Ep. 423: Render - Villines Logging

This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human. Hey, if you're in or around Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and you live for hunting season, you need to swing by the Meat Eater store in Milwaukee. We're stocked wall-to-wall with the gear we actually use in the field. First Light, FHF gear, Phelps game calls, and more. You'll find us at the Corners of Brookfield. Whether you're gearing up for the season, dialing in a setup, or just want to talk shop with people who love to hunt, this is your place. That's the Meat Eater Store Milwaukee at the corners of Brookfield. Stop in, get dialed, and get after it. my name is Clay Newcomb and this is a production of the bear grease podcast called the bear grease render where we render down dive deeper and look behind the scenes of the actual Bear Grease podcast. Presented by FHF Gear, American-made, purpose-built hunting and fishing gear that's designed to be as rugged as the places we explore. This is a great debate what to do right now. Do we stay in the heated conversation? very interesting conversation we were having but we would have to inform the listeners what we're talking to or do we just start off and tell who's here hard to say it's a roll of the dice i'm going to start off and we're going to go in the middle so i've got to my right i'm going to introduce him first then i'll introduce the others this is weird going this direction it is but in the tekova's hot seat is my friend caleb blondes you guys just entered into like right in the middle of our conversation of when like when was it october the third probably i think i think kayla and i were bear hunting on october the third and he killed a really nice bear i mean it was i'd say 350 what what did you think what did we think i can't really remember what we settled on i think you said for sure 325 so okay a big old boar killed in national forest just we just went hunting for a day and a half and so we skinned this bear in the woods quartered it up basically left you know a gut pile the the the hip structure i mean i mean you know like the pelvis and stuff and some of the rib cage right big pile of bear though left that bear and i came back maybe even just five days later and you could not have told that we skinned that bear other than just some you know the leaves it was just kind of a beat down greasy pile but this is what i was about to tell you when these people interrupted us by turning the podcast on was there was bear trails coming in from two directions to that carcass pile like like padded out like where they were stepping in the same tracks like they do and i don't know why i didn't think about it but i bet we could have killed another bear sitting on that carcass probably a real two days later i would say yeah yeah probably the one that run him out of the woods yeah yeah so when what happened i mean go ahead and you can just kind of quickly tell like you're hunting and what happened you know basically i walked into a bear fight and i didn't know it yeah yeah i heard the the racket going on down there and i knew it was a bear but i did not know what was going on were you hearing them vocalize or just leaves crunching and popping no i could hear i could hear the vocalization yeah yeah i don't know what sound you call that but right just woofing and chattering and huffing yeah yeah so i eased down there to get a closer look which i could just see the one bear but it was like postured up it got to coming off into that little draw below me you know there where the water was up and i just let him come he got about 20 and i shot him almost run me over come right up out at me and i just turned behind my tree and let him go by he how close do you think he actually got to you oh for me to bear really like oh yeah oh yeah yeah so what happened is kalen's i saw right where it all happened you know he is this little there's a dry creek bed and then there's a steep bank that kind of goes up on a little mini ridge kind of so it's almost like you're in a tree stand yeah in a way yeah and you're shooting kind of down at an angle and i think your arrow passed through that bear and hit the rocks on the other side of him oh yeah that scared him yeah so the the threat was from the opposite side where the other bear was at okay that's where we're getting But the bear turned and ran straight towards the shot. Right. Because, you know, the air clacking on the rocks was bigger than the sound of the bow. Oh, yeah. And closer. Yeah. And he didn't know I was anywhere around. Right. Yeah. But he just shoots straight up at you. Oh, yeah. I shoot and reach to get another arrow. Well, before I can get the other arrow, I look up and he's there. I mean, he's already on me. So I just roll behind my tree and he goes by and he makes a little loop and runs right back to where I'd shot him at. He hit the other side a little ways, didn't he? Run up the other side. Yeah. And I watched him die. Yeah. He just rared up and fell over. Death moan. And I thought it was over. I got probably 20 yards of him, maybe, and just crouched down waiting for him to die. I got to hearing another racket, the same vocalization. Whatever you call that. And at this point, you've only seen one bear. Yes. You don't think. Right. You knew you heard potentially what sounded like a fight, but you didn't know there were two bears. Right. Yeah. So I glance up on the hill, and here comes one bigger than the one I just shot. And he's coming to that bear I shot. He doesn't know I'm around either. So I let him get down to the bear, but I stand up. First, just wave. That doesn't do it He kind of glanced at me Kept coming So then I yell at him That didn't do it He's still coming So I threw a rock at him And he finally turned and walked off Did you hit him with the rock? No, I didn't hit him No How close did he get to the dead bear? 10 or 15 feet I mean, he was pretty well to him Wow Was he going to fight more? I think so You should have waited to see what happened Yeah, Caleb What were you thinking, man? You should have just seen what he was going to do I was thinking that this bear has just Whipped this 325 pound bear So I know he can whip me And he's still Wait a minute, you're a logger He's still mad After he wasn't really leaving, I left I just went to the truck Okay, so you chunk a rock at him And what does he do? Oh, he just kind of side heels, and he drops off back into that creek where I just shot that one. So he didn't run. Oh, no. He came up on my side, and he's circling me. Oh, wow. Yeah, yeah, I knew that. I knew that, but it's like he didn't spook like you would have thought. No. You would have thought the second he knew there was a man standing there that he would have just. Yeah, I thought he would, yeah, from the bears that I've been around. And he didn't. I thought as soon as he realized, you know, there's a human here, he's gone, but no. No, he didn't leave. How much bigger was he than the one you shot? He was noticeably bigger. I mean, did it make you think the one you shot was small? Well, I mean, not small. I knew it wasn't a small bear, but first glance, I said, oh my gosh. I mean, this bear is quite a bit larger than the one I just shot. Well, I remember, so, well, you... I told you it looked like a Volkswagen coming off the hill. yes well but it also for it it painted the my perception of how big the bear that you killed was because kaylin shoots the bear it's laying there dead but this other bear is circling and he just goes i'm out of here so he dives off the mountain and goes back to the truck and i'm still off hunting don't have cell coverage or any well no i didn't where i was at i come out well after dark well after dark and kaylin goes i got good news and bad news and he's like i killed a bear but it's still up in the mountain on the side of the mountain you know and it's like i don't know it's getting dark at 7 30 that time of year and so now it's eight o'clock and you know it's more like nine o'clock probably and probably how far back in was it it wasn't terrible it really wasn't that far from the truck it was quite a bit of elevation change but i had been a whole lot further that day yeah he had made a huge loop and killed it on the way back to the truck but i remember you telling me that you just thought it was an average bear that's kind of what i or the picture that i painted because of this other one was so much bigger and i actually remember telling you i bet you shot a sow yeah and and i bet you shot the smaller of two because i couldn't figure out why there would be two even together and i said i bet you shot a sow and that other one was just a decent boar and so we go up there in the dark and the second i see his bear in the light i just go holy cow that's a big bear you shot kalen i mean it's like it's a boar oh yeah yeah i mean a stomper i mean it might have i mean we were i really try to be conservative with bear weights because it's so easy just to be like oh that's a 400 pounder uh it was a big bear and it no doubt weighed 325 i mean probably 325 375 wouldn't surprise me you know so i mean a big in the picture you could tell how big he is because his paws are enormous i didn't even see the bear but i could tell in the picture he's a good bear well and then and the way kalen he had just been whipped by this other bear that's right and and the bear looked so big i mean when you can tell a difference i mean a 50 pound difference between two bears standing side by side you almost can't tell the difference right like they would almost look identical a hundred pound difference you'd start to see a difference 150 pound difference and it's like that bear's way bigger but i mean i don't know i i think i think it was a monster the other one yeah i do i mean i i mean i it's like i never had a doubt you're the one with no i never doubted you for a second he called me when he got back to the truck and