00:00:03
Speaker 1: Smell us now, lady, Welcome to Meet Eater Trivia the Meta podcast. Welcome to Meet Eater Radio Live. It’s eleven am Mountain Time. That’s also eleven am for our friends in Poplar, Montana, on Thursday February twenty sixth, and we’re live from Meat Eater Hqan Bozeman. I’m your host, Spencer, joined today by Randall and Seth, as well as the Poplar Middle School from Fort Peck Reservation in northeast Montana. They are here to see how a media company. You can see them live. We’re live our YouTube channel right now. You guys are really nervous.
00:00:55
Speaker 2: Right, you guys should wave to our viewers. No, okay, so hi.
00:01:00
Speaker 1: We told them they couldn’t cost live on air, so they got all their cussing out right before we went live, and I’ll do some more later.
00:01:05
Speaker 2: It was shocking to be frank all right.
00:01:09
Speaker 1: On today’s show, we’ll interview Sergeant Ian van Ness about Canada’s Polar Bear Jail. After that, we have a hot tip off about PBC rod holders and finding lost arrows, followed by a review of the legacy of a white tail deer hunter for Meat Eater Movie Club. And finally we’ll interview Emilia Delbero about winning gold at the Cheesemonger Olympics. But first we have a few programming notes. Our first video of meat Eaters twelve and twenty six is live on the Meat Eater YouTube channel right now. Giannis goes on his first baited bear hunt and encounters more bears than you can shake an arrow at. It’s a one hour film that’s presented by Moultrie and on x. You can see it on our YouTube channel right now. Phil, you have some details about another podcast coming out that it companies.
00:01:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, that’s right. Giannis is going to be doing a Q and A and fielding questions about that episode. So if you want to watch the episode and either shoot Yanni some d ms. I think we’re pulling questions from the comment section of that video as well. So if you have any any burning questions for Yannis about about the hunt or his experiences there, get him in. That’s going to be dropping next Tuesday, which is the the third, March third. Check that out March third. He’s little camera, you don’t.
00:02:28
Speaker 3: Cut it off the corner. He’s leading, uh the tour for these students, so he’s tucked himself where you can’t see him, but he is here.
00:02:36
Speaker 1: And they’re joining us for our second to last episode of Media Radio Live. Next week is the finale, and Seth won’t be joining us.
00:02:45
Speaker 4: This is my last episode ever of Media Radio Live. My wife is going to have a kid next Thursday.
00:02:52
Speaker 2: Yeah, congratulations.
00:02:53
Speaker 1: Not very good planning on your part though to put it during the Meat Eater Radio.
00:02:57
Speaker 5: Wow.
00:02:57
Speaker 4: You know, it wasn’t supposed to be, but one thing led to another. The little dude does not want to turn his head down, so that means we got to do a c section.
00:03:06
Speaker 2: Was not.
00:03:08
Speaker 3: And I’m hopeful that if everything goes well and we have a happy mother and happy child, uh, that we can do a live cut into the hospital, yes with Seth maybe for our very last, our very last report.
00:03:22
Speaker 2: Baby’s actually coming out early in the morning.
00:03:25
Speaker 3: Yeah, good time, still make it in so.
00:03:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, Seth, some cultures believe in reincarnation, you know, like the Pope dies and then Cardi B has a baby and it’s like, welcome back to Pope. The same day that Media Radio Live dies, your son is going.
00:03:43
Speaker 2: To be borne.
00:03:45
Speaker 1: Maybe I’m going to call that baby little meat e to Radio Live for the rest of its life.
00:03:51
Speaker 3: You can do it a rough go.
00:03:54
Speaker 1: No, I don’t.
00:03:55
Speaker 2: Virgil, Virgil, Virgil is his name, Virgil.
00:03:58
Speaker 1: I’m going to call it radio or Yes, it’s exactly like that, And there’s nothing.
00:04:05
Speaker 4: This is Spencer. He’s gonna call you radio. He’ll be the only person that calls you radio.
00:04:09
Speaker 3: Yeah, just let them. But we’re all thinking it.
00:04:12
Speaker 1: That’d be an interesting child if it comes out, is Medy to Radio Live reincarnated.
00:04:17
Speaker 2: That would be weird.
00:04:18
Speaker 3: A lot of bad segments.
00:04:21
Speaker 1: For our finale, we have something very special planned. Randall, fill some folks in and what’s going to happen next Thursday.
00:04:27
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think everybody here is eagerly awaiting the Meet Eater Radio Live Grand Finale Live extravaganza.
00:04:34
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:04:34
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, you know, with mixed emotions, of course. But I just want to give everybody a shout out. I alluded to this earlier heads up that we, uh, we will be going long next week. Uh, Spencer and Phil and I are aiming for about six plus hours in the studio.
00:04:51
Speaker 2: And that’s not that’s not a joke.
00:04:53
Speaker 3: That’s not a joke. We have guest hosts lined up all of your favorite radio live co hosts will be joining u US during various segments. We’re gonna try to hit every single segment we’ve ever done. We have literally special literally every single segment, So even the ones that we did just did once, we’ll try to hit those if we can remember how they go and if we have got a jingle for them. We’ve got some special messages from celebrities that will be playing on air.
00:05:21
Speaker 6: A music video, a music video Phil Yeah.
00:05:25
Speaker 3: I mean there’s a lot to look forward to.
00:05:28
Speaker 2: And because it’s six hours, we’re not expecting everyone to sit down and watch the whole thing, though you you’re more than welcome to and I encourage it. But it’s one of those things you can kind of tune in for a while, take a break, come back later. Yeah.
00:05:39
Speaker 3: I think it’ll be best be viewed in parts, yeah, and segments only.
00:05:45
Speaker 4: It won’t work for the younger folks listening, But I think the only real point of comparison would be the Jerry Lewis telethon.
00:05:53
Speaker 3: Yeah, Yeah, we’re raising so yeah, maybe we should raise money. We’re gonna we’re gonna burn through a lot of hot tip offs so empty in the clip we’ve been swamped with hot tip offs in the past two weeks after someone bad mouthed the recent round of submissions. So we’ve been swapped with some good ones. We’re gonna hit those hard. Uh, it’s gonna be a lot of fun.
00:06:15
Speaker 2: We’re gonna play some play some games, play some games with audience participation.
00:06:19
Speaker 1: That’s right. We will talk to the chat all day, so so be in our weight room. We’ll answer your questions every hour. Uh. This this is the podcast version of if your parents want you to not smoke cigarettes when you’re a kid, to be like, oh you like that. Huh, well, how about you smoke a whole pack of media. That’s what we’re doing. We know some of you are going to miss this a lot more media to radio.
00:06:43
Speaker 3: This you won’t want anymore.
00:06:44
Speaker 1: We’re gonna make sick to your stomach, exhausted, you might throw up.
00:06:49
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know, I’m I’m I’m excited. There’s still a lot of work left to put that thing together, but uh, but we’re excited and I think there’s gonna be some fun surprises along the way. And really it’s a celebration of what we all share together as a community.
00:07:07
Speaker 1: One week, Yeah, there’s going to be a movie club for that. When do we know what movie it’ll be yet?
00:07:11
Speaker 3: Yes, we’ll be reviewing the film of Congo.
00:07:13
Speaker 1: How did you land on Congo?
00:07:15
Speaker 3: It’s one of my favorite movies. It involves not necessarily hunting, but there’s camping, there’s outdoor adventure, there’s wild animals, and a bunch of animals do get killed by lasers. So it’s all the criteria based on a Michael Crichton novel that I read last year for the first time.
00:07:34
Speaker 2: Actually, did you love it? Yeah?
00:07:36
Speaker 3: And it’s actually the adaptation is remarkably faithful.
00:07:41
Speaker 1: I hear fantastic things about the Jurassic Park book. Have you read that?
00:07:45
Speaker 5: Yes?
00:07:45
Speaker 1: Is it very good?
00:07:46
Speaker 3: Yes? And and Congo came out the year after Jurassic Park, so it was like he was a heat Let’s take the momentum of Jurassic Park and carry it into a new universe. It’s a classic, especially no what we know now about satellite communications and technologies. This is made when that was just like a fanciful idea, and it plays a big role in the plot. So yeah, big ape guy, as we all know. And so I’m melding my two primary interests. Bad movies and great apes, and we’re gonna review Congo. So I didn’t look up where you can view it, but I’m pretty sure it’s on Netflix. I own it, okay, so of course, yeah, just as I owned the novel. And yeah, that’ll be a lot of fun. That’ll be a lot of fun. So we’re gonna that one’s just gonna be Yeah. I think probably the most demented radio club or movie club on Radio Live we’ve ever had, so except for maybe today, Today.
00:08:39
Speaker 1: February fifth is the finale again, probably a six plus hour episode. Hop in the Meat Eater YouTube channel that day and you’ll get to participate in our finale.
00:08:50
Speaker 3: Yeah. So if you’ve got a doctor’s appointment that afternoon at like two or three pm, you’re gonna want to cancel that one too, because that will actually be a conflict.
00:09:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, so CALLI work, yea, do what you gotta do. All right, let’s get on with the show. Joining us line First, do we do want to say say goodbye to the pop jo jo us meet? My studies class played an important anybody want.
