Ep. 789: A Bad Road, Rutty Bucks and Cookbooks | MeatEater Radio Live!

Hosts Brody Henderson, Janis Putelis, and Maggie Hudlow recap some recent fall hunts, chat with Tim Fullman and Matt Jackson of the Wilderness Society about the impacts of an Ambler Road, have a crew-submitted Hot Tip Off, and get another round of Rut Reports from the field. Watch the live stream on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel. https://www.youtube.com/@MeatEaterPodcastNetwork Subscribe to The MeatEater Podcast Network https://www.youtube.com/@MeatEaterPodcastNetwork MeatEater on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/meateater, Facebook https://www.facebook.com/StevenRinellaMeatEater/, Twitter https://twitter.com/MeatEaterTV?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor, and YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@MeatEaterPodcastNetwork See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:04Speaker 01

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• 0:34Steven Rinella?

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• 2:58Speaker 04

  Smell us now, lady. Welcome to Meat Eater Trivia. Meat Eater Podcast.

• 3:20Speaker 05

  Welcome to Meat Eater Radio Live. I'm your host, Brody Henderson. Joining me today, we've got Yanis Patellas and Maggie Hudlow.

• 3:27Speaker 06

  Good morning.

• 3:28Speaker 05

  Morning. Happy. It's 11 a.m. Thursday, November 6th, here at the Meat Eater World Headquarters in Bozeman. But no matter what time zone you're in, you should probably be out hunting right now.

• 3:41Speaker 06

  That's right. Instead of listening to this stupid show.

• 3:43Speaker 05

  Yep. But, you know, if you are listening to this here podcast, it should be from the stand or a glassing knob, because this is the week the rut kicks into high gear for whitetails, and the mule deer bucks are also starting to get pretty frisky, I hear. So whether you're doing an all-day sit, you're stuck at work, or you're already tagged out, we've got a great show for you today. We have an interview with a couple of folks from the Wilderness Society up in Alaska.

• 4:10Speaker 05

  Regarding the recent federal approval for building the controversial Ambler Road. If you don't know what that is, we'll, we'll, we'll fill you in. Um, we're also going to be checking in for a RUT report, uh, from a few of our crew members who are out hunting right now. Me and my charming co-hosts, uh, are going to be competing in our own hot tip-off segment. For which you, the live chat audience is going to decide the winner. And we're also going to share some recent hunt stories. Um, rather than some, you know, weird segment that Spencer would do, we're just going to talk hunting. Uh, and finally, we're going to try something new. Hope it works out.

• 4:51Speaker 05

  Um, it, it involves the folks in the live chat. And it involves those, one of those folks getting a sweet prize. To, uh, celebrate the release of our brand spanking new Meat Eater Cookbook Box Set. Right there, can you see that Phil? There it is. Two, two cookbook box set that releases, uh, next Tuesday, November 11th, which is also Veterans Day. We're going to give away a copy of that thing that's signed by Steve. All you guys have to do while we're doing the show live is you gotta write a comment in there

• 5:31Speaker 05

  in the chat with, and it has to be the most convincing reason why you and you alone should deserve to be the winner. Phil's going to weed through those as we go. He's going to pick out a few of the best ones and at the very end of the show, we'll vote and decide who gets a copy of this cookbook.

• 5:50Speaker 06

  Who came up with this game?

• 5:51Speaker 05

  That, that, that's how. I did. You don't like it?

• 5:53Speaker 06

  Well, I just don't really understand. Are you expecting to be entertained by, by their comments?

• 5:59Speaker 05

  I want to be entertained.

• 6:00Speaker 07

  You don't, you don't want genuine heart wrenching stories about why they desperately need to.

• 6:03Speaker 05

  Well, you know, something like that too, could might work. But yeah, we just want to get people involved in having fun.

• 6:09Speaker 07

  All right.

• 6:10Speaker 06

  You guys better be entertaining.

• 6:12Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah, I'm sure they already are. We probably already have our winner already.

• 6:18Speaker 07

  There was, there's been a chat discourse happening here. I mean, an hour before the show even started. There's people in here talking away.

• 6:26Speaker 05

  I'm gonna sweeten the pot, too. If you make a really strong case for why you deserve the cookbook, you're gonna get the effed up old trucks calendar.

• 6:35Speaker 07

  Oh.

• 6:35Speaker 05

  That's also signed by the crew. So there you go. Little, little extra something.

• 6:41Speaker 06

  Fancy.

• 6:42Speaker 05

  Um, Giannis, Maggie, before we get, get really going, um, what have you guys been up to? And what are your plans for the November rut?

• 6:51Speaker 06

  Well, I'm just really here for the rut report since I leave for Wisconsin tomorrow. And, uh, as long as I can get these rut reports in, then I know what to expect.

• 7:01Speaker 05

  Um, we, I think we have a Wisconsin rut report coming in, don't we?

• 7:06Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 7:07Speaker 05

  We do.

• 7:07Speaker 06

  And I don't, I don't think we're gonna play Mark's rut report, but I got a picture this morning from Mark. And he put down a bruiser.

• 7:15Speaker 05

  Is that right?

• 7:15Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 7:16Speaker 05

  Little teaser. Uh, Maggie?

• 7:19Speaker 00

  Uh, admittedly, I don't have deer hunting plans. I got a freezer full of elk meat right now, but.

• 7:26Speaker 05

  Got your meat.

• 7:27Speaker 00

  My bird dog Bill has been real bummed when we've been leaving every morning to go elk hunting without him. So the gears are shifting and we're gonna go try and shoot some birds now, so.

• 7:39Speaker 05

  What are you saying, birds? What kind of birds?

• 7:42Speaker 00

  Uh, ducks around where we live and then we're gonna venture to the other side of the mountain and start dabbling in some upland hunting, which is some, some new grounds for me, so.

• 7:53Speaker 05

  Why you bring that dog up here to hunt pheasants? It's like a banner pheasant year around here.

• 7:58Speaker 00

  Really?

• 7:59Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 7:59Speaker 00

  I will.

• 8:00Speaker 05

  And I saw it in the other day, mule deer and, and, uh, antelope. And I must've seen, I don't know, a couple hundred sharp tails. Like, they were just everywhere, man, where I was. So I'll tell you where they were if you don't tell anyone else.

• 8:16Speaker 00

  I know how to keep my mouth shut.

• 8:21Speaker 05

  Man, on Saturday, I had a, I had a good lesson, I feel like. A lesson that everyone needs to get now and then. I found, I killed nail up Saturday. Sunday, found a, like, for Montana, a very, very nice buck. Um, and I wanted him really, really bad. But it was windy and it was like, I had to sprint to get into position. And I think I, I had made the right choice not to shoot. And I think you need a reminder like that now and then. Like, I wanted that thing bad and I was a millisecond from squeezing the trigger and held off.

• 9:04Speaker 06

  Well, tell us, just because it was windy?

• 9:07Speaker 05

  It was rushed, like, I had to sprint, I was breathing hard, it was a small window to shoot through. Like, culminate windy.

• 9:16Speaker 00

  Just wasn't right.

• 9:17Speaker 05

  Wasn't right.

• 9:18Speaker 06

  He wasn't big enough for that kind of a shot?

• 9:21Speaker 05

  No, he was too big to make that kind of shot.

• 9:26Speaker 06

  So you're saying, I'm guessing he was like a solid one sixties, maybe even a one seventy type buck?

• 9:32Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm, something like that.

• 9:33Speaker 06

  And if he was a two hundred incher, you don't think their lead would have been flying?

• 9:38Speaker 05

  No, no, I wouldn't have shot.

• 9:40Speaker 06

  Cause I was telling my kids last night, actually at the dinner table, that personal ethics usually tend to, as the buck gets bigger, the ethics tend to sort of slide down, down.

• 9:52Speaker 05

  But I, like, I've been talking to my kids lately, like, about there's just no reason to do that shoot and see what happens thing. Like, if you want, like, you shouldn't want something that bad. Like, you need to be like, not that you would say, I don't care if I get that thing or not, but you need to say, like, you know, it's okay if I don't get that thing.

• 10:15Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 10:16Speaker 05

  And I think people need that reminder now and then.

• 10:19Speaker 00

  I respect that.

• 10:19Speaker 05

  Anyway. You look, you look like you're doubting me, honest.

• 10:24Speaker 06

  No, I'm not, not at all. It's just, I, I like struggle with this, uh, the, the whole, uh, the theory of the conversation around it because I, I know if like, if it was like a 150 and I was kinda like, "Ah, yeah, I don't really need that buck," you know, I'd be like, "Yeah, you know, it was too windy."

• 10:42Speaker 05

  We don't ever really need any buck.

• 10:44Speaker 06

  No, I, I know, but when they get huge.

• 10:47Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 10:48Speaker 06

  Like, it's, it's like a drug.

• 10:50Speaker 05

  Well, that's what I'm saying.

• 10:51Speaker 06

  They make people do stupid shit.

• 10:52Speaker 05

  That's what I'm saying.

• 10:53Speaker 06

  If it was a 200 incher, I'm gonna be like, "Well, if I can just get one in him, then I could probably get two more in him later."

• 11:01Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 11:03Speaker 06

  Just saying, it was a di- di- different way to think about it. I mean, I'm, I'm happy for you that you, you know, you had that experience and you made that decision. Um, but, uh, you know, it's such a personal thing.

• 11:14Speaker 05

  It is. It is. You know, we'll see what happens. I'm heading to Colorado like today.

• 11:22Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 11:22Speaker 05

  A 200 incher pops out, I might be shooting over the horizon.

• 11:26Speaker 06

  That's right. You'll be like, "800? Never tried it, but this buck is worth it."

• 11:33Speaker 05

  Yeah. Alright, moving on to the, the guts of the show, um, as always, there are a lot of important public lands issues going on right now. Um, one you gotta know about is this is the last few days of a public comment period where you can weigh in on the plan to, there's a plan out there from the federal government to rescind the, what's called the BLM public lands rule, which essentially prioritizes managing BLM lands, like, multi-use but prioritizes wildlife conservation. The plan would throw that out the window, or rescinding the plan would throw that out the window.

• 12:16Speaker 05

  So, you can go to regulations.gov and leave a comment supporting just leaving the public lands rule as is. Um, go on there and do that. I think you've got, what'd you say, Maggie, till November 10?

• 12:30Speaker 00

  November 10th.

• 12:31Speaker 05

  So, only a few more days. Um...

