Speaker 1: 0:15

Hey everybody, welcome back to the Son of a Blitz podcast. I am your host, george Blitz, and this is going to be a very, very fun episode for y'all to tune into. My guest today is Jesse Griffiths. You guys might know him from owning the restaurant Dai Duet in Austin. He's cooking and hunting school new school of traditional cookery. You can learn about both of those at DaiDuetcom, the A-I-D-U-Ecom, and you might be familiar with his cookbooks, a field as well as the hog book, which show one of James Beard Award as well. And now, as of today technically yesterday, but now he is offering the pre-orders for the latest cookbook, the turkey book.

Speaker 1: 0:59

This book is phenomenal. It takes you through the journey of his last turkey hunting season where he goes to Texas, georgia, oregon and Connecticut. He's got so many wonderful buddies that are with him Ben O'Brien's there, jean-paul Bourgeois, you got Jonathan Wilkins, you got Elias Cairo, brad Leone, dan Meiser. I mean just some really wonderful people and great chefs. And what are they doing after they're hunting? They're cooking some wild turkey. They're sharing those recipes. You got Jody Horton and Sam Everett that are there taking photos along the way Some phenomenal photography in this book.

Speaker 1: 1:36

And Jesse really upped his game in writing and these are the narrative, and him writing through this and talking about the dishes that are created in their time out in the field. It's really, really entertaining and educational. I mean, it's hard to put this book down. My wife, meg can attest I was reading it every single night and then flipped it over and started it again. I love this book. It's great. I think you guys are all going to enjoy it.

Speaker 1: 2:00

Get something from it. You know, as far as like the cookbook nature of things, there's an index of cuts on. You know each page We'll talk about. You know if you're going to be doing the thighs, if you're going to be doing the wings, if you're going to be doing the breast, if you're going to be doing some slow cooking stuff. There's just a little bit of something for everyone. No matter how you want to cook it, there's something there for you. And there's a lot of inclusions of not only Jesse's dishes, but some of you know the guys I just mentioned too. There's a lot of their dishes that are in there as well. So you kind of get a taste and flavor and background from a lot of different chefs from all across the country that bring in together.

Speaker 1: 2:37

I think the best representation of cooking turkey and turkey hunting that is out there. So you guys go over to the wildbookscom today and place your preorder for this book. There's also going to be some package deals with the Turkey Federation where you can get a membership and you can get a little discount on the book too. So go check out those bundles. I mean there's going to be some really cool stuff for you guys to check out on that website. Go order the hogbook if you haven't already. That is just a phenomenal book as well. I can't say enough about all the wonderful things Jesse's been part of and just this stand up great guy who really cares about conservation and educating people and teaching people to teach others. It's infectious. He's got a great spirit. I love sitting down with him. He's a great guy and I think you guys are going to learn a lot from him and be entertained by this podcast. So, without further ado, here is my podcast with Jesse Griffiths. You all enjoy it. Jesse, how are you doing today, man?

Speaker 2: 3:34

I'm great. How have you been, George?

Speaker 1: 3:36

I've been really good man. You had a good hunting season so far.

Speaker 2: 3:39

I've had. Yes, yes, I have. It's been fairly mellow. I'm saving myself for spring, so I mean I feel like I've got so many expendable days per year and I put them in the bank in fall and winter and I'm going to cash them in in the spring, so it's been a good one. But I'm just I'm it's really going to get going here in a little while.

Speaker 1: 4:02

So obviously we got turkey season coming up. Yesterday you just announced the arrival of the turkey book. You started pre-orders. Man, just let's lay that out a little bit. Man, this is a fascinating book. You sent me a digital copy. I went through it and it is phenomenal. Why don't you go ahead and just kind of maybe set up to the listeners what this one is about, what they're going to come and do expect from the turkey book?

Speaker 2: 4:25

Yeah Well, thank you first off, I appreciate the kind review Cheers. Yeah, we put this one together pretty fast and conceptually I always say this all the time it's like dress for the job you want, and I'm like I want to do some more turkey hunting, and so the best way to justify that sometimes is to write a book about it, which is what I decided to do and as it developed conceptually, I realized that I didn't want to repeat the hog book. I didn't want to just do like just all the butchery and everything kind of like encapsulated the same way, and what it really kind of panned out and became in the end was more of a journal where we just took the slice of one season. We started in Texas, which is further south, and the season opened earlier, and then we ended up in Connecticut in late or probably mid to late May of the same season and just kind of decided to take it as almost like a journal with a ton of recipes in it. And so, like I said, we started in Texas, then we went to Georgia, then went to Oregon and then went to Connecticut.

Speaker 2: 5:41

So we hit some very diverse geographic regions it's very diverse cultural regions and hunted for different turkeys in very different circumstances, with a bunch of very, I think, interesting people that were either chefs that love to hunt turkeys or turkey hunters that love to cook turkeys, and so what that gave us was this like multiple perspectives and inputs as far as hunting turkeys and also how to cook them, and then we were cooking them in real time and as we, as we were cooking turkeys in camp which I think is really important it's just like I like to eat turkey while I'm turkey hunting Sorry, you know, and it's like so, you know, we get one and we cook the liver and the gizzard, or we throw a leg in the crock pot or this or that, and then we would document that as we went, sometimes I'm cooking, sometimes they're cooking, and so we got a lot of recipes out of it. That way, as long as a lot of really just great hunting stories I thought I mean just like real. Some of them were kind of, you know, boring. You know I mean boring. Stuff didn't really make the book. You know, like I'm not going to document sitting under a tree for seven, seven hours. I think anybody's ever been turkey hunting knows what your legs feel like after that happens. But you know we had. You know we had to run in with a poacher we had. You know we got scooped on public land, somebody shot our bird. You know we had an instant success. We had long waits. We had name it bad weather. You know it was like hot, it was snowing all over the place and so that really influenced those stories a lot.

Speaker 2: 7:19

And then the ability to weave in some of the real time recipes. And then in between we took some of the hog book approach and doing some butchery diagrams, which you know it's turkeys, a lot smaller, doesn't require the same like finesse and variety that you would approach a hog with, or a deer for that matter, but there I think there is a lot of really interesting butchery that can be done with turkeys that will just improve how they cook and just improve your overall experience with eating them, and so kind of diverged into that between chapters and then address the different major parts of the turkey and then did banks of recipes in between, like as between these hunts. I'd be like playing around at home and be like I'm going to try this with turkey and so just creating a lot more recipes to go along with it. And I think we ended up with about 115 recipes, and all of them I I I really wanted all the recipes to be very unique.

Speaker 2: 8:22

You know, something new. If it was a classic recipe, I wanted to add a new twist. If it was, if it was something that I could present, a technique you know, like here's how to just simply roll enchiladas, but then we provide four different sauces after that. So I think that you know, building up people's kind of roll adex of skills in the kitchen is really important too, and as you compile books or watch YouTube videos and stuff and you start to get familiar with how to make a certain type of dish, then you can start to vary from that, and I think that really gives people confidence in the kitchen. So we focused a lot on that too.

Speaker 2: 9:03

As far as recipes delved into culture and history and little things like that, like the role of the NWTF, you know, and just talking to people that were in conservation and all kinds of stuff, land management, we just tried to weave as much as we could in there and, all told, turned it around pretty quick, got it to the printer and, if you know fingers crossed it should be should be here right before turkey season, which would be a pretty fast turnaround considering that we went on these turkey hunts last turkey season.

Speaker 1: 9:36

So yeah, that's a super fast turnaround. I mean most people I know work on books. It's like a two year thing, man. I mean for you to be able to knock this out and within that, before the next season starts, you have this book in hand. Congratulations on that, man. I mean it's, it's a phenomenal book. I really I was very impressed.

Speaker 1: 9:56

I've always thought you were a good writer.

Speaker 1: 9:57

From you know reading, you know other books and just times you may post and things, and you're very eloquent and this really took it to another level.

Speaker 1: 10:05

I really enjoyed reading, along with the hunts, and kind of getting you know your perspective on different things that were happening and just kind of, obviously, the wild world of unpredictable turkeys, man, you just never know what's going to happen and there's some really funny stories in there and there's some serious stuff too. I'll jump into that in a little bit. But I kind of wanted to ask about, as far as you know, jesse the writer, what, when you decided that you're going to write this book and then you have these hunts are what does it look like for your process of writing? Are you taking notes throughout these hunts to kind of keep things fresh? Are you looking back on videos and photography and stuff, to maybe kind of, you know, scoop up some of those memories. What does that look like? And then, how did you like what was your discipline, I guess, for sitting down and actually writing it as well? So you know, just kind of very curious about that side of things.

Speaker 2: 10:55

Yeah well, I think, to this day I don't even consider myself a writer.

Speaker 2: 10:59

I just like transcribe what I would be saying out loud, if that makes any sense I would take notes on my phone, like, especially if somebody I was in the car with said something really interesting, I'd just be like, you know, like oh, that was great, kevin, would you say that again please? You know, and Kevin had a lot of them, kevin Harlander, my friend, he's up in Oregon, he, he just has just a constant flow of wisdom and it's just very subtle. I'm like man, he just sitting over, it's like 445 in the morning and you're this smart. But I would, you know, take some notes and really just try to, you know, just mostly to preserve memory, because after four days of hunts sometimes things get a little foggy, like the sequence especially you add in, like just abject boredom and then punctuated by a lot of adrenaline. You know, just so it makes things hard to focus and I would try to, I would try to ride on the plane back.

Speaker 2: 11:54

So I mean, a lot of times I was flying to these places because they're so far away and I would, I would try to create a skeleton of the, of that story on the way back. And then you know, like, from there it's just like early mornings, I just get up and before the, before the house really wakes up. I would just try to hammer out a little bit here and there and try to refine it and and just went from there. And yeah, I'm really appreciate you saying that because I love, I love hunting stories. I always have. I remember when I was a kid my parents gave me Jimmy Carter's book. The president, former president, he wrote an outdoor book on about hunting and fishing and I had this when I was like eight and I think it was then that I really realized that I I loved, I just loved reading stories about hunting.

