September 8, 2025 • 31 mins
This week, Cal talks about a not very big but very wise lake trout, why we need to demand better management for our public lands right now, and so much more.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
From Meat Eaters World News headquarters in Bozeman, Montana. This
is Cow's Week in Review with Ryan cow Calahan. Here's
cal A sixty two year old fish pulled from Lake
Superior is thought to be the oldest ever lake trout
caught in the Great Lakes. The fish, which researchers dubbed
(00:31):
Mary Catherine, was collected at Klondike Reef in Autumn twenty
twenty three by researchers with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.
It's not a giant at just under five pounds, but
what it lacks in size, I'm sure it makes up
for an experience. Lake trout live a pretty long time
for fish, with average life spans measuring twenty five to
(00:51):
thirty years, but Mary Catherine doubled the average and is
believed to have hatched around the year nineteen sixty one.
For the youngsters there, that was the year JFK became president,
the Berlin Wall began construction, and the first man orbited
the Earth. Researchers estimated Mary's age by counting the number
of rings visible on the fish's odolith or earstone. That's
(01:15):
a fancy name for a calsum carbonate structure in the
inner ear like bone. This structure grows through the years
of a fish's life and produces rings that look like
the rings on a tree stump. After counting those rings
under a microscope, biologists determined that Mary Catherine lived through
the First Man on the Moon, the civil rights movement,
all nine seasons of Seinfeld, and the dawn of the Internet.
(01:37):
Was quite a life for that old fish, even if
she was blissfully unaware of all the changes happening on
the surface above her. Nice little reminder that it's not
all about length. Experience has something to do with it too.
I was at a pool, I was this week. We've
got agency politics, not so public land but new Land,
(02:01):
Japanese bears, and so much more of it. First, I'm
gonna tell you about my week, and my week, well,
my head's just spinning, staring at the calendar. I'm roughly
a month behind where I should be. Heck, I should
just be consumed with nothing but chasing grouse and partridge
with old snort and chasing buglen bowls up a steep
train with my bow and beer belly. But instead here
(02:24):
I sit, And because sit sounds loud like shit, listen
up people, bury your poop, flip a big rock over,
do your business and cover it completely at the bare minimum.
You know how many people use these areas. I know
you do because you complain about it. So be courteous
(02:45):
and cover up your feces. My girlfriend's long haired border
Collie is gorgeous, myrtle coloration boy, and he thinks he's
especially stunning covered in your effluent. I should and can
go into detail, but it's horrible. Old snort a dog
who I admit occasionally slips me the tongue inside my mouth.
(03:09):
Ate your poop. The other day, it was opening day
of bird season, and we were out not carrying a shotgun,
doing my nice boyfriend duty of spending quality time before
I get real busy chasing critters. And you do me
the discourtesy of surface pooping. That's just a kick to
the sack, bud. Here. I have an amazing bird dog
(03:32):
and an arsenal of scattered guns, and we weren't even
out there quote unquote competing with you on opening day
and you literally pooped in our mouths. Poop, shovel and
move on, or shovel and then poop and move on.
Whatever you do, be decent about it. Cripe's almighty, And
(03:52):
speaking of disgusting stuff, let's talk about how our elected
officials are treating our public lance. Yes, this is at
so buckle up or fast forward. If any of you
folks are wearing hats or glasses, best to remove them.
Right now. Two things are going on in conjunction, and
you need to be aware of this. You don't have
(04:13):
to agree on any of it, but you will recognize
how darned, lazy and unbecoming of our shared natural resources.
This is one roadless rule recision. Get to the federal register.
You can find the link at USDA and at Backcountry
Hunters and Anglers and TRCP to comment on this one,
(04:36):
and to the House. As in US House of Representatives
have voted to use the Congressional Review Act to rescind
resource management plans in Alaska, Montana, and Wyoming. Lots of acronyms.
This is going to make a heck of a drinking game,
but it's hunting season. That type of bodily mistreatment will
(04:57):
reserve for the doldrums, which are not hunting season. Listen up,
I'll tell you why this matters and put some of
the bs to bed. Roadless areas fifty eight million acres,
some of which overlaps with existing capital W wilderness protection
about twenty million acres or so, some of which overlaps
with areas that had previously been logged and roaded. Another
(05:20):
nineteen percent, which we'll call about twenty million acres. So
there's eighteen million acres left that has some kind of
in the middle status or in this case we'll just
say it is protected currently by this roadless designation. It's
relatively untouched, and it's spread in bits and pieces from
(05:42):
coast to coast over about forty states, the majority of which, yes,
is in the eleven Western states. All folks are talking
about when we talk about the roadless rule is timber.
We need to cut more wood for affordable housing, and
we need to cut more underbrush and deadfall, and yet
rid of this high heat fuel build up that could
(06:03):
erupt into a catastrophic wildfire. Well, the roadless rule doesn't
really prevent that wildfire management in the urban interface anyway.
That's right. We don't need to manage deep into wilderness
areas because what the hell is it going to burn?
(06:23):
That stuff's been burning naturally or through human cause fire
Long before us white folks ever got out here. So
just leave it the hell alone. It's good for wildlife
on this premise alone. Rolling back the roadless rule is
a classic case of cutting off your nose to spite
your face. Now, green groups have been litigating efforts to
(06:48):
use the roadless Rule as intended, and it's led to
some of this consternation. They sue and sue and screw
up the intention of the rule. Some of the crap
has gotten us to where we are right now. However,
that's something we can fix without removing protections for fifty
(07:09):
eight million acres if folks were willing to sit down
and actually do the work. I've already told you that
this fifty eight million acres is not all the same.
You can't look at one acre in California and say
that is exactly like this one acre in North Carolina.
It is diverse ecosystems we're talking about. It needs to
(07:30):
be managed as such. This is, after all, our public lands.
They're not making any more of them. They're highly, highly valuable.
