Ep. 757: Surviving and Thriving (and Finding a Dead Man) in the Alaska Bush

Summary

The MeatEater Podcast | Ep. 757: Surviving and Thriving (and Finding a Dead Man) in the Alaska Bush
Host: Steven Rinella
Guest: Randy Brown
Date: September 1, 2025

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Episode Overview

This episode welcomes back Randy Brown, a renowned Alaskan bushman who previously spent 15 years living off the land in remote Alaska. Steven Rinella and Randy build upon their last conversation, focusing less on big-picture tales and more on the nitty-gritty skills, daily realities, and lessons learned from a life that is, as Steven describes, "staggering in its boldness" (04:41). The episode ranges from the infamous story of the “John the Baptist” corpse to in-depth discussions about wilderness survival, butchery, bushcraft, wild food preservation, animal behavior, and reflections on human nature.

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Key Topics & Discussion Points

1. Reintroducing Randy & Life Off The Land (02:37–05:02)

• Randy previously lived off-grid in Alaska for approximately 15 years, trapping, hunting, fishing, mushing dogs, and building cabins along the Yukon with his partner, Karen.
• Steven emphasizes that after their first conversation, “we didn’t scratch the surface... we haven’t fully extracted all the usable information from your brain” (04:41).

2. The Story of ‘John the Baptist’ – Finding a Dead Man (04:44–37:08)

• Recap: Randy recounts the eerie story of finding a dead man, nicknamed “Smeagol” who called himself John the Baptist, in a remote safety cabin upriver. The man appeared to have abandoned societal ties and starved to death, undetected and unidentified to this day.
  • Randy: “He called himself John the Baptist… He just stayed and had his way with all of Fred's stuff, food, his fur, his equipment. And actually moved a bunch of stuff from his cabin… and smoked all his weed and ate most of his fish.” (16:05)
  • Surviving the Alaskan bush requires substantial planning, an understanding of the terrain, and the ability to procure food—a topic highlighted by this tragic cautionary tale.
• Aftermath: Efforts to identify the dead man, even after Steven mentioned the story on Joe Rogan's podcast, have been fruitless.
  • Steven: "I don't understand how a guy in 1978... could just vanish, starves to death, and not some effort from his family or people..." (33:21)
• Comparison: They compare his slow death to a story from “Death in the Barrens,” about explorers starving, eating hides, and the gruesome effects of such deprivation.
  • Steven: "Toward the end... they're trying to claw out of each other plugs of leather and hair... just a shitty way to go." (39:30)

3. Living Off the Land: Tactics and Realities (40:43–72:48)

A. Hunting and Butchering in the Bush

• Bear Hunting:
  • Bears sink in rivers; harvesting them requires quick and skillful work to retrieve the animal (41:00).
  • Everything is harvested: "What do you do with the bear?... Everything" (50:35)
  • Fat is generally left on the meat; curing and preservation are challenging due to warmth and lack of refrigeration.
• Meat Preservation:
  • Bear and moose meat often can't be preserved in late summer due to heat: “You hang it up and it gets dry on the outside... Bear meat doesn't keep for very long and we just, we just eat it and it starts turning bad. Dogs get it.” (54:32)
  • With moose, preservation improves after September 10 when temperatures drop. Special care is taken to hang and dry meat to avoid spoilage: “You get this mousse and you hang it up and over the next few days you work at it, you pick at it... the bottom of the back leg and the neck... anywhere where there's a cut that exists there that doesn't dry.” (64:13)
  • The importance of airflow, hanging, and protecting meat from jays and other scavengers is highlighted.
• Fat Handling:
  • Moose fat is dried and used as needed; bear fat is consumed with the meat but not generally rendered, as it spoils quickly when unrefrigerated (57:27).
• Hides:
  • Bear hides are scraped and used as rugs, seat cushions, or for parts of clothing, but are not ideal for certain garments due to snowballing (60:09).
  • Discussion of traditional uses for animal hides, including a tangent about groundhog rawhide for bootlaces (61:45).

B. Eating the Whole Animal

• Hearts, livers, kidneys are consumed if safe; experiences with trichinosis and vitamin A toxicity are shared (53:10).
• Caribou tongues are a delicacy: “You slice them up and fry them. They're wonderful” (70:29); moose tongues must be boiled then fried.

C. Survival Lessons and Skills

• The role of dogs: mushing, hauling, hunting, warning of wildlife. The genetic and behavioral differences between dogs and wolves (86:13–101:05).
• Animal behaviors:
  • Bears, moose, and canines—all have specific predator and prey interactions influenced by environment.
  • Observations of wolf resilience (“They’re outrageously tough... all broken up. They got broken ribs... broken legs that heal” – 93:09).
  • Notes on wolverines being the only animal to come toward a trapper upon approach (97:06).
• Voyages and self-reliance:
  • The importance of not relying on motors—"by having motors, you need a lot of money... that's not something we did." (118:19)
• The evolution of subsistence and market hunting in America, relating historical context to Randy’s personal lifestyle (123:25–124:49).

4. Philosophy, Reflections, and Human Nature (115:25–127:45)

• Perseverance and adaptability:
  • Randy states, “I can do anything... I can persevere. I can navigate whatever comes up.” (115:55)
  • Survival and the “difficulty scale” of life (Unabomber reference): “His gripe with technology is that human existence has become a 5. You don't even need to try at all. You're going to survive.” (99:56)
• Contrasting ways of life:
  • Living “in town” for homeless people seems harder than in the woods, to Randy’s mind (116:33).
  • Importance of being able to source one's own clothes, food, and tools—the difference between true subsistence and market/provisioned living.
  • Reflections on the "fellowship" among bush dwellers, spurred by Tolkien references (129:03–129:46).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Man, that dude’s got to come back on... we haven’t fully extracted all the usable information from your brain.” – Steven Rinella (04:41)
• On Starvation:
  Steven: “Toward the end, the three of these dudes are trying to give each other enemas and they’re trying to claw out of each other plugs of leather and hair... just a shitty way to go.” (39:30)
• On Butchery:
  “What do you do with the bear?... Everything.” – Randy Brown (50:35)
• On Meat Spoilage and Preservation:
  “You get this mousse and you hang it up and over the next few days you work at it, you pick at it... bottom of the back leg and the neck... anywhere where there’s a cut that exists there that doesn’t dry.” – Randy (64:13)
• On Dogs and Wolves:
  “In body, they’re wolves. In mind, they’re not, but in body they are. And of course, they behaved kind of like a pack...” – Randy (115:09) “A wolf is like... infinitely smarter than a domestic dog.” – Steven, quoting wolf biologist, Diane Boyd (98:04)
• On Survival Philosophy:
  “I can do anything... I can persevere. I can navigate whatever comes up.” – Randy (115:55) “His gripe with technology is that human existence has become a 5. You don't even need to try at all. You're going to survive. And that's where all of our neuroses come from...” – Steven (99:56) “We used to feel like we were the fellowship... then we start looking around and we go, well, that looks more like us than anything else.” – Randy (129:03)

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Notable Timestamps

• Episode start & setup: 01:54–04:41
• Intro to Randy and bush living recap: 02:37–04:41
• John the Baptist recap & update: 14:45–37:08
• Starvation and “Death in the Barrens” book: 35:37–40:12
• Bear hunting, floating, and butchery details: 40:43–52:01
• Meat preservation & discussion of spoilage: 54:32–58:27
• Moose butchering & preservation: 63:04–68:49
• Dogs, wolves, wild canine behavior: 83:00–101:05
• Wolverine & wolf/bear conflicts: 96:36–115:20
• Philosophy & survival takeaways: 115:25–123:12
• Contextual/historical comparison to market hunters: 123:12–125:39
• Reflections on Tolkien and ‘the fellowship’: 129:03–129:46

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Summary of Tone & Language

Rinella’s tone is irreverent, grounded, fascinated, and often humorous (“We’re gonna dive into the Randy Brown brain extraction…”). Conversations are candid and sometimes graphic regarding the realities of remote life and death. Randy is measured, practical, and deeply knowledgeable, openly sharing successes, mistakes, and observations from decades in the wilderness. The episode seamlessly blends storytelling with technical insights, philosophy, and hard-won survival wisdom, maintaining the authentic voice and cadence of outdoor pioneers.

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Looking Ahead

Steven promises a “fish episode” for Randy’s next appearance, focusing on his second life as a fish biologist—a teaser to further mine the deep well of Randy's wilderness expertise.

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Bottom Line:
This episode is a treasure trove for anyone interested in wilderness survival, bushcraft, the psychological and practical aspects of living off-grid, and the sometimes dark, always revealing intersection of human limits and the wild.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

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[A]

We hunt the Meat Eater podcast.

[B]

You can't predict anything. Brought to you by first light. When I'm hunting, I need gear that won't quit. First Light builds. No compromise. Gear that keeps me in the field longer. No shortcuts, just gear that works. Check it out@first light.com. that's f I r s t l I t e dot com. All right, man. Randy Brown is back. No, not date. The opposite of debut. Return, repeat, encore performance by Randy Brown. Because. Because Randy came on. What, what the hell do we call that episode?

[A]

15 Years of Living in the woods, living off the land.

[B]

15 years living off land. Randy Brown came in some time ago, I don't know. And it was spectacular. We couldn't. We didn't scratch the surface. We talked like just to recap, to tell people the years you lived. The years you went out and lived off the land in Alaska.

[A]

Well, it was about 15 altogether. Okay. Yeah. And this is recap.

[B]

Just. Yeah, we're going to recap.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. And so I went out on the Yukon and it was, you know, mush dogs and built cabins. Was able to persuade Karen Love my life to come out There with me, which was. That was probably one of the tougher things to do, but, yeah, it was. And then. And then she would teach in a few times out in some of the rural communities. And that was fun, too, you know, taking as I would mush dogs and fish and hunt.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Seeing new places in the state, so.

[B]

And you did a lot of. A lot of fur trapping.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And when you came on, we told the story of you finding a body.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

A guy tried to find out the identity of that body.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I even brought it up on Rogan's podcast, thinking that him having such a huge audience would turn up some stuff. We'll check in with you in a minute there.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

To find out if we found out any. If you've ever gotten any intriguing hints about the body you found. The guy you called Smeagol.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Called himself John the Baptist.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then the reason we wanted you to come back on is because we never. Because we talked about all this big picture stuff like timeline and all that, but we didn't get into a lot of the nuts and bolts, tactical stuff about living off the country in Alaska. So I want to get back into a bunch of things with you. But the minute we got done recording, I was like, man, that dude's got to come back on. And our audience as well wanted to come back on because we did. We haven't fully extracted all the usable information from your brain.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

We're gonna. We're gonna continue the. The. We're gonna. We're gonna dive into the. The Randy Brown brain extraction and find out more about just kind of like a life that's, like, staggering in its boldness. That'd be a good blur. Yeah, that's a blurb. Staggering in its boldness.

[A]

Yeah. There you go.

[B]

Before we do that, here's a couple things Randall and I. Dr. Randall and I work on this. This series. I'm telling the audience that's not you, but you can listen. We work on a series called Meat Eaters American History.

[A]

So.

[B]

As you guys know, because we used to do podcast episodes when we launched these different volumes of Meat Eaters American History.

[A]

So the.

