I'm Travis Bader and this is The
Silvercore Podcast.
Join me as I discuss matters related to
hunting, fishing, and outdoor pursuits
with the people in businesses that comprise
of the community.
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check out our website, www.Silvercore.ca where
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As well as how you can join The Silvercore
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properly covered during your outdoor ventures.
Today, I'm speaking with Rick Brazell, who spent
36 years in the US forest service, managing land
and in 2015 started the First Hunt Foundation.
Where he and his team of volunteers provide
mentorship and guidance for those wishing
to get into hunting.
Rick, welcome to The Silvercore Podcast.
Thanks, Travis.
Really enjoy being here.
So specifically I want to speak about the
First Hunt Foundation, how it got started,
what it does, as well as some of the
challenges and successes that you've had.
But first I'd like to get a little bit more into
the background on you.
Like where did you grow up and what ignited your
passion for hunting?
Oh, wow.
That's a great one.
I grew up in Texas, so I'm a long way from home.
So if you hear a little bit of a southern
accent, that's because I'm from the south.
And I grew up in the country.
I went to a little school that had like 85
students, K through 12.
So we're talking small.
Wow.
Yeah.
You know everybody, and their parents.
And so you can.
No kidding.
Get by with anything.
Of course, and my dad was the bus mechanic
for the little school so I lived on a city
block surrounded by fields and farmland.
And so I just had an interest early on to
hunt, to go get a BB gun, go out and chase things
and the poor metal arcs back then weren't safe.
And I look at it now going, I shouldn't
have done that, but when you're a kid,
sparrows and metal arcs and anything
else, it was fair game.
Sure.
So I just had an interest in hunting
for a long, long time.
And my dad wasn't a hunter, which was kind
of, made it hard for me because I didn't have
somebody to train me.
I mean, he had a shotgun, but he
didn't really hunt.
And so I had to learn it on my own basically.
That's a tough way to do it.
Yeah.
It was, it was tough.
And so when I was about in the eighth grade
and my buddy of mine at school, he wanted
to be a hunter too and his dad didn't hunt,
so we kind of figured it out on our own.
We got our own guns and it's a little bit like
the Christmas story.
I got my first deer rifle when I kept, saving up,
had a Mason jar, had duct tape on it so I couldn't
get into as a kid and it had deer rifle on it.
My parents got a kick out of that because I put
every little coin I could or ever a little bit of
money I made because I was going to buy my first
deer rifle with that.
And then I was going to get an old British 303
because it was cheap.
Yeah.
And my dad and my mom were smart and one
Christmas after we opened all the gifts, the said
well look behind the tree and there was a deer
rifle behind the tree.
It was pretty, it was great.
Wow.
My parents supported my passion and I was
in the eighth grade, I remember that.
And so now I had had a 243 and watch out
world cause here I come.
Well, you're a bit of an anomaly.
Most people don't get into hunting unless
they've had a family member, mother, father,
aunt, and uncle, somebody to kind of
get them into it.
Yeah, exactly.
And that's part of the reason the foundation's
there because I found there's a lot of,
especially youthm and we're finding a lot
of adults now too, but especially youth
that would like to get into hunting, like I
want to do, but their parents or nobody in
their family hunts.
And then they're looking for somebody to teach
them and that's kind of where the foundation
started and it's like, let's find these kids
and help them out.
And what happened, I was in Washington state,
living in Washington state working for the
us forest service.
And I had 20 acres there and it was surrounded
by alfalfa fields and in the evenings the
deer would just go to the fields, but they
wouldn't go to my pasture because it was just
grass, pasture grass.
And so in Washington state, you can
put up feeders.
So I'll put up a feeder and I had deer coming.
They would stopped to my place before
they go the alfalfa.
And I set up a stand and I made a deal with any
kid that wanted to shoot their first deer, they
could come to my place.
I had seven kids come with their parents or me
setting in that stand.
And they all were successful in getting
their first deer and years later, I mean,
years later they would come up to me on
the street and thank me and say, Hey Mr.
Brazell, I remember shooting my first deer, I
just wanted to thank you, I'll never forget that.
And it hit me.
What if I could duplicate that feeling
of excitement, thousands of times, instead of
just these seven times.
And so I played with that in my head until
I retired trying to figure out what am I
going to do with my life when I retire?
I thought I don't want to create an
organization that gives those first hunt
experiences to thousands and thousands of people.
And that's kind of where it started
was those seven kids getting their first
deer on that 20 acres in Washington state so.
Wow.
So when did you retire?
I retired now, about six years ago and started the
foundation immediately when I retired.
Yeah, I was just doing the math there.
Yeah.
And it didn't realize it was going to be so
successful that it just blossomed and took off.
And now we're operating in 28 States and have
almost 500 volunteer mentors, just about
10 shy of that, in those 28 States that
are taking people out.
We did like 4,000 days last year.
So 4,000 days of people getting out on
their first hunts, our training, we count the
days of training as well.