Speaker 2: 12:46

You know, like you know, I was sitting, I was sitting under the tree and then like and then what you know, and so I enjoy stories, and so I think that you know obviously that's what that's the approach I take to, and I hope that everybody else enjoys stories too. So, yeah, that was kind of how I went about it, and I think it, I think it worked well to convey not only my voice, but the voice of all these other people that I was, you know, so lucky to hunt with.

Speaker 1: 13:13

Yeah, and there's quite a cast. I mean, in your Texas you had Jean Paul, you had Ben O'Brien. Jonathan Wilkins from Black Duck Revival was there as well. Was there anybody else? That was a part of that. Am I missing?

Speaker 2: 13:27

Well, just the photographer. Who's the silent and visible photographer? That was there the whole time, so mostly Jody Horton who.

Speaker 2: 13:35

I've worked with. This is our third book together, but in Georgia and Oregon we worked with a new photographer who was just a recommendation and turned out to be just a real, incredible human being, sam Averitt, and he came from a hunting background and so we brought him along. His photography is phenomenal, but more so he was also able to feel like. I mean his positioning just the way that he moved into the woods was that of a hunter. And, of course, jody, who has always provided just the most excellent food photography and in the field photography as well, you know. So he would go out with us in Texas and in Connecticut and capture a lot of really good stuff. So I mean, still photography in Turkey's is hard, I mean, as is video. If you watch YouTube, these, those guys that self film their hunts, I'm just like you guys are insane, like they're so good at it. But you know, capturing the most wary of birds with the, with the camera, can be hard, but yes there was that.

Speaker 2: 14:37

That was the sorry. I diverged a little bit, but that was the crew from from Texas, and then in Georgia we were with Chris Jenkins, who is a conservationist and he's a member of the BHA board and he runs a project called the Oriental Society in southeast Georgia. And then up in Oregon I was with Elias Cairo, who's a chef, and also my friend Kevin Harlander, who's kind of just been in the hunting industry forever, and then in Connecticut, chef Dan Meiser and Bradley O'Neal who's Bradley O'Neal? Who does a little bit of everything.

Speaker 1: 15:16

Yeah, indeed, I actually just interviewed him and we talked like a little bit about his book too, which kind of was like a year of him going out and you know hunting, fishing, foraging and cooking and just like it was really cool, man. I just you know those last his you know book and then yours, last two that I've really jumped in on is really neat to see the idea of like storylines going through weaving in with cooking. But it's, I feel like there's like that real time thing where you know, like you said, you're taking pictures and you guys are cooking these dishes there and then you're borrowing, you're like, hey, you know, elias has this one, brad has this one, jean-paul has this, and you're bringing those in and having. You know, I mean I haven't seen a lot of cookbooks where someone puts it out and they're sharing a bunch of other people's stuff, I mean, unless it's like a big collective cookbook. And I really really appreciated that. You, there's just different flavors. Obviously, you got Jean-Paul and what he's bringing in, that Ken and Cajun style and stuff. And you know, east Coast, everything's a little bit different and everyone has their own you know kind of repertoire of what they're going to bring to the table, but I really love the variety of the recipes and I mean it's just, man, it's such a great book, Like you said, the images are second to none.

Speaker 1: 16:25

Man, you've got a great team with you there and it's just fun getting the personalities. It's a very entertaining book and educational like. But best of both worlds, man. I mean, I love the hogbook, I love a field. I've used them often, I share them with friends, I've given them as gifts. Like those are phenomenal and there's nothing that's taken away from that. It's just something about getting a little bit more of the story and the writing Just really, I don't know man, it just it resonated with me and again, not trying to toot your horn too much, but like I want to see more writing, man, it was phenomenal. I just I loved reading everything you have and weaved it together really well. I really liked how you also brought in some Some interesting takes. There was the guys Adriano, I know I got his name here the, the Italian pop star.

Speaker 1: 17:16

Love that reference. Why don't you? Can you set that up real quick? You want to go ahead and tell people a little bit about that and what your reference was there.

Speaker 2: 17:22

Yeah, you know, I I think this spring were probably. I'm gonna, I'll get to, I'll get that. Really, I'm buddies with the, the guys in the element you know, yeah, they're phenomenal humans. I love them so much. We're gonna go on a turkey hunt. I'm very I'm I don't know never been on a video turkey hunt and I'm very nervous because my calling is I brought. Is it's rocious? Maybe I don't know something. It works though.

Speaker 1: 17:51

You know it works.

Speaker 2: 17:52

I mean this I got. I got turkey in the free.

Speaker 1: 17:56

Four States man.

Speaker 2: 17:58

Well, to be clear, I wasn't doing all of the calling. Ben is like I got you. Why don't you put that thing away? I'm not the best and I I tend to overanalyze things, or maybe I just like. I just have a different perspective. And In the 70s there was this time I and pop star, and I guess at the time Maybe he was a little bitter or frustrated that pretty much any American pop song, no matter the quality, would you know, be at the top of the charts in Italy and all they had, all it had to be, was just like an American pop song. So he retaliated by recording this song. That sounds like English and it's it. It. The song is objectively great too. I mean, it's just like it is a total banger. It is, it is just awesome. But and you, you're listening to and you're like yeah.

Speaker 2: 18:55

I mean, even as an English speaker, you're like other skies. But what is he saying, you know? But? And he's not saying anything, it's just Jibberish. And so, yeah, I equated my turkey calling to that where I think, and not to anthropomorphize Turkeys too much, some people are very offended by that. I do it all the time, I don't. I Just, I guess I have to latch on to some kind of perspective, you know, just some, some reasoning as to why the animals behave a certain way. And the only way I can, you know, figure it out as to put it in a human term, and I assume that these, the goblers are just like. What is she saying? It's good enough, I guess. Like it's definitely it's a hen, I think, I don't know, but anyway, but I do kind of equate my calling with with that song, which is just absolute gibberish, with the exception he does say All right, it's funny. Yeah, any listeners out there, do yourselves a favor and go check that song out, it's very yes, adriano Silentano.

Speaker 1: 20:03

The name is like it's 24 letters it's. You'll just have to look it up if you just write American gibberish or something in there and do the search Adriano Silentano. But it I remember hearing this years ago and hadn't heard about that song I mean in like a decade, you know. I mean obviously you and I are both way into music and stuff, so it was like, when I saw that reference, like I know that and I completely know what you're saying.

Speaker 1: 20:27

There's been times I'm calling a turkey in and you're like, all right, cool, it's coming in. All of a sudden you hear like a real hen, you know sound off and it's like turning go in the other way. I'm like it was almost there. It was almost there, if that and wasn't there. Maybe I could have called a man, but yeah, pretty much so. Another thing that I was wondering, and this is a very, very serious question how did you survive a morning hunt without coffee? What happened there?

Speaker 2: 20:55

What it was. It was brutal and I don't even know how that all went down. I mean, it's one of those things where you're the guest and you know, I'm just keep nervously like looking around, I'm just like when, where is the, where is it? You know, it's just like I mean there was maybe six of us in a room and it's it's morning, sun's not up, and I'm like one of them, another one of them has got to make this move and I didn't really want to be the one and eventually we were running so far behind because we were having to fill out our, our, our permission slips, multiple, multiple, because we're like planning on potentially hunting and like three or four different properties that day. So each one of us is filling out.

Speaker 2: 21:40

This is Connecticut, by the way which I mean and then I think my brain is just trying to grasp that as well, like, why all the paperwork? You know, if this was Texas it'd be like you guys ready Well.

Speaker 1: 21:52

I'll be actually like don't shoot anyone.

Speaker 2: 21:53

Yeah, here's a cup of coffee. Are you guys ready? And but no, it was. It was very different and so we're, we're trying to fill these out. I think it wasn't a common. It wasn't people being inhospitable. We were also very behind, sure, sure, and needed to get the. You know, it was starting to get light outside.

Speaker 2: 22:11

We still a lot of people to rally sure drive, you know, and it was just like we gotta, we gotta make this happen. And so, yeah, it was a yeah, no joking aside, yeah, hooking our hunting without a Coffee is is rough, it's rough.

Speaker 1: 22:26

Yeah Well, I mean, you know, this is like my baby blanket for Linus, kind of thing like this. I'm keeping this around all the time. I always have coffee in it. I mean I can be drinking it to the Cheers, sir.

Speaker 2: 22:35

Cheers to you, my coffee yeah.

Speaker 1: 22:40

And I just saw that and I was like wait, I can't imagine a hunt without coffee in. So it was, it was. It was tough, but you know it's y'all got it done, so it worked out. When you get back, like you guys, tomorrow morning, you gotta have some coffee, yeah, I think I think we made.

Speaker 2: 22:58

We made like strong countermeasures the next day. I think there was some plotting, you know, between the other coffee drinkers but to, to be clear, been a Brian has never, and I repeat, has never tasted coffee. He, and now he's in it so far as a Fully grown non-coffee consumer that he can't do it. You know what I mean. Like, once you get to a certain point you can't go back. And so Ben, my, my dear friend, has never tasted copies. Of course, smelled it and seen people consuming it, but he, it has never passed his lips.

Speaker 1: 23:32

But loving you include that you like real-life coffee. And then bin didn't, because he didn't drink coffee, so he did whatever non-coffee drinkers do. Yeah, it's the mystery what do you have? Tea water? What water?

Speaker 2: 23:46

Yeah well, he's also a very good turkey hunter and he's very alert in the mornings.

Speaker 1: 23:51

That's so there you go, he doesn't need it, man. He's got the natural caffeine kicking or something, man.

Speaker 2: 23:56

Good for him.

Speaker 1: 23:58

So I wanted to guess you know I was gonna ask you too about what you have planned this season. You know you're talking about working with, you know the Ellen boys, Tyler Jones, Casey Smith I assume you know they're Texas based. You're probably be doing something in Texas. Can you kind of talk about the region you're hunting, maybe without giving too much away?