Why are they not treating them as such? On top
of that, y'all remember Doze right and the big chainsaw,
And we're saving money blah blah blah. Well, guess what
(07:50):
that tinderbox understory the fuels management. We hear about all
that stuff, the mechanical thinning, The humans are going to
get in there and hut away the fire danger. Well,
in order to make that happen, we the taxpayer have
got to pay people to remove that stuff. We don't
have the markets for that stuff to be profitable, such
(08:13):
as maybe paper pulp or woodpell at mills. Those economies
do not exist in close enough proximity to where this
work needs to be done. And right now, nobody is saying, hey,
the federal government is going to come in and pay
for this wildfire mitigation. In fact, the opposite is happening
(08:34):
right now where they're saying, we are going to immediately,
to the best of our ability, put out wildfire as
soon as it starts. Even when those fires are started
naturally and in areas that do not pose risk to
humans or structures. That type of management causes the build
(08:54):
up of catastrophic fire fuel. That's just the truth. I'm
gonna hammer this again. In the case of profitable timber,
marketable timber, which they're telling us we need to have
for affordable housing, even though if you look at the
housing market right now, what we're seeing is drop in
(09:15):
demand and an increase in supply. There are some areas
where there's some really choice timber, marketable timber close enough
to road systems that people do want to go get it,
such as in the Tongas up in Alaska. Stuff would
make some real pretty tubai force and people would make
some money. That is an area that is synonymous with
(09:39):
the roadless rule fight, and it always has been. So
if that's what you're talking about, that's what we need
to talk about. There are concessions that can be made
all over the place, but we need to talk about
those concessions specifically. A lot of this other stuff, like
that eighteen million acre donut hole in the middle of
this conversation I talked about in the very beginning, It
(10:02):
is too far away from roads and too far away
from mills to be marketable. The folks who love running chainsaws,
and I know a lot of these folks, they have
no interest in that stuff because it does not pay
for their fuel, it does not pay for the damage
to equipment, it does not pay for their time. When
we used to cut way deep into the forest, it
(10:24):
was often subsidized by you guessed it, the US government,
we the people. The US government. We the people built
the roads and the loggers followed. So what is this
currently about. What is rolling back the road to this
rule currently about? It's about gaining access to minerals. Possibly.
(10:45):
If that's the case, let's talk about that specifically. What
are the requirements and what is the need for those
mineral deposits? How many acres do you need. Let's quit
swinging the pendulum one way all the way over to
the other side, and then the next administration comes in
and swings it back all the way over to the
(11:06):
other side. The roadless rule is great. We need it.
It's working hard and doing what it's supposed to do
for a hell of a lot of Americans who really
really appreciate it. It provides a little buffer from the
crowds for US hunters and anglers, and anyone, especially in
these eleven western states, can attest that we need a
(11:26):
little buffer. This stuff is getting so busy again. Their
surface poop everywhere, long haired border collie, shell act and
yesterday's corn, the grossness type of busy. Okay, we need
some places where we can get away that stuff. Is
increasingly scarce and increasingly valuable. But if we really need
(11:51):
the mineral deposit or stand of timber, let's do the
seemingly impossible thing and talk about it. Come to the
conclusion that you may need a thousand acres here or there. Okay,
let's figure it out, but it's not fifty eight million.
And if you're really concerned about fire, we can't skip
over the fact that fire coincides with roads. The California megafires, scary,
(12:17):
nasty wall of death, heat that roars and flies like
a freight train going uphill, that type of scary it
overlaps with road access. Pull up your on AX motorized maps.
You can do it yourself. See how those things align.
Fire starts and road access go together. And I'm sorry
to say, boys and girls, this fuel's reduction talk has
(12:39):
been going on my entire life and for my whole life.
Nobody is willing to pay for mechanical thinning and underbrush removal.
So I just don't think we're having a real conversation now.
The Congressional Review Act, which is being used to rescind
management Plans Regional management Plans MPs CRA to our MP,
(13:03):
we talked about this earlier. You can rewrite a management
plan just like you can reform a roadless rule. A
regional management plan takes into account and consideration the stakeholders
at large and dissects the landscape into appropriate levels of
use for those stakeholders based off of that public feedback.
(13:26):
The stakeholders are you and me and every industry that
you can think of, from cattle grazers to conco phillips
and everything in between. This type of input makes sense, correct,
there are public lands. But right now our representatives want
to use the Congressional Review Act CRA, which is a hammer,
(13:49):
a bludgeon, not a fine tipped pencil, to destroy these
publicly facilitated management plans, which were put together not only
with public input, but with the best post possible available science.
And what you need to know is, by law, all
the good things in that RMP and the bad things
(14:10):
cannot be used again. That language can legally not be
used again. So even though let's put together right now
with the best input and the best science, if the RMP,
the Regional Management Plan is destroyed through use of the
Congressional Review Act, whenever this stuff settles down, we cannot
(14:31):
revert back to any of the good parts in that RMP,
even if it's in the best interest of extractive use, cattle, grazers, hunters, anglers,
you name it. This is lazy, lazy stuff, lazy management
for a very complicated landscape. We just cannot be okay
(14:54):
or absent from this conversation. If we won't care, who will.
This is America, after all, you can have your cake
and eat it too. Didn't we just come out of
this stuff with those gang weren't we screaming about waste
and fraud and abuse and government overreach. Well, let's not stop.
Let's talk about the laziness and absenteeism and lack of stewardship.
(15:18):
This is all we got. And through the decision of
the roadless Rule and the use of the Congressional Review
Act to beat to death our regional management plans, we
as the people, are losing, not winning. We are literally
telling our elected officials, hey, why don't you take some
personal days? You've earned it. Vague and broad and sloppy
(15:40):
is good enough with us. We're happy with broad strokes
and no actual management or care for our very complicated
public estate. I know you're not that type of person
because you're listening to this here podcast. Go to the
Federal Register dot gov. Leave a comment on the recision
of the roadless rule. Call up the Capital Square Board
(16:00):
and tell your representatives and senators that this is just
not good enough. Do better. You wouldn't be happy with
this approach to your non native, water sucking green suburban lawn,
so why would you roll over and say it's okay
for a great and finite American public lands. Get involved.
(16:22):
If you're not advocating for yourself, somebody else will. Moving
on to the Texas Desk, great things are happening down
in Texas where the Centennial Parks Conservation Fund has started
to acquire and develop land to turn into new state parks.
