September 22, 2025 • 27 mins
This week, Cal talks secretarial order 3442, bear butchery, cats on broadway, 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 Two Cornell University students found themselves at the center
of a campus controversy last week after they processed a
bear carcass and a kitchen in one of the student
(00:30):
residence halls. The Ithaca Voice reports that the students laid
a tarp over a kitchen table, cut up at one
hundred and twenty pound black bear, and put the various
cuts of meat in ziploc bags before storing it in
the freezer. Their good meat handling earned them a report
to the police from I assume one of the other students,
but officers said the kids didn't break any laws. The
(00:51):
New York Department of Environmental Conservation also looked into the
matter and found that the pair of hunters had all
the proper licenses and took the bear legally, just to
really cover their bases. The Ithaca Voice also reported that
quote Cornell's student Code of Conduct does not appear to
address animal carcass, transportation, processing, or the storage of raw meat.
(01:12):
I think that might be changing soon. However, that would
maybe lead to a ban of anybody on the carnivore
diet who likes to cook on campus looking forward to
those student senate deliberations. These two fellas haven't been identified,
though they did post images of their exploits to social media.
One of those images shows the field dressed bear laying
(01:32):
on the table first side down, another shows the bear
mostly cut up and processed, and the last shows a
freezer full of meat. To hunters, none of these images
are shocking. It's what we see every time we kill
an animal. But commenters online are obviously disturbed. Some might
say hunters shouldn't be doing this kind of thing in
such a public place. At the same time, it's good
for people to see what bear hunters do with these
(01:54):
animals we eat them. But I want to know what
y'all think. Was this stunt helpful or harmful to our
reputation as hunters? Is it even a stunt at all?
Where else are these college kids supposed to process their meat?
Let me know by writing in askcl that's asked cal
at the meeteater dot com or leaving me a voicemail
(02:14):
at four O six two two zero six four four one,
and if you know the hunters in question, send them
my way. I'd love to speak to them and hear
exactly what happened. I have heard tons of animal processing
stories that have happened on campuses all across the country.
We used to do a fair bit of it ourselves
during our uh or, i should say, my small run
(02:37):
at the University of Montana. It's just me. However, you
can freak people out, and there's good ways to mitigate that.
But college kids are young. Remember let me know what
you think. This week, we've got Strepa, Japanese Bears, feral cats,
and Tim from TM. But first, I'm going to tell
you about my week and gang. I'm still stringing it
(02:59):
all together. Happy to report the bow is throwing darts,
and I'm very close to shoving my other concerns and
responsibilities out of the way to actually pack my gear
for Alaska, get those vacation notices going, which of course
means I'll be pre recording some content to keep you
folks as dialed as possible. So if we are a
little behind the curve on the day to day, well,
(03:20):
it's because the out of doors are calling. It is
that time of year. After all. We have a couple
great podcast guests coming up. Hopefully caught our last drop
with Chris Wood, CEO at Trout Unlimited, and I know
you got your comments in on the roadless rule. So
write a letter to your representative asking them to push
back against SO three four four two, which complicates the
(03:42):
accessibility of the Land and Water Conservation Fund. How does
it complicate the accessibility? Well, it diverts funds away from
creating access to things everyone agrees we need, like easements
to land locked federally managed ground. That's right, taxpayer funded land,
but we can't get to instead. SO three four four
two takes a well functioning, fully established, no burden to
(04:05):
the taxpayer program and makes it more burdensome to use,
especially if the intent is to use LWCF for the
intended purpose, which is to provide additional access and additional
acreage of high importance. Additionally, Secretarial Order three four four
two includes redundancy such as veto power for state and
(04:25):
local governments, which, friends and neighbors is exactly how these
projects are identified is through the work and participation of
state and local governments. They do not happen without local
support and local elbow grease. We know that public lands
have a price tag on them. These acres are incredibly valuable.
They are getting increasingly so because the demands on them
(04:47):
are increasing as well. Asking to deny so three four
four two is simply asking for a well run program
to continue as it should. It's not asking for more
is an easy one. Call your representative and senator today.
Right now, the governing body that oversees the stripe bass
(05:08):
conservation on the Eastern Seaboard is taking public comment on
the latest update to their management plan. The Atlantic States
Marine Fisheries Commission is asking for stripe bass anglers to
weigh in on Addendum three to the fisheries management plan
by October third. In twenty nineteen, the Atlantic stripe bass
fishery was declared to be overfished, and in twenty twenty
a major rebuilding plan was undertaken to rebuild the stock
(05:30):
by twenty twenty nine. In late twenty twenty four and
early twenty twenty five, the latest stock assessment let us
know how those fish are doing. Unfortunately, the news ain't great.
The likelihood that the fishery will hit its twenty twenty
nine rebuilding target is less than fifty percent, and stripe
bass mortality is expected to climb this year. In response,
(05:51):
the ASMFC drafted this latest addendum plan with the measures
that aim to reduce fishery removals by twelve percent. Hope
that this will bend the needle to the twenty nine
target after all. But exactly how we get to that
twelve percent reduction is up to you. Conservation groups, including
my good buddy Chris Borgotti over there Backcountry Hunters and
(06:13):
Anglers is calling on all anglers to speak up now,
and I got to tell you participation has not been good.
I know it's the fall, I know lots of things
are going on, but unless you participate, this will likely
lead to lengthy moratoriums, as in no fishing for anybody.
So get your comments in, Get in, be a part
(06:34):
of the process, part of being a responsible angler these days.
