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Welcome to the Turkey Talk Podcast, presented by Bass Pro Shops. Join us as we dive deep into the world of turkey hunting, where we sit down with industry experts to explore the art, science, and passion behind this beloved outdoor pursuit. Each episode is packed with insightful conversations, tips, and tricks to help you enhance your turkey hunting game. Whether you're a seasoned pro or just starting out, The Turkey Talk Podcast is your go-to podcast for all things turkey hunting.
Welcome to the Turkey talk podcast presented by Bass Pro Shops. I'm your host, Rob Keck, and I'll be your guide throughout the virtual Turkey hunting woods.
From the thrill of the chase to the satisfaction of a successful hunt. Each episode is packed with tips, tricks, and tales from the Turkey woods. We're joined by the hunting public zone, Aaron Warbritton. Aaron grew up hunting public land and his online video series aims to share that love with others. I talked to Aaron about the benefits of hunting public land, but also the challenges and the issues that we're facing with protecting public access. You don't want to miss this conversation with Aaron. So stay tuned for Turkey talk with Bass Pro Shops. Aaron, welcome to Turkey talk. And it's good to have you with us. It's my pleasure to be here, Rob. I appreciate you having me on. Oh man. I'll tell you what you guys have really started an awareness of the opportunities that, uh, that are, that are all across this great nation. Many of them that, uh, you know, a lot of people just don't take advantage of. And you know, we're well into the spring season. How's it been for you and the hunting public team? Uh, great. So far we've been at it about a month now. I just got back here to Missouri a couple of days ago. We just got back from Louisiana and, uh, it's been a great spring. I mean, we, we have all kinds of surprises along the dusty trail, um, but it's been, it's been awesome so far. We started out taking kids down in Mississippi and that was, that will be one of the highlights of the spring. Just getting a runner down with them for a week and watch new hunters, you know, then start to get bit by the bug that we both have. Well, nothing like taking a young person, especially somebody it's never been before. And, uh, you know, it's almost like going out on your first Turkey, you really live that through their eyes and their actions. And, uh, you know, I think that if we're going to pass this great hunting tradition on to that next generation, we've got to take time. We've got to be unselfish about the time that we do have available and make sure that, uh, we're leaving a lasting impression and that we're sharing that, uh, that great love that we have and hopefully instill some of that passion. That, uh, that we have, well, you know, before we go any further, how about tell me a little bit about yourself, where you're from and a little bit of your background, I mean, how did, how did you become involved in the great outdoors? Especially if we look at Turkey hunting and I know your love of deer hunting as well. Um, man started at an early age. I, I grew up in Northeast Missouri in a little town called Paris. I graduated high school with 37 other people. And, uh, I mean, it's just a small farming community, tight knit group of people. Lots of friends and relatives around there, all of which hunt in some way, shape or form, and, uh, just started at a very early age. And then once I got up to be about 10, 11, 12 years old, I started finding these things called hunting shows and tapes.
And I started seeing you on the TV and, uh, and watching you every week along with, with several others. And just at that age, I think I was 11 or 12 when me and my cousin stole my aunt's video camera. And we started taking it along and documenting our hunts with it. And that was from that moment on, I kind of knew what I wanted to do. And I just, long story short, I, I just worked towards that for, well, I'm still working towards it now. I mean, I've, that's just, I was lucky at a young age to know that this is what I really wanted to do, and this is what I would, you know, sacrifice other things to do, sacrifice like sports and some of that stuff, just to be in the woods with a video camera.
And that's led me here. I've oftentimes said that passion is the emotional gasoline that, uh, carries one to higher levels of success. And, uh, you know, gosh, you're really aging me now. If you were watching me on TV as a kid, you know, I'm one of the old guys for sure. But, uh, tell me how it went from there. I mean, stealing your, uh, still on that video camera and going out there. And, you know, what was that like? You know, to, to, you know, break in, there's a lot of guys carrying video cameras today, of course, a lot of guys filming with their cell phones, but, uh, you know, it wasn't quite that easy back then to tell us about that. Oh, it was a lot of struggle. Um, we, we messed up our fair share of footage starting out. Uh, and I used to make, I begged my dad by the time I was like 15 or 16 to help me buy a different video camera. And I think we ended up splitting the cost of it. It was a little bit nicer camera. It was eight or $900 at the time. And then I bought some, uh, software from Walmart, Roxio easy media creator. It was like 13 bucks. And I put it on our, our desktop computer that we had at home and I started making hunting DVDs with it and I would take those around and I'd pass them around to people and they probably just chucked them in the trash, you know, when I was a kid. But it was, it was all a learning process. I just kinda, there wasn't at that time, there wasn't any formal education that I could find being that young. There wasn't any YouTube or Google to search for stuff really. So I just learned by trial and error. And then, uh, and then I saw a guy named Michael Waddell come on the scene. And I was like, well, there's a young guy that is starting to do this as a career. And he's doing it through Turkey calling Turkey calling contests.