• 12:35Speaker 05

  So go do that. The public lands issue we're actually going to talk about today. Um, is the Ambler Road. And if you're not familiar, the Ambler Road is, uh, will be a 210 mile long east to west route. From the Dalton Highway, which runs north, south, almost all the way through Alaska. Isn't that right, Yannis?

• 12:56Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 12:58Speaker 05

  Um, it runs east, west from Dalton Highway over to Ambler and it's going to cut directly through this like massive pristine roadless wilderness of the Brook's Range to, uh, to Ambler. Um, the Trump administration recently, it had been, it had been nixed. The, the Trump administration recently reversed that and approved construction of the road. Despite serious concerns about destructive impacts to fish and wildlife habitat, including a major caribou migration corridor. Now, there's, there's proponents of this and there's people and there's detractors.

• 13:39Speaker 05

  Um, but what I would say is like Alaska is the last place in the United States that still has these like vast swaths of largely pristine tracts of, of roadless wilderness. And like, that's what makes Alaska, Alaska special. And it's the only way it's going to stay special. Um, those in favor of the road are cite job creations and other economic benefits for local communities. But you got to keep in mind that the road is being built almost exclusively for foreign mining interests, which are Trilogy Metals of Canada and South 32 of Australia. So, yeah, there's going to be some local jobs that are going to get created, but

• 14:21Speaker 05

  the bulk of the, the financial kind of winnings are going to go to foreign mining companies. So we're going to dig into that. Today, we're going to talk to, uh, Tim Fullman from the Wilderness Society. He's their senior ecologist. We're also going to talk to Matt Jackson from the Wilderness Society, who's their, their senior manager. Um, and we're going to see what's going on and check out the potential impacts with those guys.

• 14:48Speaker 06

  So guys. If I can add, Brody, too, if you want to hear more from someone that's opposed to the Ambler Road, we did a great podcast with author Seth Cantner. Probably a year ago, um, he wrote a book called A Thousand Trails Home: Living with Caribou. Um, but basically where he lives, uh, would be greatly impacted by this road.

• 15:09Speaker 05

  Right, the end of the road.

• 15:10Speaker 06

  Yeah, and, and his, his caribou that, that he hunts and that the villages all around there hunt would be impacted by this road. And, um, I'm sure if you just search Seth Cantner Meteor Podcast, you'd find the episode.

• 15:22Speaker 05

  Yep. Uh, you got those guys in there. Yep, there they are. Okay, uh, thanks for coming, guys. We appreciate you talking to us today and, and informing the audience a little more on the Ambler Road. Uh, Matt, I want to talk to you first.

• 15:41Speaker 05

  It, it seems like this, this is a situation to, at least to me, that in many ways mirrors the Pebble Mine situation that was going on a little while ago down in Bristol Bay. Um, you know, it, it's really controversial. It involves like really good wildlife habitat, also fish habitat. So why don't you talk about the Wilderness Society's, number one, what you guys do holistically and your role in the Ambler Road situation? And then after that, after that, we'll get in and like more of a feel for who in Alaska's for and against, but let's, let's hit the, the big stuff first.

• 16:23Speaker 08

  Yeah, thanks so much for having us on. Uh, my name is Matt. I'm, uh, born and raised Alaskan and, uh, the Wilderness Society nationally, uh, we help write the Wilderness Act. We advocate for public lands, um, fish and wildlife habitat, um. And so we're working on this issue of the Ambler Road in Alaska because of its impact, not just the federal public lands, national public lands, but this huge swath of the Brooks Range. The proposed road would cut through Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, also public lands right around the Dalton Highway corridor that you mentioned. And the parallels you draw with the Pebble Mine are really accurate. You know, what we've

• 17:08Speaker 08

  got here is we're looking at the short-term profits of foreign mining companies versus the long-term well-being of public lands, of wildlife, and most importantly, the communities that rely on them for their way of life. And so that's how the Wilderness Society started to get involved in the Ambler Road is through listening to local communities and looking at the impacts that it would have on those public lands in the Brooks Range.

• 17:34Speaker 05

  So it's been kind of a roller coaster because not that long ago, the road had been shut down. And then just recently, it's back on again. So that's like, it's got to make your job harder, you know, when, when things change. So and the same thing with, with Pebble Mine too, right? Like it's up, it's down, and you know, now it's back again.

• 17:54Speaker 08

  It's been a little bit of a roller coaster, but what's been really consistent from within the state is actually the opposition. You know, we've been through multiple public comment periods where communities have gotten to speak up on this, you know, 88 tribes across the Yukon, Koi Kuk and Obuck watersheds have opposed this project. So, you know, what the feds are doing is a roller coaster, but here in the state, pretty level. We know what we want, and we've said no to this road a bunch of times. So I just try to focus on that local

• 18:27Speaker 05

  Right.

• 18:28Speaker 08

  perspective to protect the land because that's been consistent.

• 18:31Speaker 05

  Um, I want to get into some like nitty gritty stuff for the road. Like who's paying for the road?

• 18:38Speaker 08

  That's a question we don't know the answer to. The cost estimates for the road keep going up and down. You know, I think it's upwards of 350 million to build dollars to build the road is the estimate right now. And nobody's agreed who's going to pay for it. I think one thing that's really important for folks to know is this is not a public road. You know, it's not a US highway. It's going to be a private mining road for industrial scale mine trucks hauling ore back and forth. When you have trucks like that driving, they're what's called fugitive dust.

• 19:13Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 19:13Speaker 08

  Mine tailings to escape from the trucks. And so there's kind of some rough drafts to have it be a toll road and the mine company will pay the toll. But nobody knows who's going to pay to build it.

• 19:25Speaker 05

  Is there any chance like American taxpayers end up on the hook for some of the costs?

• 19:32Speaker 08

  We're certainly going to be on the hook to clean up the mess afterwards. That's typically how it works. I was not sure who's going to be on the hook to build it. But it's a risk.

• 19:41Speaker 05

  Is there, is there a timeline for construction or is that, or is it too early?

• 19:47Speaker 08

  Um, you know, some of the boosters, these foreign mining companies, they say they want to start as soon as next spring. Yeah, I think that's unrealistic financially and, uh, you know, legally for them.

• 19:58Speaker 05

  Right.

• 19:59Speaker 08

  That's what they're trying to do is start construction in the spring.

• 20:02Speaker 05

  Normally when something, you know, a road like this gets built, there, there has to be all these like assessments done beforehand. Like impact studies and things like that. Has that work already been done or is it, is it going to be done or?

• 20:19Speaker 08

  Well, uh, yes and no. Uh, you mentioned the roller coaster. All of the federal roller coaster, all of that work was done. And in 2024, the Bureau of Land Management, uh, said in a record of decision that based on all that work and permitting, there's no way you can build this road legally because it would impact wildlife. It would impact subsistence habitat or subsistence communities. It would impact water quality, you know, all these issues with that. And so that's why the, the government said no in 2024. Uh, what the administration did at the beginning of the, of October is by proclamation, they're just trying to say that none of that matters and to force the agencies to issue permits.

• 21:04Speaker 08

  That contradict what they decided in 2024. Um, and so that's what we're seeing happen right now is that by proclamation, they're trying to say, none of that science that happened in 2024 matters anymore. Just bulldozes the thing anyways. And that's what the Wilderness Society and our, more importantly, the frontline communities here in Alaska are trying to stop right now.

• 21:23Speaker 05

  What, um, what, are you guys working with, with a bunch of other conservation groups to fight this?

• 21:31Speaker 08

  We are, um, I, there's a big coalition, you know, I mentioned those 88 tribes.

• 21:37Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 21:38Speaker 08

  And so, you know, Tannenah Chiefs Conference is a, is a consortium of tribes in kind of the central interior region of Alaska, and we work with them. Uh, National Parks Conservation Association also deserves a shout out. What they do is in their name, National Parks Conservation. And, uh, they've been a leader on this for a while because of the impacts to Gates of the Arctic National Park. Uh, it's definitely a team effort, um, but really the stars of the show, um, and I, I tried to bring some of them on today, but they weren't able to make it. Are the tribal members from the region.

• 22:12Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 22:12Speaker 08

  Who, from the beginning have said, this is not going to work for our way of life.

• 22:17Speaker 05

  Great.

• 22:17Speaker 06

  I got a question, bro. Where, where does the, uh, where does Alaska's governor stand on this?

• 22:25Speaker 08

  Um, our current governor has spoken in favor of the project, you know, I don't want to speak for him, um, but he tends to be pro-resource extraction.

• 22:36Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 22:39Speaker 05

  Which isn't, I mean, resource extraction itself isn't necessarily bad if it's done in the right way, but, you know, this, this doesn't sound like the right way. Um, Tim, I want, I want to move on to you. Um, the Ambler Road, as I mentioned earlier, is going to bisect kind of the core range of the Western Arctic Caribou herd. And, and go right through their migration path. Um, it's also a critical habitat for doll sheep, moose, boreal bird, salmon, et cetera. Um, but if you could, let's, let's start with that, that caribou herd, um, be- because it, it's already, as far as I know, kind of in a, in a downturn.

• 23:23Speaker 05

  So just give us a brief history of, of that herd and how they're doing right now. And then crystal ball it, what could happen, you know, if the road goes through.

• 23:34Speaker 09

  Sure. Yeah, so I mean, I guess zooming out even a tiny bit more, caribou and reindeer, as they're called over in Europe and Asia, all the same species across the globe, we're seeing declines in many populations. It's true across a lot of Canada, and it's true here in Alaska. So when I moved here 11 and a half years ago, there were more caribou than people in the state of Alaska, and that isn't true anymore. And the westernized herd is a prime example of that. It used to be the largest herd in the state with nearly half a million animals as of the early 2000s. But over the last two decades, it showed a nearly 70% decline in numbers. Now, as you mentioned, the proposed area in which

• 24:16Speaker 09

  the road would go would cut through migration and winter habitat, other important areas that are used by the herd. And the concern there is that caribou are an animal that needs to be able to use big intact areas. They live in a really variable environment. There's lots of changes from season to season, and caribou need to be able to be free to roam across their habitat to access the different resources they need at different times of the year. And yet, studies have shown that caribou also are sensitive to development. And we see altered movement behavior at certain sensitive times of the year, like calving and post-calving, they displace away from roads and activity. And so there's a

• 25:00Speaker 09

  concern about, at a time when the herd already is in decline, what the impact of adding on extra stressors might be for the caribou.

• 25:09Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah. Can you give us some, some other more specific examples of potential impacts, like on wildlife, but, but also on local subsistence communities?

• 25:23Speaker 09

  Sure.

