00:00:02 Speaker 1: From Mediators World News headquarters in Bozeman, Montana. This is Cal's weekend review, presented by Steel Steel products are available only at authorized dealers. For more, go to Steel Dealers dot com. Now here's your host, Ryan cal callahan. Several states are warning hunters about the presence of pea fast. No, that's not, you know, some sort of urinary tract infection. P FAST is also known as forever chemicals in deer and other wild game. This is in case you didn't have enough to worry about between c w D, episodetic hemorrhagic disease, toxoplasmosis, and COVID. I don't make the news, I just read it anyway. You may remember back in two thousand eighteen when Michigan issued a do not eat advisory for deer harvested near Oscoda Township along Lake Huron. Since and Michigan officials have advised against eating deer liver from anywhere in the state due to the presence of these toxic chemicals. Main issued a similar advisory last year for deer harvested in the Fairfield area, and in two thousand twenty, Wisconsin advised against eating deer liver from animals harvested around Marinette. A number of other states, mostly in the northeast and Midwest, have issued similar warnings. P FAST stands for per and polyfluoro alkali substances. These chemicals have been around since the nineteen forties and are found in everything from fast food wrappers to water resistant clothing, to paint to fire suppressants. They're known as forever chemicals because they're extremely difficult to break down. You can't burn them, you can't dissolve them in water or destroy them with bacteria. Once they're on the landscape, they're pretty much here to stay. That's a problem because high concentrations of these chemicals can increase your risk for kidney or testicular cancer, raise class to all levels, and damage your liver and immune system. Not that I know from personal experience, but none of these things sound like a whole lot of fun. The good news is that not all venison contains these chemicals, and the chemicals tend to concentrate in the liver why well. As you might expect, deer harvested near urban environments, military bases and air strips tend to have higher levels of chemicals. A survey of twenty seven deer in Pennsylvania found that while one of the deer had forever chemicals and its liver, none of the animals had high concentrations in their muscle tissue. Since the purpose of the liver is to filter out toxins from the blood, you can simply avoid eating the liver if you're worried about ingesting forever chemicals. It also may be easier than previously thought to get rid of these substances. A team of chemists working at Northwestern University published a study this year describing a technique for breaking down forever chemicals using low temperatures and inexpensive common reagents. If their technique proves effective on all classes of p fast, we could have an easy way to dispose of these toxins before they infect our environment, which is great for the areas we haven't messed up yet. This week, we've got Snort and Antelope Adventure, shooting ranges, and the crime desk. But first, I'm gonna tell you about my week and my week Gay, you know, it's starting to get hard to keep track of I am currently back in the South Dakota State, this time running around with Sean Weaver we're filming a new episode for the water Fowler and all of us duck lore. As I write this, we've located a bunch of birds and have been told no several times to hunting them. But the good news is we are finding ducks and geese and pheasants and numbers that suggest we will connect with them soon. Fat mallards, pintails, teal, gadwall, widgeon, a few canvas back ring bills, snow gee, speckle belly, Canada's The Gang is all here, which leads me to the Snort report. Old Snort AICUs hunted so hard in South Dakota for opening week of pheasants that she really deserved a break. So we drove about eleven hours back home to Montana to hunt my antelope tag where I had failed to fill that tag opening week of the season. To kick things off, we set up camp, cleaned, organized eight dinner, and went to bed at eight p m. Instead of my typical habit of leaving everything a giant mess and rushing off to hunt. That decision to organize stuff, cool our jets a little bit may go down in history as one of the better hunting decisions I've made. Why because it was relaxing and the next morning, high on sleep, we were up early. We had a leisurely cup of coffee, the gear was already loaded. We hopped into a clean, organized truck and we're into the antelope zone in time for a big, beautiful sunrise. We oddly enough found exactly one antelope who was walking leisurely away at about two miles. I threw him an old Garrett Smith's spotting scope judged him to be a nice buck, so we closed the gap, parked the truck, grabbed the pack and we're in hot pursuit. Typically it is not a good idea to try and follow an antelope on foot while it's on the move and headed away from you, but in this scenario I had looked at on X and determined it worth the risk. Why two big basins lay ahead of the buck, and I thought he might just lay up in one, considering the early start to his day. You see, antelope aren't exactly early risers. You can find them, but they definitely get more active with the heat of the day. So anyway, we hiked across the big flat top and crossed the fence and roughly the same spot that I saw him. That was his last location. At a trot, we made it to the first basin, then slowed our speed. The wind was barely in our favor, kind of quartering into the basin, so in order to look into the basin while not being smelled, we kind of had to go backwards to go forward. So we'd slide back, look