Speaker 1: My name is Clay nukelemb And.
Speaker 2: This is a production of the bear Grease podcast called
Speaker 2: The bear Grease Rendered, where we render down, dive deeper,
Speaker 2: and look behind the scenes of the actual bear Grease podcast,
Speaker 2: presented by f h F Gear, American Maid, purpose built
Speaker 2: hunting and fishing gear that's designed to be as rugged
Speaker 2: as the place as we explore.
Speaker 1: Well today is We've got.
Speaker 2: A lot of ground to cover. I'm very excited about
Speaker 2: all the things we're going to talk about. I'm mainly
Speaker 2: excited about having Misty Neukomb back on the podcast after.
Speaker 1: A long time.
Speaker 3: You have fired.
Speaker 2: While there's a lot of rumors that go around that
Speaker 2: people get fired from the Render, only like four people.
Speaker 1: Have ever been fired from the Render. I'm just kidding.
Speaker 1: That was a joke. No one laughed. No one's ever
Speaker 1: been fired.
Speaker 3: I was curious enough I was one of them that yet.
Speaker 1: No one's ever been fired for the Render.
Speaker 2: Just just people come in and out of availability. People
Speaker 2: things happen, and they just I mean, like Malachi Nichols.
Speaker 2: I bet most people don't even remember maybe who Malachi was,
Speaker 2: but he was an original render cast member and he
Speaker 2: was with us.
Speaker 3: And one on one of the very early Bear Grease episodes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I mean basically like just his job and
Speaker 2: the amount of time it took to come down in
Speaker 2: the middle of the day.
Speaker 1: He just couldn't come.
Speaker 2: So Misty's not been fired, she's just been busy, she's
Speaker 2: been doing stuff.
Speaker 1: So great to have you back. We got to have
Speaker 1: Gary the Believer of Nu comeback on sometime as well.
Speaker 3: Oh I thought he got fired.
Speaker 2: Well, Dad may have been fired, but we'll rehire him. Uh,
Speaker 2: we got Josh, We've got Bear John here. But in
Speaker 2: the toa Covi's hot Seat you have, we have a
Speaker 2: new new delineation that we're gonna put all our special
Speaker 2: guests in, which is what we're gonna call the toa
Speaker 2: Covi's hot Seat. And in case you don't know, I
Speaker 2: wear I wear Ta Covi's every single day of my life.
Speaker 2: John Mesco, my dad's the Believers, one of my belie
Speaker 2: the Believer's best friends, John Mesco. All as a kid,
Speaker 2: John Mesco wore cowboy boots and I remember him telling
Speaker 2: me that cowboy boots are the most comfortable shoes in
Speaker 2: the world if you if you break them in, and
Speaker 2: I find that to be true. My feet get claustrophobic
Speaker 2: when I tie shoes. I mean I can pop these
Speaker 2: shoes off and not even break eye contact, and I
Speaker 2: can put them back on.
Speaker 3: Break like in case you need to get in bed
Speaker 3: in a hurry.
Speaker 2: Or I mean, I just I just I'm a boot man.
Speaker 2: And that's why I'm very proud that to Covis Cove's
Speaker 2: Boots at Austin, Texas is our new They're they're coming
Speaker 2: along on the Bear Grease road Show with us. And
Speaker 2: so we have a chair now for our special guest.
Speaker 2: And my friend Michael Lanier is in the to Coves
Speaker 2: hot seat tonight. And if you're listening to not watching,
Speaker 2: you would see that this rock and chair actually has
Speaker 2: a pair of to Covis boots on it.
Speaker 1: YEA, so impressive.
Speaker 2: SOI, Michael Michael has been introduced many times as my
Speaker 2: Jedi master squirrel sensey.
Speaker 4: That is that the title you most like appreciate? Is that,
Speaker 4: like on your business card is a top of the list.
Speaker 5: Yeah. Actually, the our office lady got me business a
Speaker 5: business card holder with a squirrel coming out of it.
Speaker 1: Oh really?
Speaker 2: All right, wow, so you're an electrician by trade, but
Speaker 2: but Michael Michael helped me get into the squirrel world,
Speaker 2: and so he's still he's he's my.
Speaker 1: Jedi master Squirrel.
Speaker 6: Sin say, I wonder if we should clarify what the
Speaker 6: squirrel world that you've you've gotten into is.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's real clear a squirrel has a lot
Speaker 2: of value to me and Michael when it's being treed
Speaker 2: by a dog.
Speaker 1: There we go.
Speaker 2: Somebody the other day asked me. They said something about
Speaker 2: going squirrel hunting, and I was like, you bet, and
Speaker 2: they were like, yeah, we'll take some Scope twenty twos
Speaker 2: and just kind of slip hunt around. And I kind
Speaker 2: of looked at him and I was kind of like, dang, man,
Speaker 2: you know what I don't I probably can't go, I was,
Speaker 2: I was, I'm double booked, Like a squirrel has value
Speaker 2: to me, was being treated by a dog. I mean,
Speaker 2: I value the life of the squirrel and his nobility
Speaker 2: and wild places. But when he's in my hand, it
Speaker 2: only means something if he's been treated by a dog.
Speaker 2: I agree, Sin say, yes, yeah, so big squirrel dog man.
Speaker 2: Now right now, tell me about your dog situation right
Speaker 2: now though, Michael, it's pretty bleak.
Speaker 5: Okay, got two young dogs at the house, haven't hardly
Speaker 5: hunted on them. There'll be a year old this spring.
Speaker 5: They're barking at yard squirrels and that's about all they know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but you go through a lot of squirrel dogs. Yes,
Speaker 1: you sell.
Speaker 2: I mean Michael's one of these guys, like I've known
Speaker 2: him to sell a dog, but I've also known him
Speaker 2: to just kind of hand him off to people.
Speaker 5: I don't mind giving a dog away to a friend
Speaker 5: if I you know that I get to hunt with
Speaker 5: later on.
Speaker 1: That's it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 2: Well, I think that I could keep you in business
Speaker 2: with the amount of people coming to me and Bear
Speaker 2: looking for squirrel dogs.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I don't, I'm out. Yeah, I already have a
Speaker 5: long line and yeah.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, just check it, just check it out.
Speaker 4: So yeah, well another failed business adventure, chucks.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well we're going to talk on this episode about mules.
Speaker 2: This is this is the mule episode. But before we
Speaker 2: talk about mules, there's many things we've got to talk about.
Speaker 2: First of all, in mid February, there is this is
Speaker 2: a massive announcement. In mid February, Bear John Newcomb is
Speaker 2: going to be the primary host of a new YouTube channel,
Speaker 2: What Yes, So so what was formerly known as the
Speaker 2: Bear Hunting Magazine YouTube channel is going to be the
Speaker 2: Bear Grease YouTube channel, and we're going to produce weekly content.
Speaker 2: It's going to be a whole lot of bear going out.
Speaker 2: It's gonna be YouTube native content. Bears been gathering content
Speaker 2: for six months. Uh what what what's some of the
Speaker 2: stuff that'll be on the on the on the channel Bear.
Speaker 7: Well, we've got we've got some squirrel, We've got some
Speaker 7: a lot of self bow hunts. We've got an elk hunt,
Speaker 7: a lot of bow making content. Uh, We've got a
Speaker 7: hawk trapping and training video. I went with my buddy
Speaker 7: to South Texas and we trapped hawks and then trained
Speaker 7: them to hunt. Uh so yeah, a lot of up front,
Speaker 7: we're gonna have a lot of hunts, a lot of
Speaker 7: self bow stuff. But as we go it'll get it'll
Speaker 7: get more and more diverse.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well, it's gonna be super exciting for Barry and I'll
Speaker 2: be on the channel some too. Uh, Brent will be
Speaker 2: as well. It's gonna be all things bear Grease, but
Speaker 2: like in a U tube style channel. So it's going
Speaker 2: to be really great.
Speaker 3: I'm excited.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, it's going to be good. Anything you want
Speaker 2: to say about that, missy.
Speaker 1: Wow, Okay, moving on.
Speaker 2: I mentioned last week their last render that I killed
Speaker 2: a big buck and this is him.
Speaker 3: That thing is awesome.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mentioned it.
Speaker 2: I just I just had I had to, I had
Speaker 2: to show it off. Yeah, this is Jimney Christmas. Jimmy
Speaker 2: Christmas showed up on Christmas Day and uh, hunting over.
