This is the Meat Eater podcast coming at you, shirtless, severely beaten, in my case, underwear.

Listen to Meat Eater podcast. You can't predict anything presented by Onex Hunt. Creators of the most comprehensive digital mapping system for hunters. Download the Hunt app from the iTunes or Google Play store. Know where you stand with Onex. Clay Newcome, tell, tell everyone the story about when you were hunting that Bart and you had them all, you know, watching them all those years, this deer right here, I don't know.

No, the one. That you found out he was dead when you were down at the pawnshop? Oh, that's an interesting story. So I was hunting this deer that I called moose. And I had pictures of him from the time he was a year and a half old, and the only reason I knew, you know, a year and a half old is pretty indistinguishable a year and a half old.

But I think because we're not like a hardcore super hardcore whitetail podcast that when you say I've been hunting deer that I called moose. OK, I'll get there. There you go. Oh, you will. Thank you.

Yeah, well, I understand. Well, I want to thank the Lord of Origin and the dogs.

I don't even know the damned I don't know this part of the story, but I can tell you what it would be, I guarantee. OK, you know what?

It's so easy. You're going to ask me. It's so easy that Seth will tell you why the deer was so big.

Remind me. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Chester. I don't know. Oh, come on, dude, it probably had Pomi to the handlers, Steve Renel nailed it. Sad nail gave you a layup, dude. Well, the handlers remind you of a moose. Yeah.

OK, now, incest defense. Incest defense.

Thanks, Johnny Sam longer and has a big black lab named.

Moose, moose, but that dog doesn't have antlers. True, but what is another characteristic of a moose, sometimes an attribute to other animal or any deer hunter that goes around naming deer and watching them since they're one and a half years old, is I can he's fixated on antlers. He fetishizes. He's an antler fetishizes.

OK, so this deer basically I got I'm still talking about this antler fetish QAISER And so when I hear the deer was named moose, OK, I think I said let's say I said to you and we call this Buc ol Red Steg. Right. What would you picture? I'd be like, let me guess. Let me guess. It had a crown to Tinh.

Hmmm, let's say we call this old buchel unicorn.

I'd say let me guess, we call this Bucho rabbit ears.

I'll be like, let me guess, is look like a. No antlers look like a rabbit series anyway, so they are the pawn shop. It wasn't the way you hoped it was. That's good. You now that's the foundation. But what was unique about this deer?

So when he was in a year and a half old deer, Ric Smith would be distinguishable by the body size, by the mass of the antlers. So this is a very small deer.

Why are you telling, Rick? Because I'm like because Rick doesn't know. Yeah. And so he damn sure knows what liver mushes.

Well, I do know that that sounds like another story. Well, I. Oh, you weren't.

I'm going to say this. No. Then I'm gonna say this. That I'm shutting up. Sure. I used to think that Rick always knew everything. Then I went through a brief period where I thought he didn't know everything. But yesterday I proved they're trying to talk about scrapple.

He got to talking about liver mush. We all had a good hearty laugh at Rick's expense for, you don't know, scrapple from a hole in the ground.

And then it turns out he was right because liver mush is basically scrapple. The little liver said, yeah.

So anyhow, there you are. You're at the pawn shop. Good job, Rick.

So a year and a half old, dear, we're back there again. This deer had incredible Palmach in for a year and a half older, usually thin horned, you know, like horns as thin as your finger. This deer had like I was. I'm looking for a picture on my phone year and a half old dear had like four or five inches of palpation on his right. Tiny antler as like a six point.

OK, look like a moose. Yeah, I said that deer looks like a moose the next year.

I actually had the story, Steve, if you want, like the five minute version, I'll give it to you. There's like a 15 minute version. I mean, we yeah, well, seven.

Not that I don't like the story. Seven, go on it, OK. So it's 11, 30. OK. OK. Eleven thirty seven were, which actually is not, but my my thing hasn't adjusted any time. You know, when you're talking to somebody, I think it's good to count like on the front end. Give me this version of that story. Check this out. I know I was going to say this. Is this my time?

No, but the cycle on your time.

But it has to do with this. Morehouse saying, I wanted a thing that everybody would have a dial, yeah, and there's a light in the middle and if people are not very interested, they could turn their dial down and the light dims. And then, you know, they're not being very interesting. You know, a guy is Malcom's one of those.

He sent me some pictures of the prototype and it escalates. It's like the color changes. But and he's going to put six dials on it, like, oh, so everybody, I'd have that light right there right now.

You'd be talking about that Balkam. I'd be cranking that sucker way up.

Nice. Good night. There you are at the pawn shop. So I have I recognize this bug is a year and a half old. Near the second year the deer comes back. He had such distinct antlers, I was able to recognize him again as a two and a half year old deer. I'm not that interested in harvesting this deer because he's just a young buck, but he's real distinguishable men around here. We don't track books for years. Like in the Midwest.

Guys have like seven years of history. Not here, man. Books come and go.

Like you may get a picture of a book here two years and never see him again. Yeah. Yeah. Makhanya They kind of like almost move into your house. It's not man that is not common here. Third year. So the deer. One and a half. Two and a half. Now the deer is three and a half. He blossoms into like one hundred and thirty inch, ten point with two kickers coming off twos which is a deer.

I'm very interested in three and a half year old deer. You don't say three and a half, three and three and a half year old deer out here is a target deer. Yep. That same year, the deer breaks his front legs, both of them.

The reason I know this is because it's such a long story.

Yeah, I give you his when he was two and a half, his right front hoof was as big around as a Coke can, and he had a massive limp the second year when he's three and a half hundred thirty inch double Kobuk, his foot is continues to be as big as a Coke can.

His left front leg is broke and visibly has a huge knot midway up. The deer is like scrawny as it can be. I'm certain the deer is going to die three and a half because it's just scrawny. I hunt the deer, never see it from the tree stand. The deer blossoms into a hundred and forty five inch, ten point with double kickers the next year still looks like a moose.

I see the deer a mile away from my house. It's a moose. No, no, the deer. Then they're no longer carries it's palpation. Oh, I'm driving. One day I see the deer a mile from where I originally knew the deer was. I know that the deer is using this certain farm. I write the farmer a letter and say My name is Clay Newcomb's. Bla bla bla bla bla bla. Go up and meet him a week later.

Got a little system.

Can I, can I ask for a quick. When you lay it out for him that you lay out for him you like, I feel that's like a moral, that's a hard moral.

I told him that there was a deer, that his farm I wanted to hide, that is, I laid it out.

That is honorable. You were like, I have no reason to believe there's a deer of any size on your property, though I would like to right the property, let alone one nickname.

Now, now, listen.

This you could learn something from is that nobody ever asked. I got one on his property because it was not a good place to hunt.

Where did this deer live? There you see him saying scrawny little patches of timber, a lot of stuff going on around like it was not the place. Like the guy. I don't think had anybody had ever like asked him who owns a small property? Well, I start getting I'm using trail cameras. By this time, I start getting pictures of the deer on that farm just like I knew I would. And that year I saw the deer from the stand two different times in the late winter.

And you'd know him coming because he he looked like he was he was broken down. You see him coming across a field.

Cletus did a walk. You can't see this. Ladies at home. Clay did a walk. Like if you watch Young Frankenstein, his assistant.

Yeah. You know, kind of. Yeah. No, no, no, no. Like for a deer. Yeah. Like Young Frankenstein. Like his assistant. Yeah. A hitch hitch in the step. Some swagger.

This, this time there's one hundred forty five inches which around here deer maybe not a lifetime but very few people kill hundred forty five inches around here.

I don't kill the deer. The one time I had him within 30 yards. Almost drown him. Didn't kill him. The next year the deer survives. He is, he has broken down small.

He goes down and this is what you wouldn't believe unless you see the pictures which there's this article in North American Whitetail about this deer that I wrote and had published. All documented that deer went dropped down to a hunt. I found the chadrick hold on.

I found the sheds of the fort after tracker picked him up. Oh, yep. Far enough that I can.

The next year, the deer was presumably so unhealthy his racket dropped to a clean 130 inch, eight point. The only reason I would have known it was the same deer is because the stink broken legs, the deer was extremely recognizable. He weighed about one hundred and forty pounds. Average buck around here. Big Buck weighs 160 to 180. This deer is like super small, broken up white antlers.

Just you just you just do not learn these deer. I'm getting there, Steve.

You know I've given up. You got a minute anyway, OK? But I don't care. I'm so I'm so he's there.

My life is red. He's he's one hundred and thirty inches but 130 inch buck. I hunt him like he's a Boone and Crockett trying to kill him. Don't see him one time the whole year from the stand I find his shed horns. The farmer found one and I found the other. So I've got two sets, a matching shed horns. The next year I get a picture in summer velvet.

I've got on my phone of a deer that I do not recognize because first just get the horns and I text my father in law and I say, I've got a 200 inch deer on camera. Text him this picture. I cannot believe it. And I keep scrolling through the pictures and then I see the deer's whole body and it is Moose. And he has I know this because I scored the deer later. You get a spoiler. Spoiler alert. He had 31 points.

He freaked out. He had the same frame.

He went from this whitetail guys just believe it because it's true. He went from one hundred and thirty eight point to a a deer that I scored at either one eighty nine or one ninety one. I hunted that deer like crazy Rick that year, I mean, like, why is this part directed to Rick? He too, he's engaged.

I asked. My body still stings from the cold hunting that deer. And I'm serious. Like, it almost burned me out from lightwater bow hunting because I just pounded it so hard that the well, the year before I'm getting ahead of myself. When he was when he when he became the big deer, I was hot on his tail. Hot on his tail. Actually, man, it's too deep of a story, but I should have killed him one day.

I didn't. There's a big butt contest over here in this town. You could tell me what happened there. Well, OK. I go up to the farm one day to hunt.

I'll point out he's telling me this, not rich. Now I'm talking to Steve, distinctly turned to my direction. I go to the farm to hunt and I've been getting it's early in the season. It's like October the fourth. And the bugs were still in groups. And that book had been run in with a book that I called Con Con stood for Consolation Prize. It was a 13 point book. I thought that goes in the.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I'll bet you were to pick that one out, Steve. No, I was trying to think of some kind of thing to be consistent, but couldn't do it.

The Deer. So Con is a stud book that if he would be hanging on this wall so like and I was at a stage in my bohunk career is like, I can't let Conn walk by. It was just an incredible year for horn growth, which we have here.

Some years are great. Some years aren't. I go to the farm to hunt and I see for Buck Standard up in the corner of the field and I know what they're about to do. They're buried over here. They just popped out. They're about to walk through the pinch point that my dear stand is in and walk right by me. I watch him walk back into their bedding area. I scuttle up the hill, get in my stand, and I'm not kidding.

An hour and a half later, here comes a line of books coming through the woods, just going to walk right under me.