he's like you ain't gonna believe what i just done and i was just joking what did you do kill with a knife he said no but i could have and then he told me the whole story and he said it he said that other bear was big yeah well i was just as the podcast started i told kaylin i said man i think about that all the time and partly because me and bear went back in there five to seven days later and it was it was as if a bear had never been in those woods i mean because that same day i had been over the mountain from you and had all but killed a bear. I mean, it was probably the closest I've been in National Forest to killing a bear but not killing it. I'm sitting over a little water hole, and, you know, 9 o'clock in the morning, I see a bear coming, like straight to the water hole. Wind's good. Everything's good. It's a color-phase bear, real pretty color-phase boar. Wasn't very big. I bet it didn't weigh 190, 210 pounds maybe. I mean, just lanky, kind of tall, but chocolate brown. And he's coming up this little dry creek to this little pool of water, and I'm in the same scenario as you, up on the side of a steep ridge. I mean, it was a deep draw like this on both sides, just straight up. He has no idea I'm there. He's walking. Winds, thermals are carrying up. I mean, it's done. He's at 20 yards, and I stand up. It's like I'm in a tree stand. and he i mean he's about to walk out in front of me and i draw the bow back and i don't know why but rather than staying in the creek and going to that water hole he just he just turns and starts going up the other side of the ridge from me but he's going to walk right out in front of me i don't even panic i'm just like no problem got the bow drawn and i'm just waiting for an opening and you know he hits a couple of openings that you probably could have shot but you shouldn't but i just knew he was gonna just stop in some opening up there and anyway he doesn't he just he just walks straight up that mountain and rather than veering towards the water hole he starts to veer more just like straight up and he just kind of like just just slips through my fingers you know and uh and i sat there the entire rest of the day entire rest of the day and uh 30 minutes before dark a bear came from the opposite a black bear came from the opposite direction and there was a hole water right in front of me that was the main watering hole bear trails beat out to it but 30 yards up from this main water was a real small pool of water about as i mean like two inch three inches deep just barely any water at all and that bear rather than coming the main hole drank water out of that hole and i saw him just kind of lift up his head and kind of look around and i could just barely see him and i kind of stood up and he just kind of sat there by that water for a minute and then just turned and walked the way he came and i tried to go after him but anyway it was a great day of hunting. Brought bear back in there and we did the exact same hunt day and a half and didn't even see one. Didn't find anything. I was that close to killing one 30 minutes after daylight. Yeah. Yeah, I saw three bear that one day. Yeah. Wow. That was an unbelievable day of National Forest bear hunting. Yeah. And then it just was gone. It just was completely gone. Quick. You going to introduce the rest of us? Well, that concludes the podcast for the day. This is a unique render. We have the guys that were on the last episode, American Loggers. Kalen Vlines. This is the Kalen Vlines that was main player on that. To his right, wild-eyed Cody Vlines. How do you feel about that description? The truth hurts sometimes Oh man, I'm so glad you guys are here That Josh is here And then the one who Is going to validate Validate or invalidate All these stories The older brother of Kalen Waylon Blonds Who I'm told Their father tried to name them Waylon and Willie So Kalen would have been Willie That would have been epic. But their mother shut it down. Is that right? That's the story we was always told. No. And then we got Bear John Newcomb with us. Yep. So Bear brought a bow he might show us. But no, it's pretty rare for us to have the actual people that were on the episode. But I want to do something real quick before we get into the log and stuff. is I've asked Bear to tell us a little bit about a couple of things that are going on that are relevant with conservation legislation. I want to be, we're going to try to be a little more active in the stuff that we all know that's going on, but like this Boundary Waters stuff, and then there was one other thing going on in Mississippi. Give us a highlight of those, Bear. Well, the Boundary Waters is the big event that I think everyone's been hearing about. But basically, they're trying to make it to where they're allowing foreign mining companies to come mine above the Boundary Waters. And all the runoff of that is going to really affect the public land that we have access to. So overall, it's a bad deal. We don't want it to happen. but the through hunters and anglers calling into their senators they have postponed the basically the day that they decide whether or not they're going to allow it or not so basically through the voice of the hunters and anglers that has has changed what's happening inside of the the government systems yeah because they were going to decide i want to say it was two days ago? A couple days ago. February 10th or something. Yeah. And because of how many people were calling in and emailing their senators, they've postponed it because they're starting to see that. Do we know a future date when they're supposed to decide? That, I'm not sure. They just said they were going to do a more further analysis on the deal, and it'll come up again. It's come up, it comes up all the time. Like every couple of years, maybe, I mean, we were talking about this like a year ago yeah but the boundary waters are on the border between canada and minnesota yeah i think so yeah yeah and uh but it's a it's a big huge federal wilderness and uh yeah i mean there's going to be stuff like this coming up more and more but um yeah but what we can take from this one is the fact that our voice inside of it actually changed so far has actually changed what's going on so so keep calling yeah so keep calling and keep keep the pressure on the you know i mean it's like as we all know this i mean that we hear it but i mean golly we've just got to become more active in this stuff and per for example miss tell us about this Mississippi bill, which has been kind of resolved, but it tells you what can happen. Yeah. Well, the attempt was to eradicate all hunting with dogs. In Mississippi? Unless it was on private land that was 2,000 acres of private land or bigger. That's the only land that you can hunt with dogs on. That's ridiculous. But that's including squirrel dogs, rabbit dogs, deer dogs, any sort of dog hunting. And so they wanted to take it out because it was not fair chase was the argument. They called it the fair chase. It was crazy what they called it. Do you, Bear, do you remember what it was? Keep talking. Keep talking. I'm going to find it. Well, yeah. Basically, their point that they were trying to make was, if you're hunting with dogs, that's not fair chase. It doesn't fall within the Fair Chase rules and guidelines. But the good news on that one is it got shut down. Yeah, it was a House Bill 828. And the good news is it got shut down. But this just goes to show you, these guys called it the Fair Chase Act, introduced to restrict hunting with dogs, limiting dog hunting to properties of over 2,000 contiguous acres, which essentially would shut down dog hunting you know yeah no one has access to for the entire state and you you would feel like a state like mississippi would be immune to this and so far they've proven to be by the fact that the bill got shut down but just the fact that that is is even there just tells you that kind of stuff can happen anywhere yeah so and what is important is that even though we don't have a lot to do like with the with the boundary waters in particular like we hardly even know what state that's in i've never been to the boundary waters but it's still important for me to call into the senators because it's the it's it's even if it's not relevant to you it is because eventually it's going to make it to you if as as they start to come for things at the bottom ring of the ladder it's going to work its way up so it's important to stop it now calling into your senators now before it reaches you Hey, if you're in or around Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and you live for hunting season, you need to swing by the Meat Eater store in Milwaukee. We're stocked wall to wall with the gear we actually use in the field. First light, FHF gear, Phelps game calls, and more. You'll find us at the corners of Brookfield. Whether you're gearing up for the season, dialing in a setup, or just want to talk shop with people who love to hunt, This is your place. That's the Meat Eater Store Milwaukee at the corners of Brookfield. Stop in, get dialed, and get after it. When I started learning about bear hunting with hounds, specifically the state I'm thinking of is Michigan. Like 10 years ago, I did some filming for the Michigan Bear Hunters Association. and what I learned was that they just have built into their culture that you have to fight for your rights to hunt like their kids it was like it wasn't even normal it wasn't even abnormal that they had they were just like politically active it's just part of being a bear hunter and I think more and more in the days ahead that's probably going to be what we have to do which I I mean, as hunters, we're the people that just like want people to just leave us alone. I mean, we're not the ones who are wanting to go get involved in stuff. That's our nature. But that's also the nature of people who get stuff taken away from them. I mean, I'm talking to myself because I