[B]

The first Meat Eaters American History we did is we did one on the Long hunters. And so the. The most famous long hunter being Daniel Boone. So we did a Meat Eaters American History, the Long Hunters. And that covered the years. I believe it was 1763 to 1775. And it was about the deer skin trade, primarily around Appalachia, the Kentucky region. But the am. The American Colonial Frontier Deerskin trade. The second volume of Meat Eaters American History we did was called the Mountain Men and that covered 1806 to 1840 and that was about the beaver skin trade of those years. Well, volume three is coming out pre. Sales are available now. It's an audio original, so it's not a print book, it's an audio original. Volume 3 is available now and it's called Meat Eaters American History the Hide Hunters and it's about the buffalo skin trademark and it covers 1865. So it starts at the end of the Civil War and covers up until 1883, which was the last great shoot. At that point they were gone. They were effectively gone. So Meat Eaters American History the Hide Hunters tells this story of the buffalo hidehunters, predominantly dudes kind of spun out of the chaos of the Civil War. The, the big hide hunt starts down in, in Kansas. First it moves south into Texas, then it moves north into Montana. And it's that story of kind of the wind down of the Civil War, the chaos and catastrophe of the Civil War. The American government, the federal government turning its eyes westward after the Civil War is over. Turning it westward in two ways, railroad expansion and the Indian wars. And how those efforts kind of opened up the Great Plains to the hide hunters who very quickly put themselves out of business by killing all of their target animals. It's a story about leather production. It's a story about combat between whites and Native Americans on the Southern Plains. And it's a story about just really not understanding the finiteness of a resource. So Meat Eaters American history the Hidehunters, 1865-1883 available for pre order now. Another little news bit here. So the meat eater crew is hitting the road again this fall. Last year a bunch of our guys headed out to do tailgate tours. Bunch more guys are heading out to do tailgate tours this year. Meteor Tailgate Tour presented by Dometic. If you have a camper, like an RV unit and you look at the fridge in your RV unit, there's a high likelihood it says Dometic on it. They make all kinds of camping gear, electric coolers. They make all kinds of stuff, tons of great products. So, presented by Dometic. Got free food. You can hang out with the crew. Texas at Ohio state, that's on August 30th. That's Randall and Giannis. Kansas at Missouri, that'll be Clay and Bear newcomb. That's Columbus, Missouri, September 6th. What's UTEP mean?

[A]

University of Texas, El Paso. Huh?

[B]

At Texas that's easy. Yeah, that's Texas v Texas. Austin, Texas, Saturday, September 30th. Jesse Griffiths will be there slinging some grub. And then Maryland at Wisconsin in Madison, Wisconsin, September 20th. That'll be Spencer Chester and Garrett Long. Garrett Long, Yeah. They're slinging grub at the tailgate tour. So any of these places you go on the tailgate tour, you're going to come out, you're going to see their tent and you can go get, hang out and get free food. Meat eater, tailgate tour. Oh, I missed some Seth and Brody. Oh, this because this is like Seth's little home spot. Oregon at Penn State University Park, Pennsylvania, September 27th. Our two, our two big Pennsylvania guys, Seth and Brody are going to be running that tailgate tour. And then Boise State at Notre Dame. Notre Dame, Indiana, Saturday, October 4th. That's going to be Mark Giannis and Garrett slinging grub for the tailgate tour at that game. Stop in and see those fellas. Another quick thing. I think we're off to the races. Oh, no. Yeah, one more thing. We're off to the race. Is that correct? No, two more things. Oh, you guys have been seeing us, like everybody. A lot of the guys come on the show, kind of live in this first light navigator hoodie. These are out and available. I didn't know they made them in this color till I got one the other day. I know. And I'm supposed to tell everybody about all the wild, crazy hunting and fishing trips I've done in mine. My fleece lined hoodie. But I just wear it all the time. I wear it on the plane. I wear it when I'm yelling at my kids. I wear it when I'm having dinner with my wife. It's just my main like garment. Check it out@first light.com. it's the most comfortable thing I own. I live in it. Oh, the last thing, if there's any people out there, this could be you who are like wizards at GE freezers. Listen to this problem I have. I have a brand new GE freezer at my fish shack in Alaska. It's not brand, it's one year old. The first year it worked. Okay, first off, when you get a freezer to a place like that, it's not coming back. It's like it came out on a boat, right? You're not gonna like bring it in for service. This isn't gonna work. Brand new GE chest freezer. The year I get it, it works fine. Come back up in May, it doesn't work anymore. But get this. It's like it's possessed on this freezer. This is for someone that's a ge. Like, I need a. I need your help. If this thing's on, the on light doesn't come on. If you turn it off. You follow me? If you turn the dial and click it off, the on light comes on, but it doesn't turn on. If you open the lid, the on light goes off. This is like an electronics problem. No, again, if you turn it off, the onlight comes on, but it doesn't turn on. And if you lift the lid up, the onlight goes off. The compressors do not run. It's possessed. If I call some 1-800number, I am. It's like, no, there's no person on the planet that you're going to call on a 1, 800 number that is going to be like, oh, what you need to do is blank. You follow my problem? Do you understand what I'm saying? What could cause that? If you're out there and you are like a wizard at freezers, send a go. Go to the me [e-mail] and write like, freezers in the subject line. I will. Like, if you have. If you know, I will, I will call and we will talk about it. I feel like it needs, like, a new. It's something electronic, man.

[A]

Maybe you got a faulty one, but it worked.

[B]

It's probably under warranty, but what do you do? I can't haul it out of there. I'm not going to bring it to town.

[A]

But.

[B]

No, it's 800 bucks down the drain.

[A]

That's upsetting.

[B]

You want. Yeah, you'd have to burn all the insulation out. You can't even get rid of a freezer like that. I just, like. That's a moment of sight. Like, in speech. There's a moment of silence to, like, have people meditate on something. I want people to meditate. To meditate for a minute on this.

[A]

There.

[B]

If you know a lot about freezers, man, I need to talk to you because I know that, like, calling a 1, 800 number isn't going to do it. It's going to be a dude that. That barely speaks English. And I'm like, oh, no, check this out. You turn it off, you know, it's just like, it's never going.

[A]

To.

[B]

So what'd you find out about? Can you recap the John the Baptist story for us? Okay, just a quick recap because I want to find out if we've found out anything.

[A]

Okay. Yeah. So John The Baptist, that's what he called himself. Came down and got abandoned. Came down to Yukon between the towns of Eagle and Circle. So it came down from Canada. That's what he claims, and I think that was true. And then with his buddy. With his buddy and his buddy then shoved their raft off and left at one point in time. And he happened to be near the mouth of the Kandik river where this fella, Fred lived. And Fred took him in for a while.

[B]

And can you remind everybody what year this is?

[A]

This is. I think it was 1978. 79. Yeah. And so then Fred ended up going back east to visit family. He hadn't been back east in a bunch of years at that point. And told him he had to leave and he didn't. And he just stayed and had his way with all of Fred's stuff, food, his fur, his equipment. And actually moved a bunch of stuff from his cabin that was out the mouth of Kandik to a place about three miles upriver, up on the Kandik. And smoked all his weed and ate most of his fish.

[B]

Was there a lot of weed smoking in those days up there?

[A]

No.

[B]

Could you grow it or do you have to bring it in?

[A]

Some people did, but it's requires, you know, some sort of a. Of a. Of a night day period that you don't have up there. So it was. I don't know. There were people that grew it.

[B]

But also, like, if you're trying to grow weed and it's daylight 24 hours a day, the weed doesn't like that.

[A]

It doesn't. It doesn't grow well. No, and I didn't grow it at all. I didn't do any gardening. But. Yeah, so Fred did, though, but it was kind of rudimentary. He would throw dog shit and seeds up on the roof of his cabin, and that's how he grew it, which is just these spindle.

[B]

Grow it right. In a medium of dog shit.

[A]

Yeah, that was the fertilizer.

[B]

So that's not even. That's not even ditch weed, man. You know?

[A]

No, but for Fred, that was better than nothing, right? And so. Except that this guy.

[B]

Then I. I mean. I don't know. I mean, what, like you could tell me that it was. I'm not like a. I'm not a connoisseur. I don't even partake. But you could tell me that. You could tell me that the best weed in the world grows out of dog. And I wouldn't know. I wouldn't refute it.

[A]

I don't know either. But anyway, Fred got pissed off and told him that when he did come back in November, that he had to get out of there. He had to leave, go to Circle or go to Eagle when the river froze up. And he took a different tactic and he said he's going to go to Chelkitsik, which was way north, and all through the woods and everything.

[B]

And how many miles would that be when this guy says he's going to go overland?

[A]

Well, it would be over 100 miles, the way you'd have to walk and through forest or in a windy old Black River. Now it's called the Dronjik. Name was changed not too long ago, but we didn't think that he could make it. There's not a chance in hell that he could do that because he didn't have.

[B]

You could make it, though.

[A]

I don't think so.

[B]

Why could you not make it?

[A]

Well, it's pretty barren country, you know. I mean, if I went, you'd still have to shoot a moose or shoot some caribou. But there weren't very many caribou there. There were caribou near the border because that was where the Ogilvy Mountains stopped, you know, and it was wintering ground. Porcupine caribou that we would get in the Upper Kandik river, upper Nation river, and in the. In the Black river, but close to the border because then it gets into flats and the caribou just didn't go there very often. So be unlikely that you could run across caribou going straight to Chakitzig.

[B]

Now, I haven't done, like, I've never done these kind of walks up there, but a hundred miles. I understand. Like, why couldn't you just, like, with a pack of food. I mean, how many miles a day can you get in that kind of stuff?

[A]

Well, you know, you could probably go, you know, six or eight miles, 10 miles maybe, if you were. If you were good, you had a good pair of snowshoes. You know, when. When the country is. Is covered in snow, you know, three, four feet of snow on the ground, it's tough breaking trail.

[B]

I got you.

[A]

It's not a simple.

[B]

I wasn't factoring in. I wasn't thinking about it in that way. I wasn't thinking about it being the wintertime cold, shit, tons of snow.

[A]

Yeah. And it's a lot easier to walk on the. On the rivers than trying to bust across country. And, you know, when you got all sorts of brushing and, you know, different. Some. Some areas have Burned and have downed trees. And it's. It's pretty tough, you know, so you got. There's a lot of different issues, but part of it is feeding yourself. He had a.22 that Fred lent him. A.22 pistol he had. His buddy had left, left him with this 20 gauge double barrel, 20 gauge Rossi shotgun. But he didn't have any ammunition for it. Neither did we. And so he had a.22 pistol. Well, you're not going to shoot a moose or anything large with it that could actually feed you. And even if you did shoot a moose, you wouldn't be able to take it very far. So it's possible that you could. I mean, if I were to set off on that kind of a journey, you'd have the equipment that you needed to do it. You're going to either either poke holes in a pond or near a beaver house on a river and snare or trap beavers to feed yourself, have some dogs along, help you with moving stuff. But breaking across country like that is really tough. And you'd have to feeding yourselves and everything else. You know, you just don't have that much small game that you could feed yourself very easily with in the winter. So what.

[B]

What was this dude's. If he had easy access to go on the ice to two different towns on the Yukon, what was his draw like? Why did he want to travel cross country to the north?

[A]

I have no idea.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I have no idea. But that's what he. That's what he told Fred. He took off and he ended up finding this little cabin that we had built a couple of years before. It's just a safety cabin about 10 miles up. And we were.

[B]

So he made it 10 miles?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Out of a hundred?

[A]

Yeah. Okay. And that's where he stayed. And he did get some things. You know, there was a ball jar in there that had a marten skin in it and he had peed in it too. It was urine in there with the marten skin. I think he was trying to. I think he was trying to tan it or something. I don't know.

[B]

But just soaking it in piss.

[A]

Yeah. And I mean, that's what he did.

[B]

You don't know what was in his mind.

[A]

Yeah, I have no idea what was in his mind, but that's what we kind of thought. But, but that was. He got that with a.22, clearly. You know, and, and, but you know, Martin are bold, you know, they'll come down a tree and yell at you and other things.

[B]

I touched one one time. What's that I was able to touch one. One time.

[A]

Yeah. A live one, huh?

[B]

Just real. Yeah, he's real curious. I was bow hunting. He's real curious.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And he was kind of on a tree, and I just wanted to see if I could. And I actually. He was so. I mean, there's not many animals that let you do that. No, I was actually able to put my hand on it.

