Ep. 831: A Wildlife Officer and Skier Walk Into a Bar | MeatEater Radio Live!

This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human. Welcome to Meat Eaters 12 and 26, presented by Moultrie Mobile and OnX Maps. 12 of Meat Eaters' biggest and baddest hunts from the last year released throughout 2026. These are long-form episodes, so you get more of what you love. The first one up is my baited bear hunt in Manitoba. If you've ever wondered what a baited bear hunt is like, you'll love this episode. My favorite part was watching a younger bear spend an hour trying to figure out how to get a creatively hung beaver carcass down from a tree. Check it out now on Meat Eater's YouTube channel and be on the lookout for more 12 and 26 in the coming months. Smell us now, lady. Welcome to Meat Eater Trivia. Meat Eater Podcast. now welcome to me eater radio live it's 11 a.m mountain time mountain standard time here in montana Whose phone's ringing? Oh, sorry. You just said you were in airplane mode. It's connected to my computer. I am in airplane mode, but it still connects. That was Steven Rinella. We got to clean this thing up here, guys. I'm bothering. We do not have to. You should tell Steve to come down. Steven's like, call me. I'm going to tell him just to come down here if he's here. Hold on one second, folks. He is here. I got to text Steve. Come to studio. Oh, this one's off to a real weird start. We're recording. I can't wait to get a text message from Spencer that says, this is the worst radio live. Spencer can sign. Yeah, whenever Spencer's not hosting, you guys don't know, those listeners at home, Spencer brews himself a warm cup of coffee, sits in a recliner and turns on the show and takes notes. And judges us. Pulls out a legal pad. And he's just like, ha ha, watch those boys burn. There may have been a text at one point that said, that was the worst radio live we've ever done. Who was hosting that one? I was involved somehow. I was involved too. I think it might have been Corey. Me, you, and Corey. Is it 11 a.m. Mountain Time in Bozeman, Montana? Yes. Do you want me to continue now? I'm just trying to get back on the tracks here. That's 7 p.m. for our fellow Americans in Italy on Thursday, February 5th. And we're live from Meat Eater World Headquarters in Spring-like Bozeman, Montana. I'm your host, Giannis Patelos, joined today by Seth Morris and Randall Williams. We've got a great show for you today, including an interview from Cortina, Italy with Olympic biathlete Paul Schomer, maybe Schomer, I didn't ask him, and his coach, Matt Emmons. We're also talking to Colorado Wildlife Officer Demi Wright, who recently wrapped up a big poaching case involving your mule deer. Then we'll look at photos of ourselves from about 20 years ago, and as always, we'll answer questions from the live audience. But first, let's get a few updates from the worlds of Seth, Randall, and yours truly on this fourth to the last episode of Meat Eater Radio Live. Oh, but don't fret. Meat Eater Radio Live is going to be replaced by the Meat Eater News with Cruise Show. Now, that's a working title. That's just, I think, what's on our... I think Steve wants the title to be The News Show. Meat Eater colon The News Show. That doesn't sound great either. But, you know, he's the boss, and whatever he chooses, that'll be it. It's going to be, so what you can expect out of that show. Updates from the crew. Spencer came up with a good thing that I like. It's like our news, your news, and the news. And what you can expect from that would be like crew stories, updates from us, and then kind of how we do stories, questions, corrections from you guys, and then the news being like what really matters right now in conservation news. So that'll be starting, I believe, March 9th, and it's going to be a great show. What else? Butchering Bambi hoodies. Can you see it? Yeah. This is what I was pestering Steve about because this is his idea. In my opinion, it is one of the best t-shirt hoodie designs we've ever come up with. I do like it. Because it takes a anti-hunting idea, this thing that was made up, Bambi, the movie, and completely flips it upside down and makes it into a pro hunting thing. Any thoughts on that, boys? It's beautiful. I love it. It's a very subversive concept. It has all the cuts on there. Yeah. Cuts of meat. Yeah, it's just like your classic butchering chart of a deer. Flank, ribs, shoulder, tenderloin. But it just uses Bambi. Yeah. That is it. Those are going to sell like hotcakes. Yeah, have any lawyers from the Walt Disney Company reached out to us about that? I don't know. Is Bambi in the public domain? I don't know. And I don't think he is. Bambi's a boy, right? Yes. I don't know. That's a buck. Maybe if we don't talk about that aspect of it, it'll just go unnoticed by a giant. That's right, Seth, a buck. I'm over here. I'm so sorry. Anyways, the hoodies just popped, just landed on the website. You all should get one and wear it proudly and then make sure you can speak about what's going on here. That's what I was bothering Steve about this morning. He says, call me when he texts me. And then I said, no, just come down to the studio. And he replies, I'm on a call. Yeah. How is that going to work? Okay. Enough about hoodies. Randall, looks like what you've got going on in your life is, well, first let's hit the international shout out. We have our favorite. Well, I don't know. I think our favorite international guest is Mogor. Mogor. one of the most, I mean, I think he has a perfect attendance record. If this were high school, he'd be recognized at the end of your assembly. But someone pointed out to me that he's not the only international listener out there. So we want to give a big shout out to Dan Hernandez, who's currently stationed in the UK. Tuning into Meat Eater Radio Live. Shout out, Dan. Thanks for tuning in, Dan. Dan, if you're in the chat, let us know. If not, why did you lie to us? yeah yeah we appreciate he seems like a good guy we traded some traded some messages on the ig seems like a real real good guy so just want to give a big shout out to dan and then the big news in my household is uh when i left this morning it was my last time saying uh goodbye for the day to dolly our five-year-old dog she's not dying she's turning six tomorrow you really made it sound like I didn't deliberately set that up. No, she's turning six tomorrow. So today's the last day with a five-year-old dog in the house. Tomorrow we'll have a six-year-old dog and two 10-year-olds, soon to be 11-year-olds. So I basically feel like I have three loaded guns pointing at my head because when you get into the big breeds, I feel like every year past six, seven is real precious. Oh, I was going to say past ten. You feel like it's past six, seven. Oh, yeah, I feel like labs. Well, with the Labrador, yeah. I think labs can take a quick turn downhill. Jeez, what do you feel like a blue tick coonhound? I don't know. You run them hot. I don't know if that's good for the engine or bad for the engine. You know, some engines like to be run hot. I'd guess that a blue tick coonhound would probably. That's probably good for Mingus. Yeah. But I don't know. I mean, these are just fluffy. So, yeah, Dolly's turning six, huge. She's kind of got a weird personality. She was a COVID dog. uh we thought what better time to raise a third dog than uh when we were forced to stay at home for a few months um but then she didn't really get socialized and so she she's got a lot going on in her own head with herself how will uh you all celebrate her birthday uh typically we'll take her swimming at the river uh that's what she likes to do she likes to just be active. She's got like a, she's a 110 volt dog plugged into a 220 outlet. And so yeah, whatever we can do to just, just wear out. But yeah, it's a big day in our household. We usually don't do a cake, but I'll often use a, you know, cheese whiz to write their ages on their food. Oh, that's fun. Yeah. I bet they enjoy that. Yeah. It just depends on, depends on how much time we're investing each year in the celebration. Okay. Any, I imagine you'll have a couple beers. Do you ever like give him half a beer in the water bowl? Our first dog used to drink a lot. He was, when we first had him, we would take him to this brewery in Missoula called Bayern. And they have all these like old German guys came over for the summer to like, you know, work on the brewery and exchange beer yes they do like exchange stuff with german breweries and these old guys loved to feed arlo beer when he was tiny and he developed a real taste for it uh thankfully he couldn't drive so that was never an issue but uh he liked whiskey he liked wine he liked beer uh and died 10 days shy of his 10th birthday but i don't think the booze had anything to do with it sorry this has gone way darker than i the booze might have i thought it was gonna be like a this was gonna to be a lighthearted uh celebration of dolly's sixth birthday but really i've taken some now we're just talking about morbid turns here yeah yeah you know well we all know that's the the worst part about dogs is that uh they die oh it kills me what does cal call it prolonged suffering or something i don't know when you get a dog because you just know they're gonna die oh yeah see we had like i didn't have mingus is really my first dog as an adult like i married my wife and she had a dog. And so, yeah, of course I adopted her, but I still, you know, didn't feel that attached. So yeah, this is, uh, I'll, I'll be going through it according to Randall, maybe in just a year or two. Um, I don't know. I just, life is a degenerative process, biologically speaking. So yes, yes, yes. Uh, let's talk about life. Uh, Seth, I'm sure you've, you're talking about this all the time these days oh god non-stop you're gonna be a dad soon uh how's that all coming along five weeks out the wife that's it yeah mackerel kelsey is very uncomfortable and sleeping poorly but she feels good like you know she's not she's not struggling with like how she feels it's just like a like a she's not sleeping well thing that's her only struggle yeah at this point yeah yeah she's probably just ready for it to be over. Oh yeah. Get on out. Our first was two weeks early, so you could be closer than you think. Man, everyone we talked to was like, we had ours at 35 weeks, you know, or within like that 35 to 40 week period. Like it seems like it could happen at any moment. Yeah. So we were one time in a Pier 1 Imports. Like, nice. It's perfect. Perfect date night. We just finished up brunch at first watch. I'm not saying that was a date night. No, no. We were looking for candles for the birth, right? We were going to have my oldest at home. We ended up having both of them at home. Oh, nice. And for whatever reason, a lot of candles is a thing when you have a home birth. And so we're at Pier 1 getting some candles. And we were still like a solid week out. But you start having these little baby contractions. And if you've been around pregnancies, then when those early contractions happen, you're like, oh, yeah, okay. It's like your body's practicing to get ready to give birth. Yeah. And we're chatting with a lady, and Jennifer goes like, oh, wow, oh, a little contraction there. And the girl looks at us and is like, please don't have that baby in here. We're like, come on. It's not going to happen in here. It's