And I'm like, I go to Turkey calling contests and that, that sort of led me down that path I, I ended up going to my first Turkey calling contest in Paris, Missouri. And I competed against Billy Yargis and Steve Stoltz and James Harrison. Uh, yeah, all well known names, certainly. Yeah. In the Turkey calling, uh, circles for sure. And of course, Billy just, uh, inducted into the grand national hall of fame. And, uh, Steve Stoltz, of course, been a long time competitor in the grand nationals and, uh, you know, you're talking about some great, great callers, great hunters. Yeah, absolutely. And, and Chris Parrish is my neighbor. He's from, he's from Paris, Missouri as well. So yeah, I got to working with him a little bit. And then those other guys were super generous to me after they just completely whipped me, I mean, I had no idea what I was doing, but they were, they were super generous and started, I remember James and his son Cody came over and started handing me Turkey calls and he was like, here's my number, man, give me a call and record it over the phone and let's see how you're doing in a couple of weeks. And it's like, you can do this. You just got to put in the practice and put in the time. And that eventually led me down the path of competing in Turkey calling contests all over, including the NWTF grand nationals and meeting all sorts of people from all over the country. And I always was toting around this dang video camera. So a lot of those guys are like, do you know how to run that thing? Like, well, a little bit. Um, um, I got these DVDs. I made it on my home computer. If you want to watch them. So I befriended a lot of those people and, and just started traveling around with them. Anybody that would, anybody that would have me, I'd run around with them with a camera for a few days. Yeah. I know what that's like in those early days, those formative years. Did you build your own mouth calls then? Yeah, I did. Eventually after James showed me how to build them. Um, I'd used a pair of needle nose pliers and, uh, that was pretty much it. Hand stretched them myself and a couple of pairs of little scissors. And that was it. What kind of latex did you use? I don't remember which, which company I got it from, but I called Chris and he put me in touch. I think they might've been called pioneer maybe. Um, that, that sent me a bunch of different thickness and, yeah, I'll, I'll do, I mean, you got to Mike all that stuff and, you know, when, when that stuff is poured out, I mean, you've got variations in thickness and, uh, when you start putting multiple reads together, as you well know, uh, you know, to get consistency, it's, it's really a challenge for sure. Oh yeah. I mean, a lot of it ended up in the trash and when I was starting, absolutely. I think anybody it's competitive calling. I mean, you go through hundreds of calls. Do you finally get the one that just is so different if they look all the same? And, uh, you know, so much for that. Are you, are you still competing? I'm not. I got to the point when I was about 20 years old. Uh, I actually, it was when I was 21. Cause I had just, I just moved up to the senior open. I was competing in the intermediates and I just moved up to the seniors and Chris at that time was helping me a lot with my calls. I was going over to his house and me and him and Keith Wolly were sitting around, you know, running calls and trying to figure out what works. And I was the, I, I started improving, you know, in that three or four year period before that in large part, because of those people, and I got to the point where I can hang with them a little bit when I was 21, but it also got to the point that you're talking about where it's like, man, this has taken it a lot of time. It does. This is, if I'm going to, if I'm going to compete with the best of the best at it, which at that time was like, you know, Jim Pollard, van size, Chris Paris, Billy Argus, uh, Sadler James, the list goes on. Steve, if I was going to compete with those guys, I knew that I was going to have to dive into this full bore, but I also was super passionate about the video stuff. And I just took a step back when I was 21 and I said, well, I'm going to go down one of these two paths. And I chose the video side and I gave up the calling. Well, then tell us how that led to the hunting public. Tell us, tell us where that took place. Uh, I tried to get jobs, any, any sort of odd jobs I could do or subcontractor jobs while I was in college from the years of when I was 21 to 24 or so.
And I applied for pro staffs, applied for jobs all over the country for various companies, and I didn't get any of them. I got a lot of, I got a lot of knows.
And then an internship came open with bill winky and Midwest white tail in Iowa.
And that was the first semi-live online hunting show. And I had been watching them in their very, I watched their very first episode on real tree outdoors on their website.
And I'd been following along with them. And at that time I'd built a portfolio of, of workup through with my footage. And I sent them all of that and, uh, eventually got hired as an intern there and then went through that internship and got hired full time with bill. After the seven month internship. Well, you got a taste in a hunting, some big white tails and, uh, you know, a lot, a lot of us Turkey hunters, uh, come fall. We, we are certainly after, after those, those big giants and, uh, you know, you can learn a lot about turkeys during that time too. And I've oftentimes said, if you're going to be a complete Turkey hunter, you got to see them in every season of the year. And so I always took a lot of notes when I was deer hunting and try to apply them to, you know, the experiences I had, uh, uh, you know, out there deer hunt. Take us then into the, into the hunting public where, where did it go from Bill? Wankie? I worked for bill for about seven years. And that's really where I learned how to become skilled at, at filming and editing, um, through working with my, my friends and coworkers at the time, you know, drew your Kosky, Jared Mills, Greg Clements, the list goes on there. And then obviously working with bill for several years and eventually left that position and was going to, I was going to go back to fish, fixing washers and dryers, like I did on a side in, in college, uh, for a good friend of mine. That's a really big Turkey hunter. He would use, he used to hang a sign on the door when it was Turkey season. He'd be like, we ain't fixing no dryers this morning. We're going hunting until noon. The customers would just call his cell phone. So I was thinking about going back to work for them and then moonlighting it in the video stuff. But then myself and my friend, Greg Clements and my other partner, Zach Farrenbaugh, we sat down at the kitchen table and we're like, you know what? We're just, uh, we're just very average guys from different parts of the country that grew up hunting public land or private land on permission. And now we, we have all these skills to create these videos and we're like, let's. Let's start something for the general public that hunts the general public that hunts and we're like, well, who is the general public that hunts more like it's the hunting public.