I get an eye on all of them, and I know that Moose is the lead. I don't see it, but I'm guessing that Moose is the final buck in the in the line. It's like a fork and horn, a six point and it ended up being four bucks in the last book was gone and I could see way behind him and Moose wasn't there. I was just like, Doc got most in there. I felt like I could kill Con and extract him without without messing up moose, like I wasn't going to mess up the whole hunt for this consolation prize.

You with me?

Yeah, I'm TrackMan. Hey, I tried to get Spencer Neuharth to let me write a story on how to stop a deer and he wouldn't do it. Why not? Because, listen, I learned kick his ass.

I just stood up here. Listen, those deer final right under me. It's full panther. Now, what's what's Spencer's problem?

He just he just didn't think it would be of interest to learn how to stop a deer. And I got some good intel on it. I mean, I've done it a long time, but I know I don't like running around doing this, but going to do it right now. When we get done here, you call Spencer and you tell them that you just got that article commissioned this month called I'll Call Jesse, you call, I'll call.

So I'm sitting here in the stand folderol. Are not Viljoen just sitting there waiting till my one five thousand three buck and I decide I'm going to shoot KCON for Buck.

He's like, it's seven yards. I'm about 18 feet up in a tree. Draw the bow back. He has no clue I'm in the world. I'm leaning the tight angle. He's walking because he's in this line and I'm at Grundt. Stop him. I was so close to him that it spooked him. And he he he he spun and looked at me and is looking, spinning and looking up as though the sun just exploded. Yeah.

And I had the I had the pin right behind his shoulder. Shot, and he he ducked the strength because he was on red alert because of the gun stop and it went right through the top of his back straps, didn't he barrels out of there.

We track the deer. I get pictures of the deer the whole rest of the year didn't hurt him. Erra went right through the back straps. He jumped the string. So here's the lesson. When you're not stopping a deer, don't run. Stop a deer that's like five yards from you, seven yards from you.

If you do, you got to do it because it's like you're walking through the woods and some dude also got. Yes. Now, if that bears at 30 yards. And the other thing is, is you've got to be at full draw before you run.

Stop like you've got to be ready. You can't stop then, Jarboe.

So don't give don't give the article away. I'm devastated that I mess up because then we had to go in and track the deer and just blew the whole area. You know, we had to do our due diligence. So we spent a day tracking the deer. No blood. No and I knew it was OK. But I just want to make sure. Now, it's October the 9th. And if you kill a big buck in this county, you take it down here to this big buck contest like it's just guaranteed, you know, because they give away, like it's just where you go.

I'm good friends with these guys down at the pawnshop. I go down there and I look at the leaderboard. They actually have photos up on the leaderboard. I know this deer like it's my own kid, you know?

And I look up on that leaderboard and there is a dude with moose in the back of his truck standing there with moose. And I'm not kidding. I felt like I was punched in the face.

I was just like, oh, my gosh, I can't believe I mean, it was just like such an instinct.

Deer, I the punch out guys are my friends. And I just said, hey, give me that guy's phone number. They did. They gave me his cell phone number.

I call the guy he he doesn't know me from Adam, but I knew where he killed the deer just way everything laid out. I knew where this guy lived and I said, My name is Clay Newcome. Congratulations, first of all on your deer. Like, I wanted him to know I wasn't upset with him.

I said, if you got a minute, I want to tell you a story and I want to come to your house any time frame on it. Like you got five minutes. You got seven minutes.

You know, he's like, he's like I give you six minutes and you'll notice there's a little light in my face with a dial. You know, he was home.

He was home, like, right when I called him and and I said, man, I'll be there. Just give me a minute.

I gathered up my shades and took my laptop computer over to his house. And I sat on his back porch with he and his girlfriend.

And I walk them through this whole story. He was the guy that bought this property from Texas the first time he ever hunted the property, he killed that deer with a bow, never knew it was there. Jeez. And it had 31 scorable points. It's been ten years ago this happened. I mean, the guy became good friends. I gave him the shed horns. I said, man, take these things. I don't want them. They're yours.

They they because the shed horns tell an incredible story of their development because the deer, the deer went up, went down and then made a 70 inch jump or not 70, 60 inch antlers jump.

But so anyway, I mean stuff you learn a lot from stuff like that man.

I mean, just even even dealing with like you can't get too caught up in a deer like like I, I was like can.

Well, but since that time I've been less vested in the deer hunt and I'm just like and I was I just want to say I was never mad.

I mean, like mad. Good for him or. Yeah. You know, tell me you guys became buddies. We did. Did he. Did he. Because, you know, he didn't have a lot into it, right, like he just got it, did it? Did it sort of open him? I mean, did he appreciate the sheds and stuff? Yeah, he's a good hunter. That's the thing he got. He did get lucky and he knows it.

But he was a he had hunted his whole life. He was a good hunter, like and it made his he'll never kill a buck bigger than that. He was thrilled it way better than just some guy killing it just like, well, killed a buck like. Yeah. Great guy to kill it for real.

She's still around here. He moved since then, but I still I still talk to him every now and then.

Yeah. Did he get the property now? No. So. Great story I'm getting so invested into box like that is is tough. My brother in Wisconsin, we're after a buck named Sidhom after a while because he was so sneaky. They nicknamed him Saddam and. One about a minute, no. I mean, how long did he didn't how long did he hide out? I think I was them for like some Saddam wasn't sneaky, you got caught pretty quick.

Remember, they caught him in the spider hole. Well, if you call them bin Laden, you probably should have picked up on your history a little bit just before you brought that up, because, I mean, wondered how long after the invasion did they did they catch Saddam in the spider hole?

You know, month they caught Gadhafi in a drainage ditch, no, in a culvert. Very quickly. They got Saddam pretty quick. Oh, three months now, Pol Pot. No, it was the pope. He had a long damn time. Anyways, go on anyways, they named him, said I could provide you with a long list of dictators who held out longer. Sure, yeah.

Maybe it was a bad guy, bad back or something. No, no, I like it. Big Deer Hunter.

I thought he maybe had crazy sunglasses. No, no, no. Just Big Deer grew up a large mustache on the family farm.

I knew where this deer bedded just was invested into this deer passed up. Other deer was hunted them with a recurve bow. And anyways, my brother Fenton went in on the wrong wind during gun season. And, you know, in Wisconsin, you got to try and keep those deer on lockdown.

And he was warned against this kind of it was it was right. Borderline wind. And I think I got done with work and he's like, where's where's Vinnie? And my mom's like, he's out hunting. And I like, where do you go? You know?

And he was in the wrong spot. Finnie climbs up the tree stand. Here's a deer get up a couple of minutes later, cross the road.

And I think I was outside and like he heard some hooting and hollering and Vinnie was just devastated.

He's so big it wasn't. He shrunk, he was probably like 190. Oh, wow. And then he probably was like 170 i 170. Just a big dear, you know, like once once every five, six, seven years you might see a deer in that area. But I was was bummed, but he was almost relieved, you know, in a way, he's like, all right, now I can move on and on.

But then he refused to go over and look at it and refused to go congratulate the the lucky shooter. Yeah, if you know Ike, he's a man of few words and he's just like, let me see a picture, my dad went over and talked to him and he's like, yeah, that was a deer. It is kind of weird how he didn't go over there, but he just was like, yeah, the deer's dead, moving on.

And I think my mom was more devastated than any of the boys that that deer was gone because he was just so invested in it. But. Hmm.

Yeah. Can you fill everybody in on the sturgeon deal? We covered this. No, we didn't cover this at all. You got to tell the whole damn story. I thought you're going to give an update, but now you got to tell the whole thing and start it.

With how you got tangled up in this whole thing, I wouldn't say I'm exactly tangled up in this whole thing.

All right. Well, just about a year ago. Miles Nulty and I and Tim met and who else shared it with us, Mike, Mike Lindenmuth went over to Fanda Lac, Wisconsin, to Speare Sturgeon on the Great Lake Winnebago.

And so explain what that's all about. You get two minutes here. All right, you put me way too far back into history to get this done in two minutes.

But yeah, there's these giant prehistoric old fish called Lake Sturgeon that live like Winnebago, and there's a spearing season for them once at once.

You know, I want people to know that this is a true crime story. It is. I just wanted I. I didn't tee it up.

Well, it could be it could be its own podcast. This is a true crime story.

We could if we were like most podcast companies, we would turn it into some eight episode long whodunit with cliffhangers. But here you get the you get the dope quick. Yeah. Yeah.

So we saw him somewhere between two and 10 minutes to add a little bit to the front end of it, which Johnny denies, like he's clean, but like he is sort of involved one degree of separation.

Oh. If he gets rolled up in this thing and also and some people barge in this door Kaufman stuff I'm not surprised by.

Another weird thing is this Chester's hometown. I was going to say if they were going to just lift your shirt up, I guarantee he's wearing a wire. He's wearing it up.

Yeah, just there might be more closely related to this story than I am, Chester.

So slide his wires. Is that big headset? He's I don't trust me. They'll never know. It's real right here. Right now.

Sturgis disappearing. You you have a fish shack and ice shack that's very similar to like the sharks. You see guys just doing fishing through, except you cut like a six by four foot hole and put the shark over it.

And these sharks are purpose made for spearing sturgeon. You got a big old giant spear. I don't know. The sucker weighs probably thirty pounds.

It's got like, well, they're heavy spears like that. Oh, nothing like a pike. No, you barely have to really chalk kind of push them.

You can just about drop them on and it'll, it'll get in there like pour molten lead in the handle that. I don't know. No I think it's just a big deal. Right. Yeah.

Any who. So we went and did it and we actually did it with some of Chester's extended family. His cousin. Right. Cousin Cousin Jake helped us out and he's he's super into and out of our group. There were two sturgeon speared, I believe, in three days. And Jake and I actually each got to throw it at a fish but didn't get one, which in the sturgeon is about like our squirrel hunt.

Mm hmm. In the sturgeon in three days. Spiring. No, that's exactly sturgeon. Spiring world.

Two is really good, yeah, go, go years without spareness, sturgeon. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I was happy just to see one. So the sturgeon have Roe in them, if they're a female of the right age class and this Roe can be turned into caviar.

Caviar is really eggs, I. I wouldn't have known what Roe was.

I mean, I do know because I watched. Yeah, yeah. Fish eggs. It can be turned into caviar. Caviar is very expensive. That's the one piece of information that I forgot to check in on is exactly how expensive it is, that type of caviar.

Do me a favor. Just yes. See what General like Lake Lake Sturgeon caviar could go for.

I don't know, he might not be I don't know, you probably can't buy it because it's wild, because there's no there's no there's no actual market. There's no man. That's why you're probably under arrest.

Mm hmm. I will be shortly. Well, the farm stuff, which is not the real deal, can go for 100 bucks for eight ounces. American sturgeon caviar. So I'll give you a ballpark. That's that's that's farmed the wild stuff, I'm sure there's a premium stuff. Mm hmm. I say that doesn't sound expensive. I thought it would because I was expecting the river that's a half a pound, the river beluga, gold, sturgeon, caviar.

I don't know how a one kilogram for six thousand dollars.