00:09:15
Speaker 3: To give a quick shout out to your friends or family, now’s your chance.
00:09:20
Speaker 1: They forgot all the names name a friend. Give a shout out to my to my cousin Kendall, shout out to all Right. We did it. Shout out Kendle and Nicholas.
00:09:31
Speaker 2: Good morning. Yeah, yeah, let’s hear that, Mike.
00:09:42
Speaker 3: Did you guys say Randall’s loser and la coda?
00:09:48
Speaker 1: Okay, we did it. Thank you for joining us.
00:09:51
Speaker 3: I’ve gotten a lot of I’ve gotten a lot of angry emails and d ms over the years, but I’ve never seen it express quite that way. Thank you.
00:09:59
Speaker 1: Enjoy the yes today, We’ll see you guys around the office for visiting.
00:10:02
Speaker 3: Guys, all right.
00:10:08
Speaker 1: Joining us on the line first is Sergeant Ian van Nest. He’s a Manitoba conservation officer in the polar bear capital of the world. Ian, welcome to the show.
00:10:20
Speaker 5: Hey, guys, super pumped to be here.
00:10:22
Speaker 1: We’re excited to have you that.
00:10:24
Speaker 2: Now.
00:10:25
Speaker 1: You live and work in a place that has as many humans as it does polar bears. There are about eight hundred of each in Churchill. What is your role there?
00:10:35
Speaker 5: Oh? So, I’m sergeant conservation officer up here in Churchill, Manitoba. So I’m in charge of the Polar Bear Alert program, one of a kind program in the world. It’s basically an APEX predator management program, and what we do is we are solely there to make sure that people can coexist with these giant critters.
00:11:01
Speaker 1: Okay, what is it about that area that creates such a dense population of polar bears?
00:11:08
Speaker 5: Yeah, Churchill again, poor bearer capital of the world. It’s got to be you know, the habitat. You’ve got the ring seal out on the Hudson Bay there, that’s the primary food staple for polar bears. And not to mention too that there’s also the largest denning area in the world. What Past National Park just to the southeast of Churchill. So Churchill is essentially in a migratory path of these bears. And it’s quite incredible because we have eight hundred plus people living right in their path. So thanks to our program, we’re able to keep people safe and also the bear is safe and prevent any problems from happening.
00:11:52
Speaker 1: How common are maullings, Well.
00:11:55
Speaker 5: Again, thanks to that polar Bear Alert program, not very very common, like you mentioned there, Like back in twenty thirteen, we did have a malling that was our last malling. So quite proud to say that due to our program we’ve been able to stop and prevent a lot of these tragedies from happening.
00:12:17
Speaker 1: Can you explain what the polar bear alert program is? How does that tell people that they need to be on alert for a polar bear.
00:12:26
Speaker 5: Yeah, it’s an APEX predator co management program where the province will identify So the province, i say, is of Manitoba. I’m an employee of Manitoba. So basically what we’re doing is we’re identifying any bears that are potentially a problem, whether they’re food conditioned or that they’re aggressive in any way, and we will do proactive measures like setting up bear traps and preventing some of these bears from hanging around. And it’s the bears that are hanging around town that are essentially problematic because then they become comfortable around humans and we all know wildlife right there unpredictable. So anytime you get these dangerous critters hanging around town, it’s usually a recipe for a dangerous situation. So we’ll either utilize proactive things like our bear traps. We might have to dart these bears using wildlife immobilization tactics, whether we’re darting them from helicopters or from the ground. Other things we’ll be doing is just simply what we do is hazing tactics, and hazing is essentially just using a loud sound and making it uncomfortable or unpleasant for that bear and letting that bear know that it’s not okay to hang out in town. So ninety nine percent of the time this is what we’re doing. We’re utilizing a shotgun. We’re going to be firing cracker shells towards the bear and steering them in a specific direction to get them out of town and a way.
00:14:06
Speaker 1: What’s the closest that you’ve come to being attacked.
00:14:11
Speaker 5: Oh, there’s been lots of times. I gotta think of one. I mean, it’s a thrilling job. And after a while you develop a comfort with the animals and that no other person has ever experienced until you do this job. So my comfort level with these creatures are a lot different than the average person. But there has been a few times. Whoa, and you know what, you gotta be a little more careful there, Like you’re only fifteen feet away from this thing and it’s given you the side eye, and once you see the whites of those eyeballs. It’s like, holy smokes, Okay, a little close, but I swear those bears they can read you and they feel your energy, and they also know that you’ve got something that’s a long stick called the booms stick, and they know that that thing might hurt them. So it’s like they’re smart enough to know. Hey. So, I mean, I’ve been fifteen feet away from these things and giving me the side eye. And we have our protocols where we’ve got somebody with lethal force in case we need to use it. But most of the time I’ve walked up ten to fifteen feet up to a bear like that eight hundred pounds on thousand pounds mail and give it a dart so we can make it go to sleep. And that’s the key part is getting it safely down get to sleep so we can get it in the facility.
00:15:37
Speaker 1: And what kind of boomstick do you carry for the protection against these polar bears?
00:15:43
Speaker 5: Great question, you know, I got a bunch. I mean, I’m using a twelve gauge with slugs, mostly because I can also fire my cracker sholl, which is a non lethal ammunition, but also I can quickly switch to a slug in case I need to use that. The other thing we just recently got is a Daniel Defense d D five and it’s in that three to zero eight cartridge three twenty round magazine so red dot site And know what, I think that is a very accurate and incredible weapon to use for defense against these creatures. So I’ve got that in my arsenal as well as a nine millimeter on my side, so that’s also comforting to know in case one of them’s on top of me or something, I gotta I gotta get in close quarters with this thing.
00:16:35
Speaker 1: So loaded to the t. I mean you said that they bet they’ve been fifteen feet from you in those situations. Have you ever drawn a gun ready to use lethal force?
00:16:47
Speaker 5: Yeah? Lots. I mean if I’m in that close, I’m drawn and ready with lethal force, and you know what, knock on wood. I have never had to use use it and kill a bear situation like that. So again, it’s a lot of reading the animal and they’re smart and they can feel your energy. So staying calm is I think a big part of it too.
00:17:11
Speaker 1: Okay, now, if the polar bears aren’t running around biting people all the time, tell us what kind of problems they do create.
00:17:18
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, it’s pretty rare for them to bite people, but they can’t write that risk is there, and it’s a real risk and they’re very dangerous and we’re in their territory. So basically a lot of what we’re doing is preventing that situation from happening, and the key thing of preventing that is stopping habituation. We have a lot of restaurants in town. People are careless with their garbage, so a lot of the inexperienced bears that are not great at their jaws on some garbage. So we’re out doing proactive measures, such is removing those attractants and trying to keep them away from that because as soon as they get that taste of garbage, they ain’t leaving and they’re gonna hang around there and tell the sea ice forums again they go back to hunting seals. So you know, we got to haze them out of there. Sometimes we might have to shoot them with a rubber slug if the loud noise ain’t working, and just getting them moving along and stop that that that food conditioning from happening. So go ahead, go ahead. Yeah, no, I was just gonna say that, like, they’re the problems that mainly arises the food conditioning, getting into human food sources, and because once they get that taste of human food source, they’re not gonna leave. And then that’s when we have to intervene. There will be a bear that’s hanging out for a week in town, and you know, someone will open up their doorstep and walk out their porch and there’s a thousand pounds poor bear sitting beside them. Well, that’s happened many times. And I’ve got videos sent to me of this happening, and and and so we respond right way. We got an emergency line in town, so I got that phone beside my bed and that they can call it. And it wakes me up, and I’m out the door with my shotgun and I’m going to scare that thing away. But it’s a lot of proactive. The problems that they’re they’re getting into is that basically getting into human sources of food.
00:19:20
Speaker 4: How often are you getting those calls in the middle of the night that there’s a polar bear too close?
00:19:26
Speaker 5: Yeah, Like you know in bear season which is starting now from August till December, so when there’s no ice on the Hudson Bay. Those bears are all on land, and that’s when they’re causing problems or the potential for them to cause problems. Once that ice is formed. They don’t care about our town. They don’t care about Churchill or being on land or humans. All they care about is seals. So during the bear season August to December, basically what’s happening is they’re getting hungry and I need to find some food. So then we’re going to be getting calls, five ten calls a night, and it’s like, you’re not sleep You’re not sleeping, so you’re up all night. My phone beside my bag, goal deal, the call go home, an our phone goes again. And yeah, so I don’t sleep in bear season.
00:20:17
Speaker 1: And if there is a problematic bear, you guys sometimes send that bear to the Polar Bear Jail. Tell us about that facility.
00:20:26
Speaker 5: Yeah, the poor bar holding facility. Again, it’s a world renowned there’s no other place like it in the world. So there’s twenty eight holding cells in there, and and so only bears that are problematic end up in there. I’d say ninety nine bears were able to get through town and get them away, and they don’t come back. It’s that one percent that they’re just causing problems and they’re not going away. So then I got to go and dart them, put them to sleep, and then we’ll transport them, put them in a trap, or or we could just use it. We have what’s called a bear board. It’s basically a stretcher for a poor bear, and you know, the bear is sleeping, goes on the stretcher back of my truck, and I bring them inside the facility and they stay there for thirty days. So it’s kind of marries a little bit of de terrence with separating them from people so that they don’t hurt people. And thirty days they don’t get fed because again we don’t want them to introduce them to human human food sources. So they’re already in a state of hibernation and their bodies adapted to living off fat off their food stores when they were hunting seal all winter. So basically they’re in there and they’re like, oh, this sucks. You know, I’m not doing this again. I’m never coming back here again.