So that's where the name came from. And that's, well, that's when we started. Sure. And you've got a lot of public land in Missouri.
Yes, sir. And, uh, so tell me then when you created this, what, what was, what was the mission? I mean, what, what was it that you were really wanting to accomplish through this? Starting out, it was to create valuable and meaningful content for the viewers. First and foremost, that was above, above everything else. Yeah. All through video. All right. All through video and on YouTube, it was to create valuable content for the viewers. And in large part, the general public that hunts, it's like, like I said, that the folks out there that are just like, just like us, cause that's what I learned. When I moved to Iowa, I learned that there's a lot of other people, you know, as I started traveling around the country, going to calling contests and stuff, I'm like, there's a lot of people that are in my shoes that, uh, that it grew up in similar situations and I feel like we can, we can serve them by creating content. That's valuable for them first and foremost, above all else. So that's what we started doing is just building videos that we, that we thought they could find value in. Good. Well, then how do, how do people find you? Let's say they hear about the hunting public and they want to know more about public lands and, uh, the opportunities that are there. I mean, where do they go? What do they, how do they find where you're, you're located? Uh, they can find us on YouTube, just search or Google the hunting public, uh, the hunting public.com. And then we're on all major social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Tik TOK. And we also have a podcast as well that we have a YouTube channel called the hunting public podcast, and then the hunting public on all audio, available audio sources. Well, tell, tell us how it grows. I mean, if you go to the website and I see products on there, I mean, I see more than just the video travels that you have around the country. Tell us about that. Yeah. We start, I started selling t-shirts pretty much out of the car and the basement of the house and didn't have any idea what I was doing at all. Um, just because people had been asking for some and it wasn't going particularly well, but, uh, through our travels, we'd, uh, met a guy named Hayden cremer up in Wisconsin, who was a young guy. He was hungry, like us and very passionate about the outdoors, except he had a, he had a background in working with merchandise. He used to work for the folks at legendary white tails.
And he was, he came to us and was looking for a job at the time. And I was like, man, I don't have, I don't have much to pay and don't have much going on, but I said, you know, way more about this than, than we do. So if we can somehow work out a deal for, you know, this first six months or whatever, and then if it, if it takes off from there, maybe we've, we can carve out a role for you here and then go forward and he's really helped us with the merchandise end of our business. And that's been, that's been a tremendous help because when we, when we set out to do this and make content for the viewers above all else that, that put them at the highest priority. So we consequently turn away a lot of sponsorships, um, just because we can't. Well, our content is the number one priority. We, there just isn't a lot of room within the content for advertisements.
So we, we had to find other ways to, you know, make money doing this because they're just the buckets that we had, the revenue buckets were very small, each of them and the merchandise has helped with that for sure. And it's helped us get in a position to help fund conservation projects and all kinds of stuff, which I'm, which I'm really excited about. That's, that's what I spend most of my time thinking about, you know, when it's not hunting season. Yeah. Well, we're going to talk a little bit more about that in just, just a minute. And you know, when we talk about public land, uh, you know, the opportunities that are out there in the universe of the United States of America, how many acres can you give us a sort of a thumbnail of how many acres of public land we might have access to in the United States? There's a lot of different figures out there. So I could get this wrong, but I, I believe around 60% of the US is privately owned.
The other 40% is owned by, I mean, all sorts of federal and state agencies. Um, there's, there's a number of different landowners there, but I believe it's over 640 million acres. Yeah. Quite a bit hard to cover them one day for sure. Yeah. Ain't going to happen.
Well, you know, speaking of the word access, and I know that has been a real challenge. I know in a lot of the work that I did in the past at NWTF and, uh, you know, working as director of conservation with bats pro shops and interacting with the congressional sportsman's foundation, uh, is getting access to public lands. And, uh, so when we talk about access, I'll ask you the question. I think I know the answer is all public land accessible.