There's four key sections of a dendum. Three methods to
measure fish, where to tag them, how to determine the
length of the fishing season, exactly who fishery removals should
apply to. Each section has several alternatives, and BHA has
done the work to determine which will lead to the
best outcome for the future of the fishery. So stop
(06:57):
what you're doing, and navigate over to the CALTA Action
section of the Mediator website where we have a link
to get involved. Remember the deadline for written comment is
October three, and there are several public hearings both online
and in person between now and then. Commissioners really pay
attention to those hearings and how many people show up
on each side of these issues, So make an effort
(07:18):
to get yourself to those for the future of this resource. Again,
all that infos over at the cal TO Action site,
Let's make sure there are a bunch of stripers for
all of us to go after for decades. To come
over to the Dancing with the Devil in the Pale
moonlight desk. We're bringing you major political developments from the
heart of the cold, Cold City, New York, that is
(07:42):
New York City mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa recently unveiled plans
to combat the city's persistent rat problem. Rats are serious
politics in New York. Current Mayor Eric Adams promised to
e raticate the rodents from homes, businesses, and parks, including
hiring full time quote quote ratzar, who, according to city records,
(08:03):
makes one hundred and fifty five thousand dollars a year.
That's nice work if you can get it. Sliwa has
a much more economical approach to the rat problem, colonies
of feral cats. Speaking to The New York Post, he
detailed the only equipment needed for his plan, saying, quote,
it's generally a little plastic tupperware box that they can
(08:24):
go in and out of, especially when there's inclement weather.
That's a pretty small feline item in the city's budget.
Sliwa recommends establishing thousands of these boxes and parks throughout
the city, continuing, quote, it would be like they're on patrol.
Consider them like Batman and Robin Gotham Caped crusaders at night.
Sliwa is a fixture in New York politics, a Republican
(08:46):
mayoral candidate in an overwhelmingly democratic town who runs every
cycle despite certain defeat. You got to start in the
late seventies founding a group called the Guardian Angels, which
he calls a quote unquote crime prevention organization, at which
most others call a group of vigilanties. Part of the
uniform of the Guardian Angels is a bright red beret,
which Sewa still wears. At all times, making this conservative
(09:09):
Republican look like a communist revolutionary. Sleewa wasn't always a
cat advocate. Over the course of the eighties, he was
busted half a dozen times for staging fake criminal incidents
to get publicity for the Guardian Angels. But in nineteen
ninety two, after bad mouthing the gaudy crime organization on
his weekly radio talk show, slee was survived an all
too real hit put out on him by John Gotti,
(09:30):
suffering several gunshot wounds to his lower body before leaping
out the window of a moving cab where the hit
was staged. He's been married five times, and he credits
his current wife, Nancy, with converting him to animal rights activism.
The couple have fifteen cats in their three hundred and
fifty square foot our apartment, and Sleewa is running for
mayor this fall, not only as a Republican but also
(09:52):
as a member of the so called Protect Animals Party,
which seems to have exactly one member. If you haven't
seen this guy yet, don't worry, you'll smell him coming.
This isn't the first time that Sleiwa has suggested cats
to combat rodents. Last year In an inspired bit of trolling,
he held a feral cat press conference outside a brownstone
owned by current Mayor Eric Adams, which has been the
(10:13):
site of continual rat infestation. How are you going to
attack a rat problem in the whole city when you
can't even deal with your own rat problem, he said
at the time. So let's run the numbers on Sleiwa's
plan upfront. I'll acknowledge that rats are gross. No one
wants to see them in a park, and having them
in your small city apartment is something I wouldn't wish
on my worst enemy. At the same time, according to
(10:33):
the CDC, rats are responsible for fewer than three hundred
cases of human illness in the US every year, mostly
from leptosporrosis and a form of strap, both of which
can be easily treated with antibiotics. Cats, on the other hand,
have infected over forty million Americans with the disease toxoplasmosis.
Although most people with toxoplasmosis are asymptomatic, over two hundred
(10:55):
thousand people get sick every year, and babies born to
women with the disease can suffer damage to the brain, eyes,
and other organs. About five hundred people go to the
hospital every year with Bartonella hensela or cat scratch disease,
and cats cause more causes of rabies every year than
any other domestic animal. Replacing rats with cats is like
replacing a hangnail with a hand grenade. Although rats will
(11:18):
outlast us all, the simple solution to minimizing their impact
is simply to lock up your garbage. New York City
has adopted trash cans with a closing lid as a
replacement for just putting plastic garbage bags out on the
street for pickup, and rat complaints are actually down sixteen
point four percent this year. However, Mayor Adams has refused
(11:38):
to carry out a statute that provided these cans free
of charge to low income buildings. Maybe that's why, along
with his countless other scandals, Adams is currently trailing Kurtis
Sliwa in the polls by two points. Either that or
Adams should try wearing a chic red beret of his
own hot dang. That article was writ and research by
(12:00):
our own Alex Tilney onto the Asia desk of the
Bear Human Conflict Beat. On September one, Japan enacted the
law relaxing its gun restrictions in response to an epidemic
of bear attacks in the northern part of the country.
Prior to this legislation, police had to conduct a review
that could last hours or days to officially approve use
(12:21):
of a firearm in an occupied area. Now, local government
officials can call for licensed hunters to respond immediately to
bear incidents. You might not think of dangerous megafauna when
you think of Japan, but the northernmost island of the
Japanese archipelago, Hokkaido, is a stone's throwaway from the Russian
island of Sakoln, and the brown bear is native to both.
(12:42):
As the Japanese population ages and becomes more urban, many
farms that acted as buffers to urban areas have been abandoned,
and hunter numbers have also declined. Climate change is affecting
the mass crops of the bear's native forests, prompting them
to find calories nearer to people. Bear human conflict has
therefore absolute exploded in the Land of the Rising Sun
over the past several years. Two hundred and nineteen people
(13:05):
were attacked by bears between March twenty twenty four and
March twenty twenty five, the highest number on record, and
already since March there have been fifty five attacks this year,
including a hiker and a newspaper delivery man killed in
Hokkaido in July. The problem has also spread further south.