Speaker 2: I was nott in Oklahoma and uh hunting over supplemental
Speaker 2: feed showed up on Christmas Day.
Speaker 1: Never seen the buck before.
Speaker 2: In my life, and uh it's both season over there
Speaker 2: till January fifteenth, and uh, man, big deer are are
Speaker 2: hard to kill over feet. I don't care who you are.
Speaker 2: If you've never done it, you just don't know how
Speaker 2: hard they are to kill her feed because you've you've
Speaker 2: concentrated all the activity to one spot and the deer
Speaker 2: super leerous stuff like that. And anyway, this deer showed
Speaker 2: up and he was very sporadic. He only came in
Speaker 2: like two times during the daytime when I wasn't there,
Speaker 2: and but I hunted him for a total I think
Speaker 2: of four and a half days. And on this place
Speaker 2: be hunt in Oklahoma. When I go down there, I
Speaker 2: have to camp and it's it's.
Speaker 1: Just a cool place. But this deer has.
Speaker 2: This time right here, is fourteen and six eight inches long,
Speaker 2: which is a really big time just for a deer.
Speaker 2: He's only fourteen and a half inches wide though, so
Speaker 2: he's really narrow.
Speaker 3: It's an impressive rack. Man.
Speaker 1: What did he score? Scored one sixty two and six saints.
Speaker 2: We we actually thought he would score one seventy like me,
Speaker 2: looks like a well just in pictures and video, and uh,
Speaker 2: he wasn't a mass. He wasn't a big body deer
Speaker 2: like when you're judging deer off trail camera pictures, like
Speaker 2: if the deer's in Kansas or if you if you
Speaker 2: know that, oh that's a two hundred and twenty pound
Speaker 2: deer and his rack still looks that big? You know
Speaker 2: you would, right this deer on a two hundred fifty
Speaker 2: pound deer, would this rack on two hund fifty pound
Speaker 2: deer would look entirely different than this rack on one
Speaker 2: hundred and sixty to one hundred and seventy pound deer.
Speaker 4: It's basically the opposite of people on TV. The camera
Speaker 4: subtracts ten pounds. Is that what you're trying to say?
Speaker 4: On a on a trail cam. When you look at
Speaker 4: a deer, camera subtracts ten.
Speaker 2: Pounds, camera adds ten pounds ten ten inches, okay in
Speaker 2: this case?
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: So so we knew. My friend Forrest Teeter, who's the
Speaker 2: one who named him Jimminy Christmas. I take to him
Speaker 2: and he said, Jiminy Christmas.
Speaker 1: He about nailed it. I was a little lad.
Speaker 2: I was a little upset with him because he was
Speaker 2: under he said, he's I said, what do you think
Speaker 2: that deer scores? And he said one fifty eight? And
Speaker 2: I was just like, Forrest.
Speaker 1: Bigger than that. My friend Jordan bliss It, who's very
Speaker 1: good white tail man.
Speaker 3: What did Jordan say?
Speaker 2: Jordan had him figured it between one fifty five and
Speaker 2: one sixty eight that broad range, I mean three inches
Speaker 2: is that that broad I thought I was already I
Speaker 2: think I'm sorry, one sixty five and one one sixty eight.
Speaker 3: I thought it was.
Speaker 2: But I kind of talked Jordan into I mean, by
Speaker 2: the time it was done, we were like, man, that
Speaker 2: deer probably score one seventy. I said it to several
Speaker 2: guys that were like, that's one hundred and seventy inch.
Speaker 2: Year and I was like, I think it is. And uh,
Speaker 2: when I the first when I measure, I knew the
Speaker 2: by the first measurement, I would know if it was
Speaker 2: going to score one seventy. When I measured that main beam,
Speaker 2: if that main beam was over twenty five inches, I
Speaker 2: felt like it was going to score one seventy. And
Speaker 2: the first main beam that I measured was twenty three
Speaker 2: and six egs or something, and I kind of went,
Speaker 2: I bet he won't score it. But it's not like
Speaker 2: it matters. This is this is the biggest deer I've
Speaker 2: killed in nineteen years. And just I mean, I was like,
Speaker 2: I mean, just ecstatic. What a killing a big deer
Speaker 2: that you're hunting and after and just means something to you.
Speaker 2: It's pretty astonishing the way it makes you feel. I
Speaker 2: don't understand it. I still don't understand it. I'm forty
Speaker 2: six years old. I don't understand it. But it was
Speaker 2: a lot of fun.
Speaker 3: That's awesome.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so there's that buck yep.
Speaker 2: So that brings up the next thing we've got to
Speaker 2: talk about is Michael and Air texted me the other day.
Speaker 1: Michael's also a.
Speaker 2: Mule man squirrel dog man, but a muleman as well,
Speaker 2: and he said, what do you think my mule.
Speaker 1: Willard is worth? Oh, that's a trick question, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: well it's that you could offend somebody.
Speaker 6: It's kind of like, Michael.
Speaker 1: What if I had come back and said, oh, he's Michael,
Speaker 1: that that mule's worth seventy five hundred dollars.
Speaker 6: Are you still friends?
Speaker 5: We're still friends, but I don't believe him.
Speaker 2: Well, it would have been offensive. So I never answered Michael.
Speaker 5: I just said I noticed that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because just like Forrest Teeters shorted me four inches
Speaker 2: and I just assumed that that meant he didn't like
Speaker 2: me as a man. This is what I was going
Speaker 2: to say to you, and I wanted to have this
Speaker 2: conversation in person. Is that what a mule's worth and
Speaker 2: what you can actually get for it are two very
Speaker 2: different and things because in some markets, like if you
Speaker 2: had the choice of markets, I would say there's a
Speaker 2: day when that mule would bring twenty grand And you
Speaker 2: might say there's a day that he would bring thirty.
Speaker 2: But I say there's also a day most days he
Speaker 2: might bring less than that. It's all about the market,
Speaker 2: like if you're if the market is just people like
Speaker 2: right here, within an hour and a half of us,
Speaker 2: it's less. If the market is America, it's more. But
Speaker 2: how do you reach America?
Speaker 5: So what market are we on today?
Speaker 1: We're in the American market.
Speaker 5: Perfect.
Speaker 2: What you guys don't know yet is we're actually going
Speaker 2: to bring Willard in here in a minute and we're look,
Speaker 2: we're going to auction them off. But tell me what
Speaker 2: what do you what do you think he's worth?
Speaker 1: Tell us about give us his stats.
Speaker 5: I got a number in my head that I wouldn't
Speaker 5: take any less for him. I'd just keep him. Okay, Yeah,
Speaker 5: I like him. He's a fourteen three nine years old
Speaker 5: horse mule, John mule mail, got a lot of gold,
Speaker 5: good and rough country. You can shoot off of him.
Speaker 5: Dogs can crawl all over him. They don't bother him.
Speaker 1: Carry a hog yep, real pretty.
Speaker 2: It's a Palomino mules really well muscled out, vice good
Speaker 2: good fee.
Speaker 1: Fourteen to three men.
Speaker 2: So a hand is four inches and so fourteen three
Speaker 2: is I like fifty seven inches or something?
Speaker 1: I can't I can't do the math. Fifty nine is
Speaker 1: it fifty nine?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Okay, so it's it's it's in the the prime height
Speaker 2: for a mule. For selling in today's market is going
Speaker 2: to be between fourteen to two and fifteen maybe fifteen
Speaker 2: to one. Sometimes out west they want to mule a
Speaker 2: little taller. Around here, they've don't as much. I would
Speaker 2: say fourteen three is like primo height. I'd tell you
Speaker 2: fourteen to two you think a little tall? No, I
Speaker 2: mean he's I like him, but I'd say fourteen to two.
Speaker 2: If you were to ask most folks they'd say, I
Speaker 2: like that hot here, okay, or maybe that's just me, but.
Speaker 4: Yeah, how long have you had him?
Speaker 5: Three? Four years? Maybe three?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'd have to go back and look at some pictures.
Speaker 1: He's a really sharp looking mule.
Speaker 3: Yeah greatly.
Speaker 2: Well are you gonna tell us what you want for
Speaker 2: the mule? Yeah, well I'll tell you what. Let's let's
Speaker 2: go ahead and bring him in and uh and then
Speaker 2: and then we'll we'll talk about it. So let's go
Speaker 2: get him. Okay, don't let tebo run between his legs. Okay, Michael,
Speaker 2: give us a tell us about this mule.