No, no. And that just seems there's over a hundred million acres. That's that are not accessible. I don't, I don't think the public knows. Actually that might be, that might be wrong. Um, but there are, there are millions of acres that are not accessible, especially out West in the checkerboard settings and stuff. Why don't you tell our listeners, our viewers, why that is? I mean, this is public land. It's owned by every citizen in this country, but if you can't get access to it, I mean, it seems like, well, somebody's benefiting from this. Why, why does that occur? Some of it is enrolled in state trust lands that have other interests at play than just hunting and outdoor recreation. There's also a lot of it that's landlocked. Like I mentioned that the checkerboard scenarios, which exist heavily out West are difficult to get access to because they're surrounded by private land. So the private landowners essentially have the, the sole access to the public lands. I know there's groups out there that are always working to try to, you know, let's just say far service land or BLM land, which of course cover a lot of the West, uh, does the hunting public work with any of these partners and trying to open access to them and, and if so, what are you doing? How do you, how do you, how could somebody be part of that? We are trying to, at the moment, that's been a hard nut to crack. Uh, as we, we set a fund or we set aside some funds a few years ago to attempt to acquire some public land, but as we started going down that road, we noticed that there was lots of other interests at play and, uh, in fact, the first piece of public land that we tried to, that we tried to acquire, um, we got turned down on because of essentially politics involved.
Like they didn't want to, they didn't want an outside company coming in with basically the sole interest of hunters going in and purchasing this property that was going to be used by everyone. So we've had to, we've had to navigate some of those, some of those hoops. And right now we have funds set aside to do more access work, but we are, we are looking at various routes to take it, whether we want to actually help purchase the property or do we want to go the walk-in hunting route and help states lease the property for hunting? Right. Both have pros and cons. Um, and there's, there's been, there's been other things that have happened there as well on the walk-in front. We started going down that road last year in Missouri and we, we learned real quick that they actually have plenty of funding for the walk-in program. The problem is getting enough private landowners to participate in it and essentially be able to be able to, uh, compete with the land leasing market. So there's, there's a lot of things that play behind, behind the scenes that. That are, that we're trying to navigate and I'm, I'm learning as I go. Um, but, but it's definitely something we're very passionate about. You know, Aaron, a lot has changed over the last 25 years and, uh, I don't need to tell you any equipment and just so many things, prices of land leases. I mean, gosh, how has hunter access changed over the last 25 years? Or has it changed at all? Um, I've seen it, I've seen it changed drastically since I was in high school. Basically.
And this kind of goes back to what I was saying about my perspective, it expanding as I started traveling around the country and talking to other hunters, you know, that were in a similar situation as I was growing up. When I was in high school, it was easy to run down the road, talk to a farmer, get permission, public land, public land was still very much the same then as it is now. It was an option that we used frequently, but knocking on doors and basically hunting on farmer's property was something I did a lot in high school. I, at one time I had several thousand acres of privately in the hunt, just via permission. And that wasn't exclusive. They, most of these landowners would let, you know, other family members and other local people hunt there that either went to their church or whatever. Yep.
And that slowly started to dry up as I, as I graduated high school and go to college. By the time I was in my early years of college, I had lost pretty much everything. Uh, as far as my permission properties had went, they'd either, they'd either been bought for recreational land use, or they were leased for hunting.
So I lost quite a bit of access during that time. As I've traveled around the country since I've seen that continue to progress. And then even with talking to state agencies, they, they regularly survey their resident hunters and ask them, you know, what, what their satisfaction looks like and what are some of the main reasons that you drop out or that you stop hunting and the amount of people that say that loss of access is a, is a number, you know, at the top, a place to go. One of the right, most of them lose a player, don't have a place to go. So it's, it's become a major issue, especially in the last couple of decades, because it, it wasn't as big of a deal before then.
You know, you mentioned Iowa and I remember back, Oh gosh, maybe it was in the early eighties when land was, you could still get it for maybe $600 an acre. And now what are those land prices? And, uh, you know, with the popularity of people wanting to kill big deer and Iowa known as one of those giant, I mean, a place, if you want to kill a giant buck, I was one of those places to go.
Uh, I can remember back when, uh, Tony night inventor of the inline muzzle around Centerville, Iowa, I was with him and with his banker and he said hardly, and this was back in the eighties. He said, hardly a week goes by that. I don't have someone from out of state calling wanting to know if there was any land for sale, if there were any farms for sale and they would pay premium prices and all they wanted to do was come and be able to hunt a week. That's all they wanted. Said a farmer can farm it. And, uh, he said, he'll own it. But he said, he just wants to have hunting rights on it. And I guess that has happened in a lot of places. Uh, I look at it here in South Carolina, for example, you know, along that I 95 corridor with, uh, you know, the early season, early Turkey season, early deer season, I mean, people from Florida, they come up 95 and, uh, they've paid some big dollars on leasing land and have purchased, uh, you know, some fantastic, uh, plantations and, uh, you know, it's, it's really made a change. Uh, I mean, it's difficult to get in some of those places that once were a lot easier to get in, like you were talking about there in Missouri.
So, uh, where do you see this going? Where, where is it going into the future? You know, when people are limited on going hunting, cause they don't have a place to go, what do you, what do you see in your crystal ball?