• 25:25Speaker 09

  Yeah, so earlier this year, we published a study looking at the Western Arctic herd and looking at how they responded to roads. And we found that it wasn't every caribou every time, but over time, impacts on the herd accumulate. And it's much more than you might expect just based on the footprint of roads. And so we saw that caribou were being affected throughout the year with altered movement. They might delay their movements near a road, spending more time near the road than otherwise expected. They might not even be able to cross it all. They approach a road, then they bounce back away, and they can't make it past those roads. Other kinds of things like that. And then you mentioned the impact for the people who rely on caribou. There are concerns about the ability to access caribou herds, to be

• 26:10Speaker 09

  able to carry on the traditional subsistence way of life that people have been practicing here for thousands and thousands of years who rely on caribou. And so there's real interest among groups like the Western Arctic Caribou Herd Working Group that I'm a part of, which brings together subsistence hunters from the range of the herd, hunting guides and transporters, and myself, representing conservationists, to try to come up with ways to encourage conservation of the herd and its habitat so that it can stay around to sustain future generations.

• 26:45Speaker 05

  Has the Western Arctic herd, is it already in a situation where quotas for the number of animals that are allowed to be taken have already been reduced before, like before the road?

• 26:59Speaker 09

  It was, I believe it was just about a year ago, that because of the ongoing decline in the herd, the bag limit, the harvest level four residence was dropped. They've also put in restrictions for out-of-state hunters and what they're able to access from the herd because of the decline. And so that's exactly why, you know, with all these things going on, there's a question of, does it make sense to add additional pressures to the herd?

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• 27:56Steven Rinella?

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• 28:41Steven Rinella?

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• 29:02Speaker 03

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• 29:18Speaker 05

  You guys got anything?

• 29:19Speaker 00

  Yeah, isn't this also gonna have a huge impact on fish? I mean, there should be, like, I think in the thousands of creek crossings, having to build culverts with this road, things like dolly varden, she fish being impacted, mine tailings. I mean, it's kind of expansive how much the impacts go.

• 29:45Speaker 09

  We definitely are hearing concerns about the impacts to fish from people out on the land and in the communities nearest to where the road is proposed. And, you know, we have an aquatic ecologist who works with us here at the Wilderness Society. And yeah, he's much better able to speak to some of the details of that. But yeah, there's concerns about what the impacts of putting in a road, putting in the culverts, all those things might do to fish and to fishing opportunities.

• 30:09Speaker 05

  If you, if you guys don't mind.

• 30:10Speaker 08

  Yeah, you're exactly right. It was 4,000 culverts.

• 30:13Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 30:14Speaker 08

  Would be required to build this road.

• 30:16Speaker 05

  If you guys don't mind, send us his, his contact info because we might want to talk to him about that more. Um, all right, we kind of got to wrap things up and, and move on, guys. But before we go, um, is there any hope of a reversal like in the courts? Or, and is there anything people can do to fight it right now?

• 30:36Speaker 08

  There's always hope, especially when there's so much unity around protecting this landscape within the state, within the communities that live there. Um, unfortunately, kind of by design, there's not a lot of public engagement. There's, you know, there's not a comment period. There's not a chance for people to speak up at this moment. But, uh, the Wilderness Society and our friends here in Alaska were working to create that opportunity to make sure we have public comments or a chance to speak up. So, uh, what I can tell folks right now is to just follow the Wilderness Society on social media or sign up for our email updates. And also, uh, the Defend the Brooks Range group.

• 31:09Speaker 05

  Nice.

• 31:10Speaker 08

  You asked earlier if we were working with lots of other groups in Alaska, uh, that, that group of, is called Defend the Brooks Range. And they're also on social media. And, uh, you know, the Wilderness Society, we, we work on a bunch of things. If you follow Defend the Brooks Range, you're going to get content on the Brooks Range, you know, learn more about the people that live there, the kind of wildlife that's there and how to stay involved.

• 31:30Speaker 05

  Yeah, and just, just look at Pebble Mine as, as an example, like that was a big win. So hopefully we get one here too. Well, thanks a lot, guys. I'm sure you're busy, so we'll let you go. Thanks. Thanks guys.

• 31:43Speaker 09

  Thank you.

• 31:47Speaker 05

  Okay. You guys got anything to say about that?

• 31:51Speaker 06

  Oh, just, it makes me sick, you know, to think that, but, you know, the whole thing is people are always like, well, we need to, we need more energy here.

• 32:01Speaker 05

  Well, this isn't even energy. This is.

• 32:04Speaker 06

  Sure, just mining, but you know, when they talk about doing more, uh, you know, resource extraction on the north side of the Brooks Range in the, um,

• 32:14Speaker 06

  uh, in the, in the park there.

• 32:17Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 32:17Speaker 06

  Right?

• 32:18Speaker 05

  Anwar, you mean?

• 32:19Speaker 06

  Yeah, it's like, most of our resources now are exported.

• 32:24Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 32:25Speaker 06

  People don't understand that. Like, we have plenty. We export it. We don't, we're not always buying oil from some other place to, to, you know, make our cars go. Um, we have plenty of it. We don't need to pump more out of it. Like, it's a reserve for a reason. Let's keep it there until we really need it, you know, for when it's like dire.

• 32:45Speaker 05

  In this case, like, it's foreign mining companies.

• 32:49Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 32:49Speaker 05

  It's, it's crazy.

• 32:50Speaker 00

  Well, and there's this frantic need, like, we have to do this now. We need to get these industries going now. And when there's this push to get things done so fast, you know, environmental protections aren't taken into consideration. Things are just, they're jumping through hoops. And it, it's, you know, it's really a, like, reversal in time of like, we've seen the damage that mines can do, yet we're so willing to just go right back to this, cause all this environmental damage without a second look, just for, you know, make the rich richer.

• 33:24Speaker 06

  Yeah, there's no doubt there'll be a few Alaskans that have, uh, some jobs there for a few years, you know? And it could be 20 years of, of, of jobs, but like, the real winners are not going to be Americans.

• 33:35Speaker 00

  No, no.

• 33:36Speaker 05

  No.

• 33:36Speaker 00

  And, and think about how much time they would have to be spending cleaning up mine tailings, cleaning up the water, cleaning up the land.

• 33:45Speaker 06

  The thing is, is like,

• 33:46Speaker 00

  Like,

• 33:46Speaker 06

  you can't, like, you never truly clean that stuff up.

• 33:49Speaker 00

  No.

• 33:50Speaker 06

  Either.

• 33:50Speaker 00

  It's, it's there. It's, it becomes part of the land. And it's, when you have a place like Alaska, it's just such a shame that some people are so willing to sacrifice that for the sake of the dollar.

• 34:05Speaker 05

  Yep. Let's move on to something fun.

• 34:07Speaker 06

  That's right. Let's get this, let's get this thing, our smiles turned around.

• 34:13Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 34:13Speaker 06

  Round upside down.

• 34:15Speaker 05

  We got an in-house hot tip-off contest we're gonna do. So you gotta follow along and place your vote in the chat. Make it real easy for Phil to figure out who the winner is.

• 34:26Speaker 07

  Yeah, I'm gonna start a poll here as soon as the tip-offs end.

• 34:31Speaker 05

  Before we get into it, if you've got a hot tip-off that's so hot it has to be shared with us,

• 34:40Speaker 05

  because we do fan hot tip-offs also, send it to, I think it's radiolive@themeat eater.com.

• 34:47Speaker 07

  I think it might just be radio. I'm a horrible engineer of the show, but maybe our producer Jake will pipe in.

• 34:54Speaker 05

  Or send it to like info@themeat eater. Someone will get it.

• 34:58Speaker 00

  Meat eater@themeat eater.com.

• 35:00Speaker 05

  Yeah. Send it to Yanis@themeat eater.com.

• 35:04Speaker 07

  DM it to Maggie on Instagram.

• 35:06Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah.

• 35:06Speaker 05

  Someone will get it. But yeah, send us those. We like, we like doing those from the, from the fans, too. Phil, you ready to tee them up?

• 35:15Speaker 07

  Yeah, let's tee them up. We've got some, we've got video tips from Brody and Yanis, and then Maggie is going to do a, an in-house hot tip-off.

• 35:24Speaker 00

  I thought that's what Yanis was doing, so that's what I rolled with.

• 35:28Speaker 06

  No, Brody said I couldn't do it.

• 35:30Speaker 05

  I didn't say you couldn't.

• 35:32Speaker 06

  Well, anyways.

• 35:33Speaker 05

  Depends on, like, I couldn't have done, like, mine that way.

• 35:36Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 35:37Speaker 07

  All right, let's watch the tips.

• 35:39Speaker 05

  Welcome to another hot tip-off. Yanis Patel is here, and here's my hot tip. During the year, prepare for hunting season by making large amounts of things like chili,

• 35:56Speaker 05

  elk stew.

• 36:00Speaker 06

  Breakfast sausage, meatballs. Slow cooked meat for barbecue sandwiches from a deer neck.

• 36:11Speaker 06

  Bear beeria, here's enough for three meals. I want some of that stuff. More slow cooked meat, more breakfast sausage. If you do this, and every time you have dinner, you just make a little extra and vacuum seal it, put it in your freezer, then when it's time for hunting season, you just throw all that stuff into the cooler, go to camp, and dinners are pretty much done. All you gotta do is reheat it, hit the grocery store, buy tortillas, some buns, whatever you need. Makes life super easy and you get to continue to be living the meat eater lifestyle and eating game while you're hunting game for next year. So there you go, beat that hot tip off, Maggie and Brody.

• 36:57Speaker 06

  Dang, aggressive. Note to future Yanni from past Yanni, shoot straight this week, okay? Aim for the top of the heart.

• 37:06Speaker 00

  Hell yeah, Yanni.

• 37:07Speaker 06

  Thanks, Yanni.

• 37:08Speaker 05

  This is Brody coming at you with a hot tip from antelope season here in Montana. My son just got this buck like an hour ago. Um, and we're, we're ready to take the head off of it. For years and years, when I was taking the head off a buck or a bull, I would always come in from the top, like back behind the ears and through all that heavy muscle and tendon that's down here. Um, and I learned that if you flip them over and come in from the throat down, it's just way easier, way faster. You come out right where you want, where the skull meets the spine and slip your knife right between the skull and the spine. And it takes like less than half the time of coming in from the top.

• 37:50Speaker 05

  So you just go down, uh, cut through the, the esophagus there and follow those, uh, jaw muscles, our jaw bone down right there. And you get through that stuff and you're there, like it's right there.

• 38:08Speaker 05

  And you'll find.