I don't know what the let's just say that to make it more interesting in the story. Yeah. Real expensive. Real expensive.

When you start talking about stuff in kilos. Yeah.

You know, you're talking about expensive stuff so. A year later. Well, let me back up a little bit.

The reason that I'm, like more raveled up or wrapped up in this a little bit is because for this for ice fishing tours episode that we did, we interviewed a fellow by the name of Ryan Koenigs, who is known at in in Wisconsin as the Sturgeon General.

He's the lead sturgeon biologist that kind of ran like all the management of that whole system.

And that system is very healthy. It's like it's the.

It's like the standard by which all others are are trying to meet and not just in the country but the world over, people would like to have a sturgeon fishery like they had like hundred years ago there, nearly extirpated all over the world.

And now here you have a place where it's so good that you can, you know, have a sturgeon spearing season. He was very real, was very helpful in helping us produce the episode, got us a bunch of other interviews with great people, he himself gave us a good interview. In general, we had good luck working with him.

Well, your later right before Seargent season this year, it turns out that Ryan was charged, has been charged with.

Basically dealing in bartering of sturgeon eggs. Hmm, yeah, so there's we don't know the whole story yet, I'm guessing, because they're probably withholding some evidence as this thing kind of works its way through. So we don't know exactly what they're going to say.

But he's actually being charged with is more like an obstruction because he supposedly lied a little bit about what he was doing with the eggs or how some of the people that were working underneath him were, in quotes, funneling the eggs from these check stations.

So when you kill a sturgeon, you bring it into a check station, you it's mandatory. And there's biologists there that take samples. They cut them open. They tell you, you know, male, female, how old a fish is all this stuff. And they're just collecting data. Well, supposedly there's a couple of different sort of mechanisms that had been in place for eggs to be sort of taken from there in a casual way and then gone to processors.

There was supposedly like a cooler with a processers name on it.

When people and people and biologists would say, hey, if you don't want the eggs, you're not planning on doing anything that takes the sturgeon could keep the eggs. It's not. Yeah, it's not unusual to keep eggs.

Well, while you keep them all the well, because, I mean, some people just maybe don't like salty fish eggs, OK?

Yeah. I mean, I know they don't have a paddlefish. That's a that's a valuable caviar and just friends of mine that go snag paddlefish, a lot of the people are like aware that people do, but I don't like caviar.

I don't know. And they don't they don't want. They want the steaks off the fish. They don't care. OK, you yeah. So, yeah. Anyways, he so Ryan's been charged with it alongside. There's also there's also three again in quotations here, caviar processors that have been charged for bartering services for caviar. So the way it works and we've gone over this a lot is that you could offer to clean someone's caviar for him for free, give them all the caviar or the eggs now turned into caviar back to them.

They could then if they want you because they're your buddies or whatever, gift you as much of that caviar as they wanted. Or they you could pay the processor to have your row turned into caviar.

But what you can't do is say, let's trade your services of cleaning for my processed caviar. At that point, you're bartering in the eggs.

So we've talked about this bartering thing a fair bit. And one of my favorite stories about bartering is. A buddy of mine was fishing. He was shrimping. This is in Washington state. He Shrimpton. And he's at the boat launch. And there's a guy coming in from fish and salmon. OK. And they are like, oh, you got one shrimp tails, oh, you got a bunch of salmon and just very casually it sort of emerges that they will do a swap.

Some shrimp tails for Sam Flay. And there was an undercover warden on that dock. The citations, but fish for shrimp is not because they were bartering, he could have said like because one was given more than the other.

No, because it was like a fall. Because you can't trade fish. No, there was a formal rendering.

But what you can do is I could go to your house, I can go to your house, and I could be like Clay just got back from my fish shack. Man Oh, love to. Here's some halibut. And you could you could say like. I just got to you know, I just put the pull of a bunch of tomatoes. Take some tomatoes back. I know you love tomatoes, that's fine, as long as we say, well, you know, I would give you some of my halibut, but what's in it for me?

And you say, well, I happen to have some some homegrown tomatoes. And I say, oh, that sounds like a deal. So it's just that's bartering.

OK, that makes sense. I mean, it's just semantics, though, is it not?

It's the quid pro quo of trading things. This for that and all Americans, all the work. I mean, essentially, like if we went I mean, if we went turkey hunting and I killed a bear and you killed a turkey and I was like, hey, take some, bear me home. And you were like, we'll take take a turkey breast.

That's fine. Yeah, but if you said. If I if I said I'll trade you, we have had I want to point this out now to and we point this out for you, but I want to keep well, because we keep getting emails about song in the keys. How about I went to you got a good placeholder on the sturgeons story.

Me? Yeah. Yeah. OK, I went to an attorney that represented Wyoming Fish and Game for many years. And and he said. We have only he could remember, he could recall, no instance. Of the bartering and trading prosecution outside of someone like really asking for it and it being a broader package of violations, right. That's that's the situations when he could say, if it's a bad guy, that they're trying to just stick it, that someone was just like because I mean, how else would you.

I guess also to come up, except for the body mind, who were an undercover guy just hanging out at the dock, seeing who's coming and going. Witnesses, a formal offer of exchange.

Hmm. Like a like a provisional I'll do this, you do this. Well, or is that what we're talking about here? Mm hmm. I mean, that's what we think happened.

Now, if this guy lied, that's also there's two there's two separate. There's the Ryan Cannex thing going on right. Where, again, I don't think we know exactly all the evidence. Right. Nobody can until proven guilty. You can't reach him and talk to him.

But what he's been charged with is that that he, like, lied about what was going on.

And then he also has wiped his DNR issued telephone. That's where it got weird, is they interviewed him. Right. And then he went to his phone.

Yeah. OK, so then these other there's I think there's three other people are nodding knowingly, three other folks who have been charged in the Fond du Lac area for basically, you know, well, I think there's two that were charged with do with processing the eggs and then trading their services for finished caviar. And then another fellow was charged for somehow get for basically serving the caviar in a restaurant. Oh, OK.

Oh, so the thread goes deep. Just like when I first heard the story, I heard that he was channeling it to the Russkies, which I don't know if anyone's actually connected it.

So that that titillated me. Yeah. And I've heard some other things that we have reported on, sort of like stories that people have heard. And I don't think I want to bring them up because it's just like they are.

No, I should I should clarify. I have just I want to defend like I heard that I have read or seen nothing that suggests anything to do with any.

It sounds good, but that's what I think.

I think it's worth noting that the like there might be people listening that wouldn't understand that one of the pillars of the North American model of wildlife conservation is noncommercial use of wildlife.

And it's just real simple. Yeah, but it just gets complicated. Yeah. We can't just like I can't kill a deer and sell it.

But you can you can sell furs, you can sell bear oil as a hairdressing. You cannot sell it as a food. But that's another podcast's. So beaver meat. You could sell it like it's generally generally general, yes, but Ferber's there's all these other exceptions, but generally.

Yes, generally correct. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's that's why you can't just take a big sturgeon flat tax and sell its eggs are traded. So that's the that's the crime. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And that's what we're. Yeah. Yeah.

So a couple of these processors have been previously warned that the way that they were doing it was illegal. Oh yeah. Titillates me.

And they sort of kept on, you know, doing their program.

Yoni's no yachties like a subject matter expert.

Listen to him over here. This is without notes. How much did you steal from Durcan? I mean, I don't know, I had it's all the same information from. We are certainly to prepare for this. I read his article, did you do the original research on. Outside of me being there a year ago, maybe a little bit, yeah, I may have to make some calls.

I made one phone call, but it was more just to see how the sturgeon was going. Sturgeon fishing was going this year.

And we just happened to talk about this a little bit. You got a little inside dope. Yeah.

Which I'll tell you right now, it's what it is and which is why it makes it like a. Controversial, contentious kind of a deal right now because. As easy as it is for all of us to do what we all just said, say, hey, take some tomatoes. Oh, yeah, great, awesome.

I brought you some halibut.

It's it's very close to being illegal, right, and you can't trade these things right, and so I don't want to say they're making an example out of it because it's illegal and you can't do it right.

The laws is the law is law.

But that's the way these things work, though, is that culture begins to establish itself. And then at some point they go, enough is enough and they pick somebody and they nail them.

I have had two people in two different states. Write to me with proposals that they were doing on their own. Nonprofit. Where they were looking to set up. Wild game exchanges formed through a social community, a social network community. Of participants. Boltons was like, dude, you can't like you cannot do that. Mm. They're like, I have so much milk, I need some one of them was a guy, one of the guy in the town we live in, you know, want to set up a wild game exchange.

Yeah.

So the local, I think feeling a lot of people are like, oh, come on, why you got to do this to these folks and, you know, put them through the wringer.

You know, so much good has been done by, you know, these people for the surge because all these people that are involved in this or have also been very active in sturgeon preservation.

Yeah.

Preservation restoration for a long, long time.

And they feel that it's like making a big deal out of a year minor. And you're going to talk about the the older couple who, you know, some stuff.

Well, yeah, that's I just decided to like to limit my I had to cut it off at some point. Otherwise it's going to regret not trying to tell that part. Yeah. Just because I don't know, I just didn't seem like we needed to know who exactly these people are. You know, we're talking about who's you know, what the problem because that was.

Yeah. And really quick, just having grown up in that area, if you know Wisconsinites, very a lot of them are just great, very great people with no ill intentions.

You find that not to be true in the other 49 states? No, but it'd be like you could go over there right now and you'd probably run into somebody on the street and they'd be like, hey, can you come over here and get the leaves out of my gutter?

And my mom will trade you for a cup of rhubarb pie, you know, like and so tell you tell your mom. Is that what is that rhubarb wild game?

No, but I'm just saying, like, it's just like always these little culture of bartering, just a little kreinberg little crimes, but not not even not even like it's a community.

They don't know they're doing it. They don't know. It's a community patchwork held together by the commission of small crimes. Yes. It's just people being nice doing crimes that they don't know that they're doing.

Yeah, and I'm not welcome to rural America. Hey. Like, yeah. So she was having a problem with the old man and I'm a good neighbor, so I just that's just the community we live in.

That would be, you know, here's a pie. No, I know what you mean.

You know, I'm with Chester. I'm with you. It's like I'm just teasing you. I mean, the law is the law at the end of the day is that that's what it comes down to. But people trying to be good people is what I think. A lot of this, maybe not on Ryan side, but on some of the other folks side. I think that that could have been the case. I'm going to editorialize here a moment.

I don't know anything beyond what you just told me, I'm one of these people. But to editorialize a little bit, the op ed segment. Yeah, this is the opinion segment.

And he gave the facts. I'll give the opinion. And I didn't really know. I could see. It's easy for me to envision if I, like, lived here and understood this all, it's easy for me to envision coming to that the conclusion of. Really, really. In terms of the extent of the press coverage. Even we're adding to the problem right now.

