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Speaker 1: From Meat Eaters World News headquarters in Bozeman, Montana. This is Col’s Week in Review with Ryan cow Callahan. Here’s cal Georgia. Game wardens patrolling a creek in Wilkes County noticed something last month you don’t see every day in the woods. A man holding an old style crank telephone. For you younger listeners, these phones were made from a wooden box about the size of a milk jug. They had a speaker you held to your ear, a microphone to talk into, and a crank handle on one side. When you wanted to make a call, you’d rotate that crank, which would generate a current that would signal the switchboard officer and a woman named Dorothy or Ethel or MAVs would connect your call. In this case, the Spellow wasn’t standing in the creek trying to get in touch with Ethel. He was using that alternating current to electroshockfish. When the wardens approached him, he tried to walk away and then chucked the telephone in the creek. Wardens were able to recover the unorthodox fishing implement and cited him with shocking fish illegally. Believe it or not, this was a pretty common fishing technique in the South in the forties and fifties. It was even used by professionals. According to a nineteen sixty eight article published in the journal the Progressive Fish Culturist, Biologist in Nebraska used telephones to stun and capture flathead catfish as part of a larger study. The method was banned pretty much everywhere in the nineteen fifties for recreational fishermen, but in nineteen eighty five, four counties in North Carolina legalized the technique to try to reduce the population of invasive catfish species. A twenty eighteen study determined the method didn’t help lower catfish numbers, but I’m sure local antique stores appreciated the influx of anglers. This week, it’s the debut of a brand new segment, Voicemail Bag Desk, Voicemail Desk Listener Mail Audio Version. Yeah, it’s a working title Nova Scotia Update the Crime Desk and so much more of But first, I’m gonna tell you about my week. In my week, well, everywhere I turn is a project that just cannot be kicked down the road any further. I open the freezer, which is a constant source of managerial worry. Logistical worry might be more apt. Freezer turnover is important Gang, especially here into hunting season. Eleven ish twelve days into hunting season. This is the furthest I’ve gone into a hunting season in my entire life without hunting a single day. Yeah, it’s a crazy world, Gang, crazy world. In any case, here’s my system. I keep a stand up freezer and a chest freezer. Then there’s the in kitchen freezer attached to the refrigerator, you know, like everybody has. The system goes like this. The chest freezer accommodates bulk processed or unrefined goodies, which is anything from whole quarters, carcasses for stock making, bones, large bags of mixed trim destined for the grinder, roasts, shanks, necks, brazing things, and most of this is in a series of game bags, so it’s separated out and trust me, I know the system. The stand up freezer is much more visually appealing as it’s nicely sectioned out, and there you have your more refined things such as fish filets that should be consumed fast, individual steaks, tenderloins. This is where the beautiful and coveted ducts go when I have them, the sausages, and the occasional trophy oddball bit like a bison tongue or cheek meat or something that I like to think on for a special occasion. The inn kitchen freezer gets the weeks worth of protein and maybe an extra bag of burger or a sausage or something for in a pinch meal. Well, I open the stand up freezer and there’s this bag that I put there, and I can’t remember why, and I look and it’s two whole chopped up turkey carcasses, which I then remembered I didn’t have enough time or ran out of jars to get these things canned in the spring, so I better do it now. And then upon further investigation, there’s a bag with the ruptured seal that’s about thirty pounds of meat, probably mix a deer an elk, destined for the grinder. I think I put it there as a reminder that it needs to get done. And underneath it is a shallow box of deer elk and antelope parts and tongues that somebody’s got to do something with, and some gun. There’s a package of five goose breasts that also has a hole in it, and one already has a little spot of freezer burn, so it’s coming home. Currently, as I write this, the second to final batch of stock has just come off it’s fifteen pound rattle and is hissing its way to stability. When that’s all said and done, I’ll have fifty pints of gorgeous dark stock, fortified with several gallon ziplock bags I found full of turkey hearts, testicles, gizzards and livers, plus one bottle of grossly over sweet white wine and all the vegetables I thought would go bad if they didn’t go in the pot. One slow cooker on the counter has all five goose breasts, and lo and behold, someone didn’t properly identify its contents by taking the time to create a label, and they are not raw, unadultered Canada steaks, but beautifully corned, perfectly pinkish red brind and screaming to be made into hash or ruben sandwich. Is not the barbecue meat I was thinking about. It’s just as good, but a reminder that I don’t learn. The other slow cooker has all the tongues and it’s cooling for taco meat, and the grinder is already cleaned, and the bags have been stuffed and have made a return trip to the stand up freezer. That grind also contains all the hearts that were in that stockpile. And what I think is, let’s say about a five percent mix of pork fat courtesy as some pork belly that was in the kitchen freezer. Now, all this is work. I enjoy it, and I do wonder if that’s the reason I can never truly get organized. I secretly love the on the fly approach and chaos of doing it all at once. I’ll tell you stock making is a good time to call your representative as well as your senator and leave a comment at the Federal Register dot gov that roadless rule clock is ticking gang. A few months ago, we