mean, but I think in the future, we're just going to have to be more involved. And the good thing is that there's a ton of organizations that are helping people get involved. I mean, like, on social media, there were so many groups that were giving you the number to call the White House switchboard. Yep. Ask for your senator. It's that easy. I mean, like, you call this number, say, I want to talk to the senator from Arkansas. Yep. And they take you directly to his office. Somebody answers the phone. You talk to them I mean sometimes you feel like that may not be enough and it may not be but it something I wrote when that whole thing was going through I sent an email to our senator I mean, I got a response back, but I mean, it got to him. I sent a little video to my senator, and I took a piece of white sandwich bread and put it right here, and I put my fist there and I put another piece of sandwich bread on top and I said, Mr. Bozeman, this is what I'm going to give you if you'd vote wrongly for this. Send him a picture of that knuckle sandwich. I'm sure that was well received. Just kidding, guys. Just kidding, everyone. Don't indict him. No, I don't want to pick on Bozeman. He's a good guy. Yeah. Most people are like me. They take for granted what we do. My hunting with dogs or whatever, I've never seen it hurting anything and don't think nothing about it. You don't think about somebody taking it away, and then the next thing you know, you wake up and it's gone. And what's up, you guys have taken away? We've been through it. You guys have had it taken away in your lifetime. We've been through it, yeah. Yeah, in my lifetime, I've seen it happen Tell us about that Because I'm from the Ouachita's Where we can still run deer with dogs And regardless of whether you think that's good or bad Yeah I mean, but we can still do it down there Yeah, it's a touchy subject But growing up, dad always had beagles And we grew up hunting deer with the beagles I mean, we didn't see it hurting anything and then the next thing you know it got shut down i mean in the late 90s yeah i don't remember exactly what it was i just know i got to be part of it and i mean dad was always he was a dog man he liked to take the dogs and when they shut that down dad pretty much quit hunting until deer hunting anyways until me and him got started riding a lot and doing it that way but yeah i mean And he just got to enjoy my mouth with his dogs and doing it like that. But, yeah, that was in the back of my mind when he was talking about that. I was like, I mean, we take for granted that just because we don't think it's hurting anything, there's people out there that do. And if they got a bigger voice, when most of the majority are like me, I feel that are just going to sit back and think, well, we're not hurting anything and let it go. Yeah. well yeah i think it was the late 90s when they outlawed deer hunt with dogs in the northern part of the state and as i understand it it was the it was the pet project of one of the commissioners that lived up here and didn't like deer dogs and and he knew he probably couldn't shut it down across the whole state and he wanted it shut down in this part of the state and i mean you know 25 five years later, people hardly talk about it. It was, for me, it was more than hunting. My dad's always been a hound man, but mainly a running dog man. It was more than shooting deer. Yeah. It wasn't about shooting deer. I mean, you were out there hunting. It was a way of life. Yeah. Deer season was like bigger than Christmas. Way bigger than Christmas. Yeah. And it was a chase. And you hear that all the time about anybody can kill one with a dog. Go try it. Yeah, I got tickled when Bear was talking about the Fair Chase Act. I was like, you ain't never tried to kill a deer in front of a dog as far as deer. I started hunting with dogs. That was just the way we hunted. Right. Not saying I haven't killed a lot of deer in front of dogs, but when they outlawed the dogs and I had to start still hunting, I was like, this is easy. I mean, honestly. You thought it was easier. It was easier. I started bow hunting a lot when they outlawed the dog deal. Right. and at that time there wasn't the guys in our part of the world that bow hunted were hardcore but there wasn't that many of them no in early season then it was easy with a bow I mean it was just easy yeah compared to a set of walker hounds coming and there wasn't no meh and he stopped when you seen that sucker coming you started shooting and when you run out of shells you either had a dead deer or they were gone yeah uh nothing about that was easy was it fun most fun ever had yeah it was the best way of hunting the camaraderie yeah uh everybody ganging up at whoever's house it might be that morning coming up with a plan drinking coffee it was more than hunting it was a way of life yeah uh and like wasn't said you know i would have been getting on up there as a teenager didn't realize what we had right until it was gone yeah yeah that all that's what runs through my mind when you was talking about that just because there's more people like me that ain't going to say anything and wake up and what you should have been speaking up about is gone yeah and it's too late then yep so yes i fully agree that people need a voice and it can change things yeah yeah for anyone listening that's interested you can find all the information you need to at backcountry hunters and anglers yeah that's that's a good one they've got all the the info for how to get in touch with your senator. Mm-hmm. Well, man, this, this, were you going to say something, Josh? I also want to talk about the Bear Grease Channel. Oh, yeah. Bear Grease Channel and Giannis' new film. We're not going to be able to talk about Login. Sorry, guys. I watched that video today. Our video? Man, so we have, so the 10 years, 11 years ago, I started the Bear Hunting Magazine YouTube channel. At the time, I was running Bearhunting Magazine, started a YouTube channel, and we made videos for eight years. Good videos, too, by the way. I started watching a few. Man, those almost had just drifted away from my consciousness for so long. There's a big gap between the last one and the one that got put out. For five years, the channel has laid dormant. and yesterday we restarted it back up and we renamed it the Bear Grease Channel. And so it's through Meat Eater. I had some people saying, hey, Claire, did you quit Meat Eater? No, I didn't quit Meat Eater. This is through them, which we're thrilled about. It's a good deal for us and for them. He had to have Bear come along to take it off. Well, and Bear's going to be the main guy on the channel. This first video you saw us. I'd rather watch his videos anyway. Me too, man. Me too. But there's going to be weekly content dropped on that YouTube channel. And Bear's already got a bunch of really cool stuff that he's done. Yeah, he killed a hog with a self-bow. He elk hunted. He's been on a big falconry trip. Yeah, I'm excited for the falconry. We trapped some hawks in Texas legally. But it's YouTube-style content. Like, the Meat Eater Mothership channel is, like, television-type quality production. And it's, I mean, it's great. It's fantastic. This is, like, YouTube native, like, fast-paced. Yeah. Just, like, really showing you what's going on. Less production. No music. Stuff like that. And so, yeah, we're real excited about it. It's going to be awesome. Yep. Yeah, so next week, there's a film out right now. Yeah, Squirrel Hunting on Mules came out yesterday. Well, by the time this podcast airs, there ought to be two or three videos. What do you think is Mule Slow Trap, Kalen? Do you see all that shooting? Pretty laid back. Pretty laid back. I would trade you. I have one. What do you got? I bet you would. Talk to me before you. Well, he's three. Three. Yeah. And I mean, that mule literally didn't even flinch that first. I mean, you saw it. I was surprised. But the one he's talking about, I've shot off him, so it might be. So the back story, now you remember this. I was going to send Slow Trap to Wayland. Last summer, I actually contacted Wayland. Wayland trains, mules and horses. We done had it all set up, H-book and everything. He backed out on me. You took the food right out of his mouth. Oh, shucks. no i was gonna have wayland train slow trap it just and and then somewhere in the process bear was like i'd like to train it and so i texted wayland back and said hey uh sorry man and you haven't talked to him since yeah yeah sorry about that left you hanging that's all right no it was really awesome for bear to get to oh yes and that's what when you told me that I was like that'll be a good one for him to start with just from the videos and stuff I'd seen on the mule I kind of had him pegged and I thought that'll be a good one to get his feet wet in yeah now he's hooked and we can send him something else yeah Waylon's gonna send you one now probably a crazy one we'll see yeah that's a that is a nice little mule it's I wish it was taller you got one like that how big is he I bet it's not 14 hands Maybe 14 If he's 14 he's big enough I know He's a 3 year old He's going to grow quite a bit He probably will Will he grow that much after 3? So Banjo Which is his half brother Was still growing When I sold him at 6 years old He grew a lot How much could you expect him to grow? Another hand? Maybe not that much Dad always told us boys that a horse mule would grow until he's seven. Okay. Horse mule is a male. Yeah. It all depends, I think, on the mule, too. Is there a difference between a John mule and a horse mule, just interchangeable words? We have a lot of words. Depends on who you're hanging with. We've only fed that mule grass hay, too. I mean, we fed it a little bit of grain here and there, but it has not had. But Ty Evans told me, he said, yeah, if you fed that mule alfalfa hay for a year, he said it would probably speed the growth. Oh, yeah. But, I