There have been one hundred and fifty four bear sightings
so far this year in Tokyo, and the city government
(13:28):
has even started an online map of bear sightings to
help people avoid run ins. And angler was attacked by
a bear in a western suburb of Tokyo on August
twenty third, and Yamagada Airport north of the city was
brought to a standstill in June by a bear who
was in no hurry at all walking along the runway.
Things have gotten so out of hand that the death
of a ninety one year old man was initially blamed
(13:50):
on a bear before a police took a closer look
and realized that the wounds had been inflicted with a knife.
The man's fifty one year old son has now been
arrested for the murder could say he barely got caught.
In response to the brewin brew haha. The security camera
company Daiwa Sushin has developed an AI facial recognition technology
(14:11):
called face Bear that can trigger sirens to scare bears
away and alert property owners by a cell phone app.
Another AI company attempted a similar tool, but their tech
couldn't distinguish between bears and common housecats. Electronics manufacturer Otaseki
has sold hundreds of solar powered robot wolves with glowing
red eyes and multiple loud speakers. In July, police in
(14:32):
Tochigi Prefecture also recorded a video with an actor in
a bear suit in an effort to educate people on
how to respond in the event of a bear sighting.
All I can say is that the actor portraying the
bear makes Godzilla look like Daniel day Lewis on a
slightly more effective front. More Japanese people are starting to
carry bear spray in addition to wearing bear bells. Let's
(14:53):
hope this recent change in firearm law goes a long
way to resolving the issue, and as a side benefit,
I for one with sign up for some bear ramen.
Moving on to the crime desk, the next one is
what you might call a very English wildlife crime. The
North Yorkshire Police in the UK report that thirty seven
year old Michael Watt was using a Harris Hawk to
(15:15):
hunt small game on a private estate called Bolton Abbey.
He has been told he couldn't hunt on that property,
but I guess he didn't listen, so someone called the police.
Officers found the hawk, ferrets, hunting traps, and falconry equipment
in Watt's vehicle, along with a live rabbit and a neet.
Watt pled guilty and was given a ten year criminal
behavior order and made to pay almost one thousand pounds
(15:36):
in fines, costs, and other charges. The criminal behavior with
order bands Watt from keeping birds of prey or ferrets,
places restrictions on hunting, and also has conditions that prevent
him entering land. Poaching is obviously bad, and you shouldn't
run a hawk in private land without permission. But something
in my freedom loving American heart is always a little
bit on the side of the hunter trying to bring
(15:57):
home rabbit stew from the land to gentry. These stories
just remind me why I love our public land system
here in America, why privatizing that land is never a
good idea. A bunch of you sent me to this
next story of moose hunting guide in Alaska who's being
accused of defrauding his clients of over six hundred and
sixty thousand dollars. Official say forty eight year old Clint Miller,
(16:19):
who operates Alaska Wilderness outfitter, took payment from clients between
twenty nineteen and twenty twenty four without having a real
plan to get them a moose. One man from Michigan
says he paid Miller twenty four thy five hundred dollars
for a hunt, only to have Miller cancel at the
last minute. Four years in a row, Miller would make
some excuse about gear or fuel, but he wouldn't reimburse
(16:41):
the hunter his money. According to the civil complaint of
the thirty two clients Miller booked and accepted full payment
from for the twenty twenty three and twenty twenty four
hunting seasons, only two of them set foot on land
where they could legally hunt, but even those two clients
had limited opportunity to hunt because they had to travel
four hundred miles round trip from Miller's base camp to
the hunting grounds every day. In twenty twenty three, he
(17:05):
booked twenty two clients. In twenty twenty four, he booked
twenty five, but he only had the capacity to guide eight.
He canceled on all the others and refused to refund
their money. He was actually a real moose hunting guide.
At one point, he had a one hundred percent success
rate in twenty twenty, which he probably displayed on his website,
but then he just decided to not do it. None
(17:26):
of his clients have killed moose since twenty twenty one,
even though he still brags about his success rate online.
We'll see where this case goes, but Palmer's Superior Court
Judge Jonathan Woodman already issued a temporary restraining order against Miller.
The restraining order prevents Miller from taking new payments from
customers and requires him to pay restitution to clients who
submitted complaints. If you're looking for an outfitter anywhere, here's
(17:49):
some things to keep in mind. Most of them start
out good with good intentions. And there's like this saying
of you can have a good out fitter and a
bad business man, and they're one and the same. There's
lots of excuses here, and there are tons of variables
(18:10):
in the guiding game. And there are such things as
like horrible, god awful weather, where you call the clients
and you're like, listen, if you can punt to next
year or next week or whatever, it's going to work
out better for you, and then you know, things just
compound on each other at the end of the day.
This is still theft, right, but the point is in
(18:35):
twenty twenty Reputable Guide twenty twenty four to twenty five
not Reputable. So as you're calling sources, be sure to
get a hold of people who ideally have hunted on
multiple occasions with that outfitter different years. You want people
a few years back, somebody in between, and somebody as
(18:56):
current as possible. And then you also want to call
your game agencies and checking im on the outfitter. You
can look up like Better Business Bureau stuff too, that's helpful.
Absolutely do your homework. It's sad to say because I
know a lot of really good outfitters and guides, but
(19:18):
it is a business that is just it's got some
bad actors and it's not a big community, so you're
bound to one run into one the longer you're at
this game. So do your homework and good luck. Moving
on to the voicemail bag desk, Tim from Tennessee called
(19:38):
in with a question about some of the moves that
Trump administration is making in the conservation space.
