CRABBY: The Animals Are Talking About YOU!

Summary

GARAGE LOGIC – CRABBY: The Animals Are Talking About YOU! Gamut Podcast Network | March 18, 2026

EPISODE SUMMARY

Main Theme / Purpose This episode dives deep into the secret world of animal communication, featuring wildlife language expert and author George Buhlman. The hosts and guest explore how animals communicate with one another—and with (and about) humans—the scientific discoveries in decoding these conversations, and the implications for those who spend time outdoors. With humor, candid anecdotes, and real sound demonstrations, listeners get a window into a wild world where “the animals are always talking, and they’re often talking about you.”

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Introduction to Animal Communication

• Guest: George Buhlman, author of Eavesdropping on Animals.
• Premise: Animals aren’t making random noises; they’re engaged in complex conversations with rich meaning.
• Notable Quote:
  “A lot of it is tonal. A lot of it’s contextual. We don’t always know unless we really embed ourselves into their space… when you start paying attention a little more, you realize, oh, wow, they’re actually not just making senseless noise. They’re actually saying stuff. They’re talking about things.” – George Buhlman (05:43)

2. Turkey Calls & Animal Language in the Wild

• George’s childhood fascination began with turkeys—learning and mastering their calls.
• Demonstration of “human” vs. “real” turkey calling.
• Discussion on how animals like squirrels, turkeys, and deer react to human presence and each other’s alarms.
• Notable Moments:
  • Host Kenny shares his strategy: “If I think one (turkey) is in the area, stop calling… let them come to you, otherwise you’re going to ruin it.” (05:12)

3. Inter-Species Communication & Alarm Systems

• Squirrels and other animals have specific alarm calls that vary (trouble in the air vs. on the ground).
• Animals listen to each other; warnings often spread across species (“neighborhood watch”).
• Notable Quote:
  “Everybody has equal say. So if you scare or piss off the robin or that squirrel or the chipmunk, everybody’s listening to them, not you. And they follow suit with whatever that first-contact animal has to say about you.” – George Buhlman (14:14)
• Stories about hunters and naturalists noticing that after they pass through an area, animals “go back to check out the trail”—proving they’re being tracked and talked about.
• Notable Quote:
  “The most common alarm sound in nature is not a sound, it’s the absence of it. Silence.” – George Buhlman (16:47)

4. Scientific Discoveries: Decoding Animal Conversations

• Landmark studies on vervet monkeys: different calls for different predators (e.g., eagle, snake, leopard). (08:24)
• Prairie dogs' alarm calls are so specific they distinguish between coyotes, domestic dogs, and humans—and all react accordingly.
• Animals rarely get the message wrong because “those who don’t get it right have long since died.” (10:23)
• Research has shown prairie dogs got it right calling out a coyote, while observers (humans) mistook it for a dog.

5. Human Connections to Animal Language—Lost & Rediscovered

• Early humans and mountain men developed a keen (lost) skill for “listening to the woods.”
• Modern naturalists and hunters can re-learn this awareness; examples of recognizing differences in bird warnings for different threats.
• “The only ones that aren’t part of this conversation are us, humans.” – George Buhlman (14:14)

6. The “Neighborhood Watch” in the Animal World

• Animals warn each other about humans long before we enter the woods; explains why hikers/hunters don’t see wildlife immediately.
• “Letting the woods die down”—waiting an hour after entering—gives everything time to settle. (15:52–16:47)
• Silence is often the loudest alarm among wildlife.

7. Extraordinary Animal Senses

• Many animals have abilities far beyond human perception:
  • Subsonic and infrasonic hearing (e.g., elephants, bison).
  • Sense changes in weather, earthquakes, oncoming storms (crows, other birds).
  • Wolves and canines separate layered scents, find ancient or hidden remains (e.g., trained archaeology dogs can detect 1000-year-old bones).
• Wolves appear “psychic” to humans, demonstrating uncanny ability to anticipate people by miles and even detect cancer in people—without training.
• Notable Quote:
  “If that animal is capable of doing that, what else is it capable of?” – George Buhlman (39:23)

8. Ravens, Crows, and Animal Memory

• Crows/ravens can recognize individual humans—by face, voice, and possibly even vehicle.
• Story: A researcher who captured ravens, disguised herself, but days later was identified by her voice and “shamed” by the birds and their friends (48:09–48:52).
• These birds also hold grudges and can form alliances, remember “danger” for years, and are clever enough to evade traps and associate danger with vehicles.
• Experiments show they can be trained to perform complex tasks and even identify specific threats.

9. Animal "Dialects" and Regional Communication

• Wolves, ravens, and prairie dogs have regionally distinct calls; some messages universal (e.g., danger), others tied to local “dialects”—so much so that playbacks from another place may not elicit a response. (67:43–69:15)

10. Human Imitation: The Art & Folly of Game Calling

• Contest-winning human calls often impress other humans, not wildlife; the “best” calls (to us) aren’t the most effective on actual animals.
• Extensive turkey and duck caller talk—demonstrations by George—which crack up the hosts.
• “Our criteria are based on what? Maybe… but these recordings… when you start really spending time around these animals, you realize these categories are so artificial.” – George Buhlman (72:09)

11. Ethics of Animal Calling & Human Interference

• The group discusses the risk of overusing electronic/playback calls in the wild; can stress animals, waste their energy, or put them at risk.
• Advice: “I don’t [call to animals]… because in most cases, I want to know what they know, and I want to learn what they have to teach. And once you inject yourself into that, you completely change the dynamic to being focused on you.” – George Buhlman (54:43)

12. Observing and Learning from Wildlife

• Encouragement for listeners: Become an “expert in your own backyard” by tuning into the everyday sounds and signals of wildlife.
• Know your “normal” and then notice when things are out of place—that’s often the sign of something important.
• “All of us live at an address but very few of us live in and of the place that we call home. And to me, this is one of the most beautiful, accessible ways for you to start listening to your real neighbors, you know, the wild neighbors.” – George Buhlman (76:19)

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Memorable Quotes & Fun Moments

• On prairie dog alarm calls:
  “When your life depends on it… you get it right, and those who don’t get it right have long since died.” – George Buhlman (10:23)

• On feeding birds:
  “That’s the one thing we try, we do feed birds here, but we don’t feed anything else. And when we do develop relationships with animals… I really try to do it on trust alone, which takes a lot longer than handouts.” – George Buhlman (22:55)

• Crows holding grudges:
  “[After capturing ravens for a study…] the bird, like, turned inside out. It went ballistic. It screamed in a way she’d never heard a raven scream before… several other ravens joined and they started screaming at her… proceeded to do so the entire distance it took her to walk back to her apartment.” (48:09)

• On giving animals credit:
  “It really blows your mind when you start seeing how some of these things unfold in ways that defy everything that we’re exposed to.” – George Buhlman (39:24)

• On human hunters in animal communication networks:
  “They’re being tattled on. You’re being ratted out way before you ever get there.” – George Buhlman (16:47)

• On ‘the most common sound in nature’:
  “The most common alarm sound in nature is not a sound, it’s the absence of it. Silence.” – George Buhlman (16:47)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Introduction of George & premise — 03:09
• Turkey call demonstration & significance — 04:32
• Discussion of animal warning systems/squirrel alarms — 06:20–07:27
• Scientific study of species-specific alarm calls — 08:23
• Prairie dog alarm specifics & accuracy — 09:11–10:23
• Inter-species neighborhood watch — 12:44–14:14
• Hunters and letting ‘the woods die down’ — 15:52–16:47
• Bird vigilance at feeders — 24:39
• Super-senses: hearing, smell, infrared, etc. — 29:26–30:51
• Wolves’ “psychic” awareness & scent stories — 31:53–33:28
• Raven & crow intelligence/memory anecdote — 41:18, story at 46:06–49:10
• Owls responding to playback; dangers & ethics — 49:42–54:11
• Animal dialects/accents & playback research — 67:43–69:15
• Human game call contests vs. wild effectiveness — 70:44–72:09
• Final advice: become wildlife-literate at home — 76:19

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Overall Flow & Tone

• The tone is relaxed, humorous, and full of banter, with lots of playful teasing between the hosts and their guest.
• The episode is rich with hunting anecdotes, real-life experiences, and scientific insight, mixed in with honest admissions about human limitations.
• George’s passion and knowledge make the material accessible and engaging even for listeners who aren’t hunters or birders.

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Takeaways

• Animals are constantly communicating, not only about threats but about weather, resources, and each other—including you.
• With patience and observation, ordinary people can begin to decode “the language of the wild” in their backyards.
• Human understanding of animal communication is growing, but there’s still far more happening than science has yet explained.
• Respect for wildlife means minimizing unnecessary interference—don’t be “the noisiest thing in the woods,” and don’t overuse calls or handouts.
• The next step? Slow down, listen, and pay attention—“the animals are talking about you.”

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Recommended:

• Read George Buhlman’s book Eavesdropping on Animals for an even deeper dive.
• Try being present and noticing patterns in your local wildlife—become a part of your ecological “neighborhood watch.”

Transcript

[Jay]

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[Garagelogic Host]

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[Jay]

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[Kenny]

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[George Buhlman]

G ellers are pretty awesome. You just gotta ask for an introduction.

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[Kenny]

Maybe try to get your life together.

[George Buhlman]

I don't know.

[Jay]

At 65, it's too late. What you see is what you get, and it ain't pretty.

[Kenny]

All right, here we go. Whenever you want, Gabe.

[George Buhlman]

Three, two, one.

[Kenny]

J. Cole.

[Jay]

Kenny, many questions this morning with this

[Kenny]

guest you lined up for your entertainment only. I am now going to play for you the sound of a. A deer, two deer, a buck and a doe making love. Are you ready? Sorry, George.

