Ep. 519: How to Hunt AND Save Grassland Habitat for Whitetails with Torin Miller and Bethany Erb

to you by First Life. So it's conservation month here on the Wired Hunt podcast, as you might have heard, and today we are going to talk about conservation. We are also going to talk about hunting tactics, but specifically we're talking about grass. Grass not the kind that some folks like to smoke legally, mind you, here in my homestad of Michigan, and not the kind that stupidly we plant and mowing our yards. I really want to get away from that. It's my goal to rewild my yards

someday and never mowed again. But that's not the point. No, we are talking about the grass out there across the country where deer and birds and rabbits and bugs flourish, and where smart deer hunters post up in search of big old bucks. Yeah, grasslands are where all those things happen. This kind of habitat, it exists just about everywhere across the country in one form or another, from crp Fields and the ad country of the Midwest, all the way to the Great Plains out west, and a whole bunch

of points in between. And this is some primo ground for wildlife and for deer hunters, and for hunters of a lot of other stuff too. But this is also a kind of habitat that is rapidly disappearing. So here's what to do today, my friends. We've got a two

partner for you. In part one, we've got my buddy, the one and only host of the Foundation's mini series, the one and only Tony Peterson, And we're gonna spend some time talking with him, a guy who spent a lot of time hunting deer and grassy habitats, and we're gonna chat about why both he and I love hunting these kinds of places. We're gonna talking about some of our favorite experiences around them, and then we're gonna dive into a bunch of strategies and advice for hunting deer

in this kind of stuff. So, how can you hunt deer in CRP fields, in the planes, in other grassy habitat across the country. That's that's Part one. Then in Part two, we're going to dive into the challenges that these kinds of places are facing across the country, some serious challenges and a new opportunity we might have to help save them, called the North American Grasslands Conservation Act,

and discuss this. We're joined by Torn Miller, the director of Policy for the National Deer Association, and Bethany Herb, the director of Government Affairs at Pheasants Forever. And let me reiterate just how important this is. By the measure of one report, we've lost about fifty million acres of this habitat in about the last decade to development, crop conversion, fragmentation, firing, a lot of other stuff. Fifty million effing acres. Fifty

million acres. That's a whole lot of good deer hunting ground and pheasant hunting and nesting grounds and pollinator sanctuary just gone in a blink. What if we could reverse that trend, What if we could slow down what if we get some of that good stuff back out there, wouldn't that be something? Well, that's what we're gonna explore today. So if you want to learn to hunt grassy habitat for deer, tune in. And if you want to learn how to save these places to stick around. So here

we go. All right, So I'm here now with Tony Peterson. You might know him, and uh, I do need to I do need to bring one thing up before we getting the meat and potatoes here, because we actually have not done a podcast what we have. We haven't talked about this together since the fall and summer, where you've been occasionally stepping in for me and covering me on the main Wired Hunt show, and every week you kind

of introduced what's going on. And every week I get messages from listeners saying, hey, how was the hop Scotch tournament? Oh hey, how was the Miley Cyrus concert? Oh hey? How was Pokemon tournament? Tony, when I said you could be part of this podcast, you swore never to tell people what I did in my spare time. I didn't. I forgot. I just I used to drink a lot. I have a bad memory. And the way you're so excited about this off, I figure you want the world

to know. Yeah, well I gotta ga Hey listen, I'm not going to throw Spencer under the bus here, but that Miley Cyrus concert you did with him wasn't that far off. How he spent his vacation recently. Let's be honest, now, he did, and this is no joke, just spend his valuable vacation time going to see Billie Eilish and Elton Johnny concert And that wasn't like a single thing. That was two different concerts. He paid tickets for it to go do that at the garden, right, Yeah? And then

art museums. Yeah. I would have to say that the most enjoyable part of my job is when I know that I have to figure out what you were doing where you couldn't be here hosting the super important podcast that you have. No, I haven't listened to every one of the episodes that you did while I was gone, So who knows what you've said, and probably not every

single one people have emailed me about. Does any one of the things that you made up stand out as your favorite that you laughed the hardest at when you came up with it? If you have a favorite thing that you envisioned me doing in your imagination. The problem is is I always hold it up to what you actually did do, which was have a yo yo. Okay, well that was that was in fourth grade. Yeah, no, no, no, I get it. I know it was a long time ago.

But I don't know if I can find anything out there that's like that fits into this category as much as that does. So you actually unintentionally set the bar when you were like ten that I don't know if I'll ever be able to clear it. Well, I'm glad that you're still shooting to reach the heights that I once claimed. Look, I'm I'm gonna achieve your buddy. Well, something's just mean a lot to me. I'm glad that

you're shooting for sky high goals. Uh, what I actually want to talk to you about not only ways to humiliate me, but but I want to talk about a place, a habitat in a style of hunting that you and I both really love. And we're talking about this over dinner. We're eating cheeseburgers. I had a beer, you had a diet coke, And I said to you, and I don't think this is the beer talking. I said to you that I would give up the Midwest to hunt in

the plains. That's how much I like hunting grassland, plains habitat. What's your take on that, Well, my take is that I understand that sentiment. I would have a hell of a time given up the deciduous forests of the Midwest that I really really like. And you know, we're sitting here looking out on the Mississippi River and the bluffs here, and this this area is just so special to me. But I understand, like it's it's a close second for me the grasslands. And you know, not only for deer.