[A]

I don't think they fear anything.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Really. And I think they. They feel. They're pretty on top of it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Deal with whatever. They're a bold animal and. And so as are, you know, the. The ermine. The weasels. Yeah, they're. They're pretty scary, actually, when you. I caught one one time in a. I was trapping voles at our place in Fairbanks and feeding them to. I had a bull snake for a while, and this was after we had moved in there. And I would feed it the voles. Well, I catch this. And it was a live catch trap. You know, little have heart. And I caught a weasel and I had this little birdcage, and I could open the door on the birdcage and let the ermine into the cage and close the door and then wire it closed. But you know those cartoons where they have the cat running around on the wall sideways? You know, that's how this guy was in that bird cage. And he would take a moment off every once in a while and jump to the side of the cage closest to me and scream, you know, and then go back to running around. I go, well, this guy is going to get out of this. This won't hold him for long. And so I went out and turned him loose because he'll probably kill the snake. I put him in with the snake, but they're. They're a trip. Yeah. But anyway, we're back to Smeagol, right? So he's. He's in this. In this cabin that we had built back in the woods because we didn't want airplanes to see us, actually, since I, you know, what, started flying with my job. It's amazing how easy you spot something that's rectangular down in the woods. It's almost. Nothing can hide.

[B]

Why were you trying to hide it from planes?

[A]

We didn't know whether somebody would try and come and kick us off. So we just built our cabins as deep into the forest as possible. Got it. And he found.

[B]

And then later you learned that that's not an effective strategy.

[A]

It's not an effective strategy. You can see it almost always. So anyway, he found it. I don't know how the heck he found it and stayed there, whether he froze his feet or whether he I don't know what drove him, but he was there and dead when we found him the next spring.

[B]

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[A]

So you were wondering.

[B]

Yeah. And then just to, just to remind listeners a little bit some of this backstory.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You found him dead. Was he still. Was he rotted down or just frozen?

[A]

No. Well, I think he had froze, you know, but you know, a cabin is, is insulated in the winter so that you can build a fire and keep it warm inside. And then once, once the fire goes out and it turns cold in there, then that cabin insulates it from the spring, you know, and it started warming up. So I don't think he'd been thawed for very long because he wasn't rotten and he was just dead and his hair was slipping just a little bit on his forehead.

[B]

And you said he was just skin and bones.

[A]

Skin and bones. Yeah.

[B]

And you picked him up and left him out on the tundra.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. We thought about trying to take him down the circle, but it was, that would have been a several day endeavor. And the sides of the Yukon at that point, not long after breakup, were just packed with ice. Breakups are different every year on a Yukon, you know, and sometimes they flow over the banks, sometimes they just slush out and it's not a big deal. That particular breakup though, had put ice packed onto the banks and so it was difficult to actually get someplace off of the river to park and walk into the woods or do other things. And so we just figured that it would put us just in an uncomfortable position not being able to feed ourselves and things. If we had gone down there, we didn't have any money or anything. We just took him out in the woods and left him.

[B]

And I never heard another thing about it.

[A]

No, never. And so after the last podcast where we talked about that there was a fella from. I got contacted by a couple people.

[B]

Who might, who had tips, who potentially had tips.

[A]

Well, so one, one fella was a French Canadian and he wanted to know whether he was a, a native or a white man. And if we could tell. And he was a white guy. And they said, well, you know, in French Canada, some people, you know, might have the name Juan Batiste. And we may have interpreted it I mean, he wrote it, so he was calling it John the Baptist, but he.

[B]

Wrote it on what?

[A]

He wrote that note to Fred on.

[B]

The door and signed it John the Baptist.

[A]

John the Baptist, Yeah. And he's got that note now.

[B]

I don't know, dude, I'd like to have that note.

[A]

I don't think it's. I'll bet it isn't around. I don't know.

[B]

Some be hanging around the wall here, if I had it.

[A]

Yeah. So anyway, he was looking through missing persons.

[B]

Records in Canada, based on our conversation.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And I don't know whether he found him or not, but he contacted me on that and we talked a little bit.

[B]

So when you told him that it was a white guy, what did he say?

[A]

Well, he said that that's one of the. One of. One of the, I guess, pieces of information that he used to search the records.

[B]

But you haven't heard anything more about that?

[A]

No. Huh.

[B]

And that was. That was the only kind of tip?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I don't understand how a guy in 1978. 78, 79. How there could be a person.

[A]

That.

[B]

Vanished, starves to death in the woods and not some effort from his family or people to sort of like formally be like, has anyone seen this guy?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I mean, he must have burned all his bridges.

[A]

Well, that's. That's possible. You know, his. His. Whoever he was traveling with took off. I don't know. But that could have been that guy's problem too. But I don't know.

[B]

And no idea who the other dude was that abandoned him?

[A]

No. And he could have. So one of the interesting things is going down to Yukon between eagle and circle. It's not necessarily an easy matter to get to circle. And if they're doing a log raft, which is what they had, that's even more tough to try to navigate different channels. And you start getting into this really braided region of the upper Yukon flats upstream from circle. And it gets way more interesting if you get downstream of it. But it's possible, unless he had a map and understood where he was, that he could have gone right past circle as well, that guy, and not even known it. Perhaps because it's kind of on a south leg of the river there and there's different islands and shallow places.

[B]

I wonder if that dude even lived.

[A]

I don't know. I don't know. We had no other information on that at all.

[B]

I don't know why that stuck with me so much, man. I was like kind of dying to know about that guy.

[A]

Yeah. I Know, I don't know why.

[B]

Yeah, I'm over it now.

[A]

Yeah, I didn't really think about it very much.

[B]

You know, it was a temporary deal for me, but it's all I could think about for a minute.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

You know, you sent me a story after we talked.

[A]

I gave you a book.

[B]

Yeah, I want to talk about that, too.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Because we talked about starving to death.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And that journal of. I talked. I've talked about that book since.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

There was a guy journal, those guys that starved to death.

[A]

Yeah. There was a guy that wrote to me and said that he had heard you talk about it and didn't know what the. What the book was and wanted to know the title of it, so got it. I sent him information on that. Yeah.

[B]

Tell people the name of the book.

[A]

Well, that was Death in the Barren Lands. Yeah. And it was about these three guys, John Hornby, and then the two. One of them was his nephew, I think, another maybe a friend. And they went out into the. You know, to the east of Great Slave Lake, over to the Thelon river. Trains into Hudson Bay, I believe.

[B]

I had a hell of a time finding that. I had a hell of a time finding that on Google Earth.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

It's a confusing tangle of water up there.

[A]

It is, it is. And. And it's pretty flat country. And. And then there's these caribou that. The barren ground caribou that are moving around in that country, but not always in the same place. And they were unfortunate enough that they. While there were caribou here, here or there, and they caught a little bit of fur, but it wasn't enough to keep them. Keep them all going, and they all ended up dying. Yeah.

[B]

And the one, the youngest one, keeps a meticulous journal chronicling his death.

[A]

Extraordinary piece of work. Yeah. You know, and then the people that ended up finding the cabin and the people there that had starved out, they found his. His journal in the stove. He had. He had put it in there and.

[B]

Left a note saying, look in stove.

[A]

Yeah. So that. So that somebody was going to be able to get it and know what. What went on.

[B]

This man, explorer. They were talking about Hornby.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

He had found. On one of his journeys traveling the Canadian Arctic.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

He had found a stand of spruce that he. He felt in that area was the northernmost stand of spruce. And he realized you could go into this. This is way above treeline, go into this stand to spruce and build a cabin and make a go of it in the way far north, you know, what he reminds me of later, though.

[A]

Who?

[B]

Hornby reminds me of Stockton Rush. The guy from the Titan submersible.

[A]

Oh, yeah.

[B]

Because. Because he knew what he was getting into. Like, he knew what he was doing.

[A]

The other two didn't.

[B]

He knew the risk. He knew what he was getting into. He'd had close calls.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

He knew how dicey it was. And he, like, brings other guys along who are sort of trusting in his expertise. And then later it comes out, you know, like with Stockton Rush, later it comes out, Stockton Rush had almost like. I wouldn't say a death wish, but like incredible hubris. And not a death wish, but definitely knew where it was headed and didn't care. And this Hornby guy, I mean, he basically offers these people up to the tundra. I mean, he serves them to the God of the tundra. He serves them on a platter.

[A]

I think he thought they were going to do all right, but it was a hungry country and the caribou didn't come.

[B]

Yeah. The thing that the most upsetting part of that story of starving to death like that is that they start eating hides, right?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And for some reason, like, a lot of hair and their bowels get impacted by hair. And so toward the end, the three of these dudes are trying to give each other enemas and they're trying to claw out of each other plugs of leather and hair and rigging up different ways to try to get their. Their colon or whatever the hell clear a hair. And the guys that find the bodies remark on this because some of this excrement, some of this solidified excrement of hair and hide are littered around the cabin. Just a shitty way to go.

[A]

Oh, yeah, it was. It was bad. Yeah.

[B]

But that really brought to life reading that book, and that's probably why he gave it to me. Reading that book brought to life what that John the Baptist dude. Like, what his days were probably like, I think so. To starve up in there.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But there's a story you told. You sent me a video clip of you telling a story about getting a bear out in a river one time.

[A]

Oh, yeah.

[B]

And you. You had mentioned the thing that hadn't really occurred to me in it, that. But. But I've seen it, but I didn't really thought about it. Like, a deer floats.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. And a moose will float even with a big set of antlers, but a.

[B]

Bear don't float good.

[A]

It doesn't float. Yeah.

[B]

Do you mind sharing, like, the sort of the implications of a bear? Like, tell that Story and the implications of a bear not floating.

[A]

It's one of my favorite stories because.

[B]

They swear they sure swim pretty damn good.

[A]

Yeah, they swim. So we used to sometimes find them in the river swimming from one side to the other. And we'd follow them and wait until they get out on the bank. And then sometimes, you know, sometimes they're running too hard when they get out and you don't get a good shot. But most of the time you're able to get them on the bank. But we knew that they didn't float because there were several people that shot bears up on bluffs that come right down to the river. And a bear rolls down and into the river and they're gone. They go away. And I mean they don't really, but they go away as far as you are concerned. So we knew that they, that they, that they sink, you know, and it may be that a cub would float. I don't know.

[B]

Well, you know, a part of why that there's air in the hair. I mean, you know this like in cervids, that hair is kind of hollow.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Imagine they got a hair, right. Bears got more what we call fur, but it's.

[A]

It's more like guard. Guard hairs.

[B]

Yeah. So I guess that's something to do with it.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. So. So August is kind of a tough time to make a living out there. You know, the king salmon at that, in that part of the river come in July and it's just wonderful time. You know, you can sit in one place and, and process. Process king salmon. And not right now because they're desperately low levels right now in the Yukon. But in those days we could fish and hang a gillnet and process, you know, five or six fish a day and, and. And jar them up and dry them and put them up for. For later as well as eat wonderful food the whole time there. But August it comes and there's no fish really. I mean, you can get pike or you can get some whitefish or a she fish or something, but the salmon have gone through and the fall chum salmon are not there yet. And so we would usually try to look for a bear because bears start getting. Getting pretty nice fat. And this guy Seymour and I, we both fished the same place, Glen Creek Bluff there. And we went down to the. To the Kandik. So we were about 15 miles upstream from the Kandik river where our fish camps were. And he and I took some dogs and we went down to mouth of Kandik looking for a bear there's some good bluffs down there that you might find them on. Or sometimes just, you know, walking down through the. You know, walking the riverbank or something. Anyway, we went down there, didn't find anything. And we're lining back up the river and we would. Which is, you know, walking the bank and pulling the canoe. And during places where the bank is really nice, you know, where you have the same kind of angle going into the water, we'd hook dogs up. We'd hook a couple of dogs up and they would pull the canoe up while you can sit in the canoe and ride during some of that. And so we were in that sort of a situation going upriver on a big inside of the bend, so we could see the shoreline only for a couple hundred yards. And then it kind of disappeared around the corner to us, right? And at one point we saw this bear that had taken off somewhere upstream of us and had been swimming out. And he got into our view even though it was around. He was probably 150, 200 yards out into the river. And the river at that point was about 500 yards. We estimated a across. So we pull. We pull over because we're going to try to get him when he comes out the other side on the. On the bank, and we, we unclip the dogs because we're going to have to go. We're going to let him get half or three quarters of the way over and then we'll paddle over there. That was how we were figuring to do it.