[Jay]

Sounds like.

[Kenny]

Sounds like something.

[Jay]

Sounds like something that goes on in your family room. What are you telling me?

[Kenny]

Let's introduce Our guest, George Bu. And you wrote, I want to plug the book right away.

[Jay]

Best open to the show we've ever had.

[Kenny]

The book is Eavesdropping on Animals.

[Jay]

Yeah.

[Kenny]

What we can learn from wildlife conversations. The reason we're having George on is because, George, I saw you on my Best friends podcast. Steve Rinella, meat eater. We actually are best friends. Although he's never met me, I'm sure he would love me, because I certainly love him and everything he does. And you, George, might be the most fascinating guest I have ever seen on that podcast. Wow. That was a good appearance.

[Jay]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

Thank you for saying so. Thanks for having me on here today.

[Jay]

Yeah.

[Kenny]

Yeah. You have made your living, your life's goal to try to figure out what the animals are saying. And it started when you were a young kid with turkey, right?

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, among other things. But turkey was one I poured a lot of my time into, for sure.

[Kenny]

And along the way, you mastered the turkey. The various turkey calls that both the female and the tom. I. I've never heard anybody gobble, but you can actually gobble. And I just thought that was fascinating. I want to play. Here's what I do. When I go out turkey hunting, I have one of these things. It's just a piece of slate and a piece of plastic.

[Jay]

How's that work? I've never seen that.

[Kenny]

How does that work? And scrape it like this.

[Jay]

Oh.

[Kenny]

I'm pretty sure what I'm doing is wrong, and I'm pretty sure the message I'm sending is, run away, run away, run away. But I have no idea. I mean, even if I was doing it perfectly, I still don't know what they're saying. What is that female saying, George, when she's walking through the woods doing that? Yeah. I can't even now. I'm under pressure.

[Jay]

Close enough. It was close enough.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[Jay]

All I want to know is, do you actually draw them in or not? That's what I want to know.

[Kenny]

Me, I have had success. What I've learned is if I think one is in the area, stop calling. And I learned that during duck hunting, if they're coming your way, put the call down, Let it go. Let them come to you, otherwise you're going to ruin it. But what is. What is she saying? Is she strolling through the woods?

[George Buhlman]

Well, they often sound a little bit more like,

[Kenny]

that's. That's dead on. That's perfect.

[George Buhlman]

And, you know, each one of those sounds has meaning for sure. And a lot of it is. Is tonal. A lot of it's Contextual, So we don't always know unless we really embed ourselves into their space to know how those things are actually working. And even then, we're still, you know, I'm still left in the dust so many times by wild animals, but there's enough there that when you start paying attention a little more, you realize, oh, wow, they're actually not just making senseless noise. They're. They're actually saying stuff. They're. They're talking about things.

[Kenny]

And the way you figure that out is to just sit there and sit there and sit there and sit there. For me, the best part of deer hunting isn't actually hunting deer. It's waking up with the woods, sitting there all day, and then putting the woods to bed. I don't go anywhere. I don't have an enclosed stand. I have a roof, but it's open. So I'm part of the. I figure I'm part of the woods when I'm deer hunting. And it's absolutely fascinating to hear a squirrel go off, and you think the squirrel's angry at you, but then you hear a squirrel 50 yards away doing the same thing, and you realize these two knuckleheads are having a verbal spat. That's what I assume, is that what's going on? Are they squawking about me? George?

[George Buhlman]

Sure, it could be both. And other things, too. You know, you have to really pay attention. You know, they even have variations within those alarms that will point to different things. You know, trouble in the air, trouble on the ground. And sometimes, yeah, they're just pissed at each other. They're carrying on. You don't you take my cones, stay over on your side of the fence kind of thing.

[Jay]

So trouble.

[Kenny]

So trouble in the air, trouble on the ground. So you would have to be sitting there, witness, hear the sound, and then you have to either focus on the ground and look for, say, a. A fox or a coyote or a snake, or look up in the air and look for a predator. Right? And that's how you end up putting the two and two together.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah. Jay? Yep. It's. Well, it's, you know, to be clear for folks listening, it's. It's a lot of correlative work. There's a lot of research that's been done out there where they've done some more inventive, ingenious with technology, you know, from robotic creatures to playbacks of sounds that animals have made to try to elicit the same behavior and kind of overlay. Okay, well, they did this the last time they made that sound. Let's make this sound and see if everybody in the, in the community, the colony, reacts the same way.

[Kenny]

Right.

[George Buhlman]

And starting in the 70s, they really started figuring some of this out with vervet monkeys and, and that they had distinct calls for a snake, which was different from the call they had for an eagle in the air, which was different still from a call that they used to announce the presence of a leopard. And, you know, there's been almost. It's hard to keep up with now, the amount of research pointing to the depths to which animals are communicating.

[Jay]

Well, I noticed you along the same lines talking about the prairie dogs. Right. And I found it fascinating that you. There's. It's been determined that, say, with a prairie dog much like that, what kind of monkey was it? A verbat.

[George Buhlman]

Those were vervet monkeys in Amboseli park in Africa.

[Jay]

Okay, so an African monkey. So the prairie dogs, much like, I suppose a lot of species, aren't much different. If I remember correctly, you said the prairie dog will know when it's a human, when it's a coyote, when it's a regular dog, normal domesticated dog, and so on and so forth. How do you decipher that? I mean, you're like a CIA decoder picking up on different languages and decoding everything. How can you. Is it that consistent? So that every time they would see a domesticated dog, it would be the same Every time they saw a coyote, it would be the same Every time. Every time they saw whatever predator, if it was a human, each time it would change for that particular predator. Is that accurate?

[George Buhlman]

That's exactly right, Jay.

[Jay]

Do they ever get it wrong? Can a prairie. You know what I mean? Like one prairie dog says to the other, or if that prairie dog doesn't like that prairie dog, I'm going to tell him it's a. I'm going to tell it's a domesticated dog because I want the coyote to come get you see what I'm saying? Does it get that involved or is that too highbrow,

[George Buhlman]

you know? No, they definitely. When your life depends on it, let's put it this way, you get it right, and those who don't get it right have long since died.

[Jay]

Have researchers found them to get it wrong at times?

[George Buhlman]

You know, wrong is by our perspective or, you know, point of view is we don't, we don't know enough to fully dig into all these details. But there's a great example from that prairie dog work where Consula Bodikov, who is the lead on that project in Arizona. He and the field techs were out there, and they're watching in this. This prairie dog screams coyote. And they can clearly see that this is a dog. And as it comes closer and closer, it comes into the colony, it gets close enough, they realize, oh, it is a coyote.

[Jay]

So the prairie dogs got it.

[George Buhlman]

You know, the prairie dogs got it right, the people didn't. Right. So there are definitely instances where, you know, they obviously know the difference. If it's anything like my black lab, a domestic dog is nowhere near the threat of a coyote. Depends on its. Its wits and its speed and its senses and things to hunt. And so they react different. The cottontails react different around our dog. The bobcat that we've got in the neighborhood, just it sees our dog, and you can almost swear you hear them laughing. It's like, ah, you know, there's Hobbs, the black lab. But, you know, if the fox comes through, the coyote comes through. So you can really easily see why the use of vocalizations saves everybody a lot of energy. But it also is. Is communicating far beyond where any one individual might be at any one time.

[Jay]

That's fascinating.

[Kenny]

And different animals, from what I understand, understand each other. So when a squirrel starts yelling, the different critters of both land and the air understand what they're hearing, or they know that that's a warning. And they to themselves then are. They're on edge or they flee.

[Jay]

So the other species will say, it doesn't even have to be a squirrel. It could be another animal would hear the squirrels and get what's going on. Is that what you're saying, Ken?

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, absolutely.

[Jay]

And that's remarkable.

[Kenny]

From what I understand, this is a skill that I'm sure early humans up through the mountain men into the early 1900s, this is a skill that human beings also had, right?

[George Buhlman]

Yeah. And still have, you know, certain places where it's still really darn important. You know, a photographer friend has been able to, from years of observing and pairing things up, sounds and sights, that knows that there's an owl around, you know, and not just any owl. He's been able to tell that there's a difference in what the red squirrel says when it's a great horned owl versus a great gray owl. The robin, common American robin, has a different alarm call when it's a great gray owl versus a great horned owl. And so if we can pick that up, you can darn well bet. Sure all the other wild inhabitants in those places have figured that out too.

[Kenny]

There's a squirrel that in my yard out here. I live out in the edge of the prairie, and there's a squirrel that every time I come home, it's talking shit to me and, and I think it's telling other animals about me. I'm pretty sure this animal, this squirrel has ruined it for me with all the other critters in the area. Could that be just me feeling paranoid or could that actually be the case?

[George Buhlman]

No, it could very much be the case. One of the things you see is because the entire wild community is in on all this. And let's be clear, the only ones that aren't are us. Humans. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And everybody has equal say. So if you scare or piss off the robin or that squirrel or the chipmunk, everybody's listening to them, not you. And they follow suit with whatever that first contact animal has to. To say about you. So I think a lot of. I mentioned this on, you know, interview with Steve was that, you know, a lot of people who spent time in the woods have had that experience of walking a trail, whether they're hunting or hiking. And you come back down that trail and there's deer tracks on top of your tracks, or mountain lion tracks or

[Kenny]

wolf tracks or coyote lessons I've learned hunting. Yeah, I was a kid when I learned that one.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, yeah. And so they're taking advantage of that community wide, you know, neighborhood watch. And that gives them several minutes of forewarning before you show up. They all step out of the way, prepare themselves, hide, flee, whatever they want to do. And after you pass through, they know it. They can detect it through the animal language. And they oftentimes go back and check out the trail where you were to see exactly who you were, I think. And you come back down the line, you're like, well, wait, I was just here and, yeah, why didn't I see the deer? It's because they knew you were there before you ever knew they were there.

