This week, we welcome Nate, the newest member of Highlands Ranch’s conservation team, as he shares his journey from a passionate young outdoorsman to a dedicated natural resources coordinator. Discover how he’s working to preserve the wildlife he grew up loving. We explore the challenges and solutions for wildlife fencing in the area and how it affects local elk populations. Plus, get tips on how outdoor enthusiasts can participate in and support these vital community initiatives.
SPEAKER 01 :
Welcome to Sportsman of Colorado, Colorado’s premier outdoor radio show heard every Saturday afternoon on KLZ 560 with insights on hunting, fishing, archery, guns, and ammo from Colorado’s top outfitters featuring the industry’s leading experts on how to enhance your experience in the great outdoors. Now, here’s your host, Scott Whatley. Scott Whatley
SPEAKER 03 :
Welcome to Sportsman of Colorado. Thank you so much for joining us today. We’ve got a great show in store for you. We’re going to kick it off. I know we just had the Backcountry Violence Ranch. Some of the folks were on with us last week. Zach was with us talking about Rocky Mountain strength. the archery thing going on there in the back country, and I want to mention that once again. That’ll be going July 22nd through August 26th, and that’ll be from 6 to 7, 30 p.m. Once again, registration will go right through Zach, and that’ll be Rocky Mountain Strength. We’ve abbreviated that for the website to register, so just spell out Rocky, R-O-C-K-Y, mtnstrength.com, and you can register there. Mark Giebel joins us, the director here. How are you, sir? I’m great. Thanks for having me. The week’s flying by quicker than you wish.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, summer’s here. I just realized today that archery season is about two months away.
SPEAKER 03 :
Man, it’s crazy, isn’t it? Yep. Yeah. Everybody’s super looking forward to it and hope we get a lot of folks out there for your event there. How did that come to really ask you? A lot of planning went into that whole archery range out there. I remember back when you guys first did that and everything. But, man, that was a really cool thing. Did you think of, hey, we have a need and build that? Or how did that come about? Honestly, I can’t take credit for that.
SPEAKER 10 :
A couple of hunters. Well, they’re not here, so you can’t. Yeah, yeah. They were in my ear for a few years. And so we started looking at it and realized, you know, the closest rangers were in Golden and up past Sedalia. So there was a need for sure, and we saw that those clubs had wait lists. So it was a pretty easy decision and successful right away. Oh, yeah, huge hit.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, huge hit. All right, we’ve got our summer hunt raffle. So for folks that don’t know about it, kind of give us some education there, and then we’ll get into some of the details.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, so our summer hunt raffle, two of our premier hunts, muzzle and fourth rifle, and both of those are what we call buddy hunts, where we have two hunters, one’s going after a trophy bull, one’s going after a management bull. The fourth rifle includes a buck hunt as well, so three tags there. But amazing hunts, both of them, and amazing opportunities at a bull of a lifetime.
SPEAKER 03 :
All right. How’d last year turn out?
SPEAKER 10 :
great. Uh, muzzle was, was super fun. The, the management hunter finished, I think on day one, day two, um, kind of getting his out of the way for the trophy hunt. And our, our trophy hunter was being picky. He wanted something over three 50 and which is a tall order. Sure. And so we spent the next eight days filtering through a lot of 300, three 20 ish bowls. He passed a really nice three 30 bowl. And I told him he was crazy. Uh, so he ended up he missed on a bull and ended up going home with nothing which is always the risk if you’re being that picky um but not for lack of opportunity opportunity um we had some amazing days just the rut activity you know the muzzleload season is right in the peak of the rut and the rut activity out there is is jaw-dropping at times you’re surrounded how many 350 bulls you think you got out there Um, that’s not, that’s always a good question. Half dozen or so in that, that rank up there. And you know, the hard part is filtering through the 300 class bowls. If you’re being that picky, I would never make it.
SPEAKER 03 :
I am not that patient. Yeah.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah. It’s hard. For sure. A lot of fun.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah. Um, now. A few specific rules. They have to list me as a buddy to enter if you don’t live in Highlands Ranch. All right, so that’s your number one rule. But no, seriously, you have to reside in Highlands Ranch or have a buddy.
SPEAKER 10 :
Correct. Right. We have three ways to win a hunt. Drawings, raffle, and auction. Our drawings are open to Highlands Ranch residents only. But our raffles, if you don’t live in Highlands Ranch, you can still buy a ticket. You just have to name a buddy that lives in Highlands Ranch. And vice versa, if you live in Highlands Ranch and you want to invite your father or out-of-state family, you can win that raffle and they can come hunt with you if you live in Highlands Ranch. Okay.
SPEAKER 03 :
Now, in that scenario, I never thought about it. Would that non-resident have to get a non-resident ticket? Yes. Tag. Okay. Yeah. All right. And so you do have to get the tag still through CPW.
SPEAKER 10 :
Correct. We provide the voucher. The hunter is still responsible for obtaining the tag. Okay. They are list A licenses. So if you have other list A hunts planned, then you’d have to skip. Right, right. But it’d be worth it.
SPEAKER 03 :
Now, can you be a buddy for somebody?
SPEAKER 10 :
Can I? I don’t know if there’s a rule against that, but I wouldn’t. I’d rather give someone else the opportunity. But I will, okay?
SPEAKER 03 :
So, once again, if you want to play, if you want to enter into this, and I’m telling you it’ll be a hunt you will never forget, seriously, I’d be glad to be your buddy, all right? And you get first choice, hey, you get the trophy, I’ll take what’s left. We would glad to have you. Now, they go through your website, right, for that?