[B]

Why not just take off after him right away? Well, because you'd spook him back to his own bank.

[A]

You never know. Yeah. Where he'd go. And so usually we would try to follow him at some point. And once they're close to that bank, they're going to go to that bank. They'd probably go anyway. But we also had dogs. We had five dogs that were now loose on the bank, and they hadn't seen the bear at that point. We're trying to get their attention, looking downstream a little bit so that they didn't see the bear. Because dogs swim a lot faster than bears. And so we didn't want them getting out there and messing the situation up. But we did have this one dog that he would look at jets going by in the sky. And so he had really good distance vision. And. And he spotted it. And they, they. They really loved to swim after beavers. And I think he probably thought it was a beaver, but it didn't matter that it was a bear. But they, the Dogs all ran up the bank to where they were, you know, straight in from where the bear was swimming. And they start barking at him. And he turns around and looks back at them and decides he's not going there. Because, you know, I think all the animals living out in the woods think of the dogs as wolves. I don't think they know what they are other than that they're just like wolves to them. And so that bear turned and kept going in the same direction while the jogs all jumped into the river and started swimming after it. And we're sitting there. Seymour and I are sitting there going, this is not good. They're going to catch him out in the river. We have no idea what's going to happen then. But it's possible that they could drown him and, you know, just by climbing on him and biting him and things. And then he would go away because he'd sink. Or it may be that he could drown the dogs just by turning around and grabbing them. And we didn't know how big a bear it was. And so we started thinking about, how do we deal with this? There's no way we can go and catch all these five dogs and haul them into a canoe out in the river and not tip over. And so Seymour, who was. He was. I don't know. He's close to 10 years older than me. Right. And so he says, here's what we'll do, Randy. And I'm just like 20 at the time and maybe 21.

[B]

How old, Seymour?

[A]

About 10 years older.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Yeah. So he says here, he's the leader. Yeah. So he had brought a.22 along on this trip down to the canyon because we were shooting squirrels to feed the dogs and things. And so I had the big gun, the.243. And so he says, you get in the front, we'll beat the dogs to the bear. You pop him right before we come upon him and then grab him. That was his solution to this thing. And so being just a bit younger than him, I like. Yep. I think that's how we need to deal with this. So he and I took off and we beat the dogs by about two canoe lengths. We beat him to the. To the bear. And I popped him and grabbed him. And he's the summer bear, you know, he still had. He didn't have a lot of fur, but enough that I could grab him right above the tail. And, of course, we're really moving with the canoe. And so it almost drug me out of the canoe on the backside. And Seymour is There just laughing in the back of the boat. The bear nerves are still active and he's kicking. And then the dogs caught up with us and they grab ahold of him and shake, you know, And I had this paddle and I'm swatting at them, trying to drive them away so they don't pull them out of my hands, because then we lose them. And so we tried, Seymour and I, after we got the dogs to leave us be a little bit, we tried hauling the bear into the canoe, but it was too big. And, you know, it's an aluminum canoe, an 18 foot aluminum canoe that we were using there, but. But we didn't think we could bring him in without swamping the boat. So we tied him onto the side and paddled. I don't think we lost about a mile, you know, getting him back to shore, but it was a. It was a nice big. About a 250 pound. Oh, yeah, Cinnamon phase bear, huh? And. And nice and fat. You know, he wasn't super fat, like, going into hibernation, but he was fat enough to make it really good eating.

[B]

So in those days, when you're living off land like that, what do you then do? Like, walk me through how you handle the bear. Like, what all do you take from the bear?

[A]

Everything.

[B]

Yeah, walk me through it.

[A]

Okay. So pulled him up. We cut around under the feet and cut down across, and then from the anus all the way up to the chin and skinned him out. And we usually will skin half back and take a arm off, a front leg and then a back leg, cut open the guts, pull the guts out and then turn them over and skin the other half and take it into quarters. Plus your ribs and the head, pelvis, all of it. And guts as well. Because the dogs eat anything we don't.

[B]

Yeah. What out of those guts will those dogs eat?

[A]

Everything.

[B]

Do you boil that so they don't get trichnosis or the dog. He's gonna get it anyways, I'm sure.

[A]

I don't remember boiling that.

[B]

Yeah, I don't think they would even. They probably just all have and it doesn't affect them.

[A]

Yeah, well, I don't know that they have trichinosis, but there's no way they don't.

[B]

All this stuff they're eating.

[A]

I don't think so. I never heard of it.

[B]

Yeah, all the bears have it. Not all, but I mean, I think.

[A]

They have the capacity to have it.

[B]

Yeah, well, so just as a point of reference, this state used to take samples in the northwest corner of the state. Where they were taking samples. 100% of bears 6 years old and over were positive.

[A]

Oh, well, you have more information than I do on that.

[B]

I, I just think it doesn't, it doesn't, it doesn't affect them. I mean they might, they might not feel good for two days or something, but they probably just have it their whole life.

[A]

And you know, it'd be interesting to know the, the pathology of that in Alaska. But I, I know that, that everybody advises cooking them because they're potential for trichinosis, but I, I've never heard or read on the details of that.

[B]

I got it from a bear in Alaska now, but I'll just get. I'm just saying, I bet you if you test it, if you pull the tissue sample from those dogs, it's possible that it's got the system. There's no way it doesn't.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Because they're just eating whatever they find out in the woods. They do anyhow. Like what? Like out of the bears innards. What do you guys want to eat and what do the dogs eat?

[A]

We would usually take the heart, some of the liver, the kidneys, and that would be what we would eat. And after I had that run in with that grizzly liver, I think the vitamin A poisoning with it, I didn't eat any liver after that. From bears. Yeah.

[B]

I don't eat bear innards, man. Yeah, I eat the meat, I ate the fat, but I don't eat the innards out of them.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I can't explain why. It's like a personal. I don't know if it counts as a taboo when it's you. It's a personal taboo, dude.

[A]

I don't know why we, we did. And, and that was, that was actually after little John and I had. Had gotten that vitamin A poisoning off of that grizzly, so. So undoubtedly I did not eat that liver. But, but the dogs do. They think it's great. Yeah. And don't seem to be impacted by it. And, and so this is August though, right? So it's. We don't have a freezer or.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You know, that's what I'm curious about. Yeah. I mean our freezer is broken because it doesn't come on until October. Yeah.

[B]

You got like meat.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And you got like meat bees and flies and. Yeah, it's hot during the day.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. So you hang it up and it gets dry on the outside. Bears, bear meat doesn't keep for very long and we just, we just eat it and it starts turning bad.

[B]

Dogs get it so you couldn't. You wouldn't. With the bear meat, you're not trying to. You can't. You're not trying to smoke it or air dry it. You're just eating it.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

And then how do you handle the fat? You render it out?

[A]

No, I just leave it on the meat and eat it with the meat.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Yeah. Because bears. Bears, you know, they have it marbled. It's marbled. Not. Not with moose. Moose isn't, you know. Well, the ribs, brisket. But. But the, you know, like the back legs or the. Or the shoulders on a moose is not marbled in fat. It's got a layer on the outside.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

If you get a fat one. Yeah, but. And then it's got the intestinal fat. Bears have fat kind of marbled through the. Through the meat, which is part of.

[B]

Why that meat doesn't freeze. Super good.

[A]

Right.

[B]

It goes rancid a little bit. Like the fat goes bad.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. You can make a difference in someone's.

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[A]

Offers may vary.

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Visit albertsons or safeway.com for more details. So if you Got a bear in August. You're not doing anything to save. No, you're not saving bear lard.

[A]

It's just food until it goes bad.

[B]

But why not, like, at that time, why would you not render it and save jars of it or save bags of it?

[A]

It'll go rancid.

[B]

Because you can't refrigerate. Because it's not refrigerated or frozen.

[A]

Yeah. It's really hard to jar it in a ball jar. I know. We've tried it. We've done it. But it gets in the seal and it doesn't. It doesn't seal really good. Okay. Some people may have had other. Other experiences with it, but at that.

[B]

Time, you're jarring salmon.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So you know about the mechanics of jarring.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But you're not jarring bear meat.

[A]

Nope. Just some people do. Yeah, some people do. But usually it's fall and they jar it and then it's frozen and they eat it later in the winter. Got it. Got it. But it's a hard thing with a really oily piece of meat to jar it and have that seal work for a ball jar. Huh.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And then I didn't like jarred meat as much as. I mean, jarred fish is great meat. I'd rather just eat it straight.

[B]

Okay. Yeah, but you're also trying to account for. I mean, you're trying to find 365 days worth of food. So in the summer months, you eat fresh meat, and then once things freeze, you just eat frozen meat.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. Because, you know, you can't keep a big piece of meat. A moose, you know, shooting them in August, you can't do it. You know it's going to go bad before you finish eating it.

[B]

What was the date at which you'd want to kill a moose then?

[A]

Anytime, you know, around 5th to 10th of September, at that point, you could keep it. You can keep it right in Capris. Okay. Yeah. But you got to be careful. You know, if you got those cuts that. You know, where there's two surfaces that flop back on each other, those are gonna. Those would go bad over that period of time. So there. There's a process after.

[B]

Tell me what that means. Well, hold on. I'm gonna go back to the bear. One last question on the bear.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So I understand the meat and fat and the guts.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

At that point in time, were you keeping the hide or selling the hide or. It's useless because it's August. Like, how would you view the bear hide? What good use would you Put that to, if anything.

[A]

Oh, yeah, we'd keep them. And it would be stretching out on a frame and fleshing it and scraping the oil off. Sometimes a really fat bear. That's pretty hard to do, but. But you can do it, you know, with a scraper and clean it up and dry it as a rug, a seat cushion, a lot of different things.

[B]

You wouldn't sew any garments out of that stuff.

[A]

I didn't. There were people that did. But it, you know, if you, like, put it on the top of a mukluk, it'll get snow packed into it. So it's not, you know, like a beaver is almost waterproof. You know, beaver fur. And that was a really good thing for, like, the top of a mukluk or mittens, but it would never get snowballs or ice balls forming it, but bare fur does. Okay, so it wasn't a desirable piece of clothing for most people. Yeah, yeah.

[B]

You know, I want to hit you with one that I was reading. It's not from your area, but I wonder if you ever heard of this. There's this book, the hell's it called? Oh, the Landbreakers. You ever hear that?

[A]

I've never heard of it.

[B]

Dude. I was obsessed with this book for a while, the Landbreakers. I sent it to my buddy, Bubbly Doug. He loved it, too. It's set in the 1770s. It's just about the first families moving into the. Sorry. Set in the 1780s.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Early American. It's a novel, but it's, like, very, very well done. It's about the first families moving up into the mountains in Appalachia. And they're landbreakers because they're clearing the ground to grow corn. In this book, they talk about that, you know, a groundhog. It's like a ground squirrel. Close relative of a marmot. Right. A groundhog. And this book talks that. That's the best rawhide for bootlaces.

[A]

Oh, interesting.

[B]

Which I'm going to make some. My kid got one the other day, but it was just a juvenile, so I didn't do it yet. I'm gonna make my own rawhide boot laces from a groundhog. But if you think about that, man, like, think about a squirrel's hide. Like, you take a rabbit hide, you can just, with your hands, tear it off. Dude, a squirrel's hard to get through. Doesn't it make sense that that would be like a phenomenal rawhide strip? Tough.

[A]

How do you get the fur off? Or does it matter? I don't know.