Back in twenty twenty three, public lands in Texas took
(16:43):
a hit when the state says lost but sold off
eighteen hundred acre Fairfield Lake State Park, which was cited
on least land private power company that owned the parcel
sold to a developer and once you know what, that
developer turned the park into a golf course and luxury community,
which God knows we need more of. Losing Fairfield Lake
(17:04):
woke Texans up to the fact that seventeen in the
state's eighty eight parks also sit on leased land that
could be sold out from under them at any time.
That little fire for voters to approve Prop. Fourteen, which
allocated one billion dollars of budget surplus to a fund
that buys private land and develops it into publicly accessible
state parks. Already, the Centennial Parks Conservation Fund has purchased
(17:28):
three properties for a total of sixty two hundred new acres.
Two of those parcels will become the new Post Oak
Ridge State Park northwest of Austin, and the third will
add three thousand acres to the existing Enchanted Rock State
Natural Area about an hour's drive to the south. The
Centennial Parks Conservation Fund also allocates money to developing the
(17:50):
park's studying which animal species live on the parcels, figuring
out where to put the trails, and building the roads,
visitors centers, bathrooms, and maintenance areas. All the la less
sexy stuff that allows people to do the hiking, fishing,
bird watching, stargazing, and fresh air inhaling that are the
main attractions. Texas can definitely use all the parks you
(18:11):
can get. The state comes in thirty fifth in the
nation for state park acres per capita, and only around
one percent of its land is publicly accessible federal land.
I'm looking forward to seeing a lot more acres open
up down there. And hey, I know a lot of
Texans who own land. Listen to this show, so listen up.
If you have a few thousand acres in Texas you're
looking to unload, get in touch with the Texas Parks
(18:33):
and Wildlife Department and see if you can make a deal.
We'll still get a hangout on the land, and your
neighbors will too. On top of that, the meat eater
land access Initiative is about to ride again. We'd be
happy to help with securing public access through easement, purchase,
or any other type of agreement as long as we
(18:53):
get more huntble acres or fishaboll acres ideally both for
the public. Moving on to the fawn desk, the Kentucky
Department of Fish and Wildlife is dealing with blowback after
agency officials euthanized twenty two white tail fawnds that had
been illegally housed at a wildlife rescue facility. The animals
(19:15):
had been rescued from counties designated as CWD surveillance zones.
Kentucky law states that deer cannot be rehabilitated if found
in these zones, but the Broadbent Wildlife Refuge had taken
them in anyway. It's unclear whether they did so knowingly
or this was an honest mistake, but whatever the reason,
the Kentucky Wildlife Agency determined that these animals would need
(19:35):
to be euthanized to prevent the spread of CWD. It's
been a tough pill to swallow for employees and volunteers
at the rescue facility, who have told local media that
the animals did not show symptoms of the disease. These
fonds had been bottle fed by staffers, and I can
understand why those folks would be upset. To those unfamiliar
with the CWD issues, it seems like wildlife officials could
(19:57):
have found another way to deal with this situation. I
don't know if that's true, but the conversation on social
media has developed in exactly the ways you'd expect. Listener
Ethan Pugh wrote in to tell me that people have
been using ted nugent as a source to claim that
state wildlife agencies invented CWD, as a pretext for killing deer.
I've listened to Uncle Ted speculate that CWD is a
(20:19):
government conspiracy meant to reduce the food supply in the
United States, and it seems like that particular theory has
made its way to Kentuck. Others have compared the situation
to Peanut, the squirrel squirrel in New York that was
euthanized after someone illegally captured him and was keeping him
as a pet. Peanut also happened to be a social
media star, so I'm sure his owners weren't at all
(20:41):
motivated by money, but just by a love of squirrels. Anyway.
The reason wildlife officials have such strict rules around deer
movement is because CWD is an always fatal neurological disease.
The problem is, there isn't a good anti mortem test,
meaning a test that can tell you whether an animal
has while it's still alive and not killing it. The
(21:04):
only reliable way to determine whether that critter has CWD
and how much is to kill the animal and test
its brain or spinal material, including the lymphnotes. That's why
wildlife officials in many states, not just Kentucky, call it
entire herds of deer rather than risk one of those
deer being infected and spreading the disease to other parts
(21:24):
of the state. It's a tough dilemma, but until there's
a reliable anti mortem test, we don't have any good
options in situations like these. As a side note, put
as much hurt on those white tails as you can,
especially in areas where they start competing with the noble
mule deer, which is very much hurting this day and age.
(21:45):
Moving on to the Wildlife commission desk, the Washington and
New Mexico Wildlife Commissions have been mired in turmoil in
recent weeks, and I'm here to give you all the
gory details. First. In Washington, governor has ordered an investigation
into the conduct of Wildlife Commission members after the Sportsmen's
(22:05):
Alliance revealed potential evidence of wrongdoing. The hunting rights organization
got their hands on emails and other messages between members
of the Commission ahead of a controversial vote in twenty
twenty two to end the spring bear hunt. The messages
appeared to show the commissioners violating the Open Public Meetings
Act by agreeing amongst themselves on a decision about the
(22:26):
bear hunt before having an official public meeting. According to
a petition filed by the Sportsmen's Alliance, the commissioners would
meet in groups of three or four, then send one
or two representatives to lobby other commissioners. This created a
wall of support while skirting Washington's legal requirement that a
majority of members be present to constitute a meeting. The
(22:47):
petition reads quote, this is the very definition of a
political cabal flouting the public strong interest in transparent government.
When you read these thousands of pages as we have,
it is beyond obvious that this practice was a well
honed routine among Baker, lemcool Rowland, Smith, and former Commissioner Reagan.
(23:08):
We see often don't reply here and other devices deployed
to encourage daisy chaining as the preferred method to avoid
the Open Public Meetings Act. The result, unfortunately, is that
the actual commission meetings are clearly nothing more than a sham,
with a preordained decision well in hand before the public
is invited or allowed to participate in any meaningful way.
(23:31):
The current commissioners named in the petition are Barbara Baker,
Lorna Smith, Melanie Rowland, and John Lemcool In light of
these allegations, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife Director Kelly
suswind requested Governor Bob Ferguson to launch an independent investigation.