mean, the mule has free access. I just bought a year and a half old. Well, I say just bought. It's been a couple months ago now. A little younger than what I was planning on buying, but I can wait until May to start messing with him. But I got him thinking he'll be, I mean, you've had this discussion, It's not like a 14, 14-2 hand mule. And that's what I thought. He'll probably be that. Well, I put a stick to him the other day, and he's already 14-1, I think. So he's going to wind up being probably bigger than what I wanted. Bigger than what you wanted. We'll see. Yeah. He's grown a lot since I got him. So we may do some trading. We'll talk later. It's kind of turned into the mule swap shop here at the Berger's Render. Yeah. The one he's talking about We can bring him up here And lead him in here Like he did that one the other day Yeah And see Yeah Well One other ticket item Giannis Patelis has a video Coming out this week That You should watch soon It's about his Manitoba bear hunt But Giannis is going to be with us On the next render Did you know that? I heard rumor of that today Yeah He's going to be with us So we'll wait to talk Until then But But no, this episode, man, it was so good, this logging episode. It really was. Yeah. And the way it happened was I came to talk to Kalen, and I didn't really plan. I mean, I thought we might talk to somebody else, but there wasn't too much planning involved in it. And while we're sitting there at the global headquarters of the Lions Login. Which is the barn. It's a barn Yeah I hope that was clear For those of you Who didn't pick up On the sarcasm The way you described it Did you get that I was being sarcastic? Yes But at first I was like I was kind of confused It's like Kalen takes us To his corner office Good You needed to be confused For a minute One thing you said About that That was completely true Is the location Yeah Yeah It's just a barn But it is in a heck of a spot It is Yeah How wide is it? I guessed it's 50 foot. It's 30 by 50 is what it is, yeah. I was right. I don't know what you said. I said it's 50 foot wide. Yeah. I'll be darned. It's 50 foot long. That's what I meant. That's what in my head. The opening on the open side is 50 foot wide? Yeah, the open sides. Okay. Yeah, so Kalen and I are sitting there, and Cody and his girls just kind of randomly pull up. I was going home. I hadn't been to dads. I was going home. Yeah. and then he walks over and i told them i've i don't think i've ever done the main part of an interview captured it quite like that usually i'm trying to direct people to get on like these good headsets and just so the audio quality is really nice but i had this little handheld deal and i was just kind of like bouncing around from one to the other when they would talk you know and uh And they just kept talking as they do. And I knew that it was really good. And then, and I did tell this to Kalen earlier, when he started telling me about the story with Ethan, that's why I came there. That's what I told Kalen the story that I wanted to hear because I'd heard him tell me the story on the bear hunt that you guys interrupted us talking about. at the first of the podcast. Me and Kalen were going down there. And he told me, yeah, so it's all tying together. It's full circle. You know, it's like a, yeah. And I envisioned a podcast that kind of revolved around that story, honestly. That's what I had in my head. But, and it ended up being that. But so Kalen, we just go back and forth. They're telling me about logging and trucks and equipment and stories about Frankie Dale, which were fascinating. Yeah. Truly were. And then Kalen starts telling me about Ethan. And what I told him just today was that I was like that close to telling him to stop because I wanted to record that on the good equipment. I mean, I might have even one time like started to speak and almost mumbled words. but he he was going and i just there's one thing i've learned after years of doing this is when somebody wants to talk just let them talk which is sometimes hard for me to do i want to interrupt them say something else but he just i just let him talk and tell the story and it was so good so authentic i was like there's no way that we're telling that story again That was it. Well, knowing them two as well as I do, that was as natural as you could get them two talking. Yeah. I mean, you stick headphones on and Mike in her face, and it's not the same. But me knowing them, I knew where he was at, first of all, and everything going on. But that's what, in my opinion, made it one of the better ones, just because it was so natural. I mean, it wasn't just like Cody showing up. Nothing staged. I even told my wife. I hate to pat you on the back. I said, it's unbelievable. I said, Cody just showed up. Yeah. And he just rode with it. And it turned out good. Well, you felt that. To me, you felt like you were just standing there with us, which is what you always want. Yep. But sometimes it doesn't translate. Like when it was happening, I knew that they were telling me really cool stuff. But I thought this is going to be really hard to translate this to the listener. I wasn't I wasn't there but just listening to it myself I really liked that like I felt like I was standing there with y'all just listening to y'all y'all talk about you know tell stories and stuff and you know you could hear things echo in the back you could hear the girls and the dogs yeah I like that well that was saying two days before that I was down there helping them work on that dozer and that's what it felt like it felt like when we were standing down there just talking and going on while we was working on it. It was cool. So when we get done, I say to Cody, I say, man, this is going to turn out really nice. Something like that. Didn't I? And he goes, what turned out nice? And I said, you've been sitting here watching me put this microphone in your face. And he's like, what do you mean? And I was like, we're going to make a podcast. He had to have been tricking me. This is when Cody, you think he's just crazy, but really smart. Yeah, he was like, what do you mean? And I was like, you think I'm just, I was just here just getting this audio so I could go listen to it myself in the truck. It was funny. Well, in my mind, you were going to go, in my mind, you were going to his house. Right, yeah. And y'all were going to do the podcast. Yes. You know, I thought what you were doing down there was just going to be like a little piece of something here or there, maybe. Yeah. You didn't know you were going to be a star. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Did he make you sign a waiver? You could probably get all that content back. Josh. No, it was so good. It really was. Hey, if you're in or around Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and you live for hunting season, you need to swing by the Meat Eater store in Milwaukee. We're stocked wall-to-wall with the gear we actually use in the field, First Light, FHF gear, Phelps game calls, and more. You'll find us at the Corners of Brookfield. Whether you're gearing up for the season, dialing in a setup, or just want to talk shop with people who love to hunt, this is your place. That's the Meat Eater Store Milwaukee at the Corners of Brookfield. Stop in, get dialed, and get after it. bear what stood out to you well i like the the look inside of the logging world because for me as a hunter on national forest public land you're always coming across loggers and there's kind of a separation between the hunter and the logger i would say like in a lot of ways it's even viewed as like the loggers are kind of opposing the hunters goals and it kind of like you know like I feel like the loggers aren't always painted in the best light but I really I really like this look at it because y'all are hunters and you're loggers and you live close to the land the land is you know providing your living so that gives you more reason to care for the land and to steward the resource that you're going and pulling. So I really like the look, like the real look inside of the logging woods. That's a good comment. Yeah. I like that because I think things like that can be villainized. Like it's easy to villainize people when you don't know them, when you don't know their ethic, when you don't know how they do what they do. It's easy just to say, oh, these guys are just out there cutting trees. And I think one of the most impacting things to me was listening to you guys talk about how different sections of timber have been generational for you guys. I mean, that's incredible. I mean, that is exactly what we need more of, not less of. You know, we need this stuff that provides for families. People can work a good job while at the same time preserves the habitat for the animals, preserves the longevity. You know what I mean? It's sustainable for generations. And that really impacted me when you talk about what was said. These woods have put many kids through college. Well, that was a guy I know that I remember him saying that to me over here. and he told me he said this track of timber has put he said every 30 years they they cut it send the kid to college i mean and it's it's true and and the other thing that people don't realize that aren't that don't know loggers or and even hunters would know this there is very little timber in this country i mean like none basically that is virgin timber it's all been Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And it's a renewable resource. I mean, even out in big, woolly national forests, I mean, there's probably some places in the eastern side in some of these deep draws and ravines that didn't have marketable timber, you know, that it just wasn't worth getting. And those trees today probably are cedar trees that are two foot at the bay. I mean, you wouldn't look at that tree and think that tree's 500 years old, but it might be. I mean, would you guys agree