Speaker 2: 24:15

Yeah, hill Country will be out. You know which is my favorite place to hunt turkeys in Texas. I mean, I don't know that's that's a ridiculous statement anywhere. I don't care. In fact I would love to be able to diversify that places I've hunted turkeys in Texas. But yeah, I'll be Hunting with them, I think in early April, which should be, if, if nothing else, peak blue bonnets, especially at this property. I went there last year, did not shoot a turkey there, but Stunning I mean like, like postcard looking property as far as blue bonnets go, like just I mean incredible and then milk thistle and Oaks and hills and stuff like that. So yeah, hill Country, not too far from here, probably an hour and a half from Austin, but yeah, doing that, a lot, of, a lot of Texas hunts lined up, probably maybe too many. I mean, take four birds so I can too many turkeys.

Speaker 2: 25:11

I'm you know I mean too many well, my fear being is that you know I might have I'm getting way ahead of myself but definitely a lot of opportunities and I will go on all of them, even if I am for some Magical reason tagged out, I'll still go and carry decoys or whatever for for someone else. Little trip to New Mexico plan to which I'm exceedingly excited about. I've never hunted Turkeys, or anything in New Mexico for that matter. I've got a lot of familial connections there. My my mom's family is from New Mexico and cool.

Speaker 2: 25:48

I've always, always traveled there for vacations in the summer since I was kid and I just love New Mexico and finally was able to put together a trip there. It'll be all public land, you know, just a real challenge. You know going in blind. You know, never having been even to this region and going in and hunting. You know my pressured turkeys in the mountains. So it's gonna be, it's gonna be hard. I mean, I'm already Trying to focus on just like. If you get a bird, you're gonna be like that's gonna be great. You know like, far beyond your expectations and I'm really going into it with just like. It'll be a Good way to just earn some experience, you know, in doing that and chase them in a different spot. But also it's turkey hunting might shoot one of the first 15 minutes, just because you never know that in the book you'll notice I kill a turkey on the first day in every spot.

Speaker 1: 26:49

I Know part of these like and you're also Calling for someone else, and some of those sits too, like they came around to you, like it's amazing, like you're like buddy out here, but that is true, Well that's I mean that's that really drove home.

Speaker 2: 27:06

And I want to be really clear when I say that I killed at one. On the first, I am, I'm not good, I am, I'm, I don't know what I am. You know, I'm a little bit lucky. But that situation where I would be, you know, I was the host in Texas. In both times I was like, hey, you're, you're at bat here, we, we've had a turkey, you know, and we're talking to him, and both times that turkey circled around to me and I was doing the calling.

Speaker 2: 27:33

And I think that the the real take home there is that you cannot underestimate their echo location abilities. Like they have that sound dialed to a square foot, maybe, like so, even if you're sitting four feet away from the ground, like so, even if you're sitting four feet away from your friend, they, they're coming to the sound of that and that's and they've got that so dialed. And if the brush dictates, then they're gonna circle around at both times and we always function on it Like whoever's got the shot, take it. You know it's like. You know I would prefer it if it was, you know, my buddy.

Speaker 2: 28:12

In both times, and one time it was Jonathan, one time it was John Paul, you know, both times I'm like, okay, buddy, you are, you're, you're up. And then both times I'm like I'm doing this because you know we might not have another opportunity. Sure, so yeah, but it was, it was pretty incredible, and you just, it's just one of the thousands of things that you can learn about these birds and our discoverers, just like how, how truly fascinating they are, how, how, how masterful they are at living, surviving in the woods.

Speaker 1: 28:42

Yeah, what are some other takeaways that maybe you know, maybe cumulative knowledge over the years or something that was maybe Maybe highlighted or something new that you learned? Maybe you know Kind of a side from that and the idea that they're coming to the calls and they have that, you know, direct focus. Is there some other things you kind of picked up throughout this year and you know, working in many different states and different lands, that you're on?

Speaker 2: 29:05

Yeah, I mean, I think that like it's, you know it's just sounds tried, but patience, you know, you really Not. Not sometimes, a lot of times you really have to slow down a lot and and really just like like, take it easy and make more calculated decisions, except when you don't want to do that and you want to move very quickly, very quick decisions. That's a total non-answer but. But I think most of the time I would be better served personally in my approach To slowing it down a little bit and not overthinking and also realizing that they might be on their way. And that's what I love about Watching other, more experienced hunters is how they can often tell that they're on the way or they have it. They're like I think he's on his way and I'm just like how do you know that? I would be second guessing and say, if I don't hear the turkey, he's gone the opposite way or something but which he might have.

Speaker 2: 30:04

There's. There's a lot to be learned and I think it's almost Too nuanced to summarize and I and I hope that I have conveyed that in the book Adequately, because and but that's the great part of it it's just like when you do things right or when you look into doing things right. That's when it feels great, but also when things don't go right and you and you fail. Sometimes it stings at the time, but in retrospect it's almost always a very good feeling of just being out there and Having having at least absorbed a little bit extra knowledge. You know you just like it's just, it's just a lifetime Spent out there. It's gonna just get you closer to being great at it.

Speaker 1: 30:49

Oh, absolutely, man, I'm fascinated with turkey hunt. I was telling you know, son, the other day that I've probably killed maybe think at this time maybe 14 or 15 turkeys in my life and Really the last year or two, the first time I ever went turkey hunting, I would always just see him opportunistically on one of the ranches, grab the shotgun, you know, and be coming through the house and you know, kind of run up to the next spot with a crossing and you know I get lucky. And then it just happened like that. And then, you know, in Central Texas there's like there's a field, it's pretty bountiful for us. Each year we usually, you know, get one or two and you know, sometimes you just kind of walk to the edge of the field and they'll just kind of be there and you're taking them, you know, 50 yard shot, it's just gotten lucky. And then the other year when I started calling them in and really trying to get my buddy one, that that was a game changer, jesse, I did not understand the Infatuation that was about to come with turkey hunting. Like I mean it, it is my favorite type of hunting now and I'd love, you know you and I've talked to it, you know At length of different. You know hog hunting adventures and deer and stuff too.

Speaker 1: 31:50

But there is something about having that call and response and also that not knowing, like you're saying too, you don't know if they're coming up and sometimes all of a sudden just a little head pops up oh my gosh, like I had no idea there was anything, even here, and then you know it can turn Western real quick, man, it's. It is so exciting. And I had a buddy last year Collin he's the other half of Matt, my ranch and we called one in and it was just past that level of where he was comfortable. But he was like that was the coolest thing, because we actually walked underneath the tree that we thought was a good one and all of a sudden we heard them all going up. We were underneath the Rouge tree and we're like, oh, let's step back, yeah, and had no idea, like I thought they were in another tree from the night before, right, and so they just kind of moved game, and so that was the most exciting thing and it was.

Speaker 1: 32:34

I kind of bring that back to the idea of some of the things of preparing for success, one of the things you mentioned in your book and you even have a picture too of like a turkey head target that has like the kind of the glow spots wherever you shoot you'll see where the BBs are gonna hit, see if you get a vital shot. And you know you talked about Going in and making sure you guys are pattern patterning your gun, because my buddy, if he had gone and tested at 50 yards he would have seen he'd be hit vitals with his shotgun. But he didn't do that ahead of time and so he was. He didn't know his distance, and I think that's something that's really important.

Speaker 1: 33:06

And I kind of want to talk a little bit to you about your equipment, what you use. I know you talked about a red dot and you're using that. That's something I haven't done, so I'm very curious to pick your brain on. You know what you think of that verse. You know just regular iron sights and such and Kind of preparing like what? What advice do you give to people so that they can get a turkey in their hands and then be able to utilize your book to kind of explore further. Maybe some you know lessons that you kind of learned throughout your years and what you saw some of these other hunters do as far as preparation, I mean, I assume, range time is probably, you know, step one, right?

Speaker 2: 33:40

Certainly, but with the cost of TSS, range time can be real short, you know it's like how much time do you want to spend throwing $15 down range at the shot? But I mean, I, you know the point must be made that people have killed turkeys with, you know, a standard pump, you know and, and number six led for many, many years and they've killed them adequately and you know, and with great skill, I would say you know technologically and I'm not, I'm not even we're close like a gearhead or I get really excited about this stuff. I usually choose the most functional tool in my price range and so, yeah, I've settled on I. I used to do a gear son semi-auto that I really like a lot. It's just been, you know, you can beat it up pretty good and put a red dot on it, and that was super helpful and, to be very clear, the red dot was given to us, you know. So it's like I mean I get, I want to be very, very transparent about these.

Speaker 2: 34:44

It's like would I have put a red dot on there, otherwise I don't know, probably I think I would have eventually the red dot I put on about halfway through the season. So I actually didn't have it. Oh no, I'm sorry, I put it on after the first hunt and so I do Credit that red dot with two of my turkeys that were shot at such awkward angles that I don't know if I could have personally Made that shot, and both of them were pretty long shots, over 40, probably over 45 yards on both of them. One of them completely twisted 180 degrees around, the other one at a very awkward uphill angle With a snow drift above us in this turkey, kind of bobbing around Below the crest of this hill, and we had obviously spooked it. But it had stopped long enough and the red dot allows you to make such a quick acquisition, both eyes full and in wherever. Obviously wherever the red dot is is where where the boom's going, so that Worked out real well for me a couple times and.

Speaker 2: 35:50

I just became a real fan of of of the red dot Again, you know, shooting TSS, and Again in with the transparency you know. I got a couple boxes of it for this project and.

Speaker 2: 36:06

I After that I think I would save my pennies for it, because I firmly believe that it it's a very ethical killer too. I mean it is. It's crazy that a pellet of that size can just zip through a turkey snack, but you get a few of them on target and that turkey's gonna die, and so I feel like it's. It's a very Worth while piece of equipment, and the thing is you're not shooting dubs with it, you know, and so it's like a box. I mean, if you are able to pattern it and and then you're in Texas, then you conceivably one box of five will get you through the whole season, and you know a turkey yields a lot of meat. I'm always approaching things like that. You know, yeah, yeah, $15, you know yeah, but you know, you know, you know about, you know it yields about 55% of its body weight, and so it's 20 pounds, and so you're still, you know, you're still looking at a pretty good ratio yeah good ratio there.