Sus Winn said in a letter that he cannot operate
his department with a quote cloud of uncertainty created by
(23:54):
the current controversy. The governor agreed to investigate, but it's
unclear what changes, if any, will result. A similar situation
is playing out down in New Mechs, but the sides
are reversed. Their Governor, Michelle Luhan Grisham, removed District two
Game Commissioner Sabrina Pack from her seat last month, citing
a conflict of interest. The decision came just one day
(24:16):
after The Western Watershed Project published emails between Pack and
the president of the New Mexico Cattle Growers Association. In
these emails, Pack, who was also a media professional, was
advising the cattleman about a public relations campaign aimed at
shifting public sentiment around wolves. This campaign was meant to
quote elevate the voices of rural New Mexicans and others
(24:38):
living with the consequences of federal wolf management, shifting public
awareness and driving more balanced policy conversations across state and
national audiences. That doesn't sound so bad, but Governor Grisham
apparently thinks that a disqualified Pack from helping craft wildlife
policies in the state. I should note here that the
Cattleman's Association did not ultimately choose packs agency to help
(25:01):
them with their campaign. It's also true that wolves in
New Mexico are managed by the federal government, not by
the state Game Commission, so it's unlikely that Pack actually
broke any laws or had any actual conflict of interest
on any of the decisions that she made. Still, the
optics aren't great, and there's nothing she can do to
(25:21):
challenge the governor's decision. Now, jumping over to another topic
that's near and dear to my heart, charismatic gallinacious birds.
That's right, we're back to the prairie chicken. Seems like
every week brings another Endangered Species Act controversy, and this
week is no exception. A Texas District judge recently vacated
(25:42):
the ESA listing of the lesser prairie chicken, which had
been protected under the Act since twenty twenty two. This
species has been in political football for quite a while now,
It was first settled in twenty fourteen, before losing protections
after a twenty fifteen lawsuit. The lesser prairie chicken ruffles
so many feathers because its habitat covers much of the
(26:02):
Permian Basin, the highest producing oil field in the US,
as well as prime grassland that ranchers graze their cattle on.
The lawsuits challenging the listing were led by energy groups,
rancher organizations, and the states of Texas, Kansas, and Oklahoma,
all of whom worry that ESA protections for the lesser
prairie chicken would cripple extraction and cattle operations. Remember the
(26:25):
cattle operations part. We've covered this before. We're going to
get back to it. Lesser prairie chickens definitely face long
odds no matter what. They won't nest around any tall
structures that remind them too much of the trees that
hold their natural predators like hawks and eagles. And this
goes for both windmills and oil derricks and high tension
power lines. Although industry groups and landowners say they've been
(26:47):
pursuing conservation strategies like shorter oil extraction equipment, conservation organizations
say it's not nearly enough. Ironically, the listing was struck
down due to part of the twenty twenty two decision
that actually protected fewer prairie chickens US Fish and wildlife
under the Biden administration divided the species into two populations.
(27:07):
It designated the northern group, living in central and western Kansas,
central Oklahoma, and Northeast Texas as just quote threatened a
lower level of protection. The southern group in New Mexico
and Southwest Texas had the higher endangered protections. Once the
Trump administration took over Fish and Wildlife, the agency said
(27:28):
that the decision to split the population into two parts
was so flawed that it invalidates the whole listing, and
David Counts, the judge in Western District of Texas who
issued the ruling, was appointed by Trump in twenty seventeen. Now,
of course, if I could have a magic wand, I'd
wave it all over the place and change the essay
in a few ways, as well as a lot of
(27:49):
people's opinions about how it could work. I'd make things
easier on land owners, including better recognition of private conservation efforts.
But the division of the species into two parts was
clearly a technicality used by one side of the fight. Here.
We'll see what happens to the issue when and if
there's another change in administration. But with the total number
(28:10):
of lesser prairie chickens sitting at around thirty four thousand
individuals and falling, these charismatic little dance and birds need
a break soon. Now. Lesser could be derogatory sounding to
some people, but that label is only there because it
closely is related to the greater prairie chicken. Both birds
(28:33):
are in the genus Timpanicus, which comes from the word timpani,
or kettle drum, because both birds stop their feet into
the ground over fifteen times a second to make a
drumming noise as part of their elaborate mating dance. The
lesser prairie chickens full species name is Tympanicus palidycinctus, meaning
pale around the edges. So another less insulting way to
(28:55):
refer to the lesser prairie chicken would be light bordered
kettle drum bird. I don't imagine this name is going
to catch on anytime soon, but we can at least
try to win these little guys a little more dignity
with everything else they have going on now. As for
grazing in the chicken, it is often, very often in
my circles, stated that ranchers can't ranch because there's an
(29:19):
endangered species on the ground. Cattle can't graze because somebody
found a lesser prairie chicken. I nor any of my
sources have been able to tell me where, when, and
who this has happened to. So I'm not calling total
bs because it very well could exist. But this often
(29:40):
sighted thing, this example of government overreach where a rancher
on his own private land or her own private land
was said, you can't let those cattle out of the gate.
There's prairie chickens out here. I cannot find that specific example,
nor has anyone I have ever spoken to been able
(30:02):
to say, oh, yeah, here it is, here's the case,
here's the person, here's the ranch. I want to have
that conversation. So if anybody knows the where, the when,
and the who, please let's get him on this here podcast.
Ask c Al. That's ask Cal at the Meat eater
dot com. Hey, that's all I got for you this week.
(30:23):
Thank you so much for listening. You know, I appreciate it. Remember,
go to the Federal Register dot gov and leave a
comment on the roadless rule. Call your representatives, call your
senators and tell them what you think about this just
ham fisted management of the most precious resource that we have,
(30:43):
which is our America's public liance. Then right in and
uh tell me what you think. Ask c Al. That's
Askcal at the meat eater dot com. If you just
can't open the email machine, let's say you're driving. Remember
as of last episode, you can call four oh six
two two o six four four one. That's four oh
(31:05):
six two two zero six four four one. That's the
voice version of a s K C. A. L at
the meeater dot com. Thanks again, we'll talk to you
next week.