with that? In some places, there is some virgin timber. Yeah. I mean, on the government. You think so? Government land, like some of that wilderness land that they don't touch at all. But they did back. I mean, I know personally a lot of federal wilderness in this part of the world that would have been cut to the ground. But now it's wilderness. Yeah. I'm talking about a lot of places. In my lifetime and before, I know they haven't cut. But guess what? You go through there now, those big trees are falling over. Dad's famous, one of dad's most famous lines ever is, it's a crop. I've heard him say that my whole life. If you don't take care of it, nature takes care of it. I mean, those big trees, as much as I myself like to ride and hunt in big timber, there's nothing better than being in big timber you know. Yeah. We were talking about that last night. We was watching a turkey hunt and it was a timber turkey hunt. Because there's nothing better than killing the old woods gobbler. There's nothing like it. But nothing lasts forever. Yeah. Those big trees that are protected if you can there a section in the government land that I hunt and have for a lifetime You can go back from one year to the next and it amazing how much of that big virgin timber has fell over Yeah. And when it starts falling over like that, it's a mess. It's a mess for years. You know, it's just, briars grow up, it's just a mess. Yeah. That's nature's way of taking care of it. Yeah. I mean, you can either manage it or God will. I mean, that's just how it works. Well, and I said it on the podcast, but I think we know now how incredible that some, you know, select timber harvests can be for wildlife property. I mean, the best thing you could do for a big piece of timber if you wanted to make it deer and turkey habitat is cut some of the timber. and so you know and and i think most people that be listening to this would know that but the the general population may be in some other places you know my you might say loggers and they might go oh man yeah those are bad guys and it's just ridiculous i mean like i said even though the world is much more much more plastic and much more metal than it used to be you know 100 years ago during the wooden age, we still use an incredible amount of wood. I mean, we live in a very wooden world still. I know the guy that, well, if you're talking about paper and cardboard, I mean, I think that there's going to be a transition more to cardboard and paper getting away from plastics now that they're seeing how wild plastics are just in terms of all the stuff. But anyway, I mean, so it's hard to be upset with a logger if you're a human today. You know? And especially like these guys. And so the next episode is going to be primarily with Teddy Valines, which is Cody's dad, Kalen Waylon's uncle. And he started, the first things he said to me was he said, I love big timber. And he said, I hate clear cutting. We select cut logs our entire lives, you know. Well, to Josh's point a while ago when he was talking about that stood out to him about the generations logging the same spot. I can remember, which I've been out of this business for 20 years now. But I was like them when they was telling their stories about being eight, nine year old with their little chainsaws. Well, I was 12, and they put me on a skidder. I was skidding three loads of logs a day behind my dad and uncle. I knew he'd try to one-up y'all. At 12. At 12. But one of the first things when he said that, something popped in my mind, something dad told me. Well, I'm a kid, first of all. And just a few drags in, and dad stopped me and said, all that little stuff don't run over as little as you can. because he said them oak bushes that big around he said is going to be cut one of these days he said be mindful and of course you're on a piece of equipment that it's you can't not run over everything right i mean but you can be selective on how you operate but that was ingrained in us at a very young age, this is what's going to support the next generation. And it's the same thing. I'd drive by and say, well, Dad, why didn't you cut that tree? Because to me it was as big as some of the other ones he had cut, but he'd say, son, we've got to leave something to come back to. Yeah. And that's really profound. You know what I mean? It's a profound thing to make choices like that because I think humans, especially Westerners, have gotten really short-sighted. You know what I mean? It's really about instant gratification, how it's going to benefit us right now in the moment, and to have people that are thinking, hey, I want to come back to that tree in 10 or 20 or 30 years, that sapling. There's a good possibility that some of that stuff Dad told me about them two have cut it since. Exactly. Before you all leave, I'll take you in my front yard. I bought and planted myself in 2005 a two-inch at the base red oak, just like I bought from the landscape place. And it was 2005. I mean, I know for a fact when I planted it. and that tree, you could cut it and make furniture out of it. You want them to take it down before they leave? As a matter of fact, did y'all bring your saw? I'm ready to cash it in. Y'all are mainly cutting hardwoods. Yeah. I mean, that's all that's up here for the most part. For the most part, yeah. Some pine. When we were kids, I would say, we cut a lot of pine on a couple of different tracks. Oh, really? A lot of pine. But in the last several years, very little that we've even dealt with. Just because it's not there, it's not marketable. Not there. Yeah. Well, it doesn't seem like the – I mean, you go south of the Arkansas River and it's almost not all pine, but those pine plantations. I mean, it feels like the world's got plenty of pine. Yeah. So you wouldn't even – I mean, the hardwood seems to be a little hard to come. I mean, there's some pine out there. some of these government tracks will have pine on them. And most of that's pretty small stuff. Whatever, but... Yeah. Most of your private land stuff, we just don't run across much pine anymore. Not up here. Really. Kalen, what stood out to you? I know it's hard to listen to a podcast that you were the main guy on, but I mean, like, did anything stand out to you? no not really he probably didn't even listen to it oh he did I can vouch for him okay okay well Kalen's just like yep man a few words good job man a few words well Cody did you hear did we get it right how'd he do putting it together oh I told him when we came in here he does with what he had to work with I said, you're the talent with the talent he had to work with. Actually, what stood out to me, I didn't know it was out. He told me last night that we were coming here today. Yeah. He's like, he put that out today. So I went home last night and watched it, or listened to it. When he got to talking about Ed, you know, just his, that mentality. Mm-hmm. I mean, you can't describe a man anywhere than he described as dead. yeah that was uh i mean we put like six minutes of probably of content there and i mean kaylin could have said so much more but what you said about him was profound and i have said that statement that you that the couple ideas that he had there i mean just just kind of like life philosophies you know just uh when he said uh well talking about contentment but then but then talking about uh when he said if you're really being honest with people you know you're probably not going to get rich yeah and i've said that to multiple people and again you qualified it and said i know that that's not entirely true they're wealthy people that are honest yeah but there's a lot of truth to it and uh you know just the idea that it just goes against the grain so much of what just pulsates through american society yeah i mean it's like you almost feel bad for not trying to get rich i mean that's the vibe that i feel it's almost like if you're not trying it's almost irresponsible this is america capitalism most prosperous nation on earth yep and it's just like i'll tell you something that i that i read and i'm gonna try to tie it in and you're gonna think i'm crazy but um i was reading a book about Inuits. I'm going on a big trip in a couple weeks. And they said that nomadic hunter-gatherer people, a huge difference between nomadic hunter-gatherer people and agrarian people was the way that they viewed objects. And this guy said that nomadic people, this is all going tie together boys uh nomadic people typically viewed objects with suspicion and kind of uh because they knew that they if they were going to take something with them they were going to have to carry it right right they thought about things in literal terms of weight and so in general nomadic people did not gather up material objects farmers on the other hand agrarian societies were just like, well, I might as well take that home. I got a place to put it. And this guy said that the Western thought process has been so influenced by the agrarian world that we falsely think that desire for material wealth is a native human desire that just runs inside of all of us. like he said that's actually not true because like psychologists and all these people would say that it is that's just human nature like if you just pulled pluck somebody out of africa and out of europe and out of india and you put them all in a laboratory they would all have this innate desire to accumulate material objects and right and this guy's saying no that's not true yeah we just are so ingrained with this this thing that it's this desire for material wealth is actually something relatively new right and when europeans first arrived in north america they were astonished it's in the it's in the record all over the place it's fascinating to me they were astonished at these guys trying to find gold like they were like yeah what do you what do you want and they're like gold what for i mean you can't eat it you can't can't plant it and make it grow you can't