[B]

I'LL figure that out.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I'm gonna probably just soak it for a while and then scrape the fur off. I don't know, I haven't. I haven't done it yet. Fixing to though.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Tough ass. Boot laces made out of groundhog, huh? Well, this would be a marmot, but either way.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

Around here they call them rock chucks.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But you never had any exposure to that because you had dealt with so many leathers. You guys didn't have like a thing of making like rawhide from marmots or anything.

[A]

No. There were marmots in the mountains on the south side of the Yukon up there. I never saw them over in the ogilvies.

[B]

Never where you hung out?

[A]

Never where I hung out. Yeah.

[B]

So tell me about moose, how you handle moose. Because now we're into September, right?

[A]

Yeah. So moose always. We skin back one half and take a shoulder off. And I never got into the game bags. I think we mentioned this a little bit previously, but it didn't matter because there's going to be a crust on it. When I've taken game bags off of meat that's sat in a boat or something for a few days, it doesn't let it dry out.

[B]

If you're dealing with water and stuff, it's just. I'm with you. Because it like it makes. It just holds moisture in a way.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

If you can hang it up in the air. What's nice about is you don't get. You don't get fly eggs on it.

[A]

Yeah. Which didn't bother me at all. Because flies, you know, once you got a crust on it, they don't bother it. Yep. But they will go and lay eggs. If you have, say you make a couple of cuts on the, you know, the bottom of the back leg, you know, between it and the. And the pelvis bone, you know. And you might have a couple of different cuts that when you hang it up, those two. There's a cut in there where the two pieces of meat flop over and touch.

[B]

Yeah. When you say that, do you mean that you take like an intact muscle but you're saying you inadvertently slice it? So now you've sliced it open and the two pieces of meat are touching.

[A]

That'S going to rot.

[B]

Why do you think that is?

[A]

Because the bacteria grow. It doesn't dry out. That's exactly why it happens.

[B]

Because it's an exposed surface that won't dry.

[A]

It's an exposed surface. Yeah. It's been inoculated with bacteria and it stays wet See, bacteria aren't going to grow if it's dry. And so you get this mousse and you hang it up and over the next few days you work at it, you pick at it. The bottom of the, of the back leg and the neck, you know, the back straps. Anywhere where there's, you know, a cut that exists there that doesn't dry. Yeah.

[B]

This is something I've never thought about or heard, man.

[A]

Well, so it allowed us to hang moose in the beginning of September and have it make a dent of freeze.

[B]

Because you just keep. You're letting the crust form, making sure there's no spots that hold any moisture.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

And then it's. And then you can hang it and you're just basically hanging dries. And then eventually, well, solid.

[A]

And so at that time, you know, of the, of the year, you tend to get cooler temperatures at night. And. And so it's. And then as the moisture from that ham or the shoulder works its way out to the crust and evaporates off, it's. It's going to cool that way as well.

[B]

Like evaporative cooling.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Are you leaving, are you harvesting the fat off it or leaving all the fat on it?

[A]

I take the fat off.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And you handle that how?

[A]

So the ribs, the ribs and the brisket, that's hard to take the fat off of. So that stays. But those are the, those are, you know, some of the things you might eat first. Okay. Right. And it's got all those layers of fat in it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so like the belly fat.

[B]

The inside fat.

[A]

Yeah, I hang that too. So it gets dry and it'll dry fast. So you know, you get the, the kidney fat and you hang it over a pole and. And you, you shift it every, every once in a while, you know, every couple of days you move it. And of course you gotta protect it from gray jays. Cause they'll come in and. Oh yeah, man. And damage it pretty bad. But I would hang little gill nets, little 2 inch stretch mesh gill nets around the meat to keep the gray jays off.

[B]

Got it?

[A]

Yeah, yeah. It's a process. But then you got this wonderful piece of meat as you go into the winter.

[B]

If you. Let's say you're. You got a cab where you know you're gonna spend your winter.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And you're mostly doing stuff off at that time of year. You're operating out of your canoe.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Are you moving that carcass? You're trying to move that carcass first back to your Cabin.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And this work is happening at the cabin?

[A]

Yeah, that's right. Not always, but that's. That's what you. That's what you try to do. Yeah.

[B]

Ideally it's back at the cabin.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then how are you protect. How do you safeguard? So if we go through this drying process and that. What date does it. At what date would you say it's going to freeze? Roughly.

[A]

The end of September, beginning of October. That's when it used to. Up there. We've had some. We've had some years where it doesn't freeze till mid October lately, though, so. Yeah, it's a different environment right now than it was.

[B]

Yeah. And at that point, the only thing you got to worry about once bears are down underground, the only thing you got to worry about is like, wolverine getting at it, whatever kind of, you know, whatever things, chewing it up, odds and ends. How do you secure it?

[A]

You know, I really haven't had any trouble with a moose. Once it freezes.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

You know, we're there. I just have never had a wolverine. Usually I would put some sort of a trap there for wolverines, but they're not going to be able to deal with a moose. You know, they could. I always hung it high enough so that my dogs couldn't reach it.

[B]

I see.

[A]

You know, at some point, if we were traveling or something, and. And that. And the wolves, they never bothered it. I never had them bother anything of mine. Okay, and so.

[B]

So you just hung it clear of a wolverine where he can't jump up and you can't climb up and get it?

[A]

Well, the wolverine can, but, you know, they just. They weren't. There weren't enough of them that it was an issue. Yeah.

[B]

For me, if you went into the ear, if you're just by yourself and you kill a moose in September.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You kill a bull. These mostly bulls. You're killing all bulls? All bulls. You kill a bull in September.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

How long can one guy live off that moose?

[A]

You know, if that's all you're eating, you know, probably three months. Yeah. It's not going to take you all the way through the winter.

[B]

So what else would you have to figure out to make the winter?

[A]

Well, so up there on the Upper Canada river, where I lived, it was caribou. Every year we were up there, there were wintering caribou from the porcupine caribou herd. And so we would take those. And they were almost always bulls, big bulls that had lost their horns, their antlers, and they were skinny. They might have just a little bit of fat on their brisket. Their tongues are spectacular. You slice them up and fry them. They're wonderful.

[B]

Would you boil them first?

[A]

Not with caribou, with moose. I did.

[B]

So you just slice it, trim off the outer part and fry the center.

[A]

You don't need to trim it off on a caribou.

[B]

Yeah, just slice it and fry it.

[A]

Slice it and fry it. It's one of the best things anywhere. Huh?

[B]

But why does that not work with a moose? Well, I always boil them and then slip the skin off.

[A]

Yeah, with moose that's true. With caribou you don't need to. Huh?

[B]

Like they got a thin shell or something.

[A]

Yeah, thin shell. And, and the muscle there is just. It's got a lot of fat in it. It's wonderful.

[B]

Just raw, sliced.

[A]

Yeah, well, it's fried.

[B]

I'm sorry. But not, not pre cooked in any way, right. To soften it up. It's soft enough.

[A]

No, you fry it right in a pan just like it is. Slice it, fry it. Really, it's wonderful.

[B]

I've never done that.

[A]

It's one of the best things anywhere. Karen. In fact, in Non Dalton, I had gotten three caribou up on this mountain and I went and was butchering one and this older fella from Non Dalton stopped and cut the tongues out of the other two and took off. And I go to butcher them and like the tongues are gone and I'm going like, this isn't right, you know. So I butcher them up and go home. And Karen says, oh, good, three caribou tongues. I said, well, I only got one because, you know, this guy got the other two. He said, well, go get them from him. So I go and I talk with him and I say, you know, we really like this. He says, you're white people, you know, you don't like caribou times. I said, no, we do. I said, karen sent me to get them back. He says, I'll give you one of them back. I said, okay. Yeah, it's funny. Yeah, but no, it's a delicacy.

[B]

My old man used to dig around other people's gut piles. Yeah, deer gut piles. He'd go get the heart and liver out of other people's gut piles.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.

[B]

Like didn't even, he didn't even think anything of it.

[A]

Well, so the heart off of a fat animal is wonderful. And they got, you know, you got this big, you know, cluster of fat around the top of the heart and slicing that up and frying It. It's one of the best things. Yeah. So moose, caribou.

[B]

So how would you handle a moose tongue?

[A]

So I'd boil it and then slice it and fry it.

[B]

Now, help me understand why can you fry a caribou tongue sliced without doing any prep?

[A]

It's tender.

[B]

So if you do it to a moose tongue, is the center still tender or is just. Even the center is hard.

[A]

It's tough. Yeah. Really? Yeah.

[B]

Have you ever monkeyed around just frying deer tongues up without cooking them first?

[A]

I've only had anything to do with a couple of deer, and that was from down in southeast when my father was living down there. And we went out to this island called Pleasant island in Icy Strait and got deer. But those are the only ones I've had any direction knowledge of.

[B]

Would you eat bear tongues?

[A]

I never tried it. Huh.

[B]

Would you go up into the mountains for sheep?

[A]

Yeah, I did.

[B]

What time of year would you go do that?

[A]

August, usually.

[B]

Okay. And how would you handle those?

[A]

Well, you know, by the time you.

[B]

Get up there, you got to eat it just to get out of there, probably.

[A]

Well, so a lot of people, they get into this crisis, Right. Because they shoot a sheep, it's blazing hot, and they got a. Pack it for miles, and then get it to a freezer. What I did is I just sat up there and ate it. Okay. Because sheep is not that big, and they're wonderful. And so it would feed us and we'd go exploring. Because you're not going to keep it in. You're not going to keep a sheep. We didn't ever hunt sheep at a time when you could put it up for the winter. Right. It's too early. It's too early, and it's not close enough to anywhere that we would. That we would have a cabin. It's a long ways out. But by not having to transport it to a freezer back in town three or four days after you kill it, we just had a wonderful time in the mountains.

[B]

How many days would you be able to eat that sheep?

[A]

They'll go for a week. Okay.

[B]

So you sit there and eat it.

[A]

Yeah. And it'll keep for longer than that. So you process it the same way, hang it, cut the places off that are rough, that are going to attract blowflies. Blowflies are not that big a deal as long as you're paying attention to the meat. You can always cut a chunk off that has blowflies on it and throw it to the dogs, and they think it's fine. You got to be on Top of it. But the sheep were wonderful. They're always fat, always good, and they're a small. So you were talking earlier about the bear. You know, what do you do with a bear? Well, you eat it. It's in August. You're not trying to keep it into the winter. You're trying to have a good piece of meat to eat for the next couple of weeks.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And you can do that.

[B]

You mentioned to Corinne something about seeing a ram, a doll ram, how, like, you know, how they broom their horns.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Did you. Have you. I've observed them. I've observed big horns scratching their horn.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But what did you see?

[A]

So. So I never understood how they broom their horns, you know. But, but so in Alaska, anyway, a legal ram is one that has two broom tips or that's full curl.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Or more. Right. And. And there may be some differences in places. It used to be 1 and 1 and an eighth or something like that, you know, but curl. But, but, but that's how it's been everywhere I've hunted.

[B]

Yeah. Like most. Yeah, I would say most. You. You hear of exceptions like any ram whatever, someplace in the Brooks Range in the old days. But yeah, full curl or two. Broomed. And they used to not define broomed very clearly, but it has to be now it's defined as the entire lamb tip is gone.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So his entire first year's growth.

[A]

Well, it always bothered me. How the heck did they break those? You know, because I don't know, you know, hitting two big rams hitting. You know, even if it did connect by the tips, you know, they're just really tough. You know, they're going to bounce off. They're hitting the boss, the round thing. Hitting a round thing. Right. And it's not going to break it. But. So I was up there with my older son in some of these mountains and big limestone mountains on the north side and of the Yukon. And we saw these three sheep walking on this one scree slope across this. This. It was a valley, real steep valley, both sides. And they were walking a scree slope. And we charged up, down, and then up to meet them on this. On this scree. Well, the sheep trail across the scree slope because you could see it where it goes, you know, and we knew they were going to go by this one place. So we climb up and we get to this place where we thought they were going to come out in front of us, but they had already gotten by. And there was one that was on the next. It. It has these big ridges of of limestone towers, you know, that would come down and they had a trail that would go through and then scree between them. And we were about 300 yards away, but we hear this banging. And we look over there and here's this sheep. And he backs up and he gets up on his back legs and crack. He hits the rock wall with his horns and he goes back again and gets up there and bam, bam. He's just one after another. He's practicing, you know, hitting this rock wall. And I realized that's how they're breaking their tips.

