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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to

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Speaker 1: the White Tail Woods presented by First Light, creating proven

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Speaker 1: versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First

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Speaker 1: Light Go Farther, stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on

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Speaker 2: the show, I'm joined by the one and only Yannis

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Speaker 2: Pitelus to discuss his land management journey, going from ground

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Speaker 2: zero all the way to the implementation of significant wildlife

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Speaker 2: habitat improvement projects such as creating wildlife openings, oak savannahs,

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Speaker 2: timber stand improvements, and much more. All Right, welcome back

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Speaker 2: to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you by

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Speaker 2: First Light, And this week on the show, I'm joined

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Speaker 2: by my good buddy, the one and only the Latvian Eagle,

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Speaker 2: mister Jannis tell Us, and we're talking about a topic

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Speaker 2: that is near and dear to my heart and something

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Speaker 2: that in recent years has really come on for Yanni,

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Speaker 2: and that's habitat improvement. Wildlife habitat projects work on the ground,

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Speaker 2: improving the landscape for deer and turkeys and other critters.

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Speaker 2: And this is something that you know, Jannis for a

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Speaker 2: long time was not interested in this at all. He

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Speaker 2: has lived out west for many years, but in recent

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Speaker 2: years he has had a kind of restirring of the

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Speaker 2: soul around white tails, which has led to him spending

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Speaker 2: more time in Wisconsin at his family hunting property and

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Speaker 2: in the last handful of years actually diving really deep

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Speaker 2: into the habitat side of things. So today's story is

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Speaker 2: this really interesting look at someone going from kind of

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Speaker 2: you know, not having any experience and really interest at

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Speaker 2: the beginning in improving a landscape for wildlife, to then

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Speaker 2: diving in headfirst and learning everything he possible he could,

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Speaker 2: talking to all sorts of people, consuming every different resource

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Speaker 2: he possibly could, and then starting to try these things

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Speaker 2: on his own. And now you know, four or five

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Speaker 2: years later, he has made some real changes on his property.

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Speaker 2: He's made a big difference. Some real things are happening now.

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Speaker 2: So this is a story and a conversation that I

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Speaker 2: think if you are new to the habitat improvement world,

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Speaker 2: or if you're just getting started, or if you're intrigued

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Speaker 2: about maybe someday trying to do some work on your

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Speaker 2: back forty or your family farm, or a new property

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Speaker 2: that you are wanting to buy, if any of that

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Speaker 2: is in your future if you have been curious, maybe

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Speaker 2: you know, intimidated by this kind of stuff. Our chat

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Speaker 2: today is going to be a big eye opener because,

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Speaker 2: you know, making a difference on the ground is something

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Speaker 2: that anyone can do, whether you have been doing this

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Speaker 2: for decades or if you're brand new, like Giannis was

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Speaker 2: just a handful of years ago. So our story today

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Speaker 2: will be documenting that entire path, that entire process, the

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Speaker 2: journey from kind of quote unquote off the couch to

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Speaker 2: doing some real stuff now. So that's our chat today

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Speaker 2: with Yanni. I think you're going to enjoy it. In

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Speaker 2: my world, lots of exciting stuff happening. I need to

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Speaker 2: do a podcast here soon about a recent bit of

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Speaker 2: turkey hunting success that we had that's very exciting here

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Speaker 2: with my family, but I will hold that off for

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Speaker 2: another time, and I think we should just get right

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Speaker 2: into it. The only other piece of housekeeping I guess

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Speaker 2: I will let you know is that this week, if

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Speaker 2: you are listening to this, the week this is coming out,

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Speaker 2: which is oh, let me just tell you here in

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Speaker 2: a second, this podcast will be dropping May fifteenth, twenty

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Speaker 2: twenty five. So if you are listening that day or

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Speaker 2: the next it's Dog Week at meat Eater, which means

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Speaker 2: that you are going to be getting all sorts of

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Speaker 2: really fun and informative dog related content across the media network,

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Speaker 2: whether it be the Houndation's podcast that Tony does over

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Speaker 2: in Cal's feed, or the YouTube channel to meet YouTube

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Speaker 2: channel across the website. I know there's a dog photo

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Speaker 2: contest and all sorts of stuff. So going over to

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Speaker 2: the meat eater dot com to engage with our dog

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Speaker 2: and hunting dog content, lots of stuff there. I'll remind

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Speaker 2: you again as I said last week, please subscribe to

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Speaker 2: this podcast, leave a review on iTunes or Spotify or

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Speaker 2: wherever you do that, and then check out the rest

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Speaker 2: of the meat Eater podcast network. I think a lot

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Speaker 2: of people don't realize that there's actually a bunch of

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Speaker 2: other shows that we produce in addition to this. In

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Speaker 2: addition to the flagship Meet it or podcast, We've also

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Speaker 2: got you know, Cal's Weeken Review, which is going to

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Speaker 2: give you conservation and hunting and fishing related news. Uh,

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Speaker 2: there's the God's Country podcast, which is a really fun

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Speaker 2: look at the intersection of country music and the outdoors. There's,

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Speaker 2: of course Tony's Foundations podcast and Foundations here on this

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Speaker 2: speed there is the Cutting the Distance podcast again more

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Speaker 2: tactics and Western focused hunting. Uh. And then we can't

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Speaker 2: forget Bear and that country life over there with play

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Speaker 2: Newcome and Brenton Reeves and the heck, I might be

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Speaker 2: forgetting something, but lots and lots to check out if

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Speaker 2: you are into hunting, fishing, conservation and you know, spending

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Speaker 2: your time and energy in the outdoors. So without further ado,

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Speaker 2: let's get to another member of the Mediator crew, my

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Speaker 2: good friend, the one and only Jannis, who tell us

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Speaker 2: and the story of how he went from zero to

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Speaker 2: hero when it comes to whitetail habitat management. All right

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Speaker 2: with me now on the line. It's my good pal,

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Speaker 2: mister Jannis tell us, Yanni, I enjoy our chats off air,

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Speaker 2: so I'm excited to have one on air here for

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Speaker 2: the first time in a little bit, so welcome back.

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Speaker 3: Thank you. Yeah, I do as well. I always appreciate

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Speaker 3: that you are willing to take the time, although as

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Speaker 3: busy as you are, it's uh, it's almost like trying

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Speaker 3: to get a hold of Stephen Ranella. I have to

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Speaker 3: like talk to Steve's assistant to just get like a

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Speaker 3: five minute convo about what we're doing this weekend with

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Speaker 3: the kids. And I feel like it's becoming that way

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Speaker 3: with you too.

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Speaker 2: Oh. I don't want that to be the case.

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Speaker 3: But I know, well priorities, you know, but I do

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Speaker 3: want to before we get started. I do. I feel

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Speaker 3: like I owe you an apology because really episode two

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Speaker 3: fifteen of the Wire to Hunt podcast. You had to

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Speaker 3: go way back, but I just found it somewhere now

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Speaker 3: now I'm not look, Oh, there it is yep us.

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Speaker 3: You interviewed Steve and myself to talk about white tails

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Speaker 3: when we were in Michigan hunting white tails, I believe

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Speaker 3: right on.

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Speaker 2: Turkeys.

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Speaker 3: Wasn't that when we were hunting our friends farm?

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Speaker 2: I think we're well, I thought we were Matt's hunting turkeys,

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Speaker 2: but maybe it was Dear. I can't remember it was Mats.

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Speaker 2: Could have been it could it could have been anyways.

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Speaker 2: I won't speak for Steve, but i'll, you know, speak

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Speaker 2: for myself, but we I definitely had uh sort of

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Speaker 2: a standoff ish I'm too cool for white tails attitude,

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Speaker 2: and I'd like to say I could blame that on

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Speaker 2: just being like young and dumb.

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Speaker 3: But I mean, it wasn't that long ago, like you

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Speaker 3: were just five years ago.

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Speaker 2: Huh, you were just middle aged and dumb.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, totally middle aged and dumb. And you know, it

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Speaker 3: was just a time in my life where I just

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Speaker 3: wasn't that into the white tails, but it was. It was.

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Speaker 3: It was literally the the leading cusp, the leading edge

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Speaker 3: of where I've gotten to now. And uh, as everybody knows,

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Speaker 3: I've done it my whole life, but never really had

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Speaker 3: I guess just taken the next step to just you know,

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Speaker 3: really call it a passion or just really get into it.

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Speaker 3: And at that time I actually had was given the

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Speaker 3: opportunity to hunt white tails more and to do it

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Speaker 3: more often back where we have some property in Wisconsin,

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Speaker 3: and I really kind of got the bug. And so listen,

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Speaker 3: I'm not saying any other hunting is any less interesting

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Speaker 3: to me. You know, bugle and bulls and goblin turkeys,

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Speaker 3: they rank very high and what I love to do,

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Speaker 3: but whitetail deer and white tail deer habitat management and

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Speaker 3: that includes you know, habitat management for all the other

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Speaker 3: species that live with white tail deer. But all that stuff, now,

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Speaker 3: is it occupies a large chunk of time in my

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Speaker 3: mind on a daily basis. So anyways, apologies for you know,

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Speaker 3: slandering your love for white tail deer hunting general white

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Speaker 3: tail deer hunting, and uh, yeah, that's all I can

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Speaker 3: say about it.

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Speaker 2: That was amazing. G Honest, I think I need to

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Speaker 2: have you talk to my wife about how to do that.

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Speaker 2: That was terrific love of may a couple like that.

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Speaker 2: It's been so fun though, to watch you know, from Afar,

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Speaker 2: to see your your new excitement around it. And you know,

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Speaker 2: we talked about this a few years ago when you

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Speaker 2: were on the show and we I had just gone

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Speaker 2: down and visited your place with you. But seeing that

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Speaker 2: fresh excitement around it is it's it's kind of a

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Speaker 2: what's the word I'm looking for, Not addictive, but uh,

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Speaker 2: contagious contagious. Yeah, and uh and you know I'm the

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Speaker 2: opposite in to you, and that I've been so deep

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Speaker 2: in the white tail world that I've I've gotten cover

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Speaker 2: up in it, completely consumed with it, and then being

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Speaker 2: with you again it helps kind of make it fresh

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Speaker 2: again for me. And uh, and that's been fun too,

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Speaker 2: So I love getting a geek out with you. When

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Speaker 2: you're sending text messages and and trying to figure stuff out.

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Speaker 2: So I'm curious though, you know, I know you mentioned

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Speaker 2: that stuff started to get rekindled when you start going

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Speaker 2: back to the Wisconsin property with your family. Was there

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Speaker 2: any more specific inciting incident or moment or or something

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Speaker 2: happened you're like, oh, wow, Like now I'm now I've

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Speaker 2: really got it. Was there anything that really turned the

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Speaker 2: corner for you that brought you back into this world

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Speaker 2: more specifically?

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Speaker 3: I wouldn't say it's one specific incident, but what I've

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Speaker 3: realized about myself is that I like just to have

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Speaker 3: fresh stuff right to be working on, and stuff that

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Speaker 3: I don't know about. And you know, it's one of

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Speaker 3: those jack of all trades, master of none, you know,

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Speaker 3: like I'm a pretty good turkey hunter, pretty good elk hunter.

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Speaker 3: Am I as good as you know the greats out there? Definitely?

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Speaker 3: I know means but I think that white tailed deer hunting,

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Speaker 3: even though I've been doing it for so long, that,

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Speaker 3: you know, jumping into it again with sort of you know,

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Speaker 3: a fresh set of eyes and a fresh amount of

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Speaker 3: time to put towards it, that's really what did it.

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Speaker 3: And then realizing that, oh, I don't don't really know

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Speaker 3: that much about it. There's a lot to learn here,

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Speaker 3: there's a lot to explore, even just on the same

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Speaker 3: acres I've been hunting my whole life. So I think

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Speaker 3: it was more that that just sort of like, oh,

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Speaker 3: here's this whole thing that you know, I've got at

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Speaker 3: least five to ten years of really you know, jumping

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Speaker 3: in headfirst into it before I'm going to sort of

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Speaker 3: feel like, oh, I get it. You know, I'm confident.

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Speaker 3: I always put it this way, where like, there comes

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Speaker 3: a time where it was even this way. It was

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Speaker 3: squirrel hunting, right where like the first ten times I

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Speaker 3: went squirrel hunting, I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing,

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Speaker 3: Like where should I be? What trees do they like

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Speaker 3: to be in? Is it better to be out early

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Speaker 3: or midday? I mean, they still humble me. But it

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Speaker 3: got to a point where I knew I was good

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Speaker 3: enough at scroll hunting where I could guide my kids

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Speaker 3: scroll hunting and have a good day. I got good

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Speaker 3: enough at turkey hunting where I could take people turkey

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Speaker 3: hunting and probably kill a turkey with them. You know,

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Speaker 3: I guided elk hunts. I could take people out elk

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Speaker 3: hunting and kill turkey. So there will come a day

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Speaker 3: where I'll feel confident enough whitesell deer hunting that I'll

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Speaker 3: be able to say, oh, yeah, come with me. I'll

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Speaker 3: put you in a spot where you'll probably see a deer.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, there's something about those big, those early phases

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Speaker 2: of any new love, right, There's just something so intoxicating

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Speaker 2: about the curiosity never being fully quenched, Like there's always

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Speaker 2: something new to learn, there's always another rabbit hole to

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Speaker 2: go down. There's always more and more and more that

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Speaker 2: I mean. I mean, you know, I'm always reading. I'm

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Speaker 2: just like that person is to constantly learn new things.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, when it comes to activities that way, same

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Speaker 2: same thing. Now, four years ago I went back and

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Speaker 2: confirmed this too. Four years ago, I visited your place

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Speaker 2: there in Wisconsin. We walked it, We looked at all

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Speaker 2: sorts of things, talk through ideas, hunting strategies, whatnot, talk

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Speaker 2: through some possible habitat, things that you might want to do.

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Speaker 2: We began a very little, tiny project and we did

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Speaker 2: a podcast recapping kind of the long history of your place,

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Speaker 2: everything that's gone on there, what your hopes and dreams,

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Speaker 2: are for it everything, so on and so forth. For

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Speaker 2: folks that didn't hear that one, can you give us

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Speaker 2: like the cliff notes version, just a really quick recap

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Speaker 2: of what's the property situation, Like what are we talking

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Speaker 2: about here, what are we working with? And then what

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Speaker 2: are the goals with this place now? So how do

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Speaker 2: we get here and what kind of set the stage?

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Speaker 3: For sure? I probably should have listened to that podcast too,

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Speaker 3: that would have been beneficial to spur this on.

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Speaker 2: But assume most people probably didn't hear.

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Speaker 3: So yeah, well go back, go back and listen. I will. Hey,

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Speaker 3: give me just a second, my dog needs inside.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, no problem.

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Speaker 3: Yeah. So I've been hunting the same spot since I

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Speaker 3: was a young boy, I don't know, eleven or twelve

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Speaker 3: in south central Wisconsin. We're basically at the northern edge

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Speaker 3: of the driftless area my dad had had owned with

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Speaker 3: a partner of his uh a forty acre chunk. They

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Speaker 3: actually sold it and bought one that was a little

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Speaker 3: bit closer to the lodging that we stayed at. And

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Speaker 3: reason beings because there's other labbyans that own there's like

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Speaker 3: a total of roughly four hundred contiguous acres that kind

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Speaker 3: of everybody hunts together as sort of a co op,

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Speaker 3: I guess, you know, and we all work together on it.

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Speaker 3: And so about I don't know, Well, I guess it

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Speaker 3: might have been had I bought the property when we

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Speaker 3: did that. Had I bought in yet when we did that,

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Speaker 3: I don't think I had.

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Speaker 2: I don't think so.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, So I don't know. Maybe three years ago my

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Speaker 3: dad's partner wanted out of the property and so it

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Speaker 3: was an opportunity for me to buy in. And timing

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Speaker 3: was great because we had just sold a house, had

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Speaker 3: some extra cash, and so we rolled it right into that.

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Speaker 3: And then basically immediately my dad hands me this contract

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Speaker 3: that says MFL Managed Forest Law in Wisconsin. I'm like,

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Speaker 3: what's this. He's like, well, it's his program we're enrolled in.

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Speaker 3: You know, it keeps our taxes really low. But it

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Speaker 3: basically the states telling us how to manage our timber,

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Speaker 3: you know, like they want you practicing silver culture. And

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Speaker 3: I'm like, okay, I don't know anything about this, but yeah,

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Speaker 3: I'll check it out. And so I was basically like

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Speaker 3: thrown pushed headfirst into having to do like some sort

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Speaker 3: of habitat management. I mean, it was just logging at

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Speaker 3: that time the way I was looking at it, But

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Speaker 3: that's sort of what really got me thinking a lot

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Speaker 3: about it. And so as I was talking to the

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Speaker 3: forester about what needed to be done, because they basically

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Speaker 3: had already written a sort of a prescription for you know,

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Speaker 3: what the next fifty years looked like on that property.

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Speaker 3: And after talking to the forester a bunch, I realized

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Speaker 3: that in his own words, he's like, look, Because I

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Speaker 3: would always ask him, well, can we do this or

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Speaker 3: can we do that? And in his own words, he's like, look,

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Speaker 3: as long as you're doing something, I'm going to be happy.

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Speaker 3: Because I think that for the most part is I

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Speaker 3: don't know what the percentage is, but I think he

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Speaker 3: has a long list of delinquent MFL landowners that have

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Speaker 3: been in the program for twenty years, twenty five, thirty

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Speaker 3: years and haven't done anything. And so you know, there

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Speaker 3: comes a time where he has to start writing letters

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Speaker 3: that say, hey, if you don't, you know, start managing

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Speaker 3: your forest actively, you're gonna to start paying these back taxes. Right.

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Speaker 3: He doesn't want to do that. That's not fun for him,

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Speaker 3: but anyways, so yeah, basically he's like, we can mold

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Speaker 3: whatever it is to fit into the plan. Really, I'm

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Speaker 3: sure there's some extremes that it wouldn't work. But like

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Speaker 3: I said, the MFL program is it's a state program

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Speaker 3: for Wisconsin, and basically, you know, we pay little to

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Speaker 3: no taxes in exchange for them sort of you know,

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Speaker 3: making sure that we are actively growing and harvesting timber.

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Speaker 3: But I realized well before we get into the weeds

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Speaker 3: about it. I guess that's sort of like the rough

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Speaker 3: history that brings us up to you know, when the

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Speaker 3: habitat work really started, and I would say early on.