build something with it and they actually thought these guys were crazy and so i just think about eddie and kind of the mentality just like not this fight and again to me the key component is contentment not how much money i mean And it's not like, well, if you have more than this many dollars, you're evil. I mean, you can't do that, you know. But just this idea of contentment, being pretty powerful. And it makes me aware of the vibe of this generation, of this time. I mean, that was a profound section, I thought. Oh, yeah, that was the best part to me, by far. yeah just knowing him yeah knowing him I mean he just wants to be my dad I mean him and dad are one and the same yeah I lived in the house with one that's the only difference honestly yeah but growing up I wouldn't have said that that's the guy I want to be like he's you know what i mean he wasn't that larger than life he was just ed to me but the older i got you know uh and before he got sick and whatever just going down there just going to his house uh he might be on the back porch with a cup of coffee in the wintertime he'd be in there by that stove with a cup of coffee whatever just going in the house you got that feeling of contentment yeah so to me that was that made the podcast for me for sure yeah yeah that was that was unique unique I'm looking forward to the next episode you know it's I hope I hope us bringing up Frankie Dale was surely his family would be proud of what all was said about him those stories were really interesting to me I mean just the way you described him and then I wouldn't have known that he died like the listener was on the same journey as me because you started talking about Frankie Dale and you know you talked about what a character he was everybody knew him and then I go and basically in my mind I'm leading to questions about man this is really dangerous you know do y'all have stories of guys getting killed now I knew about Kalen's story about Ethan that's kind of why I'm there but I had no idea that y'all would have known people that had been, I mean, I figured you did, but known people that had been killed. And then for Kalen to go, well, Frankie Dell got killed like three years ago. I mean, I don't know. It just painted the picture. I mean, and then it also, when I started doing the research on logging, just how dangerous it actually is. The Bureau of Labor Statistics puts out stuff every year about the most dangerous jobs. and I, you know, I didn't, it wasn't like a deep, deep dive into it, but basically in the 1990s, Login peaked as the most, like it was the most dangerous time. Yeah. I mean, it almost feels like maybe back in the day deeper, it would have been more dangerous. But since the Bureau is keeping stats, it peaked in the 1990s. I wonder if y'all had any insight into that. I can see that. By the time we got into it. Yeah. Yeah, y'all got into it. Yeah, not your dad's. I could see the pace of it. The pace. The pace picking up in the 90s. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We'll just see that. And there was less, there was mechanization, but there was more hand cutting going on. You bet. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And today. In the 90s, it would have been, most of the guys around here would have been hand cutting. I mean, cutting them down at the stump. Yeah. and they would also been cutting the links what we call bucking up yeah most all that would have been chainsaw work yeah i mean there was probably the 90s probably would have been when i probably seen the first buck up saw which is a mechanical hydraulic saw hooks on your loader and you can cut them to length right there with a loader okay so you're you cut them at the stump they fall over and then the buck-up saw cuts them into the links that you need for the mill. Gotcha. The first buck-up saw I probably would have ever heard of would have been in the 90s, and I was a little kid. So it got safer when you had a buck-up saw. Yeah. It took out one element. It took out one time you cutting through that log. Just like him talking about getting hung up. Yeah. When he got hung up in the log pile, that was because he was bucking up the log with a chainsaw instead of having the buck-up saw that takes that element out of it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, that would have been the heyday. Well, that's when it peaked 128 deaths per 100,000 workers per year. And that was way above the number two thing in the 90s. So this is what I was trying to describe. The second thing, I don't even know what it was, but whatever it was, it was deaths in the 50s, 60s, if it was commercial fishing. Right, commercial fishing and steelworks. They give the statistic based upon 100,000 workers. Out of 100,000 workers, 128 died. Today, and I think the most recent stats I found were like 2017 or something. And it was a little bit unclear, but it was between 50 and 100 deaths per 100,000 today. Oh, really? And logging was still the most dangerous, but it was right in line, closer to in line with commercial fishing, ironworking, small aircraft pilot. And when you think about that, that makes sense, too, because like per 100,000, you might be like, you know, how many people? We hear about people around here that are dying in little plane crashes occasionally. But anyway, it's pretty interesting stuff. Yeah. The other interesting stat that I learned was that, and now this was an older statistic from, it was a couple years old, but that the average American uses one tree, 18-inch tree, 100 foot long, and paper and wood every year. Was that surprising? 100 foot long? You didn't listen? Did you even listen, Cody? 100 foot long, was it what you said? That's what it said. I realized a tree couldn't be 100 foot long. Yeah, but I mean, just that amount. That's what they said. Just in paper products. Cardboard. The number of Amazon packages that I get at my house and the amount of boxes I break down, that doesn't surprise me. But that's increased in the last... I said after COVID, I wanted to start investing in cardboard companies. Yeah, no doubt. everything's in cardboard yep I mean everything's shipped everything's in cardboard but anyway that's a that sounds like a lot I wouldn't have thought every American was using one giant tree every year I'm thinking about just buying my tree straight from these guys making your own cardboard just mail order maybe that's a new business for you guys y'all could ship people logs just so they could hand pick because that's the way it works For their dugout canoes and their bows. Yeah, I've actually been looking at these big snakewood logs that they ship from Canada. They're like a thousand bucks for a six-foot log to ship it. Wow. Oh, really? Yeah, I'm really considering it because I've never seen a snakewood bow. We may have some snakewood laying around, you think? Is that a thing y'all have around? I've never heard of snakewood. Hey, if you're in or around Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and you live for hunting season, you need to swing by the Meat Eater store in Milwaukee. We're stocked wall to wall with the gear we actually use in the field. First light, FHF gear, Phelps game calls, and more. You'll find us at the corners of Brookfield. Whether you're gearing up for the season, dialing in a setup, or just want to talk shop with people who love to hunt, This is your place. That's the Meat Eater Store Milwaukee at the corners of Brookfield. Stop in, get dialed, and get after it. Speaking of wood, show us your bow. So this bow, new bow. Speaking of wood. Yeah, speaking of wood, I got Osage Orange, black walnut on the handle with a big knot going right through the middle, and then olive wood, which surprisingly, well, actually not surprisingly, but it kind of caught me off guard. Whenever I was cutting through that olive wood, it smelled like green olives, like really strong. And even whenever I'm filing it, it smells like olives. Can you smell it right now? Probably. It kind of has a pungent, like a sharp odor. I wouldn't have picked it as olives, but I smell what you're smelling. That odor, I think, is just the hardwood. I don't like olives. I don't even smell it. That odor, I think, is just from the place I got it. It smells like that. Okay. But no, whenever I cut through it, it smelled like olives. I'll take your word for it. Okay. I'm not an olive fan. I like that riser on there and that grip. It is a good-looking boat. I mean, it's not finished out. You know, this is the rough. Right. So he'll take a lot more off of that. Yeah, yeah. But I'm kind of trying to replicate. Show him the wormhole. Replicate more of a, like your fiberglass recur. If you look at a recurve, it's got a lot more material on the handle, and you can get a lot deeper in that grip, and that's one of the major factors. A bigger handle. For why it's easier to shoot a fiberglass recurve than a self-bow. And so I'm trying to get as close to that as I can, but it'll still. A big, meaty handle on it. Yeah. But anyway, there it is. Looks good. Where did that Osage stave come from? That's what I was going to say. Where'd you get that? The Osage I believe this stave came from One of my One of my Bowyer Teachers He gave me that stave Do y'all have Osage over there? Not to my knowledge You don't see it? Man we've got We've got a lot of Osage I think the further west you get You get more I mean I've got A ton of Osage on this property Yeah we're in kind of a weird We're cutting staves. We're in kind of like a zone where there's Osage. Yeah. Yeah, it's incredible wood, man. When you cut it, cut it with a saw, it is almost neon yellow. Have you ever cut it with a saw? I have. Yeah, and you just see a big old pile, it dulls over time. Yeah, if you see one that's like 30 years old, that's been sitting in the sun or taking a lot of use, So it'll be jet black. Really? Jet black. Black? Black. Yeah. It's pretty wild. Is that bow right there? What do you