00:21:50
Speaker 1: Say a bear is thrown in jail for a month, walk us through what happens from the time they’re locked up to the time they’re set free.
00:21:59
Speaker 5: Yeah, well, bears hanging around town. It’s been there for a week. But geez, we can’t get this thing. We can’t scare it away. So I end up darting it a lot of times. I got to use a helicopter to see get them. So you’re darting out a helicopter. You get them down, and then we transport them on the stretcher, get them inside. They go inside an individual cell. But before we do that, we give them a number, so they have a number that identifies them as an individual. So then I can go back at a database and like, oh, yeah, I dealt with this one before, and so then it’s a repeat offender, right, And so this is how we better manage these bears. And so yeah, we get them a lip tattoo, so there’s going to be a corresponding number on their lip and their ear they get a tag. And so this way, when they’re I’m in the field again, I got deal with the same bear, I can easily identify them again. And yes, I do have a refender list. It’s about twenty bears long. And this is the way we can tell if they’re just they have it in their behavior. And again a lot of times these bears are like humans. Some of them are just bad actors, and they just wind up in this facility over and over again. It’s true, and I just can’t believe it sometimes. But anyways, Yeah, it’s so thirty days, they’re not getting any food, they do get water. They stay in there, and then we’re going to put them down again to sleep. After their thirty days, we’re gonna load them on the stretcher, get them and make sure that we’ve got all the data off them that we need to. Bears will also be weighed so we know how much weight they lost inside the facility. And because they do lose about to believe it or not, three to four pounds a day. And actually this is kind of similar in the wild they do as well.
00:23:59
Speaker 3: It must be nice.
00:24:01
Speaker 5: Yeah there, it’s quite amazing. Yeah, I wish I could lose that much weight. But anyways, they are an incredible speedie and it’s just amazing how they’ve adapted to live.
00:24:15
Speaker 1: Here’s a dumb question. How pissed are they when they’re locked up?
00:24:19
Speaker 5: Oh so mad? Yeah, they like they’ll pound those bars. It’s incredible their strength, Like they’ll bow the bars, Like those bars are just solid steel and concrete cylinder block cells. So we’ve never had one escape other than we did actually have a little cub escape one time, but it got through the trough where we feed them or where we give them water. Sorry, it’s so part of me that we don’t feed them, but we give them water, and they got through that trough. So now we’ve got a special insert that goes in there so that the little cubs can’t squeeze through the trough. So yeah, and it’s in a very powerful they hiss at. Yeah, they they give you the side eye. They got a really mean deep growl. There’s a like it’s pretty eerie sounding. It’s good and you can yeah, it’s you can hear it. There’s nothing else like it, Like, I’ve never experienced thing else like that. But yeah, incredible.
00:25:23
Speaker 1: What’s the most bears you’ve ever had locked up at once? You said you have twenty eight holding facilities. Do you ever get to max capacity?
00:25:32
Speaker 5: Yes, we have done that and back back in back in the day when it first started in the nineteen eighties, they feel that that’s those cells over and over again. It was a rotating door, revolving door, Now I’ve put twenty in a season, so a fraction of that. We’re not handling them as much anymore. And that’s because we’ve changed our tactics. We don’t want to have to handle them unless we absolutely have to. So, yeah, back in the eighties, they put a lot of bears through there. Now in twenty twenty six, we’re a little more selective on the bears we put in there. And on average, i’d see we probably put twenty per year in there.
00:26:19
Speaker 1: All right, So walk us through the process of what happens when you go to let them go.
00:26:25
Speaker 5: Yeah, so once we get all the data off them, weight, their length, their girth, make sure we got their numbers, what male female, are they pregnant, stuff like that. You gotta watch, you gotta pay attention to stuff like that. Then we’re gonna we’re gonna put them in a cargo net and basically helicopter and sling them out to their habitat to the north. We put them to the north because these bears are naturally migrating from east to west and then north again, so we want to follow their natural migration. And essentially, yeah, we just throw we get them in the in the cargo nets and put them in the in a remote area to the north, away from people. That’s essentially all it is.
00:27:10
Speaker 1: And if folks want to come visit Churchill, the polar bear capital of the world, what advice do you have for them.
00:27:17
Speaker 5: Well, come check out the poor Bear Holding Facility because there’s no other place like it in the world. You might even be able to hear the loud growl if you put if you put your ear close to the door and listen, and and ask some questions about Poor Bear Alert program. Google it, check it out. Not a lot of people actually know about it, and it’s it’s a success story. It’s protecting humans and protecting bears, and and come to Churchill and just it’s the poor bear capital of the world. There’s no other place where you can easily access basically while they viewing areas where it’s very likely you’re going to see a poor bear. So book through a guide, though a licensed guide is your way to go. There are restrictions on how to view bears, and so the guides all know how to do that, and you don’t because you don’t want to get yourself in a bad situation. I’ve seen people five feet away from these things. They think it’s the zoo, and it’s just it’s so incredible how fast they can move, and people just sometimes don’t realize they get caught in a moment like all this magnificent creature and yet they’re only five to ten feet away from the thing. It’s just it’s it’s not ideal. But again, go through a guide and they’ll keep you safe.
00:28:32
Speaker 1: So have you gotten any emergency calls while doing this interview?
00:28:38
Speaker 5: No? So Luckily right now those bears are out on the sea ice and there they’re going to be there till probably June July eight and ring seal that’s their primary diet, and so I get to rest right now.
00:28:50
Speaker 1: Okay, good, good for you, Thanks for joining us, and stay safe out there.
00:28:55
Speaker 5: Yeah, thanks guys, been a pleasure.
00:28:57
Speaker 2: Yeah, like thanks, Ian.
00:29:00
Speaker 1: I noticed you boys perk up when he talked about what he carries for protection. Did anything surprise you about what he has on him?
00:29:07
Speaker 2: Oh? I mean shotgun.
00:29:09
Speaker 4: I feel like it’s pretty run of the mill protection weapon for bears, but the Daniel defense, Yeah, did that makes sense?
00:29:18
Speaker 7: Yeah?
00:29:18
Speaker 3: I mean I’d assume they’re just trying to put one in the central nervous system. So probably a bullet.
00:29:28
Speaker 1: Just be accurate.
00:29:31
Speaker 3: Bullet. We get Randall a pack of smokes from Steve.
00:29:37
Speaker 1: Popular Middle school brought gifts to the met Beater office. One of them was tobacco.
00:29:42
Speaker 3: It’s a traditional it’s a traditional gifting. Uh, you know, culture of gifting, and so tobacco is one of the gifts and gifted he just gifted me a hard pack of Marlborough Smooth Originals.
00:29:57
Speaker 1: I thought Steve said.
00:29:57
Speaker 3: There were yeah, gold, it’s a gold pack, but these, I mean, don’t don’t do that. Don’t smoke cigarettes.
00:30:06
Speaker 1: We could bust him out when baby Radio was born.
00:30:09
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, that’s how we will celebrate.
00:30:15
Speaker 3: Yeah. I love that guy.
00:30:18
Speaker 6: That was one of the best incers, throwing heat all the way to the end with his guest recruitment and uh yeah, man, we’re probably the only Americans that guy’s going to talk to for the next year that won’t mention the hockey gain.
00:30:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, don’t worry that that the chat has been on it.
00:30:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, so hopefully he doesn’t look back and feel bad about that silver medal because the chat was really poking him.
00:30:41
Speaker 3: Man, that guy was great. That was a great spencer.
00:30:44
Speaker 2: That that just who would have thought bear prison, Bear prison for thirty days.
00:30:49
Speaker 3: I want to go twenty reoffenders.
00:30:51
Speaker 1: They’ve been doing this since the eighties, so that’s that’s pretty incredible. It’s like that successful at keeping these bears out of the way of humans.
00:30:58
Speaker 2: That was great. Gosh all right.
00:31:02
Speaker 1: Our next segment is Hot tip Off.
00:31:08
Speaker 3: That’s saltyt that’s salty.
00:31:19
Speaker 1: Hot tip Off is where two listeners go head to head with competing pieces of advice and after we hear each tip, we’ll declare which one is hotter. This week it’s Dalton Bicard versus Marshall Loftis, and they’re competing for a one hundred dollars Meat Eater store gift card. Take it away, Phil Marshall Loftis.
00:31:42
Speaker 7: Hey guys, Marshall here and I have an extremely simple tip for finding your arrows. I know most of your listeners probably don’t actually ever miss, but I do, so I had to come up with a creative solution. Number one, I use i viz wrap some veins. Nothing new there. But number two, I utilize a uv Or black light flashlight. These are like ten fifteen bucks on Amazon, So you know, anytime you shoot, don’t know where your arrow goes, it goes into something like this.
00:32:12
Speaker 2: This is kind of standard. What you see.