Cause you can't just go out, usually without
learning how to hold a gun, shoot a gun,
that sort of thing.
Right.
All the things that the hunter ed course
doesn't teach you.
Right.
Yeah.
And we don't do the hunter ed stuff.
That's the state's responsibilities
down here to do that.
We tell folks, well what do we gotta do?
We'll say, take your state stuff, get that
done and we can even help them figure it out.
And then we take them from there.
We're the next step.
Right.
Yeah, we've got, of course in Canada,
hunter ed courses differ province by province,
similar to in the States.
And the most common concern or complaint that
people come out of it with is it didn't really
prepare me to hunt.
It teaches me the laws, it teaches me
regulations, it teaches me identification.
And there's all these important pieces around
hunting that you, a new hunter should know.
But the big part of it, the learning how
to hunt isn't covered in hunter education.
Right.
And it's actually with the pandemic it's got
a little bit more lax and I understand why.
But in our particular state, they don't even
do a field day now for now, they did in the
past, you'd have to do your course and spend
a day in the field.
And they said, because of the pandemic, you
can take it online and never even meet an
instructor face to face and get your hunter
education certificate.
So there's, in my opinion, a massive
disconnect between hunter education,
training and hunting, and that disconnect
would be mentorship, something in between.
And we live in a society now where the younger
generation they're on Facebook and Instagram
and Tik Tok and their social connections
are done virtually and by and large and I'm
seeing a trend towards a desire for, I guess, more
intimate connections, more real connections
with other individuals.
And I'm starting to see organizations like
the R3 movement, right?
The R3 movement is the, what is that?
The retain and recruit and re-introduce
or recruit, retain, reintroduce hunters.
Yep, and we're big into that.
We didn't start out that way, R3 wasn't
even around when we started, or at least
it was in its infancy.
And we were involved, the foundation was
involved in going to early on meetings,
trying to figure out what it was about.
And but it does stand for recruiting new hunters
and retaining those that are thinking maybe
they're losing interest.
And then re-engaging those that have
left the hunting and get them back.
And we do all of that.
Our foundation, we're chasing, getting mentors,
take new people out.
We're are keeping people interested by giving
them something to do.
And we're re-engaging folks that have left.
A lot of people say, well, my kids
are all gone out on hunting anymore.
And we say, well heck we'll find you a kid or
help you find the kids.
Some people joked about it, rent a kid, you
know, it's not really, it's like, we'll find
you a person to take hunting and then that
gets them back into the sport, which is
a whole nother thing.
It kind of bothers me to call it a sport,
but it's been called that for years.
Sure.
I think people know what we're talking about
when we say sport, but.
Right.
Yeah, I mean, just this last year, my son got
his first deer and 11 years old, 10 years old,
got his hunting license.
That's all he wanted.
He says, I want to walk in, I want to do my
exam, I want to go to the government office.
I want to, and in British Columbia, we
call it a Fish and Wildlife ID card, so
I want to get my FWID.
And the first year he was going out and learning
about the species coming on hunting trips, but
he was getting to carry around a rifle and
get used to what that feels like unloaded.
But he didn't harvest any animals and we've
got something called waterfowl heritage days.
So a week prior to harvesting his first
deer, a couple from the local sporting goods
store out here said, Hey, tell you what we
got access to land, we've got a dog, we've
got the blind, we've got all the decoys and gear.
Would your son like to come out on waterfowl
heritage days?
And these guys get nothing out of it, other
than the enjoyment of reintroducing, and I
shouldn't say they get nothing out of it, but
obviously there's a lot that mentors get out
of it, but it is geared around the new hunter.
Anyways, my son got his first duck and at
the end of the day, he was very thrilled,
so proud of himself.
And he says to me afterwards, he says,
I didn't know what it'd be like, and
obviously you don't until you've been there.
But now I know, now I'm confident I can
go out and I can go hunt that deer cause
he had a limited entry draw for a deer.
So that whole mentorship process is invaluable
for new hunters, but it's also like, you're
pointing out, a very valuable tool to hunters
who've been doing it for a long time and they want
to pass their knowledge onto somebody else.
Well, you know, it's so fulfilling to
see somebody else learn and grow.
A lot of our mentors tell us that.
And I personally would say that last year,
not the pandemic year, the year before I
did 50 something days of taking youth out.
Wow.
And then 30 something days of me hunting.
So 80 something days in the field hunting, and
I'm thinking, I think I'd died and went to heaven
because that's kind of what I love doing, but.
You're living the life.
Yeah, I had more fun taking those youth out
and teaching them and they get their first
animal and it could be a doe, but they were so
excited that it could have been a 30 inch mule
deer buck or whatever.
But to them it was just, they should just.
And then there's folks that don't have money.
I mean, there's one lady, that's a widowed
grandmother raised three of her grandsons
because the parents didn't do well in life,
I won't go into that.
But she's having struggles, and when one
son got a deer, that was food for their table.