[Kenny]

Okay, so that confirms something my son and I have been saying. When we go out to our deer stand during hunting, we're getting out there a good hour and a half or more before first light because we figure it takes at least an hour for, we call it, for the woods to die down, for everything to forget about what they just witnessed. Even though I'm being very, very quiet and it's dark, I know to the animals, I'm crashing through the woods and making a great disruption. So that's actually a thing, letting the woods die down.

[George Buhlman]

It's absolutely a thing. And it is about an hour, 45 minutes to an hour is the safe time to be out there, just settling in. Because we don't realize it, but the most common alarm sound in nature is not a sound, it's the absence of it. Silence.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

So if you're getting out there before dawn, you're getting up before everybody's awake, and so there's nobody to yell at you or spread the word, and then you wait that time for everybody to wake up and you're part of the scenery. Whereas if you just walk into a place after dawn, a lot of people say, I go for a hike or jog, bike and walk the dog. I never see anything, you know, I know. The neighbors told me he's seen that fox five times. Right. And it's because you're being tattled on. You're being ratted out way before you ever get there.

[Jay]

This is fascinating.

[George Buhlman]

The result is you feel like there's nothing out there.

[Kenny]

Yeah, well, exactly.

[Jay]

When I've gone out deer hunting with friends, they've always educated me. It's your scent, right? They want you to be quiet. They tell you to be quiet. But if they can pick up your smell, you know, this, that and the other. But what you're telling me is long before the scent maybe is an issue, they're already talking to them about the big fat white guy with a gun coming. They've already tipped them off long before they can smell that I haven't showered in two days because I'm at deer camp.

[George Buhlman]

It depends on the wind. But yeah, essentially, you know, the moment you step out of the vehicle, you're near somebody, somebody's house, somebody's thicket, somebody's usual haunts, and you are very much a brand new, out of the ordinary occurrence. And so they react accordingly. And then that message continues to travel outward. So you have, in many cases, like two minutes. You can tell if you start watching the birds and, and other animals, you see them start escaping or moving in a certain way and you know something's coming from that direction. You know, they're usually moving away from wherever the source of the disruption is. And quite often you've got two minutes yourself to figure out, okay, am I going to hang here and scare the tar out of this friend of mine, or am I going to drift into the background and just watch them go through in a, in a super creepy

[Kenny]

way, how long does it take to convince these deer that I'm their friend? And the reason I ask is because I get up at 4:30 in the morning, I leave the house at 5, 5:30, it's dark out, but I can see deer sleeping in the farmyard. And I'm convinced that deer think that we can't see them in the dark because they'll stand up, and then they'll just stand there and look at me, and I'll talk to them and I'll go, hi, good morning. How are you? You know I can see you, right? And they don't actually run away until I start the truck up, start driving, and then they're in fear. But I could never do that during the day. George, what is that?

[George Buhlman]

Yeah. It's uncanny how well they know our boundaries. It's astonishing how closely we are observed and we're clueless to the fact. And reciprocally, we are nowhere even close to them in terms of our ability to watch them, to know what's going on. Like a window, like a deer, a bird understands what a window is. They will land. Granted, sometimes there's reflection and things, but there's other times, you're behind the glass door or the window, they're carrying on, as usual, five feet from you,

[Kenny]

less than five feet. We have a bird feeder right next to our dining room window. And they will stand there two feet away from us. We'll be on one side of the glass, they'll be on the other side. And I know they're looking right at me, and they don't care. Yeah. But as soon as they hear that

[George Buhlman]

door, they know that they're safe when they're behind that barrier, whatever it is. I had a friend who was doing some mountain lion films, and he'd found a brand new carcass, new kill by this cat along the road. And he had kind of those Fleur binoculars for looking infrared.

[Kenny]

Yep.

[George Buhlman]

And he stops the truck, and the cat is, we'll say, 50 yards off the road. It's right in the brush. Right near the road.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

And he starts walking toward it. And in the daytime, you would never pull that off. The cat would be gone before the car got to a stop, right?

[Jay]

Yeah. Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

But as it was dark, it was. If this cat was like, oh, yeah, human. They can't see squat. And he's literally walking through the dark with the binoculars watching the cat. And the cat would feed, and it would look up at him and go back down to feeding and look up. And his humans, like, they can't see anything. I'm safe. And then at one point, his. The batteries did die, then he couldn't see anything. And of course, you know, those cats are. Are Pretty afraid of us. So he wasn't in terrible danger or anything. But it was just kind of comical that, you know, this cat has been watching us so closely. I always tell people in the places with mountain lions, like, they see you way more than you ever see them.

[Kenny]

Absolutely.

[George Buhlman]

And you never know. So.

[Jay]

But how is it then, if you're behind the door, right in the glass door, you're in your house and they know it, so they'll come up. I have the same thing, like Kenny, bird feeders. If I go out on that deck with a cup of coffee and fire up a heater, and I sit quietly for 5, 10 minutes, the birds are going in. This daytime, obviously, birds are going crazy around my feeders, and often they can be three, four feet from me, and they don't seem bothered by my presence at all. What's the difference between. Why aren't they reacting the same way? Because I'm no longer behind that glass door. I'm right there in their feeding area. But they're all coming around, and I've got them all the time. The woodpeckers, the blue jays, all species are coming in and fairly close to me. What's the difference between me sitting on my porch and being inside the house?

[George Buhlman]

Extortion.

[Jay]

I got something. Yeah. Okay. I got you.

[George Buhlman]

I want that food so bad.

[Kenny]

So bad.

[George Buhlman]

I don't care that you're a lot of people.

[Kenny]

Okay.

[George Buhlman]

That's the one thing we try. We do feed birds here, but we don't feed anything else. And when we do develop relationships with your understanding with animals across the species divide, it's. I really try to do it on trust alone, which takes a lot longer than handouts. They need that food so bad that they will do it many times against their own better interest. Oh, you know, a lot of people put a bird feeder out in an open part of the yard so they can see the birds, but it's a death trap. Honestly. If you take and set up a second feeder close to the shrubs and in the. In the forest edge, that one will get emptied twice as fast as the one out in the yard because they recognize it is just so dangerous. But they need it, right? Especially if they have young ones.

[Kenny]

They're.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, they just need it. Okay, so you're.

[Kenny]

You're saying something that I've been disputing for years. We have this bird feeder, and I was. I was really against feeding the birds because I've always figured they did pretty well before we put up the bird feeder. I think they'll be okay. But then she put the bird feeder up anyway. And I love it. I love just sitting there watching these birds. And it's air like you say, every species, we only feed them in the winter, wintertime. Every single bird that lands on the feeder, the first thing they do is they look up. And sometimes they look up for five seconds or more and then they get busy eating and then they pause and they look up again. What's going on there, George? What is that?

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, it's. That's referred to as vigilance in the, in the scientific literature. You know, an elk that lives in areas with, with wolves already is somewhat accustomed to knowing those wolves are around and isn't as vigilant at times versus a, say, a group of elk who lives in a place that wolves come through periodically. Those wolves come through once a month and when they do, everybody's just hair on fire, freaking out. And so that level of vigilance depends on those circumstances. And you know, for listeners out there, if you have a bird feeder play with this, you know, set up maybe that second feeder and set your timer on your phone or your watch and count how many times the birds look up in a certain period of time. And if there's more birds around, they've even found this with titmice relative of chickadees. If there's more birds around. And in this case, Katie, seething out of the University of Florida was finding it around fights. When one bird fought with another, if they had a big audience, they would go at it. It's like think of kids on a playground, you know, really got lookouts that are going to tell when the, the principal's coming. So they know to get the hell out of there.

[Kenny]

It's a prison yard fight.

[George Buhlman]

But if it's just them. Yeah, if it's just those two that are fighting, they in the back of their minds are still hyper vigilant to the possibility that while they're distracted, that hawk comes in is going to nail them.

[Jay]

I've often heard. I lived out west where wildfires were prevalent in Utah.

[Kenny]

Oh, tell them where. Because George, you live in Gardiner, right?

[George Buhlman]

I'm in Gardner, Montana.

[Kenny]

Yeah. You know where that is, right, Jay? The north gate.

[Jay]

Yeah, sure do. That's beautiful.

[Kenny]

So where did you live, Jay?

[Jay]

Salt Lake City. And then I last couple years I actually moved up to Park City, which is right outside and right up in the mountains, and I commuted the 40 minutes down into Salt Lake City. But I enjoyed, you know, I went everywhere in the woods, in the park. I mean, Utah is just beautiful, vast country and maybe one of the most underrated states in terms of beauty too, with its diversity of the, you know, from high desert to mountains and so on. But I remember Kenny and George being told during wildfire season

[Kenny]

that.

[Jay]

That the sentinel of the forest could often be the blue jay and. And that there are other species too, that when there's fire or maybe bad weather, like a tornado coming or high winds, maybe not tornado level, whatever the case might be, from fires to tornadoes, high winds, that the birds will communicate with the other animals to let them know it's time to hightail it out of here. Is that accurate, George, or is that just kind of made up and it's just folklore?