Well, they, they resort to public land, um, which is exactly what I did. When I moved to Iowa, I was making, you know, sub $20,000 a year for the first couple of years, and I, uh, you know, didn't have any, uh, it was having a heck of a time finding permission. I eventually found permission to hunt two and a half hours away from my house, but I had, I had more public land that was much closer. So that's what I resorted to. And it's been awesome experience. I mean, you deal with other hunters nonstop, but it, you know, if you still keep an open mind, you can have great experiences out there on public land, but I definitely see more and more people resorting to that as they, as they lose access to private land and there's, there's pros and cons to this access conundrum that we have many of the landowners that are coming in and purchasing land, like what, and what you're talking about, they have an interest in the wildlife, which is, is a good thing, potentially long-term from a habitat perspective and protecting wildlife. So I definitely see that, but we also need to find creative ways to get access to other people, especially local people within the communities, because that's who it affects the most or, you know, small local farming communities, uh, that whenever, whenever someone from outside of that region comes in there that just has deeper pockets and is able to pay those higher prices when they make that purchase, they are usually taking access away from a local person in that area. And I'm not saying that's right or wrong. No, either way. I just want to be able to, I want those people to be able to have the same opportunity to hunt as everybody else. Well, you know, share some of those most common habitat slash access scenarios that you see, I mean, let's start with, uh, state, uh, some of the smaller areas on well-managed public lands. What do you see happening there? Well, it's, it's hard to put all this in a box, right? But you can, the way that I look at it is that we see two most common scenarios. The state owned and managed properties that are managed by the state's, uh, wildlife agencies. Those typically are smaller in size, but they're managed more intensely in the habitat on them, not always, but often is much better. The conundrum with that is that in order to make good Turkey habitat, as you know, you've got to disturb the landscape. Sure. So you have to get equipment in and out of that property, which essentially creates easy access routes for hunters. You bet. So when season opens up, those properties have more turkeys on them because they have better habitat and they're, and they're cared for well by the agency. But the, their access is so easy for the hunters that the birds incur a lot of pressure right out of the gate. You bet. That's the, that's the first scenario that we see.
The second scenario is, oh, sorry, Rob, go ahead. No, go ahead. You're, you're on a roll. Oh, sorry. The second scenario we see is large tracks of often federally owned land with less active management going on, but those, those tracks have less turkeys per square mile because the habitat is less than ideal. However, access is more difficult and you can occasionally find pockets that are really back in far away from the roads that are, that are across water that are difficult to access, which sort of separates you from the crowd. And you can encounter birds that are unpressured. The issue there obviously is that the habitat's less than ideal and the turkeys are not as, they're just not as plentiful on that type of property. So there's pros and cons to each, but those are the two scenarios we see most often. Yeah. Well, there's no question that, uh, the landscape has been blurred by anti hunters trying to make, uh, two words that are, uh, very prominent. Uh, they want to make them, uh, sound the same conservation and preservation. And conservation is wise management. And as you said, management means disturbing that land. It may be timber harvest. It may be planning it, maybe doing all kinds of things to improve that habitat, which of course, wildlife responds to. And, uh, just because you don't touch it, doesn't mean it makes it better for wildlife. And I've seen this all across the country. Uh, I mean, right here in the South, I mean, I've seen where there's been an activist out there that, you know, I've done everything they could to stop timber harvest and, uh, when you can't manage those, not only is it not as good for wildlife, but then you got situations like wildfire. And you see that out in the West, especially, uh, you know, I'd never forget back during the George W. Bush era. I was on the, uh, sporting and hunting conservation council that president pointed me to. And this, uh, was, we were in Oregon and and Veneman was the, uh, secretary of agriculture, which forest service comes under and, uh, we looked at, uh, where a huge fire had just burned a large chunk of national forest land. On the opposite side of the road was a vibrant forest that was not burned. And the president asked the question, why did the public land burn and the private land didn't. And the answer from the secretary was, well, we haven't been able to harvest, uh, timber the way we need to. We're not able to manage it. We're not able to take out the diseased and the dying trees that need to be removed on the industrial forest. They've managed, managed it intensely. And they've removed a lot of that fuel from those dead, diseased and dying trees. And, uh, that's why it didn't burn like the public land. And so I know that that's going to continue to be a real challenge for all of us that want to hunt public lands that we want to utilize, even if you don't hunt them to enjoy them. And, uh, I know that that will be a constant battle with people that don't understand, they don't understand what management actually means and the results that come about, you know, who doesn't enjoy here in a, an elk bugle in the fall or a Turkey gobble in the spring. And they certainly do better on managed lands than they do on lands that are untouched for, for sure.
Well, tell us a little bit about the hunting public's involvement in helping fund research projects. Well, what are they? Uh, we started out, uh, helping Alabama fund a Turkey research project down there a few years ago, and it, it all started with just a phone call of Mike Chamberlain and at the university of Georgia, I called Mike and I said, look, I am a, I'm a glorified redneck from Missouri, man. I don't know. I don't know the first thing about all these terms and these papers, but I, all I know is that, you know, research needs to be on the ground in a lot of these places, because that's one of the things that helped turkeys before.