And they cried when she thanked me for
helping them, not only teach their grandson a
skill and get him out doing something besides
being on a computer, but they had lots
of meals out of it.
And they were so excited.
That to me, when, when that happens, it's
like you've changed somebody's life.
You're not just giving them a one
day experience.
You're changing their entire life.
You really are.
Yeah.
You really are.
Well, I should imagine, and it looks
like you just came on like gangbusters,
you've already got 500 mentors across the
country in a relatively short period of time.
How did you get this started?
Well, we knew we had to find people mentors.
I mean, locally, we found a bunch of real
quick, cause you talked to your friends and
that sort of thing.
And then we started thinking, well,
let's figure out how, where do we go to
find these people?
We could advertise of course, but where
do you advertise?
And we started thinking, let's go to the big
outdoor shows cause there's a lot of those
down here in the States.
And some of them have like 50,000 people
go and all those 50,000 people are
going to those outdoor hunting shows because
they're into hunting.
And so we put up a big booth and people's, we
kind of grabbed them when they come by and
try to get them to come over and talk to us.
And we were starting to sign up mentors that way.
And before you know it we had 50 and a hundred
and of course they talked to their friends and
buddies and go, Hey, you need to be part of this.
And then we would get more that way.
One of the kind of, I don't know if it's
a, call it a catch, but it was fun.
We created a simulated Nerf hunting range,
not a shooting range, a hunting range.
So we had these Nerf guns and we had this
background that had deer and elk and bear
and moose and ducks, instead of rounds
and black circles, which most target
things have for kids.
And then we had these little Nerf guns that
had scopes on them.
They looked like a gun, except they
were bright colored and we've had over
7,000 kids go through that at the shows.
And so when the kids come over and they're shooting
and we celebrate, Oh, you got an elk, what are you
going to do with all that meat versus, Oh, you hit
the bullseye and they're grinning from ear to ear.
The parents are grinning from ear to ear.
And then we kind of hooked the parents cause
they're probably hunters and say, Hey, how about
joining our organization?
So they're seeing their kid have a good
time that we provided.
And some of them it's the first time they ever
thought about, and some of them aren't hunters
and then they shot, never even shot a gun.
They don't even know how to hold a plastic gun,
let alone a real gun.
And then we're not training them
to be hunters.
We're just saying, Hey, here's an experience you
could could build on.
You could actually go out in the world later,
maybe shoot a real deer.
And so anyway, 7,000 people went through
that, but again, with the pandemic, it's a
pretty much of a germ fest when you got all
these plastic guns laying on the table and you've
literally got four kids and four behind them.
And you know, it's like, Oh, you can't
keep it clean.
No, everyone's rubbing them on their faces.
Oh yeah, I've seen them their sleeve, their nose
sleeve and then pick up the gun and just kind
of, and we wipe them.
We did wipe them down before the pandemic, but
now I'd be kind of scared to put them out there.
But anyway, it was a great experience,
it was a way to get the parents there.
And we, we recruited a lot of people from
those kind of things, as well as raffles.
Yeah, just boots on the ground, work at
the different shows.
So I should imagine, now you guys don't
charge anything.
You guys don't charge anything for a person
to come on their first hunt with you do you?
They pay their own way for whatever it
is and, but you're not charging any extra on
top of that are you?
No.
We don't allow any charges at all.
In fact, we've told our mentors that if we
find out that you're even accepting money
for gas, then you won't be a mentor anymore.
And the reason for that is, several
reasons for that.
One is we're a nonprofit, we're doing this for the
cause and for the good.
And even though there is expenses, people
are willing to donate some gas for a day
or shells or gun.
And most of these new people don't have any
equipment, so they're having to use the
mentors equipment.
The other thing in the States anyway, for
a lot of States down here, there's a lot
of rules on guiding.
And so we don't even use, we don't even allow
the word guide to be used in our vernacular.
It's just because it has a legal connotation that
if you're not a licensed guide, that you can't do
it in certain States and some people would say,
well, you're guiding.
No we're teaching.
We're not guiding.
We're not just taking them out
to get an animal.
We're trying to teach them conservation
and how everything.
Hunter ed, kind of all of the above.
Whereas a guide would just take you out
and shoot the animal.
Right.
And that was where I was going with the
question, essentially did you receive pushback
from any of the States or any of the guide
outfitter organizations?
No, we haven't, not yet.
And I hope we don't.
Partly the reason I don't think we will is because
the R3 we mentioned earlier, the States are
just like, how do we implement this thing?
When they hear about us, they go, Oh my gosh,
here's a nonprofit doing what we want, let's
put her arm around them and help these guys.
And it's the state's usually that would be on
the other side of that with the Outfitters and
guides, because they control the outfitter
and guide boards.
So, so far we've not had that, I suppose
it could happen.
You know, if some Outfitters felt like,
well, you took a kid bear hunting that they
would've paid me to take them, but you
took them for free so.
