Ep. 165: What Are You Really Chasing? Ron Spomer on Ego, Legacy, and the Soul of the Hunt

Episode Transcript
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(00:13):
Before we get into today's conversation,I wanna let you know about something
that's grown into an extremely powerfulpart of what we do at Silver Core,
our members only community, the SilverCore Club Club members not only get
access to exclusive discounts andearly access to year and events,
they also get access to the outpost.

(00:33):
Our private podcast is where I godeeper, I share lessons learned, I
answer member questions, and bringin guests to explore topics we don't
always cover in the public show.
It's real, it's personal, andit's built to add value to your
journey outdoors and in life.
Here's a review from SilverCourt Club member Ray.

(00:56):
Each episode of the Silver Court Outpostfeels like opening a small mystery box
filled with insights, practical wisdom,and a unique perspective on life.
All framed through thelens of the outdoors.
One of the most impactful elementsof the outpost is how each episode
ends with a call to action.
These weekly challenges inviteyou to step outside your routine,

(01:19):
try something new, and shift yourperspective in a meaningful way.
They've helped me change how Iapproach my time in nature and how
I reflect on my personal growth.
Having access to Travis's mentorshipthrough the outpost is invaluable.
His insight, knowledge, and wisdomcome through in every episode, and his
ability to connect outdoor experiencesto larger life lessons is very powerful.

(01:42):
If you're looking for a podcastthat's quick, thoughtful, and
transformative, he should definitelygive the Silverado Post to listen.
Thanks Ray.
Members can find their personal privatelink in the Silver Core Club dashboard.
If you're not already a member,you can learn more@silvercore.ca.
Now, without further ado, let's headinto this conversation with Ron Speller.

(02:04):
I'm joined today by someone whospent a lifetime paying attention to
animals and to l landscapes, and tothe quiet lessons you only hear when
you're still enough to notice 'em.
He's walked wild ground oversix continents with a rifle in
hand, and a story in his mind.
For over 45 years, he's written thousandsof articles, hosted shows, tested

(02:25):
gear, and taught generations of hunter.
But none of that explainsthe person behind it.
And that's who I'm looking forwardto hearing from today, where
it started, what's changed, andmaybe if we're lucky, a few of the
moments it still catch his breath.
Welcome to the SilverCore Podcast, Ron Smer.
Oh, Travis, that was aremarkable introduction.

(02:47):
I'm almost starting tolike myself after that.
I love it.
Well, I mean, you've got alarger than life personality
and persona and it precedes you.
And you know, I'll be honest,you're an inspiration.
I'm sure you've heard this by from manypeople before, but I'll say it again.
You're an inspiration to me in the waythat you can story tell so eloquently

(03:08):
the ethical storytelling and hunting.
Um, your constant pursuitof knowledge is inspiring.
The fact that you're never resting onyour laurels, you're always looking
at ways that you can improve and,you know, maybe learn something else.
And the amount of integrity and claritythat you bring into everything you do.
Massively inspiring.

(03:29):
So thank you for all of that.
Well, thank you for, for, uh,recognizing that I try to do that.
Of course, uh, how well I succeed is upto folks who are listening to me, but that
kind of is my intent, you know, after allthese years of being in this game that
I think I, I have something that I havelearned, the information I've accumulated

(03:49):
and experiences that I've had that I thinkcan help inform, maybe inspire others.
And I certainly want topass that on because.
Anyone who has the, the passion I havealways had for outdoors, for nature,
for wildlife, for the pursuit thereof.
And I, I would just like to help 'em out.
Help 'em out.
Anything I can do to help folks out.

(04:10):
That's kind of what'sdriving me these days.
Where did you first learnthat you had this passion?
For, and this talent forstorytelling and being able to
relate your passion to others.
Yeah.
That actually came from a highschool English teacher, ah, good
old Dwayne Sra, uh, rest his soul.
He was a great guy and hewas a hunter and a shooter.

(04:32):
And he lived just across the streetfrom where I lived when I was in,
uh, grade school up into high school.
And he had the reputation forbeing a real hard teacher.
He had just made him toethe line, which was great.
Uh, most of us students reallyappreciated it because he saw in us
some potential and that he had insistedthat we live up to our potential.

(04:52):
So it was really quite effective.
So when I started writing papers for hisclasses, he would write in the margins.
You've got away with words.
Um huh You ought to consider beinga writer and stuff like that.
Of course, he would catch me in classwith a. Field of Stream or sports of Field
Magazine put my textbook in the front ofit to disguise it so he knew what I was

(05:14):
up to, and he, he just knew that I wastaken with this stuff and he one day said.
He pulled me aside and said, you know,you ought to think about a career as
an outdoor writer and I, a career as anoutdoor writer from a small town farm kid.
Well, what's that?
You know?
Right.
But of course, I recognize names likeJack O'Connor and Elmer Keith and
all the old school guys, and he said,yeah, those people are being paid to

(05:37):
write those stories you're readingall the time in those magazines.
So maybe you could do that given your yourgift here for communicating and writing.
So that's what planted the seed for me.
Now the rest of it wasjust innate in nature.
Uh, my appreciation for it, I don'tknow how anyone comes up with this.
I always say it's an istic urge leftover from caveman days or something,

(06:00):
but I just think it's part of the humancondition to, uh, ex to experience nature
in a personal way and to be moved by it.
I don't know if you haveever read Aldo Leopold?
He is a Yeah.
Some yes.
Yes.
Yeah.
His, um, sand CountyAlmanac book That's right.

(06:20):
Really captured me in high school.
I read that and it waslike he was speaking to me.
He and I had the same philosophies, thesame spirit about this interconnection
between ourselves and nature.
He talked about the thrill of goosemusic and what it did to your soul.
Mm-hmm.
All of those wilderness experiencesthat I'm sure you're aware of too.

(06:42):
And most hunters have that at their core.
I think that's what pulls us into it.
Hunting isn't.
I wanna go kill a big animal, ananimal and and thump my chest so
much as I want to be an integralpart of this whole natural
experience the way all wildlife is.
We are essentially wildlife ourselves.
We are subject to the same laws ofnature as every sheep and deer and

(07:04):
chickadee, and, and mouse out there.
And we cannot live without them.
They cannot live without us.
We're all part of that same cycle of life.
So I think that's what hunting andfishing are about, is trying to connect
closer and closer to that whole program.
Did you realize that when you firststarted out or is that something that
you kind of realized later in life?

(07:25):
You know, I think it was sort of inherentor innate in me and my education and
readings of people like loophole.
Uh, that just cemented it for me.
It confirmed it, it helped me articulateit myself, but I had this incredible
urge deep inside me that I just hadto get out, you know, in high school.

(07:46):
Yeah, I stopped doing all sports because,well, the boys and my friends were
out in the football field practicing.
I was hunting pheasants.
Mm-hmm.
And to me that was way more important.
You know, I'm, I rememberthis, um, same ilk.
Uh, I didn't get into huntinguntil a little later on.
I was fishing, uh, family had acommercial fly fishing lodge in mm-hmm.

(08:08):
Uh, central British Columbia area here.
And I say commercial fly fishing lodge.
It was purchased as a lodge.
It was flying or hiking access only.
Uh, and had a commercial licensethat we held on it, but we
never ran it commercially.
We let scout groups useit, and that was about it.
So I would spend a fair bit of timeout fishing and as a youngster I would.

(08:29):
I guess I'm gonna do air brackets.
I would hunt grouse because Ihad no idea what I was doing.
I had no idea about hunting licenses.
I had no idea about seasonsor any of this other stuff.
I'm glad I figured itout later on in life.
But, um, uh, but I knew I just,I loved being out in the woods
and that connection to nature.
And it isn't if I was successfulgetting a fish, although they're,

(08:52):
when you're younger, there's alwayslike, Hey, who's got the biggest fish?
And who's got, who's got the most?
And, uh, but I, that only lasts so long.
Once, once you get a big one oronce you get a big haul or whatever,
it might be like, well, that isn'tthe thing that keeps me out here.
That was maybe something that originally,uh, appeared to be aspirational

(09:13):
based on what we see on socialmedia, what we see written about.
But it's that deepening of our connectionwith our natural environment that, uh, I'm
constantly learning when I'm out there.
That really, really drives me.
Yeah.
Uh, that's exactly it.
And I think so many peoplelistening to this will understand
that a few probably won't.

(09:33):
I know people who just, you know, youcould show them the, uh, the world's
biggest Moose or, uh, watch thatPeregrine Falcon stoop down and hit a
shorebird or something, and they go,eh, let's go to town and have a beer.
Yeah.
They just don't, they justdon't have it within them.
But, um, that's okay.
We've got room for everybody, but youcan't drag me out of the country and

(09:55):
show me into the city is not gonna work.
Yeah.
Well, I'm, I'm too closeto the city right now.
I'm actively looking out, out outwards,but, um, that, that's another story.
Um, so you've spent most ofyour life chasing wild things.
Yeah, pretty much.