were fighting back against the all out sale of our public lands. Now, folks who don’t know the value of our remaining and unfortunately dwindling wild lands are trying to dismantle it through mismanagement. This is the place that this abundance of food comes from, and these folks who are out of touch with where food comes from are trying to render these places valueless through mismanagement or sloppy management. Are you going to let that happen? You have a story to tell about why these places are special to you. These people need to hear it. They obviously do not know. The last day to comment on the recision of the roadless rule is the nineteenth fifty eight million acres Friends and neighbors fifty eight and a half. Don’t let them take it. Our friends over at on X have a roadless layer you can turn on which clearly shows where these designated roadless areas are. Backcountry Hunters and Anglers has a great map and action center you can utilize to leave a comment. A Wilderness Society has a great map. TRCP has great stuff. Seeing is believing, And don’t forget to mention about the Land and Water Conservation Fund. All that cash that excise tax paid by offshore oil and gas is our number one funding tool to get access to existing public land through easements or to create new public land. There’s more of us. This stuff’s running out. If I need to remind you of my shit bespackled border Collie because the trailheads around bos Angelus so darn busy and people can’t bury their poop. What you need to do. Please bury your poop, flip a rock. At least that’s a good sign that we’re aching for more, because concentrating us all at a couple of trailheads is no bueno. Make those calls, send those letters. I believe in you. You can do it. You can’t do it all lie long. Moving on to the first ever voicemail bag desk. Two weeks ago, I told you about a new call in number where you can leave a message to let me know what’s going on in your neck of the woods. That number, once again is four oh six two two zero six four four one. You can call in and leave a message or text a voice memo to that number. Jimmy from California called in with a question about dear numbers on the West Coast.
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Speaker 2: Hey, cal I just heard about calling in, leaving a voice and mesage on your podcast Call of the Wild. My name is Jimmy. I’m a hunter, a new hunter from California. I had a question declining deer populations out wet, especially blacktail deer in California. Just wanted to hear your thoughts on the situation, some of the causes, some of the possible solutions, I’ve heard everything from habitat loss to larger fare numbers, mountain lion numbers could be affecting the overall deer population, and I’d just like you to kind of weigh out all the different things you think are affecting it and then suggest solutions.
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Speaker 1: Thanks for giving it, Alza, thanks for the voicemail. Jimmy, You’re in luck because the brand spank New Blacktail Deer Foundation just published an article about this exact topic. They report that after steep declines in the nineties, the blacktail population in the Golden State has actually remained relatively stable over the past few years. Annual harvest numbers range from twenty six thousand to forty thousand since two thousand and one. Of course, a specific herd or region can decline due to drought or cold, and I’m sure there are blacktail hunters in California who will be surprised to learn the population is actually doing all right. But the California Department of Fish and Wildlife launched a large scale study from twenty fifteen to twenty twenty across five regions. They set out to get a better estimate of blacktail deer numbers using fecal DNA surveys, trail cameras, road counts, and helicopter flights. What they found is that blacktail deer are incredibly resilient. They’ve managed to adapt to drought, wildfire’s, habitat fragmentation, and increased human presence. In spite of all these challenges, they’ve maintained a relatively stable statewide population, which should be enough to make you love this mule deer species even more. Just like the multi pronged approach they did in that population study, right, they didn’t just use one thing. Declines or increases in populations they’re never a result of just one factor. And that predation factor that you mentioned that is absolutely a factor in certain areas, and where it’s a factor in certain areas is probably an area that has drought happening as well as habitat loss, which then exacerbates the impact of the predator population. Not a lot of people notice the predators when the populations kick an ass. Remember so, if you have questions or a comment you’d like to hear on the show, call in four oh six two two zero six four four one and leave me a message that number once again, four oh six two two zero six four four one onto the Breaking into the Woods disc an update to the Nova Scotia hiking band. We covered a couple weeks ago. A feisty hiker recently walked into the woods in full view of Department of Natural Resources staff for the express purpose of being cited for a violation and receiving a twenty eight thousand dollars fine. For those of us down south of the border, that’s just over twenty thousand dollars US. This is not an effort by scofflaw Jeff Evely to generously donate to the DNR. Instead, he brought on the violation to earn legal standing to challenge the hiking ban in court. In twenty twenty three, Evely tried to bring a suit against Nova Scotia’s Natural Resource Minister for a hiking ban put in place that year, but a judge declared that Evily had no legal standing to bring the suit. The band was already over by the time he sued, and there had been no legal action against him that he could contest. Well. Now Evely has brought on some concrete legal action that he and the legal advocacy backing him, the Justice Center for Constitutional freedoms planned to use for a new lawsuit as an aside. And this is no