Hmm.
Now, do you guys keep metrics on the
individuals coming through sort of maybe
whether they're a country kid, city kid, gender,
demographics, any of these sort of things.
Do you guys kind of keep an eye on that?
Yeah, we did.
We didn't at first, but as we first couple of
years and we started thinking, well we needed
to keep track of this.
So we started tracking youth, whether they are
youth, first of all.
Eight, less than 18 and then we started
tracking whether they're male or female.
So we know how many boys and girls are there.
We started tracking gender for adults as
well, but we didn't, we don't track specific
stuff like a species.
One of the things we've got to, we're
working on an app.
We hope that, that the app will help us collect
more data and people can do it in real time
because, well, let me tell you one of the
issues with this thing.
And it's been, it's like pulling teeth is
to get the mentors to give you data because
at the end of the year, we contact them and go,
Hey, how many people did you take out in
all these categories?
And less than half of them will respond.
And then it puts the burden on us to call them
and say, please, would you give us this data?
And it's kind of like, it's not that they're
negative against it.
But they're like everybody else, they get
inundated, I don't want to do another survey.
And so getting that data is hard.
So we're working on trying to get an app.
And if we had anybody that helped us develop
a phone app, that'd be even better.
So you could do it in real time.
So literally get on your phone and go, I'm doing
a training day, I'm doing it with a 12 year
old or male or whatever.
And then boom, it's done because what happens
now at the end of the year, we hit them up
and they're sitting there and going, Oh my
gosh, what did I do?
I got to look back into the entire year and try
to remember what I did.
You know, how many days and who I went with.
And we used to give out a little.
And nobody wants to do that paperwork.
Nobody wants to do that.
And I used to give out a little hard copy book.
And I was spending a lot of money printing
it, which had all that information in
it, plus their miles that they could put
on taxes and nobody was filling it out.
They'd tell me, Oh, I forget about it,
I put it in my glove box or jockey box and
I never remember it.
So we're trying to get, that's kind of
one of those deals.
If we could just figure a way to make
it simple for people, we could get more data.
So one thing that we've noticed up here is there
seems to be a renewed push for people to get
out in the outdoors.
I mean, COVID has locked everybody down
and we're seeing a lot more interest.
And in the shooting sports, we're seeing
a lot more interest in just being outdoors, but
hunting in particular, we're seeing a lot
of interest there.
Are you finding the same thing with the
First Hunt Foundation?
Yes.
Yeah, we are.
We getting a lot more adults this last year.
Oh, it's been a great increase in the adults
coming to us wanting to do it versus the kids.
I mean, we're still doing mostly youth, but
I've been surprised.
We had a 73 year old lady contact us.
She called me up one day, I was actually helping,
trying to find a deer for a kid that lost it.
And she said, I want to hunt and I bought a gun
and I'm a real good shot.
And my buddies, I called three of them
and they said, they'd take me and none of
them will take me.
So I heard about you, will you take me?
And we said, sure, we'll take you out.
And so we took her out and she
subsequently missed.
And so the mentor said, well, let's
go shoot your gun.
Well, the gun was way off.
So she never did sight it in, she bore sighted it,
so she thought it was on.
And so we had to, we took a step forward and
had to take two steps back and took her out.
I took her out with another guy and
she missed a couple of hard shots.
And so we'll take her out again this next
year and get her.
But anyway, we're so we're getting a lot of
the older generation adult folks that
are coming to us.
And they're a little bit embarrassed to ask
like, well, I don't know what to, who to ask.
It's a little bit humbling to say, I
don't know something.
Kids don't care, they're like sponges just teach
me, you know, but adults.
Just put it all on you.
Yeah.
Adults have a little more ego that we have to deal
with, but it's happening.
Just a tad.
Yeah.
It's awesome that we're getting that done.
Well from the adult perspective, I mean,
I guess one could say that introducing a
youngster into hunting can ignite a passion and
can point them down a path for later in life.
But hunting's expensive, it's a time commitment
and they need to have other people in their
family or in their friend group who share
that same interest.
Otherwise the chances of them continuing
down that path, get slimmer and slimmer.
Mind you, if you get an adult who's got more
discretionary means and the ability to actually
get out and hunt, from a generating new
hunter's perspective, I would think without
having looked at the numbers, but I would just
think that the efforts into the adults would
pay huge dividends.
It does because one, they can afford, one
of the big deterrents that get into hunting
is buying gear.
That's just huge.
I mean a gun, just a simple gun is going
to cost you, a used one 250, 300 bucks and
way more if you get a new one and same with
bows and other things.
So adults usually have the resources to do
that, where kids may not ever have that until
they start working.
And their parents may or may not want to get
that gun and put it behind the Christmas tree
like my folks did so.
But they do some of them do.
And some of them can't afford it.
I mean, a lot of them just cannot afford to the
gear to get into it so.
It's not cheap.
No.
And the clothing, just the clothing.