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Speaker 3: The main goals obviously was to improve the habitat for

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Speaker 3: all wildlife species including deer, including turkeys. Meet the goals

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Speaker 3: of the MFL plan, and hopefully what's nice about this

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Speaker 3: chunk is that the little ridge that we have on

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Speaker 3: it is very climbable, walkable even for people in older age.

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Speaker 3: The rest of the properties pretty flat. The other four

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Speaker 3: hundred acres are very hilly, so as my dad and

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Speaker 3: his peers age. Unless we get some side by sides

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Speaker 3: there can am If you're listening, you know, it's just

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Speaker 3: going to be harder for them to use utilize all

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Speaker 3: of that property, right, So this is nice because out

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Speaker 3: of the forty acres, there's I don't know, maybe ten

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Speaker 3: that's like a hill and the rest of its flat,

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Speaker 3: so very accessible. And so one of the main goals

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Speaker 3: I think was once this was all done, is to

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Speaker 3: have you know, very accessible hunting for guys that are

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Speaker 3: in their seventies and beyond.

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Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, from a hunting perspective, expand a little bit

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Speaker 2: on like how many people do you envision hunting this?

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Speaker 2: Is this going to be like a just a bow

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Speaker 2: hunting spot or is this bow hunting and gun hunting?

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Speaker 2: Is this deer? Is this deer in turkeys and everything?

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Speaker 2: A little bit more in the use of it.

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Speaker 3: Sure, I would imagine that for bow hunting it will

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Speaker 3: be all the above. I mean, we'll utilize it as

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Speaker 3: much as we can. For bow hunting, it'll probably mostly

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Speaker 3: be my dad and I And if it seems like

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Speaker 3: that's too much pressure, and again we're lucky because we

337
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Speaker 3: have access to the other four hundred acres and so

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Speaker 3: we can you know, rotate through and you know, maybe

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Speaker 3: only hunt that forty you know, on the right wind

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Speaker 3: every two or three days or whatever in rifle season. Again,

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Speaker 3: if it's if it can hold two hunters or three

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Speaker 3: hunters and be worthwhile to hunt that way. Once it's

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Speaker 3: the habitat is matured into what I'm hoping, then great,

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Speaker 3: we'll do that. You know. Again, these guys they hunt,

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Speaker 3: you know, two to three days for the opener of

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Speaker 3: the rifle season, and that's really about it. But so yeah,

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Speaker 3: I would say as much as possible, but the I'd

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Speaker 3: say the the hardcore hunting will happen in BO season

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Speaker 3: when my dad and I are there usually together sometime

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Speaker 3: early in Nova member and I'll give him first DIBs,

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Speaker 3: you know, and let him kind of work it and

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Speaker 3: try to give him as much as advice and direction

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Speaker 3: direction as I can to hunt properly so that if

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Speaker 3: we are holding a good buck that we you know,

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Speaker 3: we don't run him out of there.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. So one of the most common questions that I

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Speaker 2: get from folks or or like little anecdotes I hear

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Speaker 2: from people kind of similar shoes to you, is just

359
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Speaker 2: around how do I make a plan? How do I

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Speaker 2: figure out what to actually do? Because there's so many possibilities.

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Speaker 2: You hear podcasts, you read articles, there's there's a thousand

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Speaker 2: different things you can do or that people say you

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Speaker 2: should do, and then you're trying to look at your

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Speaker 2: actual piece of ground and figure out, how do I

365
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Speaker 2: make a priority, how do I make a plan? How

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Speaker 2: do I do this stuff? You know, coming into this

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Speaker 2: kind of cold turkey the way you were, how did

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Speaker 2: you go about putting together a plan and figuring out

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Speaker 2: what's steps to take in what order? What was that

370
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Speaker 2: process like for you?

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Speaker 3: Certainly just talking to a lot of people. And that's

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Speaker 3: you know, started with our the MFL forester that works

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Speaker 3: for the state of Wisconsin, you know, people like you.

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Speaker 3: I started calling. I got numbers of other neighbors in

375
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Speaker 3: the area there from my forester of people that were,

376
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Speaker 3: you know, going above and beyond the normal MFL plan

377
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Speaker 3: requirements and actually doing habitat improvement in his eyes, all

378
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Speaker 3: the way up to you know, prescribe burning and so

379
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Speaker 3: talking to neighbors, Uh going there and then you know,

380
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Speaker 3: going to neighbors places, looking at what they have done,

381
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Speaker 3: looking at results. I mean, I'm still doing that now.

382
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Speaker 3: I was. Actually I set up a I'm lucky to

383
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Speaker 3: have so many neighbors that are into this sort of

384
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Speaker 3: thing and are doing it, but we had I went

385
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Speaker 3: to a prescribe burn when I was there just a

386
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Speaker 3: couple of weeks ago and helped to help the neighbor out,

387
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Speaker 3: got to see his place and got to see a

388
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Speaker 3: prescribe burn in the woods go down. And then we

389
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Speaker 3: went on another tour on a really big property that

390
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Speaker 3: you know, you can almost pick any sort of oak

391
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Speaker 3: regeneration time frame and oak regeneration style and sort of

392
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Speaker 3: the I don't know the tactics or the processes that

393
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Speaker 3: were implemented to see and go, oh, here's oak regeneration

394
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Speaker 3: five years out with no fire. Fire, here's oak regeneration

395
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Speaker 3: with five years out with fire. Here's oak regeneration where

396
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Speaker 3: they did a bunch of forestry mulchain but no fire.

397
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Speaker 3: And then we went and saw some oak regeneration that

398
00:23:52,520 --> 00:23:57,399
Speaker 3: was you know, ten years old right after just a

399
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Speaker 3: straight clear cut with nothing having been done. So I

400
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Speaker 3: think just going and seeing, you know, neighboring properties. You know,

401
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Speaker 3: there's a big group in Wisconsin called the Mississippi Valley

402
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Speaker 3: Land Conservancy, I believe, and so you know, they conserved

403
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Speaker 3: areas for public use and but they you know, actively

404
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Speaker 3: heavily manage it. And so talking to those guys, because

405
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Speaker 3: we've been talking about putting our place into a conservation.

406
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Speaker 3: He'sman too. But talking to them, they're like, oh, yeah,

407
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Speaker 3: there's a place not far from you that where we

408
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Speaker 3: burn often and there's oak savannah there, and so you

409
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Speaker 3: know I've gone there and looked at that and see

410
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Speaker 3: what that looks like. You know, again, I have a

411
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Speaker 3: lot of resources that probably a little bit more than

412
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Speaker 3: a lot of people. But talking to people like Jared

413
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Speaker 3: van Hyes, who has also been there and you know,

414
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Speaker 3: wrote me up a very quick sort of plan of

415
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Speaker 3: you know how he would envision it. So yeah, we're

416
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Speaker 3: definitely forced into it through the MFL plan that we

417
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Speaker 3: I had to do something and that and that doing

418
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Speaker 3: something was a lot of logging, and sort of in

419
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Speaker 3: a way, you know, that was the plan. I could,

420
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Speaker 3: I could tweak it, I could be flexible with it,

421
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Speaker 3: but like, we had to log and a big thing

422
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Speaker 3: that I learned too, I think that people should know

423
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Speaker 3: it gets hard, Like just loggers in general. I think

424
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Speaker 3: from what I hear, there's more like bad ones than

425
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Speaker 3: good ones. And and I'm not trying to put any

426
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Speaker 3: loggers under the bus. I got really lucky. I've had

427
00:25:53,359 --> 00:25:57,000
Speaker 3: a great logger. He's been great to work with. But uh,

428
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Speaker 3: it's gonna It's like any home improvement project is gonn

429
00:26:00,119 --> 00:26:03,640
Speaker 3: to take way longer than you think it is, and

430
00:26:04,760 --> 00:26:07,560
Speaker 3: they might not be interested in your forty acres. I mean,

431
00:26:07,600 --> 00:26:11,560
Speaker 3: if you're covered up in you know, walnut trees and nothing,

432
00:26:11,600 --> 00:26:14,639
Speaker 3: but you know one hundred foot tall white oaks, Sure,

433
00:26:15,200 --> 00:26:17,320
Speaker 3: no matter how big the companies, they're gonna come look

434
00:26:17,359 --> 00:26:21,000
Speaker 3: at it. But I think a lot of these Midwestern

435
00:26:21,080 --> 00:26:26,600
Speaker 3: close canopy properties like ours was, they're probably sixty to

436
00:26:26,640 --> 00:26:30,640
Speaker 3: eighty years old. They were maybe high graded at some point,

437
00:26:30,720 --> 00:26:33,000
Speaker 3: and so you get loggers that walk through there and

438
00:26:33,040 --> 00:26:35,159
Speaker 3: they're like, man, it's really not worth it for me

439
00:26:35,280 --> 00:26:38,560
Speaker 3: to bring up my equipment to do this right. You're

440
00:26:38,560 --> 00:26:40,800
Speaker 3: gonna have to find someone smaller that needs to do

441
00:26:40,840 --> 00:26:44,760
Speaker 3: a smaller job. And it took a while. I mean

442
00:26:44,760 --> 00:26:48,240
Speaker 3: I talked to ten different logging companies and probably had

443
00:26:48,280 --> 00:26:50,600
Speaker 3: half of them at least come and walk the property.

444
00:26:50,720 --> 00:26:54,240
Speaker 3: And half of those said no, half said maybe. And

445
00:26:54,320 --> 00:26:57,760
Speaker 3: then it took you know, again, getting lucky talking to

446
00:26:57,840 --> 00:27:01,120
Speaker 3: Doug Durham and he recommended a lot and he said, look,

447
00:27:01,160 --> 00:27:05,959
Speaker 3: this guy's a little bit more in tune with habitat

448
00:27:06,040 --> 00:27:11,800
Speaker 3: projects as opposed to just doing logging, and to me,

449
00:27:11,960 --> 00:27:15,040
Speaker 3: I see a big future in that where hopefully there's

450
00:27:15,040 --> 00:27:17,679
Speaker 3: some loggers that can mesh those two as opposed to

451
00:27:17,920 --> 00:27:20,639
Speaker 3: just coming in and doing the logging work, but that

452
00:27:21,760 --> 00:27:23,639
Speaker 3: people like us are going to say, hey, yeah, we

453
00:27:23,680 --> 00:27:26,840
Speaker 3: want it logged, but there's these other things that we

454
00:27:26,880 --> 00:27:30,239
Speaker 3: want accomplished while the equipment's in here and whatever. And

455
00:27:30,320 --> 00:27:46,199
Speaker 3: so yeah, the plan it is still dynamic. It probably

456
00:27:46,240 --> 00:27:50,240
Speaker 3: always will be dynamic. I don't know if it's ever.

457
00:27:50,480 --> 00:27:52,600
Speaker 3: It's definitely as we all know with habitat work, it's

458
00:27:52,600 --> 00:27:55,080
Speaker 3: never going to be done. It's like it's not and

459
00:27:55,200 --> 00:27:59,040
Speaker 3: like Craig Harper says, it's not an event, it's a lifestyle.

460
00:28:01,880 --> 00:28:05,640
Speaker 2: And so look at you, Yanni, you're quoting Craig Harper.

461
00:28:06,920 --> 00:28:09,360
Speaker 3: Like you're in officially tattooed.

462
00:28:09,400 --> 00:28:11,760
Speaker 2: Pretty soon you're officially in the crew. Man.

463
00:28:13,440 --> 00:28:15,920
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, there's I posted a picture the other day

464
00:28:15,920 --> 00:28:20,200
Speaker 3: of me walking around chainsaw on one hand and then

465
00:28:20,240 --> 00:28:23,200
Speaker 3: a squirt bottle of Craig Harper's cocktail in the other,

466
00:28:24,040 --> 00:28:26,560
Speaker 3: and uh, it's like that's my happy place.

467
00:28:27,119 --> 00:28:28,919
Speaker 2: Mm hmm. Man, if you have told me this a

468
00:28:28,920 --> 00:28:30,640
Speaker 2: decade ago and never would have thought.

469
00:28:31,320 --> 00:28:34,600
Speaker 3: This crew in the woods, cutting trees, spraying, you know,

470
00:28:35,600 --> 00:28:41,120
Speaker 3: the trees that I'm not interested in having around. Yeah,

471
00:28:41,760 --> 00:28:43,760
Speaker 3: your question about making a plan.

472
00:28:44,080 --> 00:28:46,520
Speaker 2: It does, it does. So I want to I want

473
00:28:46,520 --> 00:28:49,760
Speaker 2: to dive into the parts of your plant you've moved

474
00:28:49,800 --> 00:28:52,440
Speaker 2: forward on so far. But before we get into the

475
00:28:52,520 --> 00:28:55,640
Speaker 2: details of each, can you just like list out for me,

476
00:28:55,760 --> 00:28:58,000
Speaker 2: like if you can imagine the top of an Excel doc,

477
00:28:58,120 --> 00:29:00,239
Speaker 2: like the columns, can you list for me, like the

478
00:29:00,280 --> 00:29:03,760
Speaker 2: major projects that you have, you know, put as like

479
00:29:03,800 --> 00:29:05,720
Speaker 2: I'm going to do this or I've started doing this,

480
00:29:05,800 --> 00:29:07,640
Speaker 2: Like what are those main things that you ended up

481
00:29:07,680 --> 00:29:10,240
Speaker 2: putting as bullet points on your plan? And then I

482
00:29:10,280 --> 00:29:11,480
Speaker 2: want to dive into some of those.

483
00:29:12,040 --> 00:29:15,840
Speaker 3: Yeah. Well, and one of the first ones that I did,

484
00:29:16,080 --> 00:29:19,880
Speaker 3: which can take up a column, is just general TSI

485
00:29:20,080 --> 00:29:28,640
Speaker 3: work timber stand improvement. Yeah, I won't get into the

486
00:29:28,680 --> 00:29:32,800
Speaker 3: details of it yet, but that was one. And then

487
00:29:33,560 --> 00:29:38,240
Speaker 3: the whole logging operation in of itself is another one

488
00:29:38,880 --> 00:29:43,560
Speaker 3: to get ready. And again I'm trying to balance what

489
00:29:43,680 --> 00:29:46,960
Speaker 3: this MFL plan needed. And then you know, my sort

490
00:29:47,000 --> 00:29:50,640
Speaker 3: of habitat goals, which in a nutshells basically make it

491
00:29:50,680 --> 00:29:53,080
Speaker 3: really good for deer and turkeys, right, make them want

492
00:29:53,120 --> 00:29:55,920
Speaker 3: to be there, and it doesn't seem like it's that

493
00:29:56,120 --> 00:30:00,160
Speaker 3: too hard to balance them and really mesh them. But

494
00:30:01,480 --> 00:30:05,680
Speaker 3: the logging project is by far like the biggest, biggest thing.

495
00:30:05,840 --> 00:30:09,560
Speaker 3: But in preparing for that so that I get good

496
00:30:09,680 --> 00:30:13,240
Speaker 3: oak regeneration, because that's the goal with this NFL plan

497
00:30:15,000 --> 00:30:20,600
Speaker 3: was to you know, limit competition and so hacking and

498
00:30:20,680 --> 00:30:25,000
Speaker 3: scorting or just you know killing off any you know, undesirables,

499
00:30:25,040 --> 00:30:28,959
Speaker 3: which mostly for us is just the red maple is

500
00:30:29,000 --> 00:30:32,920
Speaker 3: going to be the biggest competition. Ah, so getting rid

501
00:30:33,000 --> 00:30:40,840
Speaker 3: of those, we put in a water source. Uh that

502
00:30:40,840 --> 00:30:45,760
Speaker 3: that was top of the list. You know, you and

503
00:30:45,840 --> 00:30:50,600
Speaker 3: I did that food plot. It kind of sort of worked.

504
00:30:52,000 --> 00:30:58,120
Speaker 3: That has morphed into what are now these wildlife openings.

505
00:30:59,040 --> 00:31:01,680
Speaker 3: But I would say, you know, I could break down

506
00:31:01,720 --> 00:31:05,840
Speaker 3: the logging project into different zones because you know, the

507
00:31:05,880 --> 00:31:08,960
Speaker 3: forty acres doesn't look the same, you know, in each quadrant.

508
00:31:09,560 --> 00:31:13,840
Speaker 3: So within the logging, you know, there was one zone

509
00:31:13,880 --> 00:31:16,080
Speaker 3: that was really going to have most of the trees

510
00:31:16,120 --> 00:31:20,000
Speaker 3: taken out because they were all oaks and we were

511
00:31:20,040 --> 00:31:24,880
Speaker 3: going to get them out. The southern half was white

512
00:31:24,880 --> 00:31:28,120
Speaker 3: pine dominated with a lot of maple in there. Too,

513
00:31:28,200 --> 00:31:32,080
Speaker 3: a lot of birch in there, some aspen in there,

514
00:31:33,640 --> 00:31:36,520
Speaker 3: but none of it was very merchantable. I mean there

515
00:31:36,600 --> 00:31:40,760
Speaker 3: was maybe a dozen fifteen of these you know, giant

516
00:31:41,600 --> 00:31:45,120
Speaker 3: sixty to eighty year old white pines that had some

517
00:31:45,400 --> 00:31:49,040
Speaker 3: you know value for boards, but otherwise it was basically

518
00:31:49,040 --> 00:31:53,600
Speaker 3: nothing but pulp wood and slash. Figuring out what to

519
00:31:53,680 --> 00:32:00,120
Speaker 3: do with that was a big column. So yeah, I

520
00:32:00,120 --> 00:32:04,720
Speaker 3: would say that's a oh and I guess and again

521
00:32:05,000 --> 00:32:09,520
Speaker 3: kind of part of the logging operation. But access and

522
00:32:09,760 --> 00:32:13,200
Speaker 3: roads slash, fire brakes was another big one.

