Ep. 562: A Wyoming Grizzly Attack

This is the Meat Eater Podcast coming at you shirtless, severely, bug bitten, and in my case, underwear listening podcast.

You can't predict anything.

The Meat Eater Podcast is brought to you by First Light. Whether you're checking trail cams, hanging deer stands, or scouting for el, First Light has performance apparel to support every hunter in every environment. Check it out at first light dot com. F I R S T L I t E dot com. Join Today by Shane Burke, fresh off a Grizzly bear mauling.

Hey, Steve, thanks for having me.

Here. I'm joking. I'm not joking.

He Shane Burke is here fresh off of Grizzly bear malling don a Wyholming, joined h by his wife Chloe.

Hello, thanks for having me.

You're an EMT. Yes, where do you eat? Where do you e m T at? Chloe?

Well, so I'm currently non affiliated, So let.

Me your job hunting, dude. If your job hunting, I would pitch now hard.

I know right now I'm currently working.

As a licensed CMT working as a medical assistant.

But I used to work in Springfield, Massachusetts.

So you're not job hunting right now.

Not currently.

She's a nursing school right now.

So, oh, so you're gonna move out of the E m T business.

Yeah, yeah, but you were helpful in this whole mauling situation. I'm sure we'll get into the details. But if I was gonna get mauled by a grizzy bear, I don't want to EMT nearby.

Yeah, I mean, I don't know.

It's kind of funny because I'm always joking with friends and stuff because people are.

Like, oh, like, don't worry clothing EMT. I'm like, I really can't do that much.

Don't make me work while I'm on vacation, Like I'm going to offer you an ice pack or you know.

Shane was Shane was attacked by a baron May And we're gonna we're gonna go through that whole harrowing story. But first I got up, Uh, tell these guys about something real quick.

We have You know my kid's been selling pigeons.

Do you know how your kid's been spelling pigeon?

Yeah?

How do you know?

He spells it with the J.

I always do that text.

I got that text.

You know, it's it's like the Hawaiian language pigeon, Like.

He spells around he's a bright kid.

Yeah, one day he was for some reason or another. I think I talked about this.

He started to spell America wrong, and I'm like, you better stop.

And come back to me and spell your country properly. You know.

Yeah, there's no k in there?

Was it?

Really? I don't know?

Yeah, he spells pigeon round. But uh so they got they get a nice little We did it. We did a night rate on what the hell days right now? We had a night rate on Saturday night, and.

They wound up with three hundred and some dollars for the pigeons.

Cool sold them all the next morning, and then they kept Now we have baby pets.

So it has he come to the logical conclusion of like, why burn the gas trapping these things?

No pets, dude, Like the neighbor girl kept one and my kids kept two. And now they got these pigeons that you got to hand feed them. We took yesterday, we took sunflower seed and a couple of cheerios and ran it through a coffee mill and mixed water in it to make a paste and all kind of other little things. And they've been there feeding them with hyrop.

This is how Mike Tyson got started.

Well, I know, and yeah, does your h my wife, my wife so unhappy?

Does your h o A allow livestock operations?

My wife god's reading about like she's reading something that said that pigeons have more have more affiliated passages.

Than you should showed. Uh, your your your boy and his cruise. Uh oh gosh, their money making side, those articles on racing pigeons, the value that racing pigeons bring in, and then he can start training them to race, and if he comes up and a win with a winner, that'll be more money than his pigeon trapping business has ever brought in, hands down.

Yeah, you could train them to be like Judas pigeons, just bring them to you.

Yeah, when I've raised I don't want to spend too much time on us. When I've raised pigeons in the past, here's a weird thing that would happen. You eventually lose them because they move in with regular pigeons. Like I had a cage for like a little roost basically a chicken coop for the pigeons, and you'd start to see regular pigeons hanging around, being like.

What's gotten into you? Guys?

You know what I mean, Like they'll hang around they and then pretty soon the your pigeons will move in with the regular pigeons. And the town where I was doing is didn't have a didn't have a lot of regular pigeon hangouts. And I put red zip ties on mine and you could go down there and now then you'd see one of your old pigeons hanging out with the town pigeons. They they got to be to hang out with the town crew.

They fall in with the downtown hang out late.

That's pretty cool, though they go faral so quick, you know, yeah, you know you're there kind of dependent on you for a long time.

Well they need to, because they were reading about how they can live seventeen years in the wild and seventeen years.

And not in the wild in captivity. Yeah, and this is not Yeah, it's not seventeen years.

It's not allowed.

This it's not your retirement programor outdoor at your house.

They're not allowed in the house.

There's a space heat around.

So I actually, uh banned peregrine falcons every year on this the first year I'll miss because of the bear attack. But uh, lots and lots of bands pigeon bands on talents.

Oh yeah, yeah, where were you banned?

So I'm it's actually interesting because I was listening to an episode of organas brought up rock climbers. So we're rock climbers and you mentioned how the impact of on that we have on resting sites.

That was.

Okay, well I'll point out and Cal's defense he was making h I know.

At first I was like he was making it like for instance, yes, yes and no, but also bodies.

I have lots of buddies who are rock climbers, so I've gotten really good at making fun of rock climbers and the rock climbing life. Yeah. Yeah, so we need to go down that. Yeah you free loaders off their plates like that.

Yeah, but yeah, I did see Red for a harpe. I was like, oh, man, like but really he's he's knocking down on the rock climbers. And then then I saw that you flipped it and it was a hypothetical. We do have an impact, like as any outdoor sport has an impact in wildlife. So I actually very adult of you. Directly, I managed the falcon closures at our local crags. I helped maskil yep, so we closed down entire sections for two months.

You like the bad guy, know somewhat.

Yeah, I'm the guy that will show up and be like, dude, get the hell away from the birds, like leave helone. But yeah, we banned them. I've been doing it for four or five years now, so no kid. Yep, that's sweet, that's great.

We just released an episode with RFK Junior, who is involved in peregrine restoration.

When they realized that, you know that he used.

The term double clutching. Oh yeah, when they were trying to like repopulate peregrines. You know, you hear about if whatever, any kind of bird will lose its first clutch, like a turkey, it'll lose its clutch, if it's early in the spring, it'll just they'll get a second chance, possibly

But yeah, yeah, they're not the best nest builders. They don't build any nests. They just drop the eggs. Yeah. So sometimes they'll steal nests from like ravens and stuff, but they're not very good at that part.

You know what a pigeon uses for a nest like a stick, It uses its own I've never read this.

This is my observation. They build a nest of their own excrement.

Oh yeah, and then they wonder why they get the reputation. How'd you want up with the military, man? I always wanted to know since you were growing up.

Yeah. Yeah, my dad served, My uncle served nine to eleven. Happened. I was young, but I always wanted to do my part. I wanted to do more, you know, I was gonna go infantry and do X y Z. But my dad had a really real conversation with me and kind of talked to me. Out of infantry. The stars just kind of a line they wait, he did. When I got out of basic training in tech school, my unit was deployed Iraq. So I was like, you know, I'll go to Iraq seew it goes, and then I'll see where

So but I got lost it.

You wanted to go infantry, correct, but still one up and I don't understand what were you doing?

So I'm a mechanic, Yeah, and my overall specialty is what we call Hotel eight, which is recovery vehicles, so like if they get blown up, broken down, and basically a fancy tow truck driver that drives a really badass truck called the helmet record.

And then you spent how much time there?

I was in country for eleven months and.

Then you didn't like coming home?

No, coming home socked?

What do you like? Tell me about that?

It's like, you know, one of my mentors always told me the Army is the easiest job you'll ever quit. And it's just it's so simple there. You just got to survive. You're told when where to be and when to be there, what to where. It's just very regimented lifestyle coming home and just trying to navigate you know, pushromac, stress, drinking, friendships, relationships,

You didn't know, you didn't meet, you didn't know each other prior to service. I came home and bought a sports car. Yeah.

Yeah, I bought a Mustang, as most idiots do when it come home from a tour and.

So well discount codes when you're getting off the airplace.

Yeah. I actually bought it when I was in country, still directly from the factory. So I put like sixteen grand down. My payment was like one hundred dollars a month. I was just like, yeah, it's too easy. Yeah, So it went a little crazy, went a little crazy.

Yeah.

I think it's a very uh standard. Like I'd say more than fifty percent of the people that come back there, they deal with these adjustment issues, and at the time, the VA was not very helpful. And I was trying to like get counseling and trying to get out of these bad habits that I had developed. Eventually I got in trouble and had to smarten up.

So oh yeah, and then you had a mega health scare. We're gonna get getting.

Mold by yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean so we first he had to survive like a tumor.

So here's the thing.

It almost sounds made up.

Yeah, my life story really almost sounds made up. I've had a lot to a loss and health issues in the last four years.

Can we pause this for mix? I have to mention something. Yeah, you and I had I didn't realize this. We had like sort of interacted because you had sent in pictures.

Just tell the yeah, like you know, brain tumor, you know all that. But let's just talk about this dead jar deer.

So the deer was still alive when I found it. It was it was yeah, and that's why I was so controversial.

And I didn't even remember it until like this morning. Yeah, Shane came in.

We're getting ready to court checause if you know you we interacted, like you posted a picture of mine and he showed me and it was this he'll tell you.

Yeah.

So I was scouting for a secondary spot my first year of hunting by myself. So I used to hunt with my father when I was a kid. Through some loss, my dad stopped hunting. We lost my brother and twelve, so that really set him back. Brother twenty seven motorcycle accident. Yep, so my dad pretty much stopped everything anything that brought him joy. So anyway, when in twenty twenty, when my dad passed away, I took all his hunting gear and I was like, you know, I'm going to try to

Oh really yep.