SPEAKER 10 :
Yep, hrcaonline.org slash hunt. Okay. And you’ll find the raffle tickets there. Purchase the raffle tickets online, directly online. Super easy. And $25 each for the raffle ticket. Okay, great.
SPEAKER 03 :
All right. Now. Money comes in from that. Let’s kind of talk about, because man, this takes a lot of dough to run. So let’s talk about where some of that goes to.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, so we’re a community association and funded by Highlands Ranch Community Association and well funded and we do a lot. But what we bring in through our nonprofit and these raffles allows us to do more. So more fire mitigation, more water resources, more noxious weed spraying just to continue to improve that habitat. And our goal is just to make sure the carrying capacity out there is as high as it can be. And there’s, you know, there’s a ton of elk out there and we’re watching all the calves born right now on our, our wise eye cameras, which have been amazing to tell us what’s going on out there too. I’ll tell you, those are some good cameras. They’re amazing. The clarity on those is unbelievable. And WiseEye is a great sponsor with us and have given us quite a few cameras. So we’re going to have about 45 cameras out there. And it’s just so educational for us as far as knowing what the elk are doing, where they’re calving, so we can avoid those areas where they’re getting water and just throughout the year. Of course, we have to turn them off during the hunting season. Those are the rules. But super helpful.
SPEAKER 03 :
All right. And so once again, hey, you can go to the website. Again, how’s the – I always say the backcountry Highlands Ranch. What’s – Yeah, backcountry wilderness area. Backcountry wilderness area. All right. And you can get in for this now. You can apply through that through July 10th, correct?
SPEAKER 10 :
Correct. Raffle tickets on sale to July 10th. We have an event that night at Live in the Dream Brewery, another sponsor of ours. And they can buy tickets all the way up to 7 p.m. at that event, too. Okay.
SPEAKER 03 :
All right. Sounds great. All right, we have a new guy.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yes, a new guy. Tell us the new guy. Nate joins us. Yeah, Nathan Wilkin. He joined us full time. It’s a new position in natural resource coordinator. He started last week. But we know Nate. He’s been around for a while. He worked here first year of college, a little bit in high school as a seasonal employee. But I’ll let Nate talk about his story. But he went and got the right degree and is a great addition to our team.
SPEAKER 03 :
Wow. Nate, welcome.
SPEAKER 05 :
Thank you. Good. Tell us about yourself. Oh, well, I grew up on Highlands Ranch. I did my first shed hunt out in the backcountry when I was 11 years old. I raced mountain bikes on the backcountry trails. Oh. Turkey hunts. I just grew up in a wildlife family, or outdoorsy family, and backcountry was a great place that we got to explore. Right, right.
SPEAKER 03 :
Now…
SPEAKER 05 :
um we were talking a little before we came on air you’re going to be helping out with the archery thing we mentioned earlier um were you into rifle hunting at the beginning and got into archery or have you always been into archery yeah uh i started out with archery um i’ve kind of transitioned into rifle a little bit more as archery’s gotten harder yeah um but yeah no i i started shooting my bow over in wildcat ranch um just off of monarch over there in backcountry and met chris darrow who’s a coach and yeah and uh he he got me into the joad stuff i started shooting archery and i uh have been fortunate enough to go professional for competition archery and yeah now now i’m just an avid bow hunter yeah what is your effective range with a bow
SPEAKER 03 :
If you wanted to. I’m not saying you would.
SPEAKER 05 :
I’d say at least up to 100 yards, but I would never do that, I don’t think. Antelope might be a different story, but that was an immature decision, yes.
SPEAKER 03 :
And you went to school in Montana? Yes, at Montana State University. Okay. Now, natural resources. Yeah. Kind of tell us what that means and why you chose that field.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah. Well, so I started out in an ag business degree, and I got involved with the Ducks Limited program up in Montana State, and that kind of opened my eyes to agriculture. Conservation, giving back to the land. I’ve been very fortunate to be able to use outdoors and things like that, and just giving back is going to be a great thing for me. Conservation of the land, yeah, it’s just been a very good thing.
SPEAKER 03 :
How do we get more, don’t be nervous, it’s just us. Okay. He’s taking a real deep breath there. They can edit this. How can we get more people like you, young people I mean, involved in this? Because there doesn’t seem, when I say not a lot of interest, but a lot of kids didn’t grow up in an outdoor family or a hunting family, and so they don’t understand what all this is about. Any recommendations of how us older folk can reach the younger folks?
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, I mean, advertising for, like, I mean, the camps at Backcountry is fantastic. Like, being able to put your kid into a camp and be out in the outdoors and appreciate what you can receive out there, I think that’s a huge thing. And just opening kids’ eyes to more than just video games, being outside, I think it can develop a lot more appreciation for the outdoors. And I think having an appreciation for the outdoors is what led me, at least, to want to do conservation and things like that. Yeah, that’s a difficult question for me to think about.
SPEAKER 03 :
I know, because that’s the big thing, I think, you know, that… We’re trying to do a lot more with it. Anybody I get with, I’m trying to say, how can we keep this hunting heritage going? Because you talk to people about guns. Oh, we could never have guns in our house or whatever. I mean, everybody’s just so afraid in this day and time with everything going on. So just looking for ways that we can attract more young people to get involved in things like that you’re doing here. Now, certainly any organization would have probably taken a sharp young guy like you, got a degree. Why did you choose the backcountry? to help out?