From Meat Eaters World News headquarters in Bozeman, Montana. This
is Cow's Week in Review with Ryan cow Calahan. Here's
cal A sixty two year old fish pulled from Lake
Superior is thought to be the oldest ever lake trout
caught in the Great Lakes. The fish, which researchers dubbed
(00:31):
Mary Catherine, was collected at Klondike Reef in Autumn twenty
twenty three by researchers with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.
It's not a giant at just under five pounds, but
what it lacks in size, I'm sure it makes up
for an experience. Lake trout live a pretty long time
for fish, with average life spans measuring twenty five to
(00:51):
thirty years, but Mary Catherine doubled the average and is
believed to have hatched around the year nineteen sixty one.
For the youngsters there, that was the year JFK became president,
the Berlin Wall began construction, and the first man orbited
the Earth. Researchers estimated Mary's age by counting the number
of rings visible on the fish's odolith or earstone. That's
(01:15):
a fancy name for a calsum carbonate structure in the
inner ear like bone. This structure grows through the years
of a fish's life and produces rings that look like
the rings on a tree stump. After counting those rings
under a microscope, biologists determined that Mary Catherine lived through
the First Man on the Moon, the civil rights movement,
all nine seasons of Seinfeld, and the dawn of the Internet.
(01:37):
Was quite a life for that old fish, even if
she was blissfully unaware of all the changes happening on
the surface above her. Nice little reminder that it's not
all about length. Experience has something to do with it too.
I was at a pool, I was this week. We've
got agency politics, not so public land but new Land,
(02:01):
Japanese bears, and so much more of it. First, I'm
gonna tell you about my week, and my week, well,
my head's just spinning, staring at the calendar. I'm roughly
a month behind where I should be. Heck, I should
just be consumed with nothing but chasing grouse and partridge
with old snort and chasing buglen bowls up a steep
train with my bow and beer belly. But instead here
(02:24):
I sit, And because sit sounds loud like shit, listen
up people, bury your poop, flip a big rock over,
do your business and cover it completely at the bare minimum.
You know how many people use these areas. I know
you do because you complain about it. So be courteous
(02:45):
and cover up your feces. My girlfriend's long haired border
Collie is gorgeous, myrtle coloration boy, and he thinks he's
especially stunning covered in your effluent. I should and can
go into detail, but it's horrible. Old snort a dog
who I admit occasionally slips me the tongue inside my mouth.
(03:09):
Ate your poop. The other day, it was opening day
of bird season, and we were out not carrying a shotgun,
doing my nice boyfriend duty of spending quality time before
I get real busy chasing critters. And you do me
the discourtesy of surface pooping. That's just a kick to
the sack, bud. Here. I have an amazing bird dog
(03:32):
and an arsenal of scattered guns, and we weren't even
out there quote unquote competing with you on opening day
and you literally pooped in our mouths. Poop, shovel and
move on, or shovel and then poop and move on.
Whatever you do, be decent about it. Cripe's almighty, And
(03:52):
speaking of disgusting stuff, let's talk about how our elected
officials are treating our public lance. Yes, this is at
so buckle up or fast forward. If any of you
folks are wearing hats or glasses, best to remove them.
Right now. Two things are going on in conjunction, and
you need to be aware of this. You don't have
(04:13):
to agree on any of it, but you will recognize
how darned, lazy and unbecoming of our shared natural resources.
This is one roadless rule recision. Get to the federal register.
You can find the link at USDA and at Backcountry
Hunters and Anglers and TRCP to comment on this one,
(04:36):
and to the House. As in US House of Representatives
have voted to use the Congressional Review Act to rescind
resource management plans in Alaska, Montana, and Wyoming. Lots of acronyms.
This is going to make a heck of a drinking game,
but it's hunting season. That type of bodily mistreatment will
(04:57):
reserve for the doldrums, which are not hunting season. Listen up,
I'll tell you why this matters and put some of
the bs to bed. Roadless areas fifty eight million acres,
some of which overlaps with existing capital W wilderness protection
about twenty million acres or so, some of which overlaps
with areas that had previously been logged and roaded. Another
(05:20):
nineteen percent, which we'll call about twenty million acres. So
there's eighteen million acres left that has some kind of
in the middle status or in this case we'll just
say it is protected currently by this roadless designation. It's
relatively untouched, and it's spread in bits and pieces from
(05:42):
coast to coast over about forty states, the majority of which, yes,
is in the eleven Western states. All folks are talking
about when we talk about the roadless rule is timber.
We need to cut more wood for affordable housing, and
we need to cut more underbrush and deadfall, and yet
rid of this high heat fuel build up that could
(06:03):
erupt into a catastrophic wildfire. Well, the roadless rule doesn't
really prevent that wildfire management in the urban interface anyway.
That's right. We don't need to manage deep into wilderness
areas because what the hell is it going to burn?
(06:23):
That stuff's been burning naturally or through human cause fire
Long before us white folks ever got out here. So
just leave it the hell alone. It's good for wildlife
on this premise alone. Rolling back the roadless rule is
a classic case of cutting off your nose to spite
your face. Now, green groups have been litigating efforts to
(06:48):
use the roadless Rule as intended, and it's led to
some of this consternation. They sue and sue and screw
up the intention of the rule. Some of the crap
has gotten us to where we are right now. However,
that's something we can fix without removing protections for fifty
(07:09):
eight million acres if folks were willing to sit down
and actually do the work. I've already told you that
this fifty eight million acres is not all the same.
You can't look at one acre in California and say
that is exactly like this one acre in North Carolina.
It is diverse ecosystems we're talking about. It needs to
(07:30):
be managed as such. This is, after all, our public lands.
They're not making any more of them. They're highly, highly valuable.