523
00:32:13,920 --> 00:32:17,320
Speaker 2: Okay, so with that logging operation, since that's the big,

524
00:32:17,360 --> 00:32:21,880
Speaker 2: big job here. Yeah, you mentioned that you had to

525
00:32:22,120 --> 00:32:24,200
Speaker 2: you know, you had a forrester already have a plan

526
00:32:24,360 --> 00:32:26,560
Speaker 2: like a prescription, and then you had to go out

527
00:32:26,600 --> 00:32:29,000
Speaker 2: and call logging companies. You had some of them be

528
00:32:29,080 --> 00:32:30,760
Speaker 2: willing to come and take a look, and then a

529
00:32:30,880 --> 00:32:33,080
Speaker 2: smaller percentage of that actress that they would be willing

530
00:32:33,120 --> 00:32:35,320
Speaker 2: to do it. You finally narrated down to the one

531
00:32:35,360 --> 00:32:38,600
Speaker 2: guy who would be a good fit. What did you

532
00:32:38,640 --> 00:32:41,479
Speaker 2: guys actually do to then make the decisions about what

533
00:32:41,520 --> 00:32:43,320
Speaker 2: you just described, Like in this part, we're going to

534
00:32:43,400 --> 00:32:45,320
Speaker 2: do this, and in this part we're going to do this,

535
00:32:46,080 --> 00:32:48,880
Speaker 2: because that's a big scary set of decisions to make.

536
00:32:49,080 --> 00:32:51,800
Speaker 2: I gotta believe, and I'm sure those people thinking like, hey,

537
00:32:51,800 --> 00:32:53,680
Speaker 2: if I bring in this guy who's going to come in, like,

538
00:32:53,680 --> 00:32:55,840
Speaker 2: how do I make sure that what he or she

539
00:32:56,080 --> 00:32:59,880
Speaker 2: or they do is you know, gonna meet my goals

540
00:33:00,080 --> 00:33:03,080
Speaker 2: for the wildlife stuff while also meeting their financial goals

541
00:33:03,160 --> 00:33:06,040
Speaker 2: or my financial goals or whatever it is. How did

542
00:33:06,040 --> 00:33:08,320
Speaker 2: you guys like work through all that and put together

543
00:33:08,360 --> 00:33:09,080
Speaker 2: that part of the plan.

544
00:33:10,000 --> 00:33:16,200
Speaker 3: Yeah. Again, I was lucky because this fella came highly

545
00:33:16,240 --> 00:33:19,480
Speaker 3: recommended from Doug dr and Doug had worked with him,

546
00:33:19,840 --> 00:33:21,880
Speaker 3: and so I feel like I didn't really need to

547
00:33:21,920 --> 00:33:25,040
Speaker 3: have that another layer of protection because I think what

548
00:33:25,120 --> 00:33:27,160
Speaker 3: a lot of people do, and it's recommended, you know,

549
00:33:27,320 --> 00:33:29,680
Speaker 3: especially if you have a lot of value in your timber,

550
00:33:30,240 --> 00:33:33,960
Speaker 3: is that you would hire a forester to basically work

551
00:33:34,000 --> 00:33:38,480
Speaker 3: on your behalf. And so instead of you and the

552
00:33:38,520 --> 00:33:41,440
Speaker 3: logger just walking through the woods and marking trees not

553
00:33:41,480 --> 00:33:44,680
Speaker 3: to cut or to cut or whatever, the forester actually

554
00:33:44,680 --> 00:33:48,680
Speaker 3: goes in there they do it and then they're sort

555
00:33:48,720 --> 00:33:52,000
Speaker 3: of they take a cut, but they're responsible for basically

556
00:33:52,040 --> 00:33:55,760
Speaker 3: getting you the most amount of money out of your timber, right,

557
00:33:55,840 --> 00:33:58,440
Speaker 3: and they do it in a ton of different ways.

558
00:33:58,480 --> 00:34:01,840
Speaker 3: But like some of them will actually get the work

559
00:34:02,000 --> 00:34:05,880
Speaker 3: done and just pay out the logger to get the

560
00:34:05,960 --> 00:34:09,640
Speaker 3: work done, and then they'll have all of the wood

561
00:34:09,880 --> 00:34:13,040
Speaker 3: stacked and they'll literally have an auction and then they

562
00:34:13,040 --> 00:34:15,520
Speaker 3: can get the highest bidder for it. Right, Like, there's

563
00:34:15,600 --> 00:34:19,200
Speaker 3: all different kinds of versions of that. Because we didn't

564
00:34:19,239 --> 00:34:23,520
Speaker 3: really have that much value. I was just happy to

565
00:34:23,560 --> 00:34:28,120
Speaker 3: have a logger first of all, right, and basically all

566
00:34:28,160 --> 00:34:31,040
Speaker 3: of our you know, any financial gain that we get

567
00:34:31,080 --> 00:34:33,440
Speaker 3: got from the timber was we knew it was going

568
00:34:33,480 --> 00:34:36,840
Speaker 3: to be completely reinvested back into the property in the

569
00:34:36,960 --> 00:34:42,799
Speaker 3: in the form of these wildlife openings and roads and

570
00:34:42,960 --> 00:34:46,920
Speaker 3: access and fire breaks. We knew that basically just doing

571
00:34:46,960 --> 00:34:50,560
Speaker 3: that would eat up, you know, our profits. So it

572
00:34:50,719 --> 00:34:56,600
Speaker 3: just it wasn't huge. So the way the logger and

573
00:34:56,640 --> 00:35:02,239
Speaker 3: I went in to make those decisions was like, I'll

574
00:35:02,239 --> 00:35:04,880
Speaker 3: get I'll go back to one more thing. Because our

575
00:35:04,920 --> 00:35:09,320
Speaker 3: property was so small and there wasn't such high quality timber.

576
00:35:10,080 --> 00:35:12,960
Speaker 3: The original MFL plan said, hey, you do a shelter

577
00:35:13,040 --> 00:35:16,799
Speaker 3: would cut, which means like you take out depends on

578
00:35:16,880 --> 00:35:19,080
Speaker 3: the percentages, but you're going to take out a large

579
00:35:19,239 --> 00:35:22,239
Speaker 3: chunk of the trees, but you're going to leave a

580
00:35:22,320 --> 00:35:24,760
Speaker 3: layer of oaks. They're going to act as the seed

581
00:35:24,880 --> 00:35:28,680
Speaker 3: source to make more oaks. Once those are established, the

582
00:35:28,719 --> 00:35:31,440
Speaker 3: new young ones, then you come in for another cut

583
00:35:31,480 --> 00:35:37,240
Speaker 3: and remove these overstory trees. Well, being that there weren't

584
00:35:37,239 --> 00:35:40,080
Speaker 3: that many of them. The property is small to have

585
00:35:40,760 --> 00:35:43,200
Speaker 3: to get a loger to come back ten years later

586
00:35:43,440 --> 00:35:47,960
Speaker 3: to remove thirty big oaks. It just wasn't like it's

587
00:35:47,960 --> 00:35:51,920
Speaker 3: not going to happen, right, And so I pushed for

588
00:35:52,040 --> 00:35:58,400
Speaker 3: more of a clear cut tactic, and again the forest

589
00:35:58,440 --> 00:36:01,520
Speaker 3: are signed off on it, and so we went in

590
00:36:01,640 --> 00:36:04,200
Speaker 3: the logger and I and basically just said, okay, we're

591
00:36:04,200 --> 00:36:07,719
Speaker 3: gonna leave some oaks so that we can promote oak regeneration,

592
00:36:08,560 --> 00:36:11,560
Speaker 3: but it's gonna be a lot less. And like again,

593
00:36:12,160 --> 00:36:14,600
Speaker 3: there's been other a lot of logging in the area

594
00:36:14,640 --> 00:36:16,839
Speaker 3: that's happened. So we were able to go right next

595
00:36:16,880 --> 00:36:20,000
Speaker 3: door and I'd say, well, what kind of cut was this?

596
00:36:20,120 --> 00:36:23,040
Speaker 3: What is mine going to look like, you know, compared

597
00:36:23,080 --> 00:36:26,520
Speaker 3: to this one? And the logger would say, well, just

598
00:36:26,560 --> 00:36:28,760
Speaker 3: way more open because you're gonna have less trees standing

599
00:36:28,840 --> 00:36:32,800
Speaker 3: right because you're gonna go for the clear cutming process.

600
00:36:34,160 --> 00:36:37,480
Speaker 3: So I was okay with that, and so yeah, we

601
00:36:37,560 --> 00:36:42,960
Speaker 3: basically just walked through and we saved a couple pockets

602
00:36:42,239 --> 00:36:48,640
Speaker 3: of semi mature oaks, white oaks, and red oaks. We

603
00:36:48,800 --> 00:36:54,360
Speaker 3: saved trees that I thought were in good spots to

604
00:36:54,440 --> 00:36:59,120
Speaker 3: be uh tree stand trees where you know, either historically

605
00:36:59,560 --> 00:37:02,960
Speaker 3: we'd have of deer movement or thinking about what the

606
00:37:03,000 --> 00:37:07,000
Speaker 3: future would look like where the deer would move, you know,

607
00:37:07,040 --> 00:37:09,759
Speaker 3: it had said all right, let's not cut these, and

608
00:37:09,800 --> 00:37:12,600
Speaker 3: then even behind those trees or near those trees, I

609
00:37:12,600 --> 00:37:16,120
Speaker 3: would sort of make a little five yard by five

610
00:37:16,200 --> 00:37:19,040
Speaker 3: yard zone where we didn't cut anything at all, just

611
00:37:19,080 --> 00:37:22,279
Speaker 3: so you could have you know, breakup. Because when you

612
00:37:22,320 --> 00:37:25,239
Speaker 3: clear cut and there's a couple oaks left standing, those

613
00:37:25,239 --> 00:37:27,160
Speaker 3: oaks are not going to be great to get up

614
00:37:27,160 --> 00:37:30,960
Speaker 3: into for honey, I mean, unless you go like John

615
00:37:31,000 --> 00:37:36,480
Speaker 3: Eberhart plus ten and you're like, you know, as high

616
00:37:36,480 --> 00:37:38,920
Speaker 3: as a high as a hunter. Everyone wants to get

617
00:37:39,160 --> 00:37:41,799
Speaker 3: You're just it's hard to hide right in in that

618
00:37:41,920 --> 00:37:46,839
Speaker 3: kind of a scenario. And so that was really about it,

619
00:37:46,920 --> 00:37:50,799
Speaker 3: because the main goal was to really just like get

620
00:37:50,880 --> 00:37:55,719
Speaker 3: rid of a lot of trees, and so there wasn't

621
00:37:55,760 --> 00:38:00,480
Speaker 3: too much left if I had to look act at

622
00:38:00,480 --> 00:38:03,120
Speaker 3: that now, because the logging is finished as of just

623
00:38:03,400 --> 00:38:08,840
Speaker 3: I don't know, three weeks ago or so. The logger

624
00:38:08,840 --> 00:38:10,960
Speaker 3: actually ended up leaving a few more oaks than I

625
00:38:11,000 --> 00:38:14,319
Speaker 3: had even marked, because the whole thing is is you like,

626
00:38:14,400 --> 00:38:16,320
Speaker 3: you put your stamp of approval on it, and the

627
00:38:16,360 --> 00:38:18,440
Speaker 3: whole time you're thinking, oh my gosh, am I gonna

628
00:38:18,440 --> 00:38:21,120
Speaker 3: cut too much? Am I gonna cut too much? He

629
00:38:21,680 --> 00:38:26,359
Speaker 3: ended up leaving a few more, And that'll kind of

630
00:38:26,440 --> 00:38:29,880
Speaker 3: we'll talk about how this morphed into another project. But

631
00:38:31,560 --> 00:38:33,480
Speaker 3: I would have been happy if he would have taken

632
00:38:33,520 --> 00:38:38,160
Speaker 3: them or left them. Either way, It's like what's left

633
00:38:38,200 --> 00:38:40,840
Speaker 3: looks good to me because I can see what the

634
00:38:40,880 --> 00:38:48,200
Speaker 3: future is going to look like there. But yeah, it's

635
00:38:49,000 --> 00:38:51,960
Speaker 3: a weird place to be in because again, there was

636
00:38:53,120 --> 00:38:56,440
Speaker 3: the MFL plan. It's a fifty year plan. They require

637
00:38:56,520 --> 00:38:59,239
Speaker 3: you to do these things, and you don't want to

638
00:38:59,280 --> 00:39:02,160
Speaker 3: get that like liquent notice right from your forester. So

639
00:39:02,760 --> 00:39:04,920
Speaker 3: that sort of, you know, that pushed a lot of

640
00:39:04,960 --> 00:39:07,759
Speaker 3: my decisions to be like, Okay, I'm going to get

641
00:39:07,800 --> 00:39:11,440
Speaker 3: this done. So that like, the forester is not going

642
00:39:11,520 --> 00:39:14,279
Speaker 3: to tell me to do anything until I resign up

643
00:39:14,480 --> 00:39:16,960
Speaker 3: forty years from now, and then maybe he won't even

644
00:39:16,960 --> 00:39:19,760
Speaker 3: talking to me. He'll be talking to my kids about

645
00:39:19,920 --> 00:39:22,440
Speaker 3: you know what, what has to happen with the timber.

646
00:39:22,600 --> 00:39:27,200
Speaker 2: Right, So with this logging, I know, as you've described,

647
00:39:27,360 --> 00:39:31,200
Speaker 2: you were mandated to do something, But what is like

648
00:39:31,280 --> 00:39:34,480
Speaker 2: the end state that you're hoping this will become? Like

649
00:39:34,560 --> 00:39:35,800
Speaker 2: what are you managing towards?

650
00:39:35,840 --> 00:39:35,960
Speaker 3: Now?

651
00:39:36,000 --> 00:39:37,759
Speaker 2: So what you just took it out of one state?

652
00:39:37,880 --> 00:39:41,120
Speaker 2: You reset the deck primarily with a clear cut like that.

653
00:39:41,800 --> 00:39:43,239
Speaker 2: Now what are you going to manage it for? Are

654
00:39:43,280 --> 00:39:44,839
Speaker 2: you going to let it all regrow? Are you going

655
00:39:44,880 --> 00:39:48,759
Speaker 2: to keep it at a certain successional stage? What's what's

656
00:39:48,800 --> 00:39:49,600
Speaker 2: the end goal here?

657
00:39:51,080 --> 00:39:57,759
Speaker 3: So and originally basically with the MFL plan, it's like

658
00:39:58,000 --> 00:40:02,560
Speaker 3: you they just want you to be making trees, right,

659
00:40:02,760 --> 00:40:05,440
Speaker 3: and your higher value trees are gonna be you know,

660
00:40:05,480 --> 00:40:08,719
Speaker 3: your oaks and your walnuts. We mostly have oaks. So

661
00:40:09,080 --> 00:40:12,440
Speaker 3: you're trying to do oak regeneration because it's gonna it's

662
00:40:12,440 --> 00:40:15,319
Speaker 3: gonna be good for the you know, business of silver

663
00:40:15,400 --> 00:40:18,080
Speaker 3: culture in Wisconsin. It's gonna be good financially for you.

664
00:40:19,640 --> 00:40:28,520
Speaker 3: Within the NFL plan, you're allowed to have it twenty No, yeah,

665
00:40:28,640 --> 00:40:32,560
Speaker 3: twenty percent can be what they call non productive. So

666
00:40:32,800 --> 00:40:35,600
Speaker 3: if our forty acres is enrolled, I can have eight

667
00:40:35,640 --> 00:40:40,120
Speaker 3: acres that aren't producing trees, So that gives you the

668
00:40:40,239 --> 00:40:45,720
Speaker 3: room to do some food plots or you know, maybe

669
00:40:45,760 --> 00:40:47,600
Speaker 3: cut all the trees down and turn it into a

670
00:40:47,600 --> 00:40:53,239
Speaker 3: prairie in that eight acres. Right, Originally, I had had

671
00:40:53,280 --> 00:40:56,960
Speaker 3: that sort of gonna be my rich top, and I

672
00:40:57,000 --> 00:41:00,239
Speaker 3: was just gonna do heavy TSI on it and keep

673
00:41:00,280 --> 00:41:04,480
Speaker 3: it fairly open and not really be allowing too much

674
00:41:04,600 --> 00:41:09,440
Speaker 3: you know, woody growth to come back. But again, talking

675
00:41:09,480 --> 00:41:14,719
Speaker 3: to Doug, he introduced me to a fella from the

676
00:41:14,840 --> 00:41:25,319
Speaker 3: US and Fish Wildlife Service Partners program. And get this straight. Yeah,

677
00:41:25,360 --> 00:41:27,759
Speaker 3: he's a private lands biologist for the US Fish and

678
00:41:27,760 --> 00:41:32,520
Speaker 3: Wildlife Service, and he works within a program called the

679
00:41:32,560 --> 00:41:37,120
Speaker 3: Partners for Fish and Wildlife. And basically what they do

680
00:41:37,560 --> 00:41:44,520
Speaker 3: is they help private landowners do good conservation. Seventy of

681
00:41:44,640 --> 00:41:49,120
Speaker 3: the land in this country is private, and so they

682
00:41:49,160 --> 00:41:54,520
Speaker 3: feel that like if they put this energy and uh,

683
00:41:54,640 --> 00:41:58,960
Speaker 3: you know, money into private lands conservation, it's gonna help everybody.

684
00:41:59,160 --> 00:42:01,759
Speaker 3: And I told you, I mean there's no doubt that

685
00:42:01,920 --> 00:42:05,600
Speaker 3: in our neighborhood there. I'm talking about a big giant neighborhood,

686
00:42:05,640 --> 00:42:09,359
Speaker 3: you know, like fifty square miles or something. There's no

687
00:42:09,480 --> 00:42:13,680
Speaker 3: doubt that all of the private land habitat conservation work

688
00:42:13,719 --> 00:42:17,720
Speaker 3: what's going on there is benef fitting all the public

689
00:42:17,800 --> 00:42:21,720
Speaker 3: land stuff that's interspersed within there too, like one hundred

690
00:42:22,600 --> 00:42:25,799
Speaker 3: So anyways, he introduced me, I've made a phone call.

691
00:42:26,080 --> 00:42:28,960
Speaker 3: These guys came out, did a walk, and then they

692
00:42:28,960 --> 00:42:32,600
Speaker 3: came back and said, hey, you have something that we

693
00:42:32,880 --> 00:42:36,120
Speaker 3: like where you happen to cut heavy where you did

694
00:42:36,120 --> 00:42:39,600
Speaker 3: this clear cut in the northwest corner and you only

695
00:42:39,640 --> 00:42:43,439
Speaker 3: have you know, five acres or sorry, five oaks per

696
00:42:43,480 --> 00:42:46,680
Speaker 3: acre standing like that would be a great place to

697
00:42:46,760 --> 00:42:52,279
Speaker 3: do an oak savannah. Basically, in oak savannah is just

698
00:42:52,400 --> 00:42:56,080
Speaker 3: that like imagine a forest, but like if a tree falls,

699
00:42:56,120 --> 00:42:59,160
Speaker 3: it's probably not going to hit another tree, So very

700
00:42:59,200 --> 00:43:03,359
Speaker 3: open and the understory is, you know, three to five

701
00:43:03,440 --> 00:43:08,600
Speaker 3: foot grasses and forbes. I've heard some of these habitat

702
00:43:08,640 --> 00:43:11,040
Speaker 3: guys say that some of the best deer hunting they've

703
00:43:11,080 --> 00:43:15,840
Speaker 3: ever experience has been in oak savannahs Uh, just a

704
00:43:15,880 --> 00:43:17,719
Speaker 3: lot of a lot of a lot of benefits, a

705
00:43:17,760 --> 00:43:20,120
Speaker 3: lot of food, a lot of cover in there.