00:32:14
Speaker 1: Here’s one of my arrows.
00:32:16
Speaker 7: You know, it gets buried in the grass, it gets buried in the leaves. It’s very difficult to find. But I actually utilize this to find the arrows in the dark. So I’m back at that same area, but in the dark here obviously, I have my black.
00:32:32
Speaker 3: Light obviously, and I’m gonna walk up to.
00:32:35
Speaker 7: That general area of where the arrow is.
00:32:39
Speaker 4: And we’ll see if it’ll show up on here.
00:32:41
Speaker 5: Boom, there you.
00:32:42
Speaker 2: Can see it.
00:32:43
Speaker 3: Oh, it’s wild, looks like a paid light out there in the dark.
00:32:49
Speaker 7: This makes finding your arrows a thousand times easier and it saves you a lot of money on having to buy new arrows.
00:33:00
Speaker 8: At Hello, meat eater, I got a hot tip here for you, and a great project to do if you with your kids, if you’ve got them. This is my homemade jaw jacker, as my buddy likes to call it the ghetto jacker. I just built this at a inch and a half TVC pipe. You could build it with a block of wood and a pipe angled in the back of it to hold the rod. The main thing is this trigger mechanism which you just got to do a hook and I built this out of a paint can handle. You could use the coat hanger or whatever you’ve really got laying around. I use a zip tie here to connect it to the rod. Ran it through an islet and you just run your line up through the hook end of it. My fish grabs. It works pretty good, sets up nice. Can fit a couple of in a bucket. I keep these feet where they can just come off, so you can put a couple in a bucket. And Shirley beats the sixty dollars price tag.
00:34:12
Speaker 1: All right, those are our two hot tips. The chat is going to decide who the winner is of the one hundred dollars Meat Eater store gift card. Phil is going to give you a couple of minutes to vote. All right, Seth, which one do you like? Dalton’s hot tip about the PVC jaw jacker or Marshals of the UV light aerowfinder.
00:34:32
Speaker 2: Well, I don’t know who pixies.
00:34:33
Speaker 4: I don’t want to call anyone out, but the the era one has been has been done before.
00:34:38
Speaker 2: On this show, on this show. Oh no, Well, I just got a better memory than me because I have no recollect I did not know.
00:34:45
Speaker 3: Sorry, you began that by saying you don’t mean to call anybody out.
00:34:50
Speaker 2: No, okay, okay, which one do you like better? Was that felt? Was that you phil? No? No, okay, sorry, I don’t mean, but I should have.
00:34:59
Speaker 3: Let’s just go to the.
00:35:02
Speaker 4: Ice fishing one for me. The homemade jawjacker. Jawn jackers aren’t are not. They’re not cheap.
00:35:08
Speaker 1: Sixty dollars he said.
00:35:09
Speaker 4: Yeah, so the homemade stuff is fantastic. And I didn’t mention the or I did mention. I didn’t notice he had Buddy Ja Siemens in the background on the television.
00:35:19
Speaker 1: I wondered if it was, but I couldn’t identify just from that quick shot. But Seth has his ice fishing eyes on.
00:35:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, you knew it was Jay. I like that one, all right.
00:35:26
Speaker 1: Seth is voting for the PVC jaw jacker Randall. What do you think the UV light arrow finder from Marshall or the jaw jacker from Dalton?
00:35:35
Speaker 3: I mean to be these two tips, embody. Some of the finest traditions of tipping one is just getting some device that’s useful for one thing and applying it to another. As we remember from the air compressor blowing out the brains of the deer skull, and the other is just going to Ace hardware and buying a bunch of shit and building your own like little device. So I appreciate both of them in different ways. But man, I do like that that homemade. I mean anytime you can just make a mess of PVC. I was a big potato cannon kid. We made a battery gun one time that just shot double A batteries and we were punching holes in plywood with it.
00:36:21
Speaker 1: Oh okay, we moved on.
00:36:23
Speaker 3: From the hair spray to dry ice and water.
00:36:27
Speaker 1: We should do that for a meat eater video. I don’t know how it applies to what this company does, but yeah, Randall making a potato cannon.
00:36:34
Speaker 3: The nice thing about the hairspray, though, is if you want to launch an indiary round of some sort, you know you have that ignition source from the hair spray. But yeah, I’m going to vote for the jaw jacker.
00:36:45
Speaker 1: Okay, that’s two votes for the job.
00:36:47
Speaker 3: That was a long winded answer.
00:36:48
Speaker 5: Sorry.
00:36:49
Speaker 1: Yeah. Both of these again, like mini hot tips, it’s about how to save some money. One is you’re going to recover more errors than the other is. You don’t have to buy a sixty dollars jaw jacks. Yes, I’m going to vote. Vote for the u v light arrowfinder. You should go watch this video on our podcast YouTube channel because that thing lit up like somebody turned on a light switch on the back of that arrow is so easy to find. Here’s the other thing. I love having a UV light with me when I go camping. There’s like, I don’t know, probably twenty things that just stay in my camping kit that no matter what kind of camping I’m doing, they’re coming with me. One of them is a UV light that I look for UV I look for rocks that show up under UV light. So if you’ve got that with you turn that on at night, you can recover some very cool rocks. You’ll find other uses for that UV light. It’s only like fifteen bucks from Amazon besides just recovering arrows.
00:37:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, it’s making me think I should attach arrow fletchings to my car keys and my earbuds.
00:37:49
Speaker 1: That’d be good. Phil. What does the chat think.
00:37:52
Speaker 2: It’s been a pretty decisive lead this entire time, So I’m gonna go ahead and end the poll and with sixty four percent of the vote. Winner is Marshall with the black lie.
00:38:04
Speaker 4: Oh all right, Oh he didn’t win the last time, so he won this time.
00:38:08
Speaker 3: That’s a real dark horse, get it.
00:38:11
Speaker 1: Marshall did one, Randall, he gets a one hundred dollars media to gift card next week for the finale. We are just going to empty the clip for all of the hot tips that we have left.
00:38:20
Speaker 3: Indeed, indeed, all.
00:38:22
Speaker 1: Right, let’s take a break for some listener feedback. Phil, what’s the chat apt to say?
00:38:26
Speaker 2: Let’s see here, this is from Nate, He says, Randall, are you going turkey hunting this spring? Or was last year a one and done and you’re back to bears forever?
00:38:34
Speaker 3: No, I’d like to I enjoy eating wild turkeys, so I’d like to shoot another turkey or two. It’s just a just a question of getting on someone’s dance card. Max Barta is a busy guy, busy guy in the spring. I was talking to col last night and we were discussing a little turkey family camp. Family turkey camp, I should say, so that that’s in the cards as well. But definitely going to go ahead and look for some bruins. I already have one of those trips on my calendar.
00:39:08
Speaker 2: The question for Seth from Coda, what’s your go to razor for a clean shade? I too have a mustache, but find it hard to keep up with a clean cut. Like you razors give me razor burn on my neck and jawline.
00:39:18
Speaker 3: Well, you need the jawline first. That’s my problem with with trimming facial hairs. I don’t have anything like what Seth has there.
00:39:25
Speaker 4: I the ones I buy from the store are often different. I look at price more than Yeah, I look at price more than the actual razor itself. A few blades is good, although I recently was given one of those proof raisors. It’s made in Belgrade. It’s like a machined all machined aluminum razor, has that one blade replaceable.
00:39:54
Speaker 2: It’s it works great.
00:39:56
Speaker 4: Yeah, it’s like it’s like a razor that you’ll just have for the rest of your life.
00:40:00
Speaker 3: Okay, So, and then an aftershave or something like that. Now, as long as we’re leaning into this.
00:40:05
Speaker 2: No, I don’t use an aftershave.
00:40:07
Speaker 4: I use the shaving cream I use is like a they call it like a It’s it’s like one of those healthy kinds.
00:40:14
Speaker 1: It’s not edge best kept mustache in the company. What else you got? Phil?
00:40:20
Speaker 2: Question for King Randamal himself, if he only had to choose one of the rest of his life, would it be dogs or brots?
00:40:26
Speaker 1: Oh?
00:40:27
Speaker 3: I think I know, man, it’s probably dogs.
00:40:31
Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree, Just what’s.
00:40:33
Speaker 3: Just for the emotional factor. I just don’t give the same feelings for eating abroad at a ball game. But I do find brots. I find myself cooking brots more at home, and I feel like it’s a more versatile tube meat. But yeah, I can’t make a cheese coney with a brod.
00:40:53
Speaker 1: Phil. Let’s do a couple more and then after that. I think we put movie Club at the end of the show because our next guest is eating. So we’ll do that last year.
00:41:01
Speaker 3: It’s a great idea.
00:41:02
Speaker 2: Who knows how long that’ll take. Any of the crew from from Valancourt Hopeful for a sheep or goat tag this year? Do you guys put in for yes?
00:41:10
Speaker 3: Every year?
00:41:11
Speaker 4: Ye?
00:41:11
Speaker 1: Not hopeful though hopeful in putting in her two different things.
00:41:15
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, I’ll I probably will have a sheep tag, just an unlimited sheep tag.
00:41:22
Speaker 1: Oh.
00:41:23
Speaker 2: Oh, they changing that this year?