I have two examples that happened to me
early on, I go pick up a kid at their house.
They'd walk out, course in tennis shoes and
holding a Walmart bag with a Gatorade in it.
And that happened twice with two different
kids and that was their hunting pack,
was that Walmart bag with a Gatorade.
That's all they had.
They didn't have anything.
So I'm kind of looking at it, I'm like, well
okay, we're not doing any major hiking today.
And so getting gear is a big deal.
Right.
You know, and people can get really caught
up in the gear thing.
There are some necessities, there
are some things that you definitely need
to get out and hunt.
It doesn't have to be the latest,
greatest name brand camouflage clothing.
I think more animals have been taken in blue
jeans and plaid shirts than any of the latest,
greatest camouflage out there, but there
are some essentials.
And even those essentials aren't cheap.
No, they're not, we're looking at programs of
people donating use gear and trying to get it out.
But again, that takes the logistics and we've been
toying with the idea of how would we pull that
off because there's lots of stuff in people's
closets that they're not using anymore, that
somebody could use.
But getting back to your other topic.
I want to go back to that about recruiting people
and you know, one of the key not dynamics, but
the group that we want to get to is the women.
Because if you can get a mother, if you
can get a mother into hunting, well, she's
going to teach her kids.
That's right.
I mean our dad too, but for sure the women
are, I mean, that's just seems like we've
been very successful.
If we can get a lady into hunting that most
of her kids are going to be hunters as well.
So that becoming an outdoor woman
or BOW program.
And I've see it's in a number of States
as well is, is huge.
And then, you know, my wife went on a BOW
program up here in Canada and she had a great time.
And, she's part of a women's fly
fishing group now.
And she came from a background of wanting to
live in the city to, and working as a chef at some
high-end restaurants and that love of cooking.
Naturally went into gardening and went
into where does my food come from?
And it led to hunting and fishing and these
BOW programs, I think women are the fastest
growing demographic in all of hunting in the
United States and Canada.
And the secondary thing, I guess, on that would
be the food aspect.
When you start introducing like where
the food comes from, because there's for
a number of years now, there's been
a, and I forget what the term was called,
it's not locavore.
It's something like that.
Yes.
Like, yeah, it was like lacovore or
something like that.
I've heard it as well.
Yeah.
basically where can I find, and whether it's
foraging for mushrooms or plants and whatever
it is, or fishing and all of these things
tend to naturally lead down to a path of
hunting and learning a sustainable food source.
I think those are two of the huge areas that are
being exploited right now that are introducing
so many people into the world of funding.
So one of the things we're working on is
trying to recruit as many women mentors as
we can, because a lot of the spouses of the
hunters there, it's kind of interesting.
They're standing there at the outdoor show
and of course the guys talking to us
and the mom hunts too.
And so we're talking to them, trying to sign
them up and we look at, always look over and
say, what about you?
And she kind of looked at us if we need
more women mentors to especially take out
young girls, they feel more comfortable a lot
of times with a lady than they would a crusty
old guy, you know?
And so we're seeking hard to find good
women mentors, and we've got a lot.
We've actually got a lot.
So if somebody wants to be a mentor with
your program, what do they have to do?
How do they first, I guess they go to their
website and they, they read about it.
But what are the next steps?
Well, yeah the website has a 'our
programs' component.
You look under our programs under mentoring,
and there's a mentor sign up sheet and you
sign up on the web and it comes back here
to our headquarters and, which isn't my
loft here in my house.
Yeah.
It started on the kitchen table.
It's kind of funny.
And then my poor wife lost her sewing room
and our next step will be a brick and mortar
building as we grow.
But anyway, you sign up and yeah, it comes back
and we do a criminal background check, which
is basic and online to see if there's any
criminal history there or anything like that.
And I've had to turn a few people down, but
and then once you do that, you're basically
become a mentor.
That's that's our criteria is, have
you met the state's responsibilities
to be a hunter?
And then we try to try to get them hooked up
with some other people locally and get a chapter
going that's our goal is to get chapters going.
Cause if you have say 10 people in one area,
then you got one of them that's a duck
hunter, and one them that's a bow hunter.
And so according to the top of skill needed,
you've hopefully got somebody to shift
it off too, but that's what it is.
You go to the website, sign up and it
comes in and we do a background check on you.
So, and this might be a complete aside being
a Canadian, I've heard of these programs.
I think there's one in Washington, I
believe there's one in Oregon called a
Master Hunter Program.
Yeah.
Does that include any level of mentorship
with those programs?
Are you aware of those programs?
Oh, am I aware of those programs?
Yes.
Okay.
Fair.
No.
That was great.
Educate me.
Question.
No the Master Hunter Programs and they do have
one in Washington, they have one in Montana and
what they do is of course allow those people to
have some other options for hunting, draw hunts,
depredation hunt, other things that they have.
Well, those programs require some sort
of continuing education or service.