(10:15):
What is it that you've truly been chasing?
If you're to sit down and look back and.
Yeah, great question, Travis.
Great question.
What I've been chasing is essentiallymyself, my own identity, which is
so wrapped up in all of this stuff,but I've also been chasing beauty,

(10:38):
for lack of a better term, andthat encompasses everything within
nature that is so perfect in its inits blood and gore as well as its.
Blossoming.
Mm-hmm.
Everything from wild flowersto wildlife to a storm.
If you read, uh, Muir, uh, writingabout the glories of being up

(11:02):
in a tree in a big wind storm
mm-hmm.
Yosemite and how he was rejoicing atthe pelting of the rain and the howling
of the wind, and celebrating whatmost of us would hide from, didn't get
away from the discomfort, but he feltthat even deeper than I probably do,
because he was out in that nasty stuff.
Just thinking this is all a part of thisincredible glory then, and that probably

(11:26):
extends beyond ourselves, beyond our ownnature here on earth and into the cosmos.
I think it's that the vibrationof the cosmos, if you look into
string theory and all the latestscientific things about what.
Adams truly are, and what keeps thingsgoing, and it's all vibrations of energy.
Mm-hmm.
And we are parts of that,manifestations of that sort of thing.

(11:49):
It's a, it's the, thegreat cosmic mystery.
It's, it's discovering God and,and the, the goodness of it.
Um, and it's, as you saidearlier, it's a constant search.
You don't just get there andsay, okay, figured it out.
Now there's new thingsrevealed all the time.
A couple, three years ago or so here onthe ranch, my wife and I bought a small

(12:13):
ranch property closer to the grandkidsso that we can show, give them the
opportunity of getting out of the cityand having freedom roam around like I did
on the farms and stuff when I was a kid.
So, of course, I'm interestedin this environment that we're.
Sort of husbanding and tryingto improve some of the old farm
ground and the overgrazed pastures.
We're trying to improve those, butI would go out and look for things.

(12:36):
What is growing out here?
What is a native plantversus an introduced invasive
species in a weed and such?
And one march with cabin fever raging,I just had to get out and find something
showing me that spring was coming,we're getting renewed life and all the
wonderful things we want about spring,uh, waiting for ice out so I could go
fishing and all that sort of thing.

(12:56):
Uh, and I went up in the hills to lookfor the earliest wildflower I could find.
I knew that the, some of these glacierlilies or fawn lilies were pretty
early and would come out in the snow,but I'm up where there's just nothing.
It looked pretty desolate, and Ispotted a little white thing on
the ground and I got down closeand looked, and I found a tiniest
wildflower I have ever seen in my life.

(13:17):
And that was commonly called a Turkey pea.
It has a bit of a little rootletbulb that apparently turkeys and
other birds will dig up and eat,or, or something is the, uh, genus.
But it was just an obscure,wholly obscure little plant.
And I am speaking of a series of blossomsin a ray seam that probably no more

(13:39):
than an eighth to a quarter of an inchin size and the entire plant might be
lucky to hit two inches and it blooms.
When there's nothing else going onand then dies within a couple of
weeks, does its thing, you know?
Mm-hmm.
It's fire pressure and then it juststores the energy in that little bulb
until the next go around and you,you look at a little thing like that,

(14:00):
inconsequential little nothing butto that plant and whatever insects.
Need that plant to feed on.
It's all part of that wholesystem, that circle of life.
Mm-hmm.
And
discover something like that to meis that is as exciting as discovering
that giant ram on the mountain sidewith the big dramatic horns curling up.

(14:23):
They're equally fascinating andinteresting just in different dimensions.
You know, it's kind of interesting howyou talk about the vibration of things.
A friend of mine, he's heavy into, uh,radios and he rebuilds antique Collins,
uh, HF radios and he's like, look at this.
I take this one crystal out andit oscillates at a circle FA

(14:44):
certain frequency, and I put thisother crystal inside it and now
I can transmit on this frequency.
Over here he says, Trav.
You know, everythingin life is vibrations.
We see things on a wavelength.
We listen on a wavelength.
Everything happening onsome sort of a wavelength.
I'm willing to bet there's somewavelengths out there that we don't
even really understand that areaffecting us, and people talk about it.

(15:04):
John Sinani, he's a futurist.
He's been on the podcast and he talksabout operating at a higher frequency.
Um, Sean Taylor, x jtf two friend ofmine, who's, uh, uh, heavily believes
in the, the energy and frequency that wekind of give off, and he would use that
as a tier one Special Forces operator.
He says, that's gonna sound crazy, but I'dfeel the energy in the room next to me.

(15:28):
And then, uh, Nikki Vandel, she's, um,was on the TV show alone where they,
uh, have to survive in the Arctic.
And I was chatting with her andshe says, you know, when I go out
into the woods, I will say, hello,forest, it's me, Nikki, I'm here.
She says, it sounds so corny.
She says, but.

(15:49):
It changes the frequency and all of asudden those little brown birds that
would chirp at ya and the squirrels thatchirp at ya, they start, you start to
get on the same wavelength or frequencythat these things are operating on, and
you'll connect with nature and see thecritters that you otherwise wouldn't.
Do you have any thoughts on that?

(16:10):
No, you're absolutely right.
My wife is, has this extraordinaryability to feel the vibrations
in the room and read the room.
And she will sometimes sayto me, you're so clueless.
Didn't, you know, things go over therewas, you know, feeling blue because her
boyfriend just left her, whatever it is.
And I'm going, duh, I don't know, but putme out in the woods and it's reversed.

(16:34):
Mm. I'm seeing and sensing things.
And I said, what did you thinkof that pheasant over there?
Where, what pheasant?
She didn't see it.
We just drove by this beautiful, gorgeouspheasant all puffed out, showing off to
his girlfriends and she doesn't notice it.
So we're, we're each tuned intothe vibrations and the frequencies
that are different frequencies.

(16:55):
You know, I've.
In preparing for this, I was looking ata bunch of your different podcasts and
past interviews, and I see a lot of thesame sort of things coming up and the
same themes, and it got me thinking.
What's something about youthat people don't tend to ask
that they should be asking?
Oh gosh, Travis.

(17:16):
I don't know.
You know, people arewelcome to ask anything.
Um, but I, I, I'm not so full ofmyself that I think I can tell
people what they should ask about me.
I, I'm a pretty typical middle ofthe road American, I would guess.
Country boy probablyputs me in a category.

(17:37):
Um, I don't like categorizinganyone because we all have the,
the ability and the right tobecome what we want to become.
Mm-hmm.
But I, I am pretty heavily into, um.
A hunt on a shoot straight,which is our motto.
Um, I think that kind of sums up,even though it's grammatically
incorrect for an English teacherto do that, most people get it.

(17:59):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And it's, it's the integrityof whatever it is in life that
you're heavily involved in.
I think you need to do it with integrityand honesty and try to do it right
while understanding that none of us isperfect and we probably can't get it
right, but get it right, not just foryourself so that you can win, but get

(18:23):
it right for the entire enterprise.
And everyone else who may be affectedby or influenced by your actions.
So in the realm of hunting,I, I want to do it right to
honor the tradition of hunting.
We all know that there are plentyof what we used to call slob
hunters and probably still should.

(18:45):
You know, people who don't quite get ityet, they're not tuned in and not hearing
the vibrations and all the rest of it.
Um, but you get thatin all aspects of life.
You know, it's the same basic thing,but I think it's critically important
for hunters to try to strive.
For a higher level of interaction,uh, and respect for the

(19:06):
wildlife as well as ourselves.
And then the hunting traditions.
If we want to maintain this deep intothe future, I think we have to do that.
Uh, it used to be when we were fewerand the wildlife were more, we could
get away with some fairly bullishbehavior and over harvest and whatnot.
All it's just like St. Louis andClark coming across the continent with
their voyage of discovery in 1805.

(19:29):
They were able to shoot a bison, eatwhat they wanted, and then walk away.
Mm. 'cause there were plenty of bison.
Mm. 30, 40 million of them.
And they knew when they walked away fromthat, they had taken what they needed for
their nourishment, and then the wolvesand the coyotes and everything else
would clean it up and be thankful for it.
And the whole system worked,be because it wasn't abused.

(19:49):
Mm-hmm.
Now that we have thousands and.
Probably millions of miles of pavedhighways and channelized rivers and
drained swamps and wetlands and citiesspreading across the landscape, and we're
digging up minerals from the soils tomake the world into our image so we're
more comfortable, et cetera, et cetera.