Speaker 2: 37:04

You know I do like that a lot. I recently bought my daughter the Steven single shot and those things are really cool. They're very highly rated as turkey guns. They're they're about five or six pounds they're they're a little bit smaller and they're a single shot, but most of all they're.

Speaker 2: 37:28

The MSRP on these things is around $200 and they're they're very good shotguns and but you know it's a single shot but still, most, most of the time, you're gonna be okay with that and so that's what I bought, that for her, quote unquote. But I also have a strong feeling that in the mountains of New Mexico I'm gonna be lugging that thing around because it is so light and it's a little 20 gauge. So I think you know the technology is just so good these days that you're you're able to get like these little, I mean Even this cheap little single shot and then spend your money on TSS after that. You know, and so and that's that's kind of the plan is pop a red dot on that for her and then you know, be able to carry that around in Turkey Woods. And you know another thing I love about it it's like there's you can really approach it with a very like a modicum of Of equipment. You know a couple calls, whatever calls you're comfortable with.

Speaker 2: 38:26

I mean you can get a vest or not. You know you can. You can do it with a fanny pack. You know probably need a face mask, need a hat. I think gloves are probably pretty helpful. You know all these things. But you can be highly mobile. You know it's a water bottle and your gun and, you know, a sandwich in your pocket and you can pretty much get a half drum for a day, and I love that too. It's like there's. I mean of course you can go overboard with the gear. I mean, anybody you know that's into it will. But I like it because you can. You can kind of get away with just minimal gear out there.

Speaker 1: 38:59

Yeah, no, it's so. True, man and I definitely. I've started using some of the TSS this last year and Been pretty pleased with I mean I didn't get to put a shot on a Turkey last year. I was calling them in for friends and just never worked out time-wise. But patterning them I felt like I was really great grouping and you know some of the stuff that I've even tried before. It's high-end and you know it was led but it was a higher-end cost things of you know $10 a shell. It was shooting like crap for my gun but then I handed over my buddy and his was lights out with it.

Speaker 1: 39:35

So, like I encourage everybody to, you know, try grab a few things off the shelf, see what works best with your rifle and that goes for hunting. You know a deer rifle as well. You know. Find out exactly what works best with your stuff and give yourself the best chance of success, because it could be the you know $7 box of Roomington. It could be.

Speaker 1: 39:54

You know the TSS stuff and you know I definitely think there's a lot to that and that technology. It's come a long way from. You know what I grew up with. So I think you know there's like two on the shelf and I was, you know kid, get this one or that one. So we definitely have tried a bunch of them out. But it's fun to see those and those shooting see targets to. You can get them with the turkey head on and see kind of what your Success will be at different ranges. So I highly suggest that you know when we're talking about different turkeys. Obviously you know, let's see. If we got Rio Grande in Texas, the Eastern, you, the Miriam, when you were over there in Oregon, the, I guess the last one in your turkey slam would be it's the. It's called the Osa, oseola, oseola, have you had one yet?

Speaker 2: 40:39

and that's mainly in like Florida right, right, I believe there's five counties in Florida. We were in southeastern Georgia, so we were, we were, you know, close by. I mean, we're still hours from the range of the Oseola and Initially I had considered Trying to do that but then I I realized I didn't want to just portray a slam because, also with the Oseola, if you're not able to draw public there which is available, you have to put in some years of putting in but you can draw that, but then otherwise it's, it's fairly walled off and pretty expensive to do that, and so I didn't really want to represent like some sort of just just going out there for this, for this slam, yeah, but I did want to represent the topography. So that's why we chose southeastern Georgia and we were hunting palmettoswamps and pine Vanas and stuff like that. So so fairly similar to the range of the Oseola, which is kind of a if I'm, if I remember correctly, it's kind of like a sub variant of the Eastern. Then they share a lot of qualities and we were hunting Easterns there, definitely regretting and I'm the in Oregon, hard to say the buff side, but if it was a Rio it was a little on the white side, so it might have been a hybrid.

Speaker 2: 42:07

It was definitely a mountain bird and everybody I was with is like Miriam's, but if you look at a map it's. It's debatable what it was, but it definitely. You know it was a situation where I was hunting in a, in a place, in a circumstance that was so far different than anything I ever ever had. You know, like we're, we were in three foot deep snow and Hunting these and mountain birds. You know there's like a running stream, you know full of runoff, melting snow, and then pines and there's mallards flying around and you know just a total situation like that. So if not a Miriam's than a Miriam situation.

Speaker 1: 42:49

Yeah, and well, I mean you in that situation. There too, you ended up. You know, I think you were saying I forgot if it was Kevin or Ben who was like don't forget, you need to get some snow shoes right, and they're. You're like wait, huh.

Speaker 2: 43:01

Yeah, yeah it was. I mean, when checking in before we flew out for that hunt, he gave us a weather update, and I mean it. It was 17 degrees in the morning One morning when we were out there hunting, and it was, it was snowing overnight, so we'd we'd walk out and there was like a fresh layer of snow. You know Just, I mean it's spring came late that year and it made the hunting it was very, very difficult, because we just couldn't go anywhere. It was not only snow but it had a kind of an ice pack on top, and so every time you took a step it was just the loudest thing, way louder than leaves, you know, deadly, because it was just very, very loud. A very difficult hunt.

Speaker 2: 43:44

But I did still manage to get a bird on the first morning.

Speaker 2: 43:48

I mean through what we just we walked up on one and and didn't shoot that one, but we're caught in the process of calling that one in a little satellite not a little, but a satellite gobbler. I guess the subdominant bird Was like this is my chance. See, here I go again. He I think he saw his chance and he never gobbled, but we could hear him drumming above us and it was hard to tell where all these sounds were coming from. We're in this kind of canyon With a lot of running water, one very loud gobbler down the road kind of talking to us. But at the same time I kept being like is there, there's, there's a gobbler drumming right above us? And I mean like right above us. And it turns out there was.

Speaker 2: 44:38

But it was a very awkward climb and we had to, like kind of you know, find good footing and then be able to stick our heads up Just to even see we're on a very steep, probably steeper than 45 degree angle Slope at this point kind of wedged behind some trees, and it was, I think it was probably 10 to 15 yards from us up to slope and, and you know, finally, when I was able to lay eyes on it, it was Obviously able to lay eyes on me at the same time, and that's when it was. That's when it was like, okay, I got a seal to deal on this thing and so Made it work you know and got a very beautiful bird on that first morning, but yeah, it was.

Speaker 2: 45:25

It was just a lot, of, a lot of different regions and I think that was kind of our approach. You know, wanted to to delve into the subspecies. But really I think that, like you know, to the point, in Oregon it's like they've reestablish and Stocked turkeys there and the stocked Ria is there and you know, a turkey's gonna act like a mountain turkey, you know a turkey's gonna act like a mosquito flat turkey I'm a turkey is gonna act like a swamp turkey. So you know, I could be very wrong in this, but I don't know if the subspecies have different, you know, intellectual qualities or if they're more widely. Very well, might, might be, but I think that it's mostly determined by their surroundings and their day-to-day predator interactions, the hunting pressure and things like that. And so when we, when we approached the geographically, I wanted to to really just reflect on these different places that were so different and they had different trees, you know.

Speaker 2: 46:26

So there's like like, like what you know, mostly scrubby small trees, you know, interlaced with a few taller cotton woods of Oaks, would be like that's Texas versus, you know, these pine flats Out in Georgia versus these pine forests which are totally different in the Pacific Northwest and the Rockies. And then you go into this old world Forest of Connecticut where it's just these, these hardwoods and it's exactly what you think it's gonna be like up there. It's just, you know, pilgrim City, you know, it's like the, the New England, you know, and it's just picture perfect and just gorgeous woods up there. And so I think that we chose these spots to give it a just a diversity of environment.

Speaker 1: 47:13

Well, it does that and I think it paints it out really well and kind of gives you you know each one calls for different circumstance on. You know how you gonna, obviously in the snow, versus you know Some place in Texas where you know sometimes we might be sitting there in 90 degrees, 90% humidity, waiting on a turkey in the morning, and so you look at that burst, 19 degrees or whatever. You know night and day difference there and you know, like you said to all those elements that that come into how you approach them, what's the pressure looking like? What's it like? Are there other hunters? Is there calling? And you know there's so much and, like you said, it's very nuanced.

Speaker 1: 47:46

I was, you know, when you were talking about that. I was thinking about like Connecticut and like all the rock walls and stuff, and like going in because you're hunting in a lot of those places In a very like there's a lot of folks, houses around, I mean there's private lands that you got access to, but you have to be, you know, very mindful of boundaries. You know anywhere you are, but there's a you know it can, it can be dangerous, because I mean, I used to live in Western Massachusetts, I lived in Boston and I know there's parks or you just driving through in the town there's just a bunch of turkeys going through someone's yard, you know, and there may be someone who's at the end of that, you know, to park or something that's going to be hunting those. But it's Like orders and there's a lot of people. It's a whole different environment than you know, the wide open expanse and things too.

Speaker 1: 48:25

So I know, like in your book it was kind of brought me back to those. You know days of driving around those areas. I live there and kind of I could really get a sense of that and, yes, how there is a lot of times there's a lot of farmland and stuff there too, obviously. But you know there's some spots where you have to be so a little pocket that you're hunting. You kind of y'all have that too. There's houses around and you could hear the road traffic and you know Probably maybe helped you, help you guys as you're going through. And then I loved how you guys came around and there's a part in the book where you guys come back through a rock wall and you're standing there and like You're being super quiet and you turn to your hunter partner and you know you said like probably wasn't the best question for me to lead with, but I was like why does it smell so damn good, yeah, what was it that was down there?