And so we have made deals with the state
of Washington and currently with Montana
that if they sign up as a mentor with the
First Hunt Foundation, any of their time
mentoring and helping new hunters counts as their
continuing education.
So it keeps their status as a master hunter
doing something that they love doing anyway.
So it's a great marriage.
That's fantastic.
It's a great marriage for both of us, for
the States and for our organization.
Because if I understand correctly with enough
volunteered time and efforts into these
programs, these master hunters are then afforded
a greater land access or a greater limited
entry hunting access.
Is that, is that a fair assessment?
Yes, that's.
Am I understanding that correctly?
As I understand it because it's not here in
Idaho where I live, but yeah, there's certain
areas that only master hunters are allowed
to go, certain draws, hunts that I think
only master hunters are allowed to put in for
kind of limited entry for master hunters.
I think there may be some depredations kind
of tags that are reserved for master hunters.
So they get some benefits out of being a master
hunter and by serving as a volunteer with
us, it counts toward their credit hours
that they need to keep that, they have to keep
that certification up.
They can't just sign up one time.
They got every year, it got to do so many hours
to stay a master hunter.
That is fantastic.
Yeah.
It's awesome.
And everything they do with, yeah.
And then everything they do with you guys helps
build towards that.
So it's just, win-win all the way around.
It definitely is.
In fact, in Washington state, when we met
with those folks, we had something like
50 or 60 mentors sign up in a week.
It was crazy.
Woah.
Well, the other thing, this is what's
interesting is at least in Washington state,
the master hunters, they encourage them already to
go out and mentoring, but the state was concerned
because there was no liability insurance
provided by the state.
And so by hooking up with us, they get to
be covered under our liability insurance,
because we do have liability insurance
for the mentor.
So if a mentor takes somebody out and heaven
forbid something happens and they were to be
sued, then they would be protected under our
liability coverage.
So Rick, you guys are in 28 States
growing like crazy.
What's the future hold?
Well, you know, our goal is of course to be an
all 50 States here in the US any, any place
that they allow hunting.
Is our goal is to just get it to be the largest
new hunter mentoring organization out there.
So when somebody thinks of mentoring,
they think of First Hunt Foundation, which
means we do two things.
One is we recruit as many mentors as we can.
And two is we start offering programs
and training, which we're starting to work
on now with events.
And you can't do that of course 'til
you get organized with the leaders.
And so you get the events going where
you have training days for either new mentees
or mentors and we're doing that last year.
We did one in Wyoming where we had 10 new
hunters and 10, I think mentors go to
the same training.
And at the end of the week, they actually got
to go hunting antelope.
So they actually got trained one week or
three, four days.
Wow.
And then went hunting and harvested an animal, and
then they talked about processing the animal,
so that's all part of it.
So we want to be kind of known as the, the
full deal, where we're providing opportunities
for folks to go hunting, training
new people, mentors on how to go hunting
and how to mentor.
And someday have a certification program
to be a mentor.
I mean, other people have talked about that.
That would be tough one to get everybody,
some people don't want to be certified.
They just, let me take people out and I'm fine.
And we're okay with that because it meets
our mission of getting new hunters out, but
to bring it to the next level and to get
some highly trained people that's, would
help everybody I think.
That's our goal.
We've got the first time out of the way.
What about the second hunt?
Can people phone you back?
I mean, do you find people are just calling
over and over at, Hey, let's go to another hunt,
let's go on another hunt.
Cause I could see some people just getting
addicted to it and maybe not intentionally, but
abusing the process.
Well it, yeah, so that's kind of a misnomer
when we named it.
First hunt was the first, giving that first
hunt experience, not having a first hunt.
And so the first hunt experience is just
one experience and you can't train a person
one time, let 'em shoot an animal and say,
you're done, nevermore.
Right.
I've got one young man that I've been with for
four years and I still would go out with him
even though he's a mentor now and training people.
The real term of mentoring is
a relationship.
And then their R3 movement, there's a talk
now that we shouldn't be using the word mentor,
it should be coach, unless you're going to
really be sticking a long time with people.
I don't personally agree with that.
You're mentoring for one day, you're mentoring
for a lifetime and so.
I agree.
And so that's kind of where we're at.
So we want it to be a long-term relationship.
That's the best kind.
And so, yeah, it's multiple hunts.
The one kid, I took him on his first deer hunt,
his first elk hunt, his first bear hunt,
his first duck hunt, his first coyote hunt.
I mean, there's all these first hunts and
we give certificates too, by the way, like
your son, he could have went online and you
could get a certificate for the first deer
hunt, mule deer, white tail, whatever it is.
And then they get a certificate in the mail.
Unbeknownst to them that it's coming
kind of a surprise.
Cause the kid gets a big envelope, missed at a mom
and dad and they open it up and there's a letter.
Right now I'm able to write letters,
thanking them.
Get a little information, I hear you shot your
first deer with your grandpa's 30-30,
and they're going, how did this people
know that, you know?