It's so fun with deer, right, Like, they're so visible. And the states that have a lot of grassland left, they give you a lot of land a roam on a lot of times, and I think that's amazing. But I just love them for so much more than the deer aspect, you know. I mean, that's this that's where

I spend my bird hunting time. I was just, you know, just a little bit ago before Minnesota small game season wrapped up, I was pushing little brush patches on public land, mostly around grassland and c RP, trying to shoot some rabbits and watching pheasants fly out and deer run out, and I just I think that environment that habitat is

so amazing. So what is it? So? Uh? If I had to, if I had to choose why I or if I had to explain why I like this kind of stuff, I'd have a hard time pinpointing just what it is. Because when I'm when I think about grassland or open type habitat, you know, it can come in a lot of different forms. It can be big vast grasslands out west, but it can also be a fifty acre or twenty acre CRP field in Michigan or Ohio or somewhere like that. But across all of those, I

think you get two things. You get one. It can be some level vista, like the wide open space, the view, whether it's ten acres or a hundred miles, you get this this scene that somehow I think, and I might be way off my rocket here, but I think there's something like deep in us having been evolved from a species that grew up in like Savannah's millennia go, there's something about that wine open space that connects with us, like we like to be able to see over the

next hill and see this vast landscape. That's something that

just the place itself just does it for me. And then second, when you see animals, deer in particular moving through grass, whether it's CRP or native grasses out in Kansas and Nebraska or whatever, just moving through that stuff and you see there their back line going across, or you see their antlers nears pocon outa something, or if you're in a CRP field in Iowa and it's so tall you can't see anything but the glimmer of an antler that turns and all of like hole crap, that's

a time and then a buck steps out out of there. That is just cool. These are not only cool, but they're like rich with wildlife landscapes too. I mean, these are places where I've hunted to have grasslands. I see more deer than almost anywhere sometimes. Um so a lot of deer. Cool place, great views, very huntable because of the views. I mean, when you think about these places,

what do you like about them? Oh man? I mean I totally agree with you on the just the you know, I think when you come from the places we come from, you you don't even recognize your own claustrophobia, and you know, you go, I love the challenge of the big woods, right, But the hardest part is you know you're not gonna see very many deer. Like, if you do see one, it might be a killable situation, but it's not like you have a very very high probability of just going

out working your butt off and blanking. And when you get out there where you've got, you know, the ability to see, you're like, it's like antelope hunting, Like it's just fun because you know you're gonna be in the game. At least you're gonna see something. You're not gonna blank out in the grasslands. And I think that there is something too that of just being able to look and go.

You know, there's so many places national grasslands and big chunks of public land where you step out of that truck and you can walk for miles and so not only can you see them, but if you do see them two miles away and they're just a little dot on the horizon, they're still in play. And you know how it is when you when you live in a state like Michigan or Minnesota where you're dealing with forty

acre properties thirty acre properties. It's like, man, you know, you got a couple hundred yards by a couple hundred yards to work with. It's just a different thing. But I just I love I love that it shows us just how many animals use that kind of habitat and when you get in there how different it is. Then you kind of think, like when you think about it in your head, you're like, Okay, I'm gonna go to Kansas or you know, one of those flyover states and

it's gonna be full of awesome grasslands to hunt. But it's like you know, when you're sitting at home, it's just flat. It's kind of feature list. There's no trees, there's no rivers, Like you just like you fill in the blanks with like the worst case scenario. Then you go out there and you're like, man, this this topography is actually rolling, and there's a strainage here, and there's a little patch of cotton woods down there by the river, and it's just a cool freaking place to be. It's

amazing what it sucks up. Like you when you look at it from the road, even like you said, it might almost look sterile, but you get into it and there's a whole lot of life in there and deer well, I mean, you know, and we we talk about this. This is why Kansas partially is such a destination state, right, Like it's a big buck state anyway, people are gonna go there. But you can find those situations to some extent in Oklahoma in some of these other states that

wouldn't be quite as a destination. And then I think you mentioned this earlier in in some places in the Midwest and the East, you can find just a CRP field. It's like a mini version of this stuff, but it still brings that kind of habitat. And you know, I don't I don't know if this is right or not.

But like when you talk about, you know, use I c RP for example, you know, like I'm always keen on that if I'm if I'm hunting the land down there, because it's dude, whenever you and I apologize it for jumping, but I was just gonna say, any time I'm in the Midwest that's generally more timbred and regular agriculture, if I have access to a place that has that grassland habitat, whether it's in serp or just natural I gravitate towards that, don't You always gravitate towards you know why. I think

this is why. So if you think about you know, like if you if you go somewhere and there's a soybean field on public land, like there's an outside chance in an early season, they're betting right in there, right, not real high odd, it's like it's it's okay, like there might be deer that start in there, but that's

the destination, and everybody figures that out. But there's something different about sitting up over a big block of CRP because you get up into that tree and you're like, they could be in there now, they could be coming out to there at some point. They're gonna just they're gonna use this in so many different ways. It's not just betting. You know, you'll see them browsed through there.