706
00:43:22,000 --> 00:43:24,759
Speaker 2: What's that for critters of all types too, not just deer?

707
00:43:25,320 --> 00:43:31,200
Speaker 3: Yeah, one hundred and So these guys wanted to do

708
00:43:31,280 --> 00:43:33,120
Speaker 3: this project, and the way that it work, it's a

709
00:43:33,360 --> 00:43:36,080
Speaker 3: it's a true partnership where they're like, this is the project.

710
00:43:36,120 --> 00:43:39,719
Speaker 3: It's going to cost twenty five thousand bucks. We're going

711
00:43:39,800 --> 00:43:41,759
Speaker 3: to cover half of it, and this is what our

712
00:43:41,800 --> 00:43:44,680
Speaker 3: half is going to cover, and you need to cover

713
00:43:44,800 --> 00:43:47,840
Speaker 3: the other half. You need to take care of these things.

714
00:43:50,200 --> 00:43:52,400
Speaker 3: The cool part about it is that a lot of

715
00:43:52,440 --> 00:43:55,400
Speaker 3: it can be what they call in kind. So they

716
00:43:55,520 --> 00:44:02,560
Speaker 3: might budget, say five thousand dollars to burn these giant

717
00:44:02,600 --> 00:44:05,120
Speaker 3: slash piles that we have now on the property. Well,

718
00:44:05,120 --> 00:44:07,239
Speaker 3: if you go and burn it yourself and the work

719
00:44:07,280 --> 00:44:10,319
Speaker 3: gets done, then you don't have to, you know, kick

720
00:44:10,360 --> 00:44:14,359
Speaker 3: out that money for a contractor to do it. And

721
00:44:14,440 --> 00:44:17,160
Speaker 3: so I'll be I'm on the hook for some stuff

722
00:44:17,280 --> 00:44:21,560
Speaker 3: like herbicide buying and then applying and we're going to

723
00:44:21,600 --> 00:44:23,399
Speaker 3: need to buy a little bit of equipment to put

724
00:44:23,440 --> 00:44:27,279
Speaker 3: it out there. But the nice thing was was that

725
00:44:28,360 --> 00:44:31,440
Speaker 3: oak savannah. If you only have these few oaks, like,

726
00:44:31,480 --> 00:44:35,120
Speaker 3: it's not a like, you're not producing oak trees anymore, right,

727
00:44:35,160 --> 00:44:37,200
Speaker 3: So I had to go to my forester and go like, oh, hey,

728
00:44:38,000 --> 00:44:42,000
Speaker 3: can this seven acres be an oak savannah because we're

729
00:44:42,000 --> 00:44:43,960
Speaker 3: not going to be producing oaks anymore because we're going

730
00:44:43,960 --> 00:44:45,840
Speaker 3: to be killing any young oaks that come up in

731
00:44:45,880 --> 00:44:49,560
Speaker 3: the future. And he goes, oh, yeah, we'll just move

732
00:44:49,560 --> 00:44:52,360
Speaker 3: your non productive from that ridge top since you're still

733
00:44:52,400 --> 00:44:55,920
Speaker 3: technically growing you know, oaks up there. Although you've done

734
00:44:55,960 --> 00:44:59,000
Speaker 3: some TSI you've you've taken out some and dropped them,

735
00:44:59,520 --> 00:45:02,200
Speaker 3: but you've left a lot of them and they're gonna

736
00:45:02,200 --> 00:45:05,000
Speaker 3: get bigger. You're growing trees. So we'll just move your

737
00:45:05,040 --> 00:45:09,480
Speaker 3: non productive to that oak savannah. And so this really

738
00:45:09,640 --> 00:45:11,840
Speaker 3: was like it was a huge win for me because

739
00:45:11,920 --> 00:45:14,319
Speaker 3: early on, like the first thing I wanted to do

740
00:45:14,440 --> 00:45:16,319
Speaker 3: when I got in there was like, I'm gonna do

741
00:45:16,920 --> 00:45:20,399
Speaker 3: eight acres of corn beans four and four. Just got

742
00:45:20,400 --> 00:45:22,520
Speaker 3: to figure out how to pull that off because I've

743
00:45:22,520 --> 00:45:27,040
Speaker 3: got neighbors that have that, and like they kill bucks

744
00:45:27,080 --> 00:45:31,280
Speaker 3: off their corn and beans every year. Right, difference beings

745
00:45:31,320 --> 00:45:34,439
Speaker 3: they live there, they have farm equipment, they can put

746
00:45:34,440 --> 00:45:37,080
Speaker 3: it in. I live a thousand miles away. It's a

747
00:45:37,120 --> 00:45:39,000
Speaker 3: little bit harder to manage. So I was thinking, well,

748
00:45:39,040 --> 00:45:42,279
Speaker 3: maybe I can trade or the farmer that he'll you know,

749
00:45:42,760 --> 00:45:47,240
Speaker 3: take half of it and you know leave the other half,

750
00:45:47,760 --> 00:45:51,279
Speaker 3: things like that. In the end, I decided it's it

751
00:45:51,360 --> 00:45:54,440
Speaker 3: wasn't going to work financially, so we were just going

752
00:45:54,520 --> 00:45:58,919
Speaker 3: to kind of go with a very natural state of

753
00:45:59,040 --> 00:46:03,520
Speaker 3: these couple one wildlife openings. Well, when the US Fish

754
00:46:03,520 --> 00:46:07,040
Speaker 3: and Wildlife Service project kind of came in and said, hey,

755
00:46:07,120 --> 00:46:10,040
Speaker 3: let's do five acres of your oak savannah, I said, well,

756
00:46:10,120 --> 00:46:13,440
Speaker 3: let's maybe add my two to one acre wildlife openings

757
00:46:13,480 --> 00:46:16,600
Speaker 3: to that project. We'll make it seven and we'll do

758
00:46:16,760 --> 00:46:19,719
Speaker 3: all of it as an oak savannah. And so they

759
00:46:20,000 --> 00:46:26,120
Speaker 3: are going to provide the native urb and grass seed

760
00:46:26,160 --> 00:46:32,440
Speaker 3: mix that we're gonna plant next winter. And so basically

761
00:46:32,800 --> 00:46:36,200
Speaker 3: instead of having my eight acres of corn and soybeans,

762
00:46:36,680 --> 00:46:39,560
Speaker 3: I've sort of through this whole process ended up at

763
00:46:39,760 --> 00:46:43,279
Speaker 3: seven acres of an oak savannah and I'm gonna have

764
00:46:43,600 --> 00:46:50,800
Speaker 3: unbelievable you know, forbes and grasses. And I'm a believer

765
00:46:50,960 --> 00:46:53,799
Speaker 3: now that that's gonna be way more valuable than if

766
00:46:53,840 --> 00:46:57,120
Speaker 3: I did have my seven or eight acres of soybeans

767
00:46:57,160 --> 00:47:00,000
Speaker 3: and corn, mostly because I think it's going to be

768
00:47:00,080 --> 00:47:05,240
Speaker 3: a little bit more year round source of food cover

769
00:47:05,880 --> 00:47:08,600
Speaker 3: versus the corn of soybeans having a much more limited

770
00:47:09,880 --> 00:47:17,080
Speaker 3: timeframe when they're really valuable. So yeah, that's that's been

771
00:47:17,120 --> 00:47:21,879
Speaker 3: super exciting. That is what. Now seven acres of this

772
00:47:22,800 --> 00:47:25,840
Speaker 3: forty is gonna be oaks Savannah and it's gonna be

773
00:47:25,920 --> 00:47:30,840
Speaker 3: absolutely awesome. Whoam may old bird of prey? Just I

774
00:47:30,880 --> 00:47:33,640
Speaker 3: think maybe knocked like a chickadee or something out of

775
00:47:33,680 --> 00:47:38,279
Speaker 3: a fir tree outside my window. Looks pretty exciting what

776
00:47:38,360 --> 00:47:40,240
Speaker 3: I could see there. Sorry for the interruption.

777
00:47:40,600 --> 00:47:43,040
Speaker 2: It's always an adventure outside the window in Bozeman.

778
00:47:43,520 --> 00:47:48,839
Speaker 3: Oh, it totally is. Okay, So there're seven acres right

779
00:47:48,920 --> 00:47:54,680
Speaker 3: oaks Savannah. I don't know. I've never I've never owned

780
00:47:54,680 --> 00:47:57,080
Speaker 3: an oak savannah. I've never really hunted an oak savannah.

781
00:47:57,120 --> 00:47:59,160
Speaker 3: So I can't tell you how we're gonna hunt an

782
00:47:59,160 --> 00:48:02,000
Speaker 3: oak savannah. I know it's gonna be a huge attractant.

783
00:48:02,400 --> 00:48:05,399
Speaker 3: I know it's gonna there's gonna be deer feeding in there,

784
00:48:05,480 --> 00:48:09,239
Speaker 3: there's gonna be deer bedding in there. So how we

785
00:48:09,600 --> 00:48:20,439
Speaker 3: hunt it? I don't know yet.

786
00:48:22,320 --> 00:48:24,080
Speaker 2: What do you have to do to make it though

787
00:48:24,160 --> 00:48:26,880
Speaker 2: you mentioned that they're gonna plant forbes and grasses, and

788
00:48:26,920 --> 00:48:30,319
Speaker 2: you mentioned that you've got to apply herbicide, But is

789
00:48:30,320 --> 00:48:31,719
Speaker 2: that it is it just gonna be there to come

790
00:48:31,719 --> 00:48:33,400
Speaker 2: in they're in a plant, and then you're gonna do

791
00:48:33,560 --> 00:48:36,840
Speaker 2: an erbicide treatment or two or or what does ongoing

792
00:48:36,920 --> 00:48:37,920
Speaker 2: management look like?

793
00:48:38,080 --> 00:48:42,000
Speaker 3: So we so basically there was this you know, the

794
00:48:44,280 --> 00:48:48,919
Speaker 3: perimeter edge is fuzzy right where it starts and ends,

795
00:48:49,040 --> 00:48:54,440
Speaker 3: but there's basically this northwest quadrant that uh was you know,

796
00:48:54,600 --> 00:48:57,400
Speaker 3: dang near clear cut but a few oaks left, but

797
00:48:57,440 --> 00:48:59,879
Speaker 3: there was slash everywhere. So one of the first things

798
00:48:59,880 --> 00:49:02,160
Speaker 3: that happened as a contractor came in and made these

799
00:49:02,280 --> 00:49:06,600
Speaker 3: big slash piles. They're going to be burned this upcoming winner,

800
00:49:08,080 --> 00:49:11,560
Speaker 3: so that when we seed all of it can be seeded. Right,

801
00:49:14,360 --> 00:49:17,600
Speaker 3: We are going to do two herbicide treatments and basically

802
00:49:17,719 --> 00:49:22,320
Speaker 3: chemically burn it this summer a full full.

803
00:49:22,160 --> 00:49:25,480
Speaker 2: Like like like round up, you know, non selective herbicide

804
00:49:25,600 --> 00:49:26,160
Speaker 2: kill everything.

805
00:49:26,239 --> 00:49:30,520
Speaker 3: You know, the biologist is going to come and once

806
00:49:30,560 --> 00:49:33,759
Speaker 3: we have i don't know, eight inches a foot of

807
00:49:34,320 --> 00:49:37,160
Speaker 3: growth and he can see what sort of is what's

808
00:49:37,280 --> 00:49:39,920
Speaker 3: the competition is going to be what's coming up in

809
00:49:40,000 --> 00:49:42,640
Speaker 3: this clear cut that's responding to all the sunlight. Now

810
00:49:42,920 --> 00:49:45,359
Speaker 3: they're going to come in and see what's there, and

811
00:49:45,400 --> 00:49:48,040
Speaker 3: then they're going to give the recommendation of what kind

812
00:49:48,040 --> 00:49:51,480
Speaker 3: of herb side to buy and use, So I should

813
00:49:51,480 --> 00:49:55,560
Speaker 3: know that in the next month. So yeah, we'll basically

814
00:49:55,800 --> 00:50:00,239
Speaker 3: do two big sprays. The second spray might be only

815
00:50:00,280 --> 00:50:03,920
Speaker 3: spot spot spraying. We'll see, but you basically want a

816
00:50:04,000 --> 00:50:06,279
Speaker 3: new kid so that you know. The seeds that we

817
00:50:06,360 --> 00:50:10,440
Speaker 3: put in have limited competition. So we'll burn the piles

818
00:50:10,480 --> 00:50:16,360
Speaker 3: over the winner and then frost seed late winter and

819
00:50:16,400 --> 00:50:19,320
Speaker 3: then it's basically a waiting game the way they described

820
00:50:19,360 --> 00:50:23,560
Speaker 3: it was with these seeds for you know, to fill

821
00:50:23,560 --> 00:50:27,759
Speaker 3: in the understory. It's a three year process. And the

822
00:50:27,840 --> 00:50:31,239
Speaker 3: first year it sleeps, the second year it creeps, the

823
00:50:31,239 --> 00:50:34,200
Speaker 3: third year it leaps. So the first year you really

824
00:50:34,200 --> 00:50:39,000
Speaker 3: don't see much. It's frustrating with you, like it's hard

825
00:50:39,040 --> 00:50:42,280
Speaker 3: to wait another three five days, and then the second

826
00:50:42,320 --> 00:50:45,839
Speaker 3: year it's kind of creeping along. You see some response,

827
00:50:46,320 --> 00:50:48,720
Speaker 3: and then he's like the third year you'll have stuff

828
00:50:48,719 --> 00:50:53,319
Speaker 3: that's over your head and it'll be flourishing. So that

829
00:50:53,480 --> 00:50:56,640
Speaker 3: is basically, well, that's to make it to that point

830
00:50:56,760 --> 00:51:03,000
Speaker 3: and then it'll it'll go into a a fire cycle

831
00:51:03,120 --> 00:51:06,319
Speaker 3: where we will I don't know if it'll be every

832
00:51:06,440 --> 00:51:09,759
Speaker 3: year or every other year, but we will burn that.

833
00:51:12,360 --> 00:51:15,520
Speaker 3: You know, there's like a quadrant that's probably about five acres,

834
00:51:15,520 --> 00:51:18,080
Speaker 3: and then I've got two kind of separate openings that

835
00:51:18,120 --> 00:51:22,160
Speaker 3: are that are an acre a piece, and we'll burn those,

836
00:51:22,239 --> 00:51:24,640
Speaker 3: like I said, every year every two years. We just

837
00:51:24,680 --> 00:51:27,640
Speaker 3: had to kind of see what's the best for it,

838
00:51:27,800 --> 00:51:31,120
Speaker 3: you know, and timing, you know, if it's best to

839
00:51:31,160 --> 00:51:33,400
Speaker 3: do a you know, a dormance season burn or a

840
00:51:33,440 --> 00:51:36,759
Speaker 3: growing season burn. I mean that's all to be determined,

841
00:51:37,040 --> 00:51:40,799
Speaker 3: but that you know, that's basically the management plan for

842
00:51:40,880 --> 00:51:42,399
Speaker 3: the Oak Savanna.

843
00:51:42,640 --> 00:51:46,280
Speaker 2: What's your experience been so far in these early stages

844
00:51:46,480 --> 00:51:49,040
Speaker 2: working with that Fish and Wildlife Partners program?

845
00:51:50,200 --> 00:51:55,680
Speaker 3: Incredible? So we I also you know, called everybody always

846
00:51:55,800 --> 00:51:59,399
Speaker 3: talks about in our CS, right, I called them and said, hey,

847
00:52:00,000 --> 00:52:04,080
Speaker 3: don't you guys come out, and they're I think very

848
00:52:04,120 --> 00:52:09,319
Speaker 3: willing also to you know, help give money, help you

849
00:52:09,400 --> 00:52:13,680
Speaker 3: accomplish this, you know, conservation work on your property. But

850
00:52:13,920 --> 00:52:16,839
Speaker 3: like they didn't really find anything that was appealing on

851
00:52:16,880 --> 00:52:18,920
Speaker 3: my property. Now, they also went and walked some of

852
00:52:18,960 --> 00:52:22,919
Speaker 3: the you know, my adjoining landowners property and they did

853
00:52:22,960 --> 00:52:26,279
Speaker 3: find like a giant, you know, almost an acre of

854
00:52:26,960 --> 00:52:31,080
Speaker 3: buckthorn that they'd be very happy to help kill off. Right,

855
00:52:31,200 --> 00:52:34,960
Speaker 3: So they're working with that landowner and you know, through

856
00:52:34,960 --> 00:52:37,319
Speaker 3: some partnership figuring out how to how to whack that.

857
00:52:37,920 --> 00:52:42,040
Speaker 3: So that would be a tip to anybody. It's like, hey,

858
00:52:42,040 --> 00:52:45,440
Speaker 3: if the NRCS didn't necessarily find, you know, something to

859
00:52:45,480 --> 00:52:50,319
Speaker 3: help you with, like keep asking and calling uh other

860
00:52:51,120 --> 00:52:57,000
Speaker 3: other folks other you know, uh, I guess government conservation groups,

861
00:52:57,440 --> 00:53:01,719
Speaker 3: because there's probably somebody out there that will see, you know,

862
00:53:01,800 --> 00:53:04,840
Speaker 3: something beneficial that can be done on your property that'll

863
00:53:05,000 --> 00:53:09,160
Speaker 3: benefit them, benefit the public, benefit wildlife, and benefit you.