• 38:12Speaker 06

  Well, can he execute?

• 38:13Speaker 05

  That if you get, get it right, you can just

• 38:17Speaker 05

  cut, kick it a little bit and you're right where you're at. And you're through, like, just like that, like, it, it's like fast, way faster than coming through all the heavy muscle and tendon from the top. So that's your hot tip.

• 38:35Speaker 00

  You know, about your hot tip, Brody, if you're, uh, if you're getting lymph nodes for CWD, you've already made that first cut.

• 38:42Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 38:43Speaker 00

  You're already right there.

• 38:44Speaker 05

  Yeah, I don't do the whole, like, skin in the head and all that when I take a skull or take a head out.

• 38:51Speaker 00

  No?

• 38:51Speaker 05

  I leave all that stuff on.

• 38:54Speaker 06

  You do have to be careful, though, cutting them that close like that, because some CWD test, check stations will be like, "Hey, you're a little tight. We like to leave a little bit more neck on here."

• 39:06Speaker 00

  Well, uh, Wyoming, you just have to get the lymph nodes out.

• 39:10Speaker 06

  Can you bring them in personally?

• 39:11Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 39:12Speaker 06

  They're like...

• 39:13Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 39:14Speaker 05

  All right, Maggie, let's, let's hear yours.

• 39:16Speaker 00

  Okay, this is, this is kind of a lukewarm tip, but, uh, it was extremely convenient this year. Phil, you got the

• 39:24Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah, sure thing.

• 39:26Speaker 00

  Uh, so, processing my elk this year, uh, we just laid out butcher paper on my kitchen island. And, uh, we could label all the pots and everything, because we've got, like, a grind pile, a jerky pile, a dog pile. So, when you're shipping Miller Lights, you know, and you don't get them confused, actually, that's a high life. Um, and, uh, it just made cleanup really easy, because I don't have big enough cutting boards for a whole quarter. So, you could just kind of flop whole muscle groups there, get ready to clean it up a little more, and, uh, you know, it's kind of a lame tip, but, man, it made cleanup a breeze this year.

• 40:07Speaker 05

  You're not cutting on the table, though, right?

• 40:09Speaker 00

  No, I mean, I've got, it's just like a walnut butcher block, uh, so I could if I wanted to, but trying not to

• 40:17Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 40:18Speaker 00

  patina it up that much, but...

• 40:20Speaker 06

  I do the same thing, but without the butcher paper.

• 40:22Speaker 00

  Yeah?

• 40:23Speaker 05

  Yep, just spray and wipe.

• 40:26Speaker 00

  It, well, see, that's the thing, I can't really, because it's an untreated butcher block.

• 40:30Speaker 05

  Oh, I gotcha.

• 40:31Speaker 00

  So I don't have a way to, like, really disinfect it that well, other than, like, dish soap.

• 40:38Speaker 05

  You should just like rub a bunch of mineral oil into that.

• 40:40Speaker 00

  Well, I keep doing it, but it it's like not even a year old. So it doesn't quite have like,

• 40:46Speaker 05

  Mm hmm.

• 40:47Speaker 00

  It's not quite there yet.

• 40:48Speaker 05

  I don't want to seem like I'm bagging on your hot tip off. I think it's great.

• 40:51Speaker 06

  It's a good tip.

• 40:52Speaker 00

  No, it was.

• 40:53Speaker 06

  It does make cleanup super easy.

• 40:54Speaker 00

  It it made cleanup real easy.

• 40:56Speaker 06

  Brody's tip is good, too. He told me about it. I forget when, maybe on the youth hunt.

• 41:00Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 41:01Speaker 06

  And I've used it on two different animals now. You're going through the same stuff as you would go from coming in from the top.

• 41:09Speaker 05

  It's just easier to bind.

• 41:10Speaker 06

  But yeah, it's easier to find the gap that takes you there.

• 41:13Speaker 05

  Something about coming in from the top where you're just not lined up right a lot of the time, or I don't know, but.

• 41:19Speaker 06

  I just think that, yeah, the top, it just takes way more experience to like hit the spot exactly right. Cause when I hit it just right, I can do it that way fast, too.

• 41:27Speaker 05

  And it's also like the way that the joints come together, skull and the spine come to, if you turn it over and it's like they're coming apart almost like you stretch that throat out and it's and it's, you know, like that it it's hard to explain.

• 41:42Speaker 07

  All right, poll is live, everybody. I'll give you another 30 seconds or so and then we'll we'll call it.

• 41:46Speaker 00

  I remember that conversation because that was when I was up here last time for Meat Eater Roast. You guys were talking about that.

• 41:52Speaker 05

  We were. You need to stick those antlers in the ground or whatever and it lays lays there just right.

• 41:58Speaker 00

  I like your tip too, Yanni, because I do that all the time just for my sanity, not even just for hunting. Like, I love having stuff ready to roll in the freezer.

• 42:06Speaker 05

  Oh, I like to just roll that way all the time.

• 42:09Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 42:10Speaker 05

  Yeah, my wife would like it, too.

• 42:11Speaker 06

  We use some of it throughout the year, but what happens is the kids get overeating something or, you know, they're like stew again. And so this worked out perfectly because, you know, I had to cook for myself for the next week.

• 42:25Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 42:25Speaker 06

  And my dad, and to have basically seven or eight meals done.

• 42:30Speaker 00

  Mm hmm.

• 42:31Speaker 06

  It's gonna make it easy.

• 42:32Speaker 05

  Where'd you get that burry a recipe?

• 42:35Speaker 06

  Probably New York, New York Times, I'm guessing.

• 42:38Speaker 05

  I wanna try that.

• 42:39Speaker 00

  Have you, uh, have you gotten into the little freezer mold things, the little square things?

• 42:45Speaker 06

  Like they do for baby food?

• 42:47Speaker 00

  I don't know, uh, they, they used to be like ice cube trays, but you can freeze like stock and stuff and like a square thing and then you just can stick them in a freezer bag. Those are slick. That was gonna be my other hot tip option.

• 42:59Speaker 05

  Phil, where are we at with the voting?

• 43:01Speaker 07

  Uh, I will let you know right now with 21% of the vote in third place is Maggie Hudlow's.

• 43:08Speaker 05

  Oh, Maggie.

• 43:10Speaker 07

  Maggie has a lot of supporters in, in, in the chat.

• 43:13Speaker 00

  Thanks, chat.

• 43:14Speaker 07

  Yeah, someone said that they've been doing it Maggie's way for the last few years. Game changer. That's what he said. Um, but then the winner with 44% of the vote is Brody Henderson.

• 43:32Speaker 05

  Thank you, everyone.

• 43:33Speaker 00

  Good job.

• 43:33Speaker 05

  Give it a try this weekend when you kill a great big buck. Um, if you're not gonna get it mounted, I'm just gonna do a freedom mount.

• 43:43Speaker 05

  Well, Phil, let's, uh, we, we should do some like questions and comments.

• 43:46Speaker 07

  Yeah, sure. It's, I have, I've been book, flagging, bookmarking all of the, the cookbook submissions.

• 43:54Speaker 05

  Um, yeah.

• 43:55Speaker 07

  And we, we have, we have a few just straight up questions, but I kinda have to like sort, sort through them here.

• 44:00Speaker 05

  I get it.

• 44:00Speaker 07

  Uh, and Andrew was in the meat eater store this morning and saw Maggie in the wild and was starstruck. But that just, that just goes to show you that even, even our crew members go shop at the meat eater store.

• 44:12Speaker 00

  I needed a new hat. Hi, Andrew.

• 44:16Speaker 06

  I can't believe you didn't buy this one. Get this one.

• 44:19Speaker 00

  I almost did and then I thought we'd be matching if I came in with that hat.

• 44:23Speaker 06

  This is the luckiest hunting hat I've ever owned.

• 44:25Speaker 00

  No kidding.

• 44:25Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah. Yeah. I think like five or six big game animals have fallen in love and been wearing this hat.

• 44:31Speaker 05

  So do you, like, when you're going hunting now, like, you feel weird if you don't have it on?

• 44:34Speaker 06

  I'm gonna wear it through the end of this season and then I'll retire it.

• 44:39Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 44:39Speaker 06

  Put it in the auction house oddities or something. But I'm telling you, if you're having a rough season right now, go order yourself one of these Wired to Hunt.

• 44:47Speaker 05

  Buck hats.

• 44:48Speaker 00

  That's what everybody wants is a stinky hunting hat.

• 44:51Speaker 07

  Nathan Stillwell says with a deer, I am putting the rib meat into the grind for burger. How much would you worry about having the fat tallow attached to the meat going into the grind? Will it affect the flavor or texture?

• 45:03Speaker 05

  I think it depends on the deer.

• 45:06Speaker 05

  Like a big buck with a bunch of that tallow on the outside of his chest.

• 45:10Speaker 00

  It's gonna be a little waxy.

• 45:12Speaker 05

  I, I mean, I've gotten away from using that type of meat in my, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it.

• 45:18Speaker 06

  I am.

• 45:19Speaker 05

  But that rib meat is just full of gristle. And the more gristle your burger has, the shittier your burger is gonna be. I know people don't like sacrificing like big whole muscle roasts off the ham or off the shoulder. But like, that's what I use for burger.

• 45:36Speaker 00

  It makes better burger.

• 45:38Speaker 05

  Yeah, like I would just save the ribs to cook as ribs.

• 45:41Speaker 00

  Mm hmm, agreed.

• 45:42Speaker 06

  Or debone them and then chop them up real small and make a stew or any other slow and low preparation like you would do with the neck or the shanks.

• 45:52Speaker 05

  Melt that stuff.

• 45:53Speaker 06

  Where that stuff that you're like worrying about how, what to deal with, deal with and how it's gonna be negative to your recipe. If you slow and low those ribs, it's gonna, it's gonna add to the flavor and the consistency in the recipe.

• 46:09Speaker 05

  I mean, he's specifically asking about fat and tallow. I would get rid of as much of that as you can, but you can't get rid of all that gristle that's in the rib meat. You just can't.

• 46:22Speaker 07

  Uh, great. Most of everything else has been cookbook stuff, but I'll, I'm just gonna, this is a Phil question that Brody loves to. Uh, John's asking if I'm playing Battlefield 6. I, I am not, but Alex Plakta, who's our, uh, social guy who's plays trivia occasionally is playing RedSec and we, we might play together soon. So that's fun.

• 46:41Speaker 05

  Oh, you guys can have a little video game playdate.