not that nice of a store. Yeah. Are you cleaning something over there, Phil? No, there's. No, why? They're using solvents in the new studio. Oh. I think they're like scraping a tile. Oh. Off the concrete. Yeah. Yeah. It smells like I just, I oftentimes flood our garage with acetone fumes and it lingers for a few days and I'm getting real strong vibes of that. Yeah. Yeah. If you guys notice there while you're watching this live show that we're all getting a little drowsy, sleepy, please let us know in the comments. Call 911. Yeah. There's not a lot of ventilation in this room. Oh my God. It's getting stronger. very strong quite strong it might be they might just be pumping it directly into this is this is this how they get rid of this yeah guys have fun and radio live remember you can't leave oh my gosh yeah just like in one battle after i was just i was gonna make that reference but i wasn't sure who had seen the movie um seth uh you've also been doing a little bit of ice fishing yeah what's the what's the ice fishing report um i mean ice fishing report's not good there's not much ice there was enough ice on canyon ferry for which is the local lake here for i don't know i fished it twice but it's been fishing for two weeks or so um but it's like it's just not the first time i fished it was a little sketchy had about four inches of ice and it was moving a lot like pressure ridges pressure ridges were building while we were there and you know just not what you want and you couldn't really get to the stuff we wanted to get to out further um but then last weekend we hit it and had a good walleye bite which was fun um kind of like a morning walleye bite and then um yeah i think it's kind of done now we've had because it just warmed up too much again a warm week and what's supposed to be 60 degrees today now is it early enough where it could turn around again or is it now you're like halfway through february it's pretty much no matter what happens it's done no it could definitely turn around again and get get cold and make ice enough to fish but at this point in time i'm like let's bring on open water and get a boat right just kind of over watching the weather for ice but there's still places around where there's guys skating on the pond out back here this morning there's obviously enough ice there but i don't know fishing these little ponds around here kind of gets old after a while yeah i want to get out on some big water school kids yeah they love the high school kids the hardcores they love pounding the local pond oh i know jimmy ronello has been tearing it up yeah yeah i heard he had i heard from his little sister and i haven't got corroborated with steven But I heard that he was having hypothermic symptoms from being on a recent ice fishing trip. You heard this story? Yeah, he told me about it. He was on a... Does it sound legit? Yeah. He said they were fishing for burbot and night fishing. And apparently the temperature... It was over that period of time when we got that cold snap. Yeah. And yeah, apparently the temperatures dropped into negatives and we got hypothermia. Yeah, I heard that his partners were getting ready to take him to the emergency room because he was being so symptomatic. Oh, he didn't tell me that part. Yeah. Speaking of a place where it is really cold right now, and they're having a heck of a winter, Wisconsin. A little update on my Oak Savannah project. If you don't know, if you haven't heard this, we're turning about seven acres of our 40 in Wisconsin into an Oak Savannah, which basically meant we cut out a lot of trees with a logging project, left a few, and then instead of regenerating oaks there, we instead killed all the oaks and everything else that was going to grow there and are now going to try to grow forbs and native grasses instead underneath the few oaks that are left. And the part of the project where we were at, we had piled all of the slash that was left over from the logging, And these giant piles had to get burned. I couldn't do it since I'm a thousand miles away and I needed help. So a friend of mine, Ashley Steinke, he is the Wisconsin grassland ecologist for the Audubon Great Lakes and leads the Audubon Conservation Ranching Program in Wisconsin. And so he offered to burn these piles for me, which I have roughly 30 of hanging out. And they're giant piles, like easily the size of the studio that we're in right now. Go ahead and show us some pictures, Phil. Yeah, do you want to do that first picture? Yeah, there's a picture of Ashley with the big old fire going behind him. You can see the size of the pile. It's legit. So we had to get these things burned so that we have a clear space to then do our seeding, which is going to happen very soon here. We're going to do a frost seeding, which basically means they just sprinkle the seeds all over while they still have snow and basically a freeze-thaw cycle, which will help the seeds get great contact with the ground. Go ahead and show those three mold tree photos in a row. So this is the day that he burns. We have a stand kind of on this wildlife opening. The oak savannah is actually to the north, but you can see this is like, well, 11 a.m. And then a little bit later, Ash has got them all burning. And then by, I think, 3.34 in the next photo, you can, oh, no, already by, that was only at noon. Wow, that happened fast. So they continued to burn, and the piles got even a little bit smaller, as you'll see in the video coming up here. But I was asking Ashley, I'm like, man, this is going to take a couple of days, and you can't just take time off of work. And he's like, oh, no, I will be working while I'm doing this. I'm like, but we don't have, like, a contract or anything. And he goes, yeah, man, but our sort of attitude at the Audubon Society is like, if it's good for the birds, it's good for the bees. Sort of like meaning like, we don't have a project with you, but what you're doing helps the whole landscape around here. And it just, it has an impact. And so gladly come up and help you and put some of my work time into your project. Yeah. Can you show that video, Phil? The first one here? Yeah. This is still when they're burning pretty good. With the exception of ones in the very south facing hillside. Oh boy. All I can think of is large scale landscape level restoration like this. And sitting here in September and listening to elk bugle in this landscape. Have a good day. um we can we spent enough time on this we don't need to play that other one um but the next video would just show all those piles basically being a lot smaller and it's it's cool for me you guys are just looking at like basically bonfires and going like why is this really that interesting but for someone that's been involved in this project now for two years and knowing that the end is really well there is no end to it but sort of like hopefully it looks like the oak savanna that it's in my head in about another three years. Cause it's going to take three years for these seeds to really establish themselves and get going. But just the change from what it looked like when I was there in the fall with all these giant piles and now to see those piles gone and you can really get that sort of just like unobstructed view across those seven acres and just looking through like the few leftover giant oaks. It's sweet. Yeah. That's cool. I had major FOMO when Ashley was there the other day. Do you guys have plans to keep burning that area? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. A big part of my work now is making sure that my fire breaks and my roads act as fire breaks. I've got that dialed so that when it's time to burn, whether I do it or someone else. I was talking to Ashley about having someone else do it, and it's a lot cheaper if they roll in and your shit is tight and your fire breaks are tight and they're just like, oh, great, we're just going to burn and we leave. If they have to start doing manual labor to make your fire breaks legit, the price is going up big time. Hunting demands preparation, persistence, and gear that will not quit on you. That is why I wear First Light. This isn't about hype. It's about no compromise gear. Built to perform, built to last, whether it's their industry-leading merino wool, keeping me comfortable through the cold and the hot, or their durable outerwear shrugging off the elements. First Light is built to help you go farther and stay longer. Designed by hunters for hunters with a deep commitment to conservation and land access. No shortcuts, no excuses. Just gear you can count on. Head to firstlight.com. That's F-I-R-S-T-L-I-T-E dot com. All right, enough BSing. Let's get on with our first interview of the morning. We're going to play a little video before we start. Oh, yeah. When I'm skiing into the range, there's a lot going through my head. In 30 seconds, it feels like the race could change. Hands are freezing. Snow covers off and my heart rate's high. Magazine in. Close the action. Don't fumble. Slow it down. Focus. Pressure on the trigger. Don't fight it. Smooth. First shot. Clean. Second shot. I'm going to west. Just third. Fourth. Sometimes I'm not even really thinking. It all goes silent. And after that last shot, it all comes rushing back. Breathing. Heartbeat. Noise. And I'm not even on snow yet. This is Biathlon. Sweet. Our first guest today, joining us from Ant Holtz, Italy, are biathletes Paul Schammer and Matt Emmons. Now, Matt might not consider himself, I'm guessing he still skis as a biathlete in some version, but he is Paul's coach now. Welcome to the show, fellas. Hey, nice to join you guys. Good to be here. that uh the first time i watched that video i was like oh man he's just he's not even on snow but when i just watched it for whatever reason man it kind of got me fired fired up and i was feeling the pressure that you feel when you're out there trying to shoot those little targets um all right fellas welcome like i said uh for those that don't know can you guys just give us a 30 second explanation of what biathlon is yeah so i think just to start i think it's what's really cool about biathlon is I think it's really connected to a lot of things that make us, that we hold dear to us as humans, which I think are one, hunting, and two, protecting and providing for those that we love. Because it was really came about from people in northern Scandinavia back in the day, hunting on snow in the winter on skis, and then eventually got turned into a border patrol during World War II. And then basically from that practice, they had some mini competitions and that's what turned into biathlon. Biathlon is first and foremost a race. So the clock starts when you leave the start and ends when you cross the finish line. And it's a ski race where you stop and you have shootings either two or four different shootings from an equal amount of prone and standing So if you have a two shooting race it one prone one standing A four shooting race it two prone two standing. And for every missed target, you have a penalty either by having to ski a penalty loop or a time penalty. And so it's all about skiing fast, being efficient on the range and hitting targets. Okay. Obviously, uh, heart rate must play just like a huge, huge, it's gotta be a huge factor in like being able to execute what you're doing. So tell me before we get into like how you do it, but like, what's your like resting heart