Speaker 2 (19:43):
Hey, cal it's Tim Bauer from Tennessee. I just wondering
if you could talk more about the public Lands Rule
recision and the recision of the roadless rule and all
these other moves that looks like the federal government's trying
to make on public lands. Just kind of you talk
about how there's a middle ground there. I'd like to
know your thought. No ground, particularly with respect to the
public land rule.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
Anyway, Thanks for all you do, Tim, great question. Let
me give you a little background. The Department of the
Interior announced last week they planned to rescind a Biden
era rule that would have made conservation and official use
of BLM land. Interior Secretary Doug Bergham said in a
press release that quote, the previous administration's public Lands Rule
had the potential to block access to hundreds of thousands
(20:27):
of acres of multiple use land, preventing energy and mineral production,
timber management, grazing, and recreation across the West. Overturning this
rule protects our American way of life and gives our
communities a voice in the land that they depend on.
We spent quite a bit of time covering this rule
when it was first proposed because there was a lot
of skepticism. We even had then BLM director Tracy stone
(20:49):
Manning on the podcast talk about it. In fact, I
met with her here in Bozman yesterday. The Public Lands
Rule would have added conservation to an approved list of
US uses for BLM land, alongside grazing, mining, timber harvest,
and recreation. Advocates argued that conserving land for future generations
is perhaps the best use of land there is, but
(21:10):
opponents pointed out that putting some land under a conservation
lease might put conservation projects on other parcels in jeopardy.
They also worried that conservation leases would restrict access to
hunters and anglers on those acres. For his part, Bergham
suggests that those currently leasing land under other approved uses
already have a major incentive to conserve it. That might
(21:31):
be true for grazing and timber harvest, but I don't
think the health of elk or mule deer or sage
grouse habitat has anything to do with the mind's bottom line.
As it turns out, all that arguing was much ado
about nothing. Even though the rule went into effect last year.
I'm not aware of any conservation leases actually being granted.
Some of the media have reported that the Trump administration's
(21:52):
decision to rescind the rule is dismantling conservation protections, but
that's a bit disingenuous. It's more like the Trump admin
is dismantling potential future conservation protections, but nothing on the
ground is actually changing. Of course, the next administration might
decide to resurrect this rule, and if they do, we'll
be sure to keep you in the loop. Tim asked
(22:12):
what I mean when I say there's a middle ground
to a lot of these actions. I think some people
are ignoring when it comes to this public land rule. Again,
it's much a new would do about nothing because it
was never truly implemented. But the idea here is that
you would elevate the conservation aspect of land alongside the
(22:33):
uses of what we think of BLM for right grazing, extraction,
mineral natural gas development, that sort of thing, to where
that conservation aspect had to be weighed in higher value.
So it was meant intended to be an overlapping use,
not in exclusive use. I hope that makes sense. During
(22:57):
this time, there's lots of debate on could a conservation organization,
particularly like one of the quote unquote green groups, could
they lease BLM ground and prevent access to hunters And
that was a hard no, just like a grazing operator
can't prevent access to hunters. Currently, you have to get
(23:21):
like a special use permit to prevent access. And those
situations are almost exclusively reserved for hard rock mining, some
of the solar stuff that got chunked out on public land,
stuff like that. So oh and I guess sometimes ski
areas can prevent people from going up on the hill
(23:42):
because of you know, wanting to prevent harm to those
people through the operations. So middle ground here in this
particular case, middle ground would have been to run with
the rule and ensure it operates as it was intended.
And you know, one thing that is just always overlooked
(24:02):
is there's never a point in time where it's just
democrats in the room making the rules or just Republicans
in the room making the rules. So even when there's
a majority super majority situation, there's going to be the
quote other side in the room weighing and pushing hard
(24:23):
for the things that they want. That's that's how government
works here. So if you want to talk about middle
ground on the roadless rule. All of the stated reasons
for changing the roadless rule, rescinding the roadless Rule, they
just really don't hold any water because any one of
those reasons wildfire mitigation, let's take that still doesn't need
(24:45):
to be applied to forty eight million acres, Like we
can make that happen in those buffer areas the wildland
urban interface, and it's going to be you know, maybe
maybe I don't know how million acres, let's say five
million for Gripe's sakes, Like, it's just not going to
be something that needs to be applied across the board.
(25:05):
Same goes with roadbuilding for fire suppression, fire management, timber harvest,
timber management. Again, these are like one size fits all
statements to a very diverse, very large landscape that one
size fits all just doesn't work for So when the
roadless Rule, as Chris Wood pointed out the other day,
(25:26):
was put together, the stakeholders were at the table. This
was a non partisan action. The Greenies and the loggers
were at the table putting this one together gain and
as were the fiscal hawks that wanted to remove a
thirty three billion dollar budget item. So the middle ground
on the roadless rule is identifying what it is people want.
(25:50):
As I've said many times on the show, I think
it's mineral extraction is what they want. Then identifying those
areas and the why. Right, If it's so your buddy
can get bitch, uh, beat it go pound SAand if
it's because there's a crucial deposit of rare minerals that
the US needs to be viable in the long term, sure,
(26:13):
let's talk about it, and let's talk about how to
make that sustainable. That's a common sense middle ground. And
there's always always these middle grounds on these issues. That's
all I got for you. Remember to write in ask
c A L. That's Ascal at the meeteater dot com.
Let me know what's going on in your neck of
the woods. Ass Timmy from TM just did call in
(26:35):
to four oh six two two zero six four four
one and leave us a message. Maybe you'll hear it
here on this show and we'll get back to you.