00:41:24
Speaker 3: I saw, Yeah, I just whatever.
00:41:28
Speaker 1: Okay, Randall’s going to be the sheep hunter.
00:41:31
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, we’ll see. We’ll see my calendar’s lining so that I might be able to get out there for the unit that I want to get out there.
00:41:37
Speaker 2: Let’s see one more, Phil, Sure, I’m going to be selfish with this one. Phil, how’s cast and chill treating you? That was that low five fishing game that I’ve been talking about.
00:41:45
Speaker 1: I have it.
00:41:45
Speaker 2: So I just got myself a better monitor for my the room where I stream and I stream. But tomorrow, tomorrow is a big day because there Nintendo is in game Freak are releasing Pokemon fire Red Leaf creen for the Nintendo Switch. I’ll been picking that up. But more importantly for my streaming purposes, Resident Evil nine comes out tomorrow. I’m a big fat baby, and so I’m thinking about and here’s the scariest one so far. I’m thinking about streaming it. If you guys want to watch that, I.
00:42:16
Speaker 3: Do so gun taking a sick day too.
00:42:19
Speaker 2: When did the original Resident Evil come out? Oh like nineteen ninety eight or something. Did you play that one? No? I didn’t. I’ve only been starting. I’ve been dipping my toe into horror stuff over the last couple of years. But I’ve over the last year, I’ve played Resident Evil two, four, seven, and I’m almost done with eight, and I’ve been really enjoying them. The writing is is god awful. The plot makes no sense, but that’s kind of part of the charm.
00:42:42
Speaker 3: So you don’t like the films, then I assume.
00:42:44
Speaker 2: The films are are the films are bad? Like It’s like if you took the dialogue and plot from the Games where it’s kind of camping and fun, and you put it into a movie format, it just it doesn’t translate.
00:42:53
Speaker 1: So how do I tune into this? Phil taylored Life.
00:42:55
Speaker 2: Oh, oh god, that’s a great that’s a great question. I’ll put I don’t think this is self promotion because I make no money off of this. In fact, I think I lose money with the equipment that I’ve bought. But I’ll put my I’ll put my YouTube handle up here because it’s stupid and nonsensical. I’ll spill it out here. This is a good program.
00:43:13
Speaker 1: Maybe Phil will tell us on his Instagram story how we can watch.
00:43:18
Speaker 2: So that’s my YouTube handle and my Twitch handle Phil a Buster Sword Phil. It’s my name Philip Buster with a pH, because that’s what people call me in high school. Buster Sword, as we all know, is the iconic sword that Cloud Strife wields in Final Fantasy seven. So it’s a portmanteau of kinds.
00:43:34
Speaker 3: I’m sure our next guest head is spinning good. Still, we’ve gone from shaving products to golden sheep tags to phil buster sor.
00:43:42
Speaker 2: So you were doing that this Friday or Saturday, so tune in for you can watch me Pema pants. You never know what you’ll get here.
00:43:50
Speaker 1: Yep, let’s go to our last interview. Joining us on the line next is Amelia Delbero, who won the gold medal at the twenty twenty five cheese Monger Olympics. She’s here to educate us on pairing cheeses with wild game. Amelia, welcome to the show.
00:44:07
Speaker 9: Hey, thanks so much for having me on the show. Super stoked to be here in chat Cheese great.
00:44:12
Speaker 1: First thing, what are the Cheesemonger Olympics.
00:44:16
Speaker 9: I’m happy to explain. So the Mondel de Fromage, which is the Cheesemonger Olympics. It happens every two years in France and champion cheesemongers from all over the world compete against each other in this like grueling eight hour day of cheesemonger challenges with the goal of being crowned the world’s best cheesemonger for that year. So the challenges span everything from general knowledge written tests to blind tasting pairing challenges. Cheese sculpture, a one square meter themed, absolutely massive cheese display made with like one hundred mystery cheeses that they just put down in crates behind you. So it was obviously very difficult, but it is also as much about like stamina and time management as it was about cheese knowledge and longer skill and technique.
00:45:04
Speaker 1: Okay, I want to be there. What’s the most difficult part of the competition?
00:45:11
Speaker 9: I would say that all of the challenges that were equally difficult in terms of execution and preparation. But for me personally, truthfully, the hardest part of the entire experience was just finding the guts to show up. I have like crazy imposter syndrome, so I actually did a lot of work with my therapist in the months leading up to the competition, so I helped manage that so that I could like show up, be fully present and just do my best. And I actually think that aspect of the preparation is super important to talk about openly because I know a lot of people struggle with this.
00:45:45
Speaker 1: And then you went there and won the gold medal. Congratulations for that. Tell us about your background? How does one become such an accomplished cheese monger.
00:45:53
Speaker 9: So I actually have a degree in Italian. I went to college for Italian studies, and after that I was working a kind of a corporate job just managing a cooking school. It was a cooking school and educational space, so I was seeing a lot of these classes and events that were happening, everything from like obviously cheese tastings to butchering demonstrations to pizza making, pasta making dinners, things like that. So there’s a lot of really cool stuff that I was experiencing for the first time. And then after a couple of years of managing that particular space, I decided I wanted to kind of make a switch and learn a craft. Hope, like probably one of the things that I had witnessed in the school. And I also had a little bit of a like a run in let’s call it with an animal rights group and that kind of changed the trajectory of my career. So I decided I really wanted to learn butchery. That’s what I was going to focus on. But at the time I was like a little twenty three year old girl with no knife skills, So nobody was going to hire me for a butcher job, obviously, so I was advised to take a job at a cheese counter for a few months, learn how to handle knives, and then try to make that transfer. Obviously, I ended up loving cheese so much that it won and I pursued the career in cheese quite successfully. I might add, but I did actually stay at the counter part time while I was doing a butcher apprenticeship for a while. It ended up being a really fun combination because I was managing a cheese counter in Brooklyn during the pandemic and there was a nose to tail butcher in the same grocery store. So during the pandemic, I was able to kind of like pop over there when they needed some help and like make sausages, trim pork chops, that kind of thing. So since then I have been the cheese manager and buyer of that grocery store. I’m currently the sales and marketing manager for Formaticum. We are the country’s premier importer of cheese, paper, packaging tools, all the professional quality items that you need to run a cheese department. And that is a really cool role that allows me to do a lot of travel and educate both cheesemongers and consumers alike about how to properly take care of cheese and taste cheese and just you know, sharing the love and encouraging enthusiasm for cheese.
00:48:10
Speaker 1: Okay, you were the first American to win gold at the Cheesemonger Olympics. Congrats for that. There were fourteen countries represented at last year’s competition. What kind of reputation does America have when it comes to cheeses and cheesemongers?
00:48:26
Speaker 9: So obviously the United States does not have a great reputation globally when it comes to cheese, and like all other food and.
00:48:35
Speaker 3: Some American cheese.
00:48:37
Speaker 9: I actually I’m going to talk about that, but some of that is completely justified. But we actually do have a pretty thriving cheese culture here pun intended. There is a lot of misconception about the term American cheese and what that means. And when you say that, most people think of the like plastic eat orange slices, which totally do have their time and place. But when I think of American cheese, I think about all of the amazing cheese producers that we have all across the country, in every state, who are making absolutely incredible cheese every single day. They’re winning awards, they are focusing on regenerative agriculture, They’re giving back to their communities, and I like to say, good American cheese is everywhere for those with eyes to see. So being able to show up at this competition and represent the United States in my own way, and to be able to prove on the world stage that American cheese mongers are skilled and talented and creative was just amazing. And especially to be surrounded by so many other wonderfully talented cheesemongers, just being inspired by them and being able to learn from them. We left France with a lot of new friends. I am happy to.
00:49:47
Speaker 1: Say that’s great. Our audience eats a lot of wild games, so we want your advice on how to pair cheeses with different wild food. Let’s start with medison. Please give us some recommendations on what cheese is pair well with dear meat.
00:50:01
Speaker 9: First of all, I love venison, but with these types of unconventional pairings, let’s say, instead of focusing on like the pairing exclusively, I try to think about, like who would be eating these things and how they would be prepared, and like what those people might have access to. So in the cheese industry we have this this saying that’s what grows together goes together, and that basically means that products from the same region will likely be a good pairing. So for venison, I’m thinking like like braised venison, roasted meat, stew, ragou things that would likely be found in like a mountain region like the Alps of Italy or Switzerland, things like that. So that automatically takes me over to like a funky oniony mountain cheese like griere or fontina, something that really melts well. But on the other side of things, specifically smoky Blue, which is a really cool blue cheese made by Rogue Creamery in Oregon, I think would pair really.
00:50:57
Speaker 3: Well with that.
00:50:58
Speaker 1: Okay, Randall is shaking his head and what about phil hogsh I love this question.
00:51:04
Speaker 9: I got so excited. I immediately was like This reminds me of Chinialle, which is Italian wild boar ragu from Tuscany specifically makes me want to do a little bit of like grated parmigiano reggiano on top, give it a little bit of a salt, kick, a little umami, or specifically a Tuscan peccorino.
00:51:22
Speaker 1: Okay, how about small game like squirrels and rabbits.