SPEAKER 05 :
I grew up around here. It was a fantastic opportunity that Mark was able to give me and I’m just super excited to be able to finally make an impact myself and protect some of the outdoors, the wildlife that I love. I think that was the biggest draw to me is I can finally make a difference myself.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right, right. So Is there ways you think that we could get into just like colleges and stuff like that? Do you think people would let outdoor folks come in and try to educate people on things like this to help?
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah. No, it was actually a really unique experience for me at Montana State. I had the grizzly bear coordinator for the Yellowstone ecosystem teach in one of my classes. There was a lot of guest lectures from outfitters in the industry and A lot of things like that, but it was for my natural resource classes. I don’t think that that’s a very broad thing that people are getting to experience. It was very specific to the people who are interested in natural resources or conservation. But I don’t know. All the podcasts out there, everything like that has been extremely helpful for me at least, learning my way around it.
SPEAKER 10 :
um it’s such a good question scott and like how to get youth out there and i think the biggest thing is opportunity right and and the opportunities are harder and harder but that’s what we focus on and not just hunting but our camps and everything else giving kids the opportunity to be outside and then learn to love the outdoors whether it’s through hunting or our camps but even our hunts you know we try and mix in a little bit of conservation and certainly respect for the wildlife and why they’re there and teach that and hopefully, like Nate, hook them early and some kids like Nate will go on to get their degree and some will make it a hobby and that’s okay too. Sure, sure, sure.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, because I work with a group called Mountains and Men and they take 14 to 17-year-old kids on different excursions and hunts, fishing trips, all that. And they’re not necessarily outdoor kids, you know what I mean? And so, but the guy says, man, it’s amazing to see the ones get there and they’re like not wanting to touch something or, you know, they’re just not into it. And then by the end, they’re like some mountain kid that now they love it, you know? So I think it is just that opportunity inviting people. And that’s one thing I’ve encouraged a lot of people is, hey, you know, maybe your kids are older, you don’t have a son or a daughter, right? hey invite them to go do some kind of trip with you or go some hunting thing with you that’s the way to let them get out and experience it because you know we were i was talking with a buddy yesterday i said when i grew up you could pull down a street a neighborhood and you couldn’t even drive down because kids are out playing ball you know they’re doing things and you see parks are full and now you go by yeah there’s some soccer games going on or whatever but you just don’t even see young people much in the outside doing anything you know we’re just so hooked on the the tablets and the iphones now and all that so man congrats to you for yeah doing this it’s going to be cool now you’re going to be helping out with the archery thing so kind of tell us a little bit about from your side about that a little bit more for folks that didn’t get to hear our show last week um yeah no there’s so coming up there’s a uh a fitness class or whatever uh
SPEAKER 05 :
Fitness and archery, shooting with an elevated heart rate, getting in shape for the season, it’s really going to be a fantastic thing. You’re not going to be sitting still shooting at an elk. You’re going to be hustling your butt off to get up there, and I think that that’s going to be a very beneficial thing. I love that archery range. It’s been a fantastic thing for me growing up. I’ve shot… more arrows than I could ever count out of that range, and it’s been very impactful for me. So I appreciate that I’m able to take care of it now.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right. And we’ve got your regular just standard targets, what everybody thinks is archery target, and you’ve got the 3D range, right? Yep. That’s where it’s at. What’s the different distances of targets there?
SPEAKER 05 :
We have targets from 13 yards out to 88 yards as a moose. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER 10 :
Wow. And you can kind of pick your own range for the most part, too, if you need to go closer on a target or further to a certain extent. Right, right.
SPEAKER 03 :
All right, so for the archery that we’re talking about, that is July 22nd through August 26th. The hours will be from 6 to 7.30 p.m. And you can register at Rocky Mountain Strength with Zach that was on last week. So it’s Rocky, R-O-C-K-Y, mtnstrength.com for that. And then don’t forget the Summer Hunt Raffle. That is now through July 10th. And if you’re a resident of Highlands Ranch and your buddy is, great. But if not and you need a buddy, I am volunteering for that position. Just put Scott Watley, W-H-A-T-L-E-Y. and uh hey we will have a great hunt and uh you get first shot if we win all right so again this helps the backcountry conservation mark last question for you and nate thank you and we’re gonna be doing some more stuff with you on this archery thing thank you i was driving down santa fe the other day right across the street from where the backcountry and there was about 12 elk on this side of the fence close to the highway couldn’t get back over there i don’t know how they got out or whatever but that fencing along there Any thoughts that you want to say on the fencing or am I putting you in a rough position? No, not at all.
SPEAKER 10 :
So, yeah, you’re talking about the wildlife fencing along Highway 85. We’ve definitely noticed some changes in patterns of elk herds in the area. It’s definitely harder for elk to cross east to west from the west side 85 to our side 85. So we’ve noticed some impact there where a cow herd that typically is on the west side 85 would come over in the fall and winter. Haven’t for the past couple of years because they can’t. So, yeah, there’s some challenges there. And then there’s wildlife fencing along I-25. So the east-west movement of elk in the big picture area is probably changed a bit and decreased a bit, which could cause some overpopulation in the future on our property and others. The state and the county have done an amazing job of preserving a corridor on the west side of 85.
SPEAKER 03 :
I was going to ask you about some of these under…
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, there’s a corridor there, but that corridor is kind of blocked now by this wildlife fencing. I think that’s a great spot for a future wildlife overpass. And, you know, I’ve started floating that with Colorado Parks and Wildlife and the county and CDOT and everything to see if that’s ever a possibility. But, you know, that’s a heavy lift. Those are not cheap to build.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, absolutely. Well, hey, if you’re not familiar with the Highlands Ranch Backcountry Wilderness Area, they do a ton of events all through the year. So you can stop by out here at the rec center even. People come in, see you guys a little more?