[B]

You think so?

[A]

I know it. Yeah. And so what's the first thing that's going to hit when you have a full curl? It's the tips they're gonna hit. Huh. They're gonna hit the rock wall. I watched one that's a flat enough surface.

[B]

Yeah. I watched a bighorn one time ram a ponderosa pine. I counted. He rammed it 75 times.

[A]

Yeah, but that's a soft thing. That's wood.

[B]

Yeah, but no, I get what you're saying because you can see that they abrade it. Like, I think they don't like it in their peripheral vision when they abrade it because sometimes they wear like bighorns wear them smooth. They're like, like, like my fist, like smooth and round. And I think they abrade it.

[A]

Yeah. I don't know.

[B]

I'm telling you, dude, I don't like, they don't like it. They're, I think they see it.

[A]

I don't disagree. But I, I think the mechanism, you know, because when you get one that is, is, you know, not broomed, but a big full curl. They're tough. It's hard.

[B]

No, I'm with you, man. I don't, I can't account for him being snapped off. And I, I, yeah, I snapped off. I know, I, I like theory.

[A]

It's a theory.

[B]

But I pictured him, I was like, there's no way he's sticking in a crack in the rock and prying it off. I don't know how they break him off. I, I think, I'm sure you're right.

[A]

They're whacking them.

[B]

Yeah, I'm sure you're right. But what I'm getting at.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Is and it's more common in bighorns like you never see on a big, like a 8, 9, 10 year old Big Horn.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That some never has his lamb tips. But they're smooth.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I have watched sheep, I have watched sheep rubbing them, rubbing them on.

[A]

A, on a rock wall on a.

[B]

Rock on a cliff face. Just rubbing it.

[A]

Yeah. Like cat.

[B]

Like the same way you'd watch something scratch itself. Same way you'd watch it scratch itself on a tree. He's sitting there, like rubbing.

[A]

Yeah, but I'll bet the. I'll bet the break, the initial break.

[B]

I'm not contesting it on the break, man. I think you're right. I'm just talking about the rubbing. But by theory, and I don't know, I never talked to a guy that knows a bunch about sheep. I know like a teeny about sheep. But my theory is. And no. No guys ever crop right. Like, I don't know. This is maybe totally not true.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

My theory is had, Ben. It gets in their peripheral vision and it bugs the hell out of them.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And so they're like, what is that? And they're. They don't like it.

[A]

I don't know.

[B]

You have to interview one.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

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Visit albertsons or safeway.com for more details. Bears see a dog and they think it's a wolf.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

What's a wolf think when he sees it? What's a wolf think?

[A]

A dog is so that's an interesting thing, you know. So I used to travel quite a bit on the Kendic river and the dogs would be running loose, you know, because how do you. How do you go up the river with a canoe and not have them run loose? Right. You can't ride them in there. So there was a lot of things, you see, you know, they. They'll drive a moose into the river. The river is safe country for a moose. Right. And the moose thinks the dogs are wolves and they'll run right into the river where they can stand and the dog's got a. Dogs or wolves got to swim and then they'll pound them if they get close.

[B]

They pound them with their hooves in there. Yeah, they can get them in the water.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. And so, and so the dogs sometimes, you know, because they're not quite as savvy as wolves, they would swim out trying to get to the moose and so the moose will just pound them, you know, and none of our dogs got damaged in that, that I. That I recall. I mean, they. It didn't, it didn't kill them. It didn't break them up. But. But I think that sometimes they do that with wolves. But. But probably not in the water because wolves probably know you can't get them when they're in the water. But. But wolves.

[B]

So wolves would more or less give up when that would happen.

[A]

Yeah, they might, they might sit around. We've had times when we're lining up the river and. And the dogs chase a moose into the river and it's not big enough for us to get past while the moose is in there, you know, so we're. We camp sometimes. Oh, really? Yeah, because it's not going to get. Come out. You know, we get the. Coax the dogs back to us and get them tied up. And sometimes it's still, you know, hours before the moose is ready to get out of the water and go somewhere and then we can continue up. But one time I was walking along the river with the dogs and I hear them barking back in a spruce woods. And I'm thinking that can't be a moose because moose usually won't bay up. You know, with the dogs chasing back in the woods, they go to the water, you know, and I'm so. I think this. They may have a bear up a tree. Right.

[B]

So what can you tell what breed? I mean, I'm sure they're mixed, but what are these dogs? What do they look like?

[A]

They're. They're great big huskies. They were, you know, we had Some that were as much as 120 pounds.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And they're as, they're, they're the same size as wolves. Okay. Up in that part of the country, I mean, a big wolf would be bigger than the biggest dog. But, but a lot of people bred these big dogs because they can pack and they're, you know, when you're mushing around on a, on a trap line and you say whoa, they'd stop and you know, whereas, you know, the little hyper race dogs, they tend not to.

[B]

Yeah, that's what, that's what I was trying to picture if you had that new kind of souped up race dog or if you had the old Stylers. But when you say bay, they'll still do that though. They'll get something cornered and they'll raise hell.

[A]

Yeah. So they're barking back in the woods and I think that's got to be a bear, you know, So I start, I'm sneaking back there with my rifle, looking up into the trees, and I realized I look where the dogs are and they've got a wolf bait up. They've got a single wolf, same size as they were, and his hair is sticking straight out from his, from his whole body and his tail. And the dogs are seriously as close to me to this microphone. Right. And they're barking at him, but they're not biting him. But, but wolves, you know, if there's a wolf from a different pack that comes and gets surrounded by a pack of wolves, they'll more likely than not kill it. And so that wolf was spooked that he was in that situation where he might get nailed. And the dogs, you know, it was, I don't know how many I had then, four or five. And they're same size as this animal, but they are barking at him like seriously this close, you know, but the wolf spots me, took off.

[B]

Oh, really?

[A]

Yeah. Hauled ass. And the dog's right on his tail. And the dogs came back in about a half an hour. But I'm sure the wolf got away because the dogs, they were just interested, you know, they weren't trying to kill him or anything. And he might have been able to defend himself too.

[B]

But they knew, but they, but they knew he wasn't a dog.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

He was different, man, I'll tell you, like on that canine to canine thing, we have this little. I don't like, I don't know how big it is. Maybe it's 35 pounds, this dog. And if I even so much as skin a coyote, okay, that dog Smells that death. That dog knows. Like it's never been beat up by a coyote. Something about the smell. And if there's a coyote laying there, it is no way gonna go up. There's not a dog in the world. My dog's not gonna run up and try to play with.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Or you know, they smell each other's butts, whatever. Like there's not a dog in the world. My dog's not gonna be excited about interacting with a coyote. It knows like it knows that is not a dog, it is death. And I always wonder how it, like how they put that together. It knows it's death.

[A]

There were times when like this guy Dick Cook, we talked about Dick Cook, you know, on the Teutonic river he had his dogs sometimes interacted with wolves and they didn't kill each other, they didn't fight. But the dogs would run out if the wolves were crossing paths with them. But I don't really, I don't quite understand why. But I think they both understand or different.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

And I never had, I never had the wolves bother my dogs. Mostly they stayed away but, but sometimes I, I've shot them big wolves because they're hanging around. One time it was in the fall and we had a moose hanging and our dogs were chained up, but they would, at night they would start barking and I didn't know what was going on because I never saw anything until it snowed. And then I realized, oh, this is wolf. Wolf is casing our place, going all around. And at the time, Jed, I don't know how old he was, five or six maybe. And he wanted to, he always took great glee and going doing things by himself. So he wanted to walk this trail back to a big beaver pond that we had a ski plane land in every once in a while in the winter. And, and, and we never did let him go by himself, you know, because there's a. I don't know what it was a half mile or so on this nice trail, but we didn't think he was old enough at the time to do that. And I think in retrospect I think that wolf would have taken him if he'd been down there by himself. But anyway, I decided I'm going to take this wolf. And there were times when he would walk up along the Willow Bar right between the house and the river. And I got down there and hid out in this piece of driftwood and waited for him. And he came right at dusk and shot that wolf. And he had a busted up jaw from the moose Cracking him and teeth that weren't there. And then the jaw had healed, but just kind of in a big glob. So his jaw didn't work quite so well. So he was. Couldn't keep up with the pack, perhaps couldn't feed himself. He was trying to figure out how to get some of our moose up there.

[B]

My buddy in Alaska, this is last winter, he's a trapper. Does some trapping. His wife calls him one day and she's got, like, a. She's with her dogs.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

This is just right behind his house. And there's a wolf messing with her. And he doesn't believe her. He's like, that's gotta be a dog. She's like, I know a wolf. I'm looking at a wolf. There's a wolf. Won't leave us alone. And he's still dismissive of it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Well, later he goes and looks in the snow, and it's like, sure enough. And in the morning, it's all walking around his house. So he makes a set for it and catches it right away. Right away. I think he said it was about 20 minutes or something. I mean, it's that hard. It's like that desperate.

[A]

That wolf wasn't afraid of people.

[B]

Well, he showed me a picture. Its face, its teeth were gone. I mean, freshly gone.

[A]

It's.

[B]

It looked like it. You. If you'd have put that dog. If you'd have put that wolf. If you'd have turned that wolf sideways.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And set it on a. On a. On an anvil and pulled its lips back and had your body take a sledgehammer and pam on his teeth, you would have got something that looked like what this thing's face looked like. And the only thing you think is somehow it got just stomped by a moose. By a moose.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Stomped like he. I mean, I. It wasn't a great picture, but you look at it, its face, its teeth on the one side are just crushed.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

In.

[A]

That's how this one was.

[B]

And somehow something got the perfect shot. A moose. Has to be a moose. I don't know what else to be up there.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Got the perfect shot. Poof.

[A]

Well, so I got. I would rarely get adult wolves in any trap or. Or snare. Couple of exemptions, but mostly you get the first year. And then all of the pups from that litter would see one of their own get into a snare or get into a trap. And they were. From that point on, they wanted nothing to do with anything that people had going. And it was really rare to get the old ones, unless you shot them. And so I did a couple times in the winter, a pack would run by the house going up the river, and I ended up shooting, I think three altogether over the years. Adults, the biggest of the adults. And they're all broken up. They got broken ribs. They got broken legs that heal. That one had the jaw. All of them had broken ribs. And some of them had healed. Most of them had not. And it was just flopping bones. Flopping bones. It's just incredible. And. And it's. I'm certain that it's. It's moose. They're gonna. They're whacking them. They get close enough and. And it's just a consequence of what they eat, because they eat moose and they do. They go up and they. They bite them and they get kicked and continue on, but it damages them. Yeah, I. I got one one time and. And I was skinning it and it's casing, you know, so you go. You hang it up and go from back legs down to body and pull it down. Working your way down to the. To the face. Eventually. Well, I get to the area right around the back of the shoulders and. And the hide just comes off. It separates right there.

[B]

And I look like the hide fell into.

[A]

Yeah. And so I. And came off the head. And so I'm sitting there and the hind.

[B]

I'm not following what you mean.

[A]

So I start looking. It's got this scar all the way around.

[B]

From a snare all to the bone.

[A]

Yeah, from a snare. It had gotten caught and it drew right down to bone.

[B]

What?

[A]

And the snare had eventually rusted away and dropped off.

[B]

Damn.

[A]

Yeah, it went right to bone all the way around. What crazy. It had to have carried that snare for a couple of years.