(20:10):
That makes it harder and harderon the surviving wildlife and wild
places, and I think too many huntersalways go with the, oh gosh, what's
happening with the deer population?
We need to kill more cougars sowe can get more deer when the real
issue is what are we doing to shrinkthe habitat available for the deer
population or the elk or anything else?

(20:31):
A real crux situation.
But then that that involves somereflection and we have to say, wait
a minute, what is my role in this?
Maybe I am at fault.
We've met the enemy and he is us.
Mm-hmm.
That's.
So I, I think we do need to do it.
Each of us needs to consider thatbecause what is the impact we are having?

(20:53):
If I wanna enjoy pheasant hunting, Ihave to, can do what I can to contribute
to maintaining enough open lands withsuitable habitat for pheasants, that
we can maintain populations of those.
And that just goes for everything.
Mm-hmm.
And
to me it's, it's fairly simple, but it'salso, I think, extremely frustrating

(21:14):
because I constantly see an increasein developments, human development and
such, and people become complacent.
It goes back to an oldpop song in the sixties.
You don't know whatyou got till it's gone.
Right?
Yeah.
And each generation is born intoa world that is what it is at that
time, and they base it from there.
That's their foundation.

(21:35):
So when I was a kid, youknow, the foundation was.
Probably one farmstead on everysquare mile of ground in Eastern
South Dakota where I grew up.
And I just assumed that's theway the world was everywhere,
pretty much, you know?
And it gave us a lot of room to roamaround and find rabbits and pheasants
and, and dive into the creek and saint itfer meadows and mud puppies and whatever,

(21:58):
and then start to discover nature.
But now I can go back to thoseplaces and, and there are fewer
farms there, but the ground has beenturned into a monoculture, right?
They've got huge equipment to cropthese fields that you no longer have,
the little side weed patches and brushpiles and things that provided that.
Wildlife that we enjoyed back then.

(22:19):
So now it becomes like ohoh, what'shappened to all the wildlife?
I think there's a, uh, a disconnectthat'll happen from people in their
natural environment, particularlyif they're growing up in an urban
environment and they're just notexposed to it in the same way.
Now your writing exposes people toa different aspect, and you started

(22:41):
that, if I'm not mistaken, and I don'twanna put words in your mouth, but I
think you put five articles out andthey were all five were picked up
right when you first started, and youjust kind of hit the ground running.
And, uh, but now, now people aren'tgoing into the long form content, uh,
reading it in the way that they used to.
They're not picking up fieldand stream and, uh, reading

(23:03):
it in the way they used to.
They're getting all of their informationand tiny little bites through social
media and as long as it can, can kick thatdopamine on and, and, um, attack their
attention for a fraction of a second.
How, how are you finding that transition?
Because you're into this digitalworld now and, and how do you help

(23:24):
people connect with their naturalenvironment and make, make it meaningful?
The fact that they, they really should beconsidering how we all are interplaying
within the wild creatures and animals.
Yeah.
Great points, great points, Travis.
And you know, I'm not so sure I'm allthat successful at it, but what I have
discovered in doing what I do now, whichis the YouTube channels and a podcast and

(23:48):
some blogs on our website, I'd be writea few articles for the magazines anymore.
But as you noted, there'sjust nobody's reading them at
the rates that they used to.
So how do you reach these people withanything other than a 32nd soundbite?
Well, that's part of the challenge,and what I try to do with my
soundbites is make them meaty enough.

(24:08):
I found that I prettymuch have to cater to the.
Uh, interest in cartridges and ballisticsand all the tools that just such a
part of being human is, is tool use.
Mm. We're enamored of the latest andgreatest tools and high technology.
Look what we're doing rightnow, talking to one another a
thousand miles apart and Yep.

(24:29):
Like in the same room.
Yes.
I think what we have to do is figureout how we can use these new medium,
uh, these new media to reach people.
And then as you said, with the shorterattention spans we've got these days.
How do you get the message across?
I think by tweaking it a little bit.

(24:50):
We can do that.
So what I try to do is if I canslip a little bit of a conservation
message in with the fun stuff aboutthe bullets and favorite rifles and
cartridge and scopes and such, Hmm.
Just
try and at least each one of mybroadcasts to have a one or two points
about some conservation issue, whetherit's wildlife in Africa or in the us.

(25:11):
Um, overpopulation issues, overuse,whatever it is, just to get people to
say, okay, I learned all about the,uh, six millimeter creed more cartridge
and how fast it goes and how flatit shoots and all that great stuff.
And oh man, I better get thinking aboutall the highway deaths of mule deer
that are reducing those populations.
They can't bounce back because there'sso much traffic now and they're

(25:35):
migrating and they have to crossthese highways and they're taking
out more deer that way than the.
Cougars and the wolves ever took out.
Right.
Maybe I should start thinking aboutthat stuff, or I won't be able
to use my six millimeter creed.
More on that glorioushunt I was hoping to take.
No kidding.
Uh, have you noticed a shift in the,uh, the types of people that are

(25:57):
becoming interested in, in huntingand learning about their environment?
Yeah, I have it.
It is always a younger crowd kind ofcoming up, not as money as they used to,
because hunters are no longer heroes likethey were back in the mid 20th century.
Mm.
But still, there areenough family connections.
My grandpa hunted.
I, I hear this a lot.

(26:18):
In fact, we just had an elk camp, an elkbootcamp last week, and several folks
there were in their, Hmm, thirties toforties hunting for the first time.
They had first.
Purchased a rifle andgotten interested in it.
So they're starting to come around.
Even though, as you said earlier,there's urban, suburban environments
and growing up that way, you don'tget exposed to grandpa walking out

(26:40):
the back door and coming back witha brace of pheasants or rabbits.
Mm. So you have to find out aboutit somewhere along the line.
And I suspect that they're pickingup a few shorts on the, uh, social
media where they see someone hunt andit looks exciting to them, and then
they start digging into it and theywill discover websites or YouTube
channels similar to mine, where we'rediscussing those sorts of things.

(27:04):
And then they'll start to get interested.
And when they start seeing more and morefootage of wildlife, or especially if
they get out, literally get out intonature and have a close encounter with
something that really rings a bell for'em, then they're all excited about it.
And just down that camp we hadhere in the mountains, several
people were from the flat land backEast Ohio, that kind of country.

(27:28):
And they thought they knew what countrywas like, but they get here and the
mountains are going up this angle.
Yeah.
And they're looking across a bigcanyon at something four or 500
yards away and just the whole placefeels like another planet almost.
It's so vast.
Mm-hmm.
And that just exposes them to,oh my gosh, I've been living

(27:48):
in a cocoon all these years.
They're like butterflies finallyemerging from the chrysalis.
And it just inspiring to, tolisten to them and see the joy
on their faces when they just.
It seems crazy, but it's just thatsimple discovery of how big the world is.
Mm-hmm.
And they can be a part of it.
You know, I, I think that youkinda nailed it on the head there.

(28:11):
'cause I, I look at when COVIDhit and the, uh, concept of
self-reliance, really kind of Yeah.
Stuck home with people, people like,I'm gonna start making sourdough bread,
I'm gonna start gardening, I'm gonnastart hunting because that's easy.
I hear, I can get all my food hunting.
Right.
Yeah.
Um, and, uh, that was a, a bit of a, I sawa big boost in the, uh, in the firearms

(28:36):
and hunting industry and interests there.
But more and more I'm looking at howpeople are associating with their natural
world and vehicles to that are, uh, food.
Like, where's your food coming from?
And they're learning more about, uh,like we had Malcolm Wood on, he did a
documentary on microplastics and how thathe kind of brought that term to light.

(29:00):
Uh, we've, we've talked about,like you say, uh, mono crops and
monocultures and, and the impactthat has on our environment.
And I think people can start relatinghow they connect with their food.
I think that, uh, people you broughtup, oh, grandpa going out, coming back
with a, a, a brace, that connectionto their history I think is a big

(29:21):
part that people are looking for.
But more than anything, I think they'relooking for a connection because in
this ever connected world where youand I can talk thousands of miles
apart and, um, we're right, righthere as if we're in the same room.
W there's also a massive degree ofdisconnection that, that we have.

(29:43):
Social media isn't a social aspect.
People aren't going out to the local,um, pubs or local social gatherings
in the way that they used to.
Kids nowadays are being raised and theyhave anxiety to go in public because all
of this stuff, they don't even want, theyhave anxiety to pick up the phone and
talk because everything's a, a text andget back, and it's especially formulated.

(30:03):
So I think what most peopleare really looking for is a way
to connect to themselves, toother people and, and to nature.
And I, I think you writing and yourway of storytelling is intriguing
for people because they feel thatconnection to history and, and to others.