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, our offices are at Southridge, and you can buy tickets at the rec center if you want to do that. But super easy to do online, hrcaonline.org.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right. And your buddy is Scott Watley.
SPEAKER 10 :
All right.
SPEAKER 03 :
Remember that. All right, Nate, nice to meet you, man. It’s nice to meet you. Mark, thanks for having us out. Thank you, Scott. You’re listening to Sportsman of Colorado. We’ve got to take a quick break. We’ll be back with more right after this.
SPEAKER 12 :
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SPEAKER 09 :
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SPEAKER 07 :
560-KLZ, your home station.
SPEAKER 03 :
Welcome back to Sportsman of Colorado. Thank you so much for being with us. Just a quick reminder now, you miss our show on Saturdays 1 to 2. You can catch us twice on Sundays. That’s from 8 to 9 a.m., 8 to 9 p.m. Then the following Thursday is 9 to 10 a.m. So hopefully one of those four times will work out for you. And of course, you can catch our podcast where you get yours, as well as our website, sportsmanofcolorado.com. Well, great to have a couple of Good friends in studio, Dan Gates, Colorado’s responsible for wildlife management. Great friend of the show for a number of years now, actually. So, Dan, good to see you.
SPEAKER 08 :
Thank you very much, Scott. Appreciate it.
SPEAKER 03 :
Man, how long we been doing it? You brought Bob Brosh out in, I think, the first time we’ve sent. So how long is that?
SPEAKER 08 :
Bob left in 2017, 2018. So it’s seven or eight years for sure.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, for sure.
SPEAKER 08 :
Feels longer than that.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. No offense, but it feels longer than that. You walked in the first time. I was like, oh, my God, this guy. I better be nice to him. He might just kill me right here.
SPEAKER 08 :
I get tired of listening to that guy over and over and over.
SPEAKER 03 :
No, no, man. And Cody Loster is with us, United Houndsman of Colorado. Cody, good to see you, sir. Good to see you. Thanks for having me on. Great to have you in, man. Man, we’re going to get into some stuff next week as well. They’ve got a banquet coming up, too, August 2nd. So we’re going to get into a lot of that here over these next couple of shows. Um, with Dan and Cody. So Cody, we’ll start with you. Um, man, I’d love to get people this first time you’ve been on with us, uh, kind of give us a little bit of your background and, um, how the whole United housing thing started and what got you involved in that?
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, how much time you got here?
SPEAKER 03 :
Hey, we got plenty.
SPEAKER 11 :
I’ll tell you when we’re close. Yeah, so, you know, I’m born and raised Colorado native. Born in Longmont, grew up there, ended up going to college in Laramie, Wyoming for a little while. Didn’t finish, but moved back down to Colorado. And, you know, this has always been my home. And I don’t know, as long as people don’t run me out, I don’t plan on leaving. Yeah, no doubt. It’s pretty nice. But, yeah, you know, as I was a young boy, grew up hunting, fishing, ranching, farming, all those things, and got into riding bulls, actually. And that’s typically from Colorado. That’s how most people know me is, hey, are you that bull rider? You know, I’m not anymore. I’m retired. But fortunately was able to do something I really love to do for a living for most of my adult life. Sure. and you know I’m not one to ever toot my own horn but had quite a bit of success and ended up you know accomplishing a lot of goals becoming a world champion and um throughout all that obviously hunting was still a big part of my life even though it had taken a backseat a little bit to the to the bull riding career but um how I got into the the whole United Houndsmen of Colorado and being a houndsman and stuff like that um I’d started hunting well we let me back up a little bit we’d uh My family had always raised bird dogs, right? We raised Chesapeakes for waterfowl. And so that was something I always loved. And then when I got into riding bulls and raising bulls, raised my own cattle dogs, right? And then got into the hounds and started hunting with guys that had hounds and learning what I liked, what I didn’t. And really that kind of took off, you know, as far as the dog part of things. Sure. Always been a huge fan of working dogs. I think they’re the coolest critters around. Yeah, they are. No matter what their job is, they’re just awesome. And so if I fast forward a little bit to when my career ended, riding bulls, I didn’t get to pick when that time came, right? It was kind of chosen for me. Yeah. But mentally, I needed a new challenge. I needed something to pursue and really put my heart into something that was similar to bull riding. And you wouldn’t think running dogs or training dogs is very similar to bull riding. But for me, it was because bull riding was always an individual thing, right? My success and failure came down to how much work I put in and whether I – Whether I won or not, it was all on my back. And I really enjoyed that. Just something that’s very hard, very individual. And believe it or not, running and training dogs is the same exact way. What you get out of it is what you put into it. And being able to do something that’s very difficult. that you’ll never perfect, but you can get better every day at. Oh gosh. It just something that, that fire, that fire lit back up inside me. That was something that once bull riding was taken away, I was kind of lost. Um, and so fast forward on now, um, happened to just fall into the position, I guess, as, as vice president of UHC and, um, partly because of necessity, right. With what we faced last year with the potential loss of, uh, of being able to hunt mountain lions and bobcats. Um, and do what we love, which is, um, you know, with, with the dog work. And so, uh, kind of fell into that position just because they needed, um, the organization was already established, but we needed some different leadership with a little different connections and able to pursue things the way they needed to be done. And not that we’re anywhere near where we want to be, but we’re able to have some growth and, and move, you know, move closer to the goal of becoming what we wanted, what we want as far as representation of, of houndsmen in this state. And it’s something that I think a lot of the public doesn’t understand, right? We’re a pretty small segment of the population. Heck, a lot of hunters even don’t understand.