It was amazing first time cooking wild turkey and it came out amazing cool. So then I did deer season shotgun because I wasn't didn't have my dad's bow ready in time, and I haven't shot a bow at this point for probably a decade. So I did shotgun season and I was scouting. I had my tree stand set up, I had special access to I don't want to say it because I don't want people to blow spot up. But it so I probably gave it away anyway, but.

We can take that out.

It's all good.

It's all good, big old. So I set up my dad's tree stand. I wore all my dad's clothes. I had my dad's ashes in my pocket, and I was looking for a secondary spot because I don't want to sit in the tree stand, you know too much during the two weeks shot and so.

I got to know the detail though, how do you carry your dad's ash.

I've got a little canister from my dad had a big mustache and so he asked me to buy him some mustache wax one time. So I bought him some mustache wax, and so I have just a small sample of him in there.

I got my grandma's ashes, my allotment of them, in a ziploc bag that I just chucked into my work backpack here and I actually went to Mexico with them and back and totally forgot they were in there. So you know, this baggy full of powder.

Sus got a little dusty.

No, I mean, nobody said anything about it, but I have I've yet had a good, good enough wall. I dated a dumper in the lake which I think she'd enjoy.

Yeah.

So I was just scouting for a secondary spot and it was really windy the last couple of days on a Sunday. On a Sunday, yeah, so I had my glock on me.

That was it.

And I found this cliff that had like a little meadow below it. And I've always seen deer there. I see deer signed there all the time. This looks like a pretty good advantage point just as a secondary spot. So I walked left down the cliff band and all of a sudden, I see his massive rack sticking out

And his buck is sunk into a crack right like his feet. Yeah, he was like, who's good? Have you seen the pictures. I haven't. There's like a they need to put it up on the screen.

Yeah, you can do that. I can send him to one of you guys if you want.

He's in a crack like.

So, Yeah, he falls into this crack and you got to see it.

Yeah, it's it's pretty pictures worth a thousand words.

I don't know where any of your Sorry.

He's stuck in a crack. There's like a little cliff.

There's like a little cliff band, and where the cliff band, at the bottom of the cliff band, there's a big boulder.

But there's a there's a crack.

He's wedged into what he's wedged between the face of the cliff and the boulder as it curves in word towards the cliff.

Yeah, four legs are poking down.

Through there, and and it is and you can.

Get under him and look up, and you can get above him and look down. An impressive deer. Oh yeah. And I asked him if that's a nice buck around an exceptional deer.

Yeah, I think unofficially scored like one three.

Wow, let's see Randa, Yeah, nice book.

I'm just looking at the picture. Now, there's a picture from underneath. Yeah, and it looks like he's Santa Claus trying to come down the chimney.

Yeah, just like the deer. Yeah, it was a deer.

Okay, so yeah, so he's still alive. And so my friend Jesse came.

Out and you could have tagged it.

So I got a salvage tag. Yeah, yeah, because at first Jesse was like, hey, like, you're gonna have to use a tag for this, and I was like, I mean, I guess so, Like it's Massachusetts, deer harder to come by, especially Western mass So I was like, yeah, whatever, it's not a big deal eventually, So we we contacted e PO. Yeah. Yeah, so the EPO sold st euthanize it, so we did.

And they let you make the call. Yeah.

We tried pulling him out, and if you see, the fluid in his legs is all built up. I was more afraid that he would run still on fight or flight, however, be dead very quickly by the coyotes and stuff. So I was we made the choice to definitely put him down. He's been there for a while.

Yeah, he don't look like he's getting better.

No, No, he's he's pretty messed up. So we you know, Field dressed him there. A biologist came out. He kept making the joke. He's like, man, this is if I didn't know better, this be an elk. Dude is the biggest dear he'd ever seen. Yeah, it was a big boy. We never weighed him, but at least two hundred pounds.

What do you think he was doing? Do you think he slipped off that? I do so.

Actually when I emailed you, he actually had a cataract in his right eye, So I suspect he's walking the cliff band on with that cliff on his right so he's blinding right eye. You said he was really old, really old. Yeah. I think the biologist that came out estimated him at eight and a half, close to nine years old.

Me and my wife filled out our end of life stuff yesterday.

Did you describe this as the way I want to put myself in the youth?

I basically would have said in that situation, I'd be in the ethanized bucket.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's kind of like a what was that guy Aaron Ralston the one hundred and twenty seven hours right right?

Yeah? Yeah, his arm off.

Yeah, he's just wedged between a rock and a hard place.

Yeah, and you can see where that poor sucker was raking the dirt above him too.

Yeah, one last row.

And then someone sent you a picture. Someone sent you a picture of an elk carcass. It looks like the thing.

So I was getting a lot of flak for this.

Oh why why are people messed with you about? Who cares?

People just can't be happy for other people or just I don't want to say happy, but like, this was just a real experience that I had, and you put it.

On social media, right, just say like, oh my god, look, yeah that's weird.

Like cool, it was a cool, unique experience.

And I took it. Delighted me to see that. Yeah, and so tell me about how what are the criticisms?

Just like I was poaching? Yeah, and I did have in there, yeah right, like.

Really elaborate trap, yeah yeah they.

And it's so good at the that you duped the biologist, right, yeah, yeah, totally such a shrewd criminal. You shot an ice buck, jammed it in there, got the fluid to run down its legs, duped.

A biologist apparently.

And then walked away without even needing to use your tag, You son.

Of a I'm picturing you wedging that boulder out with a stick and standing there with a string and a carrot, and.

Okay, so you poached it, I can see.

Yeah.

Yeah, so there's just that's that's how I do it. So, actually the biologist is really cool. He ended up taking to his house, and then a couple of days later I went to his house and he showed me how to skin it and butcher it.

Really Yeah, Chloe, I'm gonna get away with this. Who'd have thought I'd go to the biologists?

Yeah, yeah, perfect, alibi.

The meat was good enough.

We had the backstraps pretty quick.

We ran out of its rare.

It was probably the rarest me I've ever eaten.

So this is like a real thing about like high stress people. Yeah, I mean even you want to talk about some high stress ye.

Well, deer was there. He was feeding them corn for like a wile. Just want to get it finished.

In your comments, people were like I would never eat that? How could you eat that? Disgusting? And I'm like, dude, like I don't know, man, it tastes like deer.

You didn't like that? Were too high stressed individuals?

Yeah right, I made a nice Asian dish last night, and uh it was it was told told to me that the ingredient list was a little too intense, and uh, it tasted good, but it was too intense because I used uh, gizzard, liver, heart, turkey, testicles and then.

An old Bucky found wedge and then and stuff.

It was really really good, but it was the knowledge of the ingredient list.

It's up after a while, said.

Well, they don't ask.

No, I think it's good.

To know what you're eating.

Bear's eye of all.

Using it all?

What were the other criticisms? None as curious, I don't.

I mean it was so long ago.

You were Sunday hunting.

Yeah, that was Sunday hunting pressured this deer to fall off the cliffs.

Like a buffalo jump.

Right right.

There.

Had there been some number of people that just said, oh that's.

Cool, Yeah, absolutely totally. I mean they got like I have seen it, they got like four hundred shares in the first couple hours in the morning.

Was that buck a total mystery book or did some did you have anyone.

Like I know that buck?

So, like I said, it's like a lottery area they got to apply for. I mean, I've in this area, this specific area, but I hunt the surrounding area that's legal to hunt outside of the lottery. And I've got about ten cameras up. I've never seen them. I have cameras there because I shed hunt there every year. Uh and so yeah, season was it? Like this was the pretty closest shotgun season, So like, oh, sorry, shotgun usually starts December, I think, so this was like a week before shotgun season.

To the brain tumor, yeah yeah, but can you imagine the story some shotgun hunter would come up with if they come came across that deer be like, oh.

No, no, no, oh I shot it. Oh yeah, I would never A lot of people would have been it's Sunday. You can't hunt Sunday. But I know where I'm gonna be. Yeah, bring along.

So back to the brain tumor. I uh so it's called I can't pronounce it, but acoustic neuroma.

Is that right?

Okay? Cool? I went to public school, so you know.

As did I think everyone at the table.

So yeah, So I found out post deployment to Poland that I had this brain tumor and that it needed to come out. Was a little bit smaller than a golf ball couldn't keep it there. Obviously.

It was always measuring tumors by golf balls.

I don't know.

Randall had a face tumor too.

Randall, Yeah, this guy.

That one was the tip of your thumb. They didn't dolf didn't do half a golf.

No, no, unfortunately.

Yeah, as as two golf balls.

I was really shooting for a golf ball.

I thought if they could get that, I'd feel like I got to accomplish something.

It made rand smarter.

Oh nice, Yeah, I name me a little slower.

But sor Ry Randall's got a good story where when he uh, I think when it all came to a thing and you really hit hit the fan.

He was in the middle of cooking, oh my fishing game cookbook. That was my stroke.

Oh, that was my stroke.

Yeah, I was.

I uh was making a big batch of mule deer chili when I had a stroke. And then my wife came home later after I'd been taken to the hospital, and once it was clear that I was going to make it through the day, she said, I packed up all that chili, but I haven't eaten any of it yet, have you had?

She we didn't know what had happened.

She's like, do you think it's okay to eat or should I freeze it? And we wait till we get the full right up. But actually my tumor when they woke up from this, when they woke me up from the surgery, Sydney handed me my phone and she said, Steve Ornella texted you. But what I said, oh my god, you must have heard from cal that badger around no which you said you said, was did you ever go to that spot I told you about?

And if you did, did you see any bears there?

And I was like sitting there in the hospital with like blood just like and I texted, yeah, saw a bunch of bears, maybe six. And then immediately you responded, was it all just thousand cups?

Continue?

Those are my Those are my meat eater related health jokes.