comment either way on the aims of this advocacy org. But you have to love the names of these outfits on both sides. I think I’ll start a similar group called Col’s Real Good Law Center at the amazingly kick Ass Policy Foundation. Anyway, as a refresher, Nova Scotia declared a ban on entering the woods in early August in an effort to prevent further forest fires during Canada’s second worst fire season on record. Although fires have traditionally been a problem confined to the western part of the country, the Prairie provinces and Atlantic Coast have seen some of the worst blazes this year. Nearby New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador have similar restrictions on entering the woods. Although fires in Nova Scotia were fairly quiet when Evily committed this act of civil disobedience on August eighth. A new fire named zero six Dash zero zero seven Dash to zero twenty five began on August thirteenth and is now out of control. As this riding in early September, it’s covering eight thousand, four to sixty five hectares, or just under twenty one thousand acres, which is over half the size of the city of Washington, d C. There are currently two hundred and fifty nine active fires across Canada, thirty one of which are uncontrolled, and so far this year, there have been a hopping four seven hundred and fifty eight fires that have consumed nineteen and a half million acres, about half the size of Florida. I’m about two mines on this one. You know, I’m going both directions. It’s true that ninety seven percent of Canadian forest fires are human caused, and recent fires have been catastrophic, way beyond the natural, healthy levels of fire that forests need. Although you can warn people not to light camp fires, set off fireworks, or use machinery in the woods, those things happen consistently when people are out there on their own. As Ken McMullen, president of the Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs, told the CBC quote, I know that this might appear inconvenient. I understand that it might seem over the top. The reality is desperate times call for desperate measures. On the other hand, keeping people in hiking boots and camelbacks from accessing the outdoors every summer and fall for the foreseeable future is not realistic. We’ll keep you up to date on Evely’s case and the fate of Canada’s hiking bands. Let us know which side of this debate you come down on by writing in to Askcal at the meat eater dot com. Moving on to the crime desk, a hunting influencer has been charged with two felonies and six misdemeanors for poaching a deer and a mountain lion and lying about where he shot a wolf in Idaho last year. Ryan Lampers, who you may know as Stealthy Hunter on Instagram, is being accused of felony, gram theft, and unlawfully killing and possessing a trophy class mule dear buck. According to an affidavid and criminal complaint obtained by Meat Eater, Lampers shot a trophy class mule deer buck in the wrong unit and after the season had already ended. The buck scored one seventy five and four eights, which bumps that crime up to a felony. He also allegedly killed a mountain lion in the wrong unit and then lied to the Idaho Department of Fishing Game about where he killed the animal. Finally, he shot a wolf last year in Big Game Management Unit twenty one and then claimed to have shot it in Big Game Management Unit twenty eight. This is important because reimbursement rates for wolves change based on the unit. Their reimbursement rate for Unit twenty eight is two thousand dollars, and Lamper’s got to check for that amount from the Foundation for Wildlife Management, a nonprofit that pays hunters for harvesting wolves in Idaho and Montana. But where he actually shot the wolf, according to game wardens, would have earned him only seven hundred and fifty bucks. The state says this amounts to stealing twelve fifty, which is why he’s being charged with felony grant theft. We’ll see where this case goes from here. A lot of you probably knew Lampers from his hunting videos, and a lot of us here at Meat Eater had interactions with him at one point or another. These stories can really change as the details come out, but right now it looks like O’Ryan is in a lot of trouble. His next hearing is scept for September twenty two. I definitely have some commentary on this one. I’m not sidestepping the subject. This guy had a really good reputation as far as I am aware. I know several folks that call Ryan a friend, and by all accounts, was a nice, nice guy. So there’s enough here that he definitely did some screwing up. There’s enough here that definitely implies it was probably more than just screwing up, but intentional. September twenty two not that long to wait, though, so I’m gonna check back in after that date and give you the full mcgilla. In other newness, here in my home state of Montana, someone shout a mule with your fun in the hind quarters and then left it to waste on the billings Rodden Gun Club Archery Range. Game wardens believe the animal was shot about a week ago and it still had an arrow coming out of it. I don’t have any more details for you as this recording. It sounds to me like the fawn wandered onto the range and someone thought it would be funny to take a shot at it. I suppose it could have been some kind of accident. Maybe somebody had taken a longer shot and they should have or errow skipped or whatever, and the critter being in the wrong place at the wrong time. But remember one of the tenants of hunter safety right identify your target and what’s beyond. I don’t know whatever happened. The person who did this should come forward. I’m sure you’re feeling bad enough already. Last one for you. A huge case in Nebraska is sending one poacher to the federal clink for twenty two months. Forty six year old dust And Noble was convicted of organizing at least one hundred and fourteen illegal hunts with friends, family, and clients to poach a wide range of animals, including mule deer, prong horned whitetail, and turkey. Federal prosecutors presented