00:51:26
Speaker 9: I’m gonna be really honest. I didn’t know that you could eat squirrel, but rabbit is one of my grandfather’s favorite foods. I have this like distinct memory of special ordering a whole rabbit to bring to their house and cook for him. So we did that. We did a rabbit ragu with some tomatoes and fresh handmade pasta. So I’m gonna go with peccorino romano for this one because that’s what my grandparents always have in their fridge for putting on top of pasta.
00:51:51
Speaker 1: All right, let’s talk about cheese pairings with fish. Let’s start with fish that have a white flesh, like walleye or perch or crappie. What cheese is pair well with them?
00:52:02
Speaker 9: Cheese and fish is a hot topic. A lot of people think that like, eating cheese with fish is kind of sacrilege, but I think that there’s definitely a right way to do it. I’m gonna say peccorino romano again, that is just kind of a go to when it comes to fish that it has this really beautiful like brininess, the saltiness that goes well with a lot of fish dishes.
00:52:24
Speaker 1: How about fish that that have some color in their meat, like a trout or salmon.
00:52:30
Speaker 9: HM. For this, I’m thinking like smoked trout, smoked salmon. I’m gonna go peccorino fiore sardo, which is specifically a smoked pecorino. It’s a little bit drier. I think that that might be nice with a more oily fish.
00:52:49
Speaker 1: Okay, final one, what cheese is paar well with wild mushrooms like morales, Chantrell’s and bullettes.
00:52:55
Speaker 9: Yum, Immediately, Oumammy, I want to go for a new mommy bomb here. One of my favorite dishes to make is a mushroom risotto with some melted to ledgio. To Ledgio is a kind of stinky washtrine cheese from northern Italy. I think that that pairs really well with those mushrooms. But also if we’re like, you know, on the Umami train. We can do something with truffle, and I know that truffled to ledgio is a thing that exists, So if you can find it, I think that that would be wonderful.
00:53:24
Speaker 1: Last question, I assume that boutique grocers and markets are the best place is defined a really good selection of cheeses, But what about the chain options when it comes to places like Costco, Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, Kroger’s, Elberton’s. Who has the best cheeses?
00:53:41
Speaker 9: That’s a good question. I get that a lot, so of course, like a dedicated cheese shop or a special che cheese counter is my first recommendation, but I know that not everyone has the access physically or financially to you know, frequent those places, and like, while my job is partially to promote these high quality cheeses, it’s also part of my job to just encourage people to eat cheese in general. So whatever cheese is that you choose to enjoy, no matter where they come from, I’m just happy that you’re eating it, because what I like to say is that cheese is for everyone, and everyone deserves to enjoy it. I can’t personally speak to the selection of cheese and everyone’s local grocery store, but I can encourage you to branch out, try something new, and just most importantly keep cheese on your table physically and metaphorically.
00:54:33
Speaker 1: Okay, and our chat has two things that they want your take on. One is cheese curds and the other is Valveda. Please tell us what you think of cheese curds and Velveta.
00:54:44
Speaker 9: I love them. I love both of those things. I love a fried cheese curd. I love a fresh cheese curd, very squeaky. I love a flavored cheese curd. Valveda, i am told, is like one of the best cheeses to make macaroni and cheese with. I personally, I didn’t grow up with it. I am a Cooper Sharp girly. I live in Philly. Absolutely love Cooper Sharp. But my my partner loves Belvida. So a lot of those cheeses are like chemically designed to melt beautifully. They’re they’re specifically meant for that, and that’s what they do. So that’s why I like. That’s why I say that they have a place and a time. And I would say that mac and cheese is the place and time for that.
00:55:25
Speaker 1: So okay, thanks for your time and wisdom, Amelia, and congrats again on winning gold at the Cheese Olympics Flash gold.
00:55:38
Speaker 5: Great.
00:55:39
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for having me.
00:55:42
Speaker 5: Wow.
00:55:44
Speaker 1: Seth was nodding his head about the velveta and mac and cheese.
00:55:47
Speaker 4: Yeah, it does make a good cheese for mac and cheese. I haven’t had velveta though in long time.
00:55:54
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think of childhood. Yeah, I heard a lot of names and cheeses am not familiar with. I need to go back and listen to this.
00:56:00
Speaker 2: We had Boondog in the chat saying his girlfriend is the cheesemonger at Smith’s here in Bozeman, and that this lady is he That’s amazing nice. So Amelia’s still here she heard that.
00:56:09
Speaker 3: That’s it’s amazing good good.
00:56:11
Speaker 1: I saw another person say that she could lead Wisconsin into battle. It would work.
00:56:21
Speaker 2: All right.
00:56:21
Speaker 1: For our last segment of the day, we have the Meat Eater Movie Club. This week, we’re reviewing the twenty eighteen comedy The Legacy of a White Tailed Deer Hunter.
00:56:37
Speaker 2: Coincidentally enough, as a conversation about American versus other cheeses in this film.
00:56:42
Speaker 1: There is Yeah. I watched that last night. I was like, oh, they we got to bring that up tomorrow.
00:56:47
Speaker 3: Boy, I haven’t heard that that jingle in a while. Thank you film?
00:56:49
Speaker 5: Oh yeah?
00:56:50
Speaker 2: Should I begin happy to play? Oh? Please do okay.
00:56:54
Speaker 3: On February fifteenth, two thousand and nine, I fell in love with a man. I was home for my first year at college. I was at a friend’s house. Across the room, I caught a glimpse of a face unlike any I had seen before. I heard his voice, and I was transfixed. He told me, in no uncertain terms that he had a mind for victory in an arm like an eff and cannon. His name was Kenny Powers, the maladjusted protagonist of the HBO series Eastbound and Down. In the years that followed, I came to know and to love many other characters in the Danny McBride Jody Hill universe who resemble Kenny Powers. These men are not villains, They’re not even precisely fools. Each is simply a man who has confused his own success in one domain of life for mastery in all domains. The inevitable consequence of this mindset is an existence punctuated by eruptions of frustration at the world around him. The expected results of his actions never quite align with his delusions of grandeur. These are men undone by their own mythologies. Josh poland Josh Bollen plays just such a man in the twenty eighteen Netflix original Legacy of a White Tailed Deer Hunter. Despite the provocative opening sentence of this review, what follows is not a celebration of my favorite comedic catalog. This is Meat Eater Movie Club, where a focus has always remains laser focused on the film at hand. Yes, but I thought it was too good of a cold open, so I kept it in there, And that detail explains the lack of a decent transition at this point in the review. The plot of Legacy is relatively simple. Man loves hunting, Man ignores son. Man attempts to force son to love hunting, Son declines. Josh Brolin stars as Buck Ferguson, the host of a successful hunting video series, who takes his a strange son into the wilderness to shoot his first deer, a ritual Buck believes will forge the bond their fractured relationship has lacked. Jaden, predictably would rather be elsewhere Buck Ferguson wants his son to want a deer, and beneath that, he wants his son to want him to see in his father, not a man his mother divorced, not a stranger who shows up with camera equipment and a bumbling sidekick, but a living repository of masculine wisdom. This is, of course, not how children work. Children are not vessels waiting to be filled with their father’s hobbies. They’re already full of their own desires, most of which involve a guitar practice and texting their girlfriends. Here’s another spot where I could have come up with a better transition. In nineteen fifty six, the sociologist Irving Goffman published the Presentation of Self in an Everyday Life, in which you argue that human social interaction is essentially theatrical, that we are all at times performing versions of ourselves for audiences we have consciously or unconsciously assembled. Goffman did not mean this point cynically. The performance, he suggested, is not a distortion of the self, but an expression of it. We become, in some meaningful sense, what we repeatedly enact. The costume becomes the skin. Buck Ferguson does not merely hunt. He films himself hunting. Every descent into the wilderness is simultaneously a descent into the role of Buck Ferguson, legendary outdoorsman, as mediated through the lens of Don, a role masterfully inhabited by Danny McBride. The film’s sharpest Excuse me, this is the film’s sharpest and most under explored insight. The camera does not actually capture authenticity, it replaces it. The moment Buck raises his rifle, he is no longer a man in the woods. He is a man in the woods being watched, which is an entirely different psychological condition, one that forecloses the very intimacy with nature and with his son that Buck so desperately desires. This is a I’ve apologize, is going on longer than I thought.
01:00:33
Speaker 2: No, you we all expect.
01:00:35
Speaker 3: There is a cruelty to this arrangement that the film only partially acknowledges. Buck wants to give him. Buck wants to give his son something real, a memory, a tradition, a moment of shared significance. But he has invited a camera to witness it, which means he has already converted the moment from experience into content. The dear if shot will not be a private communion between father and son, it will be episode forty seven buck Fever. The memory will be archived before it is even formed. This is not, it should be noted, an affliction unique to men named Buck Ferguson. We live now in a civilization that has developed an extraordinary and insatiable appetite for the documentation of its own significant moments, births, deaths, proposals, first steps, last words. All of it fed into the great digital maw, transforming from experience into artifact, from felt into filmed. It is widely acknowledged that writing restructures consciousness. One shudders to contemplate what the selfie lens on an iPhone camera has done to it, Or I might add a set of three cameras on tripods used to live stream a podcast every Thursday, during which occasionally a man reviews films. It is not lost on your reviewer that this segment is itself a performance during which Randa Williams movie critic is as much a constructed identity as Buck Ferguson Outdoorsman. The difference, perhaps is one of self awareness. Buck never quite grasps that the camera has replaced the excis experience he was chasing, whereas I know that I’m full of shit. A meaningful conclusion to this review was hard to come up with.