I said, yeah. So I basically when we found out about the brain tumor, I actually ironically found out on my brother's death anniversary. So I was like, just really bizarre. I was alone, which really sucked. I shouldn't have like opened my patient portal and saw the diagnosis.

Oh yeah, and you were already getting little deaf in your right ear.

Yeah, So I already was once.

Do you think that was related to well.

I mean I knew it was related to Basically, the Army told me I had nerve damage and just like from gunfire and just loud noises being a mechanic. All right, cool, Yeah, makes sense. I guess it's not uncommon for people in the military to go deaf, especially in my shooting year. I guess because I'm right handed. Well I shoot rifle right handed. So I told Chloe. We went to one of my best friend's weddings, and then at their wedding,

But just to save you here didn't suck.

Yeah, reapproach that right. I was watching her carefully.

She didn't react.

Also, the best moment of my life.

Yeah next time, Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was I.

Had a big wedding, and I tell people, I'm like, don't do that.

Yeah, it's a waste of money.

You just forget about it.

Hansel Fast You're like talking to you know, like, oh remember me, Yeah, I was your Sunday school, you know, and.

All of a sudden, like the night's over. You're like, there was a lot of money.

Yeah, yeah, I mean it was a very form We had Chipotle catered.

Yeah, that's the way to do it.

Was.

It was awesome, perfect wedding, perfect wed It was great. We had smoked eel.

That sounds interesting. Uh So yeah, we got married, and then I like, It's what sucked was like I really couldn't be as present as I wanted because I was, you know, sure prepping for a very serious surgery. I was very drunk, very fast.

To be fair, I wasn't very present either. I was like, I don't know what's happening. It was like we played it in two weeks.

So you're like, oh, I knows, I might be sitting on a five hundred.

Grand lucky you. Yeah, so we you know, the surgery went well. There was a high risk of face paralysis, balance being really really like no balance or just having difficulty balancing and some cognitive concerns. I have all of the above two degree without the proles. That's fine, but basically the nerve is really growing wrapped up and I'm sorry, the tumor is growing all wrapped up in my facial nerves, my balanced nerve, my taste nerve. So there's a lot

Totally deaf right here, totally definitely right here.

It's it's challenging. This past season. I had a dose sneak up on me when I was sitting in my saddle and it was a really cool experience. Is my first rut hunt ever at my dad's bow, and so I was sitting in this in the saddle, and I heard something, but I couldn't. It's just really hard for me to trianglate sound. That's why when one of these guys talking.

Yeah, locating a gobbler could be brutal.

Oh yeah, I imagine I haven't tried it yet.

Yeah, are our body Clay. He's deaf, mostly deaf in one ear. Okay, he can't tell where he can't tell where he comes from. I feel like he said kind of like ruined in a lot of ways.

It's ruined Turkey.

And for him, that's interesting.

I haven't got to have someone to like.

He kind of needs someone to point, like, well, he can hear it, but he always points. He points like one hundred and eighty degrees off everything.

Yeah, so this dough is walking behind me, and I'm also like, my eyes really messed up as well. So I didn't have my glasses on because I shoot bow lefty, so my right eye, sorry, my left eye is good. So I turned and I was like, I think that's a dough. So I had to like do another turn this way to look over my left shoulder, and I

To push back. You keep knocking your mental faculties. But like, I wouldn't be thinking about any of that stuff.

I don't know at this point. I'm you know, I wouldn't.

I'm not an amazing hunter. I've honestly only been hunting since twenty twenty on my own, so I'm doing a lot of this like trial and air stuff on my own. And I just well, that won't ever stopped.

Just so, yeah, oh for sure, for sure, you'll never be like got that all figured out.

Yeah, I couldn't believe it.

Problem, sorry to god, man, ass overhead stops and just start sniffing like crazy and.

It so as you saw it. You put a little squirt.

Out as the dough walked away. So the buck was about a minute, maybe two minutes behind her, and oh yeah, it was. It was cool. So I draw back and I was off by five yards, dropped under his belly.

He kicked up, I'm off by five yards. Yeah that's fifteen feet. Yeah yeah, so what I so.

I didn't range him?

I didn't.

I was like too jittery. I just like, I really just wanted to make a shot. I thought he was at twenty five yards. He was more like thirty five yards, so maybe ten yards.

Oh you're distance, judge, I missed. I went right under his belly, right, shooting a way out there. Yeah yeah, I know, right on, judge.

Yeah.

Was it bigger than the than the than the crack book.

I don't think so. No, the crack Buck, at least body wise, is bigger. Yeah yeah, but he was a nice ten point. I've been watching, and so he jumps snorts a couple of times. I'm like, do I got another shot? I was like, but I need to range him this time to figure out like how far he was, and he was after the shot, he pushed back about fifty yards, and I just wasn't comfortable shooting at fifty given how little experience I had at the bow at this point, so I let him let him go. But

Just thought, yeah, I thought you kicked my eye. I thought you'd kick my head.

Days are over.

But now I know your balance is off. I might take a while shot.

Let's try it.

Let's go now. Yeah.

So I remember the first time walking in Uh I had my red light on and I was walking into the shotgun and I was eight ship like seven. Yeah, man, I was getting so frustrated. It sucked.

And you probably think you got lived like that the rest of your life too.

Yeah. It was because like this is two months after surgery, so it's like this is it, this is what's going to be. Like I just had surgery on your head.

Yeah, the docks and oh that's fine.

Yeah I didn't tell them. Uh yeah, So I fell a bunch, but I had the where with all the changed the light color to green and that so it's a red blue and green and then white light obviously, so I changed it to green and that was just a little bit better.

Oh that's interesting.

Yeah, so that was helpful, just like I could see a little bit better and the depth perception was better.

So do you got a corrective lens on your het?

Yeah? Yeah, so what I was my right eye? Yeah, because I'm telling you, guys are like dude, just making all this stuff. So in twenty twenty.

You laughing about laughing about the next.

Details, which is really funny, like just retelling.

Yeah.

Story.

So and it's kind of surgery.

Yeah.

So prior to me leaving for Poland, I was shed hunting and I had a stick puncture my eyeball, which one my right eye. So that's why I wear glasses. Now this this, my left lens, is just a lens. There's no correction there. So I was, like the surgeon said, is one one hundredth of an inch from losing my eye or my vision in that eye? A stick, a stick, Yeah, straightened my eyeball.

With like such velocity that like ruptured it. It was like an open, open globe.

It's called I can show you pictures of that after I had stitches in my cornea. It's absolutely was it a branch? It just yeah, yeah, just literally like slink shotted right into my eye. Oh, I was I was leaving for for training for the army, and I just was really excited to take my dog out for a shed hunt. So I left work early, got into woods. I was mile into the woods and whack hits me

But damn.

Yeah, So four years I've had this will be this shoulder surgery from the bear attack on Friday will be the fourth surgery in three years. Actually, Okay, so it's I'm sorry to bounce back.

No, no, it's all helpful background. Yeah, let's move on to Wyoming, all.

Right, cool, So, because we want to.

Get a picture of a totally debilitated man, and I hope you come.

Back next year if you get struck by lightning.

Right, A sensory deprived, the sensory deprived, sort of half their man in the mountains.

Yeah.

Yeah, we were actually like starting to feel like recovered enough from all that that were like, let's do it.

Let's finally go on our honeymoon.

This is the honeymoon. This is the honeymoon.

Honeyway.

Yeah, HiT's keep coming, right.

So we rented a mini van.

And where did you wint the minivan? Enterprise?

No, I mean I don't mean like.

Oh, so you drove out, he'll plug for enterprise.

So you drove out. You rented a mini van to go on a.

Road trip for a three week trip.

What did you guys?

Did you do?

Chrysler Town and Country.

Was a Chrysler of the mini van.

Yeah, the reasonable daily rate.

Living in Violet built a.

Little like temporary bed platform in the back.

Yeah, I was, uh.

Bag van life.

Has van life slash rental.

Yes, So we basically were planning on to do some climbing, do some shed hunting and exploring, and we were softly kind of looking to possibly move out to Wyoming. So in the next few years when she's done at school.

Oh yeah, actually got like a transition coming up.

So we had spent three days in the bad Lands, which I just I love the bad Lands.

Let me ask, are you still a mechanic technically? Yeah?

Yeah so in the army.

Yes.

On the civilian side, I'm what's called electronics mechanic for the army, so.

It's you're still working there.

Yeah. So I'm an Army reservist mill tech, which is a dual status position, so I'm contracted in to stay in the reserves as long as I hold this civilian job understood. So it's like I called it, backdoor draft. Kind of sucks, but it's a pays the bills. So we spent three days in the bad Lands, which I love the bad Lands. I love how under traffic it is compared to the other works, and it's got just

I thought that was gonna be our scariest animal encounter.

Yeah, so I got us all on top of yeah. Oh yeah, So I got us all on a boulder, her, my dog and I and we just watched her kind of just struck around being angry. She I was. I was a little worried. I was like, we could be up here for hours. I don't I don't have a lot of dogs. Yeah, yeah, I know that.

Yeah.

I was actually the one that that spooked them.

And I'm terrified of moose anytime we run into them in Massachusetts Chad hunting. Shane makes fun of me because I'm always like shaking. Like there's one time I pointed one out near.

Shaking like the girl from Jurassic Park, and I'm like, I'm like, I mean it was only like ten feet away, so for you know, context, and I just like looked at it and I was like, this is right after my eye injury, so I had literally had an eye patch on and I only had one eye and I was just looking at the ground making sure I didn't fall.

Oh, this is shed hunting, Yeah, this is yeah, this was in Massachusetts.

Yeah. So she's like pointing at this movie and I'm like, all right, it would already charge us if it didn't, if it didn't want us here, And it just kept eating its food looking at us, and then it just did it one eighty and walked away.