I mean, I'll never forget. I think it was the first time I ever hunted South Dakota for white tails, and I was just glassing in the hills and they had different prairies and stuff. I was close to the river, so I had some wooded bottoms and stuff, but I was still in like the transition to grassland. And where I was looking for deer was in the trees, you know, like where you just like, okay, I know, dear like this stuff. And I kept seeing these deer in these

places where I'm like, why are they there? Looks like that deer's browsing away in just grassland, but I know they're not even that yellow grass. And I remember walking over there like the next morning and looking at it and there was this little tiny clover sprouting under there, and that's what they were eating. And you're just like, you know, I would have never ever known that, like that would have never occurred to me to be a

pattern I could play off of. And then you start digging in, You're like, there's so much going on here. It looks kind of mono landscape, and it's just different when we see the same thing. Like if you want to, if you want to realize the value of grasslands, get a bird dog, and you just realize, like, not only are the birds out there, but how many how many other critters you jump, how many deer that you see in places where you're like there's just no way, like

there's no way they're going to be here. And then you know how it is when you're following a bird dog along and you just sort of like they're doing their thing and you're kind of working the wind or whatever. But a lot of times you just end up on a deer trail like you just easier walk in. You're like,

let's let the dogs do the hard work. And then all of a sudden you realize, like this this deer trail is like winding its way through here, and these deer using this terrain just like they would bluffy country, but it's on such a different scale, and I think that's so freaking cool. I feel like you've told me a lot of stories where you've been bird hunting in grasslands and blood a bunch of big bucks, and like, oh, I need to try to hunt deer hunt this some day, dude.

It's kind of common thing, isn't it. It's well, it's so common for me that I just spent a weekend hunting rabbits and scouting deer on public land in a place that I never in a million years thought I would go. But just seeing what I see pheasant hunting, I'm like, I gotta I gotta see if I can kill a big public land buck down here. And it's it's just grass. So Okay, when I say grassland or grassy or prairie or any kind of habitat like that, where could we find that. I'm I'm gonna start with

the list. Second, think of here and you jump in. I'm thinking parts of Minnesota. I'm thinking parts of Iowa. I'm thinking both the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, uh, eastern Montana, eastern Colorado, eastern Wyoming. I think you could find it in the northern part of Texas. Um. I you know this is this is probably a stretch, but I've even turkey hunted places in northern Missouri where like some of the hilltops and stuff are like many little biospheres of

grassland as well. Yeah, you know, I mean where you get the you know, the oaks in the bottoms or whatever. It's a it's a mixed terrain, and that's a whole lot of white tail country that that's this kind of stuff. And then all the different grasslands that are still around in little pockets and remnants throughout the Midwest where they're there used to be all across that Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, tons of grasslands used to be at the short Grass period, I think is what it used to be where there's

still little remnants. I mean. One of the coolest things that came out of my Back forty project was when we brought this plant ecologist out to the property out there in southern Michigan. We went walking around and we came across this ridge side that had a whole lot of different grasses in there and forbes and stuff, and that guy the college just does with it was like

shocked at what he saw. He's like, hey, this is a remnant native prairie that used to be here hundreds and hundreds of years ago, that's been wiped out across the state and across much of the Midwest, like we've paved it all over. We don't have this stuff almost anywhere. This is like a rare of thing. It might be the only place in the county that we still have this. We have this little pocket of grassland. Such a cool thing to see, and funny enough, we tried to improve it.

We tried to open up some space for it, and sure enough, that's where both the bucks I killed on the Back forty came out of. So not only is it native, not only is it pretty dark cool, but hey, it's also where a lot of these deer like on time. Well, and you know we I know this is where to hunts. So we talk about white tails. But man, you go hunt an open a lot of places. You go hunt meal deer in a lot of places. Um, I hunted blacktails in southern California one time, and we were hunting

in some grassland there. You know, I mean this is there are a lot of species that I love this stuff, alright, So most memorable grassland type habitat dear story, when I say that's the first thing that comes to mind for you over all your years hunting this stuff, and you've been hunting that kind of stuff for a long time, probably for instance, before I was born. Right, Man, that was a joke. But you just want with that. I'm trying to ignore you because Mark has been making fun

of me for my age the whole time. Even though he's only seven years younger than me. You just look thirty four years older than because I have ten year old twins. Just wait, just wait, bro, you got those two little boys at home. This ship is coming for you too. Man. Anyways, graha's what you're saying. And plus I've hunted a lot harder than you. So it's been a lot more stressful on me when you when you go out there and you work your ass off on public land, you get some gray hair. I'm not just

doing the cushy hunts that you're doing. So anyways, back in two thousand seven, so can I tell you, I'm not having like a bucket killed come to mine right away? But I have this memory. So growing up in southeastern Minnesota, like I did, we had I kind of hit sort of the tail end of the pheasant days down there, which means I hit the tail end of the CRP