Speaker 5: Well, he's fourteen three nine years old horse mule, John mule.
Speaker 5: You can shoot off of him, dogs, don't bother him.
Speaker 5: Backs out of the trailer. Good, got a good stop.
Speaker 1: Safe.
Speaker 5: He's safe, but he's got a lot of go. Like, yeah,
Speaker 5: he's he's ready to go. I wouldn't put Grandma on
Speaker 5: him at all.
Speaker 2: He's got a really beautiful confirmation, like top end confirmation
Speaker 2: he's got. He's got a nice small head. Sometimes the
Speaker 2: mules get really big heads. He's kind of got a
Speaker 2: head like a horse. He's that palamino color which is
Speaker 2: really sought after. And uh just just got like good
Speaker 2: muscle tone, big shoulders, nice withers. So the withers is
Speaker 2: the the basically the top of the shoulder right there,
Speaker 2: and mules typically have small shoulders and no weathers, so
Speaker 2: the saddle slides forward. I'd say he's got really good
Speaker 2: withers and so you're gonna have less trouble with your
Speaker 2: saddle sliding forward with him. But just like super athletic,
Speaker 2: he'll jump up on rocks and rock crawl and do
Speaker 2: all kinds of stuff.
Speaker 5: If you like to get your picture taken on a rock,
Speaker 5: he's your mule. Yep, he'll back out of the trailer.
Speaker 2: Good.
Speaker 1: You shoot a forty four magnum off of him.
Speaker 5: Yep, he'll lope right off. He's got a nice low
Speaker 5: lope to him.
Speaker 2: But he's he's he's got a lot of energy, which
Speaker 2: is good. I mean, like there's there there's a version
Speaker 2: of a mule where one is just kind of a deadhead,
Speaker 2: where I mean you'd just be like prodinent to go,
Speaker 2: it'd be super safe and it'd just be trudging along.
Speaker 2: This mule is like a quarter horse. I mean, he's
Speaker 2: wanting to go where you point him, He's gonna go yep.
Speaker 2: And uh so that's why you said, you know, would
Speaker 2: you put a kid on this mule?
Speaker 1: You absolutely could put a kid on that mule. But
Speaker 1: it's not like the mule is gonna buck the kid off.
Speaker 2: But but this mule is gonna it's like putting a
Speaker 2: kid behind a corvette. Yeah, I mean it's like, yeah,
Speaker 2: he could your kid could drive the corvette, but I'm
Speaker 2: I mean he might give it the spurs and right. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean that's probably a decent analogy.
Speaker 1: Huh.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you don't have to stay any for him to
Speaker 5: keep up with everybody.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and nine years old is about pro when they're
Speaker 2: in their prime prime, like you, the working life of
Speaker 2: that mule is going to be i'd say at least
Speaker 2: twenty five years. They'll live longer than that, most likely
Speaker 2: the working life I was in. I was in Utah
Speaker 2: with McLean Meekham a month ago and we rode a
Speaker 2: mule eighty miles through super rough country last day. Asked him,
Speaker 2: use the hell's that mule? He said, twenty five years old?
Speaker 5: Wow?
Speaker 1: For real?
Speaker 2: So before I mean from like six to nine years
Speaker 2: old is like prime selling age, Like this is a
Speaker 2: young mule. Like this mule is just now coming into
Speaker 2: his prime. I would say, and uh.
Speaker 1: This mule has been squirrel hunted off of a ton,
Speaker 1: which is scrawling. Is good for him? I mean just a.
Speaker 2: Lot of activity, a lot of dogs, a lot of shooting,
Speaker 2: a lot of yelling, a lot of hooping and hollering people.
Speaker 2: So somebody could buy this mule. We got to figure
Speaker 2: out how they can contact us. But I mean, this
Speaker 2: mule is for sale. If you want a top end
Speaker 2: going Arkansas, dad, gum mule, this is your mule, yep.
Speaker 2: And it ain't gonna be cheap.
Speaker 5: It is not gonna be cheap. No. What I would say,
Speaker 5: if you've never wrote a mule, never owned a mule,
Speaker 5: and say I want to buy this mule, be my
Speaker 5: first mule don't.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right. This is not a beginner mule.
Speaker 5: Yeah, no, no.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this this this mule is for somebody who's really
Speaker 2: wanting to go, really wanting to use them, wanting to
Speaker 2: wanting a top end mule. And I've ridden with this mule.
Speaker 2: I would I would put my full weight behind anything.
Speaker 2: Michael says, I've ridden with this mule a lot. What
Speaker 2: would you take for it?
Speaker 5: Fifteen?
Speaker 1: Fifteen?
Speaker 5: Yep, dude, I want I wish.
Speaker 1: He would have talked to me before he said that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I was thinking.
Speaker 1: I was thinking that he could get a lot more
Speaker 1: than that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I was. Actually I'm shocked at that number.
Speaker 5: I'm good with fifteen.
Speaker 2: We'll take twenty for the mule, Okay, contact me directly. No,
Speaker 2: I think I think you'll sell that mule all day
Speaker 2: anywhere in the country for fifteen.
Speaker 5: Somebody whoever wants to buy. If somebody was wanting to
Speaker 5: buy and they need to come riding, we just need
Speaker 5: to go riding.
Speaker 1: Yep.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: Now he's he's beautiful. He really is.
Speaker 2: He's a top, top notch mule. Willard is his name, Willard?
Speaker 1: Yep, Willard.
Speaker 6: Well, awesome, he's kind of a messy eater.
Speaker 1: He's a little bit of a messy eater.
Speaker 5: His teeth were floated last year, So.
Speaker 2: Maybe we need to do it to Covi's mule sale
Speaker 2: on the podcast, bringing a mule every episode. Well maybe
Speaker 2: not every episode, but.
Speaker 1: Oh for real, Michael, I actually thought.
Speaker 2: You were gonna say I'd take twenty three thousand dollars
Speaker 2: for this mule. Nope, okay, that you sell that mule
Speaker 2: all day for fifteen. But it's to the right people. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean it's to somebody that's a that's an outfitter
Speaker 2: that's wanting something.
Speaker 1: Really to go.
Speaker 2: These guys around here that hog hunt on mules that
Speaker 2: really want to go in a working animal. I mean
Speaker 2: that mule would just be as good as they make.
Speaker 2: But yeah, he's beautiful. Well okay, so Josh, how can
Speaker 2: we how can people get in touch with us? Let's
Speaker 2: give him an email. Don't let Tebow run out through
Speaker 2: that mule's legs while it's bad. Puppy, get back. We've
Speaker 2: got another dog coming in here. Get back, dog. Sorry,
Speaker 2: we got a dog trying to come in behind this mule.
Speaker 2: Send send your queries to Josh at the.
Speaker 1: Metheater dot com and he will get you in touch
Speaker 1: with Michael in there. Okay, So you don't think your
Speaker 1: wife's gonna be happy about this.
Speaker 5: No, she will not. Why because she feels like I'll
Speaker 5: regret selling that mule, which's probably right. I mean I
Speaker 5: will have some regret. He's a good mule.
Speaker 2: Why okay, why are you selling the meals? So if
Speaker 2: I didn't know you, i'd say, why are you selling
Speaker 2: the mule?
Speaker 5: Because I want to buy another mule, a younger mayor mule.
Speaker 5: Just start riding it. I've got another mule I just
Speaker 5: bought back in May, and I've been riding her a lot.
Speaker 5: I haven't wrote him since I don't know when, four
Speaker 5: or five months. Maybe. Well, I just don't feel like,
Speaker 5: well you.
Speaker 1: You did, you did right? You have ridden him since then?
Speaker 1: Did you take him squirrel hunting the other day?
Speaker 5: No? I rode my new mule Phyllis. Okay, yeah, I
Speaker 5: rode her like six out of eight days.
Speaker 1: What days? What did you ride the other days?
Speaker 5: We rode hunting?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 5: Okay, okay, I was thinking you rode him six out
Speaker 5: of eight days that I was riding mules.
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well, uh so you says, it's not like she
Speaker 2: likes Willard. She just you just think she just thinks
Speaker 2: you're gonna regret selling him. Correct, Yeah, yeah, okay, but I.