So yeah, So during this most recent encounter, I was the one that uh jumped them saw yeah, and saw the calf first, and it like took off and I was like, whow all right, like now this is a safe distance away, like I'm gonna I'm gonna take a picture.

And I was looking at the picture. I was like, looks kind of small.

And then and then I see mom like walking around these boulders, just like grilling me, and I'm like, oh no, So I for Shane, And because I didn't know what to do, I don't I don't have the knowledge that Shane has. So I just radioed to him and was like, uh, I have a very angry mama moose that's not backing down, and I'm like just trying to back up the hill and give her space.

And yeah, she was just coming after me.

So and at this point, you know, if something bad happens, it's going to happen to him. Get him over there.

Yeah. So yeah, I got us all on a boulder and she stayed for like fIF lingered around for like fifteen minutes, and then I could see her calf down in the tree line, so she went to the calf and we got out of there pretty quick after that. I didn't want to stick around. Yes, yep, that was in the Bighorn yep. So then we stayed in Cody for a night. Then we got to Yellowstone and we camped out there for three days and that was awesome. We just drove around photographed animals. It's just like a

I guess.

Sold some photographs, but haven't made up for the equipment I've paid for. Uh yeah, So Yellowstone is cool. I've never been there before. It's nice to get there before the crazy Taurus. And then we were heading south to Moab and we're just going to drive through the Tetons for a few hours, just check that out. We had done some research about the great gray owls and Signal Mountain is kind of a hot spot, so that's when.

We at least read it. Told me so read it.

That's a good place to see a great gray owl.

Yeah, so we parked, we walked up Signal Mountain Road, and so it was the three of us, two of us with the dog. We walked up there together for about half a mile.

Maybe it's not a remote back country.

Not at all. Yeah, yep, and it was.

It was close to cars, but there were so many cyclists and pedestrians and stuff.

There's dozens of people up there that day.

Yeah.

So as we're walking up there was actually like a safari like a I don't know, yeah that country guy. Yeah yeah, and like we so we bumped into them and they're like, oh yeah, we went on and off the trail. They didn't see any sign of owls, but they're out there somewhere and they're like, didn't see any bear sign either. I'm like, you're like and they asked me, like, do you have bear sprayers like cats?

Right here?

Right on my f h F.

Good job you had you had the spray holster underneath the.

I didn't have the holster. I ended up buying because I've never thought about bear spray until coming out West. He's the black bear. I know that they can be dangerous still, but every every black bear ever see their run. Yeah yeah, they're running away from me. So anyway, so I just bought like some cheap elastics to hold it in place. I did stop at the meat eater store let yesterday and buy the Holster though.

Yeah, tell what you were here for.

No, I didn't know. I don't know.

I didn't. I like to think they would have given it to you. You always got it.

You walk in there, and do you know who I am? Do you have any idea who I am? We've gotten looks.

I think some people do know, because we've definitely some people looking at us a couple of times. So anyway, yeah, it's going on.

Good Morning America, will do that.

Yeah, yeah. So eventually Chloe decided like, hey, like, you know, I only have the bear spray, I'm gonna go back to the cars, like cool, I'm just gonna give myself an hour up here. I'll bounce on and off the road.

And I knew too, like I had Cadence with me, our dog, and I wasn't gonna be able to go everywhere that he wanted to go, and like, you're not supposed to take dogs off the more than a hundred feet off the road in national parks, so I want to be respectful of that too. So yeah, I just turned around and I was going to iron out some things with our itinerary and whatnot.

And yeah, sorry, no.

You're very You're endearing yourself to this crowd following the rules in a national park, especially fleash dogs.

They're supposed to protect dogs from wildlife and wildlife from dogs.

And you know, we can't help, but wonder how things might.

Have you actually like read the signs and stuff all the printed materials out there. That's amazing.

Yeah, that's what saved my life, partly, partly.

And probably why our dogs still alive. I mean, I don't know what would have happened if she had been there.

Yeah. So I had been walking all over the place up there. I have a pretty good sense of direction that like naturally, I had a compass with me. My phone's GPS was not working very great, zero service for the most part. So after an hour goes by, I'm like, I look at my watch. I had set a timer for an hour and fifteen that my alarm went off. I was like, oh shit, Like, you know, I told her I'd be back in an hour. She's probably getting

You had to downloaded the map.

Yeah, because we didn't discuss going to this location until the drive there, and at that point I had no service to download anything.

This was like, let's pull over and stretch our legs for a second. I heard there might be owls here, right, so.

Nice, but you know, it's still pointed me in the right direction back to the parking lot.

How far are you from the parking.

Lot when the attack happened?

Ye, I don't know at this point.

At this point it's hard to say.

Well, so up the road we had gone three quarters of a mile and then yeah, but.

I wandered all up on top of Signal Mountain, so I any any the furthest probably was maybe a couple of miles.

How far from the road were you.

Maybe maybe from single mountain road? Probably just a mile At any given time, it was never more than a mile. So I start b lining back to the parking lot.

Like you're you bush wagon down right? Yep?

And this straight line yep. And so just basically walking mostly east in a little southeast and uh, and I just I'm in the woods all the time. So I moved really fast and efficiently, and I think that was part of my problem, was it was really windy out. I think if I remember correctly, when was up to forty miles per hour that day. So as I'm going through the woods.

And what's the topography, like, are you going to steep? Is it steep?

I wouldn't say steep, No, it was there was it was you know, it was a big hill, but not overly steep. I can I have it all plotted on an on X seconds.

It's got a mature timber on it. Yep.

Yeah, lots of down trees. So I'm at this point at the bottom of Segnal Mountain kind of and I'm like in this weird valley and then there's just like hill protruding out. And once I get around that hill, I see the cub running.

And you're how far from the car at this point?

I want to say, fifty to seventy yards?

Oh you're back at the car.

No, I'm sorry, I thought you said the cub not the car.

Oh no, no, how far from the car?

Half a mile? Like point actually point six got you just halling ass, halling ass, making noise And I was talking.

Out loud, but tons of ambient noise as much as I wind.

Yeah, yeah, right right, It's like so the bear didn't hear me.

You were talking a lot. What were you saying?

I basically was just I was actually more or less in the army, like when we march, we sing cadences and yeah, so it's it's kind of like it's just something that's always just like grained in my like just sinched in my mind.

So you know, just give give me a sample cadence. I don't know the one you're doing. I just want to sample cast so naughty.

No, no, no, like not like the old I can't say that one nevermind. No, just like there's some like uh, airborne ones. So you just be like, I hear the choppers hovering, they're hovering overhead. They come to get the wounded. They've come to get the dead.

Gotcha, you know so that sounds more like a shandy yeah kind of.

So anyway, I just kind of just doing that and just talking out loud.

Thinking about bears.

Absolutely, I was bears were a big concern for me, Like not that I like I was overly afraid of them. I just was like, I know we're going to see them.

You're not baranoid, you're better aware, right, Yeah, totally.

I was just thinking about them, and I knew they existed out there and it was their home. And so I see this cub running about fifty yards ahead of me, and I was like, fuck running the other way, yeah, running away, And I was like, I know, Mom's got to be nearby. And so the first thing I did was I took my bear spray out. And a lot of people are like, oh, I bet you wish you had a ten millimeter or this, blah blah blah. Sure, I always I always feel a little better when I

Me, all right, let me let let's back up, not back up, but I just want to I want to talk about this three seconds realkod you like, you register a cup running fifty yards away. You know it's a grizzly oh yeah, just something about it?

Oh yeah, okay, and.

You without it, without without hearing or seeing anything of the sow. You know, you just spooked a cup and you pull your bear spray out.

Absolutely and you throw the safety on the spray I was trying to Yeah, okay, so this is all like super fast, right, and then what's the very next thing?

You register.

Mom's eyes at what distance?

A couple of feet a couple of feet.

Coming straight at you or from the side.

Just diagonally to my left, so just barely like in my ten o'clock a few feet ye, And as soon as I saw her, your attention on that cub, right, yeah, so I was looking at the cub.

You could have potentially been looking over the top of Mom's.

Back and uh so I think she was already charging me. I just did it, like I said, was windy.

Like if that cub hadn't been that, you probably would have picked up something. Yeah, yeah, you'd have picked up movement.

Yeah, yeah, I think so. I was just so gave you.

So.

I think part of the issue was they were actually walking towards me, and I was walking towards them at one point. And I can reiterate on that after after post attack. So I remember her amber eyes like they're just they're in my head for the rest of my life. And I know you were talking about your bear encounter and how it really affected you for a long time.

So when she jumped up, what what did it seem like she was coming at just like generally you kay?

Yeah, just she was just gonna hit whatever part of me she could hit with her paws. Yeah, I'm not even sure. I mean her her muzzle is right there and everything.

Was it a mouth open? Yeah, So she's coming at you? Yeah?

Yeah, And so I just like reading the kioski and when.

You when you think about it, you're standing, Okay, how when she's on the ground on all fours, where is her back on you?

It's hard to say. I was so fixated on her face. I don't, I don't. I can't put a size on that. But I know when she got on her hind leg she was taller than me.

Yeah.

So so you kind of went from like looking at or even down maybe.

Down, definitely down on down. And when she jumped, she got kind of like it was like more of a pounce, but she was definitely taller than me. And I reverted back to the signs outside the trails. It's like if you are getting attacked by a bear, get down, lay down on your belly and cover your your neck with your hands and keeping your arteries clear, you know, protected,

Oh?

Sorry, you have a displaced displace fracture? You're a Roman.

Yeah, that bite I'm not have.

I couldn't tell you or blow Yeah, I couldn't tell you. But that's where she tackled me. Simultaneously, as I started to like turn and get down, that's when she jumped on my back. She bit my shoulder, She bit down through my so canine went down through my trap and then her lower mandible canine went up into my lat and so I have like pretty good gash on my lat The puncture in my trap was just crazy as like really really deep.