864
00:53:10,520 --> 00:53:14,120
Speaker 3: But yeah, these guys were like I think the first

865
00:53:14,120 --> 00:53:17,799
Speaker 3: time I talked to them was early January, and then

866
00:53:18,120 --> 00:53:21,399
Speaker 3: by late January they had walked it, they had sent

867
00:53:21,440 --> 00:53:24,799
Speaker 3: me a proposal, and then basically the balls in my

868
00:53:24,880 --> 00:53:27,120
Speaker 3: court to decide, well, you know, do I want to

869
00:53:28,320 --> 00:53:31,160
Speaker 3: because if you look at you know, financially split in

870
00:53:31,239 --> 00:53:34,640
Speaker 3: twenty five K down the middle just to do habitat work,

871
00:53:34,719 --> 00:53:37,799
Speaker 3: that's not in my budget. But knowing that I could

872
00:53:37,840 --> 00:53:40,600
Speaker 3: have some friends that would maybe help me burn these piles.

873
00:53:41,200 --> 00:53:43,520
Speaker 3: I could have you know, my dad and his buddies

874
00:53:43,520 --> 00:53:46,080
Speaker 3: come up and do the herbicide treatments, you know, all

875
00:53:46,080 --> 00:53:47,839
Speaker 3: of a sudden, that brought down the costs a lot.

876
00:53:47,920 --> 00:53:51,520
Speaker 3: So once we decided to sign on and go forward

877
00:53:51,520 --> 00:53:55,120
Speaker 3: with the project, I think they had a contractor out

878
00:53:55,160 --> 00:54:00,640
Speaker 3: there within a couple of weeks to start doing the piling.

879
00:54:01,760 --> 00:54:04,359
Speaker 3: That guy got that knocked out in I don't know,

880
00:54:04,520 --> 00:54:08,839
Speaker 3: six seven days, and so basically the next step now

881
00:54:09,000 --> 00:54:12,719
Speaker 3: is is like seeing what's going to grow and then

882
00:54:12,760 --> 00:54:17,920
Speaker 3: doing the herbicide application. So overall, I'd say, yeah, nothing

883
00:54:17,960 --> 00:54:22,360
Speaker 3: but good things. These guys have been, you know, on it,

884
00:54:22,640 --> 00:54:27,600
Speaker 3: moving quickly and getting stuff done. So it's been, uh,

885
00:54:27,680 --> 00:54:28,319
Speaker 3: it's been great.

886
00:54:29,000 --> 00:54:31,640
Speaker 2: Do you know. I know you got connected through Doug,

887
00:54:31,880 --> 00:54:33,560
Speaker 2: But do you know if this is if this is

888
00:54:33,600 --> 00:54:37,320
Speaker 2: a program that any person could possibly get involved? Like

889
00:54:37,360 --> 00:54:40,359
Speaker 2: could any random guy like me? I call the US

890
00:54:40,400 --> 00:54:42,960
Speaker 2: Fish and Wildlife local offices and be like, Hey, is

891
00:54:42,960 --> 00:54:45,160
Speaker 2: there an opportunity for my property? Can can anyone get

892
00:54:45,160 --> 00:54:46,600
Speaker 2: involved in this? What's that look like? Do you do?

893
00:54:46,680 --> 00:54:46,880
Speaker 2: You know?

894
00:54:47,560 --> 00:54:51,719
Speaker 3: No? Literally, I just before we started talking today, I

895
00:54:51,880 --> 00:54:57,839
Speaker 3: just googled like partners Fish and Wildlife. We use Fish

896
00:54:57,840 --> 00:55:02,440
Speaker 3: and Wildlife Service, and that pay comes up and you

897
00:55:02,480 --> 00:55:05,600
Speaker 3: don't have to scroll, but you know to two scrolls

898
00:55:05,600 --> 00:55:09,840
Speaker 3: with the fingers, and there's a there's a header that

899
00:55:09,880 --> 00:55:13,160
Speaker 3: says how to get started, and you probably just need

900
00:55:13,200 --> 00:55:16,600
Speaker 3: to find the biologist in your area and make a

901
00:55:16,600 --> 00:55:20,319
Speaker 3: phone call. And then oh literally says a phone call

902
00:55:20,400 --> 00:55:23,440
Speaker 3: or email is all it takes to get started. Contact

903
00:55:23,440 --> 00:55:26,759
Speaker 3: your state coordinator to schedule an official an initial site visit,

904
00:55:27,360 --> 00:55:30,080
Speaker 3: and learn how Partners for Fish and Wildlife can help you.

905
00:55:30,680 --> 00:55:32,399
Speaker 2: There you go, and it's great.

906
00:55:32,400 --> 00:55:36,480
Speaker 3: It's a great page because it like show there's like

907
00:55:36,600 --> 00:55:40,360
Speaker 3: laws and regulations around this legislation and economic impact and

908
00:55:40,400 --> 00:55:44,880
Speaker 3: it's all there so you can see, like, you know,

909
00:55:44,960 --> 00:55:48,320
Speaker 3: the benefits of why the government might want to help

910
00:55:48,960 --> 00:55:51,120
Speaker 3: private landowners make better habitat.

911
00:55:51,640 --> 00:55:54,600
Speaker 2: Yeah, so so that's your big one. I mean that

912
00:55:54,880 --> 00:55:57,279
Speaker 2: this project the Oak Savannah is the clear cut the

913
00:55:57,320 --> 00:56:01,560
Speaker 2: logging there that really is that's going to change everything

914
00:56:01,800 --> 00:56:02,320
Speaker 2: on that part.

915
00:56:02,360 --> 00:56:07,160
Speaker 3: It's it's already changed it. I mean, a clearcut is

916
00:56:07,200 --> 00:56:11,799
Speaker 3: as it's a change, all right, you know.

917
00:56:11,960 --> 00:56:13,640
Speaker 2: Yeah, you get to see it for the first time,

918
00:56:13,760 --> 00:56:14,839
Speaker 2: just a couple of weeks ago, right.

919
00:56:14,880 --> 00:56:18,719
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. And it's interesting, how, you know, my own

920
00:56:19,480 --> 00:56:22,440
Speaker 3: sort of view on it and mindset has changed, because

921
00:56:22,480 --> 00:56:25,279
Speaker 3: I think even ten years ago, I would have been

922
00:56:25,320 --> 00:56:29,719
Speaker 3: like clearcut, you know, who wants anything to do with

923
00:56:29,760 --> 00:56:33,919
Speaker 3: a clear cut? And now I'm like, proud to have

924
00:56:34,280 --> 00:56:38,600
Speaker 3: Steve call me clear cut Yanni. But it's interesting, you know,

925
00:56:38,640 --> 00:56:42,319
Speaker 3: we have often we have invited the neighbors over, you know,

926
00:56:42,400 --> 00:56:44,399
Speaker 3: for a beer or whatever and chit chat. And I've

927
00:56:44,400 --> 00:56:47,320
Speaker 3: had a couple of neighbors be like, what are you doing,

928
00:56:48,160 --> 00:56:51,959
Speaker 3: you know, like very skeptical about like, I'm not gonna

929
00:56:51,960 --> 00:56:54,640
Speaker 3: do that to my woods. Look over there, it's beautiful

930
00:56:55,160 --> 00:56:58,120
Speaker 3: sixty to eighty year old trees, and I love the

931
00:56:58,160 --> 00:57:01,759
Speaker 3: fall colors and all that. I'm like, hey, if that's

932
00:57:01,760 --> 00:57:05,200
Speaker 3: what you want, there's nothing wrong with it. If you

933
00:57:05,239 --> 00:57:08,160
Speaker 3: wanted to produce higher timber value, you might want to

934
00:57:08,200 --> 00:57:10,799
Speaker 3: go in there and you know, cut some of the

935
00:57:11,440 --> 00:57:15,440
Speaker 3: ones down so you can let the good ones flourish.

936
00:57:15,520 --> 00:57:19,000
Speaker 3: But it's not the best habitat right, Like when you

937
00:57:19,040 --> 00:57:21,080
Speaker 3: can walk through there. I don't know who said this one,

938
00:57:21,080 --> 00:57:23,960
Speaker 3: but this is a great way to look at it.

939
00:57:24,000 --> 00:57:26,600
Speaker 3: But like, if you can walk through your woods and

940
00:57:26,720 --> 00:57:30,080
Speaker 3: like shorts and flip flops and comfortably just cruise around,

941
00:57:30,960 --> 00:57:34,960
Speaker 3: it's not good for wildlife, right, Like you want the

942
00:57:35,040 --> 00:57:36,800
Speaker 3: kind of habitat where you're like, oh, I better put

943
00:57:36,840 --> 00:57:40,360
Speaker 3: on some car hearts in my work boots and definitely

944
00:57:40,360 --> 00:57:42,680
Speaker 3: long sleeve shirt if I'm going to go just marching

945
00:57:42,760 --> 00:57:47,320
Speaker 3: through there, Like that's where the deer and everything else

946
00:57:47,360 --> 00:57:53,160
Speaker 3: wants to be. Right. So it's been interesting because you know,

947
00:57:53,200 --> 00:57:55,479
Speaker 3: it makes you question it yourself, like am I doing

948
00:57:55,520 --> 00:57:58,720
Speaker 3: the right thing right? And obviously I've never done it,

949
00:57:58,760 --> 00:58:01,880
Speaker 3: so I'm sort of justking on what I'm believing that

950
00:58:02,080 --> 00:58:04,960
Speaker 3: in three to five years, you know, we're really going

951
00:58:05,040 --> 00:58:09,120
Speaker 3: to see the responses to all of it. But yeah,

952
00:58:09,600 --> 00:58:12,600
Speaker 3: major change, but I will say that. So we have,

953
00:58:12,800 --> 00:58:17,840
Speaker 3: like again the seven acres of this oak savannah and

954
00:58:17,880 --> 00:58:20,800
Speaker 3: these two wildlife openings are connected. But I was telling

955
00:58:20,840 --> 00:58:23,920
Speaker 3: you earlier the whole southern half was just this and

956
00:58:24,040 --> 00:58:27,040
Speaker 3: you saw it. To me, it looked like a wildlife desert.

957
00:58:27,080 --> 00:58:30,680
Speaker 3: It was just these It had been pretty close to

958
00:58:30,720 --> 00:58:34,480
Speaker 3: Clearcut in the early nineties and then it was just

959
00:58:34,560 --> 00:58:41,720
Speaker 3: this nothing. But you know, three to six inch white pines, aspens, maples,

960
00:58:41,840 --> 00:58:45,400
Speaker 3: some oaks mixed in and just like all competing against

961
00:58:45,440 --> 00:58:49,240
Speaker 3: each other, had never been thinned, and the understory was

962
00:58:49,520 --> 00:58:52,120
Speaker 3: nothing like if you got down at you know, deer level,

963
00:58:52,400 --> 00:58:55,160
Speaker 3: you could pretty much see across the whole property, right

964
00:58:56,400 --> 00:58:59,800
Speaker 3: and sure there was a few trails going through there.

965
00:59:00,000 --> 00:59:02,560
Speaker 3: You'd find a couple of scrapes, but the deer were

966
00:59:02,560 --> 00:59:04,000
Speaker 3: not hanging out there by.

967
00:59:03,880 --> 00:59:06,800
Speaker 2: Any It was past past their territory for sure.

968
00:59:07,000 --> 00:59:09,480
Speaker 3: Yeah, pastor, that's a good way to put it. So

969
00:59:10,680 --> 00:59:15,040
Speaker 3: that one probably that section, that twenty acres probably took

970
00:59:15,160 --> 00:59:20,440
Speaker 3: the most thinking than any other section of like what's

971
00:59:20,480 --> 00:59:21,920
Speaker 3: going to be the plan? How are we going to

972
00:59:21,960 --> 00:59:27,120
Speaker 3: accomplish this because most of its non merchantable timber. Right,

973
00:59:27,200 --> 00:59:29,720
Speaker 3: So again you're like, oh, I have a lagger here,

974
00:59:30,160 --> 00:59:34,680
Speaker 3: but probably he would rather not touch that twenty acres

975
00:59:34,800 --> 00:59:38,960
Speaker 3: at all, just working the northern twenty acres, work with

976
00:59:39,120 --> 00:59:43,160
Speaker 3: giant oaks and giant aspens, maybe a few big maples.

977
00:59:43,760 --> 00:59:46,520
Speaker 3: Take those nice big trees out and be done with it.

978
00:59:47,120 --> 00:59:50,040
Speaker 3: Like when they're looking at pulp number one, the pulp

979
00:59:50,080 --> 00:59:53,640
Speaker 3: market kind of stinks right now, So like just finding

980
00:59:53,960 --> 00:59:56,320
Speaker 3: a place to get rid of the pulp wasn't easy.

981
00:59:57,640 --> 01:00:00,600
Speaker 3: And then, like the lagger told, and we did a

982
01:00:00,640 --> 01:00:04,680
Speaker 3: walk through when I was there, he spent eighty hours

983
01:00:04,720 --> 01:00:07,240
Speaker 3: in a harvester, which is that's the machine that has

984
01:00:07,280 --> 01:00:10,280
Speaker 3: the big arm that can grab the tree, cut the tree,

985
01:00:10,720 --> 01:00:15,080
Speaker 3: and then measure it and cut whatever lengths you've set

986
01:00:15,120 --> 01:00:19,680
Speaker 3: it to cut out. He spent eighty hours cutting and

987
01:00:19,760 --> 01:00:24,920
Speaker 3: stacking non merchantable timber. Okay, so two full weeks. And

988
01:00:24,960 --> 01:00:27,880
Speaker 3: I forget what he says he charges per hour sitting

989
01:00:27,920 --> 01:00:30,880
Speaker 3: in that machine, but it's in the hundreds of dollars, right,

990
01:00:31,040 --> 01:00:37,320
Speaker 3: so do the math. I think that you know, he's

991
01:00:37,360 --> 01:00:40,120
Speaker 3: massaging it because he wants me to be happy. But

992
01:00:40,200 --> 01:00:41,840
Speaker 3: I keep telling him like, look, man, I don't want

993
01:00:41,880 --> 01:00:45,440
Speaker 3: you to go broke doing this project, so we need to,

994
01:00:45,520 --> 01:00:51,640
Speaker 3: you know, find the happy medium. And there was all

995
01:00:51,720 --> 01:00:54,560
Speaker 3: kinds of ideas, you know, throwing around. It was like, well,

996
01:00:54,600 --> 01:00:56,720
Speaker 3: don't do anything, and you're just gonna have to do

997
01:00:56,800 --> 01:00:59,120
Speaker 3: it by hand, which is like, oh my gosh, you

998
01:00:59,120 --> 01:01:02,520
Speaker 3: know Acres with me and Asaw like that's you know,

999
01:01:03,000 --> 01:01:06,720
Speaker 3: who knows how many years work that would take, you know,

1000
01:01:06,760 --> 01:01:10,280
Speaker 3: Matt Ross and the nda was like just do strips

1001
01:01:10,480 --> 01:01:12,440
Speaker 3: do like a big turkey futt. You could like sit

1002
01:01:12,480 --> 01:01:14,560
Speaker 3: in one spot and look down strips and kind of

1003
01:01:14,600 --> 01:01:17,560
Speaker 3: hunt hunt the whole thing that way, and then you'll

1004
01:01:17,600 --> 01:01:20,280
Speaker 3: limit it. Because everybody thought like, if you actually clear

1005
01:01:20,360 --> 01:01:23,280
Speaker 3: cut it and you can take out your pulp woards,

1006
01:01:23,320 --> 01:01:26,120
Speaker 3: you're still gonna have so much slash on the ground

1007
01:01:26,200 --> 01:01:30,720
Speaker 3: that regeneration is going to be tough. Critters moving through

1008
01:01:30,760 --> 01:01:33,320
Speaker 3: it is going to be tough. Well in the end,

1009
01:01:33,480 --> 01:01:36,680
Speaker 3: I talked my logger into basically like I'm like, okay,

1010
01:01:36,840 --> 01:01:41,040
Speaker 3: take out all the pines, all the you know, maples,

1011
01:01:41,080 --> 01:01:44,360
Speaker 3: all the basically anything that wasn't an oak, and we'll

1012
01:01:44,360 --> 01:01:46,920
Speaker 3: just try to get rid of it through the pulp market.

1013
01:01:47,320 --> 01:01:49,880
Speaker 3: Anything left, we'll try to pile as best we can,

1014
01:01:50,360 --> 01:01:56,040
Speaker 3: and then we'll try to burn these piles. And uh,

1015
01:01:56,080 --> 01:02:00,640
Speaker 3: he executed against as best as he that he could.

1016
01:02:01,080 --> 01:02:03,640
Speaker 3: It definitely costs him a little bit. And again, I

1017
01:02:03,640 --> 01:02:05,400
Speaker 3: don't want the guy to go in the red on.

1018
01:02:05,320 --> 01:02:05,680
Speaker 2: It, but.

1019
01:02:07,720 --> 01:02:11,200
Speaker 3: There's so many oaks left. The positive of it is

1020
01:02:11,240 --> 01:02:15,280
Speaker 3: that there's so many four to eight inch oaks left

1021
01:02:15,600 --> 01:02:18,120
Speaker 3: that it almost doesn't look like a clear cut. It

1022
01:02:18,200 --> 01:02:21,480
Speaker 3: just looks like an oak stand it's only fifteen to

1023
01:02:21,480 --> 01:02:24,600
Speaker 3: twenty years old, even though it's actually thirty. But because

1024
01:02:24,640 --> 01:02:27,200
Speaker 3: these oaks were suppressed by all this competition, you know,

1025
01:02:27,240 --> 01:02:30,280
Speaker 3: they didn't get big. So I'm going to say, in

1026
01:02:30,320 --> 01:02:33,480
Speaker 3: the year or two, what's left is gonna really just

1027
01:02:34,040 --> 01:02:39,680
Speaker 3: pop and we're gonna have it's gonna be thicker than

1028
01:02:39,680 --> 01:02:44,040
Speaker 3: an oak savannah, maybe an oak woodland, because there's definitely

1029
01:02:44,040 --> 01:02:46,160
Speaker 3: some spots where there were no oaks, and so you

1030
01:02:46,240 --> 01:02:48,640
Speaker 3: got an acre or two that's just gonna be open

1031
01:02:49,080 --> 01:02:51,600
Speaker 3: and stuff coming up. The cool thing about it is

1032
01:02:51,840 --> 01:02:55,800
Speaker 3: because we're chemically burning this oak savannah and it's not

1033
01:02:55,840 --> 01:02:59,959
Speaker 3: gonna really come to fruition for three years. The southern

1034
01:03:00,080 --> 01:03:03,800
Speaker 3: and half where we've got these you know whatever they are,

1035
01:03:03,880 --> 01:03:07,080
Speaker 3: thirty forty foot skinny oak standing. We've got these two

1036
01:03:07,120 --> 01:03:09,840
Speaker 3: wildlife openings in there that will be planted with this grass.