SPEAKER 03 :
And that’s why I’m thrilled you’re here because, as I said before we came on air, this is an education part for everybody, you know, because I think they may see of you or know of you but don’t know, what does that mean, you know? Are they like a dog kennel club? I mean, what are they doing? What’s your mission, so to speak?
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah. Yeah. And so along those lines, you know, to spread the awareness and the knowledge of what hunting with hounds is and to promote. It’s not the sport. It’s the heritage. Right. This this goes back thousands and thousands of years of men, humanity, hunting with hounds, hunting with dogs. And so to really to bring that out, educate people on why we do this, how we do this, the efficacy of this. And also when you get into the wildlife management side of things, you know, it’s all it’s all part of the big picture on how this all works together and game. You know, animals are different, and they’re hunted different ways in different spots of the country. And the reason we use hounds, obviously, on particular species is because that is the most efficient and ethical way to hunt those particular species. And so, yeah, it’s really been fun throughout the past year to be part of all this and be able to educate and help. And, you know, we’re all looking for the same thing, and that’s just to – you know, the North American model of wildlife conservation through, through outreach knowledge and, uh, just getting the public involved in something that should matter to them. A lot of people, it doesn’t because it’s not part of their day to day, day to day lives.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah. But, uh, and Dan, this, you know, last year, as he was mentioned, the prop 127, I mean, it’s groups like this that really helped, uh, must be successful there. Didn’t it?
SPEAKER 08 :
Oh, tremendously. I mean, just what they, what these guys were able to bring to the table through the entire process. I mean, uh, the houndsman Cody correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think I am, but the houndsman didn’t historically get involved in the legislative side of the parks and wildlife commission side or the management side. They might’ve been participatory on studies and things along with Colorado parks and wildlife, or maybe wildlife services or whatever, but you hadn’t really gotten engaged because you hadn’t been really attacked or assaulted, even though you might’ve been on the periphery of things. And when, when we started the campaign in, in September of 2023, which was Initiative 91, which eventually became Proposition 127. I reached out to these guys and vice versa, and we laid a groundwork out and an establishment, a strategic plan on how we could accent each other and then how we could turn around and fight locked arms for the sportsman community, not against within the sportsman community. And there’s not a houndsman that I know that doesn’t fish or that doesn’t elk hunt, or that doesn’t bird hunt. But there’s very few elk hunters and bird hunters and fishermen that actually do houndsman stuff. And same on the trapping of the predator hunting side, like with the Colorado trappers and predator hunters. Every single one of them pursues every other type of game species, but they are a small segment of the population. The thing that we tried to make sure that we were at least lockstep in our messaging was… while we might become the low-hanging fruit, the houndsmen and the trappers or the predator hunters, it was the catalyst on what could be representative of what the overall intention, the agenda was, is to knock us out and then go to the next level. And if you look at everything in the playbook from the animal rights extremists to the opposition, yeah, they want the low-hanging fruit first, but then they’re not going to stop with that. And we were the catalyst to be able to turn around and explain that because we With hound hunting, it’s no different than using bird dogs to turn around and go out and hunt pheasants and chukar. It’s no different than waterfowl dogs, except for they’re not jumping up in the air and trying to catch a duck. They’re going out to retrieve the duck or the goose. Cody mentioned the use of dogs is an age-old tradition in humanity. And since the beginning of domestication, man was trying to utilize dogs as a tool. We just so happened that we could cross paths in our messaging to say, it’s not about me and it’s not about him and it’s not about this or that. It’s about all of us in some capacity. And that message resonated well enough to unite the sportsman community to turn around and say, I’m a sportsman and I hound hunt or I’m a sportsman and I trap or I’m a sportsman and I elk hunt. And I think that that was great because you guys hadn’t been on the landscape prior to that in any significant numbers and And what we were able to pull together just showed exactly what we were trying to accomplish. And that was unification of of the tradition and the heritage through science-based wildlife management.
SPEAKER 03 :
Now, you guys have a membership basis, right? We do. I think it’s like 50 bucks for the year.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, they’re very affordable. And it’s grown every year, so that’s good to see. And, you know, the nice thing, obviously, about memberships in all these various groups is you can support a group without doing that activity, right? We’re all working towards the same goal. And so, you know, I’d encourage everybody. Even if you’re not a houndsman, join up. And we do the same, you know, with RMEF and Wild Turkey Federation, all these other organizations, because we want to support each other to fight the big fight.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right. You know, I mean, I started Sportsman of Colorado in 2013. So, I mean, I hadn’t been doing this a long time, of course, I don’t know my life, but I mean. Once I started hearing about all these different groups and meeting people at different groups and just being honest, it seemed like every group almost, they were in their box and didn’t want to look out over the corners at anybody else and helping anything. And I was like, man, why aren’t people a little bit more engaged with each other and helping different deals? And we did see this last time, I think, quite a bit more. I was emceeing a few banquets, and there was one Pheasant Forever banquet we did. And, man, a young lady at the end said, hey, we’ve done our fundraising here for Pheasants Forever, and now we need to help Dan Gates, Colorado. And, man, that was so cool. So I thought then a couple other banquets I was emceeing, I’d go to the people that were running it, and I’d go, hey, look, what do you think about doing this? No, we don’t want to do that. We don’t want to do that. And I was just like… I mean, it really ticked me off, to be quite honest with you.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, on the flip side, too, I want to give credit to where credit’s due because a tremendous amount of those organizations and chapters came out to support the cause. They weren’t supporting Dan Gates. Screw Dan Gates. They weren’t supporting CRWM. They were supporting the fight, and we just happened to be the idiots at the front of the line. And once we got that through some people’s thick heads, other ones, it wasn’t near as difficult, but they were willing to turn around and do that stuff. And so whether it’s the Wild Sheep Foundation, Rocky Mountain Bighorn, Rocky Mountain Elk, you name it, we got a hell of a lot of support from a hell of a lot of entities. Some of it was reluctant because they didn’t think that they were in that fight. But later in the campaign last year, when the proponents of 127 came out with an email to their team, to all their followers, and said, this is our chance. Once we get rid of the mountain lion trophy hunters and the bobcat trophy hunters, then we go after the bighorn sheep trophy hunters, and then we go after the elk trophy hunters. And then everybody started going, holy crap, these guys were truthful when they were saying, it’s not just them, they’re the low-hanging fruit, but we’re next on the list. They put that in their own words, in their own email, and that catapulted us to a level to where the last month of the campaign last year, a lot of the fence-sitters started coming in monetarily, better late than never, but it would have been a lot nicer to have that funding mechanism earlier. But that showed the continuity, and that showed the realization of what our community as a whole can do when we’re pushed up against the wall, when there’s a sense of urgency, and to show how fragile and volatile our landscape is, but at the same time show how unified we can be if we really want to be and we don’t want to turn around and silo ourselves. Sure, sure.