rate and you're like racing when you're on skis and then the heart rate that you're trying to actually, when you're shooting, what you're trying to get your heart rate to? Yeah. So, I mean, resting heart rate, um, I would say most nights I'm in the low thirties. Um, so I'd say like, if I'm in like a good spot and I'm waking up, um, I'll have my heart rate. Um, I have an aura ring, but the aura ring only tracks to 33. And so there'll be some times where I'll be under that, um, and there'll be like gaps in it. And then heart rate variability is another one that you look at for recovery on the range. Um, I have a pretty low heart rate in this grand scheme of things when it comes to like max heart rate so my max heart rate is probably going to be like 175 um throughout the season whereas like some competitors they'll be up over 200. Wow okay and then so that that's your max when you're skiing and you're going full bore what's the heart rate that you're trying to be at when you're trying to uh make these shots oh man I mean honestly I don't really look at my heart rate too much um i think that the breathing is what i really focus on um mostly because that's kind of like the anchor of focus sometimes so you like control your breathing because you can control your breathing whereas your heart rate is kind of like kind of like all right heart's gonna do what it wants um i would say i'm probably shooting around 150 beats per minute most times that i'm I'm on the range or more. For those of you at home, like I don't know if you can even get to 150 beats a minute, but like go ahead and try shooting a gun accurately with your heart doing 150 beats a minute. That's insane. Um, all right, Paul, because we we've interviewed you before on the show on, not on this show, but on the mediator podcast. Uh, so I have an idea of like the things that you've been through. I follow you on Instagram. Give us the sort of rundown of the hurdles. I was talking with recently one of the main folks over at Crosscut, which is Bozeman's biathlete sort of center, shooting center, and I mentioned your name, and she's like, yeah, that guy has been through more to get to what he's getting to do now than anybody else I know. I mean, it's just like, it's amazing. So give us a short rundown of like the hurdles that you've had to go through to be able to race this next week. Um, I mean, yeah, I think that when I was last sitting in your guys' studio in 2022, uh, I was asked the question like, oh, how long, how much longer are you going to go? And at that point I was kind of like, I don't really know. Like, um, and I, I didn't really see myself competing for another four years. and I think that decision was almost kind of made for me um in 2023 I had a knee injury that I actually had to get a knee surgery um so I had to finish my season early came home got surgery rehabbed back from that surgery um made a full comeback qualified for the world cup was at the pre-world cup uh camp in Finland and my knee just totally blew up like just I didn't know what was going on. I thought maybe it was just the travel, some other things. It wasn't getting better. So I ended up flying home from Finland. And at that point, not only was I having some knee issues, I was actually having a lot of other stuff going on in my personal life as well. And I just remember sitting across the table from my coach when I was in Finland and just saying like, I'm going home and I don't know when I'm coming back. Because it just seemed like everything was pretty chaotic at that point. Um, I ended up going home and I realized that my knee had re-injured itself. So I had to get a second knee surgery. And basically what happened was the first surgery, the injury that they had repaired just had failed. And I was right back to where I was. And, um, it was a knee scope. So they're like, Hey, you should be good to like ski pretty soon. Um, and my knee just was not responding. Um, I would ski for about 30 minutes. My knee would be swollen for two days. Um, and so at that point I was like, I don't even know if I can compete much less if I want to compete. Um, and that kind of like put me in a really interesting spot because it was kind of like, maybe the decision was made for me. Um, I felt like my life at that point was maybe steering me in a different direction. Priorities that came that come before sport, um, were, were things that I think I was prioritizing at that time. Um, but as that year unfolded, uh, again, I think some, some decisions were made for me, maybe decisions that I wouldn't have made for myself. And I ultimately felt like I should train, train back. Um, I went down to Stedman clinic in Colorado because my knee wasn't responding and they said that I should get another knee surgery. Um, but they were going to put metal on my, my knee and I was just not ready to, to put metal on my knee at my age. It would have just kind of started me down another path that, I didn't really feel like was necessary. And I actually kind of started to get back into training and then got to a point where I was like, man, I finally feel like my knee's responding. I can train enough to be able to get back to a high level. And I really don't know what happened other than maybe my body responded in such a way that I was able to get back and slowly made my way back at that time because I didn't compete that year before I was left off the national team. um so i didn't have any support from the national team i lost my health insurance um i was just training on my own and thankfully was able to requalify for the team this past year um had to work my way back up through the ranks um was at world championships and um qualified for that basically like last minute um i missed a lot of other chaotic things going on and um That makes me being here in Italy right now, talking to you guys, something that I'm really grateful for because I definitely don't take it for granted. There's plenty of things that could have derailed me along the way and makes it really special to be able to compete this winter. Awesome. Okay, so you – I don't know if I'm going to phrase this properly, but you made it to the Olympics, which I think is – for most people, that would be in and of itself. like it is an amazing let's say for everybody just just generalize anybody it's an amazing accomplishment but obviously you've got a little bit more gurr in you than most of us so you you're here what's like what is your focus set on now what's your goal that you're there now um well i think like for this year i've set the the goal for myself um top 10 at the olympics um I've gone top 10 at this venue before on the world cup. Um, and so that's something that I've really thought of. I think another goal for our entire team that we have and something that we hear about all the time at the Olympics is biathlon is the only winter sport the U.S. has yet to medal in at the winter Olympics and is kind of dubbed the last first medal. Um, and so I think our goal is really to, to see the U.S. win that, that medal. Um, I think we have some chances in individual events, especially with my teammate Campbell, who last year won two silver medals at world championships. But we've been fourth a couple of times and realized this year on the World Cup. So I think we really have our sights set on hopefully bringing home that last first medal. Love it. Listen, man, if you're telling me that you're you're planning on possibly breaking top 10, I immediately think, well, if he can do that, he can also go podium. Like you're only that's only a few few spots. And I know you guys know way more about this than I do. But yeah. All right. Awesome. I love to hear it. Let's talk a little bit about how this biathlon business, uh, like relates to hunting. Um, Matt, I was told that you actually have hunted Shammy in the Valley that you guys are, are compete. Well, the Paul is competing in this week. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. Actually, I've been here, uh, four different times hunting for Shammy. Uh, it's a beautiful Valley. I call it like my second home, even though it's not, um just love coming here i love mountain hunting and i've lived in europe now for 13 years um and one of the things i've missed about living out west in the u.s was just mountain hunting um and so i got an opportunity to be able to come here and hunt chamois and it's it's just awesome so wasn't able to do it this past year but hopefully this coming year i'll be able to do it again what what does a uh is that what you guys call it chamois or do you do you pronounce it chamois i say chamois i don't know that's right or not but yeah so like what's a shammy hunt in in that area look like just gives a real quick rundown of like a normal morning chamois hunt all of my hunts actually have been morning hunts pretty much what we do is we get up before before sun up um get up in the mountains usually we drive up with a car up to a certain point uh and then you got to hike and sometimes it could be you know maybe just a 15 minute hike to get to a spot where you're going to be spotting, or it could be a longer hike. One year, we actually did go into about midday. So we were moving around trying to spot some animals. This isn't what we're looking for. Let's go over here. And then we found some different ones, not what we're looking for. Let's go over here. So it took a little bit longer, but once you get one down, usually you're up above, above 2000 meters, which is over 6,000 feet up above tree line. So once you get it down, then it's, you know, a matter of gutting it, put it in a backpack, hole. They put it in the backpack hole. They don't cut it up. Um, cause they only weigh about probably 60, 65 pounds, roughly put it in the backpack and then you're hiking back down. So it could be, you know, a short hike depending on where you parked, or it could be a fairly long hike. I mean, nothing like elk hunting in Colorado or something, but sure. You know, you get it down and we'll take it to the cooler where, where we go and let it hang. Are they pretty spooky critters or like how sneaky do you have to be to get within rifle range? They see really well. So it depends on where, where you're at. Um, last year, well, not last year, the year before last, um, I don't know if that one was just stupid or whatever, but we actually went across this opening where he could see us. And I got to about 350 yards, um, and decided, okay, he's, if we go any closer, he's going to bust. So I was able to take the shot, knock him down. Um, depends on where you're at. There's a lot of times where you're trying to sneak in, sneaking in to get to rifle range or good rifle range, which I would say is, you know, 250 to 300 yards, the closest shot I've ever taken is probably about 230. You got to kind of sneak behind rocks, try to keep yourself hidden because they see well. And especially if you've got a big group of them, you know, maybe there's 10 animals there. You got 10 different sets of eyes looking at you. Then you got to be a little bit more careful, especially if there are females in, if there are females with little ones, then you got to be really careful to get in on a buck. um i know both of you guys uh hunt hunt a fair amount are there times when you guys are actually in the field maybe right after a shot or getting ready to preparing for a shot where you have a thought where you're