Speaker 5: Mean they just got my my kids got me a
Speaker 5: black and white picture, oh to hang up in the
Speaker 5: new house for Christmas. Oh yeah, it's just kind of
Speaker 5: he's been around a while.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, what do you think, Bear, you think you
Speaker 1: should sell it?
Speaker 7: I mean it sounds like it might be the move
Speaker 7: if you can't, you know, if you don't have the
Speaker 7: time to ride a bunch of mules.
Speaker 2: Well, Michael's kind of an animal. He's kind of a
Speaker 2: he moves through a lot of animals do, and and
Speaker 2: they're always good. Are There's some people that move through
Speaker 2: animals that you're like, you don't want to get something
Speaker 2: from him. Michael's not that guy. Michael's moving through stuff
Speaker 2: just because he loves them, and he's and he's he's
Speaker 2: kind of shuffling dogs around to different people and training
Speaker 2: dogs and different stuff. And I kind of feel like
Speaker 2: this is partly why I brought you here. I feel
Speaker 2: like this kind of, you know, psychologically, you're just kind
Speaker 2: of you've you've you've used up Willard.
Speaker 1: Okay, in in in the in in in your heart.
Speaker 3: It's just there's no space in your heart for Willard.
Speaker 2: I mean, you've had him, you know what he can do,
Speaker 2: and you're just ready to move on.
Speaker 3: Is it a midlife crisis that you're trying to get
Speaker 3: a younger model? No, okay, just.
Speaker 5: Checking the mule I'm riding now is six?
Speaker 3: Okay?
Speaker 2: Well, there is something to be said for riding a
Speaker 2: mule like Easy. Like when I get on Easy, who
Speaker 2: I've now had for nine years or so, it's it
Speaker 2: loses some of the excitement. Now there's a satisfaction that
Speaker 2: comes from just a animal that you just know what's
Speaker 2: gonna happen. Right, But half of the fun of riding
Speaker 2: a mule is is training it, seeing it develops, seeing
Speaker 2: it grow, and a little bit of that just uncertainty even.
Speaker 2: And so when you have one that you just know
Speaker 2: what's going to happen, you're less likely to just run
Speaker 2: out there and saddle it up and ride around. I mean,
Speaker 2: so I'm the same way I would. I like to
Speaker 2: have one up and coming, you know, not all the time,
Speaker 2: but fair bit of the time.
Speaker 3: Michael, did you grow up riding mules?
Speaker 5: Horses?
Speaker 3: Horses?
Speaker 5: I got into mules when was it. When did you
Speaker 5: make that one hundred dollars squirrel.
Speaker 2: Hunt dollar squirrel video would have been like twenty sixteen.
Speaker 5: So I probably started riding mules in twenty fifteen, okay,
Speaker 5: year before that.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: How many meals do you think you've owned since then?
Speaker 5: So I got three now probably six seven.
Speaker 3: Okay, so it's not like you just cycled through thirty meals.
Speaker 5: Now. Some of them came and went really quick. They're
Speaker 5: pretty crazy.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, well that that is.
Speaker 1: A really nice mule. That is a nice, very nice mual.
Speaker 1: For sure.
Speaker 2: Bear's been training his meal yep, slow trap all slow
Speaker 2: trapm about this week.
Speaker 7: I'm gonna try and shoot off of them for the
Speaker 7: first time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we're gonna go hunt. We're gonna go hunt. Try
Speaker 1: to take it on his first big squirrel hunt.
Speaker 2: Well that brings up let's talk about this episode. So
Speaker 2: on the first when I first started bear Grease was
Speaker 2: I wrote out twenty six potential Beargrease episodes with the
Speaker 2: intent to mock out a year of barg grease because
Speaker 2: the Beargrease Proper documentary comes out, you know, every two weeks,
Speaker 2: So twenty six a year and on the list, high
Speaker 2: on the list was a mule episode with ty Evans
Speaker 2: five years ago.
Speaker 1: I actually talked to Tye.
Speaker 2: On the phone five years ago and we were we
Speaker 2: were like going back and forth on how to record
Speaker 2: with him. I mean we were just I was just
Speaker 2: like just that close to pulling the trigger and there
Speaker 2: was some issues. Well we just couldn't. I couldn't go
Speaker 2: up there at that moment. And so this has been
Speaker 2: in the works for a long time. Ty and I
Speaker 2: went and in Mountainline hunted with acclaim meekum Uh in
Speaker 2: Utah in December.
Speaker 1: So I was with Tie for a week up there.
Speaker 2: And in that week, you know, on the eppic so,
Speaker 2: Tye said that we had ridden sixty eight miles. We
Speaker 2: actually ended up riding over eighty, not counting the it's
Speaker 2: hard to describe it. He talked about he ponied some
Speaker 2: mules for a ways like that. I wasn't with him.
Speaker 2: That's the reason he was saying he had a few
Speaker 2: more miles than me, which was true. But by the
Speaker 2: time we got done, we actually rode eighty miles in
Speaker 2: five days and it was, oh my goodness, it was.
Speaker 2: It was a lot and through rough, rough country like
Speaker 2: we were on trails occasionally, but mainly just just following dogs,
Speaker 2: you know. And so just being there that week with
Speaker 2: Tye is when I really heard the full story of
Speaker 2: his really transformation, that's a good word to use to
Speaker 2: describe it, from the way he used to train, which
Speaker 2: he grew up in this training family and his dad
Speaker 2: was a mule and horse trainer, and so the cowboy
Speaker 2: way of breaking a horse or mule is just that
Speaker 2: just go grab a grab a wild mustang off the range,
Speaker 2: rope it, put it in a corral, catch it, put
Speaker 2: a saddle on it, get on it, and just buck
Speaker 2: it out. I mean that's kind of that's an exaggerated,
Speaker 2: shortened version, but I mean that's kind of what the
Speaker 2: cowboy way was, and that's the way a lot of
Speaker 2: horse training, mule training was done for generations and still
Speaker 2: still is done by many people.
Speaker 1: And it does work.
Speaker 2: That's the thing is that it actually does produce an
Speaker 2: animal that you can ride and that can be safe.
Speaker 2: But these these guys practicing natural horsemanship started coming around,
Speaker 2: and it's not like one person just discovered this, Like,
Speaker 2: it wasn't Buck Brandnaman just all on his own. He
Speaker 2: was one that became really famous for it, and well
Speaker 2: known Pat Parelli, Ray Hunt, the Dornce Brothers, many others.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not even qualified to start name dropping
Speaker 2: these names, but these are the people that that that
Speaker 2: started this natural horsemanship stuff where you actually started to
Speaker 2: try to understand the way a horse or mule fought
Speaker 2: as opposed to just inflicting, you know, kind of your
Speaker 2: will on this animal.
Speaker 1: It is. It was really wild. We watched the Kids documentary.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, I love that documentary.
Speaker 1: It was.
Speaker 6: It's quite moving.
Speaker 1: It is the yeah, the Buck documentary.
Speaker 6: And that was before we had mules. I mean, that
Speaker 6: was before we were people. And at that time we
Speaker 6: watched it and and we're it was. It was very moving.
Speaker 1: Anybody could watch it and it would be massively interesting.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it was. It was.
Speaker 1: You watched it.
Speaker 5: Yeah it's good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's good. Yeah, you watched it, Josh.
Speaker 2: Back in the day, back in the day, Yeah, Buck brandonman, Yeah, Well,
Speaker 2: what what stood out to y'all in the episode? So
Speaker 2: I was, I was, I was in it deep neck
Speaker 2: deep with tie. What stood out to y'all.
Speaker 1: Listening to it? Just cold turkey? Who who will go first?
Speaker 5: Lad?
Speaker 1: We're I can go first? Okay? Like this.
Speaker 7: That was a lot because as many people know, I've
Speaker 7: been working with Slow Trap and he's been the first
Speaker 7: mule that I've ever trained, but I trained him using
Speaker 7: the natural horsemanship. I went over to uh uh eld
Speaker 7: Mid Yeah, and he kind of showed me the ropes
Speaker 7: on that pressure and release, kind of learned the fundamental
Speaker 7: principles of it. And then I trained Slow Trap this
Speaker 7: summer and could really see the you know, really kind
Speaker 7: of saw that unfold, like what it really looks like.