in a lot of places. So when I could start hunting when I was twelve, you know, for a while, we had some pheasants to work with, we had some deer weed hunt in CRP, and then everything went under the plot and it kind of went away. But I remember we we had places, like we had private places to hunt, but we also just went and hunt in public land. It's like we kind of just like, what do we want to do tonight? My dad? Now, you know, like we weren't, you know, we were hunting anything, So

we we didn't care. It wasn't like we were trophy hunting. It was like, we'll have fun if we go down here to Lanesborough and have this public left on if we go to this private place. And I remember he dropped me off and I was probably like fourteen fifteen at the time. I couldn't drive yet, and I was in the CRP field and just like no clue what to do. And I remember just sneaking along Asia still hunt a lot, and I saw this deer and it was like, oh, like I never see like this is amazing.

And so I got down in that grass and started crawling closer and closer, and it was a dough and I remember just like being so scared to peek up, and I'm like, I'm just gonna get close, because you know, back then, it was like we were shooting compounds, but we were shooting like one pin like fingers, you know, like the peep site that a little pinhole through it, like painting your your pins kind of thing. And so we were like twenty yards and under a kind of deal.

And I remember when I finally got to where I was like, she's got to be right here, and I just like peeked up and she was on the trail. I was on like ten yards away facing me, and you know, I wasn't I was going to take a frontal shot, and I just remember like, oh my god, like they're never this close to me, like this little situation here in this grass and at the time I didn't recognize it, like I just knew like deer, some

deer like c RP. But I've never forgot that because that was like one of the first encounters I had, like on the ground close where I didn't kill her.

She busted me and she ran away, but it was like you you can actually get that close to them, not sitting in a tree stand, which I hated because I was so impatient, but just to actually go out and do it, and it was just because she was in the c RP not paying attention and I had the right wind in the right conditions, and that I think about that all the time, and you know, that was one that got away and it was just a dope.

There's there's so many different hunts. Even in the short time I think I hunted out in the grassland type half for the first time and deer hunted in it. And probably two thousand, twelve or thirteen, so it's been less than ten years but just in that time period, I mean, any of my favorite hunts, not just because of the deer activity, both some for the deer act, but also just for the like the ancillary stuff, like

the stuff around it. You know. Like I remember one time hunting in the state out there, and I was hunting. There was a mixture of like river bottom and grasslands and kind of bluffs and then down in the bottoms. And I remember I was camped out up on these bluffs like big rolling grasses, and then down beneath me was the river bottom where there was a few turees

and some grasses and stuff like that. And I hunted that morning, no sorry, I glassed the morning, mid day, went down to the bottom hunting this kind of grassy bottom, passed on a really nice buck I shouldn't have passed on. This was the first day across the river. Came back up this after dark, going back up, and I just remember climbing the bluff, getting up to my truck which was parked on this grassy hill. There's nobody else around for miles. It's dark except for just the brilliant stars.

And I was sitting there at the truck pop the tailgate put on the little backpacker stove and all you could hear was just the of that little stove burner. And I remember just looking up hearing that sound and just thinking this is this is it? Like this is what it's all about. I mean, I got to watch a bunch of deer day. I got to sit and just watch a bunch of deer this morning. Then I got to go see deer and have close calls up

close like fun deer hunt in the afternoon. And then I got to sit here in this wide open landscape and there's not a sound except for the burner of my little stove while I heat up a backpacker meal. And I know tomorrow I can go back and do it all over again, Like this is living let alone, good deer hunting, this is the whole thing. And I've just got a lot of experiences like that that that keep on bringing me wanting to go out to those places.

And and again, like I said, it's I like to go to those places where that's the majority of the habitat. But then also like when I wanted hunt hunted Iowa this past year, and I not scouting and looking for different locations multiple different times, I was gravitating towards where there was that CRP and loan behold that the very first morning of my first hunt in Iowa this year, really nice buck came stepping out of that c RP. Could have shot him. Other really nice buck came down

along the side of the c RP. To of my best shot opportunities of the whole week came out of that kind of stuff. Man. So it's it's valuable, not

just for its aesthetics. It is and it I think when you talk about that and your your you know, recent Iowa hunt and some of your hunts before that, there is a there is a connection to big bucks and grass like because when you say that, it reminds me when you know, when I drew Iowa and like, I found three concentrations of bucks down there on that public and every one of them was in proximity to c RP. I mean the one spot, well, the two spots that were really good, I was right on CRP.