SPEAKER 03 :
Dan Gates is with us, Colorado’s responsible for wildlife management. Catch Dan’s podcast as well, Through the Gates, and I’ll let him talk about that here in just a minute. And then, like I say, if you’re just joining us, Cody Loster is with us, United Houndsmen of Colorado. And check out their website, unitedhoundsmenofcolorado.com. Again, $50, man, annual membership, $1,000 for a live member. And, hey, good thing to throw some money at here to help these guys. Now, do you guys have – You do a lot on social media and things like that, but do you guys ever have meetings for people to come to and different things like that? Because, again, I think that’s where we’ve been missing a piece to the puzzle. CPW, they have these meetings and stuff. Well, a lot of them are Thursdays at noon. Well, I do a noon-to-one show. I’m never able to get involved in that. So how can people get involved with you?
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah. UHC has got lots of options. Obviously there’s the membership option. We just recently had our houndsman days, which is like field trials for hounds. And it’s not just for people with dogs, right? Like there’s, we got lots of good food, good company, and you get to kind of get a taste of that, of that world. Right. And this year was great. We had, we had several people come out that didn’t have dogs. They just wanted to come experience it. And so that was really, really good to see again, just on that outreach aspect of it. We do have our banquet coming up. We moved that around a little bit. Last year we had it in Gunnison. This year it’ll be at the Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame in Colorado Springs.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, that’ll be cool.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, yeah, that’ll be really nice. It’s a great facility and, you know, really cool. Even if you’re not into dogs and hunting, you can come up for that and potentially win some really cool prizes, raffles, auctions. And not only that, but just if you’re into rodeo, like there’s a lot of history there. Maybe I’m partial to that.
SPEAKER 03 :
No, no, it’s cool, man. Yeah. That is August the 2nd. It’ll start at 5 p.m., as you mentioned, Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame. Hey, here’s another thing I like about everything that, you know, the outdoorsman days we’re going to talk about. Family friendly. Yes. Hey, and it’s cool to see kids, you know, and we could do a whole show on that. But, I mean, it’s cool to see kids out there and doing this stuff, too. So how they get tickets, go to your website.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, you can get tickets on the website. You can also get them at the door. Oh, okay.
SPEAKER 03 :
You can get them at the door as well. Yeah.
SPEAKER 11 :
All right. But yeah, we always encourage everybody to come out. We’re reaching out actually to the ag community as well, cattle producers and stuff as well. They’re part of this fight in us with everything. And as Dan was talking about what we can do when we all come together, I think last year what we saw was inspiring because it made – sometimes the challenge of something seems so daunting that people don’t try. And that did seem daunting. It was a real thing.
SPEAKER 08 :
We were told we’d lose like for 14 months. Yeah.
SPEAKER 11 :
And that’s a real thing, right? People feel daunted by the task, and so they don’t attempt it. And I guess the bull rider in me despises that with every bit of my soul. Like, I don’t care if you’re going to beat me, but I’m going to make it as hard as possible for you to beat me. And most of the time, I’m going to win. And that’s the attitude I think we can all take on this stuff. It doesn’t matter how big the task is. We can get it done if we get together. So not only in the sportsman’s community, but in the ag producers as well. We can really, really do some good. Sure.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s why Cody and I get along so much because he’s a winner and I’m not a loser.
SPEAKER 03 :
And somewhere that meets in the middle, right? You’re listening to Sportsman Colorado. We’ve got to hit a quick break, and we’ll be back with more right after this.
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SPEAKER 07 :
This is 560 KLZ, your home station.
SPEAKER 03 :
Welcome back to Sports from Colorado. If you’re just joining us, Dan Gates is with us. Colorado is responsible for wildlife management. Cody Lohstra is with us, United Houndsmen of Colorado. Cody just got to tell us about his banquet, August 2nd. Once again, that’s at the Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame. And, hey, great dinner, raffle, live auction. Robbie’s going to be there, right?
SPEAKER 11 :
Yep, Robbie Kroger with Blood Origins. Starts at 5 p.m., too. 5 p.m., all right, yep.
SPEAKER 03 :
And then Pat Dorsey, I think?