(30:25):
Well, good.
I'm glad to hear that.
Um, I sometimes think when I readsome really good storytellers, I just
think I'm pretty much a piker if somefolks are enjoying it and it helps
inspire them to get out and discoverthe things you just talked about.
'cause I think you,you hit it right there.
They're just as they're afraid to havereal social interactions with people,

(30:46):
they would rather do it on the phone.
I think they're doing the gaming andwatching videos on the phone and think
like, I'm out there hunting an elk becausethey're watching someone else see an elk.
Mm-hmm.
When they really get there andthey feel the vibrations up
close and it's the real world.
It's com not completely different, butit, it brings it all home and they, they

(31:07):
understand I have to become involved in.
Getting these things for myself.
Ke self-sufficiency.
Mm-hmm.
We are big on that because I obviouslyout on the ranch here, we, we can grow.
We've got an orchard, we've got agarden, we cut our own firewood.
We're completely off the grid, so we'reconnected, but we're also old people.

(31:28):
You know, we kind of grew up that way.
And I can remember as a kid whenthe telephone came into the house.
Oh yeah,
yeah.
At first, I must have been probablyseven years old or something.
And bingo.
This telephone thing up here.
Wow.
Can't imagine a kidtoday listening to this.
Going, what?
Yeah, the telephone.
I remember we used to have torent our telephone and Exactly

(31:51):
rent it from the phone company.
And if you're lucky, you had areally long cord on it and you can
kind of sneak into the other roomto have a private conversation.
But if not, you're having yourprivate conversation in front of.
Everybody who's walkingthrough the kitchen.
Yeah.
Not only that, when I was a kid, yourprivate conversation wasn't worrying about
just your family, it was worried abouteveryone else who was on that same line.

(32:11):
That's right.
Yeah.
The lines where you would havecertain number of rings was yours and
then one shorter ring would be theneighbor or somebody else on the line.
Everybody would know those ringsand say, oh, let's listen to what's
going on with Ron and his girlfriend.
That's funny.
So if younger you was looking at younow, what would surprise him The most?

(32:35):
That I still alive.
I should have been deadseveral times over.
Amen.
I have been blessed.
I mean, God has just really beenlooking out for me 'cause I did
some of the dumbest things, youknow, guns going off where they
shouldn't have even been loaded.
Uhhuh and, uh, driving.
Oh, in snowstorms.

(32:57):
Where you shouldn't have even been on theroad and going across rivers where you got
sucked over the falls and churned arounda few times before you managed to pop up.
Yeah, I thought I wasn'tgonna get out of that one.
Tell me about that one.
That would've surprised me.
I tell you one thing though, thatI'm really grateful for when I was in
college dreaming about all this stuff.

(33:18):
You know, what do you want to bewhen you grow up kind of a thing.
And planning for it.
I just, I planned like, I thinkI'm gonna try that outdoor writing
thing that my English teacher said.
I think I can maybe makethat work, so I'll try that.
But if that doesn't work,what am I going to do?
So I picked up a teachingcertificate so I could go into
the school systems and teach.
And that way I would at leastget the fishing season off.

(33:40):
Mm-hmm.
30 months
off in the summer.
Not ideal, but it's better than nothing.
Yep.
Um, so that's what I was planning to do.
And while I was doing that, I wasdiscovering all sorts of other
things about, and I thought,I wanna live close to nature.
Ideally I would like to have a 10,000acre ranch with a river running through

(34:00):
it, butting up against the mountainsin Montana or someplace like that.
And then all that nationalforest land beyond.
So I've got pretty much the whole world,uh, to roam and hunt and fish and not
have to ask permission or pay somebody atrespass fee and all this kind of stuff.
So obviously it was thisbig pie in the sky dream.

(34:21):
But now if I'd have been thenlooking at now, I would've said.
My golly old man.
You came pretty close.
Yeah,
because I, I got throughmy writing in this career.
I got to visit those places prettyregularly and hunt in Alaska
and Asia and Australia and NewZealand and Argentina and all over.

(34:44):
And it's as if I had this giant property.
But now here I am on this small property,you know, it's not exactly my 10,000
acres, but I've got land and it, it'smine on which to hunt, run my dogs,
uh, improve the habitat, grow thegardens, whatever I want to do with it.
So I really feel blessed andfulfilled at the same time and feel

(35:06):
a responsibility to leave it betterthan I found it, improve the land.
And I think that's what a lotof hunters are doing these days.
You know, you, the big deal with whitetailhunters especially is to get a piece
of property and manage it for deer.
Right.
Hers or pheasants or something.
Right.
Managing for wildlife, that was unheardof 50 years ago when I was a kid.

(35:27):
It was all out, how can thisland put money in my pocket?
Mm. That's prior to that, my,like my grandfather probably,
or the, at least his father.
Before him, it would've been, howcan I use the land just to survive?
Mm.
Folks were essentiallyliving off the land.
They were farmers.
What are they farming for?
So they can feed themselves.

(35:48):
Sure.
And then if there's a little leftover,they can sell that and get a washing
machine from, or something like that.
But they were, they had thechickens, they had the cow for milk.
They great.
Raised a pig for bacon on down the line.
It's just good old fashionedhomesteading sort of things.
But you know, what it's turned intonow, of course, is that you can
specialize with all the big equipmentand you can produce enough food for 40

(36:11):
people, a hundred people, 200 people.
I don't know what farmers claim thesedays, but one farmer feeds incredible
number of people and that's whatenables, of course, cities to be there
and people to live in those citiesand have no connection to the land.
Mm. Going into a store and purchasingthe food product ready to eat.
Mm-hmm.
So, I, I, I just think that,as you said earlier, folks are

(36:33):
discovering there's something missingwithin them when they do this.
Um, I don't mind spending a weekor two on a, a vacation in a town
where everything is done for me.
And it's just like, this is kinda easy.
Sure.
Everything's right there.
All they have to do ispay for it and heat it up.
Uh, but after a bit of that,it's like, I wanna make my own.

(36:55):
I don't know.
I wanna get my fingernails in the dirt.
And, uh, I was just pullingcarrots yesterday, I of the garden.
There's just somethingso satisfying about it.
Yeah.
You know, nothing worthwhile in mylife has ever come easy, and I've
heard others say the same thing.
And when things do come too easy.

(37:16):
I don't find they're that worthwhile.
And I look back at all thethings that really matter.
And you know, we've heardpeople talk about type one fun.
Hey K, we're on a rollercoaster.
Lots of fun.
You look back and you say, itwasn't a memorable time in my life.
Uh, some people talk about type two fun.
Uh, during the time it's got apack on my back, all this meat,
it's pouring rain, it's freezing.

(37:36):
I can't get a fire going.
But you look back on that andthat sticks in your memory.
And that's, then of course, I had onefriend tell me about type three fun.
I said, I've never heard of that.
What is that?
And he said, well, that's when you go out.
And it's just terrible.
It's like your situation.
You talk about I can't get the fire going.
And then you think about it lateryears and it's still just as bad.
It's Oh, okay.

(37:56):
Fair enough.
Full circle.
Right.
Fair enough.
I would add this though, Travis.
Uh, there have been many things given tome that I didn't have to work for and, but
it's all pretty much the beauty of nature.
The, the feeling that you get atcertain times, it's just so intense.

(38:17):
You get almost, almost cry.
Mm-hmm.
When you see this incrediblescenery, a mountain and a a, a
rainbow, you get the picture.
Yeah.
There's just certain scenes in placesin life, even wood smoke in the woods.
When you smell it at a certain time,it just moves you internally so

(38:37):
much you can't quite figure out why.
Um, you does it remind you of homeand, and grandmother back in a
day once when you were a kid andyou really didn't even register.
But that, that scent of wood smokemeans home, hearth, family safety, all
of the things that stirs within youthat you don't necessarily articulate.

(38:59):
And that's like that.
With nature.
Mm-hmm.
You're out
doing your best hunting to seethe, the legal buck that you can
take with your tag or, or a bigone that you've been looking for.
And then you happen to seesomething completely different.
Uh, I remember one time I was muledeer hunting and at the crack of
dawn with the red sky up on the ridgeabove me here came a line of elk.

(39:24):
There must have been 40, 50 ofthem all in single file Wow.
Silhouette against that red sky andjust going about their business.
And it was the, the, the daily walk toback to bed or whatever they were doing.
And it was just the magic of thatmoment is what I remember about that.
I don't even remember if I shota deer on that hunt or even

(39:45):
saw one, but I remember that.
Yeah.
And that'll stick with you
and he'll stick with youfor the rest of your life.
Yeah.
And that was free.
That was a given.
That was just all Ihad to do was be there.
Well, that's some of the benefitsof the lifestyle that you've chosen.
Those are some of the benefits ofyou putting yourself out there.
Taking that step and being bold andseeing how far you can take your passion.