So I might have been you know, I was doing something else, like maybe hunting a river crossing or something, but it was like, you know, you got the crossing on one side, you got the CRP on the other. So important. Okay, So let's talk a little bit of strategy here if we're going to hunt any kind of grassy type habitamp, and I guess I'll break it up into two. I'm curious about a what are some things you've learned about hunting in and around CRP in a

more traditional agricultural Midwest setting. Let's just tackle that first before I got to part two. So part one, what are some best practices you've learned about, how you utilize c RP, how that factors in your strategy, how and why you had ever set up around it? Man, I think, I think the thing that's so valuable. I've been really talking about this a lot, righting about this a lot lately,

But I'm trying. I'm trying to look at these hunting scenarios and it's like so easy to default to the negatives, like what's working against me? The hunting pressure is too high, there's no big bucks in my state, blah blah blah. Like we always kind of like it's like human nature to go negative. But I'm trying to look like, what what works for you there? Like what what advantage does this specific habitat give you? And man, you know, like

when we talked about the bigwood stuff earlier. Part of the reason that so hard is because you know it's lower dear density, you don't you don't see as many so you're just like operating off a sign and you're inferring a bunch of stuff, but you don't get a lot of lessons in real time from real deer. Like

that's a that's a gift you can go in. I mean, I think one of the reasons that the state like Iowa is pretty easy to hunt compared to a lot of states is because you have a good mix of that stuff where if you go in you don't really know what you're doing, you can set up and observe still have a hell of a chance to kill when walking down the edge of the field or the crp or whatever. But you can see them and go, Okay,

this is what he did today. He got up out of that patch of brush in the middle of any walk down there through that ditch or whatever, or he came back in this morning, and you can you can run that pattern. I mean that that's why when you talk about like a Kansas hunter and Nebraska hunt. Part of the reason that's so freaking fun is you are in the game when you can see them and they're going to tell you, like, this is what I did today. I might not do it tomorrow, but I might. That's

such a gift, man. So I treat I treat those situations, you know, like obviously they're going to leave a bunch of sign and rubs around there, or you'll find beds, or you can walk through there and jump them or whatever. Find a lot of sheds in it too. But I treat that like the most important advantage that Grasslands and c RP give you is a visibility. Like you get a lot of lessons on what do you like to do just by sitting back and going, Okay, show me,

and they're gonna show you. That's the beautiful part. The funny thing is is they show you right. Typically, if you're elevated, you can see in there, so it's visible to you, but from their perspective, they feel completely concealed. So it's like this best of both worlds where they feel safe, but you can see there's no other habitat like that anywhere really where we can get an advantage while they think they have the advantage. Yeah, I mean, I would say some of the western white tails and

some sage flats and stuff. You get a similar situation, but it's not like reproducible across you know, like you if you find the right situation, you can But that's a consistent thing in grassland and CRP. So when you find a CRP field of some size, do you tip really look at that as okay? Well, let me When I walk across the landscape, I usually am looking at stuff and then lumping it into some kind of category kind of categorizes as something. Is this a travel corridor?

Is this a food source? This is a betting area, so that I can start to make sense of the bigger thing. When you see a CRP field, does that automatically go into this is probably a betting area pile or how do you think of it? What pile does that go into? For you? Um, it's usually starts that way.

I mean, that's that's the easiest default mode, right, But depending on what kind of grass it is, depending on what kind of CRP it is, you know, how old it is, how many years it's been planted, you know, I mean, if you get some shrubs and stuff in there, now you're dealing with some staging area stuff. A lot of times if it's over their head and it's got something they can rub on, yeah, they might bet on one end and walk their way through. But you might

get a staging area situation. And you know, for me, it's just I use it. It's just like an anchor point, right like you you know that you're going to use it for a lot of different things. They might be betting in there, they probably are. They might be staged in there. They might be you know, using an edge and a hard edge along there to travel there. There's gonna be a lot of things probably going on, and so you have like multiple things working for you, you know.

I mean it's the same I look at that like that's just a gift for habitat the same thing is like you know, if you have a soybean field that butts up to a pond and you have like can you can hang in early season stand there, It's like, okay, well you've got two really good things going on there with a with the CRP. A lot of times, you know, because of that security cover that you're talking about, you've got betting for sure, You've got what they think are

safe travel routes. They can move. They they're probably going to move in there in light and give you a chance to see them. And they leave a lot of sign wherever they have a chance to leave sign. So there's there's a lot of advantages to it. Now, what about if we were to head west and go to Kansas or Oklahoma, to one of the one of these other states where there's more traditional grassland habitat. What are the things you're thinking about as far as advantages and

strategic implications. I guess as far as how you hunt that stuff out there, that might be different than a CRP CRP fielding Wisconsin. Um, I would say out there, you know, the scale is so vastly different, but you have more visibility typically that's nice. Um, if you have a tree, you have a place, they're gonna walk by, you know, like they're just like fish, they're gonna gravitate to the structure. Um. But I think I think the

big advantages of being able to see them. The downside if they get into like knee high tall grass and you gotta go after them, is you better have a good plan, Like you better, but they're decoyable, you know, like there there's ways to get around it and you know. The main thing about it is, you know we always talk about like, all right, well, how do you kill this buck in this way? How do you kill a buck in that way? And the thing about you know,

like what you did in Nebraska last year for the show. Yeah, it's it's not easy to kill a buck going out and decoin them in the grassland. But tell me a funner way to hunt, Like, is is there a better way to spend your time like they're they're isn't? And so even though yeah, it might not be an easy thing, just just sort of like spotting stock an antelope, like that's if you bow hunt them. That is not an easy thing to do, but it's sure it's fun because

