.120 --> 1:41:52.880 about it? I love that movie. It was too it 1:41:53.040 --> 1:41:56.480 was too it was too like it made it all ethereal, 1:41:57.280 --> 1:41:59.880 it was too like what were they dreaming? This must 1:41:59.880 --> 1:42:02.720 be their dreams? And you're kind of just what was 1:42:02.800 --> 1:42:04.800 it like? What was it made out of? What do 1:42:04.880 --> 1:42:08.800 we think it was? Like? Stop stop this nonsense about 1:42:08.840 --> 1:42:13.439 that these are like shamans capturing their dreams. Yeah, I 1:42:13.479 --> 1:42:15.320 can see that. I mean they did just things just 1:42:15.400 --> 1:42:17.720 so overblown. You got guys like dressed up like they're 1:42:17.720 --> 1:42:20.080 from a long time ago. Like you like role play? 1:42:20.160 --> 1:42:24.880 What do they call them? People? Large? There's like lar 1:42:25.000 --> 1:42:29.200 Per's in it, live action role players of like cave people. 1:42:31.880 --> 1:42:33.759 I love that. I don't think you want to alienate 1:42:33.840 --> 1:42:40.240 the larking audience already most I'm a fan That Little 1:42:40.280 --> 1:42:43.280 Deader needs to Fly. He's got some masterpieces. Grizzly Man. 1:42:43.560 --> 1:42:46.960 He's got a novel out now. Yeah, it just came 1:42:47.000 --> 1:42:50.240 out and then he made, Um, what's that one Little 1:42:50.280 --> 1:42:52.479 Deader needs a Fly? Then he made a fictionalized version 1:42:52.520 --> 1:42:56.880 with Christian Bale. Yeah, I met him. I met him 1:42:56.920 --> 1:42:59.320 once at a in the We were trapped in the 1:43:00.280 --> 1:43:04.679 room of an ideas festival in Mexico together. They wouldn't 1:43:04.760 --> 1:43:07.320 let us out for a few hours school and uh, 1:43:07.640 --> 1:43:09.559 there were a bunch of us and I slowly kind 1:43:09.560 --> 1:43:12.439 of made my way over to Werner Hertzog to ship 1:43:12.720 --> 1:43:14.280 a little bit. He was telling me. This was right 1:43:14.320 --> 1:43:17.680 before he was making that documentary about volcanos, and he 1:43:17.840 --> 1:43:20.960 kept he just wanted to talk about volcanoes all the time, 1:43:21.000 --> 1:43:24.040 and that felt like the perfect way to meet. He's 1:43:24.040 --> 1:43:29.519 like a method actor, but a documents artists. Um he uh, 1:43:31.400 --> 1:43:33.320 you know, he wrote he made that crazy ass when 1:43:33.320 --> 1:43:35.240 he used to do fictional films, not used to, but 1:43:35.439 --> 1:43:37.760 focused on He did Fits Crawl though, and it's about 1:43:37.800 --> 1:43:42.080 it like a deranged Robbert rubber Baron who the movie 1:43:42.160 --> 1:43:44.479 is that a guy does the impossible. He like build, 1:43:44.560 --> 1:43:47.559 He moves his boat from one drainage in the Amazon 1:43:47.800 --> 1:43:51.760 to the other, which involves like hoisting it up and 1:43:51.840 --> 1:43:54.320 over a ridge and down in another valley. So you think, 1:43:54.400 --> 1:43:55.760 like today you'd be like, oh, we'll just make a 1:43:55.840 --> 1:43:59.280 thing look like c G I whatever. But he did 1:43:59.479 --> 1:44:03.400 the insane thing. They did exactly that. They took a 1:44:03.479 --> 1:44:07.559 boat and moved it. People like died on the production, 1:44:07.800 --> 1:44:09.840 and they made a movie about the movie called Burden 1:44:09.920 --> 1:44:14.280 of Dreams. And in Burden of Dreams, Herzog is losing 1:44:14.320 --> 1:44:17.679 his mind over that he can't get his movie finished, 1:44:17.680 --> 1:44:21.080 which he did eventually finished, and he's going off about 1:44:21.120 --> 1:44:25.559 how much he hates the jungle, and Herzog says, birds 1:44:25.600 --> 1:44:36.599 don't sing, they scream in agony. All right, man, thanks 1:44:36.600 --> 1:44:39.360 for coming on the show. Thank you, Thanks for tell 1:44:39.360 --> 1:44:41.560 everybody your other books. We didn't really do we do 1:44:41.680 --> 1:44:45.080 a show about about this is chance. I think we 1:44:45.160 --> 1:44:48.680 focused on that specific Okay, So John MoU Alum like 1:44:48.880 --> 1:44:54.080 move like cow Alum, not like Alan John m o 1:44:54.520 --> 1:44:57.519 A L L E M no h in the John 1:44:58.439 --> 1:45:01.400 New book is serious face, author of This is Chance, 1:45:01.520 --> 1:45:04.439 author of what was the Candidate? Not the creatures, wild 1:45:04.880 --> 1:45:09.559 wild Ones, more about all about animals, about animals, well 1:45:09.720 --> 1:45:15.000 people all people going wacky about animals. Um am I 1:45:15.080 --> 1:45:19.280 missing books. This is Chance was about the biggest earthquake 1:45:19.360 --> 1:45:23.400 to ever strike, sixty four earthquake. Yeah, good Friday earthquake. 1:45:24.160 --> 1:45:29.479 Focuses on narrows in on a woman who became very 1:45:29.520 --> 1:45:35.200 influential in the chaos, Yeah, translating and providing news as 1:45:35.320 --> 1:45:38.439 this as the catastrophe unfolded. That's right, radio reporter named 1:45:38.479 --> 1:45:40.240 Genie Chance, who kind of was in the right place 1:45:40.280 --> 1:45:43.040 at the right time and spent all of that weekend 1:45:43.439 --> 1:45:48.120 on the air pretty much as just chaos, as just 1:45:48.240 --> 1:45:51.759 being one source of like concrete information in a situation 1:45:51.880 --> 1:45:54.200 that did not seem to have much certainty at all, 1:45:54.600 --> 1:45:56.640 and stay tuned for his thing on campaigns, which I 1:45:56.720 --> 1:46:00.240 promise you'll be good. Thank you, you know, all right, 1:46:00.400 --> 1:46:02.040 Thanks everybody, Thanks, Thanks