That it looks like if the story was that people were going out of season, OK, or like or fabricating permits or committing wire fraud, let me slip something in here is that like if canings olsun is caught with, like, an extra 50 K. The no one knows where it came from. Yeah, and he's got like three dead sturgeon in his trunk of, you know, something. But you could just picture one being that there's just during the season, there's this mad rush of all these frickin eggs.

Right. And over the years, it just has kind of become the. Some jars, eggs get scattered around and and everybody feels like they're promoting sturgeon and looking out for the resource, and we're not out like killing them just to carve eggs out of them. And, you know, I mean, I could just see that you would be like, man, they were being wrong. They need to be put in their place, but it's getting a little crazy.

The reporting in the. Yeah, because the fines are pretty hefty. Forget the dollar amount, but I want to say, like, it's like up to nine to nine months in prison, something like that, you know, with like, you know, tens of thousands of dollars in fines. Hmm, yeah. Yeah, it'll be it'll be interesting, you know, I hope that it can be resolved in a way where the folks that did the wrong understand and will, you know, change their ways.

And you know that the public that is looking at this will also go OK. That was educational for me, too. I know what I can and cannot do and I won't, you know, participate in stuff like that a couple of years ago.

I think we have reported on this too much. A couple of years ago. There's a guy there's a, you know, a.

I don't want to name who he is. There's a hunter who does a lot of outdoor media. And all over the news one day, like not the news, but sort of like in the text message, huntings, you know, Sfeir and on blogs and stuff is like, oh, it's a poacher got caught poaching, hunting analysts all over the place.

You hear so-and-so hunting license and wound up being he had a license. On, say, hunting hat, what he didn't have is his five dollar archery stamp. He didn't have his five dollar tree stand, which he was eligible to have purchased, so he had his certificate number for the FO like like was the national sort of nationally recognized.

Yeah, the archery safety class. But had he had bought his like 600 and some odd dollar out permit but didn't get the five dollar archery enhancement but.

Right. And people get real excited about this stuff. Yeah. And you look into it and it's you know, you're kind of like I have a feeling that he was like, oh, I'll show. I just found a way to save five dollars.

They'll never catch me, do you? I mean. Oh, yeah, it happens. Yeah. Oh, yeah. He's not a poacher. Yeah.

No, it happens where people get real excited about this kind of stuff.

Yeah. So put the phone delete. Yeah, yeah, there's some shady stuff in the phone delete and a little. Titillating, like I said, it's Italy. I think we'll know more and such a dirty sound, a word, but it's not dirty.

Nothing wrong with that word, but man is it sounded dirty.

I wonder what the outcome would have been if there wasn't any hint of. Now, it's like I don't know I don't know this guy at all, I just I just would bet my truck that he's a good guy that wasn't trying to do anything wrong. But the whole delete the phone thing, like maybe maybe he's just a stupid criminal.

Maybe he's been the best guy his whole life and then realized he was in a little bit of trouble and then did something stupid. When a good criminal who's been a criminal their whole life, we're known not to do that. I mean, I'm not defending the guy. He's been like I've just been like, can't text.

I'll call. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So when and when, that's right, you know, I'll call you from a payphone.

Yeah, yeah. That's what the good criminals do. You know, there's a story that's all right now.

I fucking came out before, though. I understand this, someone checked into this for me because Chrin pointed it out to me and it's here in my notes. Does every year, does every year the squirrel hunting contest in New York by the German Sportsmen's Association. They try to shut down their squirrel hunting tournament, so February twenty seven, the Germantown Sportsman Association has their annual squirrel hunting tournament.

Seven years run. I should go. I'd like to go hunt this tournament in. Seven years run in teams or is it solo, they're getting death threats, they're getting vulgar phone calls and they are not going to shut down their squirrel hunting contest. Keep it alive, man. All the meat gets used, they use it for their fundraiser, they use it for the banquet. The argument against it is this killing in the name of fun and family bonding seems contradictory.

They've never been squirrel hunting because, boy, is it fun and do you get to do some bonding, they want then to replace it with something that promotes family values.

One of the I suggest a beef steak that promotes family values. Yeah, if they had a big old beefsteak, if they had a steak dinner, would anybody be giving them grief?

And the damage in so many ways would be so much greater. You get I like this, it's the weight of your bag. Oh, it's a good way. It's like bass fishing.

Yeah. So you get a limited a way out your limit, man.

Yeah. You better go, dude.

I want to contest tournaments so bad. Germantown Sportsman's Association. So it's people making their death, giving them death threats and whatnot.

You should call them and say, I hope that you stay alive a long time.

Steve, are there rules can use dogs Meenu and yarning could roll up there with a couple of hot mountain fights and they might not know what hit them. I know that on Facebook they have criticized somebody is going to cost four hundred and six people are talking about 614 likes, but no, I don't know the details. We can get back with you on that or if you'd like Clay.

We'll go up there with some mules and dogs. Listen, I got this idea, why don't you I knew you were going to say this all over.

Why don't you call over, conduct some interviews? And come back and report to us about New York Skrull Hunt tournament done another quick scroll, quick scroll go.

I'm going to leave him behind. I'm going. Oh no, no, no.

I'm not saying to not go. She's not going to make it this year. Oh, no. This is a quick turnaround. Teams have to look at this guy. This guy's like a we'll split up cash prize.

We'll take this bonus Waitzkin for red or black since I've got ten. So if you get a black face, if you get a black now, do they mean red? Like what? What do they mean.

They that mean fox guarantee. So bonus for Fox really. Bonus for you. You get a bonus for black face gray man.

That's getting a little too flashy for me boys. I'm all about trying to make it in here when it comes to squirrel.

I was know of a spot in New York where all you see is black face gray. You best get over there. Yeah, if you want, I know a spot in southwest Michigan, same thing. So if you wanted to do if you're like a, you know, smart criminal, you could hunt up a bunch there and make a quick drive to put them in your bag.

You don't need metal detecting over the piles of squirrels. Make sure someone didn't like stuff like lead balls down their throat.

Yeah, I remember that reading about that when a shark tournament, they found a shark packed full of sash weights. So then they started to X-ray in the shark's eye.

That might be a reason to use a lead shot for squirrels up there rather than to shoot.

Yeah, because we're trying to headshot. You lose weight. Yeah. Yeah, you can. Carries off some of the weight.

You know, I one time I won't get back to this squirrel news, but we years ago were hunting Turkey Hunt in Wisconsin and the local bar. Which, like all the revenue at this bar, seems to come from the same six alcoholics. What does that town. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, no. It, dammit, we're all looking at Chester now, not Roscoe, not just now with you. Oh yeah, you're on to it.

L l l l Roy, this here's the funniest part about the story. So there's two funny parts. Anyways, there's a bar in Elroy. And. No, no, no disrespect to the drunkards who spend their entire day in this bar, but if you ask them, they are all exceptional turkey hunters. So I get a big turkey and it's like my body had already signed me up for the big Turkey contest and he had to put like three bucks in your five bucks and sign me up for the big turkey contest.

I killed Turkey. Got it. I got it and bring it down, but it winds up being for a while, it's on the leaderboard, I'm like number one heavy Turk. You're trying to tell them, oh, if I didn't get it. Oh, the old drunks in this bar.

He got the turkey. Have you ever he got the turkey. We go back in there a couple days later. I can hear him. They're still in there. And can it get this?

He got the turkey and I lost that damn thing by ounces.

The funny part about it is I knew we were like by Doug Burns, Kinder and Doug Burns talking about being over in Elroy. Like like you're in Marrakech, OK? Like, oh, my God, over and Elroy, who write in one day we decided to go to Doug's. It's like we like drive down the road like, I don't know, minutes and redox hours as those people. I thought it's like a dog like yell over to right.

Oh, my God, Elroy. So, oh, here's another good squirrel story. They had a squirrel with a radio collar, we're talking about squirrel distribution. Which I've taken an interest in, I don't want to tell anybody why secret, but. In fact, there was a thing about what I don't want to talk about in here. In my notes. And I while I deleted that, I put it back in, but put a note, a comment note that this is a secret, no secret thing I know about anyhow.

The secret I know prompt prompted a question to. Ah, the squirrel biologist we recently had on that episode is called The Squirrel Doctors In. In Pennsylvania south, you'll appreciate this, in Pennsylvania, they had a ear tagged squirrel. That traveled 62 miles, really? Hmm. Hmm, I believe it will yours and where there is nothing in all squirrels disappear. Gone can't find a squirrel anywhere. Driving then and then you next year, well, good master, all squirrels are back, you know what I do?

You know, the radiuses. In a circle, yeah, I would put the I would make a radius around that wherever you are, I'd make a radius 62 miles. Around that point, and then I'd get in my car and drive. Do some surveys find someone real sharp, can figure out how far you'd have to drive a drive by? Yeah, that's the equation. And I'd find the circumference a little something. Something. Bye bye. Bye.

Ah, OK. Do you want to start on? Do you want to start on what you want to start on. Start on. Raccoon's really ok. Hmm.

Yeah. It's fresh. Yeah.

Primarily because I feel like we've reported on squirrels so heavily over the years.

Yeah. And we'll continue to report on squirrels.

We're in report on squirrels today, but we have not given due reporting to Kanun.

To Coonhound. Yeah.

Oh we've had a tough week. We've.

So you've only been here for three nights Steve. So you've hunted the last three nights. Johnny and I have hunted the last four nights together. And this is about as tough a conditions as we've as I've ever had it in, you know, we have right now in the Ozarks or when Johnny got here, there was six to eight inches of snow on the ground, which for here is a lot.

It does happen, but it's a lot. We had record it. So to back you up. It's so rare that I called a buddy of mine who used to hunt a lot of Koons in southern Missouri, which is not far from here. And I was asking about cold, snowy conditions. And he's like, I really can't tell you because I think I hunted those conditions twice in all my years.

Well, that's exactly what I told you. You said, hey, Clay, have you ever had in the snow?

And I was like, one time I hunted in the snow so I didn't really know what to expect.

But the the low are record lows. It was negative 12 on my phone for the town that I live in the northwest Arkansas, like two days before you got here Sunday.

Yeah. There's ponds around here. It looks like you could walk on on the ice and go ice fishing.

I walked out on one in my knows about this. Ice talks to me. I walked out on one and it was not.

It wasn't unlike it, yeah, when there's something about it, I got off quickly, but still, how often do you even see a pond frozen over?

I mean, not like this.

So so what was you know, I was so honest. I didn't set this up properly.

I didn't do a good. I have a I have a better Segway. OK? Because the house set it up like we're going into squirrel. And then you switch, but we went into Koonce. So check this out. Let a rip. We're talking about how when they train dogs in Germany, apparently. Naved, in all that time, you make the dog get into a barrel or a Cajun's scrap with a raccoon, you know about this. I've heard of it.

And I got to talking about people putting a dog in the fight with a weasel or to fight with a rat. I've done the weasel fight thing. Really? Yeah, really, just like with what kind of dog? No, just personal. Oh yeah. Yeah, I go underground in a coal mine. Yeah. Yeah. Did you have to scrap.