Her canine bang right.

Yeah, So she took me to the ground and she kind of like flopped and I flopped like trotten in front of me. Turned around. I screamed from the first bite.

Well, and she did what now, Like like.

When she tackled me, she kept running after she hit me, she kept running in front of me, and then she just did a one eighty and stepped on my back. And I've never felt more powerless in my entire life.

It was almost like world wrestling, like a little victory lap after.

I got him.

And then when she blew through you and did that bite, did it linger or was it just like a pass through um?

She didn't grab yet shake.

I don't think she did. I don't know. I think there would have been more damage if she shook. But also she did break my shoulder, so maybe so when she stepped on my back, she just like bit one of my legs, and I was like, I just basically started just putting my face in a dirt and shaking my face in a dirt, trying to like muffle as much of my groaning and screaming as I could. So she bit me a few times. I couldn't tell you

God thinking on his feet again, amazing, Yeah, jose a grizzly.

It was a big planker. But I don't know you thinking about that in that moment.

It was I just I remember just telling myself, just shut up, shut up, stay as stiff as possible. But I think, like at this point, the last bite she I swear to it hurts so bad that I let out like another loud scream.

Were you like stretched out or curled.

Up, stretched out, laying down what we in the military would call prone, like laying you know you're taking a.

Laying down shot, right, yeah, yep. Meanwhile, Chloe's back the car, being like every time, every time it's an hour, an hour turns into.

Two an hour for an hour and fifteen minutes.

All too after.

That is so true. She's a She's a saint.

Do I tell them about the text message?

I mean, you can because he said that yet or not?

No, No, maybe we'll get that closure.

We'll get that in a second. Okay, So anyway, uh, I'm pretty sure like her one of her canines had like tickled my femur and that's why I just got so pain. Yeah, and so she dropped me and it was just like, uh.

Well did she have you off the ground a little bit?

Yeah? Yeah, she just left me up by the leg, by the leg my my face was still on the ground though.

Yeah.

And when I screamed from.

How much do you think you weigh?

Do I weigh?

Yeah?

Okay yeah, and she was probably three eighty four hundred, So.

Now I think you would kick my eyes even with all the all the.

Disabilities, you're just gonna keep thinking the whole way.

Yeah.

Uh so yeah, she dropped me and it was just like I don't describe it, but it was just like a I don't know, just nonchalantly just dropped me and then just stepped on my back again like she's casual, right, just like this motherfucker's dead, like he's I'm gonna get Yeah. Well she was like she's like I'm gonna put you down.

Now. Does she vocalize it all?

Yeah, but it's hard to describe. It was just like I mean, you've you've heard him like that like pant that they have, Like yeah, well, like it was.

That so no crazy like barking.

Not at all, just like a yeah, it's I can't describe it, but it's like that normal like if you hear too gris like if you watch a documentary two grizzlies fighting or something like that. So that like I screamed pretty loud from that, she drops me, and.

She doesn't seem to be uh after this, she doesn't seem to be Like it's a hard question to ask, but does she seem like jacked up and pumped up? Oh, she griled up and like stiff legged, and.

Yeah, it was so dude, it was so violent, Okay, like she want like she wanted me dead. But it's easy because like the more I look at my wound, like my scars, now, I'm like, you know, this could have been so much worse, like just bit you on the head and killed And the fact that like she didn't just completely rip like grapefruit size chunks out of my thigh, Like I just I don't understand why and how she bit me.

We had a shed hunter get killed that far from your couple. I read about that and then.

I talked to someone who'd done an investigation on that, and they just they felt that it was instant, like I don't know, I never got I don't know what the injury was, but then it was instant.

So yeah, I mean that one bite, right, could that one bite in the right spot?

Just yeah, I'm so damn lucky she didn't get in any of my my leg arteries or anything like that.

So now she's standing on top of you again.

And so I had screamed.

Like placing her front feet on you, Yeah, at least one like a like pining you down or anything, and uh.

Wave into the crowd like this.

Yeah, so that's when she went to bite. You know, I suspect would have been my neck in my head. She obviously she got my hand, my right.

Hand here and see your back, I see your back, Yeah, we.

Can show you after. And then she got that behind me. Watch. So that's some teeth, yes, those yeah, yeah, those are bite marks.

Do you have claw marks all over you?

Just a little, but those have healed like they're scarred, but they're not as deep as you would expect for orange claws to cut you. Yeah, so she uh, she went for the head and thankfully, I still had the bear spray in my hand. So you're holding the spray the whole time. Yeah, unbeknownst to me. Honestly, I didn't even know I still had it. So when she bit down at this point, I wasn't feeling So the.

Bear sprays in your hand and you're still trying to protect your back, right yep.

So just trying to protect the back of my neck and my neck and my head.

Is your finger through the ring yep? Got it? Yep?

And so she bit down, like I said, she got my wrist in my hand and then she got a mouthful of the can.

So when I paused, you want said, sure we had a person, not we had a girl on one time that got mold.

H Oh.

She got tore up pretty good. But she was in the same situation where she's down and it's biting here on her back, and she's holding it and just sprays it in the face while it's biting her.

And that's what saved her.

It just happened like had the spray in her chest and just is able to do like a blind shot over her shoulder.

That's incredible, and got it had dropped her.

Did you ever go through your mind to try to discharge the spray.

I didn't even know it's still holding it. So yeah, it wasn't an instinctual thing at that point.

Oh yeah, all this has happened within like ten seconds.

Yeah, right, How many seconds do you think at this point?

I think the whole attack was probably sixty to one hundred and twenty seconds. Oh so maybe two minutes tops. Yeah.

So once she hit you were like, I mean, you said it a bunch of times, real clear, but just reiterating like you're holding it and gripping the spray, but you forgot about you're gonna Yeah, I shoot this thing with the.

B I just had the ring only, and so it was kind of like sticking up dagony up with the bottom of you know, facing up. So when she bit down and I heard the pop, I was like, that's your skull, dude, like she's she's got you. And then I felt the warm sensation go down my back.

When you say heard the pop, what do you mean?

So the can popped because it's pressurized. So when she bit down, it okay.

I'm sorry, I got it, so, but did you know that it was the can? It took a second so I would originally thought it was part of you.

That's what I thought. I thought it was my probably my skull.

I was in.

A vehicle roll over one time coming back from hunting and I just got a coffee at a gas station and we ended up hanging upside down the seat belts and I'm like and I thought, I was like, oh, it's all my blood running out of my head. And I remember touching the back of my hair and looking at my hand.

There was no blood there.

It's not coming coffee, nothing wrong, nothing wrong whatsoever. For this one second, I'm like, oh, no, my life's blood.

Yeah, so so pam pop yep. And I my initial thought was like, oh ship, she just popped you in the head, like your your skulls open and I felt warmth going down my back and my blood I thought was blood and uh then I heard her panting and running away and I was like, I was like, wait what And so I got.

Up, like and what noise? What noise is she making just the same like okay, so not a different in pain noise.

She just like I mean, I don't want to describe it as sneezing, but like it was just like she was very uncomfortable and couldn't breathe properly. I guess I don't know. And I heard her thumping running away and then that so I was like, you're alive, and I got up in the push up position. I saw her running up the hill that her cub ran.

Up, and she went in the direction of her cob.

Yeah, I'm ninety nine percent sure. It was very disoriented and regardless.

But so.

After she ran away, I got up and I ran the opposite direction.

You were still able to run?

Yeah, I ran, I want to say, almost half a mile.

Now, how are you not full of spray?

I am. I'll show you the picture after But.

I mean, are you blinded?

Nope, it didn't infect my eyes whatsoever. I don't know how or why, because.

They've pulled that part of your brain out probably right, they also nick.

Eyes.

The backs already combines to make your super power. Yeah, while I was in there, I did you a favor. So was it in your nose and mouth?

Yeah, I'll show you a good picture after hand.

But when that can went, did it dribble or did it poof? Okay? Yep?

And so when I got up and started running.

Her teeth went through the can. Who's got the can?

Now? National Park?

Are you get in the back?

No?

Why not?

They gave me the holster back because you DAP. Thank you, you DAP for saving my life. You DAP comes with a holster like a plastic holes.

You need the can?

I don't need it.

Can we get it for our auction house of bodities?

I mean, do you want to contact I have the can?

Why would they be able to have your can?

I don't know.

Did they request to keep it?

They did not, but it never crossed my mind.

You got a can with a bear's teeth holes in it.

And not just like a random one you found.

They saved your life.

Yeah, I got lots of beare teeth holes because I always bite our polly pipe and our cav.

I mean, no one cares about.

That, but uh, you gotta get that can we put the auction House of Bodies, I.

Mean or whatever you can? Or he could keep it.

I don't know what.

They can go to action and someone's interested.

About your old staples.

That they took your can?

Yeah, uh so they took all my clothes.

They actually take your can?

I don't know.

Gets off the damn mountain I've been holding my bread here and a half to three minutes.

So she runs, She runs, iron pepper sprayed. Yep.

I mean, is there any with all the pain from the biting? Are you registering like an intense stinging?

No?

What do you? What are you registering? Are you like?

Are you are you thinking? I'm so injured I'm gonna die. I can't believe how uninjured I am.

I looked at my hand and I was like, if my hand looks like that, then I don't want to know what the rest of me looks like.

So you're probably just going on adrenaline.

Yeah, so you knew what way to run?

Yeah? Why stopped the direction of the bears the best?

So didn't you didn't go toward the truck? No, the van? No, I just were getting out of there.