like oh my biathlon training is really paying off uh yeah i mean for sure uh i think the biggest thing that i've noticed um is that one i'm fit enough to be able to get places that I need to be, which is like a huge benefit. But yeah, I think that there's been a few hunts. Like in Montana, I was hunting the Missouri breaks and like we just like found a spot and it was no problem to hike in six miles or whatever. And I mean, we were just on elk all day, every day. And then I think a couple of years ago, I actually drew a moose tag in North Dakota and hunting there. I think that one, the persistence, just like waking up every single day as an athlete, you just know like, hey, it's a new opportunity. um and just got to be in the game if we're going to be there but then also like when that target shows up and the heart rate goes up um i'm i'm just like okay yeah we're just like doesn't mean that my trigger has to be any bit different doesn't mean that my anchor points my sights everything else like my my focus goes immediately to the things that uh i want to do to take a good shot and i think a lot of that comes from the fact that like i shoot tens of thousands of rounds every single year. Um, yeah, with a rifle, um, whereas with my, with my moose, I shot it with my bow, but like shooting and shooting. Um, and I think that's the biggest thing as a biathlete. Like I just, I know I'm a better shooter than, um, than I was when I was younger and I wasn't shooting nearly as much as I do now. Well, I also think all the mental part of it, because when you're, we kind of go on autopilot, it's like, we've done this so much, whether it's in biathlon or precision shooting, you perform so often under pressure that when we're hunting, you get to that moment and you just do the things that you've been trained to do the things that you've done you know thousands and thousands of times um so that that training comes in very helpful um you just you don't even think about it you just do the work that needs to be done right okay so you guys both shot i don't even know you guys do you guys have a rough number in your head about how many rounds of 22 lr you've you've put down range well i want to make a distinction here matt is a he was an Olympic shooter. How many medals do you have? He has three medals in just shooting. He probably shoots more as an athlete than I do. I probably shoot about 15,000 to 20,000 rounds of 22 a year. I probably shot about maybe 25,000 a year. How many years? I competed for over 20 years. It's a lot. That's fabulous. That's fabulous. I love powder. But your fingers still stink like powder. I think for a real take home for folks watching and listening would be coming from you guys. What are – each give me two reasons of why – what makes someone a – I'm going to use air quotes – a bad shot. Go ahead. Matt, you first. All right. Practice. practice practice everything comes down to practice um i mean also if you practice poor things if you practice a lot you're doing it wrong you're just going to get good at doing it wrong yeah um so i think proper practice is number one um a lot of people don't understand what proper technique is and it's as simple as position breathing trigger control follow through if you can do those things right you're going to hit a lot of targets or animals or whatever it might be um so i think proper practice learning what proper technique is and then just simply doing it doing it a lot ball yeah and i think um i think i like i see it in i'm gonna say biathlon and if i'm watching hunting videos sometimes you see someone man they're just they don't have any good trigger work and then they also are just popping their head up to see if they hit the target even before the shot goes off so like if your head's coming up before the recoil goes you're more concerned about if you hit the animal um i think that's a big thing it's just having that patience to be able to have that trigger squeeze watch it through the scope or your sights and see that bullet hit the target um i think that's it that's a huge one so it sounds like being a bad shot is not an innate thing everybody just needs to shoot more shoot more often right yeah it's a skill and i would say skills are trainable yeah love that uh randall seth any questions for these fellas um man real quick i uh i don't i don't need the full breakdown on your rifle but it looks like it's a straight pole a lot of stuff hanging off of it um i'm curious if you could give us like the 30 second rundown of what you compete with in terms of firearms and then also you must travel internationally with with your firearms quite a bit so i'm curious about that as well? Yeah. So pretty much every single biathlete is going to shoot the exact same action and barrel. It's an on shoots Fortner. Um, and it's just the straight pole action. Uh, reason being is because of that action and also a reliable, good barrel. Um, there's ammo testing and barrel testing that's done. So every once in a while, you'll have to get a new barrel. Um, but pretty much everybody's shooting the same thing where the differentiating like factor is going to be for each athlete is is in the stock. Unfortunately, I don't have my rifle here because they're all in rifle storage up at the venue. Otherwise, I'd be able to show you. But my stock, I got a new one back in 2019. It was made by a stock maker in Germany. He's renowned as being one of the best stock makers in the world. And it's all about balance and fitting me anatomically, my hand size, my arms, um my cheekbones everything and it's all open sights um but then it weighs about uh three and a half kilos um just over seven pounds and yeah and then you have a harness on so you can put it on your back while you're while you're skiing um now traveling with a rifle um honestly as an american sometimes really sucks because we don't have paperwork because all the europeans they all have rifle passports so when they show up to a country they can show them their rifle passport they're like okay good you go we show up here and they're always asking us oh do you have like your firearms license do you have this and we're like we're American we that like my passport is my firearm license like I don't know what you're talking about and so a lot of times they're sitting there like wait you don't have any but I'm like and usually what I show them is just the customs form the like 4457 which is the the form that allows you to bring it back into the U.S. and they're just like, oh, okay, cool. So yeah, it can be a real pain. I would say like South Korea was a huge pain. China, they didn't even let us touch it. They took the rifles from the airport and they put them in an armored vehicle and then drove them to the venue for us. But once you get in, it's pretty simple. It's not anything crazy. Paperwork. Cool. What's the ammo that you guys are shooting? Is that like all factory stuff or is someone like loading that for you guys and is everyone using the same ammo? Yeah, it's all factory ammo. So 22 is, it's not impossible to reload, but nobody does it. The way the priming system is done, the powder and all that stuff. So most everyone on the World Cup is using Lapua ammo and it's called Lapua Polar Biathlon. This was a 22 long rifle round that was developed for shooting in cold temperatures. So it uses a different type of powder that's less sensitive to temperature changes because whether it's, I don't know, 35 degrees Fahrenheit or zero, we're using the same stuff. And we need to make sure that the velocity is not going to change drastically as some other powders might. That way we keep the accuracy. It also has a special lube on the bullet, which functions better in cold weather. Most everyone's using the same stuff. There are some teams that are using RWS now, and they've also developed a similar type of bullet and powder combination. But most everyone uses Lapua. Nice. Love this. okay lastly uh tell us uh i guess what day you're racing and i'm assuming that nbc peacock is the best way but maybe there's another place on the internet to watch your races paul yeah so um we we have biathlon has i think 10 race days in the um in the olympics here we have um that's going to be split between both men's and women's the first race is going to be this Sunday, the mixed relay. And then the men's individual is on Tuesday. The men's sprint is on Friday. Pursuit is on Sunday, is it? Sunday. And then the relay is the next week on the 17th, which I think is a Tuesday or Wednesday. But yeah, you can find it all on biathlonworld.com or biathlonresults.com or on NBCMKCOT. Love it. Awesome. Thank you. Well, good luck to you guys uh we'll be cheering you on from uh bozeman montana and usa usa usa you hey i want to share one last thing with you guys uh as you say good luck i think one thing that's really cool here in europe or in italy specifically if you're wishing someone luck it's kind of a call and response instead of just saying good luck what you would say is in bocala lupo to the person you're wishing good luck which means in the wolf's mouth and the person would respond preppy lupo which means the wolf is dead. So, Imboko Alupo, Preppy Alupo. Imboko Alupo. In the wolf's mouth, and you respond with the wolf is dead. I love that. That's fantastic. Paul, you're crushing it, dude. I see a top 10 finish in your future, buddy. Thanks again for coming on, and we'll be watching you here shortly. Thanks, guys. Good luck, fellas. That's great. That's cool. That's awesome. I love that conversation. Spencer, if you don't like that, you know what I'm going to say to you. Hunting demands preparation, persistence, and gear that will not quit on you. That is why I wear First Light. This isn't about hype. It's about no compromise gear. Built to perform, built to last. Whether it's their industry-leading merino wool, keeping me comfortable through the cold and the hot, or their durable outerwear shrugging off the elements, First Light is built to help you go farther and stay longer. Designed by hunters for hunters with a deep commitment to conservation and land access. No shortcuts, no excuses. Just gear you can count on. Head to firstlight.com. That's F-I-R-S-T-L-I-T-E dot com. Should we turn to our next guest? Yeah. I was going to say, let's move listener feedback. We'll just do a supersized listener feedback at the end of the show. So we can just do back-to-back interviews here and then hit throwback and then questions. Yeah, I'm fine. Yeah, we don't want to keep our next guest waiting too long. So now we are joined by wildlife officer extraordinaire Demi Wright from Colorado. Demi, welcome to the show. Hi, guys. Thanks for having me. Super excited to be here. Were you watching that last interview? you? I was. Yeah, those guys are awesome. Are you going to be watching? Are you a fan of the Olympics? Are you going to be tuning in? Yeah, absolutely. Definitely going to watch the Olympics. I can't believe how many rounds those guys shoot every year. Oh my gosh. Lucky. I guess if you have the right sponsor, you get to shoot all that for free probably. Yeah, that's amazing. All right, Demi, we came across you. I think most of us, I mean, I'm sure a lot of people watching and listening probably have seen your face or know your name because recently you had a, uh, a big, I think a big poaching bus and it got a lot of press. Um, so tell us a little bit about that, uh, that