[George Buhlman]

It's entirely possible. I don't know in that circumstance. But we know for sure that it's not just us that they're talking about. You know, think about what we talk about. It's. It covers the range of things and, you know, actually right after the. The Meat Eater show went live, I got an email from a fella in Japan saying, years ago, my wife figured out that the crows make a sound specifically for the lead up to a rainstorm. And we know to go get the laundry outline, really. And they've been using this for years. They'll have the window open and the crows make this particular sound and they know, go get the laundry. And in the scientific literature too, there's definitely a lot of well documented stuff about weather changes, other natural events, you know, say nothing of predators or other

[Jay]

creatures out and about, because I'll notice in my yard, the birds die down just before the storm hits. They'll be hitting the feeder super hard, right? And the next thing I know, they're all gone. And it's real quiet, as they say, the quiet before the storm. And I often wondered if that's true, that they can sense bad weather, maybe a fire coming, because fire obviously would make a lot of noise too. And if they can warn each other and communicate that we're about to die. So let's get out of here. But. So there must be some truth to that, just based on the little bit I've observed with just backyard birds.

[George Buhlman]

Right, Yeah, I think you're on the right track because when you really think of it, a lot of these creatures have superhuman powers, sensory abilities and capabilities that we have built nothing even close to. So there's animals that can hear in the subsonic. They can hear Thunder, who knows, 20, 30 miles away.

[Jay]

Wow.

[George Buhlman]

Further, I. I don't know, you know, elephants, we know Are communicating in subsound, same like the bison here in Yellowstone. And in some cases they're actually able to detect sound vibrations through their feet, their bodies, and no things are gonna arrive before they ever do earthquakes. You know, lots of examples of those sort of things. So I think that's one of the. The values of starting to listen to wild animals is you quickly realize they're seeing a world that our eyes will never be able to witness or hear. They're smelling in ways they can hear, they can taste, you know. You know, pit vipers can actually see an infrared or detect infrared rather. They're not seeing it. They're using those pits in front of their. Their eyes before their nostrils. So they can literally track that mouse by heat as to where it went. So when you start listening to these creatures and watching their behavior, it can be really confusing and. But even after you've sort of picked up a little bit of in the way of chops on figuring out what's happening, you still come up against the fact that they see this world in ways we never will. And by learning to listen to them through our ears and eyes and noses, even, we can get a little bit of what they're understanding.

[Kenny]

I'm glad you brought up the sensory part because I want to bring up something I read in your book, Eavesdropping on animals and it has to do with wolves. And you didn't say it in the book, but I'm going to say it right here and now. Wolves have espn. They know shit is going to happen before long before it's going to happen. And the reason I'm saying that is because you've got a friend, a gal I believe, who worked at a. You're going to have to clean up my story and it's going to come at you weird and you're going to make corrections here. But she worked at a wolf center. I think I'm on the right track. She would leave for a day, two days, a couple of months, and the wolves would know when she's within a mile or two of returning to the center. Am I getting that right? That they knew before they could even see or smell her that she was almost there. And they would make certain vocalizations or barks or yips.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah. And it wasn't just for her. You've got it mostly spot on in that it became known to the employees at the this facility of captive wolves. You know, they'd often rescuing wolves that were used for film shoots and then ditched or ones that people had taken on as pets, just. But they're. They're wolves, right? And, yeah, it was just this crazy thing that would happen every once in a while. They. And it typically was with people that they had spent a lot of time with, if that person came back. And mind you, for listeners who haven't, you know, read the book or anything like that to just give you a little background, like they show up in someone else's car. So it wasn't like, oh, they're showing up in their old beater pickup that had that rattle in the. In the fender or the transmissions.

[Kenny]

Right.

[George Buhlman]

Particular sound. Like, these are things that. That couldn't be cracked or known or. So they. They've basically gone through all these possibilities of trying to figure out what the heck they were picking up on. And we still don't know. A lot of these things are really mysterious, but they would seem to know, like, they'd. Everybody be at work, and all sudden the wolves would go into this frenzied, howling, barking thing. And over time, they just asked, well, I wonder who's coming back now? And other folks have observed this in other places too. So we don't. We don't know how some of these things work. But at the same time, there's something. There's. There's a there, there.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[Jay]

Could the there, there be that? If it's a consistent amount of time that that person is gone. Let's say they're gone from 10 to 10 to noon, and they come back at 1. It's nothing like that.

[Kenny]

Don't try to rationalize this, Jay. No, this is. This is voodoo. It's wolf voodoo.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, they tried that, you know, the owner of the place. The owner of the place would go to town and they would. They would start howling. Upon his return, when he was still, I think, about seven miles away, Kent was telling me. So that was the first time that the. The vehicle kind of rose up out of the. The canyon or the pass and then into a place where you could conceive they might hear him. Right. It was before people could hear him. Like, I can hear a wolf howl two and a half, three miles away. With normal conditions, wolves are hearing other wolves howl up to 10 miles away.

[Jay]

Wow.

[George Buhlman]

That's been documented.

[Kenny]

Can you imagine each.

[Jay]

That's crazy. I had no idea.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, yeah, it's. It's nuts. So in those cases, when Ken was coming back, he, you know, he could say, well, okay, they're. They know I'm coming back. I left. I'm usually come back after groceries about this Time and. Right there was that too. But then there were just these other times where they had no way of knowing there was no similarity of vehicles. The windows were closed, like, and they start riling themselves up in this way when the vehicle with that person that they remember is still a mile away. So maybe some listeners out there might have a clue, but it's, it's mysterious stuff.

[Kenny]

That's a burden. I wouldn't want, I wouldn't want to be able to hear that much. I wouldn't want to be able to smell that much. And, and from what I understand, canines can separate smells. I couldn't cover myself with skunk essence and think that I could get away from a dog because a dog would go, well, I smell a lot of skunk, but I also smell a lot of candy, right?

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, yeah, probably so, you know, it's, it's astonishing. Like, I wrote about some of the dogs they've been using in archaeology efforts. You know, like as an archaeologist, in some cases you only get five holes. Let's say there's a given area of ground and you are only permitted to dig five holes of a certain dimension. Like, how do you pick?

[Kenny]

Sure.

[George Buhlman]

Like, where on earth do you dig? Put the shovel in, say, okay, well, let's see if we can't find something here. Well, they've trained these dogs to actually detect ancient bones and, and the chemicals associated with, with bones and carcasses. And some of them are finding animal, human remains that are hundreds, if not thousands of years old through sometimes upwards of 10 inches of dirt.

[Kenny]

Wow.

[Jay]

So like a cadaver through the dirt, a cadaver dog, only through a foot of dirt.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, that's.

[Jay]

So how do any of them, if they're that cagey, that smart, super sensory, can communicate effectively? How do any of them ever end up dead at the end of a barrel of a gun, ever?

[Kenny]

That's why I don't get.

[Jay]

Yeah, how do we ever get one? Yeah, how do we ever see one? They just make mistakes like we do.

[George Buhlman]

Why not? Yeah, they're living beings. They all make choices. And yeah, there's so many factors. Wind, you know, a lot of animals, as you probably have recognized, they do not like to move around in the wind.

[Jay]

Right.

[George Buhlman]

Sometimes they have to. If that bird feeder is the only thing going and they gotta buck up and get out there fast and away fast just to, to not get caught.

[Kenny]

One more thing.

[George Buhlman]

A lot of birds, you know, seen. Go ahead.

[Kenny]

This researcher that I keep referring to, she's a gal. She also. There's a story in your book where she's out on tour and she's speaking to different colleges around the country and she has her favorite wolf with her, one that she knows well, and then I'm assuming it's semi tame. She had her mom and her sister and her stepdad out in the audience. And if I remember correctly, this wolf was able to find these three people, but it had never met them before. Is that right?

[George Buhlman]

Correct.

[Kenny]

How? That's what I'm talking about. By voodoo. Yeah. How? How?

[George Buhlman]

Gotta ask a wolf, you know, they. They can smell relatedness of their own kind. And they were doing it with Shauna. They didn't react to her stepdad, but her sister and her mom.

[Jay]

Yeah, yeah. This is fascinating.

[George Buhlman]

And it was repeated. This wasn't just like a one off. Oh, wow. That. What a coincidence. Like, they structured this and did this again with one of the other gentlemen who was working with them when they went to. So that was in New York, I think, that event or Vermont. And they did it again in Ohio. This. The same wolf found breast cancer in two different women on that trip. One who knew about it and one who was undiagnosed. And dogs have been trained to do this. But here's a wolf that was not trained at all.

[Jay]

That's what I wanted to ask you.

[George Buhlman]

They're still doing it.

[Jay]

I've heard of animals doing that in hospital medical settings. Right. But how would a wolf, you know, an untrained wolf, would know to be able to find and detect breast cancer? We don't know because not enough research or. How does that even happen?

[George Buhlman]

No idea. That's crazy. It really is crazy. And it just. If. If that animal is capable of doing that, what else is it? Capable?

[Jay]

Yeah, right. Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

Or that animal over there. You know, it's. It really blows your mind when you start seeing how some of these things unfold in ways that with our senses and our brains and our knowledge, it just defies everything that we're exposed to.

[Kenny]

I've been working up to this portion of the show. I want to talk about crows because I think crows are not only the smartest being there is on the earth, they're also the dumbest. And I'll tell you why. But first, I want to talk to everybody about your vehicle needs. And everything you need for your car can be had at Schoonover Body Works and Auto Care. That includes all levels of bodywork, general repair, tires, accessories, oil changes, glass, including that new fancy glass with all the sensors and electronic stuff. There's no worries when you leave your vehicle at Schoonovers, you can rest easy knowing that it's going to come back with the work done efficiently and professionally. Every single employee there will treat your vehicle like their own. And if you have an insurance claim, don't worry about that adjuster of yours. There is not a better shop in Minnesota to handle those repairs. Schoonover isn't beholden to any one insurance company like so many other shops are. They're beholden to you, and they will handle your claim for you. They've been around for 80 years in the Metro. They know what's up. They're the official shop of both the Crabby coffee shop and garagelogic. Schoonover Body Works and Auto Care, 1060 County Road, Ian Shoreview, and on the [e-mail] so in your part of the world, George, ravens are a big deal. And you tell many stories, both on Steve's show and in the book, about ravens. And I'm assuming that a lot of what you say about ravens can also be said about crows. Is that true?