evidence that Nobyle used thermal optics, shot animals from a road at night or during a close season, and one hundred private land without the knowledge or permission to the landowner. These tactics allowed him and his clients to poach sixty one mule deer, thirty three wild turkey’s, four prong horned, three white tail deer, an American alligator, a timber rattlesnake, and approximately twelve up game birds, migratory non game birds, game fish, and fur bearing or non game animals. He ran a foul of the Federal Asia Act because some of his clients were from out of state, and he ran a taxidermy business where I assume he shipped illegally taken mounts outside of Nebraska. Along with a well deserved prison sentence, Noble will pay one hundred and seventy nine thousand, six hundred and eighty dollars in restitution and spent three years on supervised release after prison, jumping over to Arkansas. Difficult news at Arkansas this week, where seventy two year old Vernon Patten has suffered fatal injuries after being attacked by a black bear in Franklin County on September three. Although he survived the initial attack, his family has now moved him to hospice care. According to CBS Channel five News, Patten had been spreading gravel at his property in ozark when he was attacked without provocation by a seventy pound juvenile black bear. He was airlifted to Fayetteville Hospital before being transferred to the University of Arkansas Hospital in Little Rock, Arkansas. Game and fish wardens were able to track and euthanize the bear after Patent’s son witnessed the attack, and biopsies of brain tissue reveal that the bear was not infected with rabies or distemper, diseases that can cause unusual and aggressive behavior. Hard to overstate how rare an attack like this is. AGFC official Trey Reid said quote, I’ve been at the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission for almost twenty years, and I’ve never heard of a black bear attack on a human, an unprovoked attack. It’s just unheard of. Honestly unheard of, is the right way to put it. For perspective, about two hundred people are struck by lightning every year, and about twenty of them die. In contrast, research has shown that only about one or two people are killed by black bears every year, and all of those deaths are caused by full grown adults. Non fatal attacks are much more common at about twelve per year, and are typically caused by female bears protecting their cubs, while fatal encounters are almost always predatory attacks by males. All this tells us that the odds of being killed by juvenile black bear make winning the powerball look like an everyday thing. Unsurprisingly, bears habituated to human food have more run ends with people, and the bear who killed Patent did have human food in its stomach. The reason Ursus Americanus is such a relatively safe carnivore has everything to do with the habitat it evolved in by allis. Steven Herrero, the leading authority on bear attacks, has consistently observed black bears stayed close to trees throughout their life cycle, and in fact, the species originally spread throughout North America in the dense boreal forests that took root after glaciers retreated at the end of the last ice age. Herrero therefore concludes that a black bear’s first response to danger is to simply retreat up a tree. Brown bears, in contrast, evolved in the open plains of Eurasia and continued to prefer that habitat in North America, with nowhere safe to retreat to, the grizzlies first response to a threat is therefore to attack. Although brown bear cubs can climb trees by the time they’re adults, grizzlies have a lot of time moving that freight up something tall and skinny, but if you can dream it, you can do it. The location of the attack that killed Vernon Patten is notable too. Starting in the eighteen forties, Arkansas became known as the Bear State, named for the density of bears there and the stories of bear hunting that became popular in hunting magazines of the time. Because the Mississippi Delta region of the state underwent uncontrolled flooding well into the late eighteen hundreds, it was one of the list remaining forest regions in the South after most others underwent clearcut logging. Still, by the late twenties, black bears had been extirpated from the region, with as few as thirty five bears remaining in the entire state. Then, between nineteen fifty eight nineteen sixty eight, black bears were brought into the state from Minnesota and Manitoba, Canada, in what became the most successful reintroduction of a large carnivore in history. Contemporary estimates put the number of black bears in Arkansas at around five thousand and steadily growing. Vernon Patten’s family put out a statement in response to his death, this has been an extraordinarily difficult time for our family, and we are deeply grateful for the outpouring of support we have received. We asked that people show compassion and consideration as we focus on being together as a family for as long as we still can. We also want to extend our heartfelt thanks to the medical teams who are providing exceptional care and to everyone who has offered their prayers and kindness. That’s all I got for you this week. Thank you so much for listening. Remember to write in to Askcl’s Mascal atmediator dot com or you can call four six two two zero six four four one and maybe you can hear yourself on this here podcast. And just a parting shot for you, gang, please help defend the last of the wild places by pushing back against the recision of the roadless rule. There is a lot of room to meet in the middle on this stuff, if only people wanted to do it. If we don’t, I’m gonna be reading an article talking about the extirpation of hunters in America. That’s not an inflammatory statement. You aren’t gonna find this hunter out on a game farm somewhere where things are more certain than they are out in the great wild, all right, Get on it. I believe in you. Thanks again, I’ll talk to you next week.
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