And they get their certificate.
So it's like, there's this anti hunter
group out there saying you're a bad
person for doing this.
There's our group out there going, no, you're
a great person for doing this, put the
certificate on the wall to remember this event
in your life, you know?
And so.
That is fantastic.
So we do that for anybody, whether we
mentor them or not, anybody can go to
our website and get that certificate
and that letter.
And so that's one of the things we do
I'm kind of proud.
We've said hundreds and hundreds of those
out, across the nation.
Love to send some to Canada.
That is fantastic.
I know his graduation certificate, just the
paperwork he has there.
He says, dad, can we make a frame and
frame this and put it up on the wall?
Not a problem, let's make a frame.
We'll go into the shop, made something up.
And, but there's definitely.
I think you're definitely onto something here,
Rick, this is a fantastic foundation.
I'm really liking everything that I'm
learning about it.
Cause I've been doing some reading
online as well.
Is there anything that we should be
talking about that we haven't brought up yet?
Well, we haven't talked about the negative
side of things, I guess when you're.
Well, sure.
Well, it's not a big it's, we're making
it happen regardless, but it takes money to
make anything happen.
And so if you build a nonprofit or anything
from the ground up, it's like building a
company from scratch.
And currently right now I can say that we are one
of the only organizations doing as much as we're
doing that has absolutely no paid staff, including
myself, no one gets paid.
We're all volunteers.
And you know, I'm putting in 40 to 60
hours a week and I honestly am doing that.
And I'm okay with that because I'm retired
and I have an income from my retirement.
So it takes a lot to fund an organization
and so our insurance, we pay for the insurance.
That's a big bill.
We spend $10,000 in making caps that have our
logo on it to give out to kids or new hunters.
I mean, we give them away.
We don't, don't make a penny on them.
Going to these shows, you may be three or four or
$5,000 going to a show to recruit more people,
to take more hunters out.
So there's a lot of money.
So we're a nonprofit and you're always out
there with your handout trying to find grants,
to fund the cause.
We're going to, we're going to start
a membership here soon that, there's a
supporting membership.
So folks who believe in what we're doing, get
become a member of the First Hunt Foundation
and they'll get a free knife, which we had.
Was it, 1500 knives donated by the
Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, about
$8,000 worth of knives.
So stuff like that, that we can try to.
So my goal to keep this sustainable is to
find a funding source, eventually, that we're
not constantly having to chase grants down.
And I don't know what that is yet.
So we're always thinking outside the box, what
would, you know, sell a product, something that
would keep, keep the foundation going, win
the lottery, you know.
Yeah, yeah.
Just keep buying those lottery tickets.
Yeah.
So I mean, anyway, that's an issue.
Yeah.
So if somebody wanted to donate to the First
Hunt Foundation, is that just done online?
Oh yeah.
And we get some of that.
Yeah.
You can go online and there's a donate button.
I mean, and we're going to start some national,
here locally or in the U S some national raffles.
We're going to try to get going for some big
items, maybe a high end hunting rifle or
something like that, which could generate
some money as well.
And if we wanted to kind of group think
sustainable revenue generation, a model
that kind of will keep revenue coming into the
First Hunt Foundation.
If somebody wanted to contact you as all that
contact information on the website?
If someone listened to this has ideas and say,
you know what you should do, they can just contact
you through the site?
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
There's a spot on the site where you can
contact us and call me, I think probably the
numbers on there as well.
So I'm always open to those ideas, but.
So, and I tend to kind of shy away from the
negative side of things.
Like, I know that the formula for popular
podcasts would be controversy, but I always
try to impart some sort of positivity and a
learning message to each one of these podcasts.
But you know, if we're talking about some
of the negative here, are you encountering
any pushback from any anti hunting groups?
Not yet, but I'm sure those days will happen.
I mean, my truck has logos all over it.
So I have to keep thinking sometimes
when I'm traveling across the country,
that I'm going to get egged or something.
Windows smashed or.
Yeah, windows smashed or something when I
come out of the motel.
But I have people pass me on the interstate with
a big thumbs up because on the back of my.
That's good.
Yeah, on the back of my truck, it literally has
a picture, you can't tell it's me, leaning over,
whispering to a young girl who has a rifle.
You can tell at a shooting range.
And so it's a message like a here we're
helping kids learn how to shoot guns.
It's right on the back of the truck.
And so when people pass me, a lot of them are
just big thumbs up, like, Hey, way to go.
Cause I'm sure they're hunters or outdoors
people, but I suppose somebody could
drive by and give me other gestures.
They haven't done that yet.
Ahh, you got a couple other digits on the
hand, but no that's.
So we've covered sort of where you've been, where
you look to be going.
Some of the difficulties that you've encountered,
which doesn't seem like you've encountered
really a heck of a lot of pushback.
Is that a fair assessment?
That's a fair assessment.
In fact, at least with the States, everybody
we've talked to is excited that somebody is
doing what we're doing.