specific case and, and sort of, I guess, why did it get so much praise? Yeah. Um, so the recent cage with case was, uh, a poaching case, with some active duty soldiers on Fort Carson, an Army military installation here in Colorado Springs in Colorado. I cover that installation and then they allow hunting and recreation opportunities on that installation. And it's an incredible resource for civilians to hunt on and for for members of the military. But that poaching case involved six illegally taken deer. And, you know, it got a lot of attention, which I wasn't expecting at all. We have a lot of military in Colorado Springs. And so I think people always want to know what's going on. And it was pretty egregious So I think people were really upset with how many animals were taken and you know it just uh yeah it got some some more attention than I thought it would Okay. Remind everybody, because I think a lot of times when we hear about a poaching case, you're like, well, it's just one, or maybe even if it's just six deer, right. Or, oh, someone had to eat. And it's, it's, sometimes it can be easy to be like, well, it's not that bad until you, until you see like 30, you know, giant racks that were poached, but remind everybody why, why poaching is bad. Yeah. I mean, so hunting and poaching two different things, right. Um, you know, hunters are doing it legally and ethically responsibly. They've got a license in their pocket. They're out there, you know, to fill their freezers or, uh, carry on tradition and heritage, have time with family and friends, uh, you know, doing all the right things and reaping the rewards of it. And then poaching is just, is a crime. It's just straight up taking or pursuing wildlife illegally. And ultimately, you know, legal, ethical, responsible hunting funds wildlife conservation, you know, in Colorado and like many other states, hunting and fishing licenses fund wildlife conservation and habitat management. So when you're not paying into that pot, you're robbing legitimate sportspersons. And as a legitimate sports person, I'm not cool with that. And I just happen to have a patch that enforces those rules. So. Okay. We'll get back to the case itself. I want to do like a few questions to just kind of set us up here. What, um, like why did you want to become a wildlife officer? Yeah. Or how'd you get into it? I've thought about that a lot recently. Um, yeah, I mean, I grew up outdoors. I was outside since I was just a little one. I have Barbie fishing pole in my hand way back when. And I grew up around being outside, hiking, camping, boating. I grew up around a hunting family. Hunting wasn't passed down to me when I was younger. It just kind of skipped my generation. But I grew up butchering and processing all the animals that were brought home. And so I loved it. And then I realized when I got older, I could I could get paid for this. And I actually have, you know, family members in the agency that I work for. And so I spent a couple days in the summer being voluntold to do some things. So I realized, yeah, I want to do this. And then, you know, I knew I wanted to work for Colorado Parks and Wildlife. I didn't really know in what you know what aspect I did. And then I realized I could be a wildlife officer and serve a community. And so it all kind of worked out. I'm also a people person. So I didn't want to be a biologist because I need people to talk to. Our biologists do incredible work, but I'm kind of a yapper. So wildlife officer worked for me. Okay. What's a normal day look like for you? When you don't have to go and check up on some illegally shot deer, you're just going and I know that I'm very aware of the breadth of what you do so there might not be an easy answer but what's a normal day for you look like yeah um there is definitely no normal day every day is different and that's that's certainly the feel of the job right um my truck's my office so normal day starts and starts in my office in my truck um and you know maybe it's hunting season And it's that time, you know, it's fall time and I'm checking hunters for 12 or 14 hours a day. And maybe that's what my whole day is. Or, you know, maybe it's summer when, you know, in Colorado Springs is the urban wildlife interface. And so moving bears around and wrangling deer and or maybe I'm teaching hunter ed or I'm in a school doing, you know, a career career topic. I mean, no two days are the same, which is truly the best part of this job is I've never lived the same day twice. So that's awesome. That is a great reason to have your job. Okay. So that's normal day, which sounds awesome. Tell me about how many years have you been doing this job? Yeah, I would classify myself as a baby officer. So I've been an officer now for three years. I started with an agency as an intern and then I did some seasonal positions, which was the most fun jobs ever. All the fun stuff, none of the responsibility. And so, yeah, officer for three years now. So in those three years, what's the most exciting day that you've experienced on the job? What happened? We have some exciting days. I'm not going to lie. I handle bears all the time. I've got a lot of bears in my district that I cover. so I usually have my hands on a bear or two and those days are exciting especially when they're being ornery and you know you can't predict what wildlife is going to do especially when you're trying to pick up a bear you know we do some really cool stuff you know we have bighorn sheep traps that we do and that's for some relocating to create different sheep herds and that is literally just going out and wrestling cheap. Um, so there's a lot of exciting days. Okay. Okay. Um, fellas, any questions sit right now before I move on here? No, I'm just like the hands-on stuff always just grabs my imagination. Yeah. Uh, yeah. The hands-on stuff is why you do the job, right? Yeah, totally. I want to touch a bear. Yeah. All right. So the article that I read, The many that I read said there was a moment identified where you identified or associated a vehicle with this crime that happened on Fort Carson. But it didn't really say exactly how you did that. Can you explain how you all of a sudden figured out what vehicle was associated with the crime? And then tell me, was that a sort of crux of the investigation? Yeah. Um, so I was, you know, this, this tip came in from, from a legitimate hunter who, who found a buck that had the antler sawed off and, and very minimal meat taken. And, and he called the Fort Carson conservation officers who are absolutely incredible to work with. And so, you know, they kind of called me in and said, you know, we, I think we have a poacher. So went out there, um, you know, looked at the buck, obviously this is not a legitimate harvest that, you know, quarters aren't taken, tenderloins aren't taken, backstraps, I mean, just one, one small roast and the antlers cut off. And so, um, looking around for a spent cartridge, which is, uh, pretty impossible on an active military installation, by the way, uh, there's a lot of spent cartridges and, um, you know find find another doe with the exact same same rump roast taken and that's it um but near those two carcasses found some boot tracks um followed those boot tracks um off of the installation sorry to interject but uh dirt tracking or snow tracking a little bit of both there wasn't a lot of snow on the ground there was snow in some parts but it was yeah it was mostly dirt um And so, yeah, followed the boot tracks off the installation, found some tire tracks. It happened to be near a wildland firefighter housing. So, you know, we just, me and the conservation officers for Fort Carson popped in there and firefighters saw a vehicle there within the last couple of days. And I knew that those carcasses were one, maybe two, two days old. So they're like, yeah, this vehicle was here. It was weird. We took a picture of it. So I kind of linked up my guy and found the registered owner of that vehicle because they took the picture, ran him through our systems, never had a license, which of course led me to his social media, myself and the conservation officers to his social media where he certainly had some animals on there, but no license. Wow. Yeah, that brings up the question because we've talked to enough wildlife officers over the years and more and more, it seems like what's bringing these fools down is social media. And we've heard it's a big part of your job, right? Where you can actually get a lot of work done just by perusing social media. Yeah, no, absolutely. I mean, everybody takes pictures of what they do, you know, and especially if you think it's something cool. And everybody's got a cell phone in their pocket. And so, yeah, in this case, for this case, 20 something people definitely take pictures of the things that they shoot at. And so we use that to our advantage. I mean, we're going to use every I'm going to use every tool I have. So if I've got to get a warrant for your social media, that's fine. I can do that. unreal unreal um what else was i gonna ask you um oh as a part of the punishment i read that uh they're giving some pretty hefty fines and then they're still sort of waiting to see what kind of um revocations is that the right word will happen of their hunting and fishing licenses and it might be countrywide, um, because of the, uh, interstate compact that we have, uh, in place now. Um, so that's awesome. When I saw the numbers, I was like, oh good, they're going to get hit pretty hard, but you're also taking their rifle. The rifle though is being destroyed. And oftentimes that can like, it gets a little, um, like people get upset when guns are destroyed. destroyed. So why? Because I've heard that oftentimes heads and hides can be auctioned off that are heads and hides that come from poaching cases. And then that money can get put back into wildlife. So why destroy this weapon versus possibly auctioning it off and using that money for wildlife? Yeah, no, that's a great question. And everybody asks it. And the answer is, you know, it's state law. So it's Colorado state statute that this firearm has been deemed a public nuisance. And so that happens judicially. That's not something that Colorado Parks and Wildlife makes the call on. And so, you know, we follow the law and we listen to what the court system tells us. So it does get destroyed. We do have some hides that go to auction and those are like roadkill mortality hides that will go to auction. And that money comes back into the general pot. But with the firearm, yeah, it's the court's decision. But I heard everybody loud and clear on that one well i don't want to be a snob and i didn't get a good look at that thing but i don't think it's going to bring in a ton of conservation funding it's not anything right home about randall you're not going to bid on that one no no i don't think that's even worth the gun broker uh you know bumping it up with the listings like paying for extra photos and stuff like that i yeah All right, Debbie, for folks that hear this or they've been thinking about it, young folks out there thinking about what they're going to do with their lives, thinking they could possibly do the job that you do. Sounds pretty awesome. Give us some advice and maybe some sort of baseline education that you need to get involved in doing what you do. Yeah. So in the state of Colorado, you do have to have