[George Buhlman]

Yes, there's a generalization that's pretty accurate. Yeah.

[Kenny]

These crows, from everything I've learned over the years, can become your friend. And they can bring you presents if you reward them. I have a gal that I work with. Her mom will walk out the back door of her kitchen and make the worst crow sound in the world with a bunch of leftovers and garbage. And they'll come for miles. I mean, she'll go out there and it'll be something really horrible. And all of a sudden her backyard is full of crows.

[Jay]

Sound like. Sounds like somebody I dated.

[Kenny]

So in my world, these crows are pretty smart, but they're not smart enough to take over the world. And I really think they could. I really think they could. Here's why. George, I want you to tell the story about the gal who is involved in netting a bunch of ravens. We talked about this a little before we started recording today, and she was walking on campus and came across a raven that she had met previously. Can you tell me the whole story so I don't screw any of it up?

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, sure. Sure, Kenny. Well, at the time we were working on a. I was volunteering for this raven study that just got going here in Yellowstone. And one of the hardest things you can possibly do in the line of studying ravens is catch them. They are so incredibly crafty. Like, we had this one net launcher out behind a car and a pull out in the park, and we were trying to Catch this one raven. And, you know, most animals will look at a vehicle and just keep walking or keep flying. Ravens look into the car. Yes. And we're sitting there with this trap set and a dead squirrel laying on the pavement, you know, trying to entice this bird in. And this bird did a couple passes where it just flew parallel to the vehicle and looked in at us like, you're going hiking.

[Kenny]

I can see you guys.

[George Buhlman]

That's what people usually do here. What the hell are you doing still sitting in the car? And it landed about 100 yards away. Sat on a hill and just looked at us for the whole time. We had to just can it.

[Jay]

He's going to wait you out, wasn't he? He's gonna wait out. You know what I do.

[George Buhlman]

So I said to these researchers, I said, my neighbor is a hunting guide, and they've got a bone pile. They have sheep. The sheep die. Or they finish cutting up an elk or deer, and they throw the bones over the fence in this one spot. They've been coming there for generations. Let's set the trap there. And we caught a couple there initially, but, you know, it's really rare to catch even just a couple at a pass. Well, it had snowed the morning. We had set this trap up before dawn, and it was still snowing into dawn, but the trap was in place. There's some scraps from some butchers in the area that were doing game processing. And we had it set. It was a banquet of banquets. And we had this remote release to trigger the trap when it was ready. And we waited and we waited, and we fired that trap, and we caught 23 in one instance.

[Kenny]

Criminy.

[George Buhlman]

Needless to say, we were overloaded with ravens. It looked like a. It was a net launcher. So you can picture this kind of a big fishing net, like a big scene, thrown out over 20, almost two dozen ravens that look like black burnt popcorn, you know, bouncing underneath this net. So we scramble out there. We go flying out there on the. The utv, and, you know, two. Two got away. Two got out from under the edge of the net, took off. But then we had. We still had almost two dozen. And I called my wife on the phone. They had a couple cat carriers to put the ravens in and a couple pillowcases, you know, if we ran out of cat carriers, I called my wife. I said, bring every pillowcase in the house right now over to the pasture, because we got more ravens than we know what to do with. And quickly realized also, how are we going to Process all these, put leg bands on them, do all the measurements, get the transmitters on them, and release them before it's dark like that. That's how many we had and how much time it would take. So we're like. We called up our friend. We're like, are you available? She's a former vet tech. Like, get up here right now if you're free, please. We've got too many ravens. And so, yeah, it was. It was comical. We used the neighbor's garage, and we're going through measuring these birds, letting them go as we do, and the ones. There's a couple of them in pillowcases that were hopping around the garage. You know, most of them just kind of stay still in the dark, you know, but then there's a couple that look like a mauve, you know, little ghost jumping around.

[Kenny]

Yeah. Never give up. Never give up.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah. It wasn't to give up, but in that way, their vision's blocked. So if they're in the cat carriers, if they're in these bags, they can't see anything, but they can hear. And knowing of John Marsliff's study, and John was a part of this study with his crow work on the University of Washington campus, where they found that they recognize our faces and they remember us over not just years, but possibly decades. If they live that long. It's only bounded by how long the crow lives. So I wore clothes I never wear. Wear shoes I never wore. I wore a hat I didn't normally wear, and I. It was before COVID even, but I still put on a. A handkerchief over my face like a bank robber.

[Kenny]

Right.

[George Buhlman]

And I didn't talk. Right. These were my neighbors. I didn't want to be pissing them off. Right.

[Kenny]

Right.

[George Buhlman]

But this gal who pinch hit for us, she came in and. And she had all kinds, understandably, lots of questions, wanting to know about the birds, ecology, behavior, you know, why we're doing what we're doing. And she's.

[Kenny]

You're all going talk along.

[George Buhlman]

Well, not everybody else, you know, I asked them later.

[Jay]

I wear this kerchief all the time.

[George Buhlman]

Even the researchers, the fellow researchers, they didn't. They didn't, you know, big deal. It wasn't a big deal. They aren't living here, so they get the brunt of any ill will from the ravens. Well, as it turns out, even when we do measurements, you still kind of keep them covered. And we let them go. And it was a solid two weeks later, this gal was in town in Gardner, so fully, I'd Say, two miles from the release site, capture and release site. And she went into the local cafe. She got a coffee and a scone, and she walks out into the street to go back to her apartment, which was like. Like two blocks away.

[Jay]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

And this raven flies down and lands right in front of her, as they often do. Like, hey there. I see you got something.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

You want to give me some?

[Kenny]

Yeah, I'm hungry.

[George Buhlman]

And she noticed it had leg bands and a transmitter on. And she said to it just out loud, like you might to your deer or squirrel. She's like, oh, what do you think you're doing?

[Jay]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

In the instant she spoke, the bird, like, turned inside out. It went ballistic. It screamed in a way she'd never heard a raven scream before. Flew in the nearest conifer tree and just started screaming at her. And then very quickly, several other ravens joined and. And they started screaming at her in exactly the same way and proceeded to do so the entire distance it took her to walk back to her apartment.

[Kenny]

Wow.

[Jay]

So.

[George Buhlman]

So the lesson there was the birds could not see her and remember her face, but it very much seemed like they actually remembered her voice. Not unlike somebody who's probably gagged and a bag put over their head and thrown in the trunk of a car. You remember the voice of the guys who were driving, Right?

[Kenny]

Right. Yeah, absolutely.

[George Buhlman]

That's what it seemed like.

[Jay]

So they all ganged up together to shame the kidnapper. He recognized the kidnapper from her voice. That's it.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah.

[Jay]

That is nuts.

[George Buhlman]

And we know other species are doing this, too, like African elephants. They've been found to be able to tell which culture humans are from, whether they're men or women, and which ones to be afraid of. Like, they've since found this in other species. So it wouldn't be out of the ordinary that something like a super smart raven would also be able to do the same thing.

[Jay]

Fascinating. Let me ask you something that I like to do. So I'm in the woods in northwest Wisconsin, not far from Superior, if you know where Superior is. Wisconsin, Northwest Wisconsin. So deep in the woods and a lot of owls, barred owls. Right. And I will put a little JBL speaker, one of those small speakers in the window to call in some owls at night because it's high entertainment for the grandkids, or sometimes early evening, so you can see them better. And within five to 10 minutes, I've got three or four in a tree, no more than five yards, 10 yards max from my house. And they all perch at the window where the speaker is and start losing their minds. And it's high entertainment. And I'm often wondering, are they yelling at me?

[Kenny]

Yeah. Son of a.

[Jay]

Come on out and let's fight. What are you doing hiding in the house? Yeah, because they look angry, and they. And they stay there, Kenny, for a long time.

[Kenny]

Oh, you are gonna get in trouble. Oh, my God. I can't believe you would mess with them like that.

[Jay]

I.

[Kenny]

They'll rip your eyeball right out of your head.

[Jay]

And this is a city kid who moved to the woods. I have no knowledge of this. I'm sitting here going, should I even be doing this? Should I even be messing with them?

[Kenny]

I have two stories like that. But let's talk about the owls first.

[Jay]

It's so cool. And I'm often wondered, are they looking at me, George, saying, come on out. This is my feeding area, my hunting area? If you're here, let's duke it out. Is that what's going on? Or. I don't even know why they're there and why they seem so angry, but they do.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah. Yeah, it's hard. If we can't interview the owl, how do we know? We can't really know for sure, but we do know that they. And I say they, birds in general. You know, a metal arc. They know their neighbors, and they know them from year to year. So you insert a new bird by way of, in this case, an electronic playback. They know the voices of those other local birds and who is not a regular local bird. And so this is an outside ballistic. Is. This is an outside intruder. And they're probably just as confused about that as we are about how those wolves could know somebody was coming without any forewarning. Like, they're. They're. We all have our blind spots, and we all have our superpowers.

[Jay]

So when the three or four owls. And it's usually three or four, it's not usually one. I get three or four at a time. Those might be the same three or four who are all neighbors. And as neighbors, they said, hey, let's go check out the clown next door. Now, we don't know who he is, but we're going to go find out. And they all kind of agree together. Am I. Am I on the right path here? They've talked to each other, said, let's go over that Cole's house and find out what's going on.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, I would say it's probably more there. It might just be that they're curious. They're coming together out of a mutual interest of rooting out the. The outsider. And they just happen to come into contact with each other and. Hey, Steve. Oh, you're here to get this guy? Yeah, Ralph. You know, I heard him, too. I came right over.