• 46:45Speaker 07

  No, John, I just rolled credits on Hades 2. I'm in the act three of Hollow Knight Silksong and I'm playing Ghost of Yote, which I'm kind of bouncing off of. I'm kind of, I've got open world fatigue. Yeah, Brody?

• 46:54Speaker 05

  What, maybe you're not willing to share because you don't want to get attacked online. But what's your like online video hand, video game plan handle?

• 47:04Speaker 07

  Oh, um, well. Yeah.

• 47:06Speaker 05

  You don't have to share.

• 47:07Speaker 07

  I'm not gonna share.

• 47:08Speaker 05

  Okay. You gotta tell me after the show.

• 47:10Speaker 07

  I shared it once before on Ben O'Brien's old podcast. And even then, with his smaller audience, I got inundated with a bunch of requests from I'm sure fine people. But I like to have a clean friend list.

• 47:22Speaker 05

  We should run a contest to have people guess your handle.

• 47:25Speaker 07

  Oh, okay. I think some people know.

• 47:28Speaker 05

  All right. Is that all for now?

• 47:30Speaker 07

  Yeah, yeah, that's all for now. Please send in some more straight up questions for the end of the show, because we're a little light on those.

• 47:36Speaker 05

  Questions and a good reason you need their cookbook. Okay, next up. We are going to be checking in with some hunters around the country for some boots on the ground rut reports. But before we get to them, I just want to check in with you guys. Yannis, you got some exciting stuff showing up on your trail cams?

• 47:57Speaker 06

  I wouldn't say exciting. It's kind of what you expect. Deer movement, lots of deer movement, more daylight movement than a month ago. It's not like the cams all of a sudden are just lit up with, you know, Boone and Crockett type bucks.

• 48:14Speaker 06

  And I try to remind myself, and my dad especially a lot, all the time, is that like you cannot make hunting decisions based on cameras. And we have a lot of them, you know, we're, you know, partners with Mole Tree. So I basically have as many cameras I want to run. There's probably two dozen of them out there right now. But still, deer walk behind them. They walk sometimes in front of them and don't get their picture taken. You just like, I like to have them for like a general inventory. I know where there's like, a bunch of does are hanging out right now. That's a good thing to know for the rut, you know, like where they're hanging out. So, yeah, that's my trail cam report.

• 48:52Speaker 05

  Maggie, you said you're not gonna be?

• 48:55Speaker 00

  I'm not, but I have seen more mule deer running around. Which is cool to see, except for, you know, I was driving up from Wyoming last night. So I was driving pretty slow the whole way because I saw quite a few deer running around, especially driving it, you know.

• 49:11Speaker 06

  I think the way to avoid them is drive faster.

• 49:15Speaker 00

  Yeah, take a look at my truck and then uh maybe you'll reconsider that.

• 49:19Speaker 05

  Yeah, I I just I have one day of mule deer hunting in this year, just a few days ago.

• 49:26Speaker 05

  There was some some small bucks, forkeys that were like hanging with does, fought like getting their nose up near the doe's butt. But it's just like that mule deer rut, I feel lags behind the whitetail rut a little bit. I did have that big buck that was that was checking a doe, but he was like not rut. He was like, I'm gonna walk over there and see what's going on. And then he walked away. So like, I'm hoping, because I'm heading to Colorado, I'm hoping that it's it's gonna start kicking off. Good.

• 50:00Speaker 05

  Let's uh let's check out the actual uh in the field reports, Phil.

• 50:07Speaker 04

  Hey, Spencer Newarth, bringing you a rut report from November 3rd. I am in eastern Montana, hunting a place that is almost exclusively mule deer. So that's the kind of information you're getting from me.

• 50:21Speaker 04

  Last night, I saw thirty to forty muley does. Broke up into like ten different groups and not a single one of them had a buck with them. I think if it was a week from now, two weeks from now, that would have been a different story. But clearly, the muleys out here are not at a stage in the rut where the does are getting too harassed quite yet. Otherwise, I would have seen it last night. This morning, I saw a bachelor group of three bucks together. They were leaving an egg field headed to bed right at about shooting light. And those three bucks seemed kind of irritated with each other. Couple of them postured, looked like they were gonna lock antlers at one point.

• 51:04Speaker 04

  A different buck, I saw him rubbing his antlers, thrashing around in one of those draws. And one of those bucks I killed right at sunrise. And I'll go show them to you in the back of my pickup here right now. Here he is. I was doing that rut report from inside of my truck because it is so damn windy out here. And I care about our listeners.

• 51:30Speaker 04

  This buck was the biggest buck in that bachelor group.

• 51:36Speaker 04

  And if I'd have been out here a week later, he might have been in a different county. Cause he seemed like he was getting amped up to chase some tail. Alright, I will be hosting Meat Eater Radio next week. I'll have more on this story then. Back to you, Brody.

• 51:53Speaker 06

  Nice buck.

• 51:54Speaker 00

  Nice.

• 51:54Speaker 10

  Tony Peterson's got your rut report right here. Uh, as you can see, you should probably be in a tree right now. Not a huge surprise since it's the first week of November. Put it all fairness, he killed it four minutes into his first sit, so he has really no idea what's going on.

• 52:08Speaker 11

  I did sit there for two extra hours.

• 52:10Speaker 10

  Afterward?

• 52:11Speaker 11

  Right.

• 52:12Speaker 10

  Did you see rut act? Like, like after you were done hunting, did you observe any rut?

• 52:16Speaker 11

  I was drinking a Starbucks energy drink and eating a, a protein bar and I did see a little buck come through cruising.

• 52:23Speaker 10

  He was rutting.

• 52:24Speaker 11

  He, this dude was looking, that dude was looking and we had does going between and they were not together. So it was just like bucks were roaming, does were trying to avoid them, but it's definitely even being 65 degrees, 70 degrees today, so they were going.

• 52:38Speaker 10

  I'd like to return to something in case people missed it. Four minutes into his first set.

• 52:44Speaker 11

  Right, but I would like to, I would like to wrap this up by asking Steve what he was doing when I shot this buck.

• 52:52Speaker 10

  I was trying to help the deer herd by doing some coyote work.

• 52:55Speaker 11

  On November 4th.

• 52:56Speaker 10

  That's why that buck was free to be who he was, you know?

• 53:00Speaker 11

  Right, cause the real threat wasn't in the woods. So get out there.

• 53:04Speaker 10

  Oh, you know what? Uh, Tony had found him on a camera and, and, uh, his name was, uh, you might not have heard it before, his name was Old Split Time.

• 53:12Speaker 11

  Yep.

• 53:15Speaker 10

  We called him Old, Old Tri-Split is what he should have been called right there.

• 53:19Speaker 11

  Pretty derivative deer name here. We didn't go too far outside the lines.

• 53:23Speaker 10

  Um, I'm trying not to seem jealous. Do I seem unjealous, Charlie?

• 53:28Speaker 06

  I seem good.

• 53:29Speaker 10

  I seem like, I seem like I'm not, like I don't care, right?

• 53:32Speaker 06

  I don't think a jealous man would go coyote hunting on November 4th.

• 53:34Speaker 10

  Well, it was before it happened. It was like, I didn't know.

• 53:38Speaker 11

  I mean, who could have foreseen that on November 4th? You should definitely not go to your tree stand and go run a trap lane out on the moonscape of Nebraska.

• 53:46Speaker 10

  I can see where you're coming from on it, but. Anyway, get into a tree, right now. Oh, look, I didn't even notice that. He's been rubbing, rubbing big time.

• 53:57Speaker 05

  These guys need to work on their porting skills a little bit.

• 54:00Speaker 10

  East Nebraska. Rut is rutting.

• 54:04Speaker 05

  Um, before you move on.

• 54:05Speaker 10

  Coyotes are running.

• 54:07Speaker 05

  Give me the pause. Oh, no, after, no, when it's, is it over? Oh, no, it's still going. It's still going. Go to the next one. Well, wait, before you go to the next one, I got an addendum to this one. Our buddy Pat, who is also out there hunting with those guys, he got a buck as well. So it's happening out there. And Steve's chasing coyotes. Mm hmm.

• 54:28Speaker 06

  Well, now he's, he's in a tree trying to kill a deer. Now that everybody else has killed one.

• 54:33Speaker 05

  All right, back to the rut report. I don't think we need to finish this one.

• 54:36Speaker 10

  It's like a Disney movie out there.

• 54:39Speaker 12

  What's up, Meteor Live? I'm Bear Newcomb, coming at you with a rut report for the southeast. I've been hunting a lot the last two weeks, and I've really seen the rut activities start to pick up the last couple of days. The first chase I saw was the last couple of days of October. But this week I've seen two big shooter bucks that I haven't seen before, both chasing does. So the rut, I would say, is coming into its peak over here. Um, next week, we've got a big cold front coming. And so I'd imagine that that will be probably the peak of the rut, but I've been seeing a lot of chasing. Uh, I've seen three or four chases alone this week, and the big bucks are starting to come out of the woodwork.

• 55:24Speaker 12

  But I'm switching over from food sources right now, switching more to travel corridors and other pinch points. And I've been having a lot of luck that way. There's also a few spots where I saw a lot of does in the early season. And I went into one of those spots the other day and instantly got in on a, on a chase. There were three bucks chasing one doe. So the rut is in full swing. If there's ever a time to be out in the woods, it's right now. So good luck to all of you guys who are getting out there.

• 55:56Speaker 13

  Hello everybody, good morning from Central Wisconsin. Giving you a little rut update.

• 56:00Speaker 06

  Let's go Chester.

• 56:01Speaker 13

  Sitting at the breakfast table this morning, coming up with a solid hunt plan for the next few days. And I think, I think we've got a good plan. Anyways, what I've been seeing is a lot of the mature dominant bucks have been pretty locked down on does. So the rut's obviously happening right now.

• 56:21Speaker 13

  It's a good time of year to be sitting all day. Once those bigger mature deer, you know, get off that doe, they breed her, they start looking for another one. They're gonna be cruising. So what I'm focusing on is bedding areas, so downwind side of bedding areas. Pinch points between bedding areas. And then also in the evenings and mornings, transitions between, you know, the bedding area and food. Wherever those does are gonna be, those bucks are gonna be checking them out. So be careful on the roads, driving at night in Wisconsin, you know, it's a hazard. So deer are running around. Good luck to everybody and I hope you get out there and I hope you shoot a big buck.

• 57:04Speaker 06

  What a cutie.

• 57:06Speaker 05

  There you have it. Sounds like things are happening. Does that get you real excited, you honest?