a four year degree in a natural resource field. And then you go through a whole onboarding process, you know, that that you would for kind of any peace officer position. So your background checks, polygraph, psyche, all the fun stuff. And then when you get the job, you go to Police Academy for six months. And then after that, you go to Colorado Parks and Wildlife Academy. They teach you all kinds of fun things, snowmobile training, horseback riding training, wildlife forensics. It's all the cool stuff that you got into the job for. So that's kind of the education and then what you can expect if you're hired. But, you know, if you're if you're looking at this job, just get involved with whatever, you know, state agency that you can volunteer, spend your time with people, show them that you can work hard, go on ride alongs with the officers. You know, if you want to be an officer, I'd say, you know, really understand the job before before you get into it. It can be a really huge commitment. It's one of the most rewarding jobs in the world. I can't, I can't picture anything else. But just really understand what you're signing up for and get involved as much as you can and just stick with it. Listen more than you speak and yeah, just, just stick with it. It's tough, but once you get in, you're in. So I like that you said that. I like, always liked the quote about you have two ears and one mouth. You should use them. That's good advice for anyone interested in any career field, I think. Seth and Randall? I don't have any questions. I always appreciate folks out there putting themselves in uncomfortable situations to protect our shared resources. Everything that we love depends on people committing themselves to protecting that. So hats off and a promising start, a young career, but a promising start. You know, let us know when you have your next big bust. We'll get you back on here. Thanks, guys. Yeah. Thanks so much for the kind words. Really, really happy to be here and share a little bit of what's going on in this world. Thank you, Demi. Good luck in the future. Thank you. Thanks, Demi. See ya. Two stellar guests today, Yanni. Hey. Good on you. Good lineup. Good on you, buddy. I can't take I think I can take credit for Demi because I did send the article to Jake our producer and asked him to line that up and then I don't know exactly who lined up Paul and Matt but yeah I've enjoyed that. It's time for some listener feedback Phil. Yeah well we're probably only going to do one listener feedback session so let's go ahead and do throwback and then we can just hit all the listeners. We can keep this thing going Phil We'll save that for March 5th Who wants to go first on our throwback session? I'll go first This is very important I'm going to milk all these I'm going to milk these for the next month I don't think I had heard that one Yeah, that's great That's fantastic It's one of my faves. Yeah. Oh, Corey Calkins just texted me. He must be listening. And he said, I lined up, Paul. Come on, bro. Whatever, Corey. Sorry, Corey. Sorry, Corey. Shout out to the whole team here. Yeah, it's a group effort. It's not just us. I didn't do shit for this one. Group effort. All right, who's going first? Doctor. I'll go first. I don't think Yanni realized when he sent out this query for photos from 20 years ago. I don't think he realized that Seth and I were both still in high school. No, I 100% realized this. Yeah. I was half hoping that we could even have a fourth person in here that was even younger. And all of a sudden we'd have a picture in diapers. Well, there's Phil in the corner there. Yeah, you're not going to get me in diapers 20 years ago, but I do have a picture. Yeah, I wanted to share. Oh, good. I wanted to share my high school football photo. Is that it? No, it's not it. I've seen that photo. It's a good one. Maybe bring it out for the grand finale. Yeah, and I realized that was 2024. So, you know, it's not quite. But this is 20 years ago. This is me living my best life summer of 2026. um actually i was probably home from my first 20 oh i'm sorry 2006 okay uh i think i was probably actually home from my first year college uh working for a company called pro clean restoration incorporated uh we had an office on uh columbia parkway there in cincinnati um i sound like rain man when i do that uh columbia parkway cincinnati ohio 808 oak street or whatever but uh yeah so So I bring up where I'm working because as you can see on this t-shirt, it's covered in paint and deck stain. Okay. And also that hat is a Bass Pro Shops hat that I used as a wiping rag. And so it actually weighed perhaps two and a quarter pounds with all of the cedar tone deck stain, as we called it C-dub, that I'd absorbed into this hat. Fully weatherproof. Wore it for a real long time. Fishing with night crawlers in the Little Miami River. That is a Bass Pro Shops bait casting combo. I think it's probably got some pretty heavy mono on there, judging by the reflection of the light. It looks real heavy. And just a real simple night crawler on the bottom. Looks like I got an egg sinker there and a really crappy landing net that the foam had ripped off the handle. But, you know, it's always fun to net fish instead of just dragging them up on the bank. Let me guess, like a seven-pound channel cat? Is that what I'm looking at? Yeah, I think that's a good estimation. Did I get the species right? Yes. But what I like about that one in particular is that the tail is hanging out of the net, which I think always adds to... Makes it look bigger. Exactly. Looks like it's going to slap you in the face. You get a king salmon in the net and you got the big tail flopping over the side. That's a good fish, no matter how big the net is. Oh, I need to go catch one of those one day. Buy small nets. Let's go right now. All right, Seth, let's go back 20 years ago. See what Seth has. Almost 20. Almost 20. We'll say it's 18. This is 2008. Oh, look at that guy. Doing some fur trapping. Had what looks to be a good day of raccoon trapping. Back when I was in high school, I used to run a line every season, basically, and I would get up and check the line before school and then go into school. But yeah, this was just a day of coon trapping. The one on the left there, I'll point out, is quite a large one. Back in those days, raccoons were going for a decent price. Remember, I got like $58 for a raccoon back then. Wow, and that was flashed and stretched? Yeah, yeah. Sold it through the North American fur auction, NAFA, which is no longer a thing. What I like about this picture is that it could be from 20 years ago or it could be from 40 years ago. It's a timeless image. It's 2001 Dodge 1500. What's the sticker on the left? Is that a Monster Energy Drink sticker? No, no. That's a Hunter Specialty sticker. Oh, good. And on the right, there's Thompson Center and Hunter's Safety System there. God, you're just... And if I'm repeating it, if I'm doing what you did, I'll go with I'm wearing a Centlock hat and an Antler King T-shirt. Back when I was planning a lot of food plots and stuff. And how old were you? 14? Was your... Oh, gosh. Youngster. Yeah. So you didn't drive that truck. Could you zoom in on his face, Phil? No, I wasn't. Are we able to do that? No, I must not have been 14. I can't quickly. 16? I'd have to put in some time. Don't worry about it, Phil. My math's terrible. Seth, was your father an American flag and your mother an issue of Fur Fish and Game magazine? Yeah. Because you just look like you, if you asked AI to make a, to make the American, the young American trapper, this would be it. It was a trapper and predator color magazine. God, it's good. The exact. This is good. Yep. Yep. Uh, I, the first thing that caught my eye is that, uh, Seth has been rocking the same eyebrows his entire life pretty much. Yeah. That runs into family. They've actually just been getting, I noticed these days that they just get wilder with every year that passes. I'm getting like the Ryan Callahan eyebrows lately. I've started trimming mine every now and then. I'll get a white one. Because I'll get a long one that curls out. Oh, yeah. I'll get a long one that comes down and I can see it in my vision. Yeah, next thing they'll poke you in the eye. That happens to me every now and then if I don't stay on top of it. All right, Phil, let's see your photo from approximately 20 years ago. Okay, sure. Yeah, well, so I already showed. We did a throwback Thursday where Spencer asked people to bring in fishing photos. And I actually had one from almost exactly 20 years ago that I already showed. No, but you didn't do that one. No, I didn't. I'm not doing that one again. So I decided to choose a picture, uh, pictures from my natural habitat in high school, which was, which was the band room. I lettered and banned in high school. Um, there's me in the middle there. That's what my hair was for most of high school. Uh, it was very cool. That is amazing. I love it. You should bring that back. I did pretty much any extracurricular band activity I could do. It was, it was my thing. I was very cool, you could say. Did you have a MySpace page? Of course I did. Yeah. You know, I spent way too much time choosing the music that would play, you know. Actually, I had a Zanga before MySpace. Did you ever tell your parents, you'll never understand? I wasn't that bad. I probably had the thought a few times. The hair is pretty intimidating. The hair is very good. I might bring it back. What do you guys think? I'd love it. Yes, please. I would totally go for it. That's good. What would your gal say? Well, my hair was about that long when I met my wife, and it worked back then. Fill out, boy. That's a good play on words. Is that a trombone? That is a trombone. It's a large bore trombone with a little valve that helps you play the lower notes a little bit more easily. Were you wearing untied skater shoes in this photo? Probably yes, actually. Were they DC or Edney? uh yeah no it would it would have been like like vans or something you're probably too young for jenco jeans to still been in style i never owned a pair of jencos but my cooler cousins had had jenco nice all right there's that i was able to skip those hunting demands preparation persistence and gear that will not quit on you that is why i wear first light this isn't about hype it's about no compromise gear built to perform built to last whether it's their industry leading merino wool keeping me comfortable through the cold and the hot or their durable outerwear shrugging off the elements first light is built to help you go farther and stay longer designed by hunters for hunters with a deep commitment to conservation and land access no shortcuts no excuses just gear you can count on head to first light.com that's f-i-r-s-t-l-i-t-e.com all right last but not least god it's good phil thank you this photo i believe is circa 2000 this is the first bull elk that i killed and recovered uh unfortunately the year before when i was uh this is my first year that i was guiding and uh i was able to take off uh the first rifle season in colorado hunt with my dad and a couple other of our friends and um unfortunately the year before the outfitter taking me out on the last day of our diy hunt he realized that we hadn't seen an elk let alone killed one and i shot one close range and probably shot him in the guts um we looked for day and a half couldn't find