Speaker 1: 49:09

some kind of olive tree or something.

Speaker 2: 49:11

Well, yeah, not like an olive right producing olive, but it was called autumn olive and it was just like the. I mean, it just smelled incredible and I guess we couldn't speak because we we had roosted this bird and we got in really tight on it and the whole morning I'm just sitting there like I can't wait to ask the guy. I'm like, why does it smell so good right here? And finally, you know, we had the opportunity. You know, there's like just some traffic noise or I think actually the bird, it just bailed on us finally and I'm like, okay, go ahead and ask this question now.

Speaker 2: 49:43

Yeah, I mean, I think that all these places and we didn't really realize this until after the fact but gave us a really great snapshot of when you can hunt turkeys and how different these situations can be. You know, like I was saying, you know, it can be the mountains, it can be swamps, it can be. We started off on a very vast private ranch in Texas, you know, and some people are me like, well, that's, you know, and I'm like, well, yeah, but I got access to it, so I'm going, you know and we were hard.

Speaker 2: 50:18

Yeah, we worked hard to maintain a good turkey population there, to create one actually, which we discuss in the book, is like what we've, what we've done to try to improve the population there, and then winding up in Connecticut where, like he said, it's just like there's these rock walls, that just sort of you know sequester, this little plot and this plot and it's it's, it's very, very different. I mean the whole mindset of you know, filling out permission slips and lots and lots of private, little private areas and also lots of public land. And so we were, you know, within a day we might weave from public land and then go right on to private land that we have permission to go on. You know things like that. So it was, it was really interesting and at the end of the day, I'm really I'm so thankful that we got to experience that, because what I wanted to is be able to speak to as many turkey hunters as possible, you know, from my perspective as a relative novice to it and someone that loves it, but just to be able to go out there and have the experiences, hopefully, that just just some of them have.

Speaker 2: 51:22

You know, whereas, like, oh, I, I hunt public land in New England. Or I hunt, you know, in Palmetto swamps. Or you know, if you hunt in Texas, you pretty much have to hunt on private land. For turkey, I mean, there's there's hardly any opportunities for public here at all, and so or in the mountains, for that matter, you know it's like it and just really want to be able to speak to everyone through that, and at the end of it is like, oh, we kind of got that. You know, we got such a great diversity of experiences.

Speaker 1: 51:57

You really did in all the different regions. I think it there's some universal things within any kind of turkey hunting, regardless of the region, right? I mean there's this unpredictability. There's different things that you learn to like. There's obviously that dominant bird and then like the satellite birds. There's a lot of things you talk to. That, I think, paints a picture to for someone who may be just getting into it, because there's a lot of folks who you know are coming into the outdoor world that haven't before or maybe they're picking back up, and so I think it's, it's cool. It kind of gives you that the language of what it is that you know maybe more advanced turkey hunters than myself at least they're talking about and saying a this might be why this happened, and just things to consider, because there is nuances with every hunt. But I think that there are. There's a lot of different things to think about and you know, there there are areas to like.

Speaker 1: 52:44

You know, in our family ranch and in South Texas and Demy County, there we have a lot of turkeys and now there's like there's none man. I got a Jake couple seasons back and I'd seen him on camera. I didn't see any other birds there and it's something that I'm now. My approach isn't like oh, there's a turkey, I'm going to get it. Like now, this year I was like you know what, if there's a turkey or a few turkeys, maybe we just watch them, you know, photograph and video them, because if there's a lack of them in that area, we might wanna back up and not try to, you know, just put some in the freezer and think about being able to maybe then repeatedly put some in the freezer and years to come, because there are areas you talked about it when you guys were in Georgia there I'm with your buddy too like y'all were talking about making sure you're taking the right bird, and there's a reason too.

Speaker 1: 53:32

So I think each area of people need to maybe kind of have that, you know, awareness. If there's a lot of turkeys and you know, maybe by all means take whatever one, but maybe you wanna have a dominant bird that's breeding more often, because you might need those numbers and maybe those other ones are fighting and they're not breeding as much because they're battling each other and you gotta be cognizant of those things. So that was something that was kind of fun to read and kind of take that next like aha moment like oh yeah, that's something I need to consider a little bit more, kind of made me think a little bit more along the lines of not only just consumption, but you know conservation as a whole and what you can do, and I mean you kind of nod to. You know Turk Federation and you know there's a, you know Tom Kelly, which is that correct? I read, I think I read in the book you guys had the same birthday as well, is that? Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 1: 54:19

That's really cool man, that's fun.

Speaker 2: 54:22

Yeah, no, absolutely. I think that you know, especially after coming off of writing a book about feral hawks, which is, I mean, basically the approach to them is kill them all. You know, young and old, like I mean the, I mean and so, and to go from something that has an exploding invasive population to something that in some places is thriving but in a lot of places is not, and to encourage their consumption, which is what I'm doing, you know, I'm like, yeah, get out there and hunt them and let's eat them, but it has to be done in a much more mindful way, just like you said, and I think that you know, there are some of the most incredible and dedicated conservation groups out there, and NWTF, for example. I mean just boots on the ground, action, habitat, habitat, habitat, habitat and improvement, and then also disseminating the information to you know, people that are either involved in public land hunting or privately hunting on how to do habitat improvement, which is, in my perspective, like probably the best thing for turkeys, is to how do you improve their habitat? Do you open up an area or do you, you know, honestly, just control predation? You know if that's what's really taking them out, and so I think NWTF provides incredible resource for that, and they've got a lot of people behind. I mean, they're just. Their membership alone is just incredible and it speaks to their mission and their success too.

Speaker 2: 55:53

And revitalizing this incredible bird to huntable populations, which is the thing the non-hunter never understands it's just like oh, you wanna kill them all? No, that's not at all what we're saying. You know, and in fact, when was the last time you did anything to help a wild turkey? And the answer is usually never, whereas you've got this incredible organization, or many organizations, but especially NWTF, that's out there and just and helping it along, and I think it's just. Turkeys should be an indelible part of our landscape, always, you know, and it's something that we should really strive for. And if you can get out there and put a couple of them in your freezer and then watch a few dozen more, then you've really succeeded.

Speaker 1: 56:36

Yeah, no for sure, and I think it bears mentioning, like the idea too, if people were out there and they're private landowners, you know, reaching out to your NRCS agent, talking to local people about what you can maybe do, like on our property we took out a bunch of invasive invasive, you know, trees, these non-indigenous and brush and stuff, and we ended up planting a bunch of natural grasses and forbs that were native to that area in central Texas and worked with the seed company and they recommended and there's funding available to do that and one of the goals that we had was to be able to have some of these three to six acre fields that we could be able to have these higher grasses. They're better for turkeys, for whenever they're, you know, they're having their young. It also helps for fawns and things too, where maybe they can be able to reach out past that time of when, you know, predation can be the highest number and they can kind of, you know, live and you know kind of give them that safety and also places for them to be able to just go through and have, you know, just better habitat overall. So I think it's something too that you know with all animals, there's something that you can get from your NRCS agent and there's a lot of resources that's out there. So if you're looking to, you know, improve that habitat, cause I mean, you know you and I know this, but maybe some of the listeners might not there's a lot of areas that didn't have turkeys before that some of these organizations came through and repopulated them because they were hunted down to, you know, very dangerously low numbers, or there's counties that were eradicated fully and now have them again. So I think that's something too, that relocation. You know these areas that were being repopulated cause they once were, you know they were flourishing, right, they were thriving, and then they went to no numbers, especially with deer too.

Speaker 1: 58:20

There's a lot of different areas that I think people don't understand that and I was just wanted to also mention too. When you're talking about, like that, conservation too and these other organizations, you know us as hunters. Anytime you're buying equipment, anytime you're buying ammo, you're buying your license, you know there's a lot of money that goes back into the conservation funds. For this, you know, I mean hunters, anglers, target, you know, target hunters, you know. Or shooters, you know that a lot of those, you know a lot of those funds go back with the Pittman, robertson, robertson, pittman. I say it backwards every time, so I said it both. One of those is correct, but that's something that really you know. Our taxes get back more than anyone else. So I think those same people who might be like, oh, y'all are just trying to kill them. It's like part of the reason some of these are there is because there is people that want to hunt them and utilize them to know where their meat comes from, which I think is super important.

Speaker 1: 59:12

Along those lines, too, you mentioned something in the book where you talk about if someone has the ability for five to seven days, to kind of, you know, keep your turkey in a very cool, dry space, that before you go ahead and vacuum, seal and throw it into the freezer, that will help with the firmness. And you know, if you said, oh, if you don't do that, it won't have too much of a negative effect. Can you maybe talk to that idea of like what you may see a difference of if you were kind of, I guess, aging it, you know, before you freeze it for those days. And like what? Because I'm I can have some assumptions in my mind, but I don't know if they'd be right. So I'd like for you to kind of address that and maybe what are those differences between going through that process and maybe not? Is there a real discernible difference to you?

Speaker 2: 59:59

Sure, there is, and I think that, like you know, I get this question a lot about processing, you know, breaking down animals, getting them cold and when to when to start the butchering process after that, and often in context of deer and hogs and turkey stucks everything. And I think my first overarching answer is to do it when you're able, you know, and not beat yourself up about like, oh no, I need to let this animal chill for X number of days before I can effectively do it. And so a lot of times I mean for me, you know like I might break a hog down because there's a cold front the day after, you know it's just like, but it's gonna warm back up into the 70s, but if I can comfortably sit outside in the 40s, you know, on my porch, and have basically an outdoor refrigerator while I'm breaking an animal down, I'm gonna take that route. And so and that completely undoes all those things I'm saying like, oh, you know, for a hog, you know eight days is great, you know, but you know if it's gonna be cold after two days, two days is also great, you know, turkey's the same way. I think that again, I'm going to restate what I always say and just like, keep animals cold and dry. Cold and dry, not cold and wet, you know, cold and as dry as possible. However, you can achieve that under 40 and as dry as possible until you start cutting on it. So I mean hanging it in a walk-in sure that's great, you know in a cooler where it's not indirect contact with ice, and that goes for pigs and deer as well, which is very contentious.