SPEAKER 11 :
Yep, Pat will be there, and we’re working on a couple more speakers as well. So it should be a pretty fun lineup.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, that’ll be great. And once again, you can get tickets at the door, or you can get them online at unitedhoundsmanofcolorado.com. Outdoorsman days. Man, great time last year, and previous years have been great as well. But, man, Dan, looking at your lineup, got a pretty good lineup this couple of days here in August, the 8th and 9th.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, we got a good lineup this year. Last year, it seemed like it was a sense of urgency that everybody wanted to get a chance to be part of the fight. And now everybody realizes it’s the fight. Isn’t just one time. It’s not one time a year. It’s all the time. And, um, and people were willing to turn around and come in and support and help out. However, however is needed. Um, you know, you gotta have, you gotta have people that are willing to donate their time and their effort and their finances to be able to help pull this stuff off. But no, we got two great days coming up August 8th and 9th and pathfinder regional park in Florence, just south of Colorado Springs.
SPEAKER 03 :
All right. Let’s see here. We’re going to have a barbecue dinner. Tickets are $70 each. They’ve got some corporate tables available. And that says with perks.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, there’s a bunch of perks on that Saturday night, August 9th. That’s our fundraiser dinner that will culminate the two-day activity that will happen on Friday and Saturday. But the banquets. is $70 a ticket, corporate tables are 1500 bucks. Last year we sold out almost two weeks in advance, about 425 people. Had 4600 people that were actually at the event over the two days. And while we won’t be able to turn around and name every single thing, and maybe we’ll get on later in the season here, there’s a tremendous amount of activities over the two days. And we encourage everybody to look into it, come down, spend some time. There’s camping on site. There’s hotels real close. There’s a wildlife calling contest for elk and waterfowl and turkey and predator calling. cash prizes. There’s an archery shoot that Sam Westfall was helping to run with Valor Archery Challenge. He’s with Archery in Motion. And we’ve got gold panning and chuck wagon dinners on Friday night. Last year we had seven chuck wagons there. I think you were there Friday night.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, it was really cool. Those chuck wagons were cool to see how they just did all that from scratch, man.
SPEAKER 08 :
They feed a pretty good deal. And then we kind of had some weather issues last Friday. But this time, same setup, same type of goals. There will be skinning and game processing seminars.
SPEAKER 03 :
I’ll tell you, that was cool. A guy was over and did a bear. Yep. And that was really cool.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yep. And did the processing, too, to show the people how to actually cut and process their own meat off of – Well, it was a domestic goat.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right.
SPEAKER 08 :
But they get to see it hands-on. And that hunter education class that Colorado Parks and Wildlife does, that was the largest one in the state of Colorado last year. They put almost 100 people, not just kids, but people through that class in two days. And like I say, vendors, seminars, demonstration, mountain man encampment, kids fishing derby on Saturday, gold panning from the Pikes Peak Prospectors. It’s an all-day event for two days, and we’ve got some really cool stuff. We have a couple of bush planes that are going to come in and land on grounds and set up a booth over there about backcountry access in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Alaska, Canada. And they’re going to set up right there on the grounds. And so we got permission from the county commission and the Pathfinder Regional Park to set them down right there. So just a ton of different things going on. But the culmination is on Saturday night with the banquet that starts 430. And tickets can be bought either through the QR code online. You’ll start to see some social media advertisements and television advertisements. But you can go to ColoradoOutdoorsmansDays.com. Or if you can’t remember that, you can go to SaveTheHuntColorado.com, which everybody kind of remembers from last year, and it’ll lead you right to the same website.
SPEAKER 03 :
All right, cool. Hey, and one of my favorite things, the Ugly Hunting Dog Contest. Well, there’s plenty of dogs down there at that time.
SPEAKER 08 :
United Houndsmen will be there, and I think the Rocky Mountain Big Game Recovery guys will be there again. But, you know, we have a ton of people, you know, Ralph and Vicki Cianciarillo, Fred Eichler, we’ve got Sam Westfalls, Zach Hansen, Laramie Sasquatch-Miller, Ray Livingston, Jermaine Hodge, you name it. We’ve got a little bit for everybody. And if you’ve never shot a bow, come and shoot a bow. If you think you’re really good at shooting a bow, there will be some competition stuff that Sam’s running. And just come and spend some time on site because the facility is great. It’s right on the Arkansas River between Canyon and Florence. And $5 a carload to get in. So you put 15 people in the car, we’ll turn around and take you in. Whatever you can get in there. So we’re looking forward to seeing everybody. And it’s going to be something to where I think you’ll see – It continued to grow. You know, last year, 4,600 people. We expect 5,000 to 6,000 people this year. And no reservations are needed. Just show up and have fun and come engage and learn about the outdoors and learn about all the other organizations that are doing what we do to help save the hunt.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, I think I remember seeing some RVs camp.
SPEAKER 08 :
Oh, yeah, there was camping there.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, people can camp out there if they want. Yeah, Will goes. I’m going to bring a tent. Do you want to do that? And I go, no, I don’t want to do a tent, dude. I’ll do a tent when I’m behind. So I ain’t doing a tent.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, it’s a good thing. It’s a Friday night. You might’ve gotten wet as much rain as we got.
SPEAKER 03 :
That’s for sure. Once again, it’s coloradaoutdoorsmansdays.com is the website, August 8th and 9th. And I’m telling you, it’s worth it to go both days. All right. There’s just so much going on and a lot of great people. And, you know, and that’s the thing that I like too, Dan, is just getting around people and meeting new people that, you know, maybe we didn’t even know before, you know, and understand where they’re coming from with their group and how we can help them too. So, I mean, I have never seen, man, and I know you’ll agree with this, the attack, you know, from all of our gun legislation that’s happened over the last couple of years to the hunting side. I mean, man, it’s just unbelievable.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, Scott, you’re going to be down at this event.