And I think a lot of nonprofits don't last
very long, you know, like businesses that last
a year or two, and now we're going on our sixth
year and lots of numbers that we're producing.
The COVID, the numbers will be down for 2020.
We haven't done that data yet.
And our name recognition is getting out there.
So I think that's all going to help and we
teach conservationists, not just about
killing something.
It's teaching about the woods and nature.
And I mean, you got to take advantage
of that time.
You're out there besides just teaching a hunting
skills, this talk about conservation.
Let's talk about, cause hunting is conservation
in the future.
And that, I mean, I worked as a wildlife
biologist originally in my career, in the
forest service before I became a line officer.
And so I was all about for fish and
game and critters and so I love teaching
people about nature and what's out there.
So that's a big part of it as well.
And so that's the white hat part.
I mean, I've gotten hardcore conservation
organizations that know me and they were
supporting what I'm doing because they
think it's a good thing.
Well, so many people equate hunting, so
many non-hunters will equate hunting with
the actual process of harvesting the animal.
When that accounts for less than 1%.
While you're pulling that trigger, that's your time
harvesting the animal.
All the other time is the preparation and the
study and is spent with animal identification and
learning the environment.
And the whole conservation movement
is just hugely ingrained into the
hunting perspective.
A lot of people, non hunters, they
don't see that.
When I look at new hunters that are looking
to get into hunting, they're not necessarily
like you or I.
They don't come from the same sort of backgrounds
as you or I, we might have some hipster wanting
to get into the hunting for reasons that are the
idea of sustainability and finding a local food.
Are you finding any difficulties in bridging
the gap between some of the new hunters
and existing hunters?
I don't think so.
I think we're finding that most of the hunters,
if I understand your question, that we recruit
are just excited to teach anybody about hunting.
And so if somebody comes in with different ideas
or values or backgrounds, I haven't ran into
anybody that had an issue with any of the new
hunters coming in, yet.
You know, it's so exciting to, for
what we're doing.
I've had several experiences that
stick with me.
I mean, when you've been hunting, I'm going to be
67 here, probably in a few weeks and I've hunted
since I was like the eighth grade for sure.
And so when I go pick up a kid to go like Turkey
hunting, and you're going real early in the
morning, and to me, it's just like another day
to go Turkey hunting, I'm excited about it.
But the kid looks at me and says I couldn't
sleep last night, I was so excited thinking about
this I couldn't sleep.
And it reminds me, it brings back that flood
of memories of when I was a kid and I was so
excited to go hunting and nobody to take me.
And I remember one time when my dad's uncle's
came and they were going to go hunting, I
don't know how it was.
It wasn't very old and they wouldn't take me
because, you know, I was a kid and the guys
were going to go out and do their thing.
And I remember crying, thinking I want it
to be there so bad, they wouldn't take me.
And so when I heard her kids say they couldn't
sleep because they were so excited and they
were so thankful to have that opportunity.
I know we're doing the right thing.
I know what we're doing matter to that
kid, probably for the rest of their life.
And that just, that's what keeps us going, man.
That's, you know, the organizational
stuff sometimes it's a pain in the butt.
Cause it's that admin, you gotta make it happen
to make all these 'those experiences' happen.
And when one of them happens and you
feel it and see it, it's just amazing.
I had another one I got to tell you, it touched
me where I taught this young boy for years.
The first deer he shot, it was raining and
getting dark so I field dressed his animal.
I said, we got to get this done.
It's raining, just hold the light, I'll get it
down and got it done.
The next year.
I took him out again to have another experience.
He shot us his first deer or second deer and it was
daylight and I said, Oh, good, you get to do it.
So talked him through it.
He did all that, I didn't touch anything.
And the next day he called me that
night and he says, my grandfather is excited
about me hunting and he's never hunted.
Would you take him hunting?
And I knew him and his grandfather
fish, I said, sure.
So about two days later I took him and just
grandfather out hunting, he'd never hunted
before, he shot before.
And so he shot this little buck, a little
spike buck, and we walked over and I was
just about to go through the process of teaching
him how to do that.
And I looked over to Jordan.
Jordan was our number one mentor,
mentee, number one.
And I said, Jordan, teach your grandfather
how to do this.
And I stood there and watched the grandson
teach his grandfather how to field dress a deer.
It just like blew me away.
It's like, it's not passing it forward,
it's passing it back or something.
I'm not sure what it is.
So.
That's just fantastic.
I know!
And I'll never forget that and they
didn't forget it.
And they started putting in for hunts and going
hunting together.
And I created two hunters by creating one and it
was just, it was amazing.
Man Rick, I really, really enjoy
speaking with you.
I really enjoy your passion for hunting,
for bringing this into other people's lives.
It's contagious,
It is.
I tell you that much.
Thank you very much for taking the time to.
Talk with me on this Silvercore Podcast.
Well, thanks Travis.
I appreciated the opportunity.