1037
01:03:09,880 --> 01:03:14,000
Speaker 3: But everything in between that is like slash piles, some

1038
01:03:14,560 --> 01:03:17,960
Speaker 3: debris on the ground, Like whatever is gonna grow now

1039
01:03:18,000 --> 01:03:20,480
Speaker 3: with all the sunlight, it's gonna go bananas in there.

1040
01:03:20,640 --> 01:03:24,760
Speaker 3: We're not gonna really touch that. I think even just

1041
01:03:24,880 --> 01:03:32,320
Speaker 3: this fall, like it's gonna produce amazing bedding, cover and food,

1042
01:03:32,480 --> 01:03:34,400
Speaker 3: right like that's gonna be the if you're gonna hunt

1043
01:03:34,520 --> 01:03:37,200
Speaker 3: our forty, Like, you're probably gonna want to concentrate in

1044
01:03:37,200 --> 01:03:40,760
Speaker 3: that southern twenty because it's gonna have the cover, it's

1045
01:03:40,760 --> 01:03:44,360
Speaker 3: gonna have the thickness, it's gonna have food that the

1046
01:03:44,400 --> 01:03:46,120
Speaker 3: deer gonna want to be hanging out and they're not

1047
01:03:46,120 --> 01:03:48,880
Speaker 3: gonna hang out where you know, it's been it's been

1048
01:03:49,000 --> 01:03:51,640
Speaker 3: nuked by chemicals for you know, twice and there's really

1049
01:03:51,640 --> 01:03:56,200
Speaker 3: nothing growing, right, so I'm pretty excited about it. That's

1050
01:03:56,200 --> 01:03:58,200
Speaker 3: the one where you don't really we don't really know

1051
01:03:58,280 --> 01:04:01,080
Speaker 3: what it's gonna look like. And again, there's plenty of

1052
01:04:01,120 --> 01:04:03,720
Speaker 3: oaks standing where I'm like, oh, that's pretty cool. Like

1053
01:04:04,040 --> 01:04:05,960
Speaker 3: it's not a full clear cut, there's a lot of

1054
01:04:06,000 --> 01:04:09,800
Speaker 3: trees standing. They're gonna flourish now because they have no competition.

1055
01:04:10,080 --> 01:04:14,240
Speaker 3: Hopefully they'll start throwing some acorns and we'll get some

1056
01:04:14,280 --> 01:04:20,640
Speaker 3: oak regeneration coming up in there, and it's gonna be thick,

1057
01:04:21,200 --> 01:04:23,640
Speaker 3: which is great, right, Like I'm gonna have this oak

1058
01:04:23,720 --> 01:04:26,800
Speaker 3: savannah that's gonna be a little bit more prairie grassy,

1059
01:04:26,960 --> 01:04:31,040
Speaker 3: and then I'm gonna have hopefully this just crazy thick

1060
01:04:31,760 --> 01:04:37,080
Speaker 3: slash pile oak regeneration stuff. That's it's it's gonna be

1061
01:04:37,160 --> 01:04:39,720
Speaker 3: nasty where like you're not gonna want to walk through it.

1062
01:04:41,440 --> 01:04:46,360
Speaker 3: But again, we reinvested all of our profits back into

1063
01:04:46,800 --> 01:04:50,200
Speaker 3: the access and that's kind of what what you know

1064
01:04:50,560 --> 01:04:54,640
Speaker 3: brings it all together is that right now, the bulldozers

1065
01:04:54,640 --> 01:04:57,120
Speaker 3: in there, and we're gonna have a it's a square.

1066
01:04:57,480 --> 01:05:00,120
Speaker 3: We're gonna have a perimeter road that goes on on

1067
01:05:00,160 --> 01:05:02,960
Speaker 3: three sides because our main access road is on the

1068
01:05:03,040 --> 01:05:05,720
Speaker 3: forest side or the main whatever, the main road is

1069
01:05:05,760 --> 01:05:09,440
Speaker 3: on the fourth side. But he's putting in a full perimeter.

1070
01:05:10,920 --> 01:05:13,520
Speaker 3: And then we're gonna have a east west road that

1071
01:05:13,680 --> 01:05:16,200
Speaker 3: kind of meanders through it. We're gonna have a north

1072
01:05:16,240 --> 01:05:19,040
Speaker 3: south road that meanders through it just about through the middle.

1073
01:05:19,560 --> 01:05:22,479
Speaker 3: And then I've got a couple other strategic spots where

1074
01:05:22,520 --> 01:05:26,160
Speaker 3: he's gonna do not quite full roads, but more trails

1075
01:05:26,680 --> 01:05:29,960
Speaker 3: because again I need access, I need fire breaks. And

1076
01:05:30,000 --> 01:05:33,240
Speaker 3: then I'm gonna see all these roads with you know,

1077
01:05:33,360 --> 01:05:37,760
Speaker 3: some basic clover mix of some sort, right, so they'll

1078
01:05:37,760 --> 01:05:42,480
Speaker 3: also act as deer travel ways, you know, food plots,

1079
01:05:42,520 --> 01:05:47,360
Speaker 3: I guess. But that will make it so that again

1080
01:05:47,440 --> 01:05:50,760
Speaker 3: my dad can very easily take the southern perimeter road

1081
01:05:51,280 --> 01:05:54,960
Speaker 3: park not have to walk far, get into a stand

1082
01:05:55,520 --> 01:05:59,760
Speaker 3: and be almost right into the middle of what's gonna be, well,

1083
01:05:59,840 --> 01:06:03,400
Speaker 3: not the middle, but like the middle east west. But

1084
01:06:03,440 --> 01:06:05,840
Speaker 3: what's gonna be this giant, you know, five six acre

1085
01:06:05,920 --> 01:06:08,840
Speaker 3: bedding thicket. I'm hoping and be able to hunt the

1086
01:06:08,920 --> 01:06:09,400
Speaker 3: edge of it.

1087
01:06:10,080 --> 01:06:12,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's gonna be. It's gonna be pretty sweet. Now,

1088
01:06:12,840 --> 01:06:15,960
Speaker 2: this is all in the southern part. The northern part

1089
01:06:16,160 --> 01:06:19,360
Speaker 2: is where you are primarily leaving that for your di

1090
01:06:19,840 --> 01:06:20,680
Speaker 2: y T S.

1091
01:06:20,720 --> 01:06:24,360
Speaker 3: I work right, well, the northwest corners where that oak

1092
01:06:24,440 --> 01:06:26,680
Speaker 3: savannah is the.

1093
01:06:26,680 --> 01:06:28,840
Speaker 2: Ridge though, is the north like it's northeast then right?

1094
01:06:29,080 --> 01:06:29,400
Speaker 3: Yeah?

1095
01:06:29,920 --> 01:06:34,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I is so what exactly are you doing

1096
01:06:34,480 --> 01:06:36,680
Speaker 2: with that? What are you what are you hoping to

1097
01:06:36,720 --> 01:06:38,800
Speaker 2: achieve there? And what have you actually been doing there?

1098
01:06:39,640 --> 01:06:43,680
Speaker 3: Yep? What's cool about that is that that is one

1099
01:06:43,720 --> 01:06:46,640
Speaker 3: of the things I probably started doing right after you

1100
01:06:46,720 --> 01:06:48,200
Speaker 3: and I walk the property.

1101
01:06:48,400 --> 01:06:49,720
Speaker 2: Yep, and.

1102
01:06:51,240 --> 01:06:55,479
Speaker 3: You know, bought a brand new two sixty one and

1103
01:06:55,960 --> 01:06:57,600
Speaker 3: all the goodies that go with it and have been

1104
01:06:57,680 --> 01:07:01,560
Speaker 3: you know, keeping that chain nice and sharp, but mostly

1105
01:07:01,640 --> 01:07:05,120
Speaker 3: just started with by just dropping trees. And again it

1106
01:07:05,240 --> 01:07:10,760
Speaker 3: was that kind of northern part was a pretty good

1107
01:07:10,800 --> 01:07:15,320
Speaker 3: mix of oaks. We've got some white pine, we've got

1108
01:07:15,360 --> 01:07:19,320
Speaker 3: some jack pine, we've got some red pine. There are

1109
01:07:19,360 --> 01:07:22,320
Speaker 3: some maples in there too, not so much on the

1110
01:07:22,360 --> 01:07:24,240
Speaker 3: ridge because I don't think that soil is great for

1111
01:07:24,320 --> 01:07:29,480
Speaker 3: those maples. But really just getting rid of I probably went,

1112
01:07:30,200 --> 01:07:33,120
Speaker 3: I did, I went again, felt like a lot. And

1113
01:07:33,160 --> 01:07:34,440
Speaker 3: now when you go back there, you go, oh, I

1114
01:07:34,440 --> 01:07:36,760
Speaker 3: could probably still do more, but I don't know if

1115
01:07:36,800 --> 01:07:40,080
Speaker 3: I quite reached fifty percent, like right on the ridgetop,

1116
01:07:40,560 --> 01:07:43,880
Speaker 3: but it was a spot where you, because of canopy

1117
01:07:43,880 --> 01:07:45,760
Speaker 3: and the way the ridgetop rolls a little bit, you

1118
01:07:45,800 --> 01:07:49,480
Speaker 3: couldn't really see from one end to the other. But

1119
01:07:49,640 --> 01:07:52,720
Speaker 3: now you can. It's open enough now, and I mean

1120
01:07:52,760 --> 01:07:57,160
Speaker 3: obviously the understory's coming up, but it's open enough that

1121
01:07:57,280 --> 01:08:00,680
Speaker 3: you can see through there. And that's it interesting thing

1122
01:08:00,760 --> 01:08:03,280
Speaker 3: too that it takes a while to understand, and like

1123
01:08:04,360 --> 01:08:07,320
Speaker 3: the difference between being a sea like a whole ridge

1124
01:08:07,360 --> 01:08:10,440
Speaker 3: top as a human standing there with my eyes at

1125
01:08:10,480 --> 01:08:13,320
Speaker 3: six feet roughly, or getting up into a tree ten

1126
01:08:13,400 --> 01:08:17,479
Speaker 3: or twenty feet like as long as it's thick from

1127
01:08:17,560 --> 01:08:20,880
Speaker 3: four feet down low, the deer gonna love it. Right,

1128
01:08:21,479 --> 01:08:23,200
Speaker 3: And sometimes you can look at and go, oh, but

1129
01:08:23,240 --> 01:08:25,760
Speaker 3: it's so wide open and I can see all of it.

1130
01:08:26,280 --> 01:08:28,720
Speaker 3: But all you gotta do is like crouch down to

1131
01:08:28,800 --> 01:08:30,720
Speaker 3: three or four feet and you're like, oh, no, I

1132
01:08:30,800 --> 01:08:33,200
Speaker 3: can't actually see all of it. And this is what

1133
01:08:33,240 --> 01:08:36,439
Speaker 3: they're talking about with that understory coming in and being thick,

1134
01:08:37,320 --> 01:08:39,920
Speaker 3: and the deer being happy and feeling secure in here.

1135
01:08:41,360 --> 01:08:44,080
Speaker 3: And what's been great is that you know, that's already

1136
01:08:44,120 --> 01:08:52,639
Speaker 3: now three four years behind us, and like the the

1137
01:08:52,720 --> 01:08:57,000
Speaker 3: positive reaction from both deer and turkeys, which is what

1138
01:08:57,040 --> 01:09:00,920
Speaker 3: I mostly pay attention to, is incredible. I had before

1139
01:09:01,240 --> 01:09:04,000
Speaker 3: I did the work, I had a camera in this saddle.

1140
01:09:05,200 --> 01:09:07,719
Speaker 3: I'd get a picture of a deer once a week,

1141
01:09:08,160 --> 01:09:09,960
Speaker 3: you know, because it was just like a saddle in

1142
01:09:10,040 --> 01:09:12,840
Speaker 3: some close canopy woods. It wasn't really a saddle that

1143
01:09:12,920 --> 01:09:16,800
Speaker 3: connected two major whatever food sources or betting areas or nothing.

1144
01:09:16,840 --> 01:09:19,360
Speaker 3: It was just like kind of a random saddle. But

1145
01:09:19,479 --> 01:09:22,280
Speaker 3: now that it's open and it's got you know, but

1146
01:09:22,360 --> 01:09:25,200
Speaker 3: it's got plenty of cover on it. Like there's deer

1147
01:09:25,479 --> 01:09:28,200
Speaker 3: pictures on it almost every day. There's turkey pictures on

1148
01:09:28,240 --> 01:09:31,120
Speaker 3: it every two or three days, and like just this morning,

1149
01:09:31,160 --> 01:09:35,280
Speaker 3: I was looking at my Moultary app and there's a

1150
01:09:35,320 --> 01:09:38,799
Speaker 3: dope bedded like right in front of the you know camera.

1151
01:09:39,320 --> 01:09:41,759
Speaker 3: To me, there's like, I don't feel like there's nothing

1152
01:09:41,840 --> 01:09:45,920
Speaker 3: more exciting, whether I'm actually hunting or whether it's a

1153
01:09:46,080 --> 01:09:48,280
Speaker 3: it's where I've put a camera. But if I see

1154
01:09:48,280 --> 01:09:52,360
Speaker 3: a deer bed down, I'm like, okay, I'm doing things right,

1155
01:09:53,200 --> 01:09:56,519
Speaker 3: Like that deer is so comfortable and so stoked it's

1156
01:09:56,560 --> 01:09:58,400
Speaker 3: going to just go ahead and sleep and rest here

1157
01:09:58,439 --> 01:10:02,600
Speaker 3: for a little while and obviously feeding around too. So

1158
01:10:02,960 --> 01:10:06,519
Speaker 3: the actual work, I would say, it's basically just been

1159
01:10:06,520 --> 01:10:10,000
Speaker 3: cutting trees. And then once I cut the trees, if

1160
01:10:10,000 --> 01:10:11,760
Speaker 3: I feel like there needs to be a little bit

1161
01:10:11,800 --> 01:10:14,600
Speaker 3: of a path because the richetop is eventually going to

1162
01:10:14,680 --> 01:10:20,080
Speaker 3: also be a fire break, so that needs to remain

1163
01:10:20,160 --> 01:10:23,360
Speaker 3: fairly open so that it can be you know, traveled

1164
01:10:24,240 --> 01:10:28,760
Speaker 3: to do that. But yeah, otherwise, like I went in

1165
01:10:28,800 --> 01:10:32,320
Speaker 3: there and some stuff that had already grown up and

1166
01:10:32,400 --> 01:10:35,439
Speaker 3: had gotten you know, over six feet, I just cut

1167
01:10:35,439 --> 01:10:38,719
Speaker 3: it down again, right, Like keep the stuff down close

1168
01:10:38,760 --> 01:10:40,439
Speaker 3: to the ground where the deer can get to it.

1169
01:10:40,880 --> 01:10:41,759
Speaker 3: Are these fall.

1170
01:10:41,560 --> 01:10:44,000
Speaker 2: Cuts be honest or are you hinge cutting or anything

1171
01:10:44,040 --> 01:10:44,360
Speaker 2: like that.

1172
01:10:45,080 --> 01:10:48,080
Speaker 3: So I had it on my to do list this

1173
01:10:48,400 --> 01:10:50,760
Speaker 3: for my spring trip, and I didn't get to do

1174
01:10:50,800 --> 01:10:53,360
Speaker 3: any hinge cutting because I feel like it could use

1175
01:10:53,439 --> 01:10:56,559
Speaker 3: some of that, just a little bit more of that

1176
01:10:56,880 --> 01:11:02,240
Speaker 3: structure cover. But so up until now, I've just been

1177
01:11:02,360 --> 01:11:05,120
Speaker 3: just literally the goal is just like cut the trees

1178
01:11:05,160 --> 01:11:09,280
Speaker 3: down and get sunlight, you know, to the to this area.

1179
01:11:10,320 --> 01:11:13,080
Speaker 3: And that's been like I said, the response has been great,

1180
01:11:13,680 --> 01:11:16,439
Speaker 3: and now I feel like I could manipulate it and

1181
01:11:16,479 --> 01:11:19,519
Speaker 3: make it even a little bit better by actually doing

1182
01:11:19,560 --> 01:11:25,680
Speaker 3: some hinging. I've never done any hinging, so I can't,

1183
01:11:27,320 --> 01:11:31,960
Speaker 3: you know, because hinging is still so controversial, right, I mean,

1184
01:11:32,960 --> 01:11:35,479
Speaker 3: and I guess not that the hinging is controversial, but

1185
01:11:35,640 --> 01:11:39,240
Speaker 3: is it better than if you just knock the tree down? Right,

1186
01:11:40,040 --> 01:11:45,200
Speaker 3: that's sort of the debate. So anyways, I'm definitely gonna

1187
01:11:45,240 --> 01:11:49,240
Speaker 3: try it in like some small little pockets and we'll

1188
01:11:49,240 --> 01:11:54,080
Speaker 3: see how the deer respond to it. But yeah, it's

1189
01:11:54,120 --> 01:11:58,639
Speaker 3: mostly just been like just getting rid of more trees

1190
01:11:58,800 --> 01:12:02,479
Speaker 3: because I think that the answer is sunlight to the

1191
01:12:02,479 --> 01:12:05,599
Speaker 3: forest floor and then you get that food and cover

1192
01:12:05,880 --> 01:12:07,400
Speaker 3: that the deer actually want.

1193
01:12:07,800 --> 01:12:09,920
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, I was just gonna say, you could think

1194
01:12:09,960 --> 01:12:12,280
Speaker 2: about another way, which is rather than getting rid of trees,

1195
01:12:12,400 --> 01:12:16,240
Speaker 2: it's you are adding suddenly you are a sunlight creator.

1196
01:12:16,760 --> 01:12:19,320
Speaker 2: That's the more. You can do that on a lot

1197
01:12:19,360 --> 01:12:22,719
Speaker 2: of properties. Now, you know, it's different some places that's

1198
01:12:22,800 --> 01:12:26,160
Speaker 2: not the limited resource. You know, some places you need

1199
01:12:26,200 --> 01:12:29,559
Speaker 2: the opposite. But so much of the Upper Midwest, like

1200
01:12:29,560 --> 01:12:32,160
Speaker 2: you're talking about, especially the farther north, you go close

1201
01:12:32,280 --> 01:12:37,760
Speaker 2: canopy semi mature, overstocked woodlands like that, you know, they

1202
01:12:37,920 --> 01:12:40,439
Speaker 2: just need sunlight in diversity, you know.