[B]

But it was fine.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I mean, like, seemed to you fine.

[A]

Well, I mean, the hide never. Never bonded again. Right. The bat.

[B]

But the animal, like, is up and about.

[A]

Yeah. No way. Oh, they're tougher than hell. The wolves are outrageously tough. If you catch one with a foot, it's like a bomb went off. You know, there's moss hanging in trees. Smaller trees are chewed down. They're extraordinarily tough. Yeah.

[B]

You know, a friend of mine had a. He had spent some time with wolverine trappers. Tell me, interesting observations. This wolverine trapper shared with him was like in trap. When you approach the animal and the animal is always as far away as it can get on the chain.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know, he's trying to go the other direction. If his foot's caught, his legs outstretched and he's trying to get away. And this guy said a wolverine is always, the wolverine's always coming to you.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, that's right.

[B]

He's stretched in your direction, trying to get at you.

[A]

Yeah. Huh.

[B]

That's pretty crazy about that wolf though.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

It wasn't like a fatality for him.

[A]

That didn't kill him. He, he survived it.

[B]

We had a wolf researcher on the show and there's like, there's a real paucity of like level headed wolf researchers because they get, it gets emotional for them. They lose their, they lose their ability to see things clearly. Especially the park. Like the park kind just becomes like, it comes too familial. They kind of become like celebrities. The people and the wolves, they just, they don't see things clearly anymore. But this woman, Diane Boyd, she's very clear headed. She's never lost her ability to look at things smartly.

[A]

You know.

[B]

She likes bird dogs a lot. She's a big bird hunter, so she raises bird dogs. And I was asking her how smart are, like, are wolves smart? Like what's their intelligence? And this is a woman that loves dogs. And she said it's not comparable. Like a domestic dog's intelligence can't compare. Well, they can't compare to a wolf. A wolf is like, you know, I can't remember how she put it. Infinitely smarter than a dog, than a domestic dog. Well, this sense of space, right, this.

[A]

Goes back to Charles Darwin fitness, you know, the survival of the fittest. And wolves are on the chopping block every day, every generation. Dogs, we feed them.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

We take care of them. They're not on the chopping block. So I think she's probably right about that.

[B]

You remember the Unabomber?

[A]

Yeah, I remember the story. Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

In his manifesto, when he's trying to talk about what happened to society, like when the Unabomber's griping about where society went wrong, he's like, survival, you, he grades, okay? He, he, he, he has this scoring system. It's like a zero to five or a one to five scoring system for difficulty, difficulty of a task. A one, like level one difficulty. I think it's how he lays it out is that if you try your absolutely hardest, you have a slight chance of success up to. You don't even need to try at all and you'll succeed.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

His gripe with technology is that human existence has become a 5. You don't need to do, you don't need to try at all. You're going to survive. And that's where all of our neuroses come from. We have nothing to focus on. Right. It's just. It's all just like staying alive is just. It's like. It just happens. So that's why we have all these psychological, emotional issues, because our main thing has been taken away from us.

[A]

Well, Smeagol, he did have some problems.

[B]

He had a five. He encountered a five.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But domestic dogs are in it. Humans and domestic dogs share our thing.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You don't need to try it all. You'll be fine.

[A]

That's domestication.

[B]

Yeah. Like us. Them.

[A]

Yeah. Right.

[B]

And you're right. A wolf, man, that's that sucker. They're living their lives in, the two. Well, if you try really, really hard, you have a reasonable chance of success is where they're. Where they're at, you know, and it probably does drive a level of intelligence, man.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. What? You know, I think the. In recent times, you know, when they're looking at. How far back was it before we domesticated or became symbiotic with wolves? Yeah, probably 10, 15,000 years ago.

[B]

That was our first domestic.

[A]

Right. And one of the best, and for a lot of different reasons, because they did help us. You know, they could smell. They could. Could bay a moose up. They could find the seal hole on the ice.

[B]

You know, a lot of these you hear as well. That's a good point. Is an early warning system.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[B]

Like, imagine how much better you sleep knowing that anything comes near here, those dogs are going to go nuts.

[A]

But it's over that period of time that we've kind of bred out the. The intense nervousness that wolves have. And there was somebody up in central had caught a wolf and brought it into their dog yard. How they did it, I don't know, but it seemed like that would be a really fraught thing to try. And they bred her with dogs, and the progeny, the first group of pups that she had, couldn't be handled. They weren't. They. You couldn't turn them into a sled dog. Right. Even though they were half dog and half wolf. And then they would breed those, and they got the quarter wolves right off of the pup, you know. And this guy Fred, he had one of those quarter wolf pups. He called it Strider.

[B]

And was he a Tolkien fan?

[A]

Yeah, all of us were. Really? Yeah. Yeah. We named Mountains Alone because you guys had the books. Yeah, yeah, we were. We were all.

[B]

Why were you guys all Tolkien fans?

[A]

I don't know. It was that time of the world, I guess. I don't know. But, yeah, we got. I mean, it was. Tom Bombadil was this guy that used to paint his. Had a big garden that had. You know, the ends of his logs were painted red and various.

[B]

Anyway, so what I need to do just real quick on this subject. This is like a sociological experiment. When I was in high school, there's a. I had a teacher, a beloved, Beloved man that kind of. In some ways, his name was Bob Heaton. When I tell my story of how I became a writer.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

It'S. It's him. He. He's a major point in that narrative. Yeah, the first point. He's the first point.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

In that narrative. He had a class you could take in high school called Modern Mythology. All you did is read Lord of the Rings. Yeah, it was a whole damn class.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You read Lord of the Rings.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And he taught it. But I wonder if you could go and do a thing about Lord of the Rings people, what their sort of moral perspective is, their work ethic and all that.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And compare them to Harry Potter people. Like, are they tougher? Like what? You know what I mean? Like Harry Potter spun off. What kind of person did that spin off?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And what kind of person did Lord of the Rings spin off?

[A]

Yeah. I don't know. I mean, my kids, my younger boy, anyway, read Harry Potter and loved it. I haven't read him.

[B]

Is he tougher than you?

[A]

Yeah, he is. Yeah.

[B]

You're lying.

[A]

No, I'm not. But. But he works out. He works out.

[B]

Oh, that kind of tough. I'm not talking about that kind of tough. Yeah, I'm talking about, like, gur.

[A]

No, he's. He's tough that way, too. But. But I want to go back a step, though.

[B]

Sure. No, I got off on this whole Lord of the Rings thing. You can make a difference in someone's.

[A]

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[A]

Offers may vary.

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Visit albertsons or safeway.com for more details. Why did I bring it up? Oh, because his dog was Strider.

[A]

Dog. It was Strider. So Strider was, was super nervous about everything. And he would, if he was inside the cabin with Fred and his other dog, I forget what her name was, but, but he would know that there was something going on outside way before anybody else, you know, and if there were neighbors came in, if we went to visit and he didn't have it on a chain he couldn't catch, would go around in the, in the shadows of the woods, you'd see him, but he wouldn't come. Fred or anybody, Right?

[B]

Yeah. And in his whole life, his parents lives were captivity. His life was captivity. But he still had that caginess.

[A]

Yeah. He didn't lose it. And dogs lost it over 10,000 years. Right. I mean, selective breeding of those that don't bite, that don't run away, that, you know, are nice, are friendly to people, whatever. And one time this guy you're trapped there reminds me of this time. There's this guy, Charlie Edwards. He was, he was up at Shade Creek a little ways down, eight or nine miles down from Eagle. Right. And he used to set a bear trap because the bears would come off of this McCann Hill and Hilliard up Shade Creek where his cabin was at the mouth and there was two little streams that came by. And he would set a bear trap at that spot every spring and sometimes get two or three bears.

[B]

He just had one little pinch point where he knew a bear was going to put his foot.

[A]

And one time he caught a wolf, it was a female wolf.

[B]

Can you explain the pinch point? Again? He's putting it.

[A]

Where is it a bait set or a blood set? There's this bluff along the river and Shade Creek comes out about a quarter mile in two forks of Shade Creek come together, and there's a ridge that comes down right at the end. Oh, he would set it right there where those two streams came together.

[B]

It's a trail set.

[A]

It's a trail set. Well, it wasn't a trail set. It was a baited set.

[B]

Oh, it's bears.

[A]

Bears.

[B]

I understand. I understand.

[A]

Yeah. So he had this. He had this big trap there, and this wolf got caught, and it was a female. And he. He. Charlie was. He's kind of spiritual, you know, and had all these visions of, you know, moose giving themselves to us or whatever, you know, And. And so he thinks this wolf is sitting there looking off in one direction and its foot is in the trap. And he comes walking up. Its ears move, but it doesn't turn or growl or do anything. It's just sitting there freaking out, I'm sure. And he decides he's going to. That he's got some connection with this wolf and he's going to try to capture it and take it back to his place. Right.

[B]

To keep it.

[A]

Yeah, to breed it with his dogs. He's thinking he might do that. And so he sits down to somehow commune with this wolf in back where he doesn't think that the wolf can get to him. Right. Because its leg is out that way. Head's out that way. And he sits there for a little while and then he reaches out and touches it on the flank. Bam. That wolf goes. Grabs him right by the hand and looks at him right in his eyes and sort of. It didn't crunch it the way it could have, but he bit. He put some pressure on it a couple different times, looking at him right in the eye, and then let him go. What he thought he was gone. And the wolf could have killed him. Could have caught. Could have killed him right there. Didn't let him loose, so he's got some teeth marks, but he didn't crush his hand, even though he could have. Yeah, and he was just about. He was just totally, totally wiped out at that point. He rolled away. He didn't feel he could shoot the wolf, but there's no way to let it go. Can't let it go. You know, it's not like you could just say, hey, wait a minute, yourself.

[B]

Really bit then.

[A]

Yeah. And so he. He realized he had to kill it. And he walked back to his place, though, and calmed down before he went back up. But you can't. You can't get close enough to ever try to. To let it go.

[B]

What was his takeaway from that.

[A]

Well, it didn't dissuade him of, of, you know, his, his spirituality type of, you know.

[B]

Did he keep that trap set?

[A]

I don't know if he kept that trap set. He had it set on the river one time when he moved downriver from there. And we ran our dogs right past it, and none of them went to it. But we were pissed off that he had it set in a place that we would have our dogs, because I'd kill a dog, you know, break their foot. But, you know, those big, big bear traps. But anyway. Yeah, so. So wolves. Wolves and dogs actually have really strong bites because they've got a cranial ridge, you know, and so your, Your jaw muscles have more leverage than, say, a bear. They got a smooth set. Smooth top of the skull.

[B]

Never thought about that. Yeah.

[A]

And. And their jaws are not near as tough.

[B]

That cranial ridge on a skull that ties into bite strength.

[A]

I didn't know that. Yep, yep, exactly. And our dogs killed a number of black bears over the years when they would catch them where there wasn't trees, because if they couldn't get up a tree, they couldn't defend themselves.

[B]

And the dogs be able to take them down.

[A]

Take them down and kill them.

[B]

Did you have a lot of dogs get killed doing that?

[A]

None. None of them even got hurt.

[B]

It's that easy for them.

[A]

It's that easy. And I think that. I think that any wolf pack would kill bears anytime they see them. Maybe because of size, they might shy away from some, you know, like grizzlies. But I think that they. Wolves are the reason that black bears don't occur up on the North Slope or Seward Peninsula where that doesn't have trees. Yukon Delta, Alaska Peninsula. None of those places really have enough trees for black bears to go up. And I think that wolves kill them anytime they come across them, because our dogs did. And they didn't have trouble killing them one time. First time that happened, I was with Little John and we tried to get the dogs to back off so we could kill the bear. Because what bears do is they lay on their back. Once the dogs grab them, they lay on their back and they try to swipe at them with their claws and stuff, and they try to bite too, but the dogs don't seem to get hurt at all by it. And they kind of turn them to burger bloodshot pretty quickly.