I was just getting too safely clearing because I knew I was I knew I was bleeding pretty bad. The back of my pants were completely red. I didn't get any good pictures. I'll share the video, which I took just in case I did die. I'm happy to share that offline, but that's something that I think is a little too intimate share the public. There's you get a little glimpse of my my butt and not physically but

Got it?

So I run up to started running up the top of this hill. I have it all saved on on X so we can like I don't remember how much elevation I gained, but it was almost half a mile, I believe.

Looking back on it. Now, were you going? Were you?

I know you're going away from the bear? Are you also going away from the vehicle?

Yes? Okay, yeah, I ended up almost a full mile from the parking lot.

So you put that and then as you're running, at what point did you did did you feel like you got back to your normal self or is it not hitting yet? Like were your normal, rational, logical self.

So that happened maybe after being on the phone with Chloe for five seconds. So once I started running up the hill, I just remember like I still had all my I didn't have a lot of gear at me. I just had an extra lens, my camera, a fanny pack, and then my my binoharnes. My camera weighs about seven or eight pounds. That thing was just dangling between my legs, hitting me, bouncing off everything. I had to climb over a bunch of down trees, basically hurtling over the trees.

Yep, the text didn't go through.

I just saw this initial phone call and was like, that's weird that he's calling me.

And I called him back.

So I tell her, I'm like hey, I'm like hey, Chloe, it happened. I was like, I got attacked by grizzly and she didn't even this is the emt in her, but like didn't even register any empathy or any form of like the only thing she cared about was preserving my life. And you know, being in the military, I've taken half a dozen what we call combat life saving classes and in my career and it's always, no matter what, the number one thing is stop the bleed. That's the

So you're in triage mode. You're trying to figure out what the priority is. Right.

I felt generally safe, but always was concerned of a secondary attack. That's you know what happened to todd Or So that was always playing in the back of my mind. I apply a second.

But again, it doesn't matter if you bleed out.

Right right right at that point I'm talking, I think Chloe called me back. She's she's with the ranger. At this point, they're asking me where I am trying to like send them my great coordinates. Nothing was like accurate for some reason. I sent them coordinates from Google that sent them like, I don't know how many yards off I'm blowing. I have my my rescue whistle at me. I'm blowing into that.

But forty mile an hour wind still right right.

So yeah, So eventually, uh, nine one one like she was, I don't know, she was with the range of rangers. Like he needs to call nine to one one and get on the phone with the operator so they can communicate with the helicopter.

Yeah, because at that point they had the helicopter in the air looking for you, and they wanted to try like pinging his phone to off the tower to see.

You know, how much time is gone by at this point.

I couldn't tell you at this point, but total from when I called her to when I was airlifted was a little less than two hours, which is very fast all things considered the problem was like in my own head, I was like, okay, well I got attacked. I was relatively close to the road. I thought I was like three hundred yards off the road. Turns out when I ran away and now it's a direction, I was like

And they flew right over you. Didn't see you?

Yeah, that's what I was gonna is it? Are you still in like pretty timbered snow yep.

So they flew over to like a clearing and I told them to stop and I started waving to them, and that's when they.

You're probably wearing earth tones.

I am, Unfortunately, if I had, if I was wearing my normal pack, I have a orange like signal sheet and I have my i fac first aid kit that had trauma stuff in it. Like we said, yeah, yeah, I.

Swear everybody I'm prepared.

Yeah, just normally normally I am.

How much stuff we bring with you.

Yeah.

So at this point though, right like you're on the ground, there's a lot of opportunity for panic. Yeah, like somebody doesn't see you right away. You built that up as like okay, there I'm getting saved or just talking with Chloe and stuff, and like you have to have some moments of this isn't gonna work out.

Oh yeah. I mean when I saw the helicopter, that was my first real real relief. But yeah, like I would say, at the beginning, I think I think I had the TURNI kits on already, or maybe I didn't have the turnic kits on, But I made that video because I was like, I'm bleeding out like, I don't know if I'm gonna make it. I just want my family to know like I love them, you know.

Yeah, And so what is your confidence in your your self care so far? Like at this point on the hill, are you like I've done everything I can do?

Yeah? There was a point where I was like, Okay, I realized the blood flow is slowing in every spot but my back. I had moved once post tourniquet application, and there was a lot like so I moved once, sat down in a different spot, and then after a few minutes I had moved again and I noticed there's a lot less blood under me, So that was good. So basically at that point I had a.

And are you thinking about shock though too?

Yeah?

That was that was literally where my brain was kind of going in that shock in hypothermia is a real concern. Basically, the the operator was like, do you have anything to wear? And I was like, well, I took my hoodie off to absorb some blood. I can put it back on. He's like put it back on. I'm like okay. She told me to put my elevate my feet so that I wanted to pass out because I was never like I don't want to say I was ever close to fainting and passing out, but there are points in time

Are you feeling like because you can't talk to him now he's on the phone nine to one one.

Yeah, yeah, I don't know, it's it was such a surreal experience. Like I the first phone call that I made to family was to his cousin and she was like, how are you feeling? And I was like, honestly, my feeling went offline as soon as my husband said, like, I've been attacked by a bear, like it.

Just I don't know.

I'm I feel like, because of my work as an EMT, I'm pretty good at compartmentalizing.

So were you like looking for him, like with the.

So that was the worst part.

Yeah.

So initially.

After I called nine one one, I had grabbed my bag and my first aid kit, and I was kinda in my bear spray and I was kind of like pacing in the lot, and I was waiting for the first ranger to show up, and I didn't know what kind of response we were going to get. So the first ranger shows up and and I'm trying my best to give him an idea of where Shane might be based on like, oh, well, this is where I saw him last, but you know, who's to say where he

Like, so you got compartment.

Yeah, which you know, like I don't know.

I was talking to some friends after it and they're like, hey, you know, when we've been involved with SAR stuff, people have just said that they have certain credentials and they don't and they end up getting in the way and like my whole thing. You know, with training as an EMT, uh, you will fail your practicals as an EMT if you

Killed, break your leg right, Yeah, yeah, So it was.

It was really hard being in the parking lot, just waiting and feeling just like feeling like I had this skill set that could be potentially useful and just doing nothing.

There's nothing worse than being like, listen, I I'm somebody with skills and I can be helpful. And then if you do something stupid, then you're like, I, but I'm still really good, you guys, I just did this one stupid thing by which I'll be judged forever.

Right.

Oh man, I just feel like it's like put this whole spin on, like the survivor's skill that I feel for like we were on the same walk. I turned around, I went back to the car and then I'm like, oh, well I could have maybe done something and yeah, just sitting there.

Oh okay, so the helo.

Yeah, So at that like and while I'm up there on that hill alone, like a lot of things are going through my head and like is the bear going to come back? Should I climb a tree? Like what's my best scenario? I just basically the only defense I had was my knife, so I had that out and I was just like at this point, like if I'm she comes back, I'm probably dead, so I might as well fight you. So the wound, like I started, the pain started to creep in. At this point, my shoulder

God he coming on foot. Yeah.

Yeah, I had about I would say about by the time by the time the helicopters ready to take me out. There's at least eight or twelve rangers into the set up a perimeter.

How far had you come from the attack site?

I want to say half a mile ish, But like I said, we can look at on X. The rangers would have a better idea because they did a full investigation from where they picked me up down to where the and there's a huge, massive blood trail that they followed. So the first ranger shows up and he's like, you're Shane Burke and I was like, yep, I'm looking for a different Yeah, so I you know, and they have to ask that, and he starts, you know, he starts, he's like, all right, I'm so and so here to help.

Are they trying to are they are they doing anything to try to get the DNA off the bear?

Yeah?

They did, so they know if there's a record of the bear, they know what bear?

What do they what did they swo? What were they swabbing to try to get a clothing and the bite they're swabbing in somebody and put it in a tube?

Yeah yeah, I mean so they completely took all my stuff off that hill. I didn't have my phone for two days after the.

They have all kinds of ways to find those.

Yeah, we got like everything back in an evidence box and I opened it up in the motel room.

Like not the spray everywhere out.

The bear spray?

Oh god, yeah, it suck.

We're just like coughing and hacking camp.

I forgot.

I did ask him about the can and like, oh, yeah, we have it and it never occurred to me, if I holding that can, I don't know, maybe there's DNA on it. I don't know, it's probably it could be in a visitors center. I'll text the biologists and see if I can pay for it to ship to you guys or something. But so at this point, like you know, I'm I'm sitting there like and I'm in their words he said, I was a really good patient. I was, you know, obviously there's in a lot of pain. At this point.

Is the helicopter landed or just hovering?

It left and landed and for a minute for how far away? I have no idea.

I imagine gravel pit parking lot down the road where they were.

There was no good place right there to land.

Now, okay, actually they dropped to Yeah, they dropped to search and rescue people from the Jenny Lake Rangers down.

Actually one might have walked Dan, I'm not sure. But anyway, so they're working on me. They're just stuffing me with gaze. And it was like every every second they're like, oh, here's another hole, here's another hole, let's stuff it with five feet of gaze. It was sucked.

Was that painful?

Very painful?

And they just got you stripped down?

Oh yeah, button naked. They're putting like the uh, the emergency blankets on me and stuff like that. They put heater packs on my chest underneath in between my armpits, and then my concern at that point it was like, hey, did I ship my pants? And they're like they just like lift my leg up and they're like, no, you're good, dude. I was like, sick, you're just.

Crawling gain to everybody.

They say that to everybody.

There's multiple times that conversation throughout. So, yeah, they they plugged me up and they're ready to short haul me out, Hony. Just like it wasn't a stretcher or a rescue basket. I forget what they called.

It, but it was like a Stokes basket.

No, it wasn't a bad It was like a I felt like I was in a bridle wrap. It was just basically there, instead of flying me to the hospital, they're going to lift me up from the site, bring me to a safe location where there's an ambulance waiting.