intend to do with it? Is that going to be a hunting bow? Is that going to be a... Yeah. Yeah, this is going to be a hunting bow. I don't know if I should say yet what exactly I'm doing with it. It's a secret. It's illegal. Can you foreshadow? Not certain. You're not a foreshadower like your dad? I'm kidding. I'm kidding. We're going to Alaska. And I need to make the bow totally waterproof. That's what I'll give people. Wink. There's your foreshadowing, folks. I want to know how do you come up with what poundage it going to be Is that all about the string or is it all right in the bow It's all in the bow. That's what I thought. I mean, you can adjust it a little with the string, but yeah, I'll put it up in a tailoring rack and I'll take wood off of this side and I'll put just a bow scale on it and pull it down. He's constantly testing the weight. He'll put a string on it, test the weight. But you know what you've got. Yeah, it's at 48. While you're building it. It's at 48 right now. Yeah. Okay. And when I sand it, it'll probably lose a couple pounds. But he's had several that kind of got away from him a little bit, and he's like, you know, it got too light too quick. So you can change it. Once it gets too light, you can't go back. Yeah. I mean, sometimes you can cut them shorter or make the string shorter, but, yeah, it's no good once you get them too light. Have you ever had one blow up on you when you're shooting? No, but I'm kind of surprised I haven't yet. I know a lot of people who've had him blow up on him. Gary Newcomb had an American compound bow. There was a company called American. Did you ever hear that? In the 90s, there was a company called American. And he was shooting, trying to shoot bows super fast. He was shooting just the lightest arrow possible. And that's real hard on a bow, trying to get it to shoot real flat. He kind of had like hot rod bows. and I remember being out in the yard with him one day when that thing just came apart at the compound bow. Oh, I've been there. I had a high country done the exact same. When I got done, I was holding the riser. Yeah. That was it. Really? Everything else was hanging down here. I don't want to do that again. Yeah. Parks just go everywhere. Oh, yeah. There's pieces of that bow I never did find. Yeah. Yeah. You'll find that in the archaeological record one day. Good possibility. Well, man, thank you guys for coming. Yeah. We could have had you on after this next episode, but it just worked out for you all to come this time. Waylon, what stood out to you? I hadn't really even asked you that. No, it brought back a lot of memories. I mean, it was good start to finish for me because it did. And like I said, I've been out for 20 years. Cody brought up a good point a while ago. I've got two brothers. They're sitting right there. And to see them, what they've done, it's good. I got a lot of laughs thinking about because it brought up a lot of memories. Thinking about them two, one of them, whichever one of them talked about the McCullough and the Homelike chainsaw, I can remember, I think it was Kylan, that he took that old McCullough, and it didn't want to start a lot of times. That's a famous trade of a McCullough chance. It would start good the first time. Yeah, the first time. Once it got hot, it didn't want to start. No. Well, I witnessed him crank on it so much, he got mad, and as far as he could throw that saw, he threw it over the hill and left it. Dad came in to fill up with gas, and he was like, where's your saw? I got mad. He wanted to know why I hadn't bucked up the logs. Why haven't you done your job? And then he says, where's your saw? Said it's over that hill. He said, we'll go get it. That and coming in with dragging logs and seeing them playing baseball, sticking rock. Which meant we had done our job and we were caught up. Yeah, you were caught up. But yeah, no, it was, I'm like Cody, the contentment that our father had, looking back, makes a lot more sense now. I've recently stepped away from a 20-year career for that purpose, to have more contentment, to be home. and I always knew Cody brought up a good point in the podcast about it being addictive and I can tell you for me I love driving a skitter I mean that's what I grew up doing done it for well till I was 24 I think and working inside for 20 years never could get used to it I enjoyed my job I enjoyed the people but I didn't even have a window to look out of and it was hard. I mean, there was days I would have loved to have been sitting behind a big motor just hearing it roar and grabbing trees and going. And now I can get back outside again. Do you mind telling us what you did and what you do now? I mean, you don't have to if you don't want to. No, that's fine. I worked for Wilson Combat for 21 years. Yeah. pistol shop custom pistol shop here in the ozarks yeah custom ars and god blessed me with a way to provide for my family when i the year i started for them was the year my oldest daughter was born and i was able to step away because i mean just like the last few days in the wintertime there's days you don't work i needed a steady steady paycheck and was able to step away now i'm helping my cousin run a turkey farm that's less than a quarter mile from my house so for the first time in a long time i've got up every morning for the last six months and watched the sun come up and i literally rode a mule to work several days and it's just it's been great But to my point, I was able to do it, and the contentment that I have is priceless. I have a better understanding of what our Father always told us. Yeah. I mean, I don't want to talk too much. You can edit it out if you don't like it. When I told you, when you asked us what the biggest benefit was, and I said the freedom yeah uh five years ago six years ago in 2020 June 2020 I found out I had colon cancer oh redact to that editor put it back put it back put it back that's what I meant yeah he didn't hear what I said I made a joke when you started to the editor to cut it out yeah and then when I I realized where we're going. I'm like, we better keep this in. Anyway, I was 36 years old. Found out I had colon cancer. Wow. Leading up to that, I mean, I'm not going to throw out numbers or talk about production or anything, but leading up to that point, the logging business had been good for us, really good. uh and i got to the point i was working on saturday lots of saturdays if i wasn't working on saturdays i was taking care of equipment uh i love to bass fish in the summertime at night i love to bass fish tournament fish whatever i quit bass fishing i was i mean i was i was working I mean I wasn't even hunting like I normally would hunt and then that summer I found out I had a colon cancer I was cutting timber when they called me had my phone in my pocket I had been to the doctor I knew they were going to call me whatever and I had been looking at this little stretch of timber for a week I mean I had cut everything out below it I had it set up and i was cutting that little section of some big nice timber that morning i could hear dad over here he's cutting and frank he was working with us at the time he's over here i could hear saws running and my phone i'm cutting a tree and my phone vibrates in my pocket and it's the doctor and he said what we found is colon cancer and he said it was early stages uh he said this is early He said, I think you could probably get it took care of. But he said, if you don't take care of it, this will kill you. That was his exact words. I got off the phone. My chainsaw still stuck in that tree over there idling. I walked over to White Oak Stump, and I got down, and I had done some praying. And I could tell you lots of stories about the whole, you know, just the whole, what I came out of that with. But one of the biggest things I came out of that with was, I'm not going to say I was to the point of being driven by a dollar, but I was getting there. I mean, I was getting to the point where, you know, we were doing pretty good, making some money. And when that starts happening, you want to make more of it. But guess what? It's like you were talking about a while ago. You just keep wanting more. You'll never be satisfied if you let that drive you. I mean, I know guys that just like logging that much. They'll be out there on Saturday, and they ain't really doing it for the money. They just like it that much. I'm not knocking those guys at all. If that's what you love doing, get after it. But I think God put the brakes on for me. I mean, there's some other things that came out of that. but one of the biggest things for me was God was like, this is what's really important. I had two kids at the time. One was, gosh, I have to do the math. One was two, I think. The other one was even younger. But after I got back, healed up, they did surgery. I mean, the good Lord took care of me. Cancer-free. I've done scan after scan since then and scopes and so far I've seen this good but God healed me we'll just shorten it up and say God healed me because he did but after that when I came out of that and got healed up I was like okay what you know what is really important and then since that time it's amazing how much more time I spent with dad not in the woods. He was there for all of it, you know, working. We were side by side, but since then, we've spent the last five winters. We've done so much more hunting. I got back into fishing, fish all the time in the summertime. I don't know. It's funny how God can just hold you up and be like, what's really you know what's really important I mean we're only gonna get to do this one time you better do what you I mean if you got kids and friends and family enjoy them because I heard a guy say that nobody ever said on their on their deathbed I wish I'd have went to work more yeah and that's so true yeah mm-hmm that's the reason I'm doing what I do now because looking back on took it for granted dad always told us boys