He almost said that track and he went down there and set the trap and the weasel was in the culvert already.

They're going to say that we screamed like a baby.

Did not. Oh you got this is in Texas.

This is my. He talked about it. I reached down in a culvert pipe to set a trap. And there is a weasel in there and snarled at me, but it was in a culvert pipe.

So it sounded loud. Yeah. Sound like a tiger. It's a Bengal tiger. It made me step back out of jump to. And when you put your nose down and you can just smell that weasel in there to fill, I think you should take out Steve. Say, Naved, to believe now that North America.

I know, but it's not OK. Take out me. Could not be able to find my stuff, but keep Jani in sand to take out Nevada because Nevada is heavily influenced by German.

Versatile hunting dog stuff, correct, heavily influenced, but I know I just don't want to make it sound like you're saying that, Nadra, the now has these things going on where they like I can tell you, they maybe don't condone it. They maybe don't talk about it. But I can listen, I'll take this to the grave. I can tell you there are people who are OK, not Naved. There are people who are into the versatile hunting dog esthetic on this continent.

Who might? Pay attention to Naved and be interested in that stuff who are still believers in making them duke it out with a raccoon.

I totally agree.

OK, this guy has firsthand knowledge of a farmer who had a wiener dog. Dioxin, dioxins. He's a grain farmer.

And he had a dog, he even has it here, dots and parentheses, wiener dog looking at it right here, I believe it was the other way with it. He likes we don't know how to pronounce it.

I don't want to get caught not knowing how to pronounce it. Yeah. I thought was a dash and it looks like. Yeah. Dash. And then I knew I'd mess it up and then to have a laugh at my expense. Not like the laughter everybody but I want anybody laughing to me.

So he had a grain silo so he's got a grain farmer. He had a wiener, a Dashan Dodson, doxa derksen. He had a derksen that he would put in a box and make them duke it out with pack rats.

Mm. Because he had such a problem with pack rats destroying the wiring on his trucks and equipment when he stored it for the winter. So this and. That right? Daxam. Hated pack rats because of having to fight them in that box and would. Go home and protect the equipment and trucks during winter storms. I know well, who would lie in the email? Yeah. Right here where we suffer, everyone we've ever elected to office, we've had thousands of dollars of damage on my wife's car from parents getting in and chewing wires.

I bet that's what your dog ate last night.

Probably. I wasn't thinking. I was thinking about what the dog ate. I was thinking about it. That's what it was. Big Pesquera. Yeah. What the hell else would have been? Yeah. That's the only kind of big rat we have kids talking about.

Oh, I still have a Segway to watch this now. What made him write in was Johnny Tomball, his his raccoon okka his dog was good lead. Now go talk about Koonce. Yeah.

Oh, like a long time ago when I was talking about Train and Mingus on the trapped raccoon. Yeah.

So I brought it full circle and I think that's heated up really good here.

Now, people would be better prepared to track the conversation.

So we've just we've so I mean, I could say speaker track and I have I have a raccoon has to start from zero to bring everybody up to speed. I have raccoon hounds, OK? A raccoon is a mammal.

I would say cool. I would say I mean, I would just knock a bear, not super close cousins to a bear.

Yeah. So I have coon hounds and so coon hounds are there multiple breeds, coon hounds, five or six different Yuxi registered coonhound.

Rattle them off.

Well there's a walker blue tick black and tan redbone English and plot. Is that all there. All six of them I think. Sounds like. Yeah. And so tell us about how the one hand all five. Yeah.

So well it's easier to say the plot hound, the American Plot Hound is the only tree hound that did not descend from European foxhounds.

So black and tan blue take walker redbone English all descended from European foxhounds. If you look above you gentlemen, you'll see I was like a dining on the wall.

Oh, I can tell you about that.

We'll have to see that to see you. See you then. I'm sorry. Yeah, there's a there's a there's an alarm from fiction. This that's a whole nother story. You want me to talk about that later to guard the gate thing. Essentially that scene no longer exists on the earth because those dudes didn't didn't do it right.

And I understand the principle guarding the gate and I believe in guarding the gate, but I just don't know how. I don't consider that my those my brethren. Well, listen, let me let me I'm with you. I don't even dress up fancy little hats and riding around in the horse chasing the fox.

I mean, I just I just don't look look at that scene. That was us yesterday.

Look, there's a there's a family of people there on the black dogs you talk about.

Well, we'll talk about it in a separate answer.

No, I'm just saying that was a valuable. So what I've got, guys, is I've got this old painting of a European fox hunting scene, men on horseback. There's twenty walkers there.

There's nothing even it's that I don't want to take up everybody's time. I'll talk to you, I'll talk about it with you later. Sure. God, I hope they hunt and chase Fox till the till the cows come home. It just isn't relevant, it's not relevant, if you would let me tell the story, you'd see what's relevant, why that's there. No, no, no, no. I don't want to talk about that. All that is symbolic, that picture, because that no longer exists.

That's why it's on the ceiling.

No, I think I'm being dead serious. I put everything that no longer exists that goes on the ceiling, you know, because I don't think that still exists. Opinion on the need for emphasis. I don't want there to be a painting of me and Steve and Janice on mules with Feist's and coon hounds. Oh, my. They have to make paintings up because you can't do it anymore.

Oh, yeah. You see what I'm saying? Sure. That's that's the metaphor. That's why it's up there. Because I don't want that to be me. I want my kids to be able to ride mules and hunt with dogs and do the stuff that we've done. So that's almost a metaphor.

Well, I think it's a little flawed, though, because I think usually people make paintings of things that are celebrated. So in a way, I do want a painting of us, but I don't want that pain to go on to be a regular.

Well, you don't want it on the ceiling of this place now. So so we could not. So we have to announce it's something that I got my first coonhound when I was 14 years old. I hunted till I went to college, got rid of my dogs, took a hiatus from coon hunting for about 15 years till my family was kind of of age. And my kids and people were interested in six. I think six years ago I got back into coon hunting and just kind of stepped back into it.

And it's a it's a pretty I mean, if you're an outdoorsman and you're looking for places to spend time in the outdoors, it's pretty unique because you do it at night. I mean, almost even from like a logistical perspective. First of all, it's an animal that is abundant that most people don't care about. And you hunted at night. Yeah, I read involves a dog.

It's there's virtually no there's virtually no stress on the resource right now because the firs are not valuable enough to warrant trapping for him. And generally trappers trappers are like when food prices are high, they're killing nine out of 10 to get killed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. High volume, like high volume commercial dudes.

And that's not even to know nerd out even more. You know, the whole mezo predator seem like midsized predators. You know, the big main predators in North America in this part of the world, which would have been mountain lion, Wolf. They're gone. The mezo predators, mid-sized predators are more. I've got some research papers over here from some stuff I was looking at, like there is an unnatural amount of raccoons in North America right now as compared to pre European settlement.

So, yeah, that's reading in our little fact sheet. I want to say it was like, how many people are in America now?

Three. Twenty five. Yeah, roughly around I think it was around 300 million raccoons in our country.

I remember thinking like, wow, it's almost as many people as live here.

I think that's incorrect. You just got just got a big fat check to.

Could you see how fast he grabbed that phone? That's like the kind of thing. Yeah, but you know why? Because he wrote that fantasy.

I didn't. I didn't actually.

All right. Exactly. So so we when you when you're not you cannot at night and you cast million turn loose, you're really 300 million guns in North America. You ever hear about how they how they do that? Wildlife Services, does that drop of rabies vaccination pills from the air to spread to stop raccoon rabies? That's some interesting stuff. Go ahead, Clinton.

There you are. You're just going to describe.

Yeah, and I called the guy and I'm like, I'm bringing some shit horns.

So when we could not what we do is we go out to a likely spot. Usually involves water, big woods like you want to turn out around a creek around a pond. And these are trained dogs. You know, we could go a thousand different ways of how you train dogs. A lot of it is breeding, getting the right dog to start with.

And then you condition that dog and train it to get into the training a little bit, because that's the whole reason Chester and I are driving twenty hours each direction. Yeah, my dogs, he it's training done. Let me just like set up what coon hunting is, how we do it.

So we turn loose our dogs and a likely spot. These dogs are free cast, which means we just turn them loose. And the idea that they would they would go out on their own, find coon scent, trail the country, the coon.

And so what I was telling Jonathan, I want to add in to that, like the the reason there's like a name for free casting or not, that's not the reason.

But the other version of cutting a hound loose track something is that you like we do in Montana looking for mountain lions. We find the track and then you put the dog's nose literally on that track and started the human.

It finds the. Track in the snow or in the mud, you turn a dog, you bring a dog to set him on the right direction to every free cast is where I don't know where Coon is. You know, I just I just know by this pond there's likely a coon within three, 400 yards of here. Maybe he's 50 yards. Maybe he's 500 yards. I'm going to turn this dog loose. This dog has the instinct to hunt and prey drive.

He is going to he's going to seek out consent real quick.

Interesting. You told me. Tell them about. What's it called the when you don't freak out? Is there a term for it, put them out on the track? Well, I mean, if you're big game, so there's lots of different things. If you're big game hunting, a lot of guys rig dogs, which means you drive around. No, no, no.

I mean, what's called a stick his nose in a track. I mean, just turn them out on a truck. Turn them on a track. Yeah, we talked about this. I was like, why would people if coon cuts across the road in front of you. Yeah. Clay was saying that the strategy is. Drive past it, wait a while. So it's not too hot, it's and then bring them back and put them on when it's not too hot.

Anybody that's listening to this podcast that's a coon hunter for very long has had this happen. You're going coon hunting and you see a coon cross the road. The first instinct you have is to slam on the brakes, jump out, grab your dog and just throw it on the track.

And I mean, just universal.

Have you done it? Oh, yeah. Many times the swings in the air probably learned not just from my experience, but from others telling me the same corresponding story.

Dogs have a real hard time with a super fresh track. They'll usually take it the wrong way. This happened.

I saw a contract. This was like three or four years ago. I saw a coon cross the road in front of my truck, going to the right, going off down the valley. I turned Fern loose on that hot track. She just erupts.

She goes two hundred and fifty yards the other way and trees a coon on the side of the mountain over this dead serious like that. You know, you just feel like she's going to hit it. So so what you do, if you can discipline yourself enough to do it, is you just basically wait 10 minutes before you turn on the track and then they hit the track and whatever happens with the synth. So like there's there's a lot of science behind the way dogs use their noses with scent.

Like there's a scent plume like that dog is sometimes tracking ground scent, which means the pads of that cone are touching dirt and grass and soil, leaving scent the primary way that they're trail a hot track is from a scent plume. So as that coon or even you or me are walking through the air, micro particles are constantly falling off of our body. I mean, like skin particles, hair particles, particles from your shirt falling off, creating a scent plume.

That's why dog will run with his head up and not put his head right into a track.