And if we want to help turkeys now and into the future, it's something that I'm pretty passionate about and pretty certain that I've, I want to explore more. And I said, we've got some fun set aside and our followers are happy to donate more, but I need a direction and I, I need, you know, I want to know what our options look like. So Mike and I started talking about what we could do and then also got in touch with the folks from turkeys from for tomorrow and will goals be at Auburn.
And we ended up helping. It was a big collaborative effort. It ended up being between UGA, Auburn, TFT, NWTF and the Alabama wildlife federation, and it was a huge project that we got off the ground. I'm trying to remember what, which year it was. It might've been in 2020 or 21 when it started.
And, uh, they studied a variety of things. They went in and put, uh, uh, song meters across the state monitoring, gobbling activity on public, private, hunted and non-hunded lands from Southern Alabama to Northern Alabama, also studied reproduction of hens using GPS units.
And a number of other things. And some, some of that research is still ongoing, but that was, that was the first project that we helped fund. And it was amazing. The support that it got, as soon as we told people we were doing this, they, I can't tell you how many hundreds of messages and emails we got almost overnight from folks that just wanted to help in some ways, like, man, I can only donate $20 or I can only donate 50 or I can only do this, but I want to be able to help in some way. A lot of people from, not even from Alabama, from in different parts of the country that donated funds. Yeah. I mean, a lot of that research, you can apply then to, to other states as well. And, uh, you know, I've found that Turkey hunters, uh, they want to put their money where their mouth is when it comes to, to, you know, making sure that we've got, Turkey's going to gobble out there each spring, you know, the, the next part of that though, goes to putting it into management or putting it into play. You know, there's a lot of research been done on a lot of different topics out there. It just sits on a shelf and unless the agency state, federal, local agencies, NGOs can put it into practice. Then we've, you know, we've, we've found the answer, but we haven't made a difference. And I think that that's the next step in making sure that, uh, you know, that if we've found a problem and we found a way to help solve that problem, then we need to move forward and actually do the solution that needs to be there. Any other research? I know you guys have looked at a lot of me. There's a lot of Turkey research going on. I mean, uh, Bass Pro Shops, the last two years has given a million dollars to research wild Turkey research. Uh, I mean, we are heavily invested in that. I mean, we feel just like the hunting public. We've got to find some answers to some of the declines that we've seen, especially in the South and, uh, you know, try to really, uh, do something for the future. So that we don't go out there on a spring morning and hear nothing but Cardinals and crows. Yeah. Yep. Colonel Tom Kelly can he's, he's talked about those seasons. You know, many, many years ago, how they would go out for, you know, every day of the season and not hear a thing that was before restoration. We know that I had a great, I've had a great season so far here in South Carolina, but I can tell you the last four days in the Piedmont, I have yet to hear a Turkey gobble on the roost. Now that's concerning to me. In the low country, didn't have any problems at all. I mean, just, uh, I mean, it went like it was supposed to. And I've found that, uh, you know, declines aren't necessarily statewide and you'll find pockets, you'll find areas that, uh, haven't been impacted, whether it's been local weather conditions, whether it happens to be predation disease or all the many other things that Dr. Chamberlain has outlined and, you know, no silver bullet out there to, to really solve that. So, you know, as you look to the future, as the hunting public looks to the future, what do you see as some of the threats to our public land threats to access to these public lands? Um, political threats are ongoing all the time. And that's something that, uh, how for wildlife does a great job with awareness on that, and they're constantly putting out information for folks about issues that are pressing right now in social media has its downfalls for sure. But one thing that I have noticed is that it's made it easier to communicate with the masses on these issues. And it, we haven't found a way to get out ahead of a lot of them yet, but we have found a way to play good defense against them. So whenever they do pop up where public land access is threatened, uh, not all the time, but often we've been able to sort of rally the hunting community. And, you know, take action, whether that's emailing or contact in wildlife committees or, or politicians and voice and our concerns with whatever bills are out there, I mean, they just had a situation in Kentucky not long ago that sportsmen and women, uh, stood up and defended their rights and were able to. We're able to kill the bill essentially just by communicating that. So I definitely see that as a, I see that as a threat, but it gives me hope that there's a lot of people that are passionate enough about this to take action. Well, you know, go ahead. I didn't mean to cut you off. No, no, no, not at all. And there's, there is, there is hope on the horizon for that. The other, the other aspect of, of public land is the access issue that we talked about earlier, and it's just having a place for people to go. I mean, that makes moving forward, that makes public land even more important. You know, unless we, unless we find other ways and other means to get people onto private land, whether that's through, you know, walking, hunting leases or, or other programs that, you know, folks have yet to think of even, but those are the, those are the two main things. You know, people oftentimes ask me, what can I do for conservation?
You know, I've given it great thought. One of the things that we have got to do, and it really plays back to, you know, the public dealing with access to public lands is to register to vote. It is amazing to me, the number of sportsmen and women, and I've seen the numbers across the country that are not registered to vote. I'm talking about licensed anglers and hunters. So for all of you that are watching and listening, make sure that you and your friends are registered to vote. I'm not going to tell you how to vote. You'll figure that part out. We're not here to make a political statement, but we're talking about one that's a privilege in this great land of ours and this land of the free so that you can vote to try to make sure that these public lands stay open, that they're going to be there for future generations.