Why are they not treating them as such? On top
of that, y'all remember Doze right and the big chainsaw,
And we're saving money blah blah blah. Well, guess what
(07:50):
that tinderbox understory the fuels management. We hear about all
that stuff, the mechanical thinning, The humans are going to
get in there and hut away the fire danger. Well,
in order to make that happen, we the taxpayer have
got to pay people to remove that stuff. We don't
have the markets for that stuff to be profitable, such
(08:13):
as maybe paper pulp or woodpell at mills. Those economies
do not exist in close enough proximity to where this
work needs to be done. And right now, nobody is saying, hey,
the federal government is going to come in and pay
for this wildfire mitigation. In fact, the opposite is happening
(08:34):
right now where they're saying, we are going to immediately,
to the best of our ability, put out wildfire as
soon as it starts. Even when those fires are started
naturally and in areas that do not pose risk to
humans or structures. That type of management causes the build
(08:54):
up of catastrophic fire fuel. That's just the truth. I'm
gonna hammer this again. In the case of profitable timber,
marketable timber, which they're telling us we need to have
for affordable housing, even though if you look at the
housing market right now, what we're seeing is drop in
(09:15):
demand and an increase in supply. There are some areas
where there's some really choice timber, marketable timber close enough
to road systems that people do want to go get it,
such as in the Tongas up in Alaska. Stuff would
make some real pretty tubai force and people would make
some money. That is an area that is synonymous with
(09:39):
the roadless rule fight, and it always has been. So
if that's what you're talking about, that's what we need
to talk about. There are concessions that can be made
all over the place, but we need to talk about
those concessions specifically. A lot of this other stuff, like
that eighteen million acre donut hole in the middle of
this conversation I talked about in the very beginning, It
(10:02):
is too far away from roads and too far away
from mills to be marketable. The folks who love running chainsaws,
and I know a lot of these folks, they have
no interest in that stuff because it does not pay
for their fuel, it does not pay for the damage
to equipment, it does not pay for their time. When
we used to cut way deep into the forest, it
(10:24):
was often subsidized by you guessed it, the US government,
we the people. The US government. We the people built
the roads and the loggers followed. So what is this
currently about. What is rolling back the road to this
rule currently about? It's about gaining access to minerals. Possibly.
(10:45):
If that's the case, let's talk about that specifically. What
are the requirements and what is the need for those
mineral deposits? How many acres do you need. Let's quit
swinging the pendulum one way all the way over to
the other side, and then the next administration comes in
and swings it back all the way over to the
(11:06):
other side. The roadless rule is great. We need it.
It's working hard and doing what it's supposed to do
for a hell of a lot of Americans who really
really appreciate it. It provides a little buffer from the
crowds for US hunters and anglers, and anyone, especially in
these eleven western states, can attest that we need a
(11:26):
little buffer. This stuff is getting so busy again. Their
surface poop everywhere, long haired border collie, shell act and
yesterday's corn, the grossness type of busy. Okay, we need
some places where we can get away that stuff. Is
increasingly scarce and increasingly valuable. But if we really need
(11:51):
the mineral deposit or stand of timber, let's do the
seemingly impossible thing and talk about it. Come to the
conclusion that you may need a thousand acres here or there. Okay,
let's figure it out, but it's not fifty eight million.
And if you're really concerned about fire, we can't skip
over the fact that fire coincides with roads. The California megafires, scary,
(12:17):
nasty wall of death, heat that roars and flies like
a freight train going uphill, that type of scary it
overlaps with road access. Pull up your on AX motorized maps.
You can do it yourself. See how those things align.
Fire starts and road access go together. And I'm sorry
to say, boys and girls, this fuel's reduction talk has
(12:39):
been going on my entire life and for my whole life.
Nobody is willing to pay for mechanical thinning and underbrush removal.
So I just don't think we're having a real conversation now.
The Congressional Review Act, which is being used to rescind
management Plans Regional management Plans MPs CRA to our MP,
(13:03):
we talked about this earlier. You can rewrite a management
plan just like you can reform a roadless rule. A
regional management plan takes into account and consideration the stakeholders
at large and dissects the landscape into appropriate levels of
use for those stakeholders based off of that public feedback.
(13:26):
The stakeholders are you and me and every industry that
you can think of, from cattle grazers to conco phillips
and everything in between. This type of input makes sense, correct,
there are public lands. But right now our representatives want
to use the Congressional Review Act CRA, which is a hammer,
(13:49):
a bludgeon, not a fine tipped pencil, to destroy these
publicly facilitated management plans, which were put together not only
with public input, but with the best post possible available science.
And what you need to know is, by law, all
the good things in that RMP and the bad things
(14:10):
cannot be used again. That language can legally not be
used again. So even though let's put together right now
with the best input and the best science, if the RMP,
the Regional Management Plan is destroyed through use of the
Congressional Review Act, whenever this stuff settles down, we cannot
(14:31):
revert back to any of the good parts in that RMP,
even if it's in the best interest of extractive use, cattle, grazers, hunters, anglers,
you name it. This is lazy, lazy stuff, lazy management
for a very complicated landscape. We just cannot be okay
(14:54):
or absent from this conversation. If we won't care, who will.
This is America, after all, you can have your cake
and eat it too. Didn't we just come out of
this stuff with those gang weren't we screaming about waste
and fraud and abuse and government overreach. Well, let's not stop.
Let's talk about the laziness and absenteeism and lack of stewardship.
(15:18):
This is all we got. And through the decision of
the roadless Rule and the use of the Congressional Review
Act to beat to death our regional management plans, we
as the people, are losing, not winning. We are literally
telling our elected officials, hey, why don't you take some
personal days? You've earned it. Vague and broad and sloppy
(15:40):
is good enough with us. We're happy with broad strokes
and no actual management or care for our very complicated
public estate. I know you're not that type of person
because you're listening to this here podcast. Go to the
Federal Register dot gov. Leave a comment on the recision
of the roadless rule. Call up the Capital Square Board
(16:00):
and tell your representatives and senators that this is just
not good enough. Do better. You wouldn't be happy with
this approach to your non native, water sucking green suburban lawn,
so why would you roll over and say it's okay
for a great and finite American public lands. Get involved.
(16:22):
If you're not advocating for yourself, somebody else will. Moving
on to the Texas Desk, great things are happening down
in Texas where the Centennial Parks Conservation Fund has started
to acquire and develop land to turn into new state parks.