SPEAKER 03 :
Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER 08 :
You might be in a track chair or whatever you’re hobbling around after your surgery.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, I’ve got to get my knee redone here. I had a replacement five years ago, and it’s doing some cracking. We’ll push you around in a wheelbarrow. So I’ll be there. Yeah, but I’ll be there both days. But, yeah, it’s going to be good.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, I think so. I appreciate the opportunity and look forward to talking to you more about that and other things as well.
SPEAKER 03 :
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So we got about five minutes here and I’m going to, I’m going to get you guys to come back next week because I want to get into this a little bit more. So, Hey, if you’re listening to the show now, be sure you catch next week as well. Then we’ll give you a couple minutes and Cody a couple minutes on the biggest challenges facing us. And then when we do our show next week, we’ll get into some of the things that, you know, what we need to do and how to get more people engaged. Because that’s got to have been disappointing to you over the couple years. When you talk to people and you look at the wolf thing, and I think you said this, so correct me if I’m wrong, if like 30% of the licensed hunters would have voted in Colorado against the wolf thing, we would have won that, you know. And I mean… good night what do we have to do to get people engaged and i was hey if i got to be on not a huge political guy you know what i mean and i mean but after a while you got to figure out hey during my show greg lopez you know i bought greg on my haystack show because i’m like hey that’s about businesses but you know what we’re gonna have any businesses if we ain’t got a good place to so man i’ll start doing more stuff myself but but what do we do
SPEAKER 08 :
I think the biggest thing, Scott, and I appreciate the question, is people have to decide what value they have to be able to participate. We ran into so many people during the campaign that, for one, they didn’t know what, when, where, how. They didn’t know who their elected officials were. They didn’t know when elections were. They didn’t know things were on the ballot. And I’m not saying everybody needs to be a political Rhodes Scholar, like what Cody and I have become. Not that we’re the smartest apples in the basket, but we’re not infested with worms yet. we have to be able to turn around and get people to understand if it’s an attack on me and we buy a license in this state to perpetuate Colorado’s science-based wildlife management program through Colorado Parks and Wildlife, if it’s an attack on me, it’s an attack on you. And these people that are trying to stop all of this don’t have a particular interest about one thing or another. It’s about all of it. Their answer is zero, none, nada. You don’t do it for any way, shape, or form. Now, they might just talk about a little bit of it over here, but their ultimate goal, and if you look at their background, look at their fundraising, look at their message that they’ve created over the last 20 or 30 years, They want it all gone. And if you listen to the leaders of those organizations, they have said this stuff on the hot mic for the last 20 or 30 years. It’s not about getting rid of trapping. It’s not about getting rid of dogs. It’s not getting rid of shooting our state animal, the bighorn sheep. It’s about all of it. And we have to be able to turn around and ignite our side to get them to understand that all of us are up against the wall. All of us are under assault. And all of us are in the target of the enemy. Right.
SPEAKER 03 :
Through the Gates, your podcast.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, that wasn’t planned. Through the Gates, we started that January 1st. I think we’re going into our 44th or 45th episode so far. And it was an attempt based upon all the podcasts we were on last year and taking the advice from those individuals, the big influencers, the Ranellas and the Cameron Haineses and everybody. You need to do this to keep the message out and to keep people updated. And that’s just what it’s done. It’s been able to keep people reinvigorated and enthused and somewhat optimistic and informed about some of the happenings, not just in Colorado, but a lot of different other places about species of take. And just try to keep people informed. We’re not trying to be the next meat eater. We’re not trying to be the next Scott Watley and turn around and run some sort of a big radio show. We don’t have the bandwidth or the financial fortitude to be able to turn around and keep building up an army every two years to try to fight something like what we fought last year. That was a $3.3 million campaign. I don’t know about you, but we can’t keep doing it like that. We have to change our playbook and our roadmap of how we’re going to stay on the landscape and how we’re going to be at the front of the line. Right, right.
SPEAKER 03 :
Cody, I’ve got about 60 seconds, but we’re going to bring you back next week, man. Biggest challenge is kind of facing you guys.
SPEAKER 11 :
If I had to sum it up in one word, engagement. It’s got to be the engagement. If Dan famously said, if you don’t have a seat at the table, you’re going to end up on the menu. That’s something that needs to be taken seriously.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right. And, you know, I think it – Education has got to come, you know, where we get the truth out because there’s so much garbage on social media that’s not even true, you know, and then get that engagement. I think we’ll get that engagement if we do the education side, right? Absolutely. Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Hey, don’t forget the dates, August 8th and 9th, Outdoorsman Days. Go to ColoradoOutdoorsmanDays.com, and also the banquet for United Houndsmen of Colorado is August 2nd, and it’ll be at the Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame, and you can get tickets at the door there or on UnitedHoundsmenOfColorado.com. Once again, don’t go anywhere next week. Listen next week. We’re going to get more with these guys. So thanks for being with us. Hope you have a great rest of your weekend. Remember, Sundays 8 and 8 a.m. and p.m. You can catch the replay then the following Thursday from 9 to 10. So for Dan Gates, Cody Lohstrom, thanks for being with us. Hope you have a great rest of your weekend.
SPEAKER 13 :
The views and opinions expressed on KLZ 560 are those of the speaker, commentators, hosts, their guests, and callers. They are not necessarily the views and opinions of Crawford Broadcasting or KLZ management, employees, associates, or advertisers. KLZ 560 is a Crawford Broadcasting God and country station.