That's all I got for you. Thanks again, 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 Two Cornell University students found themselves at the center
of a campus controversy last week after they processed a
bear carcass and a kitchen in one of the student
(00:30):
residence halls. The Ithaca Voice reports that the students laid
a tarp over a kitchen table, cut up at one
hundred and twenty pound black bear, and put the various
cuts of meat in ziploc bags before storing it in
the freezer. Their good meat handling earned them a report
to the police from I assume one of the other students,
but officers said the kids didn't break any laws. The
(00:51):
New York Department of Environmental Conservation also looked into the
matter and found that the pair of hunters had all
the proper licenses and took the bear legally, just to
really cover their bases. The Ithaca Voice also reported that
quote Cornell's student Code of Conduct does not appear to
address animal carcass, transportation, processing, or the storage of raw meat.
(01:12):
I think that might be changing soon. However, that would
maybe lead to a ban of anybody on the carnivore
diet who likes to cook on campus looking forward to
those student senate deliberations. These two fellas haven't been identified,
though they did post images of their exploits to social media.
One of those images shows the field dressed bear laying
(01:32):
on the table first side down, another shows the bear
mostly cut up and processed, and the last shows a
freezer full of meat. To hunters, none of these images
are shocking. It's what we see every time we kill
an animal. But commenters online are obviously disturbed. Some might
say hunters shouldn't be doing this kind of thing in
such a public place. At the same time, it's good
for people to see what bear hunters do with these
(01:54):
animals we eat them. But I want to know what
y'all think. Was this stunt helpful or harmful to our
reputation as hunters? Is it even a stunt at all?
Where else are these college kids supposed to process their meat?
Let me know by writing in askcl that's asked cal
at the meeteater dot com or leaving me a voicemail
(02:14):
at four O six two two zero six four four one,
and if you know the hunters in question, send them
my way. I'd love to speak to them and hear
exactly what happened. I have heard tons of animal processing
stories that have happened on campuses all across the country.
We used to do a fair bit of it ourselves
during our uh or, i should say, my small run
(02:37):
at the University of Montana. It's just me. However, you
can freak people out, and there's good ways to mitigate that.
But college kids are young. Remember let me know what
you think. This week, we've got Strepa, Japanese Bears, feral cats,
and Tim from TM. But first, I'm going to tell
you about my week and gang. I'm still stringing it
(02:59):
all together. Happy to report the bow is throwing darts,
and I'm very close to shoving my other concerns and
responsibilities out of the way to actually pack my gear
for Alaska, get those vacation notices going, which of course
means I'll be pre recording some content to keep you
folks as dialed as possible. So if we are a
little behind the curve on the day to day, well,
(03:20):
it's because the out of doors are calling. It is
that time of year. After all. We have a couple
great podcast guests coming up. Hopefully caught our last drop
with Chris Wood, CEO at Trout Unlimited, and I know
you got your comments in on the roadless rule. So
write a letter to your representative asking them to push
back against SO three four four two, which complicates the
(03:42):
accessibility of the Land and Water Conservation Fund. How does
it complicate the accessibility? Well, it diverts funds away from
creating access to things everyone agrees we need, like easements
to land locked federally managed ground. That's right, taxpayer funded land,
but we can't get to instead. SO three four four
two takes a well functioning, fully established, no burden to
(04:05):
the taxpayer program and makes it more burdensome to use,
especially if the intent is to use LWCF for the
intended purpose, which is to provide additional access and additional
acreage of high importance. Additionally, Secretarial Order three four four
two includes redundancy such as veto power for state and
(04:25):
local governments, which, friends and neighbors is exactly how these
projects are identified is through the work and participation of
state and local governments. They do not happen without local
support and local elbow grease. We know that public lands
have a price tag on them. These acres are incredibly valuable.
They are getting increasingly so because the demands on them
(04:47):
are increasing as well. Asking to deny so three four
four two is simply asking for a well run program
to continue as it should. It's not asking for more
is an easy one. Call your representative and senator today.
Right now, the governing body that oversees the stripe bass
(05:08):
conservation on the Eastern Seaboard is taking public comment on
the latest update to their management plan. The Atlantic States
Marine Fisheries Commission is asking for stripe bass anglers to
weigh in on Addendum three to the fisheries management plan
by October third. In twenty nineteen, the Atlantic stripe bass
fishery was declared to be overfished, and in twenty twenty
a major rebuilding plan was undertaken to rebuild the stock
(05:30):
by twenty twenty nine. In late twenty twenty four and
early twenty twenty five, the latest stock assessment let us
know how those fish are doing. Unfortunately, the news ain't great.
The likelihood that the fishery will hit its twenty twenty
nine rebuilding target is less than fifty percent, and stripe
bass mortality is expected to climb this year. In response,
(05:51):
the ASMFC drafted this latest addendum plan with the measures
that aim to reduce fishery removals by twelve percent. Hope
that this will bend the needle to the twenty nine
target after all. But exactly how we get to that
twelve percent reduction is up to you. Conservation groups, including
my good buddy Chris Borgotti over there Backcountry Hunters and
(06:13):
Anglers is calling on all anglers to speak up now,
and I got to tell you participation has not been good.
I know it's the fall, I know lots of things
are going on, but unless you participate, this will likely
lead to lengthy moratoriums, as in no fishing for anybody.
So get your comments in, Get in, be a part
(06:34):
of the process, part of being a responsible angler these days.