over the rim of the sage brush valley, move forward, slide back, look forward, move forward, slide back, all the while trying to keep the wind right. Only to determine that despite this being an incredible spot for an antelope, it was in fact antelope less. Good chance he just kept walking, is what I was thinking to myself. We were about a mile and a half from the truck at this point, but we pushed onto the next ridge in hopes he held up in basin number two. Now, even a mile in antelope country is really nothing. When you get out on the big planes, their giant it's a wide open range land. Being on foot is in my opinion, way more fun and certainly better for the beer belly. But the reality of the vast plane is your odds of finding and killing antelope increase greatly if you cover ground in a vehicle also known as the Alberta Mobile blind and unfortunately for me, my clock was ticking. Only had a couple of days left of antelope season before the general rifle opener in Montana began. That's not when the antelope tag ends, but it does mean more people, and for me, that means less fun. On top of that, the forecast was calling for rain, which, if you're familiar with the area, you know moisture and clay make for impassable roads, horrible walking, and mud stuck to you, your gear, your vehicle for at least the next few months, which you know alludes to my second all time greatest decision, and I'll get to that in a minute. So anyway, we worked the wind, peeking over the second ridge and sub ridges, moving forward, backtracking with the wind, looking forward into the valley, not seeing him, sliding back to the blind side of the ridge, moving forward, sliding back with the wind, looking forward, and eventually there he is a herd all by himself, as the old outfitter used to say, five hundred and fifty six yards. So we back up and slide back to the blind side of the ridge, move forward, slide back with the wind. Three d and fifty five yards. Well, wash rints repeat. We move as far up wind as we possibly could, just on the edge of a nasty little wind swirl blowing him out of the country. Slide back two yards. That'll do. I snap on the Spartan bipod, which when I began this antelope game a long long time ago, the Harris bipod was like the king of all bipods, and there's still a damn fine bipod option, especially for the big prairie. They're heavy, they're extremely stable, they articulate quite a bit, they come in a bunch of sizes. They are a great option. The Spartan bipod is the backpackers option, very compact, very lightweight, pretty darn minimalist compared to a Harris. Now, the next part of this is just kind of an interesting observation. When I crawled into position on this goat, we were in an excellent viewing position. Could really look him over, judge those horns, make sure it was a big, mature antelope. And it was. But this is something that happens very often in prairie country. You can crawl hidden on ridges without providing the frightening animal scattering silhouette and observe your prey perfectly. But often, in order to clear the barrel of grass or sage brush, the shooter is forced to get forward of the ridge of that nice hidden position to a position just exposed enough to be noticed by your game animal, which is exactly what happened. But by the time he decided he needed to look at the bump on the horizon, he was dead. And here is where things get more interesting. As I touched off the shot, old Snorticus decided that it was her cue to go find what I had shot at, which is a very bad bird dog. I took my time, grabbed my things, made sure I didn't leave anything on the ground, collected my brass, and when I turned around, I was staring directly at a coyote that had just made up its mind to go after my spastic yellow dog. Now I probably could have gotten a shot off at this coyote, maybe fifty five yards. Instead, I said, hey, what are you doing? And you know, situation dissolved. We dressed the buck, got a few pictures. The buck just so happened to expire within spitting distance of a two track on blm ground. Went back to the truck drove up to him, parted him up, and had him packed on ice back at the camper, probably by noon end result. Snort likes antelo hunting and was never aware of the coyote. Now for good choice number two. As I said, I was in the Black Series camper, which is a super cool camper designed for off road living. It's got this independent suspension, doesn't fall apart when you drag it down gravel roads, all that fun stuff, but it also weighs about four thousand pounds dry, and mine is, of course a hunting camp and full of stuff, so the forecast was laying heavily on my mind, as well as the fact that a mud covered trailer would be way, way too heavy for my beat up old truck to drag out the next morning, the day before opening day, we got up real early, did some scouting for deer in a very fine mist that turned into a cold drizzle. By the time we got back to camp, we were soaked in cold, and I fired up the weather forecast quarter of an inch of rain on Saturday, one to three inches of snow on Sunday. I packed up camp, put my tail between my legs. Images of opening morning bucks painfully in my mind and headed for Moms. Sad to see that big, beautiful, mud filled country in the rear view, you see that rain starts. The only option you have is to sit tight, read a book, and wait for the dry wind to blow. A law enforcement friend of mine notified me that the local Sheriff's department had been attempting search and rescue operations for several groups scattered throughout eastern Montana that opening weekend. I'm not here to say I told you so, but I do hope you stayed the hell off of the ranch roads. Every single block