Speaker 7: And the biggest thing that I noticed was what Tye
Speaker 7: was saying was that you can't ask that mule to
Speaker 7: be something that you're not and it it. It really
Speaker 7: made sense to me after training Slow Trap that like
Speaker 7: if you know, like when a lot of my flaws
Speaker 7: would reflect in his behavior pretty much. Shaggy hair, yeah
Speaker 7: he doesn't. He does need a haircut right now, so
Speaker 7: just his so did his partner bears.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 7: But I really liked the podcast because it kind of
Speaker 7: displayed a lot of those principles and I think they're
Speaker 7: they're really powerful principles just in life. Like after training
Speaker 7: Slow Trap, I kind of looked at the way that
Speaker 7: I did everything differently, Like I looked at the way
Speaker 7: that I looked I made bows differently. I mean I
Speaker 7: saw that, like the the Boa, my bows that I
Speaker 7: was making in a lot of ways were a reflection
Speaker 7: of me as a craftsman. Like if I was taking shortcuts,
Speaker 7: that bow was going to take shortcuts, and it was
Speaker 7: you know, it wasn't going to perform the way he
Speaker 7: needed to. And then it, you know, it just kind
Speaker 7: of like rippled out through all the areas of my life.
Speaker 7: But I really liked the episode because it's a it's
Speaker 7: a it's a really it's a good way, like you
Speaker 7: can really understand it with the mules whenever you're training
Speaker 7: an animal. It but that principle kind of can ripple
Speaker 7: all through your life.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, I think that's I think that's the the
Speaker 6: thing and that I think that's what stood out about
Speaker 6: even when we watched the Buck film a long time ago,
Speaker 6: is this whole idea that you can't expect people, you
Speaker 6: can't ask people to do what you've not to become
Speaker 6: who you've not become. And and I think as a
Speaker 6: parent that that is a super important concept. I'm an
Speaker 6: educator in education, you can apply that principle. You can
Speaker 6: really apply it. You can apply it anywhere. And and
Speaker 6: I think that that's that's what was really meaningful to me.
Speaker 6: You and I talked about this whenever you came back,
Speaker 6: and you were easy as the first maybe the first
Speaker 6: or second mule you ever trained, the.
Speaker 1: First when I fully trained.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and she's she's she's sassy.
Speaker 1: She's sassy, she's sassy.
Speaker 6: And uh and and I think that that probably is
Speaker 6: a reflection of you know, Clay's a little Sassy's true,
Speaker 6: but I'm not not not even that You're just you
Speaker 6: were probably a little shorter with Izzy. It's kind of
Speaker 6: interesting watching you Traine Banjo, watching Izzy, watching Bear train,
Speaker 6: work with Banjo, and work with this with slow Trap.
Speaker 6: You know, Slow Trap. We joke around that he's practically
Speaker 6: a dog, like he'll come to a whistle's he's yeah,
Speaker 6: he's he's pretty funny as a mule. He's not a.
Speaker 1: He's super general, super.
Speaker 6: General, super laid back. Barry answers to his name.
Speaker 1: Uh, kind of like be kind.
Speaker 6: Yeah. And it's just it's it's just kind of interesting
Speaker 6: and and it brings up I just thought the podcast
Speaker 6: brought up a lot of, you know, bigger ideas that
Speaker 6: whole thing of you have to you have to change,
Speaker 6: you have to transform to get the people around you
Speaker 6: to transform, the people that you're leading to transform. And
Speaker 6: I think that was such a big principle inside of parenting,
Speaker 6: like you can't ask your kids to be well behaved, well,
Speaker 6: I think if you're you know, angry and all that.
Speaker 6: But I also think there's a there's the podcast. It's
Speaker 6: something else I thought was kind of interesting that I
Speaker 6: wasn't expecting. And that was the part about just kind
Speaker 6: of putting putting away the ways that you're you're maybe
Speaker 6: the past, yeah, coming into new ways of doing things
Speaker 6: and yeah.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 6: And I think that those two things can merge really well,
Speaker 6: even inside of our lives, you know, like there would
Speaker 6: be things that we would have done in the past
Speaker 6: that we wouldn't do anymore, right, I mean, I think
Speaker 6: it's a I think it's a good it's a good
Speaker 6: podcast to think about those things.
Speaker 1: So the so this book.
Speaker 2: I talked about this book and I didn't really mention
Speaker 2: the significance that it had in the industry, but this
Speaker 2: book evidence based horsemanship.
Speaker 1: I believe I've got it right here. Where is it?
Speaker 2: I've got it somewhere here it is steps on myself.
Speaker 2: This book right here, Evidence Based Horsemanship. Before I ever
Speaker 2: had meals, I read that book. A guy just mentioned
Speaker 2: it and was like, hey, you should read it, and
Speaker 2: I did, and a whole premise.
Speaker 1: Of it was the way that the.
Speaker 2: Equine industry has been trained in animals is just not
Speaker 2: the right way, and so you're going to have to, like,
Speaker 2: you know, going back to that one quote about just
Speaker 2: because you know it's been done this way for for
Speaker 2: fifty years, doesn't negate that it could be done wrong
Speaker 2: for fifty years. And this, Oh, I could talk about
Speaker 2: that book. I could talk about that book forever. But
Speaker 2: the thing that I remember from this is that humans
Speaker 2: look at something and we assume that it thinks like us.
Speaker 2: And this neuroscientist talks about how a horse or mule
Speaker 2: doesn't have a place in his brain to like you
Speaker 2: or dislike you, like like I like, or dislike Josh
Speaker 2: he and they actually talk about the brain science of
Speaker 2: a horse and mule have these huge brains, but most
Speaker 2: of it is for control of actual physical elements of
Speaker 2: the body to control all these muscles, like you need
Speaker 2: a bigger hard drive to be able to control twelve
Speaker 2: hundred pounds of muscle, and the frontal lobe of the
Speaker 2: horse or the mule is very small, and a human
Speaker 2: frontal lobe is very big. And all the things that
Speaker 2: make us human that you know, like our ability to reason,
Speaker 2: our ability to love, our ability to think about spiritual
Speaker 2: things like to me, like the breath of God that
Speaker 2: makes us human. Like where that stuff happens, a lot
Speaker 2: of it is registered in in the frontal lobe of
Speaker 2: a human and a horse just basically doesn't have one,
Speaker 2: or has a small one. And uh so when you
Speaker 2: go out in the pasture, like a common thing in
Speaker 2: the equine world would be like, oh, that horse doesn't
Speaker 2: like me. And basically this book is like that horse
Speaker 2: doesn't have an option in its brain to like you
Speaker 2: or dislike you. What he is focused on is security,
Speaker 2: uh leadership. I mean, an equine animal has one question
Speaker 2: to answer when you walk up to it, and it's
Speaker 2: the only language that it knows is who's in charge.
Speaker 2: It's like if if I had, if if the simplicity
Speaker 2: of my operating capacity as a human, it basically was
Speaker 2: just one thing, Like I would walk up to every
Speaker 2: person I met and I would go who's in charge?
Speaker 2: You were me, who's in charge? You were me like,
Speaker 2: that's the only question I have And I mean, in
Speaker 2: a way, that's the way an equine animal is. And
Speaker 2: when you set the tone for you being the leader,
Speaker 2: it's fine with that. But if you don't answer that question,
Speaker 2: you're going to have problems. And then and then obviously
Speaker 2: every animal is a little bit different when we're going
Speaker 2: to be harder. But but this, this book dispels a
Speaker 2: ton of myths about training. And this is not all
Speaker 2: about natural horsemanship, but it kind of bleeds into what
Speaker 2: Brandaman and and uh all these guys were talking about.
Speaker 2: But uh, yeah, and you talking about Isy. This first
Speaker 2: mule that I trained, my insecurity as a trainer translated
Speaker 2: into me being really harsh with her, not like not
Speaker 2: like abusive, but just harsh like when she didn't do
Speaker 2: what I wanted. Honestly, I was intimidated by that. And
Speaker 2: so rather than like finding a better way, a better
Speaker 2: way to ask it a question, essentially, in training, you're
Speaker 2: asking an animal a question. You're saying, will you turn
Speaker 2: to the right, will you turn to the left? Will
Speaker 2: you follow my leadership? And basically my intimidation with not
Speaker 2: really understanding the animals. When it wouldn't do what I wanted,
Speaker 2: I would just come in harder with the same question,
Speaker 2: and finally it would do it. But my intensity would
Speaker 2: rise so much so would hers, and all of a
Speaker 2: sudden you had this like massive tension.