Aaron, you know, in the Turkey world, a lot of guys talk about, uh, man, I want to get a grand slam this year. I want to get a Royal slam this year. I want to get a world slam this year. And of course, there's a few out there, you know, in that 49 state super slam. And of course, they always wonder, where should I go? So as you look at the five subspecies of wild turkeys here in this country, the Oceola, the Eastern, the Rio, the Miriams, the Goulds, it can be hunted the U.S.
My question to you is each one of those found and can they be hunted on public lands?
I think so. I'm not sure about the Goulds pretty sure that Goulds can be public. I did. I was on the Coronado national forest in Arizona. I got one of those tags and, uh, but what a privilege it was for me to go back to a place where we brought turkeys in, in the early nineties out of Sonora and, uh, released them there on public land and to get one of those tags and go back there and have the opportunity, uh, as with John Milliken, who was, uh, one of the land managers for Arizona game and fish. Now he's chapter president of the, uh, watch hookah gobblers and to share that time with him, you know, to come full circle, to enjoy something that, uh, you know, I and many other people had a, had a hand in. So I can assure you that, uh, that the Goulds Turkey is on public land in the state of Arizona. How about the, that's the only one, that's the only one we haven't chased on public land.
And as you know, it's a difficult tag to get, but yes, the other, the others are, are available to hunt on public land. The Osceola's are tough. They are, but there is, they do live on public land. There are some. Yeah. I know this another one that it'd be hard to put your fingers on, but if you just had to guess, give us the universe number of how many acres of public land have turkeys, because I know not all of it does a lot of that, you know, is, uh, you know, vast areas of, of just wide open country with no roost trees and what have you, but have you ever tried to put a number on that? I don't know. I don't know a number, um, but in general, generalizing it a little bit. I would say that those big federal tracks that we talked about a while ago, there's a lot of dead space in those, even the big forested landscapes. Yeah. There's, there's a lot of areas within those where turkeys, they may have turkeys there, but you know, as we've learned more through Turkey research, especially using GPS tags on birds in the last 15 years, um, you know, they're, they're drilling down and they're getting specific fine detail movements on these birds and the habitats that they use.
And we can see that they're, they're not utilizing large portions of that habitat. They may walk through it to get from A to B, but yeah, I know we're very pocketed. Yeah. And I know Turkey, I took in South Dakota back some years ago, trapped as a Jake released in Northeastern Meade County in South Dakota when I killed him. And I turned the tag number into the biologist done. He said that Turkey is seven years old and he's covered over 40 miles from where he was released and he said, he went through two sections of badlands. He said, I can't even imagine a Turkey traveling through that, but they do cover ground through some of these places that they don't actually stay. And, uh, you know, when you look at Miriam's turkeys, I mean, we've seen some of them, you know, radio collared turkeys that have traveled 85 miles from winter range to spring range and, and vice versa. So there's a lot of that that they don't live in, but they cross through it. And so I would think that, you know, you got to consider that valuable as well. Well, I know you're on the 2024 Turkey tour. Tell us about that. And you mentioned, uh, Mississippi and Louisiana. Where do you go from here? I'm going to be hunting in Missouri for the next week or so. I'm hoping that my stepson will be able to get out early next week and maybe get a chance at his first one. That's my main priority for the next week or so. He hunted turkeys last year with me three different times and wasn't able to get one, but boy, we were close. His heart was pounding on more than one occasion. So I'm hoping to get him on one. Uh, and then from there we'll, we'll be in the Midwest for a few weeks and then eventually traveled to the Northeast and the Northwest in May. Yeah. Well, how can people follow the Turkey tour? Uh, just go on YouTube. It's a day by day series of our adventures throughout the country. And there's, there are some, you know, great footage here and there of birds and some good hunts, but there's also a lot of hunts where things go wrong. And we don't kill one, which is just part of Turkey honey, especially on public lands. It is, you know, I've oftentimes said it's not the size of the Turkey, but it's the size of the experience that you have that really makes a hunt. And some of those are ones that you don't kill the Turkey. I mean, have close encounters setting up a half dozen times or even more and interacting using different calls and, uh, you know, trying a variety of things and coming so close, you can hear him drumming, but you can't make the shot. And, uh, man, I know I saw one, uh, one clip. Uh, you guys were in South Carolina. Tell me about that. Tell me about that. Yeah. I wasn't on that hunt. The, my partner Zach and some of our other guys were out there. Greg was out there as well. And last I talked to them a couple of days ago was that they were, they were on turkeys about every day, but they were getting whipped pretty good. Whip by the Turkey or whip by other hunters. Both, both, both. They found a, they found a pretty good pocket of turkeys where there was very few hunters. They didn't find much pressure in there, but the birds were extremely hinged up and you know what it's like dealing with them when they're like, Oh yeah. Well, they're there the opening day. I mean, you're talking up in the mountain unit where I think they were. Uh, I don't care what subspecies it is. Hens make this game tough and to try to, uh, to, to make that work. Uh, you got to pull a lot of tricks out of your hat for sure.