There's four key sections of a dendum. Three methods to
measure fish, where to tag them, how to determine the
length of the fishing season, exactly who fishery removals should
apply to. Each section has several alternatives, and BHA has
done the work to determine which will lead to the
best outcome for the future of the fishery. So stop
(06:57):
what you're doing, and navigate over to the CALTA Action
section of the Mediator website where we have a link
to get involved. Remember the deadline for written comment is
October three, and there are several public hearings both online
and in person between now and then. Commissioners really pay
attention to those hearings and how many people show up
on each side of these issues, So make an effort
(07:18):
to get yourself to those for the future of this resource. Again,
all that infos over at the cal TO Action site,
Let's make sure there are a bunch of stripers for
all of us to go after for decades. To come
over to the Dancing with the Devil in the Pale
moonlight desk. We're bringing you major political developments from the
heart of the cold, Cold City, New York, that is
(07:42):
New York City mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa recently unveiled plans
to combat the city's persistent rat problem. Rats are serious
politics in New York. Current Mayor Eric Adams promised to
e raticate the rodents from homes, businesses, and parks, including
hiring full time quote quote ratzar, who, according to city records,
(08:03):
makes one hundred and fifty five thousand dollars a year.
That's nice work if you can get it. Sliwa has
a much more economical approach to the rat problem, colonies
of feral cats. Speaking to The New York Post, he
detailed the only equipment needed for his plan, saying, quote,
it's generally a little plastic tupperware box that they can
(08:24):
go in and out of, especially when there's inclement weather.
That's a pretty small feline item in the city's budget.
Sliwa recommends establishing thousands of these boxes and parks throughout
the city, continuing, quote, it would be like they're on patrol.
Consider them like Batman and Robin Gotham Caped crusaders at night.
Sliwa is a fixture in New York politics, a Republican
(08:46):
mayoral candidate in an overwhelmingly democratic town who runs every
cycle despite certain defeat. You got to start in the
late seventies founding a group called the Guardian Angels, which
he calls a quote unquote crime prevention organization, at which
most others call a group of vigilanties. Part of the
uniform of the Guardian Angels is a bright red beret,
which Sewa still wears. At all times, making this conservative
(09:09):
Republican look like a communist revolutionary. Sleewa wasn't always a
cat advocate. Over the course of the eighties, he was
busted half a dozen times for staging fake criminal incidents
to get publicity for the Guardian Angels. But in nineteen
ninety two, after bad mouthing the gaudy crime organization on
his weekly radio talk show, slee was survived an all
too real hit put out on him by John Gotti,
(09:30):
suffering several gunshot wounds to his lower body before leaping
out the window of a moving cab where the hit
was staged. He's been married five times, and he credits
his current wife, Nancy, with converting him to animal rights activism.
The couple have fifteen cats in their three hundred and
fifty square foot our apartment, and Sleewa is running for
mayor this fall, not only as a Republican but also
(09:52):
as a member of the so called Protect Animals Party,
which seems to have exactly one member. If you haven't
seen this guy yet, don't worry, you'll smell him coming.
This isn't the first time that Sleiwa has suggested cats
to combat rodents. Last year In an inspired bit of trolling,
he held a feral cat press conference outside a brownstone
owned by current Mayor Eric Adams, which has been the
(10:13):
site of continual rat infestation. How are you going to
attack a rat problem in the whole city when you
can't even deal with your own rat problem, he said
at the time. So let's run the numbers on Sleiwa's
plan upfront. I'll acknowledge that rats are gross. No one
wants to see them in a park, and having them
in your small city apartment is something I wouldn't wish
on my worst enemy. At the same time, according to
(10:33):
the CDC, rats are responsible for fewer than three hundred
cases of human illness in the US every year, mostly
from leptosporrosis and a form of strap, both of which
can be easily treated with antibiotics. Cats, on the other hand,
have infected over forty million Americans with the disease toxoplasmosis.
Although most people with toxoplasmosis are asymptomatic, over two hundred
(10:55):
thousand people get sick every year, and babies born to
women with the disease can suffer damage to the brain, eyes,
and other organs. About five hundred people go to the
hospital every year with Bartonella hensela or cat scratch disease,
and cats cause more causes of rabies every year than
any other domestic animal. Replacing rats with cats is like
replacing a hangnail with a hand grenade. Although rats will
(11:18):
outlast us all, the simple solution to minimizing their impact
is simply to lock up your garbage. New York City
has adopted trash cans with a closing lid as a
replacement for just putting plastic garbage bags out on the
street for pickup, and rat complaints are actually down sixteen
point four percent this year. However, Mayor Adams has refused
(11:38):
to carry out a statute that provided these cans free
of charge to low income buildings. Maybe that's why, along
with his countless other scandals, Adams is currently trailing Kurtis
Sliwa in the polls by two points. Either that or
Adams should try wearing a chic red beret of his
own hot dang. That article was writ and research by
(12:00):
our own Alex Tilney onto the Asia desk of the
Bear Human Conflict Beat. On September one, Japan enacted the
law relaxing its gun restrictions in response to an epidemic
of bear attacks in the northern part of the country.
Prior to this legislation, police had to conduct a review
that could last hours or days to officially approve use
(12:21):
of a firearm in an occupied area. Now, local government
officials can call for licensed hunters to respond immediately to
bear incidents. You might not think of dangerous megafauna when
you think of Japan, but the northernmost island of the
Japanese archipelago, Hokkaido, is a stone's throwaway from the Russian
island of Sakoln, and the brown bear is native to both.
(12:42):
As the Japanese population ages and becomes more urban, many
farms that acted as buffers to urban areas have been abandoned,
and hunter numbers have also declined. Climate change is affecting
the mass crops of the bear's native forests, prompting them
to find calories nearer to people. Bear human conflict has
therefore absolute exploded in the Land of the Rising Sun
over the past several years. Two hundred and nineteen people
(13:05):
were attacked by bears between March twenty twenty four and
March twenty twenty five, the highest number on record, and
already since March there have been fifty five attacks this year,
including a hiker and a newspaper delivery man killed in
Hokkaido in July. The problem has also spread further south.