you're always in the game. Yeah, so I think it offers up one of the most enjoyable types of habitat to work with. Yeah. Now, one of the things that I know you've utilized in grassland habitats. That's just something

i'll throw out there. It's not really related what you're talking about, but would you say that water factors into your game plan even more in these grassy planes to habitats that elsewhere or the huge, huge I always if I'm in those that kind of situation where if you if you think you could look across the landscape and not see a whole lot sticking up out of the ground. I'm always starting with water because there's gonna be some kind of different plants there typically, I mean it depends

how that, you know, if it's pastures or whatever. But so you might get some scrubs eaters or something, or a windmill to tuck into or some something to work with. But it's just a centralized point, you know. And the hard part, you know, when you asked me about like what's my best memory in the grasslands, Like one of the things that occurred to me after I talked about a little bit is a buck I killed in Nebraska one time with a muzzleloader out in the middle of

that stuff. And the whole my whole plan there was just like get on water and like check these water holes because there's tanks all over for the cattle. So it gives you like kind of like, Okay, I gotta route. I got a thing to do. Like I know, I know they need the water even if they have a lot of water out here to work with. So yeah, I mean, what can you get there? That's different that will work to your advantage. That's a big one. Yeah. Okay, So for hunting those kinds of places, water is going

to be something to pay attention to. Any kind of structure if it's present, is something to think about. Another general thing, if you can get to a high point and watch and observe, take advantage of that whole visibility aspect, that's a great starting point. Get as high as it can, or park your truck and stand on top of your

truck and watching glass. I mean, I think this is one of those habitats where you know, observation stand or observation sitting on your truck for a morning or the evening is very worthwhile right to see if there's anything, Is there anything else other than those couple three things first starting points and that kind of habitat that's worth keeping in mind if you're heading out for your first Oklahoma hunt or South Dakota hunt or Texas or whatever. Yeah.

So one thing that's like super important that I had to learn. And so I went out to South Dakota I think was hunting mule deer and hunt on the grassland for mule deer, and you know, I went out there knowing like this is gonna be a tough place to spot in stock, but this is where the mule deer live, and this is just what I'm working with. And so I was out there with my buddy Eric and we had a really good hunt. He killed one, I killed one, and so it was like, you know,

it's pretty good. We're halfway done. And that the other two guys in our camp, we're from Colorado. Well one was from Colorado, was from Wyoming, so their Western hunters. They met us there. We live in Minnesota, so you'd consider us like Eastern hunters, right, And in my head I had no problem going into a mule deer hunt that way. But after we tagged out, we stuck around for a few days and I just hung out with our other buddies and tried to help them get a deer.

And because they're from out west, they wanted to shoot a white tail, and so they found a concentration of white tails and they're telling me about it, and I was like this, you know, I saw some white tails out there, but like this seems weird. Like they're like, yeah, there's this creek bottom with these trees in it, and I was like that sounds like the stuff I hunt.

And I went and glassed one day with one of my buddies who had found this spot, and I'm looking at it and there's like eight trees in three miles, you know, and it's like one little drainage with like a foot deep right in the center, you know, like a little tiny creek. But to them coming from the west, they're like, that's good habitat. And they were freaking deer in there, And I would like I would have driven

past that and never given it a second thought. Like if I would have been driving down the road and I saw run, there would have been that that's a fluke. I'm gonna keep going. But they come from a different place and they're going, that's good habitat. There's these gotten woods down there. They're relating to it. There's a little

bit to dip in the train. So when you come from the Midwest or the East, and you're like, okay, I know what I know about dear, and I know a lot, and then you go out there and you look at this stuff and you go, well, this this sucks.

Like a lot of people get kind of like going into the mountains for elk, like first time, you get this feeling of oh, man, like I'm not I'm not in my home ground, and like I really actually don't know what's going on, and so you kind of have to reframe what you think about for like, good dear cover because that stuff does not look like where a lot of us come from. I can definitely attest to that being a lesson that takes a while to learn, but once you do, it does open your eyes to

a whole lot of new possibilities. I think it's you start out with really a low confidence and then you're just like, well, what else we gotta do? And then all of a sudden you find your way in close to one because you lose you use a little bit of the train, or he's distracted by a dough and you're like, wow, this is totally doable. But it looks it's a vastly different environment than where we hunt deer a lot. It is, so question, do you think that you and I should go hunt in a grassland type

state and habitat this year together? Sure? All right, then I think we should. I absolutely think we should go hunt some deer somewhere. I think we should. Okay, So here's that that's the good news. The bad news is, and I know you already told you this, but I'm gonna say it again because it still shocks me. We are, according to some estimates, losing about a million acres of this stuff every year, million acres and in the last well,