management map has rules on the back no driving on wet roads. If you wondered why that rule exists and you tried it, I'm sure you now know. As for the rest of you, I hope you had a great opening weekend. One last thing before we move on to the hard hitting news. Season eleven of Meat Eater is now live. We are releasing one episode at a time exclusively at the meat eater dot Com. Be sure to check it out there. Spear fishing, angling, archery, rifle, shotguns, moose, bucks, bulls, ducks, and so much more only at the meat eater dot Com. Moving on to the legislative desk. A congressman from Utah has proposed a bill that would require a shooting range to be constructed on every national forest and every district managed by the Bureau of Land Management. The ranges would not be allowed to charge a user fee and would have to accommodate rifles, pistols, and shotguns. Congressman Blake Moore introduced the bill to give hunters a safe place to site in their rifles or practice their marksmanship. He also says it will enhance Pittman Robertson funding, presumably by encouraging more people to take up rifle hunting or just shooting. It's been endorsed by several big outdoor and conservation organizations, including the Congressional Sportsman's Foundation, Duck's Unlimited, and the Mule Deer Foundation. This might surprise you if you live in an urban area or a largely private land state, but folks out west often shoot firearms on areas of public land not designated as shooting ranges. The tracks of land are so big that this isn't usually a problem, but accidents have happened. I know I'm speaking to the choir here, but it's worth a reminder never shoot a gun without an appropriate backstop. And no, a tree is not enough, nor is it appropriate, especially with a high powered hunting cartridge. I've seen bullets zip through trees the size of my Torso get yourself a nice big hillside it up your target, preferably a compostable and biodegradable one like a cardboard box with no stupid stickers on it, and then pick up trash when you leave. There's no sense being a slob or going to jail for a nasty accident just because you wanted to sight in your dear rifle. If you'd like to weigh in on Congressman Moore's bill, it's called the Range Access Act, and it's currently before the House Natural Resources Committee, you'll want to get in touch with your US representative. In California, another gun related bill is having some consequences its authors may or may not have intended. In June of this year, Governor Gavin Newsom signed a bill making it illegal for a quote firearm industry member to market firearms to miners. And we're not talking guys with hard hats and picks. The bill supporters say they're horrified by gun companies that run ads for youth sized firearms, and the bill imposes it twenty five thousand dollars civil penalty for each violation. The problem is that the bill defines firearm industry members so broadly it could encompass virtually any organization that is even tangentially related to firearms. Organizations that market hunter education, school sponsored firearms teams, youth hunts, youth camps that include firearms training, and even short seminars or how two events could be caught up in the net of this law. According to the Sportsman's Alliance, Paul Kane, president of so Cal Top Guns, runs a program aimed at teaching kids gun safety and competitive shotgun shooting. He says they've shut down their entire operation in fear of that dollar penalty, and they appear to have taken down the home page of their website. It's still possible for kids to take hunter ed courses in California, contrary to what I've been seeing online, and the activities themselves are not banned. But you can see how this bill makes it virtually impossible for youth shooting sports groups to advertise their events and programs. In response, a group of outdoor organizations, including Safari Club International and the Congressional Sportsman's Foundation have filed a lawsuit alleging the bill violate its constitutional rights under the first, second, fifth, and fourteenth Amendments. A federal judge said just last week that she's expecting to uphold the law, but these groups will still be able to appeal the decision to a higher court. If you want to get involved in this one, you can contribute a few bucks to one of the organizations bringing the lawsuit. Moving on to the crime desk, a group of six fishermen from Colorado were cited for poaching four hundred and sixty pounds of salmon on Northern Michigan's Manistee River. Another angler noticed that the group was using illegal means of take, and he flagged down to conservation officers to report the crimes. When officers arrived at the scene, they discovered that the Colorado anglers were snagging fish using way lures and rigs with weights attached below the hooks. The anglers at first tried to cut their lines to hide their illegal tackle, but they soon admitted what they've been doing. Officers confirmed that none of the six fishermen had valid Michigan fishing licenses. They had collected seventeen fish on the bank and another forty to fifty fish and coolers in their vehicles. Combined, they faced more than four thousand, six d thirty dollars in restitution and additional costs. In Oregon, two hunting guides were forced to surrender their mules and gear after an investigation revealed they had been guiding out of state hunters illegally for at least ten years. Neither David Ravia nor Caleb Richmond possessed a guide license, but they still convinced hunters from Michigan, Ohio to pay for their services. They told their clients to tell anyone who asked that they were just friends, not clients. You know how, if your