(40:10):
What are some of the costs?
You know, my particular lifestyle is.
It has a pretty heavy cost forrelationships sometimes, and I
have many friends in the same boat.
When we were really active rider,outdoor rider, gun rider type,

(40:31):
uh, it involves being away a lot.
You've gotta go on a doll, sheep hunt toAlaska, you're gonna be gone for a week
or two and the family's at home and, youknow, truck drivers, anyone who does a lot
of work away from home, you've gotta have,you gotta work at it pretty hard to keep
things going so things can fall apart.
And then there's a little bit of a anego, potential ego issue if you start

(40:56):
to think you're somebody importantbecause there's your story and picture
on a magazine cover or something.
Uh, and, and you couldstart to act like a jerk.
And I certainly went through amore than a short phase of that.
Thinking you're really somebody important.
But when you, you get a little olderand you come to the realization that
you're really no better than anyone else.
You just try your best.
They try their best and you giveeveryone the benefit of the doubt.

(41:19):
You turn the other cheek andyou just try to do your best and
help others to do their best.
So now you're working as a team,or at least as you know, not
antagonistic, you know, it's not acontest on who did the best, who shot
the biggest and all the rest of it.
Um, once you realize that, itjust becomes a lot more pleasant.
Mm-hmm.
And, and then success ismeasured in many ways.

(41:42):
Of course, I can look in the wall andsay, boy, am I ever a great sheep hunter?
Look at the size of that dollram up there on the wall.
Every time I look at that baby, Iremember the glacier, we hiked up
and I remember sleeping on the ice.
And I remember, uh, waiting across thatriver and all the rest of the adventure.
But, hey, wait a minute.
I had a guide.
And I had a packer and theyhelped me and they were an

(42:05):
integral part of the operation.
The only real difference was I hadthe rifle, they didn't, but otherwise
it's as much their ram as it is mine.
Mm-hmm.
So
that's sort of a humbling, eh, notreally humbling, but just appreciation
for what others have done for yourather than, well, look what I did.

(42:25):
Yeah.
You know, I was in, um, uh, Nurembergand we were, uh, what is it, AWA
over there at the, uh mm-hmm.
At the AWA show.
And, um, friend says, uh, Trav,uh, I want to hook you up with
a friend of mine over there.
He's head of, uh, hunter trainingand firearms education for the
Bavarian region and mm-hmm.

(42:47):
Excellent.
Had a good chat with himand, um, excellent fellow.
I. Anyways, learning a little bit abouttheir culture and, and what it's like.
'cause he's very heavy into thetraditional hunting culture.
And, and I, I talk to myfriend, he's like, yeah, we'll
get you out over in Germany.
We'll do some hunting over there.
He is like, my first hunt,holy crow, what was that?

(43:08):
Ever expensive?
I'm like, okay, welllike, what do you mean?
He says, well, you gotta get allthe traditional attire right.
You gotta wear the, the right gear.
Okay, sure, fair enough.
I get ya.
He says, but when you get your, um, firstbuck when you're over there with them,
now you gotta pay for everything, drinksfor everybody, celebrate for every,
it's unlike in North America where thehunter has looked at, Hey, look at this

(43:32):
great hunter in what he came home with.
When the hunter goes out and they'resuccessful, they now have to turn around
and thank all of the people who broughtthem there, the people who helped set
up camp, everybody else who was outhunting, who had eyes and ears out
and passing intel back and I thought.
Isn't that interesting?
I, I really like that idea behindcelebrating the community and

(43:54):
everybody who made it happen,because we're not all gonna be the
one with the rifle in our hand, butwe all play a very integral role.
Yeah, that's, that's interesting.
It's part of the, the village tradition.
The tribe.
Mm-hmm.
The
tribal experience of huntingwhen everyone worked for a common
goal with his extended family.

(44:14):
Uh, I think we kind of got away fromthat in the States with the pioneers.
Obviously the Native Americans weredoing it, uh, but they had fairly small
tribes, but they all sort of had towork together and I'm sure there were
better hunters in the group and otherswere better at, at setting up camp.
And the women were obviously doing thecooking and a lot of the grunt work and
such, but everyone had his role to playand we've kind of gotten away from that.

(44:38):
Once we went off and got our.
160 acres and plowed the ground,put up the Saudi or the log
cabin and raised our families.
We were sort of individual.
That's always been a big partof America's individualism.
Mm-hmm.
And that
freedom, which I think is a greatthing, but we really are not isolated.

(44:59):
So the, the sod buster who was outdoing that with his family, he was
probably using a plow made out of ironor steel that was built by somebody else.
Mm. Mine out of the ground in anothercountry, you don't realize that, you
know, you think, oh, aren't I sufficient?
Well, wait a minute.
Who made the plow?
Yeah,
that's fair point.
Yeah.
And you gotta thinkabout all those things.

(45:20):
So yeah, it's, it's kind of the tradition,I think, in America as opposed to Europe
as you were discussing, where we're,we're still a little bit fresh with that.
Do it yourself.
Attitude and that that way of life.
But obviously now we've gottenpretty, pretty well away from it
other than the back to the landmovement, the self-sufficiency
movement, which I think is prettyexciting, I think is a good move.

(45:42):
I think most people should consider, howmuch can I do to become self-sufficient?
Uh, we're living in an area, in acommunity where we have a lot of
like-minded folks, most of whomare at least indulging in some
production of their own food sources.
A lot of hunters around here,obviously, but then we have cattlemen
and some people raise goats andsome people specialize in honeybees.

(46:05):
Some of 'em are doingsweet corn and orchards.
And when you get to know folksand you go realize, well, I don't
have to grow everything myself.
You're better at growing cherriesthan I would be, so why don't I get
my cherries from you and you can getyour squash from me, or whatever.
We have to trade.
Mm-hmm.
That's a, a useful old fashionedlifestyle that I think can be

(46:30):
done even in suburban areas.
And you get to know folks whohave, they may have a connection to
somebody in the country, but theyalso may have it in their backyard.
Mm-hmm.
Have suburban backyards in which you cangrow enough vegetables to probably feed
a family of two for a year or close toit if you really know what you're doing.
Yeah.
There was a book back in, when I was incollege, five Acres and Independence.

(46:53):
Someone had written about, we live on fiveacres and we provide everything we need.
Wow.
Obviously not, not the steel tools,but the food, they were growing.
They were making honey and maple syrupand they had rabbits and chickens and
eggs and uh, I think a milk goat orsomething like that, but they laid
it all out in this book on how twopeople could produce enough to live on.

(47:15):
Completely.
Huh.
Acres
might have to give that book a read.
That sounds very intriguing.
Five acres and independence.
Can't remember the authors, but it waspretty fascinating to me back in the day.
You know, we talk aboutindependence and individuality.
Uh, my wife and I were inSweden and we did a driven hunt.
That was the first time I'veever done a driven hunt.
That was pretty neat.

(47:36):
We're in historic solar on, and, uh,it's a, uh, it's a bit of a throwback
for, uh, Sweden, the whole community.
And, uh, the men, the women, they'reall out there hunting and it's a little
different than in North America wouldbeing such a male dominated activity.
But the hive mindedness is, I guessthe best way that I can put it,

(47:58):
the way that they all, they're,they're a very social culture.
And, um, red Deer goes down andeveryone's working together and get
it on the sled and get it, drag thething on out and get it up in one of
the farms hanging up and everyone'sout there working on the different
animals and butchering 'em up and.
It's, uh, it's a verysocial sort of event.

(48:20):
Very, um, very natural.
And over in North America, Ifind there's, uh, this level of
individuality that tends to kind of,uh, tear, tear our community apart.
Firearms, community hunting community.
Well, I'm not a bow hunter.
Forget them.
Well, you know, I'm justa pistol shooter, right?

(48:41):
Forget those, uh, shotgunsor whatever it might be.
And there's this sort of, um, uh, lesscohesive nature that I've, that I've seen.
And I don't know if, Idon't know why that is.
I don't know.
I, I, I have a feeling in Canada,I see it a lot because in Canada
I'm gonna do my air quotes.
Guns are special because you've goneand done a, um, uh, a two day course and

(49:05):
you've been criminal record checked andvetted, and not everyone can have it.
And they got all theserules that apply to you and.
So when you have all of these extrarules, I see these sub communities go out
and they start trying to have some sortof control over what they're doing and
they create their own rules and mm-hmm.
And I, and I don't know if this is alevel of social engineering that's been

(49:27):
brilliantly put upon to try and dividethings that are looked at as negative
guns, hunting the rest by, um, by society.
But I, I can see, um, I can seework like what you're doing and,
and others in the storytelling andthe connectedness of helping break
down the chinks in that armor.