Speaker 2: 1:01:38

But I do think that with turkeys you do experience this kind of flop. With them, where they're very fresh, it might affect their tenderness a little bit. No, it probably will. I mean, usually if you eat something where it's super fresh, it's not gonna be as tender. You know that goes for a deer or a hog. If you let any of these animals kind of age for you know and chill for a few days, they will start to kind of relax, become more tender. I think, yes, I mean a turkey will start to firm up very nicely after three, four, five days They've kept nice and cold and dry and you might not experience so much of that wobble that they can have. But it's not a hill I wanna die on at all, because they're just objectively delicious birds and there might be a nominal amount of more of like chewiness to it, but not even in a bad way from not quote unquote aging it or letting it chill for that long.

Speaker 2: 1:02:46

So really I'm more in the camp and my whole goal is to encourage people to process their entire animal and cook it and enjoy it further.

Speaker 2: 1:02:56

And so last thing I wanna do is go in and out all these stipulations or make it harder or guilt people about, are over complicated or cause any self doubt there. So really I think for me it's imperative that we just attach some very simple rules, cold and dry, and then, at your convenience after that not necessarily your earliest, but just at your convenience after that get in there and try to process that animal, enjoy the processing, like enjoy this time spent with the animal afterwards. It's just kind of a new campaign. I'm just like I think that we're hyper focused on the fun stops either when you take the shot or when you walk up to the animal, and then you're like, oh hell, now all the work starts. It's like I'm like a whole new array of work starts now.

Speaker 2: 1:03:49

That is also highly enjoyable to me and I think if we can realign our wants, like what we're looking for out of this whole process to embracing the plucking of the bird or the eviscerating or the breaking it down, the packaging. You can spend time with a friend or a loved one and package and you're like, oh, you're on labels, oh, hey, you did a great job back stealing that with kids and get in the freezer and then the enjoyment of cooking it. If we can just realign to enjoying the entire spectrum this is a very broad answer to a very specific question by the way.

Speaker 1: 1:04:28

No, man, this is good. I like where you're going.

Speaker 2: 1:04:30

But I think that, yeah, instead of bogging down a little bit in specifics is just kind of embrace some just rough general guidelines that will improve game, like keeping things dry and cold for a while and trusting your nose.

Speaker 2: 1:04:49

I had a client recently who was like, is this deer age too long? And I'm like you'll know, you'll know, your brain is hardwired to tell you when deer is not good to eat anymore. And until that point I'm pretty sure that it's gonna be fine. So I think that, yeah, like I said, realigning what we want out of the process and trying to enjoy it more, and just taking it day by day and just saying oh hey, I've hung the turkey here, I've kept it in the cooler, nice and dry. It's only been three days, but I gotta get to work in three hours. I'm gonna go ahead and just bust it down back, seal it and put it in the freezer and then, if you were to tell me that that was your plan, I'd be like that's great, that's great, I really. Yeah, you did not do anything wrong, that's exactly how it should be done, and I hope that all those dishes come out beautifully in your family's happy.

Speaker 1: 1:05:45

No, it's very important. I'm glad you touched on that Because I think you know there's a lot of people who, well, like that idea that work begins. Like for my buddy, like Matthew Mitchell and I, who hunt together a lot and he's quite a cook Like that's where another level of the fun begins. I mean, look at work. It's like, yes, there's things you have to do in the time and you know you gotta move along. If it's hot, you gotta kind of get to that animal as quick as you can, cool it down and dry as quick as you can, but that's fun. And then you know you're thinking about, like we're always butchering stuff up and like, okay, that's gonna go for that meal, this is gonna be how we're gonna cook this. Oh man, that cool new recipe from the turkey book, we're gonna try that out. Okay, like there's different things when you're looking at that meat and figuring out what you're gonna do with it. But I think is just as important and like I think Kim remember if we talked about it last time you were on, or if maybe I just heard you talk about it before and maybe a post. But like for those who, like you know it's like you go out to like the double lease right, you drive four hours, you go, you know, shoot your limit in 30 minutes, and then why not spend half that time of driving you did to be able to take to feather and pluck these birds and like, like the amount of time we spend and the money we spend leading up to that, we should enjoy the process of preparing our foods for our family and our friends just as much, and I think it's. I think it's one of those things we have to have that time spent in honoring that animal and that time of what you're going to do with it later on. All the preparation, so just kind of quickly throwing it down, you know, getting in the freezer, whatever, I think anything you can do to prepare it where it's going to be the tasting best, having the most experience, but I find it to just be super fun when breaking down.

Speaker 1: 1:07:29

So I wasn't always that way. I definitely gained the knowledge, you know, and I think that's where people who are listening, who are maybe, are coming in the first time hunting. You know, maybe you know a particular animal. Something like the Hogbook, the talk, the turkey book is going to be very valuable for them to learn about butchering, you know you guys in the book you talk about. You know plucking and then you know cutting out and skinning too, so you kind of leading people along whatever path they want to choose in their adventure, and I really love it. Again, the photography is just second to none, man. You know, jody and Sam did such an amazing job with all those. It's really. It's a work of art, man. I'm so stoked for you, man. I mean, I can't wait to get it in my hands, and I'm sure you as well, right, yeah yeah, we can't wait to get it out there.

Speaker 2: 1:08:17

It was an incredible experience to be able to hang out with all these people and put it together and again, I just like I love it, you know, and I hope that it shows, you know, I have a lot of enthusiasm for it and I grew to love these birds, you know, and I grew to love them out of from the way I normally grow to love something is I love to eat them Like I just absolutely love eating turkey, like on my birthday, which happens, you know, it's Tom Kelly's birthday.

Speaker 2: 1:08:48

Colonel Tom is, you know, kind of at the tail end of turkey season. So, with any luck, around my birthday every year, I'm gonna have some turkey breast and I'm gonna have some do berries, and it's like those two things, for me, are represent like probably my favorite meal. And it's not something extreme or fancy, it's like, well, I love fried turkey with gravy and mashed potatoes, probably some greens but we can do green beans that time of year too, that's perfectly fine and then a do berry cobbler and like to me that's just like that's what I wanna eat and so like coming at it from that direction. And then I was like, oh well, and they're also like probably the most enthralling hunt that I've ever been on and a really good excuse to be out in the spring, no less you know, at the most you know, arguably the most beautiful time of year, especially here in Texas.

Speaker 2: 1:09:43

Just everything is just exploding. The birds are, you know, just like all the bird life is talking you know, things is just growing, it's verdant, it's just like it's so beautiful and it's so wonderful to be out that time of year and like what. You know, I'm just so lucky to be able to experience things like this and yeah, I just hope that, you know, the enthusiasm is conveyed for that and you know, like plucking a bird with friends or standing around it because you've got the time come on you've got the time.

Speaker 2: 1:10:15

You know it's like to say that you know, like, oh, it takes too long to pluck these doves. It's like, listen, yeah, like you said, listen, there's a four hour drive out here, even a one hour drive. You know, it's like time spent in the car is. You're not gonna convince me as any better than times plucking a dove. Like I mean, come on, because you can still listen to your podcast. You know, you can still listen to some music. You can still, you can legally drink a beer.

Speaker 2: 1:10:42

Yes, yes, there you go, you are allowed to have an open container while plucking doves, and so I mean I don't know what more argument I need.

Speaker 1: 1:10:54

That's really the foundational one right there. From here on out, I'm not gonna drive anymore, I'm just gonna drink some beers in the field. Pluck dogs, man. There you go, there you go. Oh, you talked about like that being your birthday meal and your death row meal for fried. While turkey. I was actually gonna ask you to. If, for some reason, while turkey is not available, what is your second or third go-to meal for birthday or the death row meal? What is it that you're like, man, I'm preparing this if that isn't available.

Speaker 2: 1:11:28

Crab cakes, blue crab yeah 100%.

Speaker 2: 1:11:31

So yeah, blue crab, you know, we just pull the traps. We got 16 big old male, what they call whales. You know, just like those like one pounders blue crabs, I'm gonna boil those, chill them, we're gonna pick that meat and I'm gonna make the biggest batch of crab cakes ever and a salad. I like crab cakes with salad and some sort of like homemade mayonnaise that's flavored probably with basil or some other herb and a lot of white wine. That's yeah. I mean technically that could be the first course before the fried turkey.

Speaker 1: 1:12:12

Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I mean if it's your birthday or your last meal you get to choose these things.

Speaker 2: 1:12:18

Yeah, so I'd go. Crab cakes, definitely, 100% I love, obviously I love crab cakes.

Speaker 1: 1:12:24

Yeah, now, if it was a big game animal, what would you go for?

Speaker 2: 1:12:28

Probably. Oh no, I would do axis. I would probably eat raw axis, probably tartar, you know just a classic tartar preparation. You know just diced, probably backstrap axis deer, you know a little mustard, a little shallot, maybe a little raw onion in there, a nice beautiful egg yolk from a very reputable farm on top of that and a side of fries. Nice, nice. I'm playing this game all day long.

Speaker 1: 1:13:01

Yeah, no, I mean, there's a certain point where we're gonna get so hungry we're gonna have to retreat to kitchens, but no but I was just I was very curious about that because I mean, I think fried wild turkey is one of the best ways to give an introduction to people who are hunting and especially like kids. And I mean, even in your book there you have some pictures of you and your daughter, like you know, preparing those and stuff too, which is really cool. I like seeing that and you know hearing about you talking to her and how you're like this is all for, hopefully something that we'll share together and I, you know I can echo that statement too with you know, hoping that you know my little one and I appreciate your throw out on that idea, the single shot too, because I'm letting my young one move from the 410 on up, so that'll be valuable as well to check out. But doing something there together with the family and like I've done fried turkey and I've done like a turkey cordon blue for folks too, and I mean anytime you're throwing a bunch of prosciutto or bacon or just you know all sorts of really amazing cheeses, I feel like it kind of hides the wild turkey dough a little bit.