And so depending upon how hot, how fresh the scent is and how good the conditions are, conditions or everything, if it's cold, it's one way. If it's hot, it's another way. Like so there's just all these variables that come with the olfactory conditions that Dr.. So what to go back to the sequence that I want. I told Johnson, Steve, so to a coon hunter, like the objective is to get a coon like we're after coon, there are better ways to get guns than with a dog.

Like if we were just like if Steve was like Clay, I got to come to Arkansas and bring 10 cousins home with me, I would have said, well, let's put out some dog proof traps. You know, let's like there's a more efficient.

Yeah, there's a more efficient way.

So, like, the whole thing is about working with this dog. That's part of it. And so what happens when you're a coon hunter is if I took Rick Smith out, he might have if he hadn't heard the spill the first night, just been like the dogs barked. And then there was a coon like big deal, my yard. Dog barks Well, to a coon hunter, the nuance inside of those barks is like a book.

It's like a story in man. I mean, it was dark last night and I can't hear out of my right ear. And the you guys.

Oh, you want to talk about a handicap? No, this guy, no doubt.

I'm sure he knows this, but when you hear a sound, your ears are making a Kalakuta, it seems crazy, but this one, a sound hits your head.

What are you laughing about? No, it's true. I know it sounds insane.

Your brain. Nose, which your ears, the sound got to first. As fast as that is traveling, yeah, in fact, that's why when you're under water, you can't tell where it came from because it's traveling, what, 13 times faster, something like that looked at.

My guess is seven times faster. Look at them.

When you're under water and you hear like a whale weigh off or you hear a. But boat motor, if you're going to get reliable and faster than in there. Oh, yeah. So fast that your brain. Can't pick it, that's why when you have four times, that's why when you hear an outboard, when you're diving underwater, you hear outboard, it feels like it's going to hit you from some direction.

You can't tell what are you feel like you're surrounded by whales when that's what a whale sounds like. Kind of like coonhound. Yeah, so whistle, yeah, that's why it's so disorienting, your brain knows what you're that sound hit first and then like through some calibrates, it's unbelievable. Yeah. Clay's got a bad Obermaier every noise claeys like where they come from, where they come from. He can not tell where it came from. So you play a hell of a trick on you.

Oh you could for sure. I they're hiding out in the woods at night.

Hey do you know, do you want to know how I learned that I couldn't hear direction when I was a kid.

I'd be hunting with my dad and he'd holler at me from, you know, we'd split up to scout for deer and he'd be like, Clay.

And I'd be like, yeah, come over here. There's a buck rub.

And I'd just take off going that way. And he'd holler Clay and I'd be like, Yeah, and he's further away. And I'd take off after.

And I mean, it would just so that's that's not like a result of born in a year.

When I was in the ninth grade, my ears started ringing after getting a 22 pistol and burning up about two thousand rounds.

But but I didn't shoot it at home. Kids, where you're right now, it's like daily dollar short do the runs around all day or the earplugs in.

No. Oh, I want to lose the other way.

Steve, if you clapped your hands real hard by me, my bad ear that I can't hear out of pouring ring so loud I can't hardly hear people talk. Oh like if you just went pop like that's good to know to do that too. So yeah. I mean so, so I really take care of my bad ear because that's the one that rings. So that's the one you're protecting when, when you'll learn.

If you hunt with me very much.

I always ask people to tell direction. I was doing it with you yesterday. Oh you're right. You're not even fond of it.

I was like which I say point point where that dog is. And Steve would be like this way Michael and does support those dogs because I hear them because I got a good ear. I've got one here that's great. Which is a blessing. You know, if they're both bad. I couldn't hear people talk. I can hear you talk fine. Oh no. You hear it. I just don't wear it. Well, I can't tell. It makes for a tough turkey hunt.

Oh, dude, it's sort of ruined my solo turkey career. No doubt.

I want to train my mule to key and I'm serious. I thought about getting a gobbo machine. Yeah.

And oh, and then go feed the feed. You have a treat of a treat said a treat next to it. And then so when she hears a gobble on a cold on a spring morning oh ears go up a little surprised at the mule that the mule ls riding squirrel hum.

I was kind of wondering how much would you need to do this before when those dogs bayed they go to them that the mule will just be like, I might just go over there because this guy is going to be kicking my side, yanking them marines and whatnot. I feel like now see the mule you were riding would be one that we ride less like is he my mule? Like every time that we on our mules, I'm riding her.

And I'd be stretching to say that when she hears dog bark, she just starts going. I think it'll eventually happen. She she tends to go the way they go. You should every time you get a squirrel. Feeder, give that mule something to eat. Get out there. So she's like over there with those dogs are those that dogs are great.

Those dogs are banned by some grain.

That's a good solid. It really would work. Those those mules would sell their soul for a handful. Phil, cut that out because I'm actually going to sell that idea to somebody. A book. He's going to make a book. We were talking about the sequence and I said, like in the dark, you're listening for these certain things to happen. What might seem just like a bark to someone else is like this, this story. And so there's four things that are happening, Nonaka, not you.

Turn the dogs, forget the dogs in the first bark that you hear. That is what we call a strike. So you would hear us say that man and destruction. That would mean she located the scent of a coon. And there is an excited bark.

I mean, it could be a variation of Bachs, but it just there's no like someone stepped on their tail. They strike the coon and that means different.

So, you know, yo, you don't know exactly sound OK.

Like, for instance, I didn't even have time to get into it the other night. But there was one time when Ferne went way out embark down in that field where we thought we heard a coyote. And when I heard her open strike, I didn't think it was a I thought she was booger barking. Well, no, she got sprayed in the face by a skunk.

That was another time. Yeah. You got to explain, Lagerbäck.

Well, let's not let me just why can't I mean, a booger bark would just be a meaning. The dog was scared by something. And like if a UPS man drove up in front of your yard and the dog was out, it would be like, boo.

You just got to stand there and look, when Fern strikes, she has a squall, and when I hear a squeaky squall out of Fern, I feel good about that. A coon she's after. So they strike. The next thing they do is they trail the coon. And this is this is the worst part of the sequence that every dog is going to be different. There's no dog that's going to be the same. But what they're doing is they're trail on the ground.

Scent of that coon, the tempo. Cadence, loudness, sidedness of that bark tells you how hot that track is, if they just blow out of there, then, man, you're like, man, it's a hot track.

If it's like.

We heard a lot of this this week. Oh, you're just like me and they're working it in on a textbook track, the track would get hotter and hotter, but it's rarely textbook. So there's there's the trail sounds.

When you're hunting an animal that climbs trees, you have you and these dogs are tree dogs, which means they are bred to run game. And when that game runs up a tree, they stay there and bark. And that's a special thing because most, most, most hounds would be dogs that would just want to pursue a game. So like running dogs, that's what we call a run and run and hound. And a tree hound is different. A run hound.

When he chases a coon and it goes up a tree, he goes, dang, this isn't any fun anymore. I'm going to go somewhere else and find another one to try to catch a tree hound.

When he gets to where he believes the animal left the earth and has ended up in a tree, he will stay there and bark, which is. Think about this, though, Rick Smith. This is an unnatural thing for an animal to do, like in the wild. There is no replication of that thing because a tree hound has a human partner that will then come to the tree and harvest the animal. It's like a wolf wouldn't be a tree hound.

A wolf would run you up a tree and be like, I get that guy. I'm going to go catch you. See what I'm saying? So it's this influence of human artificial selection and breeding that makes that really special. So when I say that dog's a tree dog, like what I'm going to say about Angus, I got a question. Can all of the. So the breeds of the hounds, can they all be tree dogs?

Well, I mean, they'll all be running into coon hounds like like like all the six breeds that I just. Oh, it's all coonhound. So they're all street. They're all tree hounds. Yeah.

What's a hound that is not a tree hound.

Well, there's lots of walkers that are run and walkers like guys that run deer, guys that run foxes, guys that run coyotes, those are running dogs.

So it's a beagle.

Beagles are running down a beagle eagles. A rabbit could climb a tree. A beagle would just leave in the tree and go find a rabbit to run my dog, my dog's snuggling dog.

But they see someone on the couch.

That's where it's going. Yeah.

It's a snug, artificial human selection. Our dog is such a snuggling dog that now I know if we let the kids go and we don't have like a living room with a TV area and when the kids go into the house was like, oh yeah, we get sick of, like, you guys and go watch the show.

And if that dog hears that a cartoon or something, come on, like a beeline, what runs in knowing it can go snuggle with the mother thing.

Wow, that's a snuggle dog. Yeah. Stays on that snuggle. So we're part two of four. OK, so so strike trail and then locate and these are all things that I could call in a sequence locate Barak is when the the the animal in our case raccoon, has gone up the tree. And it may seem like the dog would just trail footsteps right up to a tree and just start barking. But it's never the way it happens. Like you saw last night, like Fern Trail, that coon got to generally where she believed it was.

But the central was indistinct to which it was. I mean, she was checking every tree in a 50, 60 square yard area. She didn't know where it was. And she during that time will let out a series of elongated barks that indicate that she is no longer on the actual linear trail that coon.

And she's like doing circles in every dog would be different. I know what ferns locate bark. Sounds like if you're coon hunter, you'd say she's looking up, but she doesn't know where it's at. Looking up would mean the dog is trying to locate the country, but it's not real clear. They almost always locate. And so you get excited when your dog locates. So the dog strikes, the dog trails, and then when she locates you slap your buddy on the knee and you go, man, we're about to be looking at a coon.

And then the fourth thing, the fourth sequence is the dog begins to tree with. That's when the dog locates the coon in the dog begins and excited series typically of chops.

Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow.

Not all dogs chop some dogs ball, but like 80 percent of these compounds that are in these breeds will chop on the tree. So it's like. Locate. O o o o o o o o o o o strike trail, locate tree when last night when we were having such a time when they having such time untangling that track. Well, thought was interesting was you on? They hit a tree. And you said, I think the treed. And we ran over there and I said, well, there it is, I can see it up in the tree and you seem real surprised.

Yeah, man, just because you were getting frustrated with how long it took to sort the track out, you know, yeah, what we saw last night was. It was in some ways, it was great dog work and otherwise it was bad dog work, I mean, it just kind of which side of it you wanted to look at for whatever reason, that was a hard track for them to sort out. And I can't tell you why it was.

They made a massive loss, so I should have never gone in there, Steve. I was just I got them confused, Noel. It doesn't help them any. But like when I was looking at my Garmin and there's like eight people looking over my shoulder and we've been hunting for four nights and we hadn't even seen it yet. And this is so not a big deal.

Now, it's one o'clock in the morning on the and out here furn location.

And I'm watching my Garmin and I see you're doing tight circles. I felt like she was treed and I said, let's go to her. And I made the decision, we're going to go and we got in there. And as soon as we got in there, she wasn't where I left her. You know, she was. So you knew. She left. I knew. And it wasn't she didn't leave the tree like a bad thing. That would be a bad thing.

She just hadn't committed. I hadn't got bored and left. No, she just she just knew it wasn't there. She wasn't certain where it was. So we got in there and I saw her nose on the ground and not pointing in the tree. I just was like, got it. And this is after several nights a tough kuhnen.