[Jay]

That's funny, because I love it and the grandkids love it. It's entertaining.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, it's really cool. But I don't do it so much. Like the animal sounds I make, which I'm known for in a lot of circles. I don't do outside, and I don't do playbacks generally, unless it's, like, exactly what you're doing. It's like, to show the kids, like, open them up to the natural world or someone who's totally new to it, because it really costs them. It costs them the energy and puts them into dangerous positions. Sort of like that bird feeder out in the open. I've been with birders who do this sound called pishing. It's a. It mimics an alarm call. And it's a great way to get a bird to come up out of the shrubs and look around and see what the trouble is. And you, by virtue of that, get a look at exactly what kind of sparrow that is. Right. But I've been with people when someone did that, and a hawk swoops in and kills the bird right in front of you that you, criminy, just called into.

[Kenny]

Sorry, kids.

[Jay]

Yes, sorry. And that would have been my luck that these owls would have killed something right in front of my two granddaughters. So it's okay if you just do it on occasion.

[Kenny]

No, no, don't get adamant. It's really not okay. Don't do that. Here's the lesson.

[George Buhlman]

I wouldn't do it too much, but if it's a, you know, every once in a while, probably won't hurt that much. Generally, of course, you do that and then words will come back on me. But I don't do it. Like, I don't outside Yellowstone. I don't howl to the wolves, even if it's legal. You can't do that inside the park. But I don't do it because in a lot, most cases, I want to know what they know, and I want to learn what they have to teach. And once you inject yourself into that, you completely change the dynamic to being focused on you.

[Kenny]

So I have one of these you probably recognize with. This is just a handheld electric animal collar. And I used to do what Jay was doing with the coyotes. So if I would hear. Hear a coyote at night, I'd go outside and I'd hit the Coyote thing. And then every coyote with the within ears reach, I mean, couple of miles and all the dogs on all the farms would start howling and barking and it was great fun. And I didn't think much of it because I don't know what kind of call I'm sending them. Am I saying, come on over, I've tapped a keg, or am I saying run for your life, there's a wolf here. You know, I have no idea, I'm saying. But I wanted to tell you about something I did, George, with this call. I was out in a deer stand on the edge of a field. I was hunting coyote and I brought this out, you know, and there's many different sounds on there, like a wounded rabbit or a mouse or whatever. A crow flies over. So I switch it to crow and I give it this. And within 30 seconds I was being circled by 30 crows. I have no idea where they came from, but they were all circling the deer stand and they were not happy and I fee. And so I turned it off and I kind of hid. Kind of got down and hid and there were no repercussions from that. And I've always been worried that there would. That they would see my truck and they would know my truck and they would see where I live and they'd come back. But the thing with crows, they have so many distinct different calls and with ravens that they actually. If they see a wolf, they'll make a certain call, correct? Or a coyote or a snake or a grizz. Yes or no?

[George Buhlman]

I don't know about wolves, coyotes or possibly snakes. And they may, you know, just. I've figured out a certain level of things, but we just don't know how deep some of this stuff goes. But yes, some of the. The communication these birds are doing is exactly at that level of specificity. And then how do I get there?

[Kenny]

How do I get them on my side? I want an army of crow that. A murder of crow that will be on my side and default me. Defend my homestead.

[George Buhlman]

Feed them well, you have to appeal to what is important to them.

[Jay]

Kenny's not going to do that.

[George Buhlman]

It's funny. I'll tell you. Let me tell you a story that. I'll tell you a story of the reverse and maybe it'll help inspire some of your efforts. I don't. And I can't remember if it made it in the book because we cut a bunch of chapters, but a friend of mine is a falconer, right at the time he had goshawks. They're a Goshawk. And he's living in Colorado on campus, and needed to fly his bird, needed to train his bird, practice his bird, you know, exercise it. But the best thing he had to practice and fly the bird on were crows. So they figured they would take advantage of the element of surprise by driving up or not even stopping but driving by. There's this one. I think it was a churchyard, where the crows always hung out. And they drive by and is. Let's say it was a Datsun, and his buddy is at the wheel. He's sitting in the passenger seat. He rolls down the window and throws the goshawk out and boom, it nails a crow. Right. Oh, one, two. Certainly by the third or fourth time, those birds, those crows are taking off as soon as they see that car and they're screaming in that way your call just depicted. That's an agitated, pissed off, excited crow.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

And so he would have to start borrowing cars and trucks from his friends.

[Kenny]

Oh, he's pushing his luck to get

[George Buhlman]

into these places, sneak up on these crows, throw the goshawk out the window before they figured out who was inside. And he tells. He was telling me stories of how he would. He'd drive to the grocery store, and he'd have this cloud of angry crows.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

Following him. And he stops, and they're in the parking lot, and, you know, people walking out of the store looking up the birds and looking down at him like, what'd you do? Hell did you just do?

[Kenny]

What's your deal? Bastard.

[George Buhlman]

I feel bad for his friends who lent him cars. Right. They have no idea what's going on.

[Kenny]

I'm just driving on the road. I had no idea what. I had no idea what I was in for.

[Jay]

Set all of his friends up for a raven attack.

[George Buhlman]

Hey, George, out there on the Internet, if you Google that, there's examples of people who've trained crows to. In exchange for peanuts or some other treat, to pick up change or cigarette butts or attack people with certain colored hats on and that kind of thing. So it's possible some of those things have taken a fair bit of time and creativity to train them. But it's pretty funny when you see those intelligences at work, especially for what they evolve for. You know, ravens have a specific call for meat, like when they find a carcass, when they find, you know, leftover scrape, you know, scraps of steak in the garbage. Or they. They have a call for that. They have a call for golden eagles. They have a call for chasing. When they're chasing another Raven out of their territory. Like, it's so specific in some cases, and in other cases, it's very general. You know, it operates on more of a. A tonal level and. And rapidity and speed and. And pitch. So, like us, you get excited or you're angry. You know, you change your tone, you speak faster or slower. You know, my mom was famous for when we were. We kids were in trouble, she'd say, come here right now. Right? Like she go. She'd go the opposite way. And you really knew you're in trouble when she started talking really quiet.

[Kenny]

George Jefferson, human, get in here now.

[Jay]

Every mom had a different call for a different level of anger. We get, yeah, totally.

[George Buhlman]

Yep, yep. And that's why, you know, in a colony of thousands of sea lions or penguins, these moms and dads can find their kid or the kids can find them through all that cacophony. It's just astounding.

[Jay]

Since I moved to the woods, you know, I've. I know when I hear a coyote or two off in the distance, but every now and again, George, I hear what sounds like a pack or more of coyotes just howling and wailing all together at once. And it almost sounds creepy. It's always at night, and it just sounds like something wrong is going on. Almost like something's about to die or did die. And I've often wondered, what is that all about? Because it's almost eerie to hear.

[George Buhlman]

Well, I'll base it on what we see out here. I grew up in the east, on the east coast, and spent a lot of time in very forested areas, so you never actually got to see what was going on in those places. But living out here, you know, similar in Utah, it's like you actually can stand a chance to see them while they're making these sounds, which is really, really helpful. It might only happen one out of a dozen times, but over a year, five years, 10 years, 20 years, 40 years, you. You kind of build up a library of, okay, when they're making this sound, this is what was going on. And quite often I'll get this question. And it's. It's most often that wolves and coyotes are howling during shifts in behavior, right? So they are bedded down and they go hunting. They'll howl kind of as a group. High five. You know, let's go. We're all ready. Hey, we're getting active and then take off. They've been hunting, they've fed, and they're laying down. They'll kind of have a high five rally before they actually lay down things like that. And certainly at dawn and dusk or during activity periods, they will also be triggered. You know, whether it's that call, whether it's the siren on an ambulance, they're going to respond to, let the neighbors know, hey, yeah, we're still here. Yep, we're still here too. Those guys are still there over there. Everything's copacetic.

[Jay]

Okay.

[George Buhlman]

Because if you don't hear the neighbors to the west, you're like, oh, maybe something happened to them and we can take that turf. Right? You really have. It's almost like an acoustic territory, you know, no trespassing sign. But in often cases, I'm guessing in your area, those coyotes are probably hunted at some level, which with a lot of animals that are, they go nocturnal. So that's when most of their activity is, and hence when you hear most of them, them howling. And you got to keep in mind, it goes back to those superpowers. Those animals have a. What's known as a tapetum lucidum. It gives the eye shine in the headlights, whether it's deer, coyotes, you know, mink, lot of creatures. Owls have this reflective layer that effectively gives them twice the exposure to the photons coming into their eyeballs. So what looks to us as dark night, impenetrable inkiness. They're probably seeing some, in some cases, some just slightly altered version of what we might call dusk or even daylight if the moon's out. So they're not inhibited by light and dark and the way we are and carrying on their usual lifestyle in the dark if they need to. So when they're hunting, a lot of people think that call when they go bananas is when they're hunting. In my experience, out here in two and a half decades is wolves, coyotes, they're absolutely silent when they're hunting. When they're in the act of hunting, they are not making a sound. And if they're low pack on the totem pole, they keep their mouth shut after they make the kill too. Oh, they might pick up with a. A rally howl or something like that. After they've moved away from the carcass, they've eaten it all up, you know. Hey, high five. Woohoo. That was a great meal. Boy, you sure brought that deer down, or what have you, totally anthropomorphizing here. But you get the idea. It's like they. They're away from divulging where their food source would be. It'd be, It'd be bad idea. You know, we've had These occurrences where territorial ravens will not say a thing when they have a big food bounty in their territory. Now somebody comes along who's not a territory holder, not from there, there's no compunction, no reason for them to keep it quiet. They scream, there's a specific call that meat call. And ravens come out of the woodwork, sort of like with your call there, you know?