Speaker 1: 1:14:06

It's a great tasting dish and there's a lot of things I've done with it, but I think it masks a little bit, so I'm always looking for different things that it'll be kind of like okay, here's the second meal to show you guys what this can feature, and there's so many amazing ones in there. You know, I think it's really important too that, for those who didn't know, like turkey legs, a lot of folks I've known before like I don't keep them, or I've heard them say that People that I hunt with keep them always because they're delicious. You just have to maybe do a little bit of a different preparation and I know that this may be mundane for you to talk about a little bit, but can you maybe address the idea of what you're doing with turkey legs and what are some of the things that people need to know and why you need to keep them?

Speaker 2: 1:14:50

Oh, 100%. I mean I love that question and I mean I was being very kind earlier about you know, like, oh, don't be hard on yourself about this and that, but if you're not saving your turkey legs, I think you should be hard on yourself.

Speaker 2: 1:15:02

I'm sorry, like there's probably about 45% of the usable bird right there, and if you've had a bad experience with turkey legs, it's because you didn't cook them long enough Done period and they more than likely need to be cooked in some sort of liquid. I think the crock pot is bar none the best way to do that. In fact, for dinner not tonight, but tomorrow I'm making a tortilla soup from the turkey book and I just had a leg in the crock pot and it took a long time to cook. I mean, I let it roll overnight, and so we're probably talking about maybe start to finish 10 hours.

Speaker 2: 1:15:44

And you do need to allow it to have a lot of time. At the end of that, though, what I have is a lot of broth and a lot of shredded meat, which gives me multiple opportunities to our recipes that I can apply that towards, so in this case, I chose the tortilla soup, but I try to put this in the books a lot, whereas you can do a method that will yield broth and shredded meat, and then here's one, two, three, four, five, six, maybe more recipes that you can use with said shredded meat, and then you also have this beautiful stock that you've made, and it's better than water, I mean, in fact, it's very good, it's nutrient, dense, it's delicious. You can either use that in the recipe or you can substitute that. Where somebody's saying, oh, you need to use chicken stock, like, why would you do that? You just made turkey stock, and a leg yields a surprising amount.

Speaker 2: 1:16:35

People are like, oh, but the tendons? I'm like, listen, they will just. You just pick them right out. It's so easy. They're the hard white pieces. Remove them, it's so easy. And, yeah, I think that the legs absolutely have to be kept.

Speaker 2: 1:16:51

If I was in charge, it would be a law, but also how interesting it is like how different the legs and breasts are on a turkey. I mean, the breast is a highly approachable white meat, like you were saying. It's a wonderful introduction to people who may be leery about game. You're like oh, here, try this wild turkey, where it's just, it's recognizable, but it still has enough of a flavor, of a singular, unique flavor, that is that of wild turkey and only wild turkey, that they can recognize while at the same time being completely in the realm of everyday food. I'm like, oh, this is easy. I mean like, if they're like, I would never eat wild game. I mean, then they're eating like, yes, of course this is great, but then the legs represent something totally different. They're very dark, they're very rich and they can be tough. I mean, if you think about that animal, it ran around all day.

Speaker 2: 1:17:51

It's an athlete, those legs, versus the amount that it uses its breast to power its wings. They need to be cooked for a very long time and it just really requires some planning. More than anything else and I think that's where people might get tied up is that they pull out a turkey leg and they want any afternoon and they're like let's have this for dinner. It's like no, I mean tomorrow.

Speaker 1: 1:18:12

Yeah, maybe, but not to now.

Speaker 2: 1:18:15

Yeah, but it's so simple to take that cut an onion in half, throw a bay leaf in there, cover it with water, put it on low, wake up in the morning to this delicious smell and then go from there, but absolutely keep the legs. I love the heart liver gizzard because it represents such a good volume and they're also very mildly flavored for those organs. I mean venison liver, for instance, pretty strong, turkey liver, however pretty mild and very, very good for making things like boudin or pate, things like that. So it's very simple. It's also large. It yields a good amount. I mean there's whole dishes that you can make with the heart liver gizzard that probably feed four people if you stretched it appropriately and I just love tricks like that.

Speaker 2: 1:19:04

But speaking of the legs specifically, I really feel like it's not hard to remove them, especially if you're skinning. You don't have to pluck if that's not your desired outcome, just to have the skin on there, and so they're real easy to skin and just break them off and you're almost doubling your take home yield from that hunt and they're very enjoyable.

Speaker 1: 1:19:33

Oh, I learned the hard way by not cooking it long enough and it was something that I was like I probably needed to double that time and I forgot I did some kind of basoli basolo See Basoli, Basoli, Basoli. And did you have one that was like a Verde in the Eiffel book, was it?

Speaker 2: 1:19:56

There was a crab basoli. Ok, gotcha.

Speaker 1: 1:20:01

I just recalled reading about that I forgot where I had found this one, but a bunch of hominy and it was just a wonderful soup that I made. And I tried one with red wine, two another time, just to really sing different ways to break it down and just sampling. And I think that's part of the fun too, is you have something like an open playbook and you look at the turkey book and you can just see all the different ways you can try. Like you said, there may be like four or five different ways you can try to do this. Once you have this, you break it down, different broths you can reuse. There's so many different ways to utilize that and try things out and figure out what you and your family like and go from there. And I'm always happy when I get one turkey in the freezer.

Speaker 1: 1:20:41

But this book has made me it's reinvigorated something with me, jesse, like I want to take it to that nth degree and make sure that I can fill the freezer with more. You know, like, as we've talked about before, my place in central Texas it's a one turkey town, right? I mean that's what you get in South Texas. You know, in Texas you can have up to four a year, but out there it's being kind of really run down as far as the turkey hunt is going. So you know, I'm definitely looking to expand things out and, you know, talk to some other friends and they trade some hunts because I really want to cook more with wild turkey.

Speaker 1: 1:21:18

It's something that I find to be one of my favorite things to work with, next to hogs, and 10 years ago you would have never heard that statement out of my mouth, like it was all about deer, and you know, someone brought some milk around. But I'm really enjoying that and getting into small game a lot too. So I'm really just super excited to hopefully get something on the ground this year and I think I got like one leg and one breast left and I was actually curious too because I have some sand dill crane. Is there some of the things that are in the turkey book that you would maybe say, hey, you could also try this with sand dill crane? Is there any that are kind of, you know, replaceable in there that you would maybe point someone in the direction to if they had some sand dill crane around?

Speaker 2: 1:22:02

The legs would probably be fairly similar. And it's going to take a long time to braise them out. So yeah, I think so. The breasts, you know, on a sand dill. I always think, you know, just like highest and best use of breasts is to kind of cook them like a steak. You, know a medium rare, which is not what you would do with turkey. So I think the breasts are going to kind of pose like a bit of a different species, you know a bit of a different situation you know and where.

Speaker 2: 1:22:31

I probably wouldn't, but the legs, yes, I would. Yeah, I mean, I think that's the short answer.

Speaker 1: 1:22:38

Yeah, no, that's great, man. You know, I got to thinking too. You've got the hog book, you've got the turkey book, and so I have to ask will we one day see the crappy book? Because the name alone warrants a book. You know what are the first 10 copies? Right now, man, I'll get the ball rolling.

Speaker 2: 1:22:57

Yeah, I mean, I did cover.

Speaker 2: 1:23:00

I covered crappie and in a field a bit, and it is something that is very near and dear to my heart and also poses a real existential crisis to me.

Speaker 2: 1:23:15

I am a proud non-boat owner. I have a canoe and a kayak, you know, but for the most part I have no motorized boats in my arsenal, and so my crappie fishing is very much confined to the spring, along with my other favorite, which is the white bass, and I'm really running into a real problem in that turkey season, white bass season and crappie season are all kind of happening at the same time and I don't know how to like break up my time in order to address all of those, especially crappie and turkeys, because a white bass run a little bit earlier, you know, you can kind of get like February, early March on those, but everything the crappie and the turkeys are a little too concurrent for me, and so I'm in my second season of really dealing with this terrible personal issue and so I'm trying to figure it out. This year Also, I get hyper focused and it's like while I'm in turkey, brain I can't go fish for crappie, like yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:24:20

And it's hard for me to bounce back and forth between them, but I think this year I'm gonna have to man up a bit and figure out how to make that so and go and do both.

Speaker 1: 1:24:31

Well, and it's not like you have anything else going on. You know, for those who are maybe not fully familiar with the scope of your work and projects, let's go ahead and just give a real brief description of what you got going on with. I do a new school traditional cookery. If you don't mind, just spend a short time. So we talked about in the last podcast. I'll put the links down below. You can learn a little bit more, but for those who may be new listeners, maybe just go ahead and give them a little glimpse of that.

Speaker 2: 1:24:56

Yeah, so Didouay is my restaurant. Fortunately enough, we have a very talented chef who runs the day to day. But I'm there quite a bit. I'm about to head up there in a little while. You know it's in the east side of Austin. Been there We'll be at 10 years. We'll have our 10 year anniversary this August.

Speaker 2: 1:25:15

Congrats yeah yeah, it's a long time for a restaurant. Yeah, especially in the past few years. It's a tough life, but yeah, so we have a restaurant. It's a very locally focused restaurant. We serve lemons only when they're in season. Our tea I'm sure you're familiar with Yopon. Our iced tea is made out of Yopon. All the meats and seafood seafood all comes out of the Gulf. All the meats are locally sourced, all of our dairy, all of our vegetables. It's a fun place to eat. It's fairly meat focused and a lot of stuff grilled over oak.

Speaker 2: 1:25:55

We do a lot of butchery in-house and pretty much make everything from scratch. I like it a lot. And then we also have the new school of traditional cookery which is the educational branch of that. I do start to finish hunting, butchery and cookery classes, mostly hog and deer focused, obviously trying to branch out a little bit. We've done a lot of fishing in the past but trying to create a more robust program.