And dangling from the helicopter.

Yeah, so does that when they come down with that bridle wrapper, do they drop it and then you hook up and then they come down and hook up or is it stayed hooked to.

The Yeah, helicopter, they dropped it and then it didn't stay hooked up.

Okay, So they say get them ready yep. And then they lower down a hook and someone on the ground hooks that correct and they lived out yep.

And So I think her name was Livy No Lexi, Lexi, sorry Alexi. So she she tethered in with me, She flew with me. She was great. I think she was on a newer side because when they were talking about who would would fly with me, she was like, oh.

I've never been.

So she clipped into the same hook your clip into, but on some kind of climbing harness or something.

She had to rescue harness and some diesel equipment that she was connected tethered with. So we land. There was a lot of people on scene, some rubberneckers. Yeah, and then I had met I. So they load me up into ambulance and then they start, you know, checking me out there. One of the rangers that the investigating ranger, came into the ambulance. He introduced himself. He had some questions for me, what where's the can?

Yeah, where's the can?

So you say, yeah, he just wanted to know some of the finer details, like just some quick details so they could have an idea of what happened vaguely before they go out And because they didn't go out to the locate attack location till the next day, I think they secured it overnight, but they didn't like go out there to do the overall investigation until the next day. So he had some questions like, you know, are you sure it was a grizzly Like I got asked that

Great big claws.

Yeah, they did this to me versus running away.

Yeah, and so you know, my Carrey team is great. They finally hit me with some pain killers which just took the edge off.

No chlora. Are you there at the ambulance.

Just briefly, which is funny because I got in and Shane's like, don't cry and just get out of the get out of the ambulance so I can go and then they repacked all his wounds.

So he was there for like another hour and.

You couldn't ride.

You couldn't ride in the back with him.

No, I had the dog, you know.

So are they taken you to Jackson to or too apart to Jackson?

Yeah, And at this point had they begun trying to flush all that bear juice out of there.

So I did mention it because I was like, guys, my hands are really freaking hot right now. I was sweating really bad because they had scary of hypothermia. They had the heat cranked up to a thousand degrees in then, and so yeah, I was like, hey, like, I have a lot of bear spread in the back of my head. It's it's really starting to make me uncomfortable. So they tried to clean it up the best they could. All my wounds that were packed had absorbed the all of

I think that was Inside Edition.

It was so funny and I knew we started laughing. That was the first time I started laughing about the situation. Like I knew, I was okay, I'm not like I've had so much shit happened to me in the last four years that I'm just like, if I just sit here and be mad about it or sad about it, it's not going to do me any good. So I

Our friends have been amazing at like keeping our spirits up, like like teasing him and being like, you know, there's easier ways to get attention rather than getting like hoisted out by helicopter.

Do you feel, uh, do you feel you'd be any more jumpy? What do you mean being in bear country?

Oh?

Absolutely?

Do you think it'll do you picture laying off on real, real grizzly hotspots.

I don't know. I mean, I don't think we'll be back for at least two years anyway.

Yeah, let's just say I mean, outside of that, let's just say ILL said to you, man, let's go check out the spot where's always a lot of grizzlies hanging around.

Depends am I gonna be like in a vehicle or am I gonna it's on the ground walking I don't know. Yeah, and groups of three bring spray. Yeah, I think i'd go. Yeah, I mean still pretty fresh. It's still really fresh. You know it's only been three weeks, right, I mean we I listened to the Otter podcast and like those women came on after nine months, so they had a lot of time to process what happened and talk about it.

Yeah.

So you feel like, yeah, no, I see what you're saying, like the freshness of it, but you feel like down you're comfortable with the idea that down the road you'd spend time in Bear country.

I think so I've struggled with the idea of camping in bear country. I think I would do what you do and bring electric fence. No, I don't have one time, just one time, okay, just because it was a Kodiak Island, well.

A fog neg which is such the same thing.

Okay, I remember that they're separated, they're separated by a narrow straight But yeah, that's the only time I've used this.

Okay, I'm not down on it. It's just the time.

Good good buddy of mine drew an awesome tag in Wyoming for ELK this year, and and like super Dance Grizz Country and he's bringing an electric fence there despite having an untold amount of hours and super down to Grizz Country in Montana and never bring an electric fence.

Yeah.

So it's like, you know, there's no one way, yeah, and and you don't just because you've done it one way forever, It doesn't mean you can change. You don't have to change.

What it would afford you is is at least you'd be able to sleep at night.

Good.

Yeah, right, Yeah, all days, you know, you're still doing what you're doing, but at night, if it's anything that helps you get a little.

Bit of Yeah, did they I want to get back to the bear. Did they identify it?

Did they know it?

They They never came out with publicly whether or not they knew what bear it was, but I'm sure they do. Yeah, they keep pretty good. Yeah, I've talked to some people.

It could be a bear. They haven't.

Yeah, it could be. It totally could be. I know bear three nine nine is a hot topic of the situation.

Yeah, and the photographer's bear.

Yeah, it's very the most habituated bear ever.

Right, but she's actually two people, so I mean it's not far fetched. She does have a single cub right now. We were told she was not in the location at the time, and.

She's gotten.

And then we were also told that like she was like six miles away.

Yeah, we've been We've been told about very far.

But even if it was her, I don't care. Like it was a bear, I'm I mean as far as it was acting naturally, so it doesn't really matter. And to me, it's not like this bear seeked me out and was like I'm gonna kill you. Motherfucker for being in my area, like she had a very real reason to not want me to be alive.

So well, yeah, just like you said, you're in a place with a lot of human traffic, right, and you peeled off away from all that that traffic into what sounds like a nasty blowdown area unbeknownst to you, right, but it seems like a pretty secluded spot.

Yeah, and you already got scratched anyway. So what's the difference that old bear? Now was there?

Do you know if there was elk around in their calving.

Where I did find elk droppings, but I did not see any elk, so yeah, hm hmm, Yeah, so that's kind of the bulk of it.

Yeah, I mean a lot of people don't know that those army cadences that you guys sing so have a lot like a bawling calf elk to Brodie's.

Point, really, yeah, come get me bear.

In the future, would you stick with spray pepper spray?

Absolutely? I mean, like I said earlier.

You've had a lot of training with pistols.

Uh, not not necessary pistols.

Pistols military. They don't teach you a lot about shooting pistols.

No, I mean so we you get familiarized with it. But pistols are mostly reserved for infantry, military, police, special forces officers, So your commanding officer will be assigned a pistol, not a rifle. I'm as being like mostly operating vehicles. I'm just assigned a rifle or a machine gun, like

Oh I thought it meant the highest probability of getting that.

No, sorry, that that would make sense. Yeah, sorry, Oh.

Yeah, they don't want Yeah, you're supposed to be doing your job, not that job, right, gotcha?

Yeah, but you said a handgun would have done you note probably.

In my specific situation. Absolutely, Like maybe if I went for the gun first shot and that scared it, but me getting an accurate shot on it that wasn't I would just piss the bear off even more like.

Yeah, if you couldn't even hit the I mean, think about the spray, you don't need to aim at that.

Great, I'm not. I'm like, I think three seconds is generous, Like how fast it happened.

If you didn't hit that, If you didn't have time to hit that button on that spray and you knew to go for it, you have time to ain't a gun now.

And that's what I'm like. That's why I try to tell people in the comments, like if I see a comment worth like commenting that I know I've dodd.

Everyone, everyone in the everyone in Montana, Idaho, Wyoming.

Is by birth a bear expert.

Yeah, I will tell you I got this would be like a checking you out charge, not a charge that.

Was on this show right, well, no, not that one, but.

With you that was me on the BC one.

Yeah, but then there was. But he had a he had a run in long ago too, But.

I was I was actually working on grizzly Bear DNA project but super early in the morning, had two dogs with me coming across the base of this hill. Look

Yeah, so be ready.

But it's.

Yeah, exactly, you're just having the mindset of, like I am, I'm going to kill a bear today, so just be ready. I'm going to kill a bear, yeah, right, which is just not the situation.

I mean, they can run thirty five miles an hour thirty yards it takes second and a half. Yeah, Like, it's just they're fast. So yeah, I mean that ship. Your pants are not your pants.

You didn't.

I did not.

I'm very very proud of that. That was one of the first things my buddy Murphy asked me. He's like, so you shut your pants And I was like no, He's like, no, you must not be that bad then, But I.

Also think, man, if you've got time to ship your pants or piss yourself, it's not really happened.

No, I was pretty dehydrated anyway.

But so you've got to you've got a surgery coming up there.

Yeah, yeah, so my uh after I was getting discharged, so I was only in the hospital for one.

Night, and which is amazing.

Yeah, it's kind of crazy. It was kind of a mine fuck for us. We were but they're basically like, you're not getting any more antibiotics only oral. You can stay here, but it's gonna cost like five grand a night. I'm like, yeah's a hotel because we had to stay in the area because the rangers had all my stuff, my cell phone, my camera, all my like backpack stuff. The can, Yeah they have the can. Still can in.

This situation, does uh do you get any sort of like military medical assistance?

So yeah, is definitely gonna be a big help.

So you still get VA covered if you get her outside.

Because I'm a disabled veteran, so I have a high enough percentage to get free health care. So the only thing like, yeah, like they're going to cover everything, the ambulance, the hospital, surgery, uh PT will cover everything.

You're covering that can into that.

I'll text justin. I'll text you.

Earlier you said she had broken your shoulder, so they just kind of left.

It as is.

Yeah. So when I was getting discharged, the nurses were kind of putting band aids on me and stuff, and they're like, just like Chloe helped them, so she had an idea because bless her soul, she's the one that has been And then now I have you know, I can move my arm a lot, but you know the first week I couldn't even button my pants, like sitting down to take a ship, like the toilet seats right on one of my wounds, so uncomfortable to do anything.