(49:48):
Like when I look over into the states,and of course grass is always greener,
but when I look on over, uh, there seemsto be a lot more camaraderie between, uh,
different factions and less divisiveness.
Um.
I'll just throw that out there.
Yeah.
I didn't, I don't know enough about, uh,your Canadian gun and hunting cultures

(50:09):
to make that assessment, but I do knowthat we have a similar issue here with
the, I only shoot a bow, you know?
Right.
I'm a better father than you are.
It's not, some people reallyjump on it and they wear it as a
badge of honor, which is sort ofsilly, but it, it is part of it.
But what I do notice is there seems tobe a built in negativity, and maybe it's

(50:31):
social media, but I noticed it beforesocial media came in to a degree, but
it wasn't as blatant and noticeablebecause people had to do it face to face.
Right.
If you were out in the raffle range andyou were shooting a, say an auto loader,
and the next guy was shooting an old blackpowder muzzle loader, he could climb on
his moral high horse and give you a bitof a ribbing about how he was the superior

(50:53):
hunter and shooter because you're usingthis newfangled high tech stuff, Uhhuh.
That always goes on to a degree.
But what I've noticed on socialmedia is that people really
go to the hate side of it.
Hmm.
And I
think that's, that's a product of seeingthe hatred on all the political issues.
Nobody can make a comment and say, I haveobserved that X, Y, and Z, so maybe we

(51:17):
should consider Z, Y, and X next time.
Mm. It's you worthless blankety blank.
So-and-sos who like theYZ Xs are full of it.
We're gonna kill you all.
Yeah.
Worthless, blah, blah, blah.
Oh my gosh.
You think, what iswrong with these people?
But I think part of it is, of course,they just need to vent whatever
undisclosed anger is within them.

(51:38):
Here's a place where you can spit it out.
Mm. Just
get your anger out there and be as nastyas you want because you're incognito.
Mm. We see you do it.
Or, or come after you afteryou've done it sort of thing.
That spills over into this.
Some of the things I cover,uh, just the other day we did.
A review, Tate on my channel did areview of a rifle, I think it was a ra.

(52:00):
Mm-hmm.
And
somebody had to write in andsay, why didn't you do a, um,
a show of Tika in that review?
That was disgusting that day.
Well, how can you do a reviewof a ra if you use the Tika?
You wanna see the Tika review go there?
Yeah.
But they've just gotta complainabout something and bitch about it.
It's just crazy.
And then the worst one is when theysay, oh, that new cartridge they came

(52:22):
out with, what a piece of junk that is.
Nobody needs that.
Why my grandpa's old whateveris more than good enough.
You know, they're just gonna, they'rejust trying to take your money.
And I always have to remind theseguys, of course, the ammo and firearms
manufacturers are doing it to make money.
That's what's called a business.
That's right.
That's right.
And they're making thetools that you need.

(52:43):
Do you really want themto go outta business?
That's right.
Well, whose side are you on here?
Yeah.
You
sound like an anti gunner to me.
Totally.
And, and people don't see that.
I don't.
Yeah.
It's, um, being in the business andhaving been here for, um, I guess
1994, I started, uh, training.
I was in high school at the time, and, um,I decided I'll try and make a go of this.

(53:06):
I applied with the local policedepartment in my early twenties and,
uh, the Vancouver police, they said,Hey, you did awesome on the physical.
You came top on the, um, on thewritten, on the, uh, intellect side.
I don't know what that means,but, um, but you're young.
You need life experience.
I'm like, okay, well I'll do thisthing I've been doing on the side and
I'll make it into a business and whenthat fails because all businesses

(53:28):
have a high likelihood of failure,then, then I'll, I'll come on back.
Well, it never failed and theyended up becoming a customer and
I'm doing gun plumbing for themand for other police agencies.
And it kind of, uh, built out from there.
But I, and so my view has always kindof been in this industry, so maybe it's
a little myopic, but I, I see a lotof, I want to tear down your building

(53:53):
to make my building look bigger.
And maybe that's like it everywhere.
But for me, being in the industry,I sure see it a lot in the hunting
and firearms kind of community.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's crazy.
It's just human nature building,you know, trying to build yourself
up by tearing someone else down.
Hmm.
One needs to recognize itand fight against it, but it

(54:13):
really does hurt our industry.
What's the point?
But I am amazed at the number ofmanufacturers who are buddies with others
in the industry, say, you are building.
You're making bullets.
Hmm.
And
I'll, I'll get these bullet people whoare visiting with their competition
and comparing notes and getting alongjust fine and they respect one another.

(54:34):
And I think that's because they'vebeen around long enough to realize
that the competition helps everyone.
Mm-hmm.
You see that your competition'sselling more bullets because
they have a new designer or a newmaterial that you didn't think of.
Now you get your brain going, wait aminute, I can't rest on my laurels.
I need to come up with something better.
Right.
And that's what pushes, uh, the,the product development throughout.

(54:57):
I've really seen it in optics,
scopes,
and binoculars in the last 25, 30 yearsis, for a long time it was, there are
two or three top line European makers of.
Binoculars and scopes.
They really have it figured out.
They've just got the optical sciencedown to an art, and the others really
didn't know some of these secrets.

(55:18):
Hmm.
One of the first secrets thatcame out in the 1930s was zes.
They found, accidentally found out thata coating of magnesium sulfite on the
surface of a lens would cut the lightreflection or the light loss in half.
Big deal.
Huh?
So they start making binocularsusing this, and people would look
through 'em and go, holy mackerel.

(55:38):
This is the most incrediblysharpened, contrasted,
binocular image I've ever seen.
So they own the, they own that field.
Hmm.
Until others
finally figured it out.
Well, these days everybody's figuredout all the secrets, as much as I can
tell, and they all know how to make it.
Now it's just a matter of finding thecheapest way of getting it done, whether
that's offshore with cheaper labor, orfinding a source where you can save a

(56:04):
nickel on your materials here and there.
Or maybe skip the middleman.
Like some of 'em are doing it sell direct.
But the upshot is we're nowlooking at optical quality
in our binoculars and scopes.
The, that are half the pricethey were 10 years ago.
Yeah, yeah.
'cause of the competition.
Yeah.
And, and the benefits

(56:24):
everybody.
Yeah.
Well it benefits the end user for sure.
I, it's gotta be tough on the opticscompanies if they're uh, uh, always
looking for the cheaper outsourcing.
Like,
yeah, you can go too, too fardown, I think to the bottom.
But I think what's alsointeresting is that how many
of them are still in business?
They pop up and they.

(56:46):
Shine for a while.
They, they start to get accolades formaking an incredible instrument and
then they hang on for quite a while.
Um, I see way more optic companies stayingin business now than were 30 years ago.
Yeah.
With, with the Optic.
So I've got some friends at ArmamentTechnology and they do SAI optics

(57:07):
and tangent Theta and like superhigh-end, uh, crystal clear optics.
They're, they're really cool.
And what I'm noticing in, at least from myoutside perspective looking in is that not
only is it a process of trying to make it.
The best out there and the mostrobust and, uh, sing and all dancing

(57:28):
and like, they'll innovate toollessre zero, so you don't have to, uh,
like cool little things like that.
But it's the storytellingthat I'm starting to see
really kind of bleeding in.
I, I think people arebecoming less interested.
I, I guess there's gonnabe different groups.
There's gonna be those who are alwayslooking for the cheapest one, the best
they can get for the cheapest price.

(57:49):
But then there's gonna be those who wantto know the individuals behind the brand.
And if they have money that they can spendand they got their choice, maybe I'll buy
made in Canada, or maybe I'll buy Made inAmerica over top of, uh, getting something
that's gonna be made, made in China.
And the, the level of storytelling thatI see, uh, in marketing essentially

(58:11):
is, uh, really seems to be the thingthat's amped up over the years.
And I've seen it in the gun culture too.
Like when, uh, uh, Magpole started makingtraining videos because they're like,
well, we can't advertise our guns, butwe can put out a training video and if
you have this mag pull device on your gunand you follow our training, look at how
much of a better shooter you're gonna be.

(58:33):
So, um, uh, that, that's one areathat I've seen really kind of propel.
And that's probably an area thatyou've had a fair bit of experience in.
Yeah.
And that might be answering yourearlier question about storytelling
in social media and in YouTube insteadof people reading the magazines
or heavens forbid, a book, can youbelieve that people ever did that?

(58:54):
That's right.
Yeah.
They're telling their stories inthis new media and that is the,
the short film or the long film.
But you get to see the personality.
You get to hear the voice, and it helps.
It's a lot more challenging toget that through in writing.
Mm-hmm.
If you've read good literature andyou remember some characters that

(59:14):
just struck you, they stick withyou, you, you know, this person.
Mm-hmm.
How do you make that happen?
It's an imaginary person andyou wrote words that made people
feel that they know this person.
But then you look at something likeLonesome Dove, Gus, um, Gus Mo it Gus call

(59:35):
on Lonesome Dove, the character in that.
I call it a movie.
It was on television.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And stuff, but the, the Best Westernever made because of that character.
Mm.
Robert Duval's characterin that just grabs you.
And I try to imagine writing, well,heck, I don't have to imagine.