Speaker 2: 1:26:26

But usually this time of year are during hunting season. I'm down there quite a bit. We do these four day classes, starting with sighting, in all the way packaging of lion, but those are very popular. It's very hard to keep up and I would love to in the next couple of years, start to develop a plan that could accommodate more people, because I think we'd have so much demand and it's hard to reach everybody and I love the educational aspect of it, so I love teaching butchery classes and cooking and talking about stuff like that and just helping people, along with just getting more confidence and empowerment as far as breaking down animals and utilizing them to their potential.

Speaker 2: 1:27:20

So NSTC does that for us. And then yeah, so now three books in. I never saw that coming, but the Hogbook and the Turkey Book are both available through our we're self published. Jody handles that and loses the photographer, slash publisher. So they're now available under an umbrella called the Wild Books, and that's the Wild Bookscom and the Turkey Book and Hogbook are both available through there.

Speaker 1: 1:27:50

And then Bezos has a field. If you guys need that, right, yeah, jeff will sell you one of those.

Speaker 2: 1:27:55

Yeah, that's the best way to get it. Oh, we have them at the restaurant too, if you want to avoid Jeff. But yeah, he'll sell you one, no problem.

Speaker 1: 1:28:03

And then pre-orders are available right now at the Wild Bookscom. That's, you have Turkey Book. You're going to have some that are signed too, and is that last time you had some with you and Jody? Is Sam going to get in on the signature side of things there too? How are you going to?

Speaker 2: 1:28:19

Honestly, I don't think so because Sam is in Bozeman and so I think the shipping conundrum that we would have or we'd have to fly them down here just to wear his hand out sign the books.

Speaker 2: 1:28:32

Sam was imperative in the creation of these books, though, and so highly appreciated. We're also very excited because we're going to have a bundle with NWTF where you can get a membership your membership to NWTF and a book at $10 off each of those, so a $20 savings total for those, so you can get a book and a membership. If you're already a member, then it will automatically tag on a year from the date of purchase of your membership with NWTF, and you get a really good savings out of that, so we're really excited to offer that as well.

Speaker 1: 1:29:09

That's great, man. I know you've worked with a bunch of different organizations. Are there some other ones that you're kind of you know doing some work with now? I mean, I don't want to spill any projects through anything coming out, but just some other ones that you kind of near and dear to your heart that you might want to just kind of give a shout out to or think, you know, maybe people should take a look at you know, and obviously they're huge in the Turkey world. But are there some other ones that you kind of would say, hey guys, you should check this one out as well.

Speaker 2: 1:29:34

Certainly I mean my friend Graham Jones. He always puts it best. He says there's a lot of room in the sandbox for everybody. And you know, here in Texas and we usually are trying to just work on a more local level.

Speaker 2: 1:29:48

I mean I feel like I can get a lot more done, you know, in Texas than a more broader scope. So we work a lot with you know. My two favorite organizations here are one of them is a private land advocacy group and one is a public lands advocacy group and I love working with them both and I love how they get along in this state because we're all on the same team here and that would be the Texas Wildlife Association and also back country hunters and anglers. There's not that many public opportunities in Texas but they still get out there and represent and then mostly focus on conservation at this point, which is great, and I mean there's never any need or any end in need for conservation focuses these days and so, and then also TWA, which advocates for public land I'm sorry, private land and helping landowners just get the max usage out of that and then how to conserve on their land and how to improve the stewardship of that. And they also bring a lot of new hunters out to these private lands to their adult learn to hunt program, which I am a huge fan of. I think it is an exemplary program and should be copied by the lesser states. You know, it's just, it is a really incredible program and they cycle a lot of new hunters through that program and gain access to some really beautiful ranches and also give these landowners a really good opportunity to maintain and manage their animal populations in the absolutely the best way possible.

Speaker 2: 1:31:26

I think you also you talked to Doug Durin, who's also doing very similar things up North I mean, another really wonderful human being right there who does some really good work, and it's just I love to see stuff like that. So you know, I think that you know new hunters are always asking you know, like how do I go about it? And I'm like get in with these organizations, like just contact them. They're not only gonna provide you with resources and contacts, but they're also the ones that we should be supporting right now because they're advocating for everyone here and navigating a very complicated land situation here in Texas. But I think very, very well, and so I always would encourage anybody that's interested in getting into hunting to. You know, both those organizations represent some really good opportunities for getting out in the woods.

Speaker 1: 1:32:23

Yeah, no, I strongly, strongly agree. I mean I talked to Justin, the CEO at TWA and learned more about what they have going in all the different levels of involvement People can get into the youth programs, learn to hunt programs, the different things that are partnered with the Texas Parks and Wildlife, and just getting folks out there. I mean there's so many great opportunities that you know I didn't really know or look into before. Or having private land at my disposal and just seeing how you know how would someone start? We had a buddy of ours, johnny, who had never even fired a rifle a year ago, and so we took him through the idea of like really safety instruction. We kind of did it on our own, but he Matthew, I on our land, then he would work on the property and we're buddies, so it wasn't like you have to do this or you can't hunt, like it just ended up being part of the package of like learning to get involved and see a property and really kind of expand your knowledge of that. And then he hunted it. So it was a cool, real 360 moment. But that hasn't been available for a lot of people and I think it can be discouraging. But when you find these programs and these initiatives and these associations that offer these weekends where you can go out there and it's some cases free or it's a small fee to get in there and get your feet wet and kind of understand. And you know, I know you've done some stuff too where you volunteered times for hunts and kind of, you know, been a mentor of sorts too.

Speaker 1: 1:33:45

And I think I kind of want to leave this on that idea too, that you spoke about it in our last podcast, and the idea too of that, the idea of like wanting to teach teachers, like sharing this knowledge so that those other people can be able to expand upon that and share that knowledge, and whether that's in a kitchen or in the field, I think this idea of mentorship, sharing this collective nature of our knowledge, of really being able to put this out there and what will best benefit our lives in Richmond for getting out there and also our health, for eating really good food and really for the habitat for our future generations you know we have children.

Speaker 1: 1:34:28

We want to leave it better for them, for the grandchildren, for seven generations down the line. So I think it's very imperative that we have that part of the discussion with everything we're doing too, because that conservation and the ethics that are there in place today leave it better tomorrow, and I think that's something that you know, you've spoken to and wanting to do this in a local way, so I like that you also pinpointed that here and you know, act local right, so it's important.

Speaker 2: 1:34:54

I couldn't put that better myself. That's awesome.

Speaker 1: 1:34:57

Well, I stole it from writing you did earlier. So you know, well, is there anything else that you kind of want to, you know, tell people about, or kind of let them know, or kind of some final thoughts or words? You know, as we're kind of approaching the turkey season, as it's starting to maybe thaw out a little bit, and we're, you know, it's just right around the corner, man. So if there's any kind of thing you want to give or message, or maybe just you know, people that have, you know, supported you over these years, yeah, I mean just get out there.

Speaker 2: 1:35:27

I think that, like, if you're new to hunting and you want to get into turkey, I think you know, do that with a great deal of grace and patience, because that's they're going to demand that of you. And then if you're an experienced turkey hunter, you know it's just like I mean I can't really offer you that much in advice, you know, because I'm still right in the middle and you know, just, I feel like I'm a bit of a novice but I'm just like the happiest of novices because it's the best school to go to. It's just being sitting out there and experiencing turkey season. I love it. I mean, I'm on a countdown right now. I think we're about seven and a half weeks out from my first turkey hunt. Who's counting? You know, I just get out there, you know, and I just I love that.

Speaker 2: 1:36:18

You know people are still so motivated to go and do this thing and that we have so many new people that are interested in it.

Speaker 2: 1:36:25

Whether you've been doing it your whole life or you're just wanting to get into it, there's still so much to be learned about it and I think just you know valuing everything as a resource, whether it is a hog or a turkey.

Speaker 2: 1:36:38

You know, everything is a potential resource and there's so much that can be done with it and there's so much enjoyment and so much fulfillment that you get out of being out there, and I'm just I'm so happy to be able to be a part of that and get to have conversations like this around that and basically make that my whole job, you know, which is I have a great job and so I really love it, and so I'm very appreciative when I get an opportunity like this and I come on and talk to you and therefore speak to a bunch of other people about this, and so, yeah, just get out there and enjoy it and remember that it's a blessing to have that, and then we should treat it as such. So it's a real valuable thing and it will go away if we don't take care of it and if we don't maintain it and admire it on a personal level every time.

Speaker 1: 1:37:29

Great points there. Great points, well said man. Well, everyone go check out daiduicom, the wildbookscom and daidui. You can be able to search then for daidui or a new school traditional cookery. There's kind of a branch off there from that, and for those who wanna follow you and your journey, can you give them your Instagram handle and where they can find you?

Speaker 2: 1:37:50

Yeah, it's Sakalay. It's the Southern Louisiana term for crappie, as we spoke of earlier. It's s-a-c-e. Dot a dot, l-a-i-t. And follow me on Instagram for lots of pictures of Turkey.

Speaker 1: 1:38:07

Yes, hopefully a bunch more this season as well, man. I'm excited for you, man. So, as always, I'll let you know whenever we're heading out to the ranch and when I can get you out there for Turkey hunt and your busy schedule. We'd love to have you. If not, we'll have some Dewberries aplenty to go ahead and pick and hang out. So we gotta make that happen this year. Perfect Good deal. Hey Jesse, thank you for joining us. I really appreciate it and all the best and all the success. Congratulations on the Turkey book. Can't wait for that to get in everybody's hands. I was blessed and honored to get an early sneak peek and I find it to be one of the most fascinating, best cooking related books I've ever seen, and you're writing a second to none. Everyone, go check it out. You can pre-order today, get the signed copy and whenever the NWTF bundle comes out, make sure you grab in that as well, everyone. So thanks again and have a great day. Thank you.