There have been one hundred and fifty four bear sightings
so far this year in Tokyo, and the city government
(13:28):
has even started an online map of bear sightings to
help people avoid run ins. And angler was attacked by
a bear in a western suburb of Tokyo on August
twenty third, and Yamagada Airport north of the city was
brought to a standstill in June by a bear who
was in no hurry at all walking along the runway.
Things have gotten so out of hand that the death
of a ninety one year old man was initially blamed
(13:50):
on a bear before a police took a closer look
and realized that the wounds had been inflicted with a knife.
The man's fifty one year old son has now been
arrested for the murder could say he barely got caught.
In response to the brewin brew haha. The security camera
company Daiwa Sushin has developed an AI facial recognition technology
(14:11):
called face Bear that can trigger sirens to scare bears
away and alert property owners by a cell phone app.
Another AI company attempted a similar tool, but their tech
couldn't distinguish between bears and common housecats. Electronics manufacturer Otaseki
has sold hundreds of solar powered robot wolves with glowing
red eyes and multiple loud speakers. In July, police in
(14:32):
Tochigi Prefecture also recorded a video with an actor in
a bear suit in an effort to educate people on
how to respond in the event of a bear sighting.
All I can say is that the actor portraying the
bear makes Godzilla look like Daniel day Lewis on a
slightly more effective front. More Japanese people are starting to
carry bear spray in addition to wearing bear bells. Let's
(14:53):
hope this recent change in firearm law goes a long
way to resolving the issue, and as a side benefit,
I for one with sign up for some bear ramen.
Moving on to the crime desk, the next one is
what you might call a very English wildlife crime. The
North Yorkshire Police in the UK report that thirty seven
year old Michael Watt was using a Harris Hawk to
(15:15):
hunt small game on a private estate called Bolton Abbey.
He has been told he couldn't hunt on that property,
but I guess he didn't listen, so someone called the police.
Officers found the hawk, ferrets, hunting traps, and falconry equipment
in Watt's vehicle, along with a live rabbit and a neet.
Watt pled guilty and was given a ten year criminal
behavior order and made to pay almost one thousand pounds
(15:36):
in fines, costs, and other charges. The criminal behavior with
order bands Watt from keeping birds of prey or ferrets,
places restrictions on hunting, and also has conditions that prevent
him entering land. Poaching is obviously bad, and you shouldn't
run a hawk in private land without permission. But something
in my freedom loving American heart is always a little
bit on the side of the hunter trying to bring
(15:57):
home rabbit stew from the land to gentry. These stories
just remind me why I love our public land system
here in America, why privatizing that land is never a
good idea. A bunch of you sent me to this
next story of moose hunting guide in Alaska who's being
accused of defrauding his clients of over six hundred and
sixty thousand dollars. Official say forty eight year old Clint Miller,
(16:19):
who operates Alaska Wilderness outfitter, took payment from clients between
twenty nineteen and twenty twenty four without having a real
plan to get them a moose. One man from Michigan
says he paid Miller twenty four thy five hundred dollars
for a hunt, only to have Miller cancel at the
last minute. Four years in a row, Miller would make
some excuse about gear or fuel, but he wouldn't reimburse
(16:41):
the hunter his money. According to the civil complaint of
the thirty two clients Miller booked and accepted full payment
from for the twenty twenty three and twenty twenty four
hunting seasons, only two of them set foot on land
where they could legally hunt, but even those two clients
had limited opportunity to hunt because they had to travel
four hundred miles round trip from Miller's base camp to
the hunting grounds every day. In twenty twenty three, he
(17:05):
booked twenty two clients. In twenty twenty four, he booked
twenty five, but he only had the capacity to guide eight.
He canceled on all the others and refused to refund
their money. He was actually a real moose hunting guide.
At one point, he had a one hundred percent success
rate in twenty twenty, which he probably displayed on his website,
but then he just decided to not do it. None
(17:26):
of his clients have killed moose since twenty twenty one,
even though he still brags about his success rate online.
We'll see where this case goes, but Palmer's Superior Court
Judge Jonathan Woodman already issued a temporary restraining order against Miller.
The restraining order prevents Miller from taking new payments from
customers and requires him to pay restitution to clients who
submitted complaints. If you're looking for an outfitter anywhere, here's
(17:49):
some things to keep in mind. Most of them start
out good with good intentions. And there's like this saying
of you can have a good out fitter and a
bad business man, and they're one and the same. There's
lots of excuses here, and there are tons of variables
(18:10):
in the guiding game. And there are such things as
like horrible, god awful weather, where you call the clients
and you're like, listen, if you can punt to next
year or next week or whatever, it's going to work
out better for you, and then you know, things just
compound on each other at the end of the day.
This is still theft, right, but the point is in
(18:35):
twenty twenty Reputable Guide twenty twenty four to twenty five
not Reputable. So as you're calling sources, be sure to
get a hold of people who ideally have hunted on
multiple occasions with that outfitter different years. You want people
a few years back, somebody in between, and somebody as
(18:56):
current as possible. And then you also want to call
your game agencies and checking im on the outfitter. You
can look up like Better Business Bureau stuff too, that's helpful.
Absolutely do your homework. It's sad to say because I
know a lot of really good outfitters and guides, but
(19:18):
it is a business that is just it's got some
bad actors and it's not a big community, so you're
bound to one run into one the longer you're at
this game. So do your homework and good luck. Moving
on to the voicemail bag desk, Tim from Tennessee called
(19:38):
in with a question about some of the moves that
Trump administration is making in the conservation space.