• 57:13Speaker 06

  Ah, you know, I was kinda joking about being here for the rut report. The thing about a rut report is like, it's never gonna change. Cause what one person sees doesn't really make a difference. Well, you could be the next ridge over, next valley over, county over. It could be a completely different thing, just depending on if you're where the hot doe is or not.

• 57:34Speaker 05

  Right, right.

• 57:35Speaker 06

  Chester there's got some cool video, like he's been in them. Like they obviously have a hot doe that these bucks are around. But like, Mark just did a great podcast with, about like what science says about the rut. And those fawns are all, they try to be all born. Or the, I should say their moms all try to give birth on the same day. So that they have, the fawns have the best chance of survival.

• 58:02Speaker 05

  It's called predator.

• 58:03Speaker 06

  Well, that's one reason, but the other reason too is that like, if it's Memorial Day, which is from like Pennsylvania. Just take that Latin Teuton line across the Midwest.

• 58:14Steven Rinella?

  Like you have the most food on the ground.

• 58:16Speaker 05

  The green, they try to tie it with the green up.

• 58:18Steven Rinella?

  Yeah, so you don't want to be too early because you don't have enough food. It can, you can still be get some cold.

• 58:23Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 58:24Steven Rinella?

  Nights and you could die when you're only weighing two pounds, you know, as a deer. And so like the peak breeding is going to always be.

• 58:33Speaker 05

  Sure, it just might happen at night or.

• 58:35Steven Rinella?

  That gestation period before, you know, whatever that is, 200 and some days before Memorial Day, right?

• 58:41Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 58:41Steven Rinella?

  So it's fun to hear about what people are seeing and what's happening. But every single year for the rest of our lives. Across like the Midwest.

• 58:51Speaker 05

  Right.

• 58:51Steven Rinella?

  Like roughly November 1 to November 15th, 20th. It's gonna be pretty good hunting.

• 58:58Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 58:59Steven Rinella?

  You know?

• 58:59Speaker 05

  Yeah. But you know, it's, it's good to know what's going on around some different areas.

• 59:06Steven Rinella?

  It is. It's fun. Like I said, it's entertaining.

• 59:08Speaker 06

  It's about the hype.

• 59:09Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 59:10Steven Rinella?

  I'm hyped.

• 59:11Speaker 05

  The rut.

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• 1:01:11Speaker 05

  Obviously, we're in the heart of hunting season here, so we're gonna, we're gonna share some recent crew hunt stories.

• 1:01:18Steven Rinella?

  Oh, boy.

• 1:01:19Speaker 05

  Maggie, what do you got?

• 1:01:21Speaker 00

  Oh, yeah. I, uh, I was elk hunting this year and, uh...

• 1:01:25Speaker 05

  You gonna pull up the pictures, Maggie?

• 1:01:27Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 1:01:28Steven Rinella?

  Is that not something you do every year?

• 1:01:29Speaker 00

  I mean, it is. Um, so I've kind of been like year on, year off for the health reasons. Um, so like last year, I was just, uh, I was packing out. So I was, I was hunting, I just wasn't pulling the trigger, um, because my eyeballs were messed up.

• 1:01:49Steven Rinella?

  Right.

• 1:01:50Speaker 00

  Um, but, so yeah, this year is my turn to pull the trigger and, uh, we had a real slow October. We, uh, we hunted every weekend in October and did not have a single opportunity to shoot an elk.

• 1:02:06Speaker 05

  The thing about Wyoming is their rifle season starts like October 1st, so the bulls are still rutting, you know?

• 1:02:11Speaker 00

  Well, they're real high up, too. We don't have pack animals or nothing, so, and I just had a general tag, so we were kind of hopping around because it's like one place will be open for a couple of weeks for a bull and then another place will. And so it's like, sort of just hopped around for where we could hunt because I was like, you know, I'd like to shoot a bull if I can, that'd be cool, you know? It's, uh, I'm, I'm a meat hunter, but I also can't help it that I want to shoot something with horns. Um, so I think we ended up hunting four different areas in total and, uh, this last one is like, alright.

• 1:02:52Speaker 00

  There's a cold front coming in, feeling good about it. We're gonna hunt this new spot. We were scouting out on Onyx and like, we're both from the area, so we're pretty familiar with, you know, where to go. It's just a matter of where there's gonna be people, where there's gonna be elk. Um, and so, uh,

• 1:03:10Speaker 05

  Usually they're where the people aren't.

• 1:03:11Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah. And that was, we got pretty lucky. We, uh, we saw these elk first thing in the morning, but it was just dump and snow and, uh, it was like, they were like 500 yards away. So, we were just kinda tromping around, following tracks all day, like,

• 1:03:32Speaker 05

  Oh, you saw a bunch of elk, but then didn't go after them?

• 1:03:35Speaker 00

  Well, we did, but they, we just, we kinda lost them in the timber. We, we were, uh, we were trying to get after them. We eventually got back to those elk. It was the same, it was the same group where I shot that bull at like 3 o'clock that afternoon. So, it was just a matter of like looping around, crawling around in some downfall hellholes and finally coming back to an open meadow where we could get to them.

• 1:04:07Speaker 05

  Were you tracking them in the snow or just looking for them?

• 1:04:10Speaker 00

  Uh, it was both.

• 1:04:11Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:04:12Speaker 00

  And then we had a pretty good idea of where they'd be. We kinda gave them some time in the afternoon, went on a little side quest. Um, saw some real big bull tracks and I was getting it really excited. We were gonna see a bigger elk, which we didn't, but. I'm still happy to shoot little four by five elk. He's real tasty. Um,

• 1:04:36Speaker 05

  Listen, those young bulls are the ones that shoot if you wanna eat them.

• 1:04:39Speaker 00

  Oh my gosh, young bulls. I, I don't think anything can top it.

• 1:04:43Speaker 05

  You're rolling a dice with those cows, man. They could be like 18 years old.

• 1:04:47Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:04:48Speaker 05

  You never know with a cow.

• 1:04:49Speaker 00

  Totally. I was just explaining that to my mom like just the other night.

• 1:04:54Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:04:54Speaker 00

  Um, I was like, I don't know. I feel like I'm kind of a cougar hunter, mom. I like the young bulls.

• 1:05:03Speaker 00

  And then, oh, that's Bill. That's uh, that's my bird dog Bill. He's uh-

• 1:05:09Speaker 06

  He's happy elk season's over.

• 1:05:10Speaker 00

  He is. He's ready to spend some time. He got to fetch like one duck that day. We were kinda just tromping around. It was a quick morning hunt, cuz we had an elk to cut up that afternoon. Uh, we just wanted to get him out. Uh, so Bill is happy to get some elk scraps and uh, happy to be, be the star of the show from here on out.

• 1:05:32Speaker 06

  Nice work Maggie.

• 1:05:33Speaker 00

  Thanks. It was a fun hunt.

• 1:05:36Speaker 06

  Yannis?

• 1:05:37Speaker 00

  Oh, oh, I forgot. I uh, I brought you guys a little treat, some elk jerky from my bull, but I've been told it is not a fun auditory experience to listen to people eat jerky.

• 1:05:49Speaker 06

  I could eat jerky and tell my hunting stories at the same time.

• 1:05:53Speaker 00

  So we'll save it for after the show, but uh-

• 1:05:56Speaker 06

  I mean, I don't give a shit. I'm looking for, I'm looking forward to trying it.

• 1:05:59Speaker 00

  If you haven't tried uh, Danielle Pruitt's smoked uh, venison jerky recipe.

• 1:06:05Speaker 06

  It's heavy on the smoke.

• 1:06:06Speaker 00

  It's uh, it's my go-to favorite and it's, it's, it's worth trying out. I tweak it a little bit, but-

• 1:06:13Speaker 06

  We'll try it here in a few minutes.

• 1:06:14Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:06:15Speaker 06

  Um, Yannis, let her rip. I'm getting hungry. Alright, I started with this first slide cuz uh, it uh, turns out this is my biggest bull to date, bow or rifle.

• 1:06:25Speaker 00

  Yeah, Yanni.

• 1:06:26Speaker 06

  And uh, didn't really know what I had until I walked up on him and, and found him. Uh, so yeah, that's exciting. Cory uh, taped him for me the other day, three hundred and ten inches on the dot.

• 1:06:40Speaker 00

  Nice.

• 1:06:40Speaker 06

  Pretty stoked. Next picture shows uh, speaking of eating bulls, the backstrap. I was very surprised. I've actually sort of reorganized my freezer in my plant, cuz I've got a lot of meat this year. Caribou, deer, lots of deer with the kids shooting deer, this bull.

• 1:07:00Speaker 06

  And I was gonna give away a lot of elk steaks, but this bull is eating extremely well. Like even the hind quarter uh steaks have been very tender um. Just delicious, so I'm actually starting to hoard this bull's meat a little bit more.

• 1:07:14Speaker 05

  Well, you could like, you can keep that, like, people think it's like a year, like, you could be eating that bull three years from now.

• 1:07:21Speaker 06

  Oh, for sure, for sure. Um, let's see, next, there's a buck I got in Idaho. Uh, whatever, nice buck, fun hunt. What made it super fun was hanging out with our buddy Max Barta. Um, who you can see in the next photo. Oh, no, we had, we had an awesome tent site. Where you could literally glass for bucks right out of the tent door.

• 1:07:43Speaker 05

  Is that snow? Do you have some snow up?

• 1:07:44Speaker 06

  Yeah, there was a little bit of snow up high and uh it was not, that was kind of probably the last camping trip of the year, you know, we got to spend three nights on the mountain.

• 1:07:53Speaker 05

  Pack some pizza in there?

• 1:07:54Speaker 06

  Yeah, well, we made uh, we made a pit stop on the drive down and we were having some uh pizza and I'm like, you know what? Let's uh add a uh, let's add a few more slices to this order and then we can have some in the mountains. So we, we packed some uh up in the, into the mountains with us. And uh, yeah, it was great to share a week with uh Max. Alright, here's, here's the exciting stuff. Here's youth hunt with my daughters. We are three hundred fifty yards, maybe a little bit less, from a bedded buck.

• 1:08:25Speaker 06

  Uh, Mabel was the one to be shooting. Mabel laid there uh on that, on that buck for nine hours. We got there on, to that spot right there at ten AM. That buck never stood up. We yelled at it. Ina, my other daughter, shot bullets ten feet.

• 1:08:42Speaker 05

  Wait, how long?

• 1:08:44Speaker 06

  Nine hours.

• 1:08:47Speaker 00

  Really?

• 1:08:48Speaker 06

  Ten, ten to, what time did it get dark out there?