girlfriend or boyfriend ever introduces you as just friends, that's a big red flag. Well, for those of you who don't know, the same rule goes for hunting guides. Rabbi and Richmond got away with their shenanigans for at least a decade until someone filed a complaint with the Oregon State Police Fish and Wildlife Division. The resulting investigation spanned multiple states and included the US Fish and Wildlife Service. Raby had pled guilty to three counts of failing to register as an outfitter, and Richmond pled guilty to five counts of the same. They'll both have to pay fines, serve community service, and write a letter of apology to all hunters and guides. Two of their mules were also seized, and Oregon Fishing Wildlife plans to use them in the High Lakes fish stocking program. I wonder if the confiscated mules asked the others on the back string, what are you end for? Over? In Idaho, a multi year investigation resulted in fifty wildlife charges filed against five men. The group was sentenced this month to a combined twenty one thousand, nine seventy five dollars and fines, fifteen years and license revocations, three thirty hours of community service in lieu of jail, and four prong horns forfeited. If you're confused here, the American prong horn antelope a little Capra americana also goes by prong horn also goes by speed goat, even though it is not a goat. It is, however, the only true horned mammal that sheds its horns anyway. The case began when a landowner called Idaho Fishing Game about trespassers on his property. Conservation officer Chad Whipperman went to investigate, and he found tire tracks in a small pool of blood. It looked like someone had shot a prong horn from the road, thrown it in the back of their truck, and driven away. A friend of the landowner saw the vehicle the night before, which he described as a white suburban style vehicle. As Whipperman was in the field following the blood trail, some different prong horn hunters flagged him down. They told him they had seen a white suburban with four or five men in it who had been hunting the area for several days. They said these men were being obnoxious and loud and yelling at other hunters. They couldn't describe these men in much detail, but they did give Whipperman a partial license plate of the suburban. Just a few days later, another landowner in the area reported that a car he parked in one of his fields had been vandalized. It looked like a dead prong horn had been placed on the hood to cover it with blood and hair, and the suspects had stuck beer cans under the windshield wipers. Here's Whipperman. I didn't know if the two were related or not, but I thought that was a possibility. Right like the same time frame, this group has been reported as being kind of loud and rowdy and doing an obnoxious things. It's like I kind of suspected it was related. Using this information, Whipperman tracked down the group of individuals, all of whom except one were from the same family. They admitted to vandalizing the car and going into the field to retrieve the prong horn, but Whipperman could tell they weren't being completely honest. By the time the investigation was over, Whipperman and his colleagues secured sixteen search warrants of the suspects, phones, and other items, which revealed a host of wildlife violations. Beyond that single pronghorn. The group got hit with everything from turkey hunting violations to spear fishing violations to big game violations. Whipperman described some of the videos he found on their phones as quote disturbing. I remember seeing one video where they so they're driving the vehicle. There's two people and as a driver as a crossbow and the backseat passenger has a crossbow, and there's they're moving like they're driving the vehicle down this road and there's a herd of antelope running alongside of them, and they're they're taking shots out the window of this moving suburban at a running herd of antelope. Whipperman couldn't say exactly why this family, whose last name is Phillips, decided to make a habit of breaking wildlife laws. He described these folks as quote successful, so they weren't killing animals out of necessity. Whipperman thinks maybe there was some ego involved. They wanted to fill the tags and they were willing to do whatever it took. Whipperman can say that the case wouldn't have been possible without those pronghorn hunters who came over to talk to him. Yeah, it was really those other hunters. Had they not stopped to just chat with me and give me that little piece of information, like I mean, those guys might have gotten away with it and might still be doing it today. I think that'd be my take home message for your audience is we're all working for the same thing here to conservation and protect wildlife. And when we can get little tips. Even though it might not seem like much, it can it can really open the cantle ones. I agree with Officer Whipperman there, yah, who's will give us a bad name, make sure you do your part to give us a good name. That's all I've got for you this week. Thank you so much for listening. Remember to write in to a s k C. A L that's asked cal at the Meat Eater dot com and let me know what's going on in your neck of the woods. Also, if you're watching those leaves fall and you want like the coolest tool ever to blow leaves off your lawn and also get a big old ripping fire going, go to www dot steel Dealers dot com and find a local, knowledgeable steel dealer near you. They're gonna get you set up with like a clean, quiet leaf blower of the battery powered variety that will totally change your bonfire game, and they won't send you home with what you don't need. Thanks again, I'll talk to you next week.