1203
01:12:40,880 --> 01:12:41,680
Speaker 1: So h.

1204
01:12:53,600 --> 01:12:58,120
Speaker 2: So, okay, I want to close with this, Yannie. Given

1205
01:12:58,200 --> 01:13:00,680
Speaker 2: everything you do you just said, given the journey you've

1206
01:13:00,680 --> 01:13:03,240
Speaker 2: been on for the last ten years and especially the

1207
01:13:03,320 --> 01:13:07,080
Speaker 2: last four, you know, you went from being on the couch,

1208
01:13:07,560 --> 01:13:10,880
Speaker 2: you know, metaphorically to being you know, in the race,

1209
01:13:12,120 --> 01:13:15,599
Speaker 2: from from no experience doing this stuff to a land

1210
01:13:15,680 --> 01:13:17,960
Speaker 2: manager that has now been a part of some really

1211
01:13:18,000 --> 01:13:24,600
Speaker 2: significant changes. What would be the three most important lessons

1212
01:13:25,160 --> 01:13:28,759
Speaker 2: you would pass on to someone who's in your shoes

1213
01:13:29,280 --> 01:13:31,920
Speaker 2: five years ago? So somebody right now who was like

1214
01:13:31,960 --> 01:13:35,320
Speaker 2: you five years ago, fresh and not having any done

1215
01:13:35,320 --> 01:13:37,439
Speaker 2: anything like this, but now all of a sudden being like, yeah,

1216
01:13:37,920 --> 01:13:39,880
Speaker 2: I want to try to do this to the family farm,

1217
01:13:39,960 --> 01:13:41,920
Speaker 2: or to this new place I bought, whatever it is.

1218
01:13:42,439 --> 01:13:46,840
Speaker 2: What are the three most important pieces of advice or

1219
01:13:46,920 --> 01:13:48,400
Speaker 2: lessons that you would pass along right now?

1220
01:13:49,160 --> 01:13:57,160
Speaker 3: M get started yesterday, Yeah, because it just it takes time.

1221
01:13:57,640 --> 01:13:59,920
Speaker 3: You know, all of it is more work than you

1222
01:14:00,080 --> 01:14:02,360
Speaker 3: think it's gonna be. You know, I always show up

1223
01:14:02,360 --> 01:14:06,519
Speaker 3: for our spring work trip with like a list so long,

1224
01:14:06,800 --> 01:14:09,439
Speaker 3: and I end up getting through, you know, a quarter

1225
01:14:09,720 --> 01:14:11,200
Speaker 3: or a third of it, and a lot of it

1226
01:14:11,240 --> 01:14:13,720
Speaker 3: is little dinky things like oh yeah, go move some

1227
01:14:13,760 --> 01:14:16,680
Speaker 3: cameras around, or you know, go spray some roads with

1228
01:14:16,840 --> 01:14:19,960
Speaker 3: you know, four gallons of herbicide or whatever. But uh,

1229
01:14:21,200 --> 01:14:24,559
Speaker 3: it's like, yeah, if you're gonna see anything, get done,

1230
01:14:24,720 --> 01:14:28,920
Speaker 3: Like get started. You know, don't be scared to cut trees.

1231
01:14:30,560 --> 01:14:32,800
Speaker 3: You know, make sure you got yourself a nice chainsaw,

1232
01:14:33,040 --> 01:14:35,640
Speaker 3: learn how to use it properly, read that book how

1233
01:14:35,680 --> 01:14:41,200
Speaker 3: to Fell a Tree, and and get started doing that.

1234
01:14:42,200 --> 01:14:47,400
Speaker 3: I don't think that one person with because again it's

1235
01:14:47,439 --> 01:14:49,720
Speaker 3: scary just to start cutting trees down, you know, but

1236
01:14:49,760 --> 01:14:52,280
Speaker 3: you need to identify what trees you know you're cutting.

1237
01:14:52,680 --> 01:14:54,800
Speaker 3: But like for me, it's like I could just walk

1238
01:14:54,800 --> 01:14:59,000
Speaker 3: through the woods and cut hundreds of red maples a day,

1239
01:14:59,320 --> 01:15:04,040
Speaker 3: and I'm not gonna doing any kind of negative you

1240
01:15:04,080 --> 01:15:07,080
Speaker 3: know thing. It's all gonna be positive and I'm not

1241
01:15:07,120 --> 01:15:11,120
Speaker 3: gonna mess anything up, right, So like, identify what it

1242
01:15:11,160 --> 01:15:13,120
Speaker 3: is that you feel like you can't screw up, because

1243
01:15:13,360 --> 01:15:15,320
Speaker 3: you know, first time Doug Durham watched the place with

1244
01:15:15,400 --> 01:15:18,160
Speaker 3: me after I've done TSI, He's like, man cutting a

1245
01:15:18,200 --> 01:15:21,400
Speaker 3: lot of oaks down, you know. I'm like, well, like,

1246
01:15:21,760 --> 01:15:24,120
Speaker 3: if that's all there is and you want to get

1247
01:15:24,320 --> 01:15:26,679
Speaker 3: sunlight to the forest floor, you're gonna have to cut

1248
01:15:26,680 --> 01:15:29,639
Speaker 3: some oaks, right, So what do you do? You pick

1249
01:15:29,760 --> 01:15:32,960
Speaker 3: like the crooked oaks or the ones that don't look

1250
01:15:33,000 --> 01:15:35,400
Speaker 3: like they're producing. If you have time, you could like

1251
01:15:35,520 --> 01:15:38,559
Speaker 3: wait till a good acorn here and go, oh, this

1252
01:15:38,600 --> 01:15:41,400
Speaker 3: one's got great acorns. These three don't. Then you cut

1253
01:15:41,400 --> 01:15:44,800
Speaker 3: the ones that aren't producing. I didn't have that time.

1254
01:15:44,840 --> 01:15:47,320
Speaker 3: But anyways, even like when you're looking at a stand

1255
01:15:47,320 --> 01:15:49,599
Speaker 3: of oaks, you can pick the ones that you're like, oh,

1256
01:15:49,680 --> 01:15:52,719
Speaker 3: this one's gonna be robust and be able to handle,

1257
01:15:53,920 --> 01:15:56,200
Speaker 3: you know, winds. Sitting here by itself when it doesn't

1258
01:15:56,200 --> 01:15:59,320
Speaker 3: have its buddies around it anymore might be a great

1259
01:15:59,360 --> 01:16:01,920
Speaker 3: tree stand because it's straight where it's got a nice

1260
01:16:01,960 --> 01:16:06,360
Speaker 3: branch coming off of it that'll help hide you. So yeah,

1261
01:16:06,400 --> 01:16:09,360
Speaker 3: number one, would we get started. Number two, I think,

1262
01:16:09,479 --> 01:16:12,759
Speaker 3: like call around and just talk to a lot of people,

1263
01:16:14,280 --> 01:16:17,600
Speaker 3: because that's that's been so helpful man, you know my

1264
01:16:17,880 --> 01:16:21,400
Speaker 3: I mean, I know I'd probably heard Craig Harper's name before,

1265
01:16:21,880 --> 01:16:25,000
Speaker 3: but one of my neighbors as soon as I after

1266
01:16:25,080 --> 01:16:26,679
Speaker 3: I talked to him on the phone the first time,

1267
01:16:27,120 --> 01:16:28,880
Speaker 3: he sent me a couple of pictures. He's like, these

1268
01:16:28,880 --> 01:16:32,559
Speaker 3: are my favorite books, and one was like a guide

1269
01:16:32,600 --> 01:16:36,840
Speaker 3: to Wisconsin's Wildflowers and Forbes, and then the other one

1270
01:16:37,080 --> 01:16:40,080
Speaker 3: was Craig Harper's book, and he's like, if you get

1271
01:16:40,120 --> 01:16:43,840
Speaker 3: these two, you're you're gonna be getting you know. I

1272
01:16:43,880 --> 01:16:46,200
Speaker 3: just feel like the amount of advice that's out there

1273
01:16:46,240 --> 01:16:50,280
Speaker 3: for free just by calling your neighbors, and you know,

1274
01:16:50,360 --> 01:16:52,040
Speaker 3: it's always a great thing to do is to know

1275
01:16:52,080 --> 01:16:57,640
Speaker 3: your neighbors. But just ask around, get get People that

1276
01:16:57,680 --> 01:17:00,920
Speaker 3: are into this are very happy be to I think

1277
01:17:01,000 --> 01:17:03,800
Speaker 3: help others most of the time. So when you talk

1278
01:17:03,880 --> 01:17:07,120
Speaker 3: to them, they're probably going to offer, like, hey, I

1279
01:17:07,160 --> 01:17:09,040
Speaker 3: would love to come out to your place. And walk

1280
01:17:09,080 --> 01:17:13,200
Speaker 3: it with you Mark. And then I mean before we

1281
01:17:13,240 --> 01:17:17,519
Speaker 3: started logging, I bet you I had at least six

1282
01:17:17,600 --> 01:17:22,360
Speaker 3: different people that I did that with and uh yeah,

1283
01:17:22,400 --> 01:17:24,759
Speaker 3: each one of them looks at it a little bit different.

1284
01:17:25,000 --> 01:17:28,760
Speaker 3: And then but you also hear recurring themes and once

1285
01:17:28,840 --> 01:17:32,320
Speaker 3: like the fourth person says like, yeah, definitely do this,

1286
01:17:32,880 --> 01:17:35,120
Speaker 3: like that's the thing. You're like, all right, got it,

1287
01:17:35,200 --> 01:17:40,679
Speaker 3: you know, like I'll start there. So yeah, call around,

1288
01:17:40,760 --> 01:17:44,120
Speaker 3: talk to a lot of people, call your the nrcs,

1289
01:17:44,200 --> 01:17:47,000
Speaker 3: call these private lands biologists. There's just there's a lot

1290
01:17:47,040 --> 01:17:49,400
Speaker 3: of help out there for you. You just gotta put

1291
01:17:49,439 --> 01:17:59,280
Speaker 3: in the effort and make some connections. And number three, man,

1292
01:18:05,040 --> 01:18:07,640
Speaker 3: I don't know, there's so many little bitty things that

1293
01:18:07,720 --> 01:18:17,840
Speaker 3: are I can give as sort of hot tips. I think,

1294
01:18:18,439 --> 01:18:26,320
Speaker 3: like think about it. Yeah, I guess holistically where you know,

1295
01:18:26,400 --> 01:18:29,479
Speaker 3: the logging has been a has been a sort of

1296
01:18:29,520 --> 01:18:32,120
Speaker 3: a big part, and then there's but there's also the

1297
01:18:32,320 --> 01:18:35,599
Speaker 3: habitat and then but there's also this thing, you know,

1298
01:18:35,760 --> 01:18:38,400
Speaker 3: hunting that we all really want to do with our properties.

1299
01:18:38,600 --> 01:18:43,040
Speaker 3: So you know, think about all those things put together.

1300
01:18:44,320 --> 01:18:46,800
Speaker 3: Because for a while I even thought like with our

1301
01:18:46,880 --> 01:18:48,639
Speaker 3: roads that are going to be put in that's gonna

1302
01:18:48,680 --> 01:18:50,760
Speaker 3: cost us a lot of money as opposed to like

1303
01:18:50,800 --> 01:18:54,960
Speaker 3: putting that money into the bank account. I was like, ah,

1304
01:18:55,080 --> 01:18:58,760
Speaker 3: maybe we can skimp on that. But now realizing what

1305
01:18:58,840 --> 01:19:00,720
Speaker 3: those roads are going to get us and what that

1306
01:19:00,840 --> 01:19:02,920
Speaker 3: access is going to give us, and comparing it to

1307
01:19:03,240 --> 01:19:06,280
Speaker 3: what the access was like where you really couldn't get

1308
01:19:06,320 --> 01:19:08,800
Speaker 3: into these spots properly and be able to hunt it

1309
01:19:08,880 --> 01:19:15,280
Speaker 3: from the outside in, Like I'm glad. I thought about

1310
01:19:15,280 --> 01:19:17,599
Speaker 3: that a lot. A lot of people mentioned that, and

1311
01:19:17,760 --> 01:19:21,160
Speaker 3: you know, it's again a recurring theme. People walk it

1312
01:19:21,200 --> 01:19:23,840
Speaker 3: and they're like, oh, well, if you can make sure

1313
01:19:23,880 --> 01:19:26,080
Speaker 3: you put in a perimeter road and it's gonna be

1314
01:19:26,560 --> 01:19:30,000
Speaker 3: a big time. So yeah, I guess I would just,

1315
01:19:30,040 --> 01:19:33,160
Speaker 3: you know, make sure that you're even if you're just

1316
01:19:33,200 --> 01:19:35,280
Speaker 3: looking at like logging, or even if you're just looking

1317
01:19:35,320 --> 01:19:37,840
Speaker 3: at putting in this, try to always step back and

1318
01:19:37,880 --> 01:19:41,120
Speaker 3: look at it holistically and see how the whole thing

1319
01:19:41,160 --> 01:19:43,840
Speaker 3: is gonna work, and you know, not just your property,

1320
01:19:44,280 --> 01:19:48,200
Speaker 3: but holistically with like the next mile out. I think

1321
01:19:48,200 --> 01:19:50,920
Speaker 3: it's so easy to always be staring at on X

1322
01:19:50,960 --> 01:19:53,880
Speaker 3: and only looking at forty acres and thinking like, well,

1323
01:19:54,200 --> 01:19:56,320
Speaker 3: on my forty the deer going to bed here, and

1324
01:19:56,400 --> 01:19:58,360
Speaker 3: they're gonna come here to drink, and then they're come

1325
01:19:58,400 --> 01:20:01,240
Speaker 3: here to eat. And the bucks are always going to

1326
01:20:01,360 --> 01:20:03,920
Speaker 3: do this when they're checking my little betting area. But

1327
01:20:03,960 --> 01:20:06,559
Speaker 3: it helps so much to go, Okay, well, let's bump

1328
01:20:06,560 --> 01:20:09,040
Speaker 3: it out of half a mile and then think about

1329
01:20:09,080 --> 01:20:13,559
Speaker 3: how like, really the big not it's not even the

1330
01:20:13,560 --> 01:20:17,040
Speaker 3: big picture, it's the picture because the deer aren't going

1331
01:20:17,080 --> 01:20:19,080
Speaker 3: to live on your forty acres. The buck's not going

1332
01:20:19,160 --> 01:20:21,760
Speaker 3: to only be cruising doughs on your forty acres. He's

1333
01:20:21,760 --> 01:20:24,360
Speaker 3: going to be cruising a much bigger area around it.

1334
01:20:24,840 --> 01:20:28,880
Speaker 3: And then think about how more of that flows. You know,

1335
01:20:28,920 --> 01:20:32,000
Speaker 3: how did the deer flow from you know, a mile

1336
01:20:32,080 --> 01:20:34,760
Speaker 3: that way through your place and a mile the other way,

1337
01:20:34,880 --> 01:20:39,479
Speaker 3: or however it works. That's been helpful, and that's definitely

1338
01:20:41,040 --> 01:20:50,240
Speaker 3: I think it's influenced decisions that we've made, because yeah,

1339
01:20:50,640 --> 01:20:53,320
Speaker 3: because it's like you're always saying, like, what don't the

1340
01:20:53,360 --> 01:20:57,880
Speaker 3: neighbors have right yep? And if you don't, if you're

1341
01:20:57,880 --> 01:21:00,680
Speaker 3: not thinking about it that way, because that's the thing.

1342
01:21:00,680 --> 01:21:03,160
Speaker 3: With the corner of soybeans, we've got, like I don't

1343
01:21:03,200 --> 01:21:05,280
Speaker 3: know how big those fields are, but there's you know,

1344
01:21:05,400 --> 01:21:07,639
Speaker 3: two three fields that are probably you know, a couple

1345
01:21:07,800 --> 01:21:11,840
Speaker 3: hundred acres of corn and soybeans every year, Like, are

1346
01:21:11,920 --> 01:21:14,840
Speaker 3: my corner soybeans really going to be that attractive when

1347
01:21:15,520 --> 01:21:19,400
Speaker 3: right across the street there's that different no one has

1348
01:21:19,520 --> 01:21:22,839
Speaker 3: around there is an oak savannah.

1349
01:21:23,000 --> 01:21:27,880
Speaker 2: Yep. Yeah, I love it. I think there's a good

1350
01:21:27,960 --> 01:21:32,960
Speaker 2: good advice and really inspiring. I think just seeing like

1351
01:21:33,200 --> 01:21:36,640
Speaker 2: encouraging and inspiring to see what you've been able to

1352
01:21:36,680 --> 01:21:40,280
Speaker 2: do in just a few years and your journey is

1353
01:21:40,280 --> 01:21:42,720
Speaker 2: really cool. It's really cool to watch them afar so

1354
01:21:43,160 --> 01:21:46,080
Speaker 2: some nice work way to just get after it and

1355
01:21:46,439 --> 01:21:50,400
Speaker 2: jump in head first and figure out stuff along the way.

1356
01:21:50,560 --> 01:21:53,080
Speaker 2: I think there's a lot of people that get paralysis

1357
01:21:53,080 --> 01:21:57,240
Speaker 2: by analysis, myself included sometimes, uh, and then afraid to

1358
01:21:57,640 --> 01:22:00,200
Speaker 2: take those big swings and try stuff like that. Oh

1359
01:22:01,120 --> 01:22:03,559
Speaker 2: pretty cool that you have have just gone for it.

1360
01:22:03,680 --> 01:22:06,320
Speaker 2: So yeah, I mean I don't.