• 1:08:51Speaker 05

  I don't think it was that late, but a long, yeah, eight hours, maybe.

• 1:08:55Speaker 06

  Well, ten to six would be eight, I guess. Alright, eight hours. Long time.

• 1:09:00Speaker 00

  And she's like staring through the scope?

• 1:09:01Speaker 06

  Yeah, on a bedded buck. And uh, the one thing Brody later told me I should have tried is to, I didn't have with me, but.

• 1:09:07Speaker 05

  Well, I'll get to that.

• 1:09:08Speaker 06

  Fawn in distress call.

• 1:09:09Speaker 05

  I'll get to that.

• 1:09:10Speaker 06

  Oh, Brody's gonna talk about it. Anyways, uh, yeah, the next slide shows that when you're waiting for eight hours on a buck, you take some naps. My girls have become extremely good at napping. Cause they're both napping. I'm like, who's watching the deer to stand up? Like you.

• 1:09:28Speaker 06

  So.

• 1:09:28Speaker 05

  Did you guys have the sun?

• 1:09:30Speaker 06

  I'll gladly do it.

• 1:09:31Speaker 05

  Did that sun get behind you? Like you weren't having to stare into the sun to watch that buck?

• 1:09:36Speaker 06

  No.

• 1:09:37Speaker 05

  That's good.

• 1:09:37Speaker 06

  No, no, we were looking kind of due east, actually. So it got behind us for sure. And then, uh, let's see, was that it for all my pictures? That was it. That was it. Okay. Oh, well, I was gonna mention last night, Mabel, who did not get a shot off that day. We went on a hunt last night to a very target-rich environment, uh, not far from Bozeman, a lot of whitetail deer. She kinda, I asked her, I thought this was a clever answer. I said, you're gonna shoot the first buck that comes out? Which I thought she would say yes, you know, to be successful, put some meat down. She goes, uh, depends on what he looks like.

• 1:10:15Speaker 06

  So then we had to look over, we had to look over, we literally saw more deer yesterday than I'll see on my entire Wisconsin hunt. I mean, I don't know, we saw probably close to a hundred whitetail deer. And, uh, multiple bucks that we were like, okay, too small, small to medium, too medium, little, getting a little bit better. And then we finally got, we saw a few that were like big enough. And they, the one big enough buck came to us, got to within 200, like with 20 minutes of light left. And we were like, safety off, ready to shoot him. And that sucker had been feeding all evening, not running does, nothing up until that point, like just out of range.

• 1:10:57Speaker 06

  And then once he like came into range within the does, he just got full on ruddy. And he would not stand still long enough for an 11-year-old to make the shot. And, uh, it was funny, cause she, I was like talking her through it the whole time. I'm like, okay, he's the one facing left, he's the one facing right, he's running right, he's got a doe behind him now. And every, all the time, she's like, yeah, okay, I'm on this, I'm on the right buck, I'm on the right buck. Okay, she's, he's got a doe going right to left behind him. Yep, I'm on the buck, I'm on the buck. And then as light was fading and they were getting a little bit farther away from us, I could like hear her answers in her voice starting to crack a little bit as in like, oh, I know it's not gonna happen tonight.

• 1:11:36Speaker 06

  I'm going home buckless. I gotta tell the story about not shooting one. And multiple times, she's like, I think I'm looking at him, but there's also some grass and like, I wanna be sure. And I'm like, yeah, you can't shoot if you're not sure.

• 1:11:51Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:11:51Speaker 06

  You know, you gotta be sure. And so we had that a bunch. So anyways, it's like, would have been great to kill a buck last night. But at the same time, I'm like, she's killed, I guess she was only killed one other buck. Well, she's got like three gullers now. It's all been pretty easy for her.

• 1:12:06Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:12:07Speaker 06

  It's good to have a couple hunts where she's having to work for it.

• 1:12:10Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 1:12:10Speaker 06

  And not have just success just laid in her lap again.

• 1:12:13Speaker 05

  Definitely, definitely. She'll get one this season. Uh, I guess that leaves me. Phil, can you pull up the antelope one first?

• 1:12:24Speaker 05

  Uh, this is my kid Hayden. Um, this was opening day of antelope season. The reason, like, he's shot an antelope before. He shot bucks. He shot elk. Like, the kids killed some animals. Um. The reason I'm showing this picture is because this year I kind of decided I was gonna let him make most of the decisions, like, on how the hunt went. And it started, like, at first light. Like, we were parked on a high spot on a road to glass, as you do for antelope. And I was like, let's check what would be the north side of the road. Because we'd, in the past, seen a lot of antelope in that zone. And he's like, no, we should glass the south side of the road first,

• 1:13:08Speaker 05

  because pretty soon we will be staring into the sun over there and we won't be able to glass it. I was like, man, kid's got a point. So we, like, hike in a little ways, get on a knob, start glassing, and he found five antelope, like, within minutes. Um, and I was like, it's great. There's a, like, I couldn't, I couldn't tell if, like, with my eyes, and it wasn't, like, quite, you know, light light yet, if there was a buck or not. But he's, and he's just free handing a pair of those Sig, uh, image stabilizing one. He's like, one of them's a buck. Like, cool. Um, but, and I was like, we can't, there's like, no way. We can't go straight at them. Like, they're gonna see us, you know?

• 1:13:51Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:13:52Speaker 05

  So I'm like, what do you think we should do? And he's looking around and he picks a route, like, a circular, you know, half-circle route around. Like, sounds good to me. And we kind of eventually get up into that zone near where they were. We had a little, like, pointy, like, dirt mound kind of thing. We were using it as a landmark. And we, man, we got in there and it's just like, where are they? Cause you get in that antelope stuff and it's broken. And there, you realize they're, they were in a low spot. You couldn't really tell from the road. Um, and we're sitting there for a while. And I was like, man, I think we should, like, creep forward, like, fifty yards and get a look into that low spot. He's like, no, let's stay here. And sure enough, a few minutes later, we see some ears and some horns.

• 1:14:37Speaker 05

  And, uh, eventually they feed up out of that low spot. And I'm like, two fifty, and, you know, he took care of everything else. It was cool, cause it was like, really like his hunt for the, for the first time.

• 1:14:52Speaker 06

  Yeah, sounds like, from the, at least the details that you shared, that, uh, you might just wanna let him continue to do that and start guiding you a little bit.

• 1:14:59Speaker 05

  Well, sure.

• 1:15:00Speaker 06

  Slow you down a little bit, look in the right direction.

• 1:15:03Speaker 05

  Exactly, exactly.

• 1:15:04Speaker 06

  Um, I like that you, uh, are doing that with him, because I told both my girls too, at the end of this year's youth hunt, I'm like, next year, I'm not glassing. I'm gonna gla-, I'm gonna glass. I'm gonna glass, because I like to glass. And I'll, I'll be like, oh, I see some bucks.

• 1:15:18Speaker 05

  Find them.

• 1:15:19Speaker 06

  But, yeah, I'm like, you guys are gonna have to find them.

• 1:15:21Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 1:15:22Speaker 06

  Cause otherwise, they just like, they like to hang out while, while dad's glassing up the critters.

• 1:15:26Speaker 05

  Eat candy.

• 1:15:27Speaker 06

  Yeah. And now I'm gonna, I'm gonna make them find a, find a deer.

• 1:15:30Speaker 05

  Yep. Um, we can do the next one there, Phil. All right, that's my younger son. Uh, this year he turned 10, so he first year he's able to hunt in Montana.

• 1:15:42Speaker 13

  Nice.

• 1:15:43Speaker 05

  Um, and you know, same thing, youth hunt. We all, we, we do a youth hunt together, group of us. Um, and this was opening morning and he definitely wasn't like looking for, my other kid was looking for a big one, the one that got, got the antelope. But Conley, the younger one was like any buck. And, uh, we went kind of in a zone. We had hunted in years past. And his brother was a little bummed because that was like his brother's zone. Um, but just me and Conley went in there and, uh, I, it was windy and cold that morning. He was suffering a little bit while, while we're glassing around.

• 1:16:25Speaker 05

  And things calmed down like maybe an hour after shooting, like, like eight 30, it kind of got a little warmer. The wind calmed down. And I glassed up two little teeny bucks, like one of them might've been a forky. The other one was probably a spike, but it was like, all right, it's on, let's go. And we had to kind of hustle down this drainage. To get into shooting position and these two bucks were like oblivious to what was going on. We were out in the open and they just weren't looking our direction. And I got Conley set up for a cross canyon shot. That was a little over 300 and, uh, you know,

• 1:17:05Speaker 05

  get him, he's laying down, he's shooting off of bipod and kaboom, like I say, are you steady? All, all that stuff. We go through the whole thing and he lets one fly and misses. And, uh, one of the bucks continues to stand there. The other one runs. I, I was pretty sure he had missed, but the other one ran in a way that I was like, we got to check. Um, we went down there and we, he's like, can I shoot at the other one? I was like, no buddy, we got to make sure you didn't hit the first one. So we went in there and we spent a good. Thirty to forty-five minutes looking for blood and hair.

• 1:17:43Speaker 05

  Nothing. And he was down, man, like bummed out. First hunt, first opportunity. He was definitely like bummed. Like no tears, but like, close, you know? And I was like, man, we gotta both hold it together and just go find another one. Um, and then an hour later, we found a buck bedded down. Uh, and, and it, the terrain laid out nicely for us to get set up, but it was still three hundred yards and he was bedded like on a timbered hillside. And I forgot to mention that earlier that morning. When we had first s- sat down to start glassing, we'd heard some like hooting and hollering. Way off in the distance and uh. Humans.

• 1:18:27Speaker 05

  Well, Conley was like, is that a coyote? And I was like, man, I don't like, I think it was people. And the first thing that came to mind is like, there might be some cowboys in here, cause there's cattle in the area we're hunting. Anyway, we're laid down on this buck. He dry fires on it a couple of times. Like he's comfortable. He's solid. Everything's looking good. And I tell him like, w- we might have to lay here for a while, you know, before he stands up. And he's cool with it. And then we hear that hooting and hollering again. And I look off that direction and maybe a thousand yards away. Here comes two cowboys with a couple of dogs pushing some cows.

• 1:19:08Speaker 05

  And I like know that zone well enough to know where they are, that that cattle trail is going to go right under that buck. Like right under him. And I'm like, oh my God, really? Like, what do we do here? And I told Conley, I was like. We can lay here and see if that buck just lets them go underneath him and nothing happens. Which, and I was like, I think the buck's going to spook because they're going to get too close to him.