I think I think it was two thousand seven. Our next guest will confirm this form, but I'm pretty sure since two thousand and seven we've lost almost an area the size of the state of Kansas of this type of habitat getting converted to crops, plowed up, developed over, turned into different things. We're losing this really cool deer hunt in habitat wildlife paradise. And I'm gonna take a leap here and put words in your mouth. But I'm

guessing you don't think that's cool. Man. I you know, as you've pointed out, I'm so old that I'm like I'm becoming like hyper aware of this stuff or like focused on it. Differently. When I was younger, I didn't really give it, like I didn't understand it, never the

gravity of why. Like when I was growing up, my dad would go shoot pheasants with with his brother in law every night during the season they would go and it like I just took it for granted that that opportunity was just there, and by the time I got into it, it was already like we're losing our spots

to hunt and it was going away. And you know, in high school, I ended up going down to Iowa more because they had more CRP and I had like the gravity of the fact that like these birds that I love, these pheasants, they need I think they say forty acres of nesting habitat per section or something something like that. And when you don't have that, they're just gone.

You don't like you might have a little a few fringe birds here and there, somebody might maybe sit a little population of them, but generally the opportunity disappears, and you look at that and go, man, that's that sucks. Like I get what, you know, like I get why it went away, and I get why we're losing it now, Like I understand, is a big issue. But when you look at like everything that uses it and everything that needs it, then you look at some of the erosion stuff.

Like I grew up, I know you love to fish and trout fish, you know, I grew up fishing lots of trout streams, like that's what we did. And then you see how it changes with the runoff and how long it takes the run off to get through there.

And you watch some of these streams you grew up fishing, and they were brooks brook trout streams when you were ten, and now they're brown trout and suckers, you know, Like you see these changes, and part of it is tied to the fact that this this habitat that we had, you know, these grasslands that we had for ten thousand years, they're gone, and we we have the opportunity to bring some of them back, or at least, you know, stop the bleeding a little bit. Man. I I'm for it.

I feel like and and and this is like a dead horse that we're beating over and over because it's cliche gas, but I keep on thinking about it, like having kids just changes the level of significance, I guess with these things even more, Like it's one thing for us not to get to enjoy them or see them or experience them. But for some reason, at least for me, it feels like a different level of just shittiness that my kids wouldn't necessarily be able to see that or

experience that. Like all these stories we just told, if there's half this much country like that left for them twenty years from now when they want to go out and do this thing, that'd be pretty that would be pretty tragic. Yeah. Well yeah, and there's going to be implications way beyond that, some game species and probably probably a whole lot of well, you know, butterflies and things that songbirds. And we're not really thinking, like, we're not

focused because we don't shoot them and eat them. But there. Yeah, it's not great. No, no, it's not so I guess that. I guess the one silver lining here is that there are people that are trying to change this. There are groups that are trying to change us. There are opportunities for us to get involved in ways to stop that bleeding or to actually kick start things back in the right direction. And that's what the next half of this episode is gonna be about. Tony. We've got two great guests,

Torn Miller and Bethany Herb. We're gonna walk us through a potential solution, a step in the right direction away we can try to get back moving in the right direction. So should we get to that alright with me. Now today I've got Bethany Herb and Torren Miller. I appreciate you both joining me and to get us started. Bethany, could you give me a really quick introduction to what exactly your role is at Pheasants Forever and then what

brought you to this kind of work? Why is it that you wanted to work at an n g O doing conservation? Sure? Um, so, hello every when. My name is Bethany Irv. I'm the director of government Affairs for Sentence Forever and Quail Forever. I'm based in Washington, d C. Have been working on conservation environmental policy on Capitol Hill for over fifteen years. Now, Um, why is that into this line of work? Is? Um? You know, I grew up on a ranch in southwest Montana. I grew up

in the outdoors. I love the vast open spaces. Uh. And my career, my childhood brought me into the career that I'm in today, where I work on national policy that focuses on conservation and more specifically grasslands. Okay, Torn, same question to you. What are you doing at the n DA these days? And why are you here? Yeah? So, my name is Torn Miller I'm the director of Policy at the National Deer Association. I actually came to the Deer Association via the merger of the Quality Deer Management

Association and the National Deer Alliance UM. I worked over at the National Deer Alliance for although I had intern experience both with q d m A and the Alliance before, UH, you know, getting a job here and working. But born, raised and still live in central Pennsylvania and grew up in Pennsylvania's very strong hunting camp culture, particularly UH that's particularly strong throughout the northern part of our state, and so always had a really strong connection with the woods

and waters. UM very passionate about the wildlife and the landscape, and so that led me to an education and wildlife and fisheries UH. And while going through that process, I realized that I had a really strong interest in human to engines and the policy side of things, and I saw a real opportunity there to to make it real on the ground different and so that led me to law school and to focus a little bit more on the legislative side of things and how laws and policies

are formed and influenced. And so I ended up here at the National de Association focusing on all of our policy and at the efforts everything you know, from the grassroots level to direct outreach to the lawmakers, um, everything from local and state level up to big federal issues. And so I get to work every day with folks like Bethany and organizations like hers on big conservation topics. Unfortunate enough that folks looked just to engage on cool