Speaker 1: And to this day is these like that. Part of
Speaker 1: it's probably just.
Speaker 2: Her nature, but part of it absolutely goes back to
Speaker 2: her training. Yeah, and she's become a really a mule
Speaker 2: that I love and can do anything on the world on.
Speaker 2: But your animal reflects what you put out and what
Speaker 2: I take away from it, what I've learned inside of
Speaker 2: training an animal.
Speaker 1: Is this the energy that we put out as people.
Speaker 2: And I don't mean sometimes using that phraseology might sound
Speaker 2: like something weird or something.
Speaker 1: I'm not talking about something.
Speaker 2: I'm literally talking about the the energy that we put
Speaker 2: out just with our personality, the way we speak, our
Speaker 2: blood pressure, like being high or low, I mean affects
Speaker 2: people around us. And uh and and Ty talked about
Speaker 2: being flat. Actually I can't remember if on this episode
Speaker 2: that you're not, But man, when you're around an equine animal,
Speaker 2: it's like being able to just like drop your blood press,
Speaker 2: just drop your expectations and it helps so much. But
Speaker 2: I think there's we can't ask an animal to be
Speaker 2: something that you're not. Can't yell at your kids and
Speaker 2: tell them to calm down, while you yourself are yelling at
Speaker 2: your kids.
Speaker 6: Yeah, not calm Well, it makes me, It makes me
Speaker 6: think a lot. We talk with with new teachers a
Speaker 6: lot about control because because like you were describing yourself
Speaker 6: with Izzy, control is like a new teacher is insecure.
Speaker 6: They don't. I mean, it's the scariest thing you've ever done,
Speaker 6: is stand up in front of a group of teenagers
Speaker 6: and or preschoolers and ask them to do what I mean.
Speaker 6: It's just terrifying. And because you don't know if they're
Speaker 6: gonna do it or not, and that they feel it,
Speaker 6: they know it, and they know that that you are
Speaker 6: and and your tendency is to grasp for greater control
Speaker 6: in those moments. It's like I feel insecure, and so
Speaker 6: I'm gonna I'm gonna try to hold this tighter, I'm
Speaker 6: gonna be more and I'll get it and it it
Speaker 6: just never works. It never works. The the kids respond
Speaker 6: to the person.
Speaker 1: Who's who's certainty con.
Speaker 6: Yeah, confidence, certainty and also just what you're putting on them.
Speaker 6: Like they don't your respect for them. Yeah, yeah, no,
Speaker 6: I mean your respect for them. It's like, yeah, sometimes
Speaker 6: you just need law in order, but sometimes you just
Speaker 6: need to hear, give them a voice, let them hear
Speaker 6: what they have to say. You don't need to just
Speaker 6: control every single thing. And so yeah, sometimes if you
Speaker 6: put that on them, if you your control and your
Speaker 6: desire to to manage them, if you put that on them,
Speaker 6: they're going to buck against that. You have to kind
Speaker 6: of respect who they are and respect that this is
Speaker 6: their space as well. And and let's all let's hear
Speaker 6: what you've got to say.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I thought I thought that point because Time made
Speaker 7: that same point. Yea said, they can see they know
Speaker 7: when you know, and they know when you don't.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's the truth. Yeah.
Speaker 7: Whatever, you're riding a mule, if you give it anything,
Speaker 7: it'll it'll take everything. Yeah, because it's just like if
Speaker 7: you put someone in like whenever I first started riding mules,
Speaker 7: you know, I wasn't too strict on what the you know,
Speaker 7: whenever they'd eat grass or something, and then throughout the
Speaker 7: ride they'd start eating more and more and more, and
Speaker 7: then you'd kind of lose control of them. Because they
Speaker 7: don't want to stop every time. Yeah, they see grass
Speaker 7: to eat, right. I thought that was a was an
Speaker 7: interesting point.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, that was good, Michael. What stood out to you?
Speaker 5: The leadership part of it stood out to me. I
Speaker 5: mean I've seen it within companies where you know, whoever's
Speaker 5: running it, if they're not the best to work for,
Speaker 5: not the best to be around. You know, say they're
Speaker 5: a screamer, maybe they're not very confident, so they just
Speaker 5: you know, just jump up and down to try to
Speaker 5: get their point across that. It just it trickles down
Speaker 5: to everybody around them.
Speaker 6: M m yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: What about with what about with mules?
Speaker 2: Did you like there wasn't any real specific meal training stuff.
Speaker 2: I get we weren't really like trying to teach people
Speaker 2: how to train a mule necessarily, but I don't know,
Speaker 2: did you do you hear anything that stood out to you?
Speaker 5: Well, I'll listen to the you know, he said make
Speaker 5: the right thing easy and the wrong thing hard. Yeah,
Speaker 5: And I was a little bit like I don't completely
Speaker 5: understand that, Like I get making the right thing easy, yeah,
Speaker 5: but if you walk up and you're wanting your meal
Speaker 5: to jump up on that rock and you, you sit
Speaker 5: there and spend it in circles, go around the rock
Speaker 5: five hundred times, I mean an hour later. I mean
Speaker 5: making that right thing easy would be me putting the
Speaker 5: spurs in its ribs until it gets up on that rock. Yeah,
Speaker 5: I mean, I don't know if that. I have no
Speaker 5: idea what he's trying to say there, Like what would
Speaker 5: the wrong thing?
Speaker 2: Well, here's here's the best example that i've got. And Tie,
Speaker 2: if you were here, I have no doubt he could
Speaker 2: give us many great examples. But like when they he
Speaker 2: told me one time that he had a mule. I
Speaker 2: can't remember the exact scenario forgive me, tye, but like
Speaker 2: there was a mule that was worried about going through
Speaker 2: a gate, and every time they got to the gate,
Speaker 2: the mule would start to get kind of watchy and
Speaker 2: and and wanting to not go through it. And so
Speaker 2: he started riding like big circles around the arena. And
Speaker 2: every time he would get to the gate, he would
Speaker 2: try to stop to let the mule rest in the
Speaker 2: zone that it was nervous, and if it was nervous
Speaker 2: and uneasy, he'd just ride it again and and and basically,
Speaker 2: the right thing to do was to be confident and
Speaker 2: go through the gate. And he made it hard everywhere
Speaker 2: else but the gate. You see what I'm saying, Does
Speaker 2: that make sense? That's may not be the exactly what
Speaker 2: he did, but that would be one example of it.
Speaker 2: And it's it is a lot easier to visualize making
Speaker 2: the right thing easy. And that's one of the biggest
Speaker 2: thing with riding these animals is and and I make
Speaker 2: this mistake probably every time I ride, but you can
Speaker 2: tell for sure when somebody's doesn't know what they're doing.
Speaker 2: They asked the mule to do something that the mule
Speaker 2: is not going to do, and then and then the
Speaker 2: mule doesn't do it, and then the mule is like, well,
Speaker 2: this guy's not in charge because he told me to
Speaker 2: do that, I didn't do it, and now we're just
Speaker 2: riding up the trail, you know. And and so that's
Speaker 2: when I ride with new people, I'm just like, whatever
Speaker 2: you ask it to do, make sure it does it.
Speaker 2: From small things to just going around the tree, to
Speaker 2: backing up to stopping to going into a.
Speaker 1: Trot or just whatever.
Speaker 2: Just make sure that the commands that you give are
Speaker 2: clear and that you make the animal follow through with
Speaker 2: what you've asked it to do, and it's not hard
Speaker 2: on it. But like Bear said, you put a kid
Speaker 2: on even a good mule, you can put a kid.
Speaker 2: You could put a kid on a fifteen thousand dollars
Speaker 2: mule and by in two hours, in twenty minutes, that
Speaker 2: mule might just be wandering around doing what it wanted do.
Speaker 2: I mean, just because it's they're very perceptive of a mule,
Speaker 2: will will elevate and lower to the skill of the rider.
Speaker 1: I've heard a lot of.
Speaker 2: Mule guys say that that when you're selling the mule,
Speaker 2: you're like, I mean, you got to make sure the
Speaker 2: person that's riding the mule knows what's going on, you know, and.
Speaker 1: So but anything else say out to you, Michael.
Speaker 5: Or Josh, something did well.