• 1:19:37Speaker 05

  Or I can hit this fa- this fawn bleat real loud a couple of times and try and get him to stand up. There's a chance like, you know, he could run, but there's a good chance he'll stand up. And he didn't even think about it. He's like, hit the fawn bleat. Like, I don't want the horses running underneath that deer. And I did it. The buck stood up. I was like, are you solid? Aim, you know, and 10 seconds later, boom. He kills the buck.

• 1:20:01Speaker 00

  Nice.

• 1:20:02Speaker 05

  Yeah. And, and then like, we, the, the, the cowboys were out of sight. They had to cross this draw. But I was like, Conley, we're gonna like, walk over that direction and talk to them before we go look for your buck. Um, and we went over there. It was a young couple, very nice. I was like, you know, he just shot. They're like, we heard the shot. Hope you get, I mean, and then the guy's like, did you see any cows down the hill? I was like, yeah, there's a bunch down there. So they just took off and looked for their cows. We went up there and found the buck and it was all smiles, you know? It's fun.

• 1:20:37Speaker 00

  Heck, yeah.

• 1:20:37Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:20:38Speaker 06

  Yeah, he was fired up.

• 1:20:39Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:20:40Speaker 00

  That's awesome.

• 1:20:42Speaker 05

  All right. Thanks for listening to our stories, guys. It's always fun to, fun to talk hunting. Um, we're gonna move on to the cookbook box set, uh, contest here. Um, if you don't know about this thing, can you see that thing, Phil? I'll move it over. I'm moving my, there we go. If you don't know about this, this is like a special edition kind of limited run. We didn't print a million of these things. Um, it's got both of our cookbooks in it. Uh, the original Mediador cookbook, Fishing Game Cookbook and the, the Outdoor Cookbook. Um, they're paperback, which is kind of nice. You can fit them both in there. Um, it's a really good Christmas gift, uh, pretty economical way to get both of them.

• 1:21:27Speaker 05

  You can preorder them now, uh, if you really want to. They go on sale next Tuesday. Um, if you want a signed copy like this one, we've got a limited number of them that are only available on the website. Or you can, you can, our two retail locations in Bozeman and Milwaukee also have some, so you could pick one up there. Um, but not until Tuesday when the book releases. Um, you got anything to say, Yannis, about like, these two cookbooks, making of them, what you, what you think about them? Favorite meals, recipes, anything like that?

• 1:22:04Speaker 06

  They're a lot of fun to make.

• 1:22:05Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:22:07Speaker 06

  Um, it's always a fun project.

• 1:22:09Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:22:09Speaker 06

  Especially because we plan them not in hunting season, which is smart of us.

• 1:22:13Speaker 05

  Yep, get to eat a lot of good food.

• 1:22:14Speaker 06

  The one I keep going back to in the original cookbook is the, uh, fish stew.

• 1:22:21Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:22:22Speaker 06

  Love that recipe. We've got a bunch of halibut now, which, uh, tends to do very well.

• 1:22:26Speaker 05

  Is it a chowder? I can't remember.

• 1:22:29Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, it's kind of one of the same, isn't it?

• 1:22:32Speaker 05

  Well, no, stew and chowder aren't the same thing.

• 1:22:35Speaker 06

  No.

• 1:22:35Speaker 00

  I think a chowder is like creamy.

• 1:22:38Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:22:38Speaker 06

  Oh yeah, it's got cream in it.

• 1:22:40Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:22:40Speaker 06

  Yeah. But I feel like we call it fish stew in the book anyways.

• 1:22:44Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:22:44Speaker 06

  That don't matter. Get the book, try it out. It's a good one.

• 1:22:47Speaker 05

  Um, Maggie?

• 1:22:48Speaker 00

  Is the Osobuco recipe in there?

• 1:22:50Speaker 05

  Oh yeah, the original. That was the original.

• 1:22:53Speaker 00

  I love that recipe.

• 1:22:55Speaker 05

  Nationwide Osobuco movement, I feel like.

• 1:22:58Speaker 00

  Uh, yeah. Save your damn shanks, folks.

• 1:23:02Speaker 05

  Yep, drown that thing in some red wine for several hours.

• 1:23:05Speaker 00

  Oh, hell yeah.

• 1:23:06Speaker 05

  Um, yeah, they're, they're both great. Um, a lot of, like, the original, uh, for like beginner hunters, wild game chefs, like, it's got great butchering tips, fantastic butchering tips. The outdoor cookbook's got some great like gear and equipment information. You'll love them. Um, but let's move on, Phil, to, to see if we can actually pick a winner.

• 1:23:29Speaker 07

  Okay, yes. I'm just gonna rapid fire through a bunch of these and then you guys just kind of flag them in your head.

• 1:23:34Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 1:23:34Speaker 07

  Uh, by far the most, um, the answer that came up the most was that my, my wife or my girlfriend thinks my cooking is terrible and this would help me. There were so many of those that I don't think I picked any of them. Uh, you guys step up your game.

• 1:23:48Speaker 05

  Yeah, you guys are gonna have to buy this thing, sorry.

• 1:23:50Speaker 07

  Sorry. Uh, let's see. Okay, I'm just gonna run through these. Um, uh, Wilcom says, Brody, if I win, I will put the recipes into the fall menu of the kitchen I manage.

• 1:24:00Speaker 05

  Um.

• 1:24:01Speaker 00

  Is that a copyright issue?

• 1:24:02Speaker 07

  Yeah, that was gonna be my next question.

• 1:24:05Speaker 05

  Uh, also, um, you can't do that with wild game if it's like a restaurant kitchen.

• 1:24:11Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:24:12Speaker 07

  Yeah, I'm sure he's just talking about the recipes anyway. Okay, that's gonna be a no go.

• 1:24:15Speaker 05

  Maybe.

• 1:24:16Speaker 07

  Ben says, need a new recipe for my tag. Tag soup's getting a little stale. Kevin says, "My seven-year-old daughter's favorite show to watch together is Meat Eater. Her favorite way of helping in the kitchen is Cooking Wild Game with me. Having these cookbooks would give us infinite memories."

• 1:24:29Speaker 05

  Getting better.

• 1:24:30Speaker 07

  Mogor, our dude, "Why should I win this book? Because I've already cleared shelf space and trained my cat to turn pages. If I don't win, I'll be forced to read cereal boxes again. Don't let that happen."

• 1:24:41Speaker 05

  Mogor. Where does Mogor live? Like, shipping this thing to him could be a problem.

• 1:24:46Speaker 07

  It could be expensive. Uh, let's see. Um, Brian says, "Contingency plan for acquiring the cookbook. Phil, do you accept bribes?" My Venmo is PhilTaylor6. Um, let's see.

• 1:24:59Speaker 05

  He won't share his video game handle, but I'll share that.

• 1:25:02Speaker 07

  Yeah, duh. Ethan, "Anytime I cook Wild Game, I truly feel like I'm disrespecting my harvest unless I'm using one of Steve's recipes. No others come close. Just ask my wife how many times I've said this."

• 1:25:11Speaker 05

  I feel like that's sucking up a little bit.

• 1:25:13Speaker 07

  Yeah, a little bit. Uh, speaking of sucking up, or, um, well, that sounds mean. I'm just gonna read it. Uh, Ritzman says, "I'm a young adult who recently got married, had my first baby, and I'm hunting, butchering, and cooking solo for the first time in my life, and then he's got a part two. My dad was my mentor for years, but a devastating shattered pelvis left him unable to keep up the tradition. The cookbooks would be one more arrow in my quiver and bringing the hunt tradition in to my family." Um, another one from Brian. He says, "Max Barta would want the cookbook to go to his favorite native North Dakotan. Um, Brian, when Max wins a game of trivia, I will send you so many cookbooks."

• 1:25:48Speaker 05

  There you go. Honest, you getting excited about any of these?

• 1:25:52Speaker 06

  Not really.

• 1:25:52Speaker 07

  Yeah. Apologies. I flagged the ones that jumped out to me.

• 1:25:58Speaker 06

  Remember, Brody, I was looking for entertainment.

• 1:26:00Speaker 05

  I know. Mogor was entertaining, but he lives halfway across the world.

• 1:26:05Speaker 07

  There's a guy named Adam who has been just, uh, typing out verses from The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald and replacing random words with cookbook. Um, I'm not going to select yours, Adam, but you're gonna love the Meat Eater podcast on Monday. Stay tuned.

• 1:26:19Speaker 05

  Phil, we gotta find a winner here. This is dragging on too long.

• 1:26:22Speaker 07

  Listen, you guys can can jump into the chat. Honestly, out of all of them, when Mogor's popped up, I was like, I thought that he would just take it because it was funny. We love Mogor.

• 1:26:33Speaker 06

  Yeah, we'll we'll get it. We'll ship it to Mogor.

• 1:26:34Speaker 00

  There was one that kinda made me laugh, but it was just how it was written and it said...

• 1:26:40Speaker 07

  This is my favorite one, and I'm not gonna put it on the screen because of the profanity, but I will read it and censor it. Steven says, cookbook? I don't want or deserve no stinking cookbook, but an effed up truck calendar? That I deserve. I deserved an effed up anything for that matter. That's from Steven.

• 1:26:57Speaker 05

  All right, well, let's do this. Mogor gets the book and Steven gets the calendar.

• 1:27:03Speaker 06

  Sounds good to me.

• 1:27:04Speaker 00

  That sounds good to me.

• 1:27:06Speaker 05

  How's that? How's that?

• 1:27:07Speaker 07

  That's some great negotiating.

• 1:27:08Speaker 06

  Nobody was good enough to get both.

• 1:27:10Speaker 05

  No. Mogor, send, uh, don't send your address and stuff to me. Send it to like...

• 1:27:16Speaker 07

  Radio at themeat eater dot com, which is the correct email address.

• 1:27:20Speaker 05

  There we go. All right.

• 1:27:22Speaker 06

  Radio at themeat eater dot com.

• 1:27:23Speaker 05

  Do we got any other like comments?

• 1:27:25Speaker 07

  We do, but I've got a plane to catch soon, so let's wrap this baby up. How about that?

• 1:27:29Speaker 05

  All right. We're shutting you guys down. We'll...

• 1:27:32Speaker 00

  Get him, Phil!

• 1:27:33Speaker 07

  I mean, this is already on the longer side of the show.

• 1:27:35Speaker 05

  We'll see you next week. Thanks, everybody for tuning in and get out there in the woods. The rut's on. Take it easy.

• 1:27:42Speaker 06

  Thanks, guys. Bye.

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