I like that you yelled at me in there to. You said don't start shining your light up in the trees. Yeah, yeah, because then they'll think they got the tree. Yeah, yeah. Which is interesting that they got that.

Well, I mean, a bunch of dudes come in and shine light the tree, like must be the raccoon.

Exactly. I mean think about it a couple of hundred times or more in their life. The only time we shot up in a tree, a coon comes falling down. You know what I mean?

Yeah. So you don't especially when they're struggling, you don't. You just cut your lights. You just kind of want to.

And when we did go in on the tree, when you finally like you, the dogs are doing a bunch of they going all over the place and sort it out. But then they finally, like, really committed to a tree. Yeah, but you're still a little incredulous just because there's so much weirdness already going on. Yeah.

You had me switch my light to a green light. Yeah. So that I didn't get so that if they were not. If they were not sure yet that I didn't make too much of a suggestion, OK, that wasn't my thought at all, that I assume that's what it was.

Yeah, I can see why you'd think that, because I was telling you at one time not to shine your light. And then he said, put it on green, put it. Yeah, I had mine on red.

The reason I did that, Steve, is because we were in a cedar thicket and those cones would get up in the top of those 30 foot cedars and you can't see them. You might walk.

Was another five, 10 feet higher in that tree. Would have been hard to pick up a car.

Oh, I would.

You saw how quick I found that so quick that when I saw that tail, the ring on the tail, it was beautiful. Well, what I wanted that kind to do was look at it.

He'll look at a red light and he won't look at a bright light. Also, that's what you were thinking, because a lot of time look at my eyes shine.

A lot of times you get you get one flicker of akuna, right. When you walk up when you walk up there trying to figure out what's going on, they'll look at you and then the closer eyes and just hunker down.

And if they're up at the top of a cedar tree that you can't see all of it, you might get one look at him in a red light. They'll look at a red light or a green light. So I was worried about finding the coon. I saw fire and standing on the tree bark. And I was like, whether she's got it or not, she's committed. I'm going in.

And then the coon was not very far up the tree saw it right away. I was excited, man.

Well, I mean, you know, if it was way up, I could have saw it right away.

To Clay, do you think the dog's getting sprayed by a skunk mess with them at all? You know, because that's that's so strong.

We gesture said it. Somebody said it. I kind of doubt it did. And let me tell you why we have this sense of what it's like to use your nose to navigate life because. But a dog's navigation of life through its nose is vastly different than ours. The way I've heard it described by someone, it would be like walking into a house. And let's say your wife was cooking lasagna, you were cooking lasagna, Jani, and you'd walked into the house, you would smell lasagna, your dog would walk in and he would smell tomato sauce, boiled noodles, ricotta cheese and Italian sausage.

And he could distaso oregano. He could do it would be like distinct colors and he could separate from one another.

So yeah. Ah, my dogs were out. I got to qualify this because people are going to think I have dogs, my dogs, where I think they were working a little drainage and both of them just erupted just, just for probably four or five seconds like ran into it.

I think they just spoke there was a lot of you noticed there was a lot of skunk tracks last night. They were out.

Yeah, because I think that warm break in the weather.

So in a lot of greener tracks. Yeah. We hadn't seen a greener track, I don't think. I didn't see one, you know, saw it, we saw a once he left. I don't know if you went looked around that area. It looked like he had had a hole down in that area. Is that right? Mm hmm. He'd been working and work and work and then was. Up in the air, I remember asking you what that little outburst was.

Yes, the dog's like kind of went crazy there for a second there, like. Right. They probably just jumped something. Yeah. And that's what you said.

They maybe they maybe they kicked up a deer and it scared them or whatever because they didn't run it. I mean, like you to run it out of the cut. I mean I just typically don't they're pretty straight dogs. But it was as tough conditions as I've ever been in four Trinka in the last several days.

And just so everyone knows, those dogs treat that coon after they got sprayed by that skunk.

Yeah. So, yeah, probably 30, 40 minutes after they got sprayed. Basken Yeah, they did. What do you think about that one? You know, John, he's one of his nicknames is The Laughing Eagle. What did you think when Yianni spotted that squirrel's eyeball up in that tree?

That was impressive. It really was, man good. That's when the Benos saved us. Now we got a lot. We lost a squirrel in the tree. This is a Segway in the squirrel home. No, we've got something. Yoni's dubbed the song The Ballad of Mingus, The Dog, um, we lost the squirrel in the tree. And Jani, there's a crack in the tree and Johnny found its eyeball up in the cracks like a little hole.

Look like a you know, like a hole.

Yeah, not too small. You could probably make a volleyball stick into it. Yeah.

Jam it in there. Eyeball looking out, but it wasn't deep and so on. I glanced up there.

You could see the little squirrel head. Yeah.

You could see head and the shine of it.

That was an interesting call on squirrel hunting is like. You could see his head in there and he definitely could have shot him in the head, but then if you stoned him. He might not come out, but the nature of the hole was such that you had to actually do something, go for a less ethical kill. In order that it would have a lot enough life to scurry itself out of that crack. Well, that's not what we did, though.

We didn't do. You know what we did? You're spooked him out.

Yeah, a shot right under the hole. So what we did so we had twenty twos on him. We had Michael in the air with the 12 gauge.

I was carrying a for ten. And the fact that we could see the squirrel in the hole told me that the hole didn't go deeper, like he would also take advantage of it.

He was just in a little cavity. And so I said, well I'll just shoot right beneath the hole. And that's what we did. And it worked, shot. And he ran out of the hole. It was delayed, though, a shot, boom.

He didn't move. And then he broke like a few seconds later. That's the way I remember it, know. And then he ran up the tree. And then I guess Michael ended up shooting it with a shotgun as it was going up the tree. Yeah, talk about a Mingus update, we need a Jingle for Mingus update. A little song segment, just a single segment. Oh, you know what I want to do? I want to know that old kiss song.

Beth Oh it goes Barthe. You hear me calling. You hear me call it.

I hear you calling. But I can't come home right now. DOS one, I want to rewrite it so it's and I can't stop. I want to be a turkey hunting song, confession songs. Well, no good last night.

Well I know, but now I got to thinking, Seth, I hear him call them all like that. They'd be us hearing a gobble. It'd be all about me and Seth here and a guy named Seth. I hear him call.

Yeah. Like that. I like that better than the flesh. Yeah. I'm just in a turkey state of mind right now.

It's come it's going to be sweet and I get that song written up just as God help me with the creative projects just for around here, throw some chords in there.

So then also when you get working out at work, up a jingle for Yoni's Mingus update.

OK, yours will be Mingus, Mingus, Mingus. Mingus means don't make it that they're all the same songs.

And also that Clay speak to more is Clay's got more experience so he can see what my dog didn't learned. But to set it up, Mingus has been trained a little bit with one live coon in a dead coon in Montana, maybe four days total. And he got to trail one and he fought on for a little bit and then we'd shot it out of a tree. And, you know, you got to smell a little bit when it was when it was not had much exposure with.

Not much. Not much. And he's been at two lion trees now. He's been in quite a few more hunts, but my horns just haven't been panning out. So he hasn't actually got to run a lot of tracks. So I wanted to bring him down here for this. Yeah. So you get some more experience. Yeah, well, first of all, for the hounds being out there are the non Housman Mingus's. And I'm not just saying this because I don't just walk around telling people they got good looking hounds.

That's just not a compliment. You throw around too lightly.

But Mingus's is like a big ol handsome looking dog, really is for Houn handsome looking dog, loud most house known to be ugly.

I mean, not always pretty. I'm being serious. They're working dog.

Right. What sentence would sound more familiar to you?

And up on the porch is an ugly old hound dog or an up on the porch is a beautiful old hound dog. Ugly.

That seems like something you wouldn't you don't really you wouldn't really call a hound beautiful. You might call him handsome, regal, or, you know, just say that's a beagle, regal beagle.

I know it really. When I saw him, I'd seen him when he was younger back in Montana, you know, when he was just kind of a pup, maybe three quarters grown. But boy, he's a big old dog and in a pound puppy. Yeah. Just got him from a pound. Didn't know anything about him.

So we don't know the daughters picked him up.

This this is what it would be interesting about Mangus to me is that George doesn't know any history of this dog like my dogs.

I would be able to tell you back to about 1750, their lineage and sort of being serious, like, you know, you just know so much. This dog, we don't know anything, but Sale is going to bring the dog. I didn't I mean, I was all for it. I didn't think the dog would do much, not because he's a bad dog just because he was coming to a new environment. He's going to be with new dogs.

He's going to a new territory run in something he's not familiar with. And then he's a puppy and he's just. Yeah, he's a puppy. He's a hell of a deer.

Yeah. And anything under two years old in a hunting dog would be kind of considered a young dog and he might be out of the puppy stage. You might be into a young dog stage. They're pretty pliable until they're about two, two and a half years old. You got a lot of room to train and such. But the dog, we cast the dogs with my dogs. And I mean, he went hunting, which no one. That's a good thing.

He didn't just stay at our feet the whole time. Yeah. He'd go way the hell off. Oh, yeah.

That that's one of the main things I'm looking for is just drive to go, you know, because, you know, my dog go back in the truck. Yeah.

Well, you kept saying you kept making the joke of when you'd see a dog that was doing that. Well, what's the what's the line? I don't even remember.

Oh, you're always saying, like, oh, Mingus's is just over there standing there thinking like, boy, enjoy.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good. Cute, huh. Yeah. Ferne every now and then it comes back and she'll hear Jed bark out there four hundred yards and she'll just perk up and listen like she's so proud of him. She's the man she loves hearing a good coon race and then. Yeah.

So, so we cast the dog. And what I was most impressed with was the first night my dogs went, I think, eight hundred yards, which is essentially half a mile and treed solid, and we're going to the tree and my dogs are not big. Dogs in my plots are not loud, like they're just average in a lot of things, which is not factors I'm that worried about. And we hear like the volume and you can use it to set the volume of noise coming from that tree, like tripled.

Oh, that's right. You guys can hear me.

It would be like this would be like oh oh two oh oh oh.

I mean, just like yeah we thought it we thought they turned around and came towards us. Yes. And essentially Mangus went to him and started Trehan. Yeah. Which which to me that's what I was impressed with is tree instinct that he didn't see the images that he has.

The idea that you stand here, put your feet on the tree, chew on the bark, make a ruckus and don't leave. You don't know how special that is unless you you're after a tree dog and you see all the ones that won't do that. Even ones that are bred to do that, don't do it very well.

Well, and the reason I have some now understanding of why it's it is something special and I don't know. But, you know, it wasn't but probably I don't know in December sometimes. So two or three months ago, we're at a tree with three other dogs that are treeing, barking nuts, and there's a lion in the tree and Mingus's walking around and wanted to play grab ass with the dogs and just kind of wagging his tail and like not putting two and two together at all.