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

It's just they, they take the other tact of if there's more of us here, it's harder for the resident birds to kick us all out and everybody's going to get a little food. Right. So kind of putting yourself into their mindset a little bit about what you stand to lose or gain is sometimes helpful for interpreting things.

[Jay]

So I'm kind of hearing the after party.

[George Buhlman]

Most likely you're hearing the after party or the pre game hurrah, you know, like, hey, we're gonna get going here. And keep in mind again, they may be howling at another pack that howled way beyond your, your ability to hear.

[Jay]

Right.

[George Buhlman]

And we've literally watched this happen in Yellowstone. We have group of friends with radios, you know, two way radios there, and they're six miles away down the valley. And we're watching a pack and it's howling in the direction of a pack that those folks are watching six miles away. And we can't hear a thing. All we see is those, those wolves are all standing close together, ears facing forward, listening intently, and all of a sudden they lift their heads and howl at the same time. We're basically on the radio saying, okay, our wolves are just starting to howl now. Okay, the wolves we're watching six miles away are now listening in the direction of those wolves. They also cannot hear a single thing aside from seeing the change in behavior in those wolves. So keep in mind the neighborhood communication system could be at work in ways that you're just not hearing. They're being triggered by something outside of their own turf.

[Kenny]

That's cool. Do you suppose, George, a wolf from Yellowstone would understand a wolf from northern Minnesota is the language?

[George Buhlman]

Think so. I, I for the important things. It seems like a lot of species those calls are pretty uniform. You know, not to beat the raven thing to death, but like the call for territory, the call for meat, the call for get out of my turf. You know, those are very similar. Whether you're listening in Austria, Denali national park in Alaska, British Columbia, Vancouver, Utah, Montana, those tend to be very similar. Now that said, a lot of species actually do have what we can call regional dialects or even Accents like when I go to Maine or Virginia or. Or California, those ravens sound so different than the ones here. And they're saying stuff I have no clue. Oh, absolutely. And Baron Heinrich, I asked, I interviewed him for the book, and he's one of the world's authorities on ravens. And he's like, oh, yeah, I noticed that too. They definitely sound different in different areas. And those calls that they're making. Yeah. Have very specific meanings, I'm sure. And uses. But like the fellow who did the prairie dog work, he took recordings of those prairie dogs in Arizona and played them for different species of prairie dogs or even the same species in different states.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

And aside from a few vocalizations, they didn't react at all. Oh, watch out, a hawks coming, you know, And. And they didn't do anything. They did not do anything. Oh, wow.

[Jay]

Language barriers.

[George Buhlman]

They do have these, for lack of better term, culture of language, of agreed upon meaning and context for these situations that matter to them. And when you take it out of context and dish it up to somebody who's never been exposed to it, it's kind of like us, you know, you take someone who's never driven a car before, do you think they would know what to do when the brake lights come on and the car in front of them? No, they probably rear end them, you know, so we have a lot of corollaries that go both directions.

[Kenny]

Well, wow. I've been waiting for this interview for a long time. I've watched the Meat Eater one three times and I've read your book twice.

[Jay]

Yeah, you tell. He was into it.

[Kenny]

Yeah, yeah. And I could talk to you all day, George. So fascinating. And I've grown up duck hunting and listening to the guys around me with their calls and the guys that are really good at duck hunt, at calling, I think they're too good. And I know you came across this with people with turkey calling, but my dad, for instance, really, really, really good with the duck call. And I don't think I've ever seen him call a duck in. You know what I mean?

[Jay]

He's too good.

[Kenny]

I mean, he's really, really, really good at it.

[Jay]

He's so good. The ducks are like. That's fake.

[Kenny]

I think. So is. Could that be.

[Jay]

Sounds like.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, it's a funny thing. And. And you're right. I ran into this with turkey calling where I went to my first and only turkey calling contest. And, you know, there's a group of four or five guys sitting behind a curtain telling you whether you sound like a turkey or Not.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[George Buhlman]

And what we as humans coming into this with an idea of what sounds right in all likelihood is pretty damn far off from what a duck or a turkey would actually say is Right. A turkeys haven't been asked to judge them. E. Yeah, that's no good. To me.

[Kenny]

That sounds wonderful.

[George Buhlman]

But if you're saying you got to angle the striker the top of the strike a little more away from you.

[Kenny]

Away from me.

[Jay]

Yeah, that's no good.

[George Buhlman]

The top of the striker away.

[Kenny]

If you say it's no good, I think that means it's good.

[Jay]

Well, you said you've called him in with it before, right?

[Kenny]

Yeah, that's the.

[George Buhlman]

That's the. That's the thing is these turkeys weren't asked to be in these calling contests, the ducks. And they probably wouldn't win, right? They would not win.

[Kenny]

Right.

[George Buhlman]

And so our criteria are based on what? Based upon maybe. Leonard. No, it wasn't. Lenroo.

[Jay]

That's funny.

[George Buhlman]

But these recordings, you know, here's the. Here's the yelp of a hen wild turkey, right? Like, here is the cluck, you know, and these categories, when you start really spending time around these. These animals, you realize these categories are so artificial. Yeah, they're so artificial. They are human ideas, and they are not derived from the animals. So it's like. Yeah, I had. I can't. I don't know what it is about my hen yelp. I've never had great success calling in gobblers with just my voice. I have to go to a diaphragm call or box call or something, really? And they pipe right up. I don't know if there's frequencies missing. I don't know what it is, but it is not right.

[Kenny]

Huh? What about your gobble? What about your gobble? Your gobbles pretty damn good.

[Jay]

Maybe too good. Maybe too good.

[George Buhlman]

All right. Oh, I don't know if it's too good, but give me.

[Kenny]

Give me a shot.

[Jay]

Let's have a hit.

[George Buhlman]

So the hen calls out,

[Kenny]

that's good. How in the.

[Jay]

That is so good.

[George Buhlman]

It was like this stupid, stupid human tricks on Letterman, right?

[Kenny]

You know, Jay, try it. Try it, George. I gotta see what you're doing with your tongue.

[Jay]

I'm no good at any of that.

[Kenny]

I gotta see what you're doing with your tongue, George. Do it. Do it again.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah, I've got a voice actor friend who. Who swears up and down. I have a very special uvula. I don't know.

[Kenny]

Wow.

[George Buhlman]

Dangly in the background, he's like, you You. That's. Yeah, I'm sure that's got to be part of you.

[Kenny]

So what. What happens? It's so embarrassing to do that. That the only place I can do that is my truck when I'm driving around.

[Jay]

I wouldn't even attempt it anymore.

[George Buhlman]

Now you've done it for the world.

[Kenny]

But what does that mean? I don't understand what a gob. Does a gobble mean get over here so I can kick your ass? Or does it mean, I'm really horny and let's hook up and come, you know, meet me at 2am at my. What does the gobble mean?

[George Buhlman]

I would say think of it like a song. Think of it like a warbler's song. Think of it like a sparrow's song. Yeah, it's probably serving multiple purposes. It's keeping the other guys at bay. Look, I'm here. I'm the big cheese.

[Kenny]

Swagger.

[George Buhlman]

It's advertising to the girls, you know, that. That sort of thing. And it runs the gamut in terms of exactly how they sound. But they're gonna know. Know their neighbors, same deal. And they know. They establish their pecking order literally before the season, mating season comes on. So if they know, they hear Fred go, problem over there, that they had to either be real sneaky when they go in to check out the girls or they go in with some buddies to overwhelm him. Okay, so he's.

[Kenny]

No. When I'm doing it, they're going, listen to this jackass over the hill. What? What is that? What is he doing? Is he over there dying?

[Jay]

Based on our gobbles, Candy. Based on our gobbles. No wonder we never got laid. Gobbles. Ever.

[Kenny]

The book is Eavesdropping on Animals.

[Jay]

That's fantastic.

[Kenny]

By George Buhlman. You so buy the book and then if you have a chance. And if you want to hear more of this, check out Meat eater podcast you were on with my best friend Stephen Rinella a few weeks ago. And it was a really good interview.

[Jay]

It was.

[Kenny]

George, thank you so much.

[Jay]

Yeah, George, that was fun.

[Kenny]

Really appreciate it.

[George Buhlman]

We got some laughs in.

[Jay]

Yeah, you have to a little bit with that stuff.

[George Buhlman]

You know, whether you buy the book or not. Just go outside right after you listen.

[Kenny]

That's. I wanted to.

[George Buhlman]

Patio.

[Kenny]

Yeah, I wanted to bring that up with you.

[George Buhlman]

If I can say anything. If you start to figure out what is quote unquote, normal for your place, that's where the door opens. Literally, sometimes not just metaphorically. The door opening. As you step out the door Be aware that you're being watched and listen for how many times that animal makes that sound. What's the most common animal with the most common sound? And then what happened when it changed that? And that's really the doorway on to you becoming the world's leading expert in your own backyard. And I. And I can't tell you how much, you know, all of us live at an address but very few of us live in and of the place that we call home. And to me, this is one of the most beautiful, accessible ways for you to start listening to your. Your real neighbors, you know, the wild neighbors. And they can show you things you never imagined were going on in your neighborhood. And that's a. It's a big thrill.

[Kenny]

Yeah. They're talking about you folks.

[Jay]

Yeah. And way nicer to deal with than humans down the street. So.

[Kenny]

Yeah. Thank you so much, George. We're gonna take a break and we'll come right back.