him it was found maybe i don't know a week later by another guide bear on top of the carcass so lesson learned there uh when the elk is at uh 50 yards you don't have your scope cranked up to nine. Hard to know where the bullets going to hit, right? Yeah. But great morning. This is opening morning and I wanted to hunt the top of this particular, let call it a mountain Mountain makes it sound a little too big It a nice it a big ridge that has an apex to it And the elk like to go up there And a lot of the other folks hunting that area it too big of a climb for them So it was kind of left to those that wanted to make the walk up there. And I'd hunted basically my way all the way up to the ridge, to the very tippy top, and hadn't seen nothing. And it was pounding snow, just a full blizzard. A lot of times, you know, visibility less than 100 yards. And I'm kind of, once I turned around on the top, I kind of gave up and said, ah, you know, I'm just going to have my rifle like slung on my shoulder. And I'm more kind of mosey and ding dong and back down the same ridge, heading back towards camp than hunting. And I think because of the snowstorm, limited visibility, I stop at one point and I look and there's a bull standing there close 50, 60 yards, you know, and he's looking at me, but just couldn't make me out or whatever, and I had enough time to take my Model 700 BDL, Randall, which I did a little searching on this this morning, and I'd forgotten what ADL, BDL, CDL stands for. Can you answer that question? Well, the ADL is the blind mag, right? Yes. And then the BDL is a floor plate. Uh-huh. Is it CDL or BoxMag? I think the CDL is still hinged floor plate, but there's just some other fancy, more satin on the walnut, and it's just a little bit fancier. But what I found really funny is that the DL stands for deluxe. Oh, yeah. The A stands for average. And yeah, so you go from average to luxe. To better deluxe. To better deluxe. To classic deluxe. so no matter which 700 you buy you're getting a deluxe rifle but just average better or classic um yeah my dad gave me that rifle when i was uh i don't know 15 16 years old and it was one of those deals i wasn't expecting a rifle i hadn't asked for a rifle but he just comes up to me we're actually at a latvian like social function and he just whispers in my ear i just got your rifle I was like oh that's cool that's never happened to me in my life am I a man now dad it's one of those things you're not expecting a present like that but it was secret it was kind of like yeah don't tell anybody because it costs money we'll just work it into the he was long divorced from my mother at that time but anyways yeah so I shot the bull Remington Corlocked you can see where this story he's going to go. I shoot him once later to find out in the heart. He jumps. I shoot him again. Another part of this story is when he jumps, he jumps a couple yards, whatever. He's standing in a new spot. I look back to where he was just standing. Now, this is a nice... If you're not looking at the photos, this is like a very small, probably two-year-old four-point bull. Where he was standing is probably a three-year-old five-point. I'm like, oh, look at that! So I've got two shots in him and he's sort of like in that moment starts taking off and I just take off after him and uh I get another shot in him I don't know where that that one hits he keeps going I run I don't know close to another 100 yards I kind of end up in the timber and his downfall and he kind of gets caught up I'm sure he's gonna die at that point but he's not dead yet so I put a fourth shot into him he ends up having three in the heart and one in the lungs whoa and uh again maybe would have died from the first one but it's just like I'd already been around long enough to know that like with those elk you just keep shooting until they're not there until their tongues hanging out if you want to go through the attire I want to say that was a Eldora ski resort like just like a wool beanie I was wearing I was wearing probably a Patagonia fleece with a probably a Patagonia capoline underneath it Cabela's Shamwa or chamois. Remember that? It was like a soft brush cotton. We loved those pants because they were so quiet. And for whatever reason, I thought that suspenders were also hip at the time. But yeah, my first bull elk. Love it. 2000. That's cool. What was the rifle chambered in? 30-06. I forgot. I missed mentioning that. Yeah, 0-06. Probably was shooting 180 core locks, if I had to guess. killed a lot of animals with 180 core locks yep alright now the long awaited we're only 17 minutes behind but let's do some listener feedback Phil sure a couple shout outs here first this is from Bryson I'd love to get a shout out to my son who turns 2 today and was the only 3 month old when he attended the Boise Meat Eater live show 2 years ago which made him the youngest attendee happy birthday happy birthday And we also had another shout out here too, that I will find at some point, but there's a first. McCullough was going on a javelina hunt. Oh yes. Did you see that one somewhere? I saw it live. Okay. I'll find it later. Cranky surf. When is Randall's haircut? Will there be a raffle to determine how much is cut off? Still don't know when my haircut is. uh we have a listener who's a barber who's offered to cut my hair on the radio uh media to radio live finale grand finale spectacular but he lives in maine so i haven't yet been able to determine whether that will happen uh as far as how much is getting cut off pretty much just the stuff that's getting in my ears um i need to keep it long in the back because it's sweet and I need to keep it long on top to hide the bald spot that has grown and grown in recent years. So I'm just hanging on by thread to my youth. So the haircut... Sweet would be the word you would use. The haircut, if I cut it all off, it will be surrendering to father time. Mogor asks, Yanni, how are the little, or big, kitties doing in your area? Mingus and I have not been bothering them. Hopefully that answers your question. As far as I know, the population is doing great. But yeah, we've just had sort of a streak of bad luck. We've had tracks. A lot of tracks have gone on to private, which we haven't been able to follow. We've had tracks that have just filled in with snow. We've had tracks that we've lost on bare hillsides, which are common around these parts right now. We have caught a bobcat this year, which was quite the accomplishment for Mingus. He caught his first bobcat. But the big ones, I have not seen one in a tree yet this year. I will be going out, I believe, Friday or Saturday. And keep after it. Great. Will there be more Mediator Kids episodes coming soon? This is from Chad. Chad, they're not going to be in the same format that we did the first three seasons in. So we're currently cooking up some new kids content. How's that for alliteration? And, but it's probably still a few, few months down the road, but keep your eyes peeled and keep them on that, on that podcast feed. There's a question for Seth. Seth, how much experience do you have with drones for photography? Do you have any? None. Okay. Then I will not ask you this guy who was looking for a drone recommendation. Right above you is the shout out. Oh yeah. Oh, it's from Leland. Oh, Leland. Arizona Youth Javelina opens for my daughter. could I get a good luck to McCullough on her first javelina hunt? Good luck, McCullough. Good luck, McCullough. That's right. Just remember what we learned earlier. It was, what was it? Breathing, position, trigger pull and follow through. Yeah. Those four things. Knowing Leland, I'm sure she's already got plenty of practice. Yeah, I imagine so. Here's a Seth one, PA and fishing related. It's just Stephen, he's looking for some basic gear, some beginner gear to get into ice fishing. if you had sort of like a quick kit you could um yeah i would start with an auger doesn't have to be anything fancy you get one of those hand augers they work pretty good as long as the blades are sharp um a basic ice pole which is just a short fishing pole with a you can honestly just use if you have a spin reel um you don't have to buy a new reel you can just throw that on on a ice pole and then um from there as far as safety wise pennsylvania doesn't always have great ice they do this year but um i would get a spud bar and those those ice picks that you put around your neck so if you uh you kind of wear them around your neck like a necklace if you go through the ice you can grab those things and use them to pull yourself back up on the ice that's good to have especially for beginners that don't have a lot of experience on ice. And then from, I mean, that's basically it. To start, you can go super deep on it with electronics and, you know, having a sled to haul your stuff out there is nice. But Sam Fella can't do the electronics part. That's kind of where I'm at. I feel like I have all the other gear, but I feel like without electronics, like how am I ever going to find the fish? So how do you find the fish? with no electronics? Well, back when I used to fish without electronics, we were just trying to find points that go out into the lake or whatever you're on. So like read a map. Yeah, basically if you have access to a map, that's helpful because you can just look at the map. But if you don't have access to like underwater mapping or whatever, I just try to find like points that are coming out into the water or, um, you know, if, if you're, if you can see the bank and there's like, it's like a Sandy bank that transitions to a different type of like rip rap or something like finding transitions like that. Or, you know, it's, it's totally doable. I used to do it all the time. Is it bad form? Because I was going to say, well, you'd pull up and then see where all the other shanties are or people are fishing. Yeah. And then go near there or start asking them questions. Like, is that bad form just to roll in and be like, hey, man. Let me take a look at your live scope. Yeah. I'm new to this. Like, would it be okay to drill a hole 10 yards away from here? Is that a good spot? You think most people would be open to that? Totally. Yeah. And if you're going to go that close, I would definitely talk to someone. but you can definitely find the general area where people, um, you know, are fishing or if you go like early in the morning, wherever you can find last or yesterday's holes basically. Um, and, and try those spots too. So yeah. Good luck. What else you got, Phil? Giannis is, this is from Judah. Do you have any tips on trying to stay injury free or for trying to stay injury-free over years of running? Hmm. Yeah, I've been lucky. I think I've, I have been able to stay injury-free. I mean, I've had a bad ankle sprain once. I'm dealing with a little bit of like a cartilage issue. And it's just, I think that's no matter if you're running or just living, you're going to have those issues in your knees. But, uh, I don't know. I think doing it, that was, I recently had to go through this knee kind of a process of figuring out what was going on in there. My last appointment was with an orthopedic surgeon. She said, the worst thing you can do is stop doing what you're doing. I said, you even mean like running a hundred miles? She goes, yes, do it. It is good for you. Do not stop. It's going to get worse if you stop. So don't stop running. Bow