Speaker 4: I I when I listened to it, I've I had
Speaker 4: a great appreciation for just tie his process into the
Speaker 4: whole thing, you know, watching his dad break horses and
Speaker 4: horses the cowboy way, and I have really great appreciation
Speaker 4: for someone who can watch that and not condemn it,
Speaker 4: but also watch that and then and then find ways
Speaker 4: to do it better, Like as a father. You know,
Speaker 4: I look back and I made some I made some
Speaker 4: boneheaded mistakes raising my kids, and I want my kids,
Speaker 4: you know, I think there's a lot of people who, like,
Speaker 4: I want my kids to raise raise their kids like
Speaker 4: I did. I want my kids to do it better
Speaker 4: than I did. And I think ty was able to say, hey,
Speaker 4: that worked for a time, but there's a better way,
Speaker 4: and not condemn that, but be able to just take
Speaker 4: these new things that he observed and that he learned.
Speaker 4: I appreciate how he applied himself to learning something different,
Speaker 4: something that other people hadn't done in the past, and
Speaker 4: became successful with it. I mean, that's the thing that
Speaker 4: makes people stand out that I think that really shows
Speaker 4: the character of who Tye is. And I think that's
Speaker 4: the thing that really stood out to me the most.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a hard thing to do something different. I mean,
Speaker 2: I guess there's some version of fatherhood and sonhood or
Speaker 2: just parents where you know, there's some people out there
Speaker 2: that would say, oh, I knew for sure I was
Speaker 2: not going to do things like my mom and dad did.
Speaker 2: But it's not even about father and son. It's more
Speaker 2: about what's the cultural norm for the way things are
Speaker 2: done and what it could be.
Speaker 1: In electrical work.
Speaker 2: It could be in training mules, it could be in hunting,
Speaker 2: it could be in business, it could be.
Speaker 1: But just to be able to have enough.
Speaker 2: Overarching perspective to see that something's being done like completely
Speaker 2: the wrong way and be able to transform to somebody.
Speaker 2: To me, that's what always appealed to me about natural
Speaker 2: horsemanship is that it was just like so different. And
Speaker 2: uh it was kind of cool though to see tie
Speaker 2: uh and to to see him, Uh he was a
Speaker 2: bronk rider before, which being a bronc rider literally is
Speaker 2: you're purposely getting onto the back of an untrained animal,
Speaker 2: right and bucking with it just because it's fun. And uh,
Speaker 2: I know when I was making videos about training mules,
Speaker 2: uh nine years ago, a bucking mule video does better
Speaker 2: than a non bucking mule video. And so I trained
Speaker 2: is he and my version, you know, just the best
Speaker 2: way I knew how. But it was very heavily influenced
Speaker 2: by several of these natural horsemanship guys.
Speaker 1: And she never bucked.
Speaker 2: I mean, you know when it finally came to get
Speaker 2: on her, you know, I remember I did this countdown
Speaker 2: on YouTube. Oh it was good, Michael, where I was like, Okay,
Speaker 2: I've trained her trained or trainer trainer. Today, I'm getting
Speaker 2: on her for the first time, and I did this
Speaker 2: countdown one or you know, ten nine eight, and I'm I'm,
Speaker 2: you know, like holding onto the saddle and kind of
Speaker 2: shaking the saddle and slapping her on the back letting
Speaker 2: her know I'm about to get on. And you know,
Speaker 2: the viewer is just thinking, oh, this sucker is just
Speaker 2: gonna buck him off when he gets on there, and
Speaker 2: you know, I throw my leg over and she just
Speaker 2: kind of sits there, does nothing, won't even move and
Speaker 2: I get off, and I mean.
Speaker 1: It's like probably probably didn't go viral.
Speaker 2: It's one of the best videos on the former Bear
Speaker 2: Honey magazine now Bear Grease channel.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it got like multiple millions of yous.
Speaker 2: Actually, but but Bear kind of ran into the same
Speaker 2: thing he was. He was making some videos of training
Speaker 2: slow Trap, and Slow Trap did the exact same thing. So,
Speaker 2: I mean, Ty was saying, it's kind of fun when
Speaker 2: they buck. But if you're buying an animal from somebody,
Speaker 2: I wouldn't want to buy one that they bucked out. No,
Speaker 2: I would want to buy one that never bucked.
Speaker 1: Up kicking his life.
Speaker 6: You know.
Speaker 1: But who trained Willard H.
Speaker 5: Warren Campbell owned him. That's who I bought him from.
Speaker 5: And I believe he took him to an Amish guy
Speaker 5: to get him started, and then Warren wrote him. He
Speaker 5: wrote him a lot like that's where he got his
Speaker 5: name Willard from the Amish.
Speaker 1: Oh, the Amish called him Willard.
Speaker 5: Warren told me he went to tie the mule up
Speaker 5: at the Amish guy's place and he was talking to
Speaker 5: the guy and his the son, the Almish son come
Speaker 5: riding his bike down the driveway, stopped and skid, you know,
Speaker 5: turned his bike real sharp right there by the mule.
Speaker 5: And the guy was like, now, Willard, you can't be
Speaker 5: doing that. Yeah, and so Warren would tell the story better.
Speaker 5: But I believe that.
Speaker 1: So Warren was like, this mule's name is Willard. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a great that's good. That's good, that's good.
Speaker 2: Well, it's a good name, Willard, Willard. Well this I
Speaker 2: hope these episodes have been entertaining for people that aren't
Speaker 2: into equine animals. I know, before I was into equine animals,
Speaker 2: I was interested, yeah, in horses and mules, just kind
Speaker 2: of from a spectator.
Speaker 1: Position, you know.
Speaker 2: And but but no, Ty Evans it just salt of
Speaker 2: the Earth guy, just fantastic guy. And uh, we're going
Speaker 2: to try to get him to come to Northwest Arkansas
Speaker 2: and do a clinic. He can't do it this year,
Speaker 2: he's already booked up, but potentially in twenty seven.
Speaker 1: He said he would do it.
Speaker 5: So let me ask you this. Whenever he's talking about
Speaker 5: making a bridal mule, I mean his level of commit
Speaker 5: commitment six to eight years. Yes, what I mean, I
Speaker 5: don't know what a bridle horse or bridle mule is,
Speaker 5: but yeah, I mean that's a lot of a lot
Speaker 5: of time in one animal.
Speaker 2: I mean I probably know just a touch more than
Speaker 2: you because we talked about it while we were in Utah.
Speaker 2: But that term a bridle horse actually means something. It's
Speaker 2: a category of training for a for a horse that
Speaker 2: basically just it's it's a series you go from different bits.
Speaker 1: You go from like this bit a hack, this bit.
Speaker 5: I think it's a hack to a snaffle to solid Yeah,
Speaker 5: I'm not.
Speaker 1: Sure, something like that. It's a progression.
Speaker 2: And then but by the time one is a bridal mule,
Speaker 2: that it's just the Cadillac of all animals in terms
Speaker 2: of control, safety, and yeah, very few people make bridle
Speaker 2: ms today, you know that are actually like finishing them
Speaker 2: out to that, And that's what he's trying to do
Speaker 2: with And not everybody wants a bridle mule.
Speaker 6: A highly trained, responsive rancher show horse, typically developed over
Speaker 6: several years using the traditional VCO method. The extensive process
Speaker 6: involves transitioning through different stages of headgear, results in a
Speaker 6: finely tuned animal that could be ridden with subtle cues
Speaker 6: and often with one hand on a loose train. The
Speaker 6: ultimate goal is a reliable partner for ranch work and competition,
Speaker 6: capable of complex maneuvers with minimal guidance. Also, it could
Speaker 6: be referring to bridle mule a bridle horse, a horse
Speaker 6: used in weddings, But I think he's talking.
Speaker 5: About I don't think that's what he's talking about.
Speaker 6: Those are the two options I got.
Speaker 1: Are the mules that are could you call time two
Speaker 1: thousand dollars?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 1: What mules are selling for ninety thousand dollars? Well, okay,
Speaker 1: the there was a mule.
Speaker 2: At chrome in the canyon. So McClain Meekham and his
Speaker 2: son Hunter are the ones who put on that chrome
Speaker 2: in the canyon. Sale in Bryce Canyon, Utah. And last
Speaker 2: year they had a mule sell for ninety thousand dollars.