projects and initiatives like the North North American Grasslands Conservation Act. So, yes, you said it right there. The North American Grasslands Conservation Act is the is the latest issue on each of your to do lists these days. Uh. When we say grasslands, when we talk about any kind of grassland related habitat that's covered by this potential bill, what are we talking about? What? How do how do you guys define that ecosystem? Where is this stuff? Is this just a Montana and Wyoming

thing or is this applicable to someone in Michigan or Pennsylvania. Uh, Bethany, do you want to jump on that first? Sure? Um, that's a really great question. And I'm going to apologize in advance to the biologist listening um this podcast, because I'm not So I apologize if I get some of the terminologies incorrect. Um, we are looking at a wide dw off of land across the U. S. UM, this isn't just a great plane issue, and so we it's

it's a name at this point. It's the North American Grasslands Conservation Act, but it also includes the stage brush bios and grasslands include every form of grassland, coastal grassland, savannah UM. And so it's a huge area of the United States because almost every state has an area that

would be considered currently or historically grasslands. Torrent. What about specifically in deer country, I mean, the first thing that comes to mind when I think of grasslands and I think of how that is relevant to whitetail deer is all the CRP grown we've got across the Midwest. Is that the kind of thing that comes to mind for you when you think specifically dear So that's absolutely like the first um type of cover that deer hunters would

think of. And not all CRP is is true grassland or true native grassland, but that's sort of the cover types that we're talking about. But UM, certainly throughout the Midwest and pushing farther west. I mean, you've experienced those landscapes marks you're thinking sort of pothole prairie, and then native tall, short mixed grass prairie or things that have historically been native prairie. In the southeast, you're thinking thing

like pine savannah. UM. So these ecosystems are really, as Benthany said, all over the country and really all throughout our deer habitat um and pretty much anywhere throughout the US. UH, You're going to be somewhere where there there is or was native grassland at at one point. I think generally when we think grassland or stage of US, we certainly get the picture of Western landscapes in our head, just because this is sort of the iconic nature of those,

uh landscapes. But there are grasslands throughout the south, southeast, Midwest, mid Atlantic, and even in some cases throughout the northeast and northwest. Yeah. And I can say, from at least anecdotal experience, uh to what you said to her, I've seen these types of habitats in one form or another all across the country, and at least from my own personal experiences out there, either hiking through them or hunting near them or in them, they're typically pretty prolific as

far as how wildlife utilize them. That's deer, birds, bugs, the whole nine yards. But torn when you guys at the NBA to look at this issue and you start talking about why do grasslands matter? Why do these types of habitats matter for deer or deer hunters, which is obviously your constituency base. Uh, why why why does this matter to deer hunters? Why do you guys, why are you taking a stand in support of this kind of habitat? Um? Can you kind of elaborate on the importance of this

kind of stuff for the critters that were so passionate about. Yeah, so um at the National Deer Association, we're interested in all your species to white tail, and you'll do your black tail and all the subspecies and so um, as I mentioned, these grasslands are found throughout the country, and so they impact all of these deer species in one

way or another. And certainly UM throughout the west in the stage brush region you're thinking mule deer, and then throughout the southeast you're a very strong white tailed culture. And so these habitats are critically important to all deer species depending on the region, and UM grasslands by nature, especially native grasslands UM provide incredible amounts of forage for deer UM in the grasses and fords that are growing there.

They provide incredible amounts of cover for deer UM. And anybody who spent enough time around these types of habitats and there's hunted and there's a habitat UM certainly know that the key in on them. And you know, as a deer hunter, as you mentioned, there's UM not much better or not much more of a picture or a picture that comes more to mind than like a big crp field separated by like a wooded draw or something. That's because it's we just, yeah, exactly, we know that

they're just such great deer habitat. And so that's where a lot of our interest comes from, UM is the conservation and creation of excellent deer habitat, both when we're talking cover and forage UM. But out side of really focusing on deer and deer hunting, grasslands provide just a wide array of UM environmental services UH, you know, including carbon sequestration, water filtration, UM. Excellent habitat for non a game or non game species UM excellent you know, cover

and forage for pollinators and all those sorts of things. Yeah, Bethani, would you have anything to add to that, especially, you know, on that topic of outside of just deer. I mean, these are important landscapes for a whole suite of of critters in life, right, Yeah, absolutely, UM, and I think

touring summarized it beautifully. UM. I wanted to reference something program that you mentioned earlier, which is the RP and the Conservation Reserve Program, and that has been from a a bird hunter perspective and from our organization, very very critical UM to good habitat for upland birds. And so we wanted to do something, UM that would be complementary to CRP, and so we started to talk, uh with TORN and other groups about doing something a little more

broad um in a new agency. And we're gonna get into the policy a little bit further down the road. But UH, CRP as administered to the USDA Department of Agriculture, and we started to look to do something at the Department of Interior and UM as Torn mentioned too, you know, or at a time on Capitol Hill right now, where legislators want to make policy as it relates to climate change, and we believe that that grasslands are a critical part of this discussion. We see a lot of policy coming

out about forestry, UM important part of the policy discussion. UM. But grasslands definitely have their place, uh carbon capture, the potential and