Back in twenty twenty three, public lands in Texas took
(16:43):
a hit when the state says lost but sold off
eighteen hundred acre Fairfield Lake State Park, which was cited
on least land private power company that owned the parcel
sold to a developer and once you know what, that
developer turned the park into a golf course and luxury community,
which God knows we need more of. Losing Fairfield Lake
(17:04):
woke Texans up to the fact that seventeen in the
state's eighty eight parks also sit on leased land that
could be sold out from under them at any time.
That little fire for voters to approve Prop. Fourteen, which
allocated one billion dollars of budget surplus to a fund
that buys private land and develops it into publicly accessible
state parks. Already, the Centennial Parks Conservation Fund has purchased
(17:28):
three properties for a total of sixty two hundred new acres.
Two of those parcels will become the new Post Oak
Ridge State Park northwest of Austin, and the third will
add three thousand acres to the existing Enchanted Rock State
Natural Area about an hour's drive to the south. The
Centennial Parks Conservation Fund also allocates money to developing the
(17:50):
park's studying which animal species live on the parcels, figuring
out where to put the trails, and building the roads,
visitors centers, bathrooms, and maintenance areas. All the la less
sexy stuff that allows people to do the hiking, fishing,
bird watching, stargazing, and fresh air inhaling that are the
main attractions. Texas can definitely use all the parks you
(18:11):
can get. The state comes in thirty fifth in the
nation for state park acres per capita, and only around
one percent of its land is publicly accessible federal land.
I'm looking forward to seeing a lot more acres open
up down there. And hey, I know a lot of
Texans who own land. Listen to this show, so listen up.
If you have a few thousand acres in Texas you're
looking to unload, get in touch with the Texas Parks
(18:33):
and Wildlife Department and see if you can make a deal.
We'll still get a hangout on the land, and your
neighbors will too. On top of that, the meat eater
land access Initiative is about to ride again. We'd be
happy to help with securing public access through easement, purchase,
or any other type of agreement as long as we
(18:53):
get more huntble acres or fishaboll acres ideally both for
the public. Moving on to the fawn desk, the Kentucky
Department of Fish and Wildlife is dealing with blowback after
agency officials euthanized twenty two white tail fawnds that had
been illegally housed at a wildlife rescue facility. The animals
(19:15):
had been rescued from counties designated as CWD surveillance zones.
Kentucky law states that deer cannot be rehabilitated if found
in these zones, but the Broadbent Wildlife Refuge had taken
them in anyway. It's unclear whether they did so knowingly
or this was an honest mistake, but whatever the reason,
the Kentucky Wildlife Agency determined that these animals would need
(19:35):
to be euthanized to prevent the spread of CWD. It's
been a tough pill to swallow for employees and volunteers
at the rescue facility, who have told local media that
the animals did not show symptoms of the disease. These
fonds had been bottle fed by staffers, and I can
understand why those folks would be upset. To those unfamiliar
with the CWD issues, it seems like wildlife officials could
(19:57):
have found another way to deal with this situation. I
don't know if that's true, but the conversation on social
media has developed in exactly the ways you'd expect. Listener
Ethan Pugh wrote in to tell me that people have
been using ted nugent as a source to claim that
state wildlife agencies invented CWD, as a pretext for killing deer.
I've listened to Uncle Ted speculate that CWD is a
(20:19):
government conspiracy meant to reduce the food supply in the
United States, and it seems like that particular theory has
made its way to Kentuck. Others have compared the situation
to Peanut, the squirrel squirrel in New York that was
euthanized after someone illegally captured him and was keeping him
as a pet. Peanut also happened to be a social
media star, so I'm sure his owners weren't at all
(20:41):
motivated by money, but just by a love of squirrels. Anyway.
The reason wildlife officials have such strict rules around deer
movement is because CWD is an always fatal neurological disease.
The problem is, there isn't a good anti mortem test,
meaning a test that can tell you whether an animal
has while it's still alive and not killing it. The
(21:04):
only reliable way to determine whether that critter has CWD
and how much is to kill the animal and test
its brain or spinal material, including the lymphnotes. That's why
wildlife officials in many states, not just Kentucky, call it
entire herds of deer rather than risk one of those
deer being infected and spreading the disease to other parts
(21:24):
of the state. It's a tough dilemma, but until there's
a reliable anti mortem test, we don't have any good
options in situations like these. As a side note, put
as much hurt on those white tails as you can,
especially in areas where they start competing with the noble
mule deer, which is very much hurting this day and age.
(21:45):
Moving on to the Wildlife commission desk, the Washington and
New Mexico Wildlife Commissions have been mired in turmoil in
recent weeks, and I'm here to give you all the
gory details. First. In Washington, governor has ordered an investigation
into the conduct of Wildlife Commission members after the Sportsmen's
(22:05):
Alliance revealed potential evidence of wrongdoing. The hunting rights organization
got their hands on emails and other messages between members
of the Commission ahead of a controversial vote in twenty
twenty two to end the spring bear hunt. The messages
appeared to show the commissioners violating the Open Public Meetings
Act by agreeing amongst themselves on a decision about the
(22:26):
bear hunt before having an official public meeting. According to
a petition filed by the Sportsmen's Alliance, the commissioners would
meet in groups of three or four, then send one
or two representatives to lobby other commissioners. This created a
wall of support while skirting Washington's legal requirement that a
majority of members be present to constitute a meeting. The
(22:47):
petition reads quote, this is the very definition of a
political cabal flouting the public strong interest in transparent government.
When you read these thousands of pages as we have,
it is beyond obvious that this practice was a well
honed routine among Baker, lemcool Rowland, Smith, and former Commissioner Reagan.
(23:08):
We see often don't reply here and other devices deployed
to encourage daisy chaining as the preferred method to avoid
the Open Public Meetings Act. The result, unfortunately, is that
the actual commission meetings are clearly nothing more than a sham,
with a preordained decision well in hand before the public
is invited or allowed to participate in any meaningful way.
(23:31):
The current commissioners named in the petition are Barbara Baker,
Lorna Smith, Melanie Rowland, and John Lemcool In light of
these allegations, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife Director Kelly
suswind requested Governor Bob Ferguson to launch an independent investigation.