[B]

Yeah. If you did an autopsy on a bear that your dogs killed, what would the autopsy say?

[A]

Well, they just got. They got bite marks all over in their. In their chest. In their neck.

[B]

But they never think that, like, they don't know enough to, like, crush throat or something. They don't. They're not strategic.

[A]

No, they're, they, they would, you know, bite the inside of the back legs and the belly. When we would open them up, they'd be all bloodshot.

[B]

It was, yeah, but just doesn't seem like that would add up enough.

[A]

Well, they did it with black bears three times that I remember.

[B]

I wonder if, like, the stress is also real bad.

[A]

Oh, I imagine it's enormous. Yeah.

[B]

Like, also leads to mortality.

[A]

Yeah. They killed one grizzly.

[B]

Your dogs killed a grizzly?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And that grizzly didn't get any of the dogs killed.

[A]

I think that it was a young grizzly. And I think what happened is it broke its back. It, it flopped on its back on a rock as it was up in the Sheep Mountains. And we saw the dogs chasing this bear over the, over a little ridge. And when we got up to the top, they were all just laying around next to it and it was dead.

[B]

These dogs are real menace, man.

[A]

In body, they're wolves. In mind they're not, but in body they are. And of course, they behaved kind of like a pack when they would encounter something.

[B]

They're bold.

[A]

They were bold. Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

What do you, what's like, what's kind of the biggest lesson you took away from. Like, what's the biggest life lesson you took away from living in the bush?

[A]

Oh, God.

[B]

Like something you realized about people. You know.

[A]

Biggest life lesson or like.

[B]

A valuable lesson, you know, whatever.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I don't know what the hell difference in a valuable lesson and life lesson is, but, like, what's something you carried with you from it?

[A]

I don't know. I, I, I guess I always, in doing that, I realized I can, I can do anything, you know, I can, I can persevere. I can navigate whatever comes up. I don't really know, but it was, you know, there. I look at, for example, I look at the folks clustered, you know, homeless folks in town, and I say, there were me, I'd be out the road, I'd be out on the river because I can make a living there.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

In town it's a lot harder. But I don't know, just thinking, I mean, I realize there's a lot of different reasons that people might be homeless and I wouldn't degrade that at all. But for me, I really think being out on the country is a neat place and there's ways to go about feeding yourself there.

[B]

What did you see you had to have encountered guys in that time. You had to encounter guys that were going to go do it but just didn't work. Like it wasn't going to work.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Did you have. Would you be able to gauge. When you met somebody, would you be able to gauge off your own intuition? You have what it takes. You don't have what it takes. Like, would you know someone was headed for trouble?

[A]

I don't know that I would. At least not right away. Yeah. You know, after you get to know somebody, you realize, you know, these guys, they. They need their motors, you know, and. And be able to move places really fast. And. And that's not something that we did. We. We didn't. So. So by having motors, you need a lot of money. Right. I mean, it's just the way it works. Snow machine or a big boat to go up and down the Yukon and that's a lot of money is really not to be had out in the woods. At least it. It certainly wasn't for. For us. Even if you have a Goodyear trap and you're not going to buy a snow machine and spend it on that, you know.

[B]

So you would view reliance on motors at that time, reliance on motors was a deficit?

[A]

Well, I mean, I felt it was. I mean, I didn't want to go to get the job. You know, there were a lot of people that went worked up on the pipeline, you know, when that was happening back in that period of time. And, and it was good wages and everything, but they. That's where they lived.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

You know, they were.

[B]

And you were never. You were never drawn to that?

[A]

I wasn't. Yeah.

[B]

Were you running into guys at that time? Were there guys coming out of Vietnam, coming. Coming home and going into the bush? Were you encountering that?

[A]

No, I think out there were to. To the. To the communities there, like Eagle and. And Circle.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

You know, Tanana and like returning veterans.

[B]

Were going into those communities to live, but you weren't seeing them off. Living off the land out in the bush.

[A]

Yeah. I don't know if you. There definitely was that happening. I don't know whether it was a movement per se, but it was. There were some people that were ex Vietnam.

[B]

Your circle of guys, what was the commonality, if you had to think of one, in your circle of folks and you're. When you say. Because you often use the term, we, we would do this, we would do that.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

In your circle of folks, what were they? What was pushing them? What was pulling them? What was pushing them? Where were they? Coming from?

[A]

Yeah, you know, a lot of it was just back to the land type, you know, adventure, going out and trapping, living in the woods. I think they liked what I did, which was the ability to go out and get my own food. And I did a lot of tanning. I sewed my own clothes, the winter clothes anyway. I tried leather for the summer and it didn't work so well. It just got wet because it's always going to rain at some point you're going to walk through bushes and have your leather pants soaking wet. Yeah. I don't know. I like the idea of building things out of what's there and being able to feed myself. I mean, there were things that we were buying from town, you know, the rifle, gillnet plastic eventually for the bottom of the toboggan, you know, so it slid better than just straight birch boards, which is what I used for a few years to start with. Yeah. Aluminum canoe, you know. Yeah. There were a lot of things that we brought. We weren't in any way like, you know, previous times with the native folks. There's they. They truly made everything and, and worked it and it was, it. It was pretty great. So one thing that happened when I was down in Chevac, I mentioned Chevac, I think when Karen was teaching, we had gone out to there on the Yukon Delta, right. And I remember one time when I was going downstream, I had fixed this old double end canoe. It was a fiberglass canoe. And this one woman there let me use it because I patched it up for her. And I would take the tide out from this river and hunt ducks and things. And I had a gill net in for some fish. And one time when I was down there, I don't know, 10, 15 miles away from Chevac, I started coming back in with the tide and this old man waves me down and I pulled over and wanted to ride. I said, jump in. He had all skin clothes and he had these hip boots that were made out of seal skins and sewed with this grass in the thread. It was some sort of sinew thread, but they would put in a blade of grass with it and that would. My understanding was that that would swell when it got wet and help to seal it. Yeah, it was outrageous. And he just sat there with his feet in the water, just like me with my rubber hip boots.

[B]

Guy had you out badassed.

[A]

Totally, totally. Yeah. No, it was great. It was cool to see and so, I mean, we did that sort of stuff with the, you know, tanning hides and sewing clothes with them. And various things, but not like that.

[B]

You know, when I was talking in the beginning of the show, I was talking about these American history things. Were doing one on Daniel Boone and the long hunters, then the mountain. The mountain men like Jim Bridger and then the buffalo hide hunters.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So it's funny because those buffalo hide hunters are a hundred years before you were living in the bush. Like, they were the sort of peak hide Hunt was 1874, and you were around, you know, a century later. But one of the observations we have in that hidehunters piece we got coming out is that the long hunters, the Boone and the long hunters, Jim Bridger and the mountain men, those guys lived off the land, okay. They could produce their own clothes, source their own food. It was the part of the whole plan, right. That you like a part of the whole mountain man plan, is that you're going to have to source your food there. Was baked into the system. Boom. They'd source their own clothes, their own shoes, everything. In a pinch, they could make gunpowder.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

The hide hunters. By 18. By. By 1870, the hide hunters were. They were these fir. This first breed of market hunter that they didn't live off land. They had wagons, they carried bacon, they carried flour. They ate enormous amounts of buffalo meat. But they didn't make clothes like they. They. These were guys that would write letters and order.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And it's. And so it's like.

[A]

They.

[B]

They look. They would. If you saw them, they would look like gunfighters in their attire. Right. They were. No, at that point, 1870, they're no longer living off the land. You feeding yourself some, but you're not responsible for all that anymore. Maybe that's why they're more effective killers. There's no time. Like, they lived in tents, man.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

They had access to canvas tents. They had wagons. They had to reload ammo. But they wore cotton, they wore wool, they wore linen. Didn't make tools, just bought tools, carried extras of everything, you know. That was a century before your time, though.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So the fact that a century later, you were still doing what you did is remarkable.

[A]

Yeah. And you couldn't really do it in lower 48. You sort of could.

[B]

You'd land in jail.

[A]

Yeah. You'd get chased away. Eventually. There were people in the mountains in northern New Mexico who would live in some of the caves and do gardens and things. But the foresters, as I understand it, would go and chase them away every few years so that they didn't have the adverse possession thing in Alaska. The adverse possession Was they made it so that it didn't apply because it was such huge land masses that they couldn't afford to keep track of them all. Mm. And so it never was an issue. And we didn't. We didn't own property either out there. You know, some. Some. I mean, it was in that transition period, you know, and, you know, the. The native claim settlement had gone on and there were. There were. You know, a lot of the time was. Well, some of the time was before Anilka, but even then, you know, nobody knew what land would become, what ownership for quite a while.

[B]

There's places you can still make a pretty good go of it. You could because you got all the non game squirrel, porcupines, stuff like that. Very long waterfowl seasons like you, you know, extended camping periods. Like this place is in a canoe, just rod and reel. You're not gonna be able to net. But like, there's places you could make a go of it for sure. If someone had the audacity.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. It'd be easy in the summer and easy if you moved pretty regular. Yeah. There's nothing stopping you from doing that. But there's a few private land holdings that somebody could pick up and then make a go of it, you know, so that you couldn't get. You could build something that was.

[B]

No one can run you off.

[A]

Yeah, well.

[B]

Yeah, well, man, I gotta get. But man, I'm so glad you came back. I had a lot of these questions I needed to clarify.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. We didn't get to fish, though. I know.

[B]

Next time. Next time you come out, we're gonna just talk about fish research.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Like just to titillate people ahead of time. I'm gonna tell them how you can tell. Want to. Well, the whole thing with salmon, sharks and salmon.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That's interesting. What they do that. We're gonna do the fish episode next. It'll be a three part.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And next time, we're not gonna do any recap on John the Baptist.

[A]

There you go.

[B]

We're gonna dive right into fish.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Fish research. Because just to. Just to remind folks, in. In preparation for Randy's next visit, when he quit the bush, you became like a full on fish researcher. A fish biologist.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Your second life.

[A]

I know. And that's been really rewarding too. Yeah, yeah.

[B]

All right. Next time. I'm serious.

[A]

All right.

[B]

Next time's the fish episode. The final episode. The fish episode. It'll be like. How many installments are there in Lord of the Rings? Three.

[A]

Well, there's the Hobbit.

[B]

I don't count the Salmarillion.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Not counting the Hobbit.

[A]

It's a three pack.

[B]

It's a three pack. Or we'll go back in time and hit the Hobbit later.

[A]

One last thing on, please. On the Lord of the Rings. Yeah. So when we were. When we were living out. There was a time when we felt like we were the good guys, you know, we were the Fellowship. Yeah. We were fine. Right. And then we started reading these passages in Lord of the Rings, you know, with. What was it? The. The oryx or something with. With these areas where there's just all these dead bones from things that they'd eaten. And we start looking around and we go, well, that, that looks more like us than anything else. But it was true, you know, because you can't get rid of the bones. They're always going to be there. Dogs chew them and they're there.

[B]

That's a part about. That's a part about death in the barrens.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

As they're dying, they get to digging out all their old bones.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And trying to boil them and all that. And that left more trouble for them.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know what I did after reading that book because I was curious about it? I took some rawhide and boiled it and ate it.

[A]

Did you? Yeah. Hair and all?

[B]

No, no, no. I just boiled the rawhide. I boiled it and boiled and boiled it till it turned into like a gelatin.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I didn't eat enough to clog my. You know, I didn't have to have the Mrs. Do an enema on me.

[A]

But I might say.

[B]

Yeah, I had a couple. Yeah, a couple strips just to see. It kind of had like a. It had like a noodly. Like a very gelatinous noodly quality to it. But I didn't eat enough to die or anything, you know, as evidenced by my presence.

[A]

Exactly. Yeah.

[B]

Yeah, I. Dude, I gotta run.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

All right. Next time, fish.

[A]

Thanks for having me.

[B]

Yeah, thank you, man.

[A]

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[B]

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