[Jay]

Hey, it's Howie Mandel and I am inviting you to witness history as me and my Howie do it Gaming team take on Gilly the King and Wallow267's million dollars gaming in an epic global gaming league video game showdown. Four rounds, multiple games, one winner, plus a halftime performance by multi platinum artists Travy McCoy. Watch all the action and see who wins and advances to the championship match against Neo right [e-mail] that's globalgamingleague.com everybody games.

[Kenny]

How fun was that?

[Jay]

It was awesome. It was great. It was a nice break from all the other stuff that's going on. We joked a lot, but in all honesty, I learned some things too that I did not know, which I love. Right. And he just. The way he lays it out, he's got that kind of country folk style, that old laid back, rocking porch storyteller. It's good stuff.

[Kenny]

Yeah. Yeah. It's one thing we didn't get to. He grew up hunting, fishing, trapping, doing all of the outdoor stuff. And now because of how familiar he is and I guess I'm putting words in his mouth and I shouldn't be. He no longer hunts.

[Jay]

Really?

[Kenny]

Yeah. And he has a good reason for it because I think it. My perception is that he's just so familiar with these animals that he can't get himself to do it anymore.

[Jay]

So he's become.

[Kenny]

And I certainly don't blame him. He's not anti hunting by any measure. Yeah.

[Jay]

Whatever your reason is to hunt or not hunt is fine by. I don't care.

[Kenny]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Jay]

But so what's interesting is you're telling me he had a little bit of a connection to them beyond the norm.

[Kenny]

And that's when it started when he was a kid with the turkeys and all the calls and whatnot.

[Jay]

You know, I could see that happening.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[Jay]

Honestly, doing what he does day in and day, it's his life and profession. Absolutely see it happening.

[Kenny]

And he lives in one of the coolest towns in the country. He does Gardner, which is at the north gate. The only thing. And I wanted to ask him about this too.

[Jay]

I've been to Gardiner so many times.

[Kenny]

I bet the tourism, the tourism would get me down in the summer.

[Jay]

Yep.

[Kenny]

Just like what I've learned about Yellowstone is in the summer, get up at 3 in the morning.

[Jay]

Yeah.

[Kenny]

Get in there while it's still dark and get out of there by 10am because after 10am it is. It's like going to Disney World. It's a mad house.

[Jay]

When, when I had the luxury living in Salt Lake and all that stuff was a drive away.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[Jay]

A day's drive away. Yellowstone, all of it. We're the same way. We would avoid the high peak tourist times to go up there. You know, I had to cover it for the wildfires from. That was different. But when I went there to just visit and have fun like you, I quickly learned from the locals and the people that had grown up out there wanted to stay away because it was just gobs of people. Which, you know, it's too, too bad on one hand, but the other hand, we're lucky to have it. It's really cool. Right.

[Kenny]

It seems like a lot of the people that are there have also like such said have lost touch with nature.

[Jay]

Yes.

[Kenny]

And they'll try to get a selfie with a grizzly bear or a bison and it's like, oh my God, you're so stupid. You're gonna get mauled.

[Jay]

It's. It's so true, Kenny. That is so true. And it was happening way back when I was there in the 80s. That was starting to happen.

[Kenny]

And.

[Jay]

Yeah, that's so true. And then the, you know, just out west there in general. Whitefish, Montana, all of it. So much of the people from all other parts of the country buying up the land.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[Jay]

It's just, you know, it's like anything else, right, Ken? It's just.

[Kenny]

Yep.

[Jay]

You know, as we get old, we like it the old way.

[Kenny]

Yeah. No kidding. But I know, you know how much I, I love deer hunting.

[George Buhlman]

Yeah.

[Jay]

Oh yeah.

[Kenny]

And it's not, it Ain't the hunt. It's not for pulling the trigger.

[Jay]

Right. No, I know.

[Kenny]

It's an excuse to be out there. And it's just so fun being in the woods and watching these critters and birds and animals in their own environment when they know I'm not there. And having in the. In the late fall when it's already cold, having the chickadees land right next to you and look at you like, what the hell is your deal, buddy? Why are you out here?

[Jay]

Yes. They'll come that close.

[Kenny]

Yeah. And look at you and turn their

[Jay]

head sideways, and then I'm with you 100%. I don't hunt as much as you do, but every time I do, and if I go into the woods and when I'm not hunting, it's the same experience for me. Like, one time when I was deer hunting. I think I might have told you this story years ago. One morning, for most of the morning, I had a red fox right below my. My stand.

[Kenny]

Isn't that fun?

[Jay]

Yeah. And at first, I was pissed. I wanted him to get out of there.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[Jay]

And then after a while, I'm like, you know, I don't care if I never see another deer. The rest of the.

[Kenny]

And the red fox won't bother a deer, and vice versa.

[Jay]

I just was worried because I was going off the scent thing. Like, if a deer could smell a fox, would they go near there? I don't know.

[Kenny]

Yeah, they will.

[Jay]

Okay.

[Kenny]

I didn't know fox generally smells like a skunk. If you've ever smelled a fox close up. No, they. They pee on themselves, and their urine smells just like a skunk.

[Jay]

I didn't know that.

[Kenny]

Yeah.

[Jay]

So I was under the impression that that might. That scent might. But then, seriously, Kenny, after about 20 minutes of watching him, I didn't care if he stayed there. And he stayed there most of the morning. He was just running. He didn't go very far. I don't know. He was probably looking for mice. I don't know. But I just sat and watched a fox for about an hour. That was it. And I loved every minute of it.

[Kenny]

Yep. And you'll never forget it.

[Jay]

No. It was way better than shooting a deer, to be honest with you. Because to be honest with you, I hate cleaning and I hate dressing a deer. I don't want to. I love the meat. I just had venison last week, but I'm not into that part of it.

[Kenny]

I'm very much a meat hunter. I don't judge by. By the size of the rack or the antlers. I judge by that. Looks like about 49 pounds of ground to me.

[George Buhlman]

Yes.

[Kenny]

And it's worth the eight hours it's going to take me to process.

[Jay]

There it is. There it is. Yeah. With your brother.

[Kenny]

All right, Coles, that was a lot of fun.

[Jay]

Great show. Great.

[Kenny]

Thanks for indulging me.

[Jay]

Yeah, no, all at any time. That was a great show.

[Kenny]

Thank you to Gabe Mikulski for producing the show. And thank you so much for listening to news from the Krabby Coffee Shop.

[Jay]

We'll be back with another good one next week. We got a good one lined up. Stay tuned. As they say.

[American Experiment Host]

Hey garage logicians, stick around For a preview of this week's American Experiment podcast. We're covering the DFL's proposal to create a new tax on ICE agents, the continuing debate over earmarks for nonprofits, or as I like to call it, corruption, and then a firestorm of top hits from the Capitol that you won't want to miss. On the back half, we're talking to Bill Walsh about our brand new polling on Minnesotans views towards immigration since Operation Metro Surge. We got everything you need to know in here, starting with the DFL proposing to tax ICE agents. They have a whole bunch of bills that they've proposed aiming at ICE agents in particular, things that have to do with trying to rein in the federal government. Things that are clearly not legal or irrelevant now that this is kind of over.

[Political Commentator]

Yeah, but really good pr.

[American Experiment Host]

Yes, but really good pr. So on Wednesday, a bill in the House Taxes Committee would require those agents who weren't Minnesota residents but made more than $15,000 in wages while working here to file a Minnesota tax return. They think they could bring in $600,000 this way. Democrats argue that the whole operation cost a lot in state and local resources, so these agents should pay their fair share. Minnesotans will effectively subsidize a federal enforcement operation that they did not request and that they do not support, said Representative Athena Hollins. Moreover, enforcing this requirement sends an important message. Minnesota will not allow its tax base to be eroded by temporary federal deployments that shift costs on our communities. Well, Minnesota taxes nonresident income already and that applies to federal government employees. Currently, a person needs to earn about 15,000 from Minnesota Sources to be required to file and remit as a non resident. That would apply to any ICE officer who's here long enough to meet that threshold, too. However, the bill creates separate treatment for the ICE officers, subjecting them to tax on the first dollar of their income so while Minnesotans tax authorities can make federal law enforcement abide by the same rules they impose on everyone else, obviously legally they cannot discriminate against them. And yet they propose this bill anyway.

[Political Commentator]

They have to treat ICE officers the same as professional athletes, basically, is what this says. Because we talk about this a lot. I think actually our economist John Phelan does a lot of work on professional sports and incomes. And when a professional athlete comes to town and works in our town, plays a basketball game or a hockey game or a football game or whatever, they certainly make more than 15,000. Many of them do, even if you split their income, millions of dollars over the course of a game. So they all have these guys, these guys that play professional sports have accountants that have to split up their state income tax around the country.

[American Experiment Host]

So it just impacts all kinds of people. Lawyers, pilots. Pilots don't like flying to California. California, because they have to separate that out at a higher level.

[Political Commentator]

So of course we're going to single out ice. ICE activity because it's worse than all those other things. I just disagree with the premise. Of course, her premise is that ICE came and came and then all these costs were borne by state and local governments because ICE came to town. If ICE comes to town and does their job and there are no protests, no one knows ICE is here, they'd make their arrests. There's no strain on state and local government. All I would say 90% of the strain on state and local government is from the protests that occurred trying to stop and impede and protest what ICE was doing.

[American Experiment Host]

That was a preview of the American Experiment podcast. Tune in every Tuesday afternoon wherever you get your podcasts score big savings this week at Grocery Outlet, your extreme value headquarters. Dinner just got easier with 1 pound of 93% lean grass fed ground beef for just $4.99. Plan A nacho night with all the toppings or serve up a big pot of warm chili. The meal possibilities are endless when you can stock up without breaking the budget. This deal is only available until March 24th. While supplies last. Hurry to your local grocery outlet today.

[Kenny]

Grocery outlet bargain market.