when about the only time we took a vacation was in november we'd take off a couple weeks deer hunt and dad always tells us boys do it what you can i know now what he meant i mean i'm 45 year old and got two kids chasing around all over playing ball and i love it but year or two ago we had uh got out and my youngest daughter i took her we went squirrel hunting took mom's dog just walked a circle killed a few squirrels had a big time and And my youngest daughter had never even squirrel hunted. And I told my wife then, I said, something's got to change. I said, missed way too much. I said, things have got to slow down. I said, there's got to be more of this. I've always loved riding, loved breaking animals. Been able to get back to that. But that contentment, I mean, this is circled back around. But that's, you can't put a price on that. yeah for sure i mean dad now is fighting cancer you know that he just kind of found out november uh he's doing good right now they're real good right now but when all that happened and i was able to look back on you know the last five six years and be like you know i i haven't taken it for granted every time we went we're out you know doing something besides working I mean I've enjoyed it and now looking back on it it's like I mean you can see what God kind of lined up for you but it's been yeah it's been quite a journey yeah yeah yeah yeah and our not to bring up everything bad going on but our dad was diagnosed with Lewy Body's dementia yeah almost three years ago now. Going on four. Going on four years. Almost four. And it seems, I hate to say it, but it seems like one bad thing after another just happened. But boy, it puts things in perspective. Yeah. Makes you think about the things that he told you. Oh, yeah. That's the reason this, I mean, yeah, I got a lot of laughs out of it. out of it and everything, but it brought up a lot of good memories. I mean, don't get me wrong. We've always had it good. Oh, yeah. I mean, not knowing any better. Not knowing any better. I mean, we didn't know when we was kids how tough it probably really was. What our fathers and mothers went through because we didn't know that we didn't have anything. looking back on it I mean we had don't get me wrong we had a lot but yeah I can remember being like an early teenager 13, 14 years old or whatever coming home from school one day and mom said oh so and so had a heart attack and I was like well what happened to him and she said I think it was just stress and I was like what and she said he was just stressed out and I said what's that mean? what does that mean? and it wasn't anything to do with me it was everything to do with the two people that raised me I never heard the word stress I never heard them say man I'm stressed out this is going wrong that's going wrong I mean they were trying to raise two kids my sister was born with a hole in her heart and that's a whole other podcast I mean she's a miracle still alive today they dealt with that but they never talked about being stressed out or it's so bad they weren't victims of no sir it was just life it was just life and how we dealt with it how they dealt with it and I'm so thankful for that I mean looking back on it now I can look back on it and be like you know everybody didn't have the mom and daddy that I did. I mean, it's just plain and simple. Everybody didn't, but I sure am glad I did. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Well, that's why this was, it was, uh, I mean, you know, this podcast obviously is focusing on this logging thing, but you're seeing behind it to see little pictures into you guys' family. And, and that, that's something I'd noticed right away when I, got to know you guys which i hadn't known you my whole life i mean i don't know five or six years ago kaylin we met um but no y'all really do have something really really special and i mean your families are strong believers i knew that right away which was unique and then yeah just the the the history that you guys have and and where y'all live and I mean, I got a cool story and I'm glad we found a way to kind of share it. And we're kind of just getting started because next episode's all about your dad. And it's really good. This whole episode, I actually, the way I build these is you kind of just like, I don't see the whole thing when I start. I mean, even when I'm like have done all the interviews, I come back here and I listen to every episode. I mean, every interview. And I had like two and a half hours of talking between at your house with your dad and then our stuff at the global headquarters. And so I just I listen to the whole thing and I just pull out the pieces that I'm just like, that's interesting. I want that in there. I don't know where it's going to fit. And so I started pulling out pieces and stacking them together in like little bricks and blocks. And the whole time I was thinking, okay, this is all going to Teddy. You know, we got to introduce Teddy. And, you know, I like built this whole episode and we hadn't even talked to him yet. And it just, you know, and I did that because it was good. I just kept stacking stuff on top of stuff. But that's good, though, because next episode will be. And I'm glad you got him. Yeah. You got him going. Well. I mean, we've talked about it for years, like with Hillard, our other Uncle Hillard. That's right. Why didn't somebody have a tape recorder when he started? I mean, I've got like an eight or ten minute video that Hillard doesn't know. He don't know what I got on my phone. Yeah. Just because one day I just happened to be like, oh, here's my chance. And I've got a couple different ones of Dad and Frankidale together, talking about the old times. Oh, do you really? You bet. Like, sitting in a truck, sitting down to eat lunch, and I would purposely get them going, and I'd hit record on my phone. Really? I've got a couple different 20-minute. And one of them's a good one. But everybody said for years, it'd be like, like with Grandma? why didn't somebody record that well can i tell them about hillard when we went over there yeah is that okay so there there ted it's it's confusing i've been around enough i know the story now but teddy and eddie their dads have an older brother named hillard and he is the oldest living brother there's another brother that's older but but hillard is 87 87 still alive still in incredible health and kalen last year sometime two years ago said uncle hillard i've got a buddy that would like to come interview you and talk to you about we're going to talk about because no he grew up on the buffalo yeah we're going to talk about buffalo river when we did buffalo river episodes and anyway i end up going over there and meeting with him and we put these stinking headsets on him and i did with no we clay did i warned you about that before we got there i know the thing was is that we i felt like i had some rapport with him i mean i'd talked to him and he was warmed up and he was just seemed to be enjoying himself and then i was like man hey let's let's go ahead and do this and put this this headset on him and it was like something shifted. Like putting a muzzle on a dog. And he turned to Kalen and he just said, hey, I don't want to do this. And anyway, it was a shame. And I was just like, hey, no problem. I don't want you to feel uncomfortable. I mean, he's just a... Hillard's 87, but he's probably 50 years behind the times in terms of just his knowledge of... I mean, he's like a guy that you plucked out of the 1940s. You had a long conversation with him after you took the headsets back on. Well, yeah, we took the headsets off and then talked about all the things we wanted to talk about. He had no problem telling me and just talking to us, but he just didn't want to be recorded. He just was like, I just don't want to be recorded. I mean, yeah, so it's not like we hadn't tried to get Hillard. Now, Hillard's younger brother, also your uncle, Willard, he loves to be recording. I don't want to make it sound like he loves to be recording. But just today, this year, there's going to be a film that comes out about our bear camp. And we made sorghum. I'll show y'all a clip of it. Nobody's seen it, but anyway, you're going to get to see Hillard Valines, which is y'all's uncle. Willard. Willard. Willard, excuse me. Willard the Lions. Junior Willard. And a.k.a. Sonny Boy. Sonny Boy. Yeah, that's what everybody knows him as, is Sonny Boy. But so anyway, yeah, a lot of tie-ins with you guys. I mean, getting to know you guys has been just incredible. I mean, it's been a lot of fun. And then our other buddy, my buddy, Justin House, is like y'all's little brother. Yep. Who's become a good friend of mine. Sometimes. We all just gang up and whoop him, though. My youngest daughter and I are going over to his house He won't even listen to this So we can say whatever we want My youngest daughter and I are going to his house on Sunday We're going to ride mules Oh really? Yep So anyway, thank you guys We've been going This has been a long render Well, thanks a lot And anything else? Keep the wild place wild Check out the Real Bear Grease Instagram Real Bear, yeah, we have a new Instagram channel page too i forgot to say that yep yep see if we can get hillard vlans to like us on instagram if the wild place is wild because that's where the bears live hey if you're in or around milwaukee wisconsin and you live for hunting season you need to swing by the Meat Eater store in Milwaukee. We're stocked wall to wall with the gear we actually use in the field. First light, FHF gear, Phelps game calls, and more. You'll find us at the corners of Brookfield. Whether you're gearing up for the season, dialing in a setup, or just want to talk shop with people who love to hunt, this is your place. That's the Meat Eater store Milwaukee at the corners of Brookfield. Stop in, get dialed, and get after it. This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human.