hunting at full draw asks who, who all of you guys are going to be at NWTF in Nashville. Oh yeah. Well, I guess you two are not. Nope. I am. Full draw. I wish. I do love the wild turkey. I'll be at the Hunt Expo that weekend. Yeah, and if you're going to be at NWTF, a good place to run into us is going to be the Grand Slam After Party that Meat Eater is hosting. It's a big fundraiser. They're going to have a bunch of cool hunts and guns, shotguns, rifles to auction off. and we're going to tell some turkey stories. We're going to try to get all of you to buy as many raffle tickets for these items as possible. We're going to have an owl hooting contest that Clay is going to MC. So if you're a good owl hooter and you're at NWTF, now this is voice, voice only. And then we're also going to play some trivia. So yeah, it's the Grand Slam after party. It'd be a great place to bump into us. Or on Saturday, most of us will be at the booth, the First Light booth, all day, and you can see us there. And if you want to find me at the Hunt Expo, I'll be slumming in the beer line with everybody else. I'll make mention that the Great American Outdoor Show in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, is kicking off. And the family boot shop will have a booth there, Center Boot Company. Look them up. They'll have some First Light gear there. And I think some Meteor stuff, too. Brett Reeves is at that show, I believe. Oh, really? Yeah, I think he's doing something with Case. Oh, we'll look him up, too. He's a nice guy. Go talk to him. Yeah, he's all right. Extremely nice. Have him tell you a bedtime story. Ian asks, do you guys have more episodes of Roast on the way? Yes, Ian. We do have more episodes of Roast on the way. They were hounding me yesterday to put my notes in on an episode, which I believe they want to release here in the next week or so. So don't fret. And then behind that one, there are many more coming. We have been hard at it. We have been cooking, roasting our tails off here recently. Phil and I judged an episode together. We did. I think we did a pretty good job. I haven't seen a cut of that one yet, but I'm expecting great things. I think it's going to take a lot of work to cut that one. I think I gave the editor specific instructions on camera of things to do. So whoever's cutting that, I apologize. Let's see. what will you guys be doing on Thursdays at 11 a.m. after March 5th? That's from Mogor. Answering emails. Yeah. If I'm in the office, it'll be something. Mogor. Working on a book. Editing video. Editing photos. But to be honest, when I look at my calendar after March 5th, it's nothing. Nothing there. My world is ending on March 5th. Hey, Spencer, if you're still out there, has he commented, Phil? Spencer Newhart has not been in the chat. Oh, no. I shamed him for being too active in the chat one week, and I think he's cold with him. Well, if he is out there listening, I would like him to give us a rating between 0 and 10 on how well we did on this episode. This is a 9.5 at least. All right. It's up there. This is one of the better ones. another Mogor one we've got some good questions this week this is for Randall, it's a specific one you're the weapons expert, Randall, have you heard of the Walder RS3 straight pull bullpup hunting rifle family the one with the integrated suppressor and is that monocoque? I would imagine that's a one piece receiver and then he had more to say but that was basically it yes, I saw that it was recently released I'm really intrigued by bullpup rifles uh there was a there's a company called defensive edge out of idaho that makes something called the long-range killing machine um and it has a 30-inch barrel but because of the bullpup arrangement the overall length is much shorter so uh it's designed basically to ride it up to the top of the mountain on your back on a dirt bike uh but bullpups offer the advantage of having a longer barrel length compared to the overall length of the rifle walther i've never owned a walther um but interestingly enough against it i think they made a um like a police sniper rifle like a marksman rifle that was a semi-auto bullpup so they have a bullpup legacy i'm also really intrigued by guys on forums that are making their own bullpups with like homemade trigger linkages and weird stocks. And, uh, it intrigues me and scares me at the same time. So you're going to have to explain it because I'm looking at pictures and there's like, it looks like a thousand variations of what a bullpup might be. So like, is there a definition of what a bullpup is? Um, a bullpup is essentially the, the, the action is, is further back in the stock than the trigger is ahead of the action. so the action is almost like where your yeah you're almost resting your cheek on the action so instead of the instead of the action being in front of the grip uh like the wrist of the stock the action is back further so that you know you can have you can have this much barrel but it starts back here instead of starting out here okay and obviously i guess the sort of the i don't know if it's the issue but you got to figure out how to connect the trigger to the to the action yeah and um yeah there's like some you know there's a lot of like factory bullpup options but you can also find people sort of there's some companies that make like a bullpup style chassis for a remington 700 and you have a basically a trigger linkage but uh in the age of suppressors you know overall length is is a uh very important consideration so So yeah, when I think about big magnum cartridge, I want to get a big long barrel on there. A bullpup would be mighty nice. That's weird enough. Interesting. That was a weird enough tangent for me. Anything else? The LRKM though. If you want to have your hair stand up, look up an LRKM and the prices they fetch on the used market. Leland's asking your opinions on wild game tartar or tiger meat or cannibal meat or whatever all the terms are for it. Do you guys, is that something you guys consume or prep, prepare often? Yes. Oh, really? I think a burger is just better. We, if you cook it. We like eating, um, we like eating like beef tartare. Like if we go to a restaurant that has some sort of raw beef preparation, that's typically what we'll get as a starter. And so, yeah, we, when we get like a fresh animal home and then we have some back straps, we'll do some tartare. Yeah, I enjoy it. I just often don't remember to make it and I should do it more often because it is delicious. But yeah, I just, yeah, for whatever reason, I don't know. My family's probably only eaten it a couple of times. Nate Pow Pow looking for recommendations on a pistol chest pack and chest holder handgun needs a proper safety you guys have any recommendations as far as how to carry it I go back and forth on the chest I think he's looking for specific items like from FHF or something you guys could help him out with FHF doesn't make i mean they use a it's a it's a rasco holster that's attached to the the bino pack right it was it was yeah um they make a system that that attaches to the bottom of a bino harness or chest rig yeah there's a company called gunfighters inc uh that makes a a chest rig that you would wear under they also make one that you would mount to your bino pack but they make one that you wear, you would wear under your bino pack. Um, cause it's just sort of free. Like it's, it's literally just meant to be worn on its own with nothing else rigged to it. And I like that quite a bit because you can take your binos off. Like if you're, if you're butchering an animal, um, and you can just have that gun on your chest, uh, when your hands are all bloody and you don't want something hanging off like the big bino rig hanging off. But I also go back and forth between like a belt holster. Sometimes I'll put a belt holster on my hip belt and my pack, but then you end up carrying two holsters. Cause you also want one that you could wear if you drop your pack. So it all comes down to individual individual preference, I think. Um, but there's a lot of options out there. Well, Paul, I think trying to solve for some of this now, instead of like, he doesn't really offer a holster anymore. It's basically the holster hanger. It's like the blade. It's a blade tech. Yeah. And there's a quick detach system so that you could have one holster, but then have this attachment that could be under your binal harness. You could have another one on your hip belt of your pack, and then you can just move it around. I personally find it to be too much when it's all on my chest. Um, and so I like to go to the hip, but yes, every time I drop my pack. Yeah. I also started wearing, I started wearing, uh, like a short thigh drop like a drop panel and i've like seen people sit back and forth say oh you don't want to wear that when you're hiking you don't feel like it's it's too cumbersome but i don't really notice it and then i have that gun on my hip always at all times take my pack off take my bino harness off it's one less thing when you want to shed a layer to mess with right and yeah send me the link to that whatever you're using I run this thing that it's just a clip so like I can open it up put it on my pack and then if I want to drop my pack I just pop it off my pack and put it on clip it onto my belt works pretty good Phil anything that has to be answered yet or can we save it for next week there's this one for me we'll have this be the last one This is good. I mentioned this like lo-fi pixel art fishing game that came out recently called Cast and Chill. Cast and Chill. And Cole is asking if I've played it yet. I have it downloaded on my Switch 2 and I've been holding off because I thought I might stream it the first time I played it, which I still might do. But I haven't played it yet. Oh, I didn't realize you got a Switch 2. Oh, yeah. I just got my first Switch. Yes, and that's the thing. Maybe if I stream after we play some Cast and Chill, I'll play some Breath of the Wild because Randall getting a Switch and playing Zelda had me restart a playthrough of Breath of the Wild. Yeah, Verizon. I got some sort of Verizon deal where I got a free Switch. So I'm getting back into video games. Never too late to start something new. Couldn't agree more, Randall. Let's call it. Kids, go outside. This might have been our longest. I think this is our longest episode. Forget your video games. Go outside. You know, find a healthy balance. An hour and 36 minutes. That's a hell of a warm-up for the grand finale spectacular. That's right. I hope you guys all enjoyed it. It looked like most of them stuck around for the entirety of it. Thank you all for watching and listening. And we'll see you again next week. Same time. Meat Eater Radio Live. Same place. Deuces. Later. hunting demands preparation persistence and gear that will not quit on you that is why i wear first light this isn't about hype it's about no compromise gear built to perform built to last whether it's their industry-leading merino wool keeping me comfortable through the cold and the hot or their durable outerwear shrugging off the elements first light is built to help you go farther and stay longer designed by hunters for hunters with a deep commitment to conservation and land access no shortcuts no excuses just gear you can count on head to firstlight.com that's f-i-r-s-t-l-i-t-e.com this is an iheart podcast guaranteed human