I know you mentioned that deer that's behind you, how memorable it was at the age of 16 to take that, that buck with a bow. What's your most memorable public land Turkey hunt? Uh, myself and Zach, my business partner hunted for a week and a half in Iowa on public land with my grandpa's muzzleloader. We lost him to cancer and my uncle gave me that muzzleloader and he said, your grandpa wasn't much of a marksman and he couldn't hit the broadside of a barn with it. He's like, but maybe you can figure out a way to shoot this whole thing. And throughout the course of that week, I miss four turkeys, missed them clean. Uh, I had multiple misfires. It was just, it was awesome hunting action. I mean, we had birds in gun range seven or eight times. Yeah. And I eventually shot one and killed one with it on the fifth encounter after hunting for about a week. And that was, that was probably my most memorable week of hunting. Yeah. You know, I've, I've, I've, I think anybody, any turkey and it says they've never missed one hasn't hunted very many turkeys.
And certainly, uh, understanding point of aim and point of impact becomes very, very important, uh, in that if you're using a shotgun and, uh, uh, I think we've all been through that, but you know, when you finally do make that connection, I mean, it's just like, there's been a burden lifted off of your back, I mean, it's like the monkey's gone. The, you know, you finally killed the snake that was keeping you from being successful.
Uh, yeah. That old muzzleloader gave me a fits. Oh man. We eventually, we eventually got it, got it dialed in and was able to kill one with it. Yeah, for sure. Pretty awesome. You know, you mentioned something to me in a text about, uh, spending $14,000 on purchasing turkey stamps in Arkansas. What was that all about?
Well, we've, we've donated around 90,000 to Turkey research in the last three years between three different States. And every year we set aside a certain amount of money for research or habitat. And we've wanted to get involved in the habitat stuff as of late, because that's one, like you mentioned earlier, you have to put the research into practice. And one of the main things that we were seeing from the research after talking to Mike and will and Marcus and, you know, Brett Collier and all those guys is a lack of brood rearing habitat. And Arkansas has obviously had their challenges with Turkey flock in the last 15 years and they, they instituted that Turkey stamp, you know, a few years ago, which is a voluntary stamp.
And you can, you can purchase that thing in the funds or earmarked to go to, to Turkey habitat and research in the States. So we talked to their, uh, Turkey coordinator and purchased $14,000 worth of those stamps and, uh, they, it's a really cool project. Really cool program. They send out a document that shows where they spent all of the money, you know, on these public lands and for which projects, whether it's prescribed fire, disk, you know, mulching timber management. So really cool. I'd like to see more States do that. Yeah. I think it's a great, great project, great way to, to, to fund and involve so many in the things that are so important. I know you are a fanatical deer hunter. You talked about times working with Bill Winky and certainly, uh, all the video work you did there, anything you wanted to share before we leave here about, uh, your 2024 deer season on public lands, what are you looking at? Uh, as a fall rid net far away. I know we're in spring, but, uh, I know you're always thinking about where's that next year hunt going to be. I'm not real sure where I'm going to go next fall in the Midwest other than around home, but I know I'm going back down South again.
Uh, those Southern deer down there on public land are just, uh, they're, they're a total pain to figure out. They are really difficult to hunt. Um, in, in South Carolina, stretching all the way to Louisiana. Yeah. It's just all across through there. They're, they're a tough, tough critter to catch up to. So every year we try to make it down there. And that's one that I always look forward to. Yeah. I, I've oftentimes said, you know, here in South Carolina and much of the South, uh, Southeast we've got a lot of deer. We've got long seasons, liberal bag limits, but we don't have the genetics. We don't have the agriculture. We don't have the fertility that the Midwest has. So you can kill of a five and a half, six and a half year old deer. And he might score one 30 or one 40.
But I'll put him on the wall to kill one of those things. Let me tell you with a bow, you're talking about a challenge. Well, let me ask you this a final thought you'd like to share as we wind this thing down, Aaron. Uh, just, uh, enjoy the experience. If you get out this spring, involve others. If you can focus on the social aspect of hunting, because that's what, that's one of the main reasons why we're here. And that's why, you know, turkeys came back in the first place was because we were able to work together as a United group and, you know, uh, push things forward from there. So we're, we're big on the habitat stuff right now. That's what I'm really, really fired up about. So, uh, learn, learn as much as you can about it. There's lots of resources out there available. No question. Just wish everybody good luck. Well, I wish you good luck on the Turkey tour and good luck with that steps on out there. I know that, uh, that's, that's one of those marks you want to make one of those experiences that you want to see come to fruition and thanks for making public land public and sharing it with so many people out across the board. Thank you for tuning into this podcast with Aaron war Britain. Make sure you hit the subscribe button and watch our other episodes to stay up to date on all things Turkey.