Speaker 2 (19:43):
Hey, cal it's Tim Bauer from Tennessee. I just wondering
if you could talk more about the public Lands Rule
recision and the recision of the roadless rule and all
these other moves that looks like the federal government's trying
to make on public lands. Just kind of you talk
about how there's a middle ground there. I'd like to
know your thought. No ground, particularly with respect to the
public land rule.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
Anyway, Thanks for all you do, Tim, great question. Let
me give you a little background. The Department of the
Interior announced last week they planned to rescind a Biden
era rule that would have made conservation and official use
of BLM land. Interior Secretary Doug Bergham said in a
press release that quote, the previous administration's public Lands Rule
had the potential to block access to hundreds of thousands
(20:27):
of acres of multiple use land, preventing energy and mineral production,
timber management, grazing, and recreation across the West. Overturning this
rule protects our American way of life and gives our
communities a voice in the land that they depend on.
We spent quite a bit of time covering this rule
when it was first proposed because there was a lot
of skepticism. We even had then BLM director Tracy stone
(20:49):
Manning on the podcast talk about it. In fact, I
met with her here in Bozman yesterday. The Public Lands
Rule would have added conservation to an approved list of
US uses for BLM land, alongside grazing, mining, timber harvest,
and recreation. Advocates argued that conserving land for future generations
is perhaps the best use of land there is, but
(21:10):
opponents pointed out that putting some land under a conservation
lease might put conservation projects on other parcels in jeopardy.
They also worried that conservation leases would restrict access to
hunters and anglers on those acres. For his part, Bergham
suggests that those currently leasing land under other approved uses
already have a major incentive to conserve it. That might
(21:31):
be true for grazing and timber harvest, but I don't
think the health of elk or mule deer or sage
grouse habitat has anything to do with the mind's bottom line.
As it turns out, all that arguing was much ado
about nothing. Even though the rule went into effect last year.
I'm not aware of any conservation leases actually being granted.
Some of the media have reported that the Trump administration's
(21:52):
decision to rescind the rule is dismantling conservation protections, but
that's a bit disingenuous. It's more like the Trump admin
is dismantling potential future conservation protections, but nothing on the
ground is actually changing. Of course, the next administration might
decide to resurrect this rule, and if they do, we'll
be sure to keep you in the loop. Tim asked
(22:12):
what I mean when I say there's a middle ground
to a lot of these actions. I think some people
are ignoring when it comes to this public land rule. Again,
it's much a new would do about nothing because it
was never truly implemented. But the idea here is that
you would elevate the conservation aspect of land alongside the
(22:33):
uses of what we think of BLM for right grazing, extraction,
mineral natural gas development, that sort of thing, to where
that conservation aspect had to be weighed in higher value.
So it was meant intended to be an overlapping use,
not in exclusive use. I hope that makes sense. During
(22:57):
this time, there's lots of debate on could a conservation organization,
particularly like one of the quote unquote green groups, could
they lease BLM ground and prevent access to hunters And
that was a hard no, just like a grazing operator
can't prevent access to hunters. Currently, you have to get
(23:21):
like a special use permit to prevent access. And those
situations are almost exclusively reserved for hard rock mining, some
of the solar stuff that got chunked out on public land,
stuff like that. So oh and I guess sometimes ski
areas can prevent people from going up on the hill
(23:42):
because of you know, wanting to prevent harm to those
people through the operations. So middle ground here in this
particular case, middle ground would have been to run with
the rule and ensure it operates as it was intended.
And you know, one thing that is just always overlooked
(24:02):
is there's never a point in time where it's just
democrats in the room making the rules or just Republicans
in the room making the rules. So even when there's
a majority super majority situation, there's going to be the
quote other side in the room weighing and pushing hard
(24:23):
for the things that they want. That's that's how government
works here. So if you want to talk about middle
ground on the roadless rule. All of the stated reasons
for changing the roadless rule, rescinding the roadless Rule, they
just really don't hold any water because any one of
those reasons wildfire mitigation, let's take that still doesn't need
(24:45):
to be applied to forty eight million acres, Like we
can make that happen in those buffer areas the wildland
urban interface, and it's going to be you know, maybe
maybe I don't know how million acres, let's say five
million for Gripe's sakes, Like, it's just not going to
be something that needs to be applied across the board.
(25:05):
Same goes with roadbuilding for fire suppression, fire management, timber harvest,
timber management. Again, these are like one size fits all
statements to a very diverse, very large landscape that one
size fits all just doesn't work for So when the
roadless Rule, as Chris Wood pointed out the other day,
(25:26):
was put together, the stakeholders were at the table. This
was a non partisan action. The Greenies and the loggers
were at the table putting this one together gain and
as were the fiscal hawks that wanted to remove a
thirty three billion dollar budget item. So the middle ground
on the roadless rule is identifying what it is people want.
(25:50):
As I've said many times on the show, I think
it's mineral extraction is what they want. Then identifying those
areas and the why. Right, If it's so your buddy
can get bitch, uh, beat it go pound SAand if
it's because there's a crucial deposit of rare minerals that
the US needs to be viable in the long term, sure,
(26:13):
let's talk about it, and let's talk about how to
make that sustainable. That's a common sense middle ground. And
there's always always these middle grounds on these issues. That's
all I got for you. Remember to write in ask
c A L. That's Ascal at the meeteater dot com.
Let me know what's going on in your neck of
the woods. Ass Timmy from TM just did call in
(26:35):
to four oh six two two zero six four four
one and leave us a message. Maybe you'll hear it
here on this show and we'll get back to you.
That's all I got for you. Thanks again, talk to
you next week.
Host
Cal Callaghan
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