(59:55):
I read the book.
Mm. And it's just as good in the book.
You love this guy, youlove this character.
In the book, I guess Val's Artas an actor was portraying that
e with equal effect in the movie.
And just what you mentioned now, ifyou've got a manufacturer who puts
out YouTubes on his website, or maybehe's putting him on a YouTube channel

(01:00:18):
or something like that, they've gottabe careful how they tiptoe through
the minefield of This is a bad gun.
Mm-hmm.
Mention this word and that word andall the thought police out there.
Yeah.
Yes.
How do you get your message across?
And storytelling is probablythe, the right answer.
I think you nailed it,
huh?
Well, that's, do youfind a lot of hurdles?

(01:00:40):
Like, I don't think, I don't thinkTikTok will let images of guns and
stuff, uh, easily, uh, Instagrammeta that they, they clamp down
pretty hard, but not like TikTok.
And then YouTube is sort of a littlebit broader of what you can talk about.
Do you, do you talk, see hurdles there?
Oh yeah.
There're hurdles all the time.
You're always tiptoeing you throughthe minefield and walking on eggshells

(01:01:05):
because you don't know exactlywhat thing you might say that gets
YouTube to say You're canceled.
Your
channel is gone forever.
It's so arbitrary.
They can do it if they want.
And you ask them what are your rules?
And then you try your best to followthose rules and then the next time
they're, they ding you and say,well, we're gonna pull this one
off because you violated the rules.

(01:01:25):
You go, what rules?
So they changed them.
Mm-hmm.
So the rules are constantly changing,but also individuals who check that
video, I think it's all done with ai,computer bot stuff, but you can ask for
a real person review saying, mm-hmm.
I don't think they got this.
Right.
That usually works.
Yeah.
You know, some guys won't even saythe word rifle or bullet or shoot,

(01:01:48):
and they've got code words like pew.
Pew Sure.
And bang stick and freedom pillsand all sorts of silly things.
I hate that because it's slow.
I know there's language, but
it's, yeah.
Like why?
Why do you have to hide what itis that you're talking about?
It's not nefarious.
Yeah.
But that's, that's the way it is.
So you've gotta be careful, and I'mglad we're having this conversation

(01:02:09):
because I hadn't really thoughtof the power of storytelling to
get around some of this stuff.
I don't necessarily have to mentionspecifically all the items and what
they do if I have a riveting story.
Mm-hmm.
That inspires people toinvestigate on their own.
Because everybody knows once you have thename of a product, you can come close to
approximating the correct spelling of iton a search and you're going to find it.

(01:02:32):
Yes.
So I gotta remember thatand put it to effect here.
Well, it's, it's a direction that Itook with my company a few years ago
and I was, um, silver Core Firearmstraining for the longest time.
It was started as Silver Core GunWorks and doing gunsmithing for
every Joe Blow who came through.
And I mean, anyone who's gonnabring their gun to a kid to work on

(01:02:54):
is not gonna be paying top dollar.
And, uh, every gun that I worked on wasgonna be different, different issues.
And I learned, okay, start picking uparmored car companies, police agencies,
they're all on the same platform.
I can tool all the sameand they pay their bills.
So then it was silver Court firearmstraining, silver court training.

(01:03:15):
'cause the word firearms wasgetting blocked all over the place.
And, and recently I thought, you knowwhat I mean, I, I know the gun stuff.
I was raised around the gun stuff.
Um, I know some, not all,I mean in, in my area.
But there's so many otherthings that I'm interested in.
And I rebranded to Silver CoreOutdoors because firearms are a natural

(01:03:37):
portion of some outdoor activities.
And I found greater success in beingable to tell the story of connecting
with people, connecting with theirenvironment, connecting with their food.
And I reached far more peoplewho I ever would than if I
just looked at the gun side.
Now, uh.
I, I can't deny that if you putthe word gun in a post, it's gonna

(01:03:59):
have a very vocal crew of people.
But it's, it's the echochamber, so to speak.
It's the people who wouldalready be looking at your stuff.
Mm-hmm.
Um, if you want to try and win hearts andminds and show people that there are other
ways out there, and you know, guns can bereally scary in the wrong person's hands.
Guns can be a, a dangerous thing if usedimproperly, but so can cars soak, can

(01:04:25):
household cleaning chemicals, right.
Um, let's, let's look at thestory and the lifestyle behind
how you can connect to nature.
And, you know, there just sohappens to be a gun in the
background in some of these things.
I found some success doing that.
Yeah, I can imagine.
Um, I think it's a lot more,it's a lot harder work, more

(01:04:45):
challenging to do it, but yeah.
Great storytelling.
I've, uh, for the several years nowI've been sort of bemoaning the fact
that we don't have hunters as heroes.
Um, who's that authorwriting about a game warden?
His protagonist is this gamewarden in Wyoming, I think.
Uh, okay.
Box c CJ Box.

(01:05:06):
Does that sound right?
Okay.
The last name is Box.
He's got a series of paperbacklittle novels that are, you
know, fairly good, pretty, prettyriveting, uh, for some folks.
He's real popular anyway.
Yeah.
But that's the first one I'veseen in a long, long time.
Who made sort of the gunuser hunter the hero?
Mm. He, I assume he had to sort of.

(01:05:28):
Ca couch it or cover it with Game warden.
So he's an official, officiallygovernment approved gun owner.
Right.
But still, at least the gunsend up many times being part
of the hero, saving the day.
Mm.
In novels like that.
But now I think back when I was a kid,when a heroes were, we were seeing

(01:05:48):
them on TV with some Disney moviesabout Daniel Boone and all the old
Pioneer Heroes and the Cowboy Westerns.
That was a big deal in the1950s into the seventies.
So people like Davey Crockett andDaniel Boone and the Lewis and Clark
Expedition and all these things thatwere not that far in our background,
which made America, which made us great.

(01:06:09):
A kid with a love for the outdoorsand exploration and discovery and
adventure, would hear about those people.
And we heard about 'em in school.
They were on pop culturein those days, these days.
What does pop culture give you?
Mm-hmm.
Urbanites playing makeup space games and,and who can dance better than the next guy

(01:06:31):
on the street corner and things like that.
And, you know, more power to youthat takes a lot of talent, but
it doesn't have that connection tothe real world that we were getting
with our heroes back in the day.
Even a, a hero as fake as JohnWayne or some of the Yeah.
Cowboys on, you know, that's like,obviously this guy's just a Hollywood

(01:06:51):
star and he's pretending to be somebodywho was probably never really did exist.
Mm. But
there were people, there's a, there'sa gram, a grim seed of truth in
that there were people like that.
Uh, they weren't the white hatperfect Western cowboy saves the day
sort of person, but they were werereal people living out there who did

(01:07:11):
the right thing at the right time.
And they used oftenfirearms to accomplish it.
Right.
Because firearms were a tool justlike an ax or a plow or your horse or
whatever you, whatever else you needed.
In those days, the technology waswhat it was, and you used that
technology and did the right thing.
Of course, people could say, oh,what, what about all the people they

(01:07:33):
killed and the bad guys shooting and,and then the treatment of the Native
Americans are taking away their land.
You can always go to the darkside on all of this stuff.
Sure, it's human nature, but the ideathat some good guy with a gun can
save the day, I think is still valid.
We just don't see it in pop culture.
You don't?

(01:07:53):
Well, it's shifted, uh, like I thinkyou nailed it there when you talk
about good guy, it was the, the whitehat individual who, and it just so
happened to be that the situation wassuch that a firearm necessitated the,
uh, prevailing of good over evil.
And over the years it changedfrom a moral, ethical.

(01:08:15):
Um, high ground.
Yeah.
Based on the zeitgeist, based onthe culture to, um, to Rambo, uh,
who's, and it's more about, well,the person with the biggest gun and
the biggest muscles, and there's thiswhole fascination in Hollywood with
the just go out and shoot 'em up and,you know, it ends justify the means.

(01:08:35):
But the, the human ethicalpart of the whole story, um,
seems to have been minimized.
And I,
yeah, and they, they alsocelebrated the actual evil guy.
Right.
Many of the movies would havethe bad guy in the end getting
his riches and his rewards.
And the good guys didn't.

(01:08:55):
Mm-hmm.
And you, you look at those andthink this is not helping anyone.
I mean, I get the artistry in thestory, but what a downer of a story.
And then I think back to something assimplistic as the Rifle Man TV series.
Mm-hmm.
Back in the sixties, love that show.
Mm-hmm.
Still
do.
But like most of the shows in the sixties,there was a moral lesson in there.