So did did you to drive all the way home too?

Oh man?

We had to finish out the honeymoon.

Yeah.

If we didn't, we're just gonna be when everything.

Oh man, the window the wind show got cracked by a rock from a car. So that's been a fiasco to deal with.

You just can't win, no dude.

Uh.

So they were dressing my wounds for me to be discharged, and they were like.

They just noticed like this deformity and older like little knob.

Yeah, they knew my shoulder was messed up. Like I told him, I was in a lot of pain there, and so the.

Lys was like, does that always look like that?

And I'm like no, I like looked at her.

Like what I can see it right now? Yeah? What yeah? Yeah knob there, Yeah at that bone. Was that like that before?

So they she was like, oh, this looks like.

A protrudnob shoulder.

They thought it was just a dislocation. They're like, that should reset. Let me talk to ortho and see if I'll come in and look at it. And he's like, yeah, it looks like a c separation. Just follow up with your ortho back home.

And I'm like, God, shouldn't they give you like X rays and stuff.

I'd be like, yeah, we're already here.

Yeah, it's kind of crazy for it, That's that's kind of crazy.

Try your shoulder.

No, I guess I feel my sense is that emergency medicine is trying to like move away from just like nuking everyone with radiation like CT scans right off the

Well, you guys didn't like rock and roll home.

We didn't like we had to change our.

Plus just how was like crawling into your makeshift dirt.

Beds and friend's houses along the way.

Yeah, So basically we just wanted to like stay with the friends that we were already planning on seeing and just to give him kind of some time to recuperate.

Story a thousand times an anytime you went in anybody's house, going.

Been talking about it quite a bit, which is fine. I think for me that's therapeutic in a way.

Mm hmm.

Yeah, I keeps the story alive, I guess in my head. The first time I did when I got my phone is I wrote that post before I even thought about posting it. But I just wanted to have all that information down while it was still fresh.

How long how long was it for the phone started ringing from like.

Not as soon as I made that post, I would say, I for the first week, I was getting fifty to seventy phone calls a day. My inbox on Instagram was just crazy. That's why I didn't see Corinne's message right away. Yiannis ended up messaging me and I follow him, so I went straight to my inbox. Yeah, it's the media

I'm clearly not a paramedic. Guy was put in my place that day.

They some some places were like Shane Burke combat hardened veteran, disabled veteran fights off grizzly. I'm like, dude, very modest about my combat time. It was very minimal, Like most of the time that anything that happened to me in Iraq, it was just the insurgents basically just trying to annoy us. So combat, I wouldn't even say combat, just sitting, you know, a lot of times it was just indirect fire or just randomly shooting out our trucks when we drive by,

Just getting randomly shot at and blowing up is fine.

That's fine. So yeah, so yeah, it's And then what really really pissed me off. There's a YouTube video that he he got all of his facts within less than twenty four hours of the bear attack so.

On, and made one of those dumb videos. Yeah, like in the news, those like bad, it's bad. Yeah, it's super bad.

It has the exclaimer that says, please respect the victim and their family, and we're literally in the comments like none of this is accurate, please.

And they would just delete the comment, right, facts rude. So that that was that sucked. And I've had some like you know, hate mail, like people have been like, oh, you should have died up there, like because of what, because they're just I don't.

Know what's the criticism.

So a lot of people, not a lot of people. I would say it's been overwhelmingly supportive, absolutely overwhelming. Jackson in particular big shout out to Jackson. I can't even think Jackson as a whole enough for the care the like we hospital The hospitality was through the brief really kind of so. But there's some people three nine nine's fan group we're telling, like trying to tell people that spread rumors that we were out there over a carcass trying to harass Bears.

Three days prior to the attack.

Yeah, we had only been in t Times for a couple of hours, and not the type.

Of harassment where you just parallel them on the interstate all the freaking day long telephoto lenses that harassment.

People on that Bears fan page.

Yeah, I had a few messages like, oh, you're no hero, And I was like, I never said I was a hero. I was like, self preservation doesn't make you a hero. I said, I just.

Did a plank in a bear's mind.

Right right, Yeah, It's like I just survived something that was really tremendous.

What was the thing? What about have sitting on a carcass? What did they say?

So this woman messaged me and she was like you, She's like, you know, you're not a hero that the people in Jackson are, you know, just so you know, there's saying that you did this and no one believes your story, and I'm like, okay, like I I was super respectful, I have you know, And then there's just other people that were like.

Who would their right mind would go stand next to an elk carcass?

Yeah, I don't.

I don't know that.

Yeah.

One of the best, one of the best arguments for grizzly bear recovery is that you get enough of.

Them that none of them have a name.

Yeah, it's like or even a number that none of Yeah. The whole idea of like fandom around individual animals, Oh my god.

Yeah, I mean it is what it is, and I don't it doesn't bother me because at the end of the day, like when these when these people are are setting this stuff to me, I'm just like, all right, yeah, someone's parents don't love them, and it shows.

My favorite misconception was just be honest, it wasn't a bear, tell us what it was.

Yeah.

Yeah, don't know if that's what they're trying to go with, or if they're like, you did this to yourself somehow. I I don't know.

I think with your history of baiting bucks into.

The deer guy again, the crack guy. Yeah, was an adventure. You glad it happened or bummed it happened?

You know, I'm a little I'm bummed. I I'm not I like being under the radar. So like my Instagram following went from like two thousand people to over twelve thousand.

Uh, there's waiting for what's next.

Yeah, that's that's a little something I'm not used to. I guess I'm thankful for some opportunities that did come out of it, but and I'm just thankful to be alive. And I hope that if anything, like people just learn from this experience the best they can and maybe it'll prevent one other one because it is I know, like when so the Otter podcast was like one of the ones I listened to on the way here or so,

That's a little touch. Yeah, I don't know. This is like, no, I want that much.

Maybe the softest an attack.

Yeah, this was a lot to.

Come up, and it's gonna be like listen, I'm gonna scratch you right the chest. This was you're ready.

This is definitely okay, do it.

I'm ready.

This is a very mild attack all things considered a little too heavy duty for me. Yeah, it sucks. My my tissue and my legs is like really tight right now. So it's like not hard to walk, but I feel it. I feel like when I kneeled down, I'm stretching it. It feels really bizarre. And the shoulders just a really big step back because that's gonna hurt my climbing. I don't know if I'll be able to hunt this year. I might try to apply for a like a temporary

Across help you out.

There's cliffs that you can lure.

A good boulder set up. Yeah, I just.

Now we played the wedding game.

Yeah, so yeah, that would be cool if I could get across temporary crossbow license, because then I could I could hunt, and uh, that'd be sweet because I have put actually a lot of time in one of the zone.

Pretty they'll give you one.

Come on, you'll figure it out. We'll make some calls and find your cross that'd be cool.

But I got to say I was not.

I was not certain what you look like when you walked in here today, and uh, you know.

You thought you'd look a little more beat up.

Yeah, privately I thought maybe I won't be the worst looking guy at the podcast. But like you, I mean, if a guy saw you on the street, unless they knew what they're looking for. Like, I'm just shocked that it was three weeks ago, because some of those photos are pretty overwhelmed.

Yeah, I don't. I've I've always bounced back pretty quick and and all these injuries.

I had, Yeah, dude, you're a survivor.

Man, every like the eye injury. You know. I was like, I'm I got deployed a Poland, Like I want to go, like, uh, you got to fix me, doc, And she's like, this is like a year long situation. I they fixed me up in six weeks. She was like there's no She's like, everything has to go exactly right for you to go to Poland.

She said better than perfect.

So at the postop appointment, I was like, how does it feel to be better than perfect?

Wow?

The brain surgery, I bounced back really fast. I was like, I said two months after I was hunting, you know, by myself.

I get these ingrown toenails.

Yeah, they'll suck.

I see her off your wrist brace there.

Oh, also good loss like carple To, a lot of your sympathy. I'm feeling you. No, Yeah, you've been health You've been through hell.

Yeah, mm hmm.

I hope to. I don't know. I don't know if I want you to keep it up, if I want you to chill out.

I need you need like a little good luck streak, now I do I do you guys canna take a second Chance out of honeymoon?

Do you feel sick? You feel like you got to take care.

Of So next summer we'll be back in Montana. A company or organization rather called Operation Second Chance reached out to me and it's basically like disabled veterans or purple heart recipient retreat, so a couple's retreat.

So we that's cool. Yeah.

So they reached out and they're like, hey, man, like, actually this wonderful wildlife photographer out of Montana named Colleen I think she. I want to say she was the first person I responded to on Instagram. She's been super, super sweet this whole time. She like, she's like, if you ever want to come back, I'll show you this gray owls you can photograph. She sent me care package. She got me hooked up with this Second Chance organization.

Photographer sticking together.

Yeah, total sweetheart. She's been awesome. So yeah, I think.

That's some stuff to look forward to.

Yeah, I think that'll be the time. Unfortunately, like working for the government, time off is like I have generous time off. However, like this is going to set me back so far that I gotta like tiptoe around what we're gonna get for time what I'll have for time off.

Yeah, that's working for the army. I also guys worked for the government, They've got nothing butt time off.

Yeah, so I I, like I said, it can be generous. But because I'm at zero right now, essentially after the surgery, I'll have to I have to cruise some time off. But we'll we'll see by the time we get there out of a couple of weeks.

So get your good job with the ARS, dude, Yeah, non stop time off, that'd be nice.

Well, all right, man, thanks for coming on the show.

Thanks for having us big fans. So yeah, really really happy to be here.

Stay safe out there.

Thank you.

Do forget your bear spray again.

Yeah, thanks for sharing my pleasure.

I appreciate it. Thank you.