Sus Winn said in a letter that he cannot operate
his department with a quote cloud of uncertainty created by
(23:54):
the current controversy. The governor agreed to investigate, but it's
unclear what changes, if any, will result. A similar situation
is playing out down in New Mechs, but the sides
are reversed. Their Governor, Michelle Luhan Grisham, removed District two
Game Commissioner Sabrina Pack from her seat last month, citing
a conflict of interest. The decision came just one day
(24:16):
after The Western Watershed Project published emails between Pack and
the president of the New Mexico Cattle Growers Association. In
these emails, Pack, who was also a media professional, was
advising the cattleman about a public relations campaign aimed at
shifting public sentiment around wolves. This campaign was meant to
quote elevate the voices of rural New Mexicans and others
(24:38):
living with the consequences of federal wolf management, shifting public
awareness and driving more balanced policy conversations across state and
national audiences. That doesn't sound so bad, but Governor Grisham
apparently thinks that a disqualified Pack from helping craft wildlife
policies in the state. I should note here that the
Cattleman's Association did not ultimately choose packs agency to help
(25:01):
them with their campaign. It's also true that wolves in
New Mexico are managed by the federal government, not by
the state Game Commission, so it's unlikely that Pack actually
broke any laws or had any actual conflict of interest
on any of the decisions that she made. Still, the
optics aren't great, and there's nothing she can do to
(25:21):
challenge the governor's decision. Now, jumping over to another topic
that's near and dear to my heart, charismatic gallinacious birds.
That's right, we're back to the prairie chicken. Seems like
every week brings another Endangered Species Act controversy, and this
week is no exception. A Texas District judge recently vacated
(25:42):
the ESA listing of the lesser prairie chicken, which had
been protected under the Act since twenty twenty two. This
species has been in political football for quite a while now,
It was first settled in twenty fourteen, before losing protections
after a twenty fifteen lawsuit. The lesser prairie chicken ruffles
so many feathers because its habitat covers much of the
(26:02):
Permian Basin, the highest producing oil field in the US,
as well as prime grassland that ranchers graze their cattle on.
The lawsuits challenging the listing were led by energy groups,
rancher organizations, and the states of Texas, Kansas, and Oklahoma,
all of whom worry that ESA protections for the lesser
prairie chicken would cripple extraction and cattle operations. Remember the
(26:25):
cattle operations part. We've covered this before. We're going to
get back to it. Lesser prairie chickens definitely face long
odds no matter what. They won't nest around any tall
structures that remind them too much of the trees that
hold their natural predators like hawks and eagles. And this
goes for both windmills and oil derricks and high tension
power lines. Although industry groups and landowners say they've been
(26:47):
pursuing conservation strategies like shorter oil extraction equipment, conservation organizations
say it's not nearly enough. Ironically, the listing was struck
down due to part of the twenty twenty two decision
that actually protected fewer prairie chickens US Fish and wildlife
under the Biden administration divided the species into two populations.
(27:07):
It designated the northern group, living in central and western Kansas,
central Oklahoma, and Northeast Texas as just quote threatened a
lower level of protection. The southern group in New Mexico
and Southwest Texas had the higher endangered protections. Once the
Trump administration took over Fish and Wildlife, the agency said
(27:28):
that the decision to split the population into two parts
was so flawed that it invalidates the whole listing, and
David Counts, the judge in Western District of Texas who
issued the ruling, was appointed by Trump in twenty seventeen. Now,
of course, if I could have a magic wand, I'd
wave it all over the place and change the essay
in a few ways, as well as a lot of
(27:49):
people's opinions about how it could work. I'd make things
easier on land owners, including better recognition of private conservation efforts.
But the division of the species into two parts was
clearly a technicality used by one side of the fight. Here.
We'll see what happens to the issue when and if
there's another change in administration. But with the total number
(28:10):
of lesser prairie chickens sitting at around thirty four thousand
individuals and falling, these charismatic little dance and birds need
a break soon. Now. Lesser could be derogatory sounding to
some people, but that label is only there because it
closely is related to the greater prairie chicken. Both birds
(28:33):
are in the genus Timpanicus, which comes from the word timpani,
or kettle drum, because both birds stop their feet into
the ground over fifteen times a second to make a
drumming noise as part of their elaborate mating dance. The
lesser prairie chickens full species name is Tympanicus palidycinctus, meaning
pale around the edges. So another less insulting way to
(28:55):
refer to the lesser prairie chicken would be light bordered
kettle drum bird. I don't imagine this name is going
to catch on anytime soon, but we can at least
try to win these little guys a little more dignity
with everything else they have going on now. As for
grazing in the chicken, it is often, very often in
my circles, stated that ranchers can't ranch because there's an
(29:19):
endangered species on the ground. Cattle can't graze because somebody
found a lesser prairie chicken. I nor any of my
sources have been able to tell me where, when, and
who this has happened to. So I'm not calling total
bs because it very well could exist. But this often
(29:40):
sighted thing, this example of government overreach where a rancher
on his own private land or her own private land
was said, you can't let those cattle out of the gate.
There's prairie chickens out here. I cannot find that specific example,
nor has anyone I have ever spoken to been able
(30:02):
to say, oh, yeah, here it is, here's the case,
here's the person, here's the ranch. I want to have
that conversation. So if anybody knows the where, the when,
and the who, please let's get him on this here podcast.
Ask c Al. That's ask Cal at the Meat eater
dot com. Hey, that's all I got for you this week.
(30:23):
Thank you so much for listening. You know, I appreciate it. Remember,
go to the Federal Register dot gov and leave a
comment on the roadless rule. Call your representatives, call your
senators and tell them what you think about this just
ham fisted management of the most precious resource that we have,
(30:43):
which is our America's public liance. Then right in and
uh tell me what you think. Ask c Al. That's
Askcal at the meat eater dot com. If you just
can't open the email machine, let's say you're driving. Remember
as of last episode, you can call four oh six
two two o six four four one. That's four oh
(31:05):
six two two zero six four four one. That's the
voice version of a s K C. A. L at
the meeater dot com. Thanks again, we'll talk to you
next week.
Host
Cal Callaghan
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