(01:09:17):
Mm-hmm.
Pretty,
you know, pretty, uh, softly delivered,but it would be paw showing the son
that you, you can't just go around,uh, bullying everyone in the streets.
You're probably not gonna work.
Right.
I have this rifle that can settle thescore with these crew of bad guys.
Yep.
Yeah.
But, okay, great.

(01:09:38):
So you've got your white hat heroand he's usually, well, he was
always depicted as doing the rightthing in all aspects of life.
He took responsibility for himself.
He didn't stick his nose into otherpeople's business generally until it
was required, you know, push him to theedge and now he's gonna do something.
But I think the story that camethrough is that each of us, within

(01:09:58):
the community has to do our partto make that community successful.
To make life worth living.
Mm. Help
one other out, mind your own business,work hard, do your part, and it'll
all mesh pretty nicely, but as soonas you get the, the greedy guy who
wants to come into town to make easymoney, whether it's robbing the bank or

(01:10:19):
cheating at cards in the bar and all therest, all the stories that they told.
Sure.
Sure.
Yeah, the moral was alwaysthe right, do the right thing,
and it works out in the end,
right?
We're away from that and now we'reto the, the guy who's the strongest,
the toughest, the meanest and cheatsthe most is going to win heck of
a message to send to our kids.
Yeah.

(01:10:40):
Yeah, it is.
Well, looking at the differentlegacies that these characters have
left over the years and how that'schanged, if I were to look at you
and say, what would your legacy be?
What would that
be?
Hmm.
You know, I used to never think aboutit, but I hear a lot about it from my.

(01:11:03):
Viewers and listeners and fans these days.
And I'm beginning to appreciate itbecause to them, I'm Grandpa Ron
or Uncle Ron, somebody who's beenfortunate to have done the things
that they dream of someday doing.
So they, they look up tome, uh, because of that.
And then IF feel that it's myobligation to provide them with the,

(01:11:27):
the best information education, ifyou can call it that, that I can.
And ultimately I would like mylegacy to be that I helped prolong
our tradition of outdoor mm-hmm.
Of, of, I don't wanna sayhunting specifically, but
that's definitely a part of it.

(01:11:47):
A huge part of it.
But our outdoor lifestyle.
Let's go with outdoor life, youknow, the outdoor life adventure,
the canoeing and the camping, and theexploring and the fishing and, and
finding mushrooms and, uh, just livingoff the land and staying connected
to nature as we were designed to do.

(01:12:08):
I mean, you think about how long manlived that close to nature, the stone
age cultures, of which we might have twoor three left on the planet that haven't
been influenced by modern things, but whatit was like to be that close to nature,
to understand that you could eat thisplant in this season, but not this plant.
And you could, how you would getthis meat to keep you and your

(01:12:32):
family alive without destroyingthe environment that supported you.
I, if my legacy can do that and thesame time maintain or restore, uh,
a bit of, um, let's say glory, but.
A proper place for hunters.
In other words, we're not thebad guys, we're not the anti

(01:12:54):
hunter's ideal of an evil.
Kill all the animals.
You don't care about 'em thing, whichis ridiculous, but it's out there.
Mm-hmm.
I would like for more and more peopleto understand that hunters can be
an influence for good in nature.
Uh, we, many of us have been obviouslywhat we've done since the start of

(01:13:15):
the conservation movement, uh, endingmarket hunting, establishing wildlife
lands and refuges and Nashville forestsand grasslands in place, protecting
the wild so that the wildlife couldthen thrive with good management and
understanding all of those programs.
I think we've done a great job of that,or at least our two generations ago did.
I think we're falling on ourfaces a little bit here in

(01:13:37):
the last generation or two.
Hmm.
Or three where we wasriding on the coattails.
Like I, I grew up in an erawhere the Canada geese were
starting to come back until, wow.
Now look at 'em.
They're all practically a nuisance.
Mm-hmm.
Whitetailed deer were neveraround when I was a kid.
They started coming back and now lookat how many whitetailed deer there are.
We brought elk back, pronghornback on and on It goes until

(01:14:00):
we just took it for granted.
Isn't this something weget to go out and hunt?
We get, I, I used to be able to get eightdeer tags in one season in South Dakota.
Wow.
It was in my twenties.
Yeah.
Wow.
So you start to take it for granted andnow you, you look at what's happening
now and you, I like to tell folks we'vegotta do what your great-grandpa did
and your grandpa did, which is geton the ground and, and build the wood

(01:14:22):
duck nesting boxes and, and lobby tosave this wetland from being drained
and put into another shopping center.
Because when's the last time you huntedin a shopping center parking lot?
Yeah.
And then it's really funny, I'll saythat to some young kids that live
in the cities and it's just likethey get this look on their face.
Like, oh gosh, you're right.
I never thought of that becauseI've been around long enough

(01:14:44):
to say I used to hunt there.
Yeah.
Where that center is.
Yeah.
And how long can that continue?
So if my legacy is waking people up tothat reality so that they continue to
do the good conservation work that wasstarted a hundred years ago by real
conservation hunters, that would be cool.
I really like that.
And you know, I think there's this ideawithin people that the conservation work

(01:15:09):
is hard or it's somebody else's job.
And I think maybe what they overlookis the opportunity for themselves.
'cause you know, society is often,what's in it for me if I do this well?
L lots in it for you, foryour kids, for your grandkids.
Oh, that's too far in the future.
I just look right now likewhat's in it for me right now.

(01:15:31):
I mean, we've got a local group, pitwater fellers, and they're building duck
boxes and they love bringing people out.
And you can go up and you can volunteer.
And what do you learn?
Wow, I learned new places I can hunt.
I learn other people in the community whoare like-minded and I'm picking up tips
and tricks and maybe I'm gonna be moresuccessful on my, on my next season out.
I mean, if it's something thatyou're interested in, one of the

(01:15:53):
biggest things I've heard peoplesay is like, how do I get into this?
It's so expensive.
And how do I find a mentor?
Well, through the conservation groups isone way that you put out and infinitely
get back for generations to come.
So right now you get back connectionsand people might not tell you their
secret honey hole, but they'llget you pointed in the right
direction to kind of get you going.

(01:16:14):
Yeah.
Excellent point.
Yeah.
The conservation group like that,you don't think of it as, no, I have
to go out in the hot sun and, anduh, pull weeds or whatever they're
doing and I guess I could sacrifice.
No, you get to be a part of that communitythat is improving wildlife areas for
everyone's benefit, including yours.
And you're gonna meet folks who say,yeah, come on, join the club, take you

(01:16:35):
under the wing, be a mentor to you.
Or you know how it works.
You get to be friends withsomebody and you go, well, shoot,
I want to take this guy hunting.
Yeah.
I
enjoy him so much.
So suddenly you do have a place tohunt because you've made a new friend
who's taken you and then you returnthe favor with something that you're
doing in your neck of the woods.
Yeah.
I've got a, an old friend that Ibumped into a few years ago and

(01:16:56):
we just connected and now he comesout to the ranch to pheasants.
He shot his first pheasant insomething like, what did he say?
It was about 20 or 30 years sincehe'd gotten a pheasant really.
Yeah.
And he hunted with Covey and meon the ranch, and I was tickled
to have him shoot my pheasants.
Totally.
You know, it took him quite a while.
'cause his balance isn't as goodas it used to be, and a few issues.

(01:17:17):
And when you get into yourseventies, sure these things happen.
But he made this beautiful shoton a, a big rooster that Covey
pointed and went across hisfront and he killed that rooster.
And he was just about cryingbecause it felt so good.
No kidding.
His puppy made the retrieve,which made it even more special.
And so I get as much joy out ofthat as, as shooting a aluminum

(01:17:38):
pheasants in three seconds of myself.
Mm-hmm.
You know, the wholething just comes around.
So, yeah, it's, it's a great way to do it.
Join Ducks Unlimited or PheasantsForever, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation.
All these user groups who areconservationists, who are striving
for the kind of work that needs tobe done to keep us all in the field,

(01:17:58):
enjoying open spaces and wildlife.
That alone is a great legacy for anyone.
I love that.
Ron, is there anything that we shouldtalk about that we haven't talked about?
Where are you gonna takeme moose hunting next?
Come on up.
Yeah, I think what we'retalking last was, uh, I was on
the moose hunt there and yeah,
no, no, this, this has just been great.

(01:18:20):
I'm happy to visit with you.
I love your insights andyour passion for this.
Um, I didn't really know wherethis was going to go, uh, but I
figured, hey, you talked to anotherconservationist hunter and it's probably
gonna be some pretty good stuff.
Well, I really enjoy this conversationRon, and thank you so much for
being on the Silver Corp podcast.
My pleasure.
I'll be, uh, more than tickledif you invite me back someday.

(01:18:43):
I can guarantee it.
Thanks so much, Travis.

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