01:02:09
Speaker 1: Okay, Randall, you’re a really good writer out there.
01:02:14
Speaker 4: Someone says you’re in the chat that Randall writes, well, oh thank you, rights so well, thank you?
01:02:19
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, Irving Goffman, that was the text that I read in probably my worst series of classes in college. It’s terrible, and I’ve skipped two of them to watch some of my favorite teams lose in NCAA championship games that year.
01:02:34
Speaker 1: Okay, but only to Florida. If I recall, you must have been a good student. If missing two classes was no.
01:02:39
Speaker 3: No, no, I missed more than that, But two of them were specifically to watch Ohio based sports teams lose in college. Got it?
01:02:45
Speaker 1: Okay?
01:02:46
Speaker 2: Hopefully it depends on.
01:02:49
Speaker 3: Guys. I think if you go to this film wanting to see a great hunting film, you’re you’re missing the point. Yeah. I think that the you know, like, nobody watches Ricky Bobby Talladega Knights and says that’s not how sports cars were, right, nobody watches so throw Away, the Weird Camo, the CGI, dear Yea, all that stuff. I enjoyed this film, not as much as I enjoyed the rest of his catalog, but I thought it it. I mean, the reviews I read were terrible, but I thought it was good twenty five percent on Rotten Tomatoes.
01:03:27
Speaker 1: I think I saw another IMDb had it like two point eight out of ten stars. So not a well received straight to streaming.
01:03:35
Speaker 2: I think that’s fair.
01:03:36
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would agree with that.
01:03:38
Speaker 5: Yeah.
01:03:39
Speaker 3: And if you see the title, what’s wrong? Oh, just you guys, didn’t you guys didn’t enjoy it.
01:03:45
Speaker 1: I’m glad I got to watch it. I imagine there’s some point in my life I would have needed to have turned this on. But if you’re like, if you see the title and you’re like, this is a movie for deer hunters, that would be incorrect. It’s not like Anie McBride’s catalog. You wouldn’t watch Righteous Gemstones if you attended a megachurch in the South, like it’s it’s just not for you, yes, and this film isn’t really for someone you know who really loves the outdoors.
01:04:12
Speaker 3: Although there’s a lot of stuff in there that you wouldn’t pick up on if you didn’t live in this space. That’s true when he when he wrecks the ATV and he’s like, now I have to pay for that. Yeah, it’s great. When he says the air mattress, he’s like, he’s like, they sent me this, you know, like to test this out. And he just reads like the product description to his son, like it’s very in conversation with the real uh.
01:04:35
Speaker 2: And Jody Hill and Danny mcbrid broth grew up in North Carolina, like really inundated in this culture, and so I think they bring a lot of affection for it while also you know, kicking it on a little bit.
01:04:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, I liked that while he is talking about getting the air mattress for free, you have a well placed Ozark Trail logo on the tent, and my wife and I disagreed on if Ozark Trail paid for that placement or not. I said, there’s no way that Ozark Trail has that budget to do that. And then also the tent was like just kind of loose and sloppy, like they wouldn’t be satisfied with seeing their tent like that, but you could see it and you know feel either way they’re like, Oh, he’s talking about a sponsorship thing while there’s a sponsorship thing happening on this movie. It was like breaking the fourth wall in a way.
01:05:25
Speaker 5: Yeah.
01:05:26
Speaker 3: I mean, I think for me, I have a hard time coming into this and judging it on its merits because there’s so many elements of a classic Danny McBride product in it. There’s the lackey McBride plays essentially Stevie Janowski from East Bound and Down. He’s he’s the man who wants to be the great man, who really cares nothing about his welfare, and in fact he suffers disfigurement for that man several times, this several times saying inappropriate things to children. When he describes parkour as gymnastics, I couldn’t help but think of the classic line I’m not trying to be the best at exercising to describe a triathlon. He has like a very precise understanding of behaviors that make characters look like losers, like when the stepdad is riding the hoverboard right, and then the guy taking pleasure in secretly sabotaging like one of his rivals when he’s deleting the pictures off the phone like these are a classic Kenny Powers motifs.
01:06:37
Speaker 1: Do you think do you think if someone loved Kenny Powers, they would love this.
01:06:40
Speaker 3: I mean, I don’t want to go I don’t want to go overboard here. I don’t I wouldn’t say that I loved it. I enjoyed it. I don’t know that I’ll watch it again. I won’t revisit it. But given the state of comedy movies in the two, I guess this is twenty eighteen, so sort of coming out of the tail end of that era. But I don’t know. I enjoyed watching something that I had never seen before, and it kind of tickled my tickled the right notes for me.
01:07:07
Speaker 1: I there’s certain times when we’re making a piece of content at Meat Eater, and you know when you’re doing it, like this is really good or this kind of sucks. We like didn’t hit our marks. I’m certain they knew when they were making this movie that they were making a movie that was going to get twenty five percent on rot Tomatoes. Yeah, I’m sure that they felt it and were very aware, and that probably was a little freeing for them that, like, boy, this is just a steaming pile we’ve made. Oh yeah, and that’s okay because that’s that’s what it is.
01:07:38
Speaker 4: Yeah.
01:07:38
Speaker 2: I don’t think it’s a good movie, but it’s very watchable, mostly because of Brolin and Danny McBride. I think they’re just very compelling, fun actors to watch. And it does have, like Randall said, most of the hallmarks of a McBride like Jody Hill thing, which is like a guy who wears his fragile ego just like all plastered right there.
01:07:58
Speaker 3: Brolin’s great. Yeah, there’s just like the moments where he’s like not on camera and he’s like quietly sad or desperate. He the other The other thing I enjoyed was ending with a climactic like Whitewater negotiating the rapids. How many movies have ended with that. I’d like to think that they didn’t know how to end the movie and they were just like, let’s just do it.
01:08:24
Speaker 1: Yeah. Another thing I enjoyed was that they had a Mary Poppins backpack. Were like, it didn’t matter the size of the backpack they had. Any piece of gear could have come out of that thing.
01:08:35
Speaker 3: Yeah, at any time. And the guitar I did enjoy, like the vo mid sequence in the film he talks about he has like the vo where he’s like Buck Ferguson goes always gets his deer and that was dead on. Yeah.
01:08:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, those those videos are great. I specifically flagged the soundtrack of of of those those hunting videos, which was very like Mannheim Steamroller likes jangly synth stuff like it, but it fits so well. I thought that was like a really inspired decision.
01:09:06
Speaker 1: Phil. I saw the Mannheim Steamroller in Bozeman a couple of years.
01:09:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, remember you tell me about that.
01:09:10
Speaker 1: And then they played Convoy while they were there, even though it was a Christmas show. They said they can’t do a show without playing.
01:09:15
Speaker 2: Sure, you gotta do the hits. I’ve got some questions for you, guys, because you know, I’m not really I’m new to this whole world, but just just some vernacular. Have you ever before shooting an animal said referred to shooting it as punching a time card? No, okay. One of my favorite lines too, was I’m gonna honor this deer by splitting its dang eyebrows? Have you ever said that that? I was just wondering if those were common phrases. I’m just not not privy too, Okay.
01:09:43
Speaker 1: The other one was that people will joke about other people saying catch a deer, and I personally never heard someone say catch a deer. Yeah, and so it feels like it’s like being overplayed that someone who’s out of the loop would say catch a deep But they say multiple times in this movie.
01:09:59
Speaker 3: Ye make I mean they make like hats that are say catching deer. Yeah, you know, it’s like a joke.
01:10:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, Seth watched this movie back during COVID. Seth, what did you think of it?
01:10:08
Speaker 5: Then?
01:10:11
Speaker 2: Well, I don’t remember a whole lot.
01:10:13
Speaker 3: Of it, to be honest.
01:10:14
Speaker 4: Yep, But it was one of those movies like when you guys said you’re gonna review them, I’ll review this movie.
01:10:19
Speaker 2: I was like, I’m not gonna watch it again. Like I feel like that’s fair.
01:10:22
Speaker 4: I feel like what I’ve seen and remember is like enough to get through this segment of the show that I just didn’t want to spend any more time watching it again because what I remember was that it was it was. It had its funny moments, but overall it was you know, I’m with the folks on Rotten Tomatoes.
01:10:41
Speaker 2: Yeah.
01:10:42
Speaker 1: Seth had observed that it was like watching Jackie Bushman portrayed in a movie, and I said, well, actually, it’s about Roger Regland. That’s who Josh Brolin’s character was based on. So if you’re a fan of Roger Regland, then maybe you need to watch this movie.
01:10:56
Speaker 2: It did have one of my favorite sort of tropes of a Danny mcride project, which was genuine emotional sweetness that’s punctuated by something like horribly explicit. When he’s telling the story to the Sun about his girlfriend, he’s like, I got this girlfriend, Kim. Did you know she was a registered nurse and a mechanic. Yeah, and so I told her that I had a broken truck and a heart condition and she liked that.
01:11:19
Speaker 4: You know.