Speaker 2: And what I know about the deal is that there
Speaker 2: was just some there were two people that just really
Speaker 2: wanted that mule. Okay, I mean the mules was a
Speaker 2: fantastic mule, but I think it's public knowledge that the
Speaker 2: mule was sold for way less than that, like a
Speaker 2: year before at a different sale or two years before. Okay,
Speaker 2: So the mule was super gentle, super well trained, in
Speaker 2: the prime of its life. It was a curly haired mule.
Speaker 2: There's some there's some cross of a mule where they
Speaker 2: get a little curl in their hair, which is unique,
Speaker 2: it's not unheard of. And and just two people got
Speaker 2: in a bidding war and they had plenty of.
Speaker 6: Money values the eye of the beholder.
Speaker 2: So but that I don't want to take anything away
Speaker 2: from that mule, the mules that are selling for Every
Speaker 2: mule cell has a different thing like and it's it's Yeah,
Speaker 2: what I've learned is that every mule cell has a
Speaker 2: different specialty. And I'm a little bit afraid to say
Speaker 2: what those are because I'm not sure if we say
Speaker 2: that out louder.
Speaker 6: Yeah, Oh do you think we should talk about speaking
Speaker 6: of curly hair. Should we talk about Clay's hair?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 7: Should we talk about bears hair? We've been talking about
Speaker 7: my hair. But your hair is out of control. I
Speaker 7: would say.
Speaker 3: It is a little I mean, it's been a lot
Speaker 3: of years since we've seen you that much hair.
Speaker 1: What do you think I should do? Josh, just let
Speaker 1: her go or cut it?
Speaker 3: I'm a bit torn, you know.
Speaker 4: I I like to keep my hair pretty close cropped,
Speaker 4: but I also don't have a head of hair like that,
Speaker 4: you know, so maybe maybe like.
Speaker 1: Just caught in the crosshairs of indecision.
Speaker 4: Well, I think on the outside I would be like, yeah,
Speaker 4: you definitely need to get your hair cut and be respectable.
Speaker 4: But maybe on the inside I think, man if I
Speaker 4: had hair like that, I'd probably grow it out. Okay, really,
Speaker 4: I just yeah, he keeps the hair, keeps the hair
Speaker 4: you wanted to keep the hair.
Speaker 6: There's a day in Clay's life where he's not going
Speaker 6: to have that beautiful frock of hair.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 3: I don't know that that that dude's cut some things.
Speaker 2: Michael Lanier met me on the street the other day
Speaker 2: and Prayer Grove, we just randomly were walking down the
Speaker 2: street in downtown Pray Grove, Arkansas, and Michael was there.
Speaker 2: We didn't know, and I'm pretty sure the first thing
Speaker 2: he said to me was, you need a haircut.
Speaker 5: We're right outside the barber.
Speaker 1: And see when my Jedi master says that, I have
Speaker 1: to kind of take it into consideration. But Michael would
Speaker 1: be the guy that would say, get haircut.
Speaker 3: At what point, Like, are you like, Okay, Clay, that's enough.
Speaker 6: I don't know. I'll know it when when we get there.
Speaker 6: I mean, he's got he's got some great hair. I've
Speaker 6: got a vision for it right now. I think it
Speaker 6: is given some you know, nostalgic vibes. This is kind
Speaker 6: of what Clay's hair look like, except for where all
Speaker 6: the gray is. It was frost tips, you know, in
Speaker 6: the nineties when we were dating. Uh, so maybe there's
Speaker 6: some of that there.
Speaker 2: I'm also going to the Arctic for in a couple
Speaker 2: of months, well less than in a month that half. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and I'll tell you what a lot of hair does
Speaker 2: keeps you warm?
Speaker 3: Yep, absolutely, mm hmm.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 6: We'll just see, we'll see what happens. Clay's hair has
Speaker 6: historically grown out rather than down, you know. And so
Speaker 6: there's a point where if it gets far enough out,
Speaker 6: it's like let's let's let's do something. But right now
Speaker 6: I think I think, I'm I'm pleased with what I see.
Speaker 3: Wow, we're getting a real window into your marriage.
Speaker 1: What more can be said?
Speaker 3: What more can be I'm just gonna let my mustache go?
Speaker 1: Then, yeah, you definitely should.
Speaker 2: Yeah, man, how's it felt been in the Ta Covi's
Speaker 2: hot seat?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Man, I mean you had to nail down the
Speaker 1: price on your mule. Yeah. Wait, and thanks for coming here.
Speaker 1: We are going to give you.
Speaker 2: You're gonna get to to pick out a new pairt
Speaker 2: of Takvis.
Speaker 1: So there's a store here in Northwest Arkansas, and.
Speaker 2: I've got a box. I've got a box of Ta
Speaker 2: COB's right here. But we're gonna let you pick out
Speaker 2: the kind of boots you want. And I had to
Speaker 2: talk Michael into coming. Yeah, he wasn't gonna come. And
Speaker 2: I was like, come on, man, you gotta come. You
Speaker 2: gotta come to bring Willard. We'll get your pair of
Speaker 2: to Covis.
Speaker 4: And so he was like you had met Yeah, what
Speaker 4: kind of what kind are you gonna get?
Speaker 1: Just a pair of leather boots just like cowboy boots.
Speaker 1: Wait for just.
Speaker 4: Okay, yeah, great styles you.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, there's your your gift certificate right there there.
Speaker 2: It is your Covi's boots. And uh, I think we're.
Speaker 6: Gonna have to work on that. That handoff of the
Speaker 6: box a little bit best. That needs to look better.
Speaker 2: Okay, great, well man, I'm excited about this episode.
Speaker 1: It's been good.
Speaker 2: And uh, don't forget about the Beargers YouTube channel. It's
Speaker 2: not it's not launched yet. It's gonna launch in mid February,
Speaker 2: but we're gonna go ahead and start talking about Let
Speaker 2: me go ahead and say one more thing. I'm going
Speaker 2: to open up the next render talking about this. If
Speaker 2: I've seen the little, hazy eyed and distant the last
Speaker 2: two and a half years, it's possible because I've been
Speaker 2: working on a book for the last two and a
Speaker 2: half years, behind the scenes, in the dark corner time,
Speaker 2: in the dark corners of of this office, when no
Speaker 2: one's watching.
Speaker 1: I've been writing a book.
Speaker 2: On February the first, the manuscript for that book is
Speaker 2: due first, the original manuscript, and so me and my
Speaker 2: team we will be submitting a basically ninety thousand word
Speaker 2: manuscript of the book American Bear, which is still over
Speaker 2: a year from being able to be purchased.
Speaker 1: But I'm just so excited about it. I really am.
Speaker 1: I might just quit.
Speaker 6: Life, not live everything.
Speaker 1: I might just retire after the book's out. Bear can
Speaker 1: take over, just trade mules and I like it.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, he's not going to do that.
Speaker 3: I'm excited about the book.
Speaker 4: I've gotten to see a little bit of a window
Speaker 4: into it, and folks, it's going to be good.
Speaker 1: It really is.
Speaker 2: It's it's there's never been a I can say with
Speaker 2: certainty and not with with any kind of sense of pride,
Speaker 2: but there's just not ever been a book written.
Speaker 1: About this like this.
Speaker 2: It's about the American Black Bear, but it's an untold story.
Speaker 2: Nobody's ever told it like this. So I'm excited.
Speaker 3: It'll fly off the shelves. I just know.
Speaker 2: Will Well, there will come a day when I petition
Speaker 2: those who listen to bear grease too. Yeah, exactly, like
Speaker 2: all those all those years, come help me buy this book.
Speaker 2: So start saving up your pennies because in twenty twenty seven,
Speaker 2: a year from.
Speaker 3: Now, to buy a book.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, start saving up your pennies.
Speaker 2: Or if you've got more money than that and want
Speaker 2: a mule Josh at the mediator dot com. Michael would
Speaker 2: take fifteen grand for the mule, but you're gonna have
Speaker 2: to come to Arkansas and pick it.
Speaker 1: Up and ride it. Serious inquiries only. No traders, Yeah,
Speaker 1: no traders. We ain't trading. We ain't trading you nothing
Speaker 1: but green backs, green.
Speaker 3: Backs, straight up benjamins.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And no tire kickers.
Speaker 3: That's right, because I'm going to be fielding all the
Speaker 3: tire kickers.
Speaker 6: I think I'm going to need a compar to Covis
Speaker 6: and a dealer.
Speaker 2: All right, Well, thanks everybody. Keep the wild places wild
Speaker 2: because
Speaker 1: That's where the bears live