1361
01:22:06,520 --> 01:22:11,600
Speaker 3: It just doesn't seem like any cause I the mentality

1362
01:22:11,760 --> 01:22:14,000
Speaker 3: is even my kids, like they joke, even though I

1363
01:22:14,000 --> 01:22:16,519
Speaker 3: talk to them a lot of time, They're like, you're

1364
01:22:16,560 --> 01:22:22,640
Speaker 3: doing deforestation and I'm like, no, we're not. You know,

1365
01:22:22,720 --> 01:22:26,439
Speaker 3: that's what happens down in the Amazon when they're clearing

1366
01:22:26,600 --> 01:22:28,800
Speaker 3: you know, hundreds of thousands of acres and burning it

1367
01:22:29,000 --> 01:22:33,720
Speaker 3: so they can run cattle. Right, Yeah, that's that. And

1368
01:22:34,000 --> 01:22:38,280
Speaker 3: this is different, like we're actually what we're creating does

1369
01:22:38,360 --> 01:22:42,160
Speaker 3: way more for you know, flipping carbon dioxide back to

1370
01:22:42,240 --> 01:22:45,679
Speaker 3: oxygen than just the standing trees that were there alone, right,

1371
01:22:46,439 --> 01:22:50,720
Speaker 3: And so yeah, I guess like, don't be scared to

1372
01:22:51,320 --> 01:22:58,920
Speaker 3: to cut trees down. It's uh yeah, the sale so

1373
01:22:59,280 --> 01:23:02,120
Speaker 3: it's so been a official, it's so beneficial, and like

1374
01:23:02,360 --> 01:23:05,200
Speaker 3: it's going to be so good for your for your

1375
01:23:05,240 --> 01:23:08,640
Speaker 3: deer hunting, you know, if that's really what your what

1376
01:23:08,720 --> 01:23:09,479
Speaker 3: your goal is.

1377
01:23:10,160 --> 01:23:12,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, and if and if that kind of thing scares

1378
01:23:12,280 --> 01:23:15,200
Speaker 2: you or you're you know, still don't quite see how

1379
01:23:15,240 --> 01:23:17,160
Speaker 2: that can beneficial. We had a really good chat about

1380
01:23:17,200 --> 01:23:19,360
Speaker 2: this a couple of weeks ago with Ethan Tapper, and

1381
01:23:19,400 --> 01:23:22,000
Speaker 2: he spoke kind of about this, you know, how there's

1382
01:23:22,080 --> 01:23:25,240
Speaker 2: there's a time and a place for leaving stuff untouched

1383
01:23:25,280 --> 01:23:27,680
Speaker 2: and growing is you know, mature force, and there's a

1384
01:23:27,720 --> 01:23:30,759
Speaker 2: time and a place for restarting the cycle and adding

1385
01:23:30,800 --> 01:23:33,880
Speaker 2: diversity and managing in this kind of way. And uh,

1386
01:23:33,920 --> 01:23:36,320
Speaker 2: and what you're talking about, Giannis is a great example

1387
01:23:36,360 --> 01:23:40,559
Speaker 2: of of the latter. So lots lots to learn there,

1388
01:23:40,600 --> 01:23:43,600
Speaker 2: But to your point, give it a shot. Try some

1389
01:23:43,680 --> 01:23:49,439
Speaker 2: of this stuff, learn, ask questions, call around, and start yesterday.

1390
01:23:49,960 --> 01:23:54,679
Speaker 2: So be honest. If folks want to see the stuff

1391
01:23:54,720 --> 01:23:58,040
Speaker 2: you're doing these days, you haven't yet done anything big

1392
01:23:58,080 --> 01:24:00,760
Speaker 2: around the habitat that I've seen. But folks want to

1393
01:24:00,760 --> 01:24:04,960
Speaker 2: see your content. You're hunting films, your latest cooking exploits,

1394
01:24:04,960 --> 01:24:07,839
Speaker 2: anything like that. Where could folks see all that? Connect

1395
01:24:07,840 --> 01:24:08,240
Speaker 2: with all that?

1396
01:24:08,640 --> 01:24:11,080
Speaker 3: Oh, it's all mixed up there on the old meat

1397
01:24:11,120 --> 01:24:14,360
Speaker 3: Eater YouTube channel really for the most part, about most

1398
01:24:14,400 --> 01:24:18,519
Speaker 3: of it. You know my hunts, you know, there's there's

1399
01:24:18,600 --> 01:24:21,960
Speaker 3: different iterations of the of titles these days. So you

1400
01:24:21,960 --> 01:24:25,960
Speaker 3: can just search my name and there's been some haunts

1401
01:24:26,000 --> 01:24:28,640
Speaker 3: that have happened on that property. Actually haven't hunted on

1402
01:24:28,840 --> 01:24:32,640
Speaker 3: camera on our forty yet Again, I often give my

1403
01:24:32,760 --> 01:24:35,600
Speaker 3: dad kind of first DIBs there and I hunt the

1404
01:24:35,640 --> 01:24:40,160
Speaker 3: neighboring stuff. But yeah, I just search my name on

1405
01:24:40,160 --> 01:24:43,400
Speaker 3: on YouTube and you'll see content. We do have a

1406
01:24:43,439 --> 01:24:47,479
Speaker 3: new cooking show on meat Eater called meat Eater Roasts,

1407
01:24:48,080 --> 01:24:50,280
Speaker 3: and seems like folks have been liking it. It's a

1408
01:24:50,400 --> 01:24:56,080
Speaker 3: very lighthearted cooking competition show where we have two of

1409
01:24:56,120 --> 01:25:01,000
Speaker 3: our crew members cooking and then we have two crew members.

1410
01:25:01,040 --> 01:25:04,120
Speaker 3: Sometimes we invite folks from outside of our crew to

1411
01:25:04,240 --> 01:25:08,160
Speaker 3: judge them, and then I sort of just try to,

1412
01:25:08,280 --> 01:25:11,639
Speaker 3: you know, steer the conversation in between and have fun.

1413
01:25:11,680 --> 01:25:13,880
Speaker 3: And kind of gist of it is is they don't

1414
01:25:13,920 --> 01:25:17,720
Speaker 3: know what they're cooking with until I reveal it, so

1415
01:25:17,760 --> 01:25:20,600
Speaker 3: they sort of have a mystery chunk of meat and

1416
01:25:20,640 --> 01:25:23,000
Speaker 3: then they have, you know, some amount of time to

1417
01:25:23,320 --> 01:25:25,640
Speaker 3: cook a meal out of it. And so far, I mean,

1418
01:25:25,680 --> 01:25:30,040
Speaker 3: I tell you, I've been really impressed and really inspired

1419
01:25:30,160 --> 01:25:32,479
Speaker 3: actually by a lot of the meals that have been

1420
01:25:32,520 --> 01:25:36,840
Speaker 3: made in you know, ninety minutes, to the point where

1421
01:25:36,840 --> 01:25:40,719
Speaker 3: I've probably made like I know, I made krins stir fry,

1422
01:25:41,439 --> 01:25:48,080
Speaker 3: one time, I made Spencer's potstickers, made sets smash burgers,

1423
01:25:48,520 --> 01:25:50,439
Speaker 3: and it's great to just see like even though I

1424
01:25:50,479 --> 01:25:53,240
Speaker 3: make smash burgers, it's like, oh, Seth did this and

1425
01:25:53,320 --> 01:25:55,000
Speaker 3: did this and it was a little bit different. So

1426
01:25:55,680 --> 01:25:58,080
Speaker 3: you know, it's been educational and like I said, people

1427
01:25:58,120 --> 01:26:00,000
Speaker 3: are liking it. So check that out. It's called meat

1428
01:26:00,040 --> 01:26:03,639
Speaker 3: Eater Roasts. That too, is on the mediater YouTube channel.

1429
01:26:05,320 --> 01:26:11,000
Speaker 3: You can hear me on the Mediat podcast Mediater Trivia sometimes.

1430
01:26:12,320 --> 01:26:15,960
Speaker 3: But as far as the habitat stuff goes, really, I've

1431
01:26:16,000 --> 01:26:21,479
Speaker 3: just posted videos on my Instagram doing stuff. It's uh.

1432
01:26:21,800 --> 01:26:25,960
Speaker 3: As much as I'm enthralled with it and so passionate

1433
01:26:25,960 --> 01:26:31,519
Speaker 3: about it, it's hard to make habitat work sexy, you

1434
01:26:31,560 --> 01:26:35,519
Speaker 3: know what I mean. It's just like there's a niche

1435
01:26:35,600 --> 01:26:38,240
Speaker 3: group of people that are like really into it, and

1436
01:26:38,280 --> 01:26:42,280
Speaker 3: we'll watch, like I'll watch a video on YouTube with

1437
01:26:42,320 --> 01:26:48,360
Speaker 3: some people burning in oak Savannah, right, a lot of

1438
01:26:48,640 --> 01:26:51,640
Speaker 3: for everyone, though, Yeah, it doesn't do it for everybody,

1439
01:26:52,520 --> 01:26:54,120
Speaker 3: but yeah, you can kind of follow along with what

1440
01:26:54,120 --> 01:26:58,360
Speaker 3: we're doing over there. So yeah, now basically because all

1441
01:26:58,400 --> 01:27:02,080
Speaker 3: the work, the major work has been done. Yeah I

1442
01:27:02,120 --> 01:27:04,040
Speaker 3: say that, and then I think, well, not really, but

1443
01:27:04,240 --> 01:27:06,560
Speaker 3: the logging has been done, and so now it's a

1444
01:27:06,600 --> 01:27:08,880
Speaker 3: little bit of a waiting period to just kind of

1445
01:27:08,880 --> 01:27:12,280
Speaker 3: see how everything is going to respond, which obviously I'm

1446
01:27:12,320 --> 01:27:15,479
Speaker 3: super excited about. It's very hard being a thousand miles away.

1447
01:27:15,560 --> 01:27:19,160
Speaker 3: I constantly deal with fomo, the fact that I can

1448
01:27:19,320 --> 01:27:22,960
Speaker 3: just swing over there and just see how the oaks

1449
01:27:23,000 --> 01:27:24,840
Speaker 3: are butting out or whatever you know.

1450
01:27:25,000 --> 01:27:28,639
Speaker 2: Have you have you started strategically placing your cell cameras

1451
01:27:28,720 --> 01:27:31,479
Speaker 2: yet to just give you views of habitat changes. Do

1452
01:27:31,520 --> 01:27:34,559
Speaker 2: you have like a savannah cam and a clear cut

1453
01:27:34,600 --> 01:27:35,559
Speaker 2: cam or anything like that.

1454
01:27:35,640 --> 01:27:39,599
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh for sure, for sure. Yeah. I mean, obviously

1455
01:27:39,600 --> 01:27:41,960
Speaker 3: they're in spots where they're going to catch some animal

1456
01:27:42,040 --> 01:27:46,519
Speaker 3: movement too, but yeah, no, no doubt. And it's amazing too,

1457
01:27:46,560 --> 01:27:49,439
Speaker 3: even without Like there's a couple of spots where they

1458
01:27:50,160 --> 01:27:53,680
Speaker 3: did some stump grinding and some and some mulching, and

1459
01:27:53,680 --> 01:27:57,880
Speaker 3: so it's very flat and clear, and like the turkey

1460
01:27:57,920 --> 01:28:01,320
Speaker 3: gobblers have been strut in there like crazy, you know,

1461
01:28:01,400 --> 01:28:03,519
Speaker 3: and they didn't used to strut there when it was

1462
01:28:03,520 --> 01:28:09,400
Speaker 3: a close kind before us. And so yeah, for sure,

1463
01:28:09,560 --> 01:28:11,760
Speaker 3: for sure, it's great to see. But the problem is,

1464
01:28:12,160 --> 01:28:16,080
Speaker 3: again you're getting such a just a sliver of what's

1465
01:28:16,200 --> 01:28:19,320
Speaker 3: actually going on there. Like I can't zoom in on

1466
01:28:19,360 --> 01:28:22,880
Speaker 3: my cameras to be like, oh, that is golden rod

1467
01:28:23,000 --> 01:28:26,080
Speaker 3: growing or that's little blue stem growing. I'm just like

1468
01:28:26,280 --> 01:28:32,080
Speaker 3: it's grass, I think. But yeah, it's funny doing all

1469
01:28:32,120 --> 01:28:35,240
Speaker 3: this stuff and being so into it. Again, I kind

1470
01:28:35,240 --> 01:28:37,760
Speaker 3: of give first DIBs to my dad, the other old

1471
01:28:37,800 --> 01:28:40,439
Speaker 3: guys like if my kids are gonna want to hunt it, sure,

1472
01:28:41,240 --> 01:28:44,040
Speaker 3: And for me, I've actually been starting to explore some

1473
01:28:44,120 --> 01:28:46,679
Speaker 3: of the public land that we have within an hour's drive.

1474
01:28:47,800 --> 01:28:51,800
Speaker 3: And I've always hunted the hill country because that's what

1475
01:28:52,280 --> 01:28:55,599
Speaker 3: our place is, right. It's got hills that are roughly

1476
01:28:55,720 --> 01:28:59,439
Speaker 3: two hundred and fifty feet of elevation, you know, relief,

1477
01:29:00,160 --> 01:29:03,280
Speaker 3: and a lot of this public land around there is

1478
01:29:03,680 --> 01:29:07,120
Speaker 3: swampy and flat, and so it's like a whole new

1479
01:29:07,160 --> 01:29:09,400
Speaker 3: adventure for me. Like I haven't quite run into a

1480
01:29:09,400 --> 01:29:13,400
Speaker 3: spot where you need waiters. I've gotten close, But I

1481
01:29:13,479 --> 01:29:16,519
Speaker 3: tell you what, it's been almost easier for me. I

1482
01:29:16,520 --> 01:29:21,040
Speaker 3: feel like to learn and pick out where I want

1483
01:29:21,040 --> 01:29:24,719
Speaker 3: to hunt, because it seems like the deer trails are

1484
01:29:24,760 --> 01:29:29,599
Speaker 3: just like more pronounced like you in the Hill Country.

1485
01:29:29,680 --> 01:29:32,160
Speaker 3: Just seems like those jokers are just anywhere they want

1486
01:29:32,200 --> 01:29:34,080
Speaker 3: to go. We're in this swamp country. I'm like, Oh,

1487
01:29:34,080 --> 01:29:35,920
Speaker 3: they're not going to go there because that's a lake,

1488
01:29:36,800 --> 01:29:39,719
Speaker 3: and they're not going to go there because it's wide open.

1489
01:29:39,840 --> 01:29:42,839
Speaker 3: So oh, here's a great funnel and here's three trails

1490
01:29:42,840 --> 01:29:46,960
Speaker 3: going through it. Oh, great place to get into a tree,

1491
01:29:47,080 --> 01:29:48,960
Speaker 3: you know, and clear out a couple of shooting lanes.

1492
01:29:49,080 --> 01:29:51,040
Speaker 2: So that's pretty cool that you've got a spot though,

1493
01:29:51,040 --> 01:29:54,320
Speaker 2: where you have that diversity of options both yeah, you know,

1494
01:29:54,600 --> 01:29:58,960
Speaker 2: to keep it fresh, to learn new places, and just

1495
01:29:58,960 --> 01:30:02,679
Speaker 2: to kind of figure out what works. But but I gotta say, yannesty,

1496
01:30:02,880 --> 01:30:07,320
Speaker 2: you should make a point to let old Papa Giannis

1497
01:30:07,720 --> 01:30:10,519
Speaker 2: uh slide on over and give you a seat on

1498
01:30:10,560 --> 01:30:12,800
Speaker 2: the forty so you can see the fruits of your

1499
01:30:12,840 --> 01:30:14,800
Speaker 2: labor a little bit this fall. You gotta try to

1500
01:30:14,880 --> 01:30:16,839
Speaker 2: hunt it at least a time or two and see

1501
01:30:17,120 --> 01:30:19,880
Speaker 2: see what's happening there. We will, yeah, for another reason,

1502
01:30:19,880 --> 01:30:21,559
Speaker 2: because we want to We want to see, We want

1503
01:30:21,600 --> 01:30:21,960
Speaker 2: to see the.

1504
01:30:22,120 --> 01:30:25,400
Speaker 3: Yeah, for sure, for sure. Yeah, it'd be good to

1505
01:30:25,439 --> 01:30:30,599
Speaker 3: get a first first person report. What am I trying

1506
01:30:30,600 --> 01:30:30,920
Speaker 3: to say?

1507
01:30:31,160 --> 01:30:35,360
Speaker 2: I yeah, yeah, yeah, first person. I think I know

1508
01:30:35,360 --> 01:30:36,360
Speaker 2: what you're trying to say, but I don't know the

1509
01:30:36,360 --> 01:30:44,400
Speaker 2: words either. Ye in person in person? Thank you well,

1510
01:30:44,479 --> 01:30:48,280
Speaker 2: my friend. I appreciate sharing this with it. I'm excited

1511
01:30:48,320 --> 01:30:50,320
Speaker 2: for you. Super fun to watch.

1512
01:30:50,760 --> 01:30:52,439
Speaker 3: We can get to half the stuff that I had

1513
01:30:52,520 --> 01:30:54,479
Speaker 3: written down in my notes. But want's say that for

1514
01:30:54,520 --> 01:30:55,120
Speaker 3: another time.

1515
01:30:55,720 --> 01:30:58,360
Speaker 2: We never do. There's always there's always way more to

1516
01:30:58,400 --> 01:31:00,080
Speaker 2: cover than we can get through in a dec the

1517
01:31:00,120 --> 01:31:02,360
Speaker 2: time on these things. So thanks for joining us, Yanni.

1518
01:31:02,400 --> 01:31:05,800
Speaker 2: Let's touch base again when we've got another year or

1519
01:31:05,840 --> 01:31:07,600
Speaker 2: two of progress and you can tell us all the

1520
01:31:07,600 --> 01:31:09,800
Speaker 2: things you did wrong and what you do different next time.

1521
01:31:12,200 --> 01:31:14,439
Speaker 3: It was a pleasure Mark as always, Thank you.

1522
01:31:14,840 --> 01:31:20,400
Speaker 2: Thanks buddy. All right, thanks for tuning in, folks. I

1523
01:31:20,520 --> 01:31:22,599
Speaker 2: enjoyed this one with my buddy Yanni. I hope you

1524
01:31:22,640 --> 01:31:25,240
Speaker 2: did too. Hopefully it inspired some of you to give

1525
01:31:25,240 --> 01:31:27,920
Speaker 2: this stuff a try, to dive into the world of

1526
01:31:28,040 --> 01:31:31,519
Speaker 2: wildlife habitat improvement, to do some good out there on

1527
01:31:31,560 --> 01:31:33,840
Speaker 2: the ground that has done so much good for you.

1528
01:31:34,439 --> 01:31:37,160
Speaker 2: So without any further ado, I'm going to wrap it up.

1529
01:31:37,479 --> 01:31:40,479
Speaker 2: Thanks again for being here, and until next time, stay

1530
01:31:41,120 --> 01:31:42,439
Speaker 2: wired to Hunt.