01:11:20
Speaker 2: It’s like a genuinely sweet moment. And he’s like, and check these out. Then he pulls out the cuckold polaroid pictures.
01:11:26
Speaker 5: Yeah.
01:11:26
Speaker 3: I apologize to anybody that watched this. I didn’t realize that scene was in there. I’d never seen it.
01:11:32
Speaker 2: It was great. He’s got one where he’s on his foot with the missing toe. He’s like, see that, that’s my foot.
01:11:36
Speaker 3: The missing toe is so good. I don’t know how much more we want to I liked the kids playing Redemption song and the dad. The dad compliments it and he’s like, I didn’t understand any of the lyrics, but it sounded good. The dad not knowing that his son has been playing guitar for two years is great. And then my last note is one of my favorite all time lines from a film. Oh from this film, Yes, when he begins to tell the story to the kid of him splitting up with the kid’s mom, and he goes it started at own nine DVD sales were down slightly, and then proceeds to say that, uh, the he had he had to prevent the kid’s mom from going to the mall. After that, that was great.
01:12:28
Speaker 2: Sorry, if you heard some static on this stream here, I don’t know where it’s coming from. It doesn’t sound like cell phone stuff. I’ve never heard this sound before, so it’s probably a good thing the show’s ending. Yeah, I just want to throw out one a couple, a couple of lines that I really enjoyed. When when when Brolin finds him with the pictures and he’s kind of yelling at the kid even though it’s not his fault at all, and and he says, I’m not a kid anymore. He goes, you are a kid when it comes to nudeness and sexual relations. Ye, I did.
01:12:53
Speaker 3: I did love nudeness.
01:12:55
Speaker 2: There’s one where he’s talking to his girlfriend on the phone and it’s clear that there’s some like that the kid is the twelve year old kid and uh, and he says, you know, I he’s something about how his girlfriend is hanging out with another boy that he found that peculiar. And there’s some silence on the other line and he goes, I know, life’s peculiar. I’m the one who taught you that.
01:13:13
Speaker 5: Uh.
01:13:14
Speaker 2: And then when when when when he shoots, don you see like an explosion of blood and Josh Brillen goes, shit, it’s done. Those are those some of my favorites.
01:13:26
Speaker 1: Not strong mussle control in this movie.
01:13:28
Speaker 3: I mean, the big question for me is did he shoot at the end down then he brings it back up? That was great? Yeah, that was great, but it wasn’t gonna be on camera.
01:13:39
Speaker 1: I bet this looked very familiar to you Big Buck Hunter boys, because that’s like how the deer looked the sega was as though they just pulled them from a Big Buck Hunter video game.
01:13:49
Speaker 3: Yeah, I liked how bad the deer looked.
01:13:51
Speaker 2: Yeah.
01:13:51
Speaker 1: Oh, and they’re always around like they’re always in the most picturesque they’re always at the water at the waterfall.
01:13:56
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was like they found a beautiful place and they’re like, we know that Buck will be here.
01:14:00
Speaker 5: Great.
01:14:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, that’s how it works.
01:14:02
Speaker 1: All right Again, our last episode next week with the movie club topic being Congo Randall’s favorite movie.
01:14:10
Speaker 3: It’s one of them.
01:14:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, it’s top ten, top ten, Yeah for show. All right, Phil, let’s get some final feedback from the chat.
01:14:17
Speaker 2: This is from Chase. Phil. You got to ask Randall what led to his trivia beatdown for Steve. Oh.
01:14:22
Speaker 3: Yeah, sometimes you just don’t have it tough time killed me. That question. I will say that question is is an experience that I haven’t had before. In the room where Steve was just talking and talking and there was there’s nothing that could happen in my head, I just blew up. It’s like playoff. It’s like Game six Harden, you know, man in the arena. Yeah, yeah, I don’t know. I like it’s fun to have competition sometimes, So we’ll be back sometimes.
01:14:58
Speaker 1: What else you got, Phil?
01:15:00
Speaker 2: Uh, throw this one to seth If you’ve got something to say. It’s from Sarah. What’s a good steelhead fishing tip Midwestern or fishing off the Great Lakes? And I’m new to the method, so any tip would be appreciated. Oh I’m not the right person now. I’ve never caught a steel I’ve never steal ahead fished before.
01:15:14
Speaker 1: I never touched one in my life.
01:15:16
Speaker 2: I’m not a big trout guy. Oh that sounded it sound kind of angry.
01:15:20
Speaker 3: Sarah, find.
01:15:22
Speaker 2: Find a buddy, just like warm, warm water stuff. YouTube.
01:15:26
Speaker 1: Go to YouTube type in steel head fishing, Great Lakes.
01:15:29
Speaker 2: Message Chester Floyd.
01:15:31
Speaker 1: There you go.
01:15:31
Speaker 2: On Instagram a couple of shout outs here. I thought this was fun. This is from Tyler. If any listeners of the or of the Meat Eater Squad or ever in southern Indiana, check out Old Homestead Distilling Company at Potoka Lake. We are sportsman friendly and out and they have outlets to charge boat batteries. Oh that’s fantastic.
01:15:48
Speaker 3: That’s good.
01:15:49
Speaker 2: I love that. And then uh, Jay Seuss is asking for a shout out from Randall for his daughter, who’s probably one of his biggest little fans. Shout out to your daughter or or her looks like it might be a woman in the picture there.
01:16:02
Speaker 3: Shout out to your daughter, Jay Seuss two one four five. I don’t know what it is that she sees in me, but it’s good to have that support out there.
01:16:12
Speaker 1: What else?
01:16:13
Speaker 3: I don’t think I played to a young crowd. Maybe I do. I’ve always thought I skewed older.
01:16:18
Speaker 2: What do you think?
01:16:20
Speaker 1: What do you think a randomal demographic is?
01:16:22
Speaker 5: Uh? I don’t know.
01:16:25
Speaker 3: Guys watching east bounding down a lot? Yeah, history buffs maybe what what.
01:16:30
Speaker 1: Would he walk out of a gas station with he goes in there for beer and something?
01:16:34
Speaker 2: Roller dog, roller dog?
01:16:35
Speaker 3: Okay, cooler ranch, Dorito’s cooler?
01:16:40
Speaker 2: Yeah?
01:16:40
Speaker 3: Didn’t they change the more cool there? No, they’re they’re not cool ranch, am I right? It’s all it’s all cooler and and not nachio cheesier. Didn’t they change that?
01:16:51
Speaker 2: Yeah? It used to be nacho cheesier and I think cooler ranch. But then they they made them all simplified because everyone was used saying cooler ranch.
01:16:57
Speaker 3: Anyway, I might be they made them all compare. Oh no, maybe they did go back to cool ranch.
01:17:02
Speaker 1: Okay, real random, I think walks into a game, random would know that he gets a roller hot dog.
01:17:09
Speaker 3: I feel like a fool.
01:17:12
Speaker 2: What else is I’ll press the cut button. A couple of.
01:17:18
Speaker 3: A couple of brew dogs, yeah, some bruskies, yeah, maybe some nightcrawlers.
01:17:24
Speaker 2: Yeah.
01:17:25
Speaker 3: And he’s got weird. He’s got something weird that he’s thinking about.
01:17:30
Speaker 2: Maybe some zin.
01:17:31
Speaker 3: Yeah, he’s not going home to like a traditional I feel like he’s not going home to like a traditional like uh, you know, like happy family sitting around the dinner table. I feel like he’s kind of a loose cannon.
01:17:45
Speaker 1: And the cigarettes are speaking to him, but he doesn’t listen.
01:17:50
Speaker 3: Usually sometimes he listens, but if he’s not buying them, it’s like he never smoked them.
01:18:01
Speaker 2: Favorite smoked trout recipes or techniques from Lane.
01:18:05
Speaker 3: I like them gifted to me.
01:18:06
Speaker 2: I like the I like to turn into smoke trout dip.
01:18:11
Speaker 1: Anybody will enjoy even if they’re like I don’t enjoy fish, they can enjoy a smoked fish dip.
01:18:16
Speaker 2: Yep.
01:18:16
Speaker 3: God, I’m totally shaken by the doritos thing. I always thought that was like a fun nugget that I had in my head.
01:18:21
Speaker 2: Oh man, sorry, last Oh, I don’t even know if I have last one.
01:18:26
Speaker 1: Okay, that’s all right. We will be back for the finale next week.
01:18:30
Speaker 2: Yes, six hour, mega stream, lots of stuff happening every segment. You could imagine. It’s gonna be fun and us. This is me signing out for good.
01:18:39
Speaker 1: Oh well, you’re gonna call in and deliver the happy It’s true of the baby Radio.
01:18:45
Speaker 2: That’s true.
01:18:46
Speaker 3: Did you know that internationally they’re called cool American doritos.
01:18:50
Speaker 9: I like that.
01:18:52
Speaker 2: That’s way cooler.
01:18:53
Speaker 5: So it was, it was.
01:18:54
Speaker 1: It was cooler from.
01:18:56
Speaker 3: Nineteen ninety five to two thousand and five. Two thousand and six, the day of my Derita’s consumption.
01:19:02
Speaker 1: There’s your flavor text in the future. All right, we’ll see you back here for one last time next week, same time and place by now
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