You know what I mean? Yeah, I remember you saying you were trying to make him look up the tree and someone told you that don't work. Yeah, yeah.

So, like, yeah. Even though there was a when we knew it was a very because I want to lie. And when you come up to that tree, that line ran into that tree like a coon might have been there for half an hour. Right. Right. But a lion's been there four minutes. By the time those dogs get there, you know, I mean, it happens like that smell on the tree. And even with that, he just would like kind of put a pup on the tree.

But there was no barking. He's just kind of like, yeah. So what what turned him around on that? They just click, man. They just they just.

Well, eventually I told them to show me. I'm trying to prove. Yeah. Yeah. So the next time the line was a little bit lower on an exposed branch where you could just see the whole cat and the hill was so steep when you backed 10 yards off the tree, you're almost eye level with it. And he was kind of just walking around look and look in the other dogs or bark. And that's when I grabbed his head and I pointed it out there.

I felt his head quiver for a moment as he locked on. And then he almost blew my hands up. Guys, guys. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And when Mingus says, guys, guys, there's a cat in a tree, he goes, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.

It's loud, if you like. Yes, well, it I was I was just impressed they did that.

So you and you so if you if you imagine your own honor as a man, Clay, you wouldn't shine. Yoni's up. Just for the sake of sparing his. Feelin's, no. I really wouldn't I now what I want to qualify, I've tried to be encouraging, to be honest, because I'm like a child. No, no, no, no. I just know there's a lot of people that if your dog does something good, they wouldn't tell you it was good if it was the best dog in the world.

And I'm just not going to be that guy. You know, it's like, yeah, the dogs are doing good. I don't want to say, like, there's so many other components that make a whole balanced sound.

That's just one of them.

Yeah. And he's got it. Good. So there's all like. So that doesn't just mean because I say he's a good tree dog, it means that Mingus is going to be the best line hound in the West. There's a lot of other factors that come in that are going to determine like his end goal. But for a pound dog that's been your yard dog. I mean, I told him press. I mean, my dog that I've got out here, that's the same age as Mingus that we did not hunt.

That was bred specifically. I mean, it's out of my fern dog. Won't won't do that. So, I mean, I'm just saying you're hoping it will yeah, it will at some point it just hadn't yet. But so I'm not trying to shout him. I was just impressed with the dog.

Well, look, we we as a team Magnesite got benched here yesterday because it was tough to tell you that I'm not afraid to hurt his feelings because I actually wanted to talk to you about that in private to make sure you didn't think I was being a jerk.

So I understood. I don't tell this. Yeah.

You know, if I mess it up. The Dodgers struggling. On a couple of tracks that were hard to sort out and Mingus being impressionable as a young youngster and liking all that excitement. The dogs have come in and they check some trees and are trying to figure it out and Mangus to be like. There it is. It must be in the tree and then he gets worked up and they're like, well, must be in the tree because look at him.

Yep, he's. Why would he be that excited? Yeah, and then it sets off a false tree, Johnny, I wouldn't have known that except for when I walked away from at one point I walked away from the guys and I walked in there and I watched Fern on my Garmin come down, make a and it's in the dark. I'm just watching a Garmin and listening with my one good ear. And I hear Fern locate bark like once or twice, make a couple of tight circles and then move on.

Mingus comes out and I don't have him on my Garmin, but Mingus comes down, gets to the same spot Fern was, and just just starts treating like crazy fern pedals around for probably five or six minutes out here and trying to work the actual track out. And then Jed hears Mingus and gets 300 yards away. He comes to the tree and Jed's like, oh, it's here. He starts tree. And and then ferns like, well, Dargon, Mingus and Dad are tripping over there.

Here I am, like some sucker. I'm. Yeah. And so and that's a fault of my dog.

And that's what I wanted to say last night. I wasn't trying to make an excuse for my dog's slick trian, essentially like Trehan where there is not a coon because like and that's just whatever.

They just did it, you know, Yoni's honorable man himself. And he's a grown up. I don't think you hurt his feelings. Yeah, well, I didn't want it to sound like he did he strike you as being diminished and hurt last night? Oh, no. You thought you didn't look like a man. Yeah, I thought it was he was taken is like this is more valuable for my dog.

To do this well, and the thing is, if we hunted together two or three nights a week, it wouldn't be any big deal. I would probably I mean, just but we we kind of had a mission we had accomplished, which was Traken. And and it just it was just another factor. And then we could even go deeper on why my dogs are more susceptible to honoring another dog, which is true. My my dogs away. They're bred.

If they hear another dog bark, they're probably going to go to him. A more independent bred hound would hear Mingus bark and would be who cares? I'm going to find my own. Yeah. Clay was talking about in.

Kuhnen contests where you like basically it's a it's a dog handling like a display of dog handling. That's right. That they might put out multiple dogs that are competing against one another. And they each got to find their own thing and you got to get a dog that doesn't care what's going on. He's in a silo. Mm hmm. Not like a group thing, but in other kinds of hunting. You want that group aspect. So in big game hunting, it takes more than one dog to carry a bear, a lion.

And so you want a dog that, when we call it honor, will honor another dog. And my dogs come from a long lineage of big game hounds. So they're not they have not been influenced by the competition coon world because they could breed that they got a pack mentality. Yeah. So they hear Mangus and they're like going to him so and and so what happens when guys dogs struggle? And I was frustrated. I really was. I mean, you guys come all the way down here to go Kunai with me and I'm like, oh yeah, well Triola kind of Koonce and we can't Traken.

I'm frustrated and I'm not frustrated. Mangus are you? I'm really not. But I'm just I see what's happening and I'm like probably be best hold back. Yeah.

Well I thought it was fun to watch. It's on such a micro scale. Is watching the when when you and your body head out the four squirreled dogs and there's no leaves on the trees. So you see pretty far out in the woods and lot of times you kind of know where they're all at. Yeah. And wanted to hit a tree light and just watch those. The ones be like. Yeah, let's go.

Come running from all directions showing that one of the trees is kind of falling and I won't lie.

It's like it's no fun to get taken out of the game. No different. When you're in a basketball game and you know you're taken out, you want to be in the game and now you don't. You're just sitting there, like, trying to hang on to the 70 pound bistrot of to through the woods. But I told you the first night or maybe the second night, I said, man, if I could just hear him bark out in the woods one time on, like what we think is a coon track or a country like, I'll consider this trip a success.

So when I thought that through, I was like, man, we're like, we blew that goal out of the water, you know? Yeah. Yeah. I've got a question for you.

You know, you're saying how competition dogs are good when they get them out of the truck, they get on sent in tree quick. Do you think Mingus would be a good competition dog because he does lock down in tree or. You know what I'm saying?

I see what you're saying. And I don't think the we have enough data points to like say that for sure, because there's other things. I mean, like my dogs will go out and Traken quick and lot down on a tree if there's a fresh contract there, you know, I mean, like we saw kind of an atypical series of coon hunts this week because of extreme temperatures and whatnot.

Oh, you know, you don't know on that extreme temperature point. It was interesting as hell. We're all on and Ridge Pounder finds like. It look like a taxidermy to Robin laying on the ground. Not a ruffled feather on it. Like, what the hell's that all about? Like no broken neck, nothing. And last night. We find three froze to death woodpecker's, yeah. Steve, I didn't like laying there, like, completely, completely fine.

Like, any time you find a bird was you looked roughed up generally, like in some way roughed up just like. Like, you've gassed it in a bag and laid it out on the forest floor. I just got froze out. Yeah, negative 20 or whatever Fayetteville got Tony killing all these migrant workers, they have 12, 12 Kaelyn like migratory, like killing birds that are there was a dead bird right by my house. I didn't tell you all that.

But the morning I was skinning squirrels after our first day, there was a I mean, he was alive laying there. I kind of nudged him and they I could tell he was going down. Yeah.

Those woodpeckers, like, froze to death. All of the same vintage, too. It was like, oh, he died a month ago. It was like, yeah.

Remember when we went and got coffee the first morning we park, I get out and I could have missed it. But you don't think I would miss it because it's like it's one of those spots on the sidewalk where they've got a little spot cut out. There's like a little bit of dirt and a tree growing out of it.

You know, there was snow, whole tree where a tree will tree, will snow lay there. And it was fractious. Could be we go and get coffee and I come back and I open the door and as I open the door and I look to the ground and right there, you know, like the door had to swing over.

The top of it is a dead bird, clean looking.

And I was like pretty. I had a window. But now. Right, mass event, just like how many that we made clean the claim, the woodpeckers out of this place. Well, not just woodpeckers, but I bet a lot of birds died. I wouldn't I wouldn't have picked birds to die. I would have thought like rabbits died, you know, and this strikes at me personally out of interest there. But a lot of Neil guy.

Died in Texas. No way. Yeah, they just aren't built for now. Hmm. I guess those real hard on Sika deer. No, not is our access access Hexter. A lot of dead access to a lot of dead guy.

A lot of those exotics are going to join in.

Oh so you got here just like in there. Yes, we did the book. I mean, when did you start coon hunting and the book Where the Red Fern Grows, how that did you read as a kid? You know, I, I don't it was influenced. It influenced me just kind of culturally.

I can't say that, like I read where the Red Fern Grows and wanted to start doing, you know, want to start coon hunting. But, you know, so that book was took place in northeast Oklahoma. If you remember in the book, Talika, the city of Tahlequah is mentioned. That's where Billy Coleman got his dog in anyway. Cat calls like 45 minutes from here. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, it's like this is this is coon hunting country.

You know, it's funny when when when I was a kid and read that book, I didn't really I can imagine the South, but at all didn't really I didn't think of it like a place like this. Yeah. Felt like it was I don't know. But that was the first book I read. And I remember reading this book that I, that I cried after reading. Really. Yeah. I just remember being like were born to be a coon Hendrix man.

Well you never know, you never know what's going to happen. Suburbs of Bellevue. Come on.

There's a marketing thing that people use in marketing about touch points. And you like to get someone to buy something, right? Oftentimes it needs to be six to like an average like six touch points and in marketing, you just trying to provide yet another touch point. You could describe where the Redfearn grossed. As perhaps a touch point, yeah. In New Jersey, for sure, read the book, great movie, I especially like the nighttime scenes, I really felt like it was nighttime really warms my heart.

Night, our nighttime scenes are going to really feel like nighttime. We got some good stuff like season four.

All you listeners out there and all the child for all the child performances were stellar. Well, everybody did a phenomenal job, child actor is Mings screen are going to go out again tonight. Is he back on the team really? We're going to guess that's that's why we're not out there. Make him stand there trying to restrain that dog. So I was saying, if there's not anything, we'll just turn him loose tonight.

The saddest thing on the planet, man, poor Johnny Stanier trying to restrain that. I want to say no. Your son, Barry and I, we have a plan. And that dog, Bryan, because he can't go out.

No, hey, it means the world to me that you guys came to Arkansas for real. I mean, like for real to my family to. Thanks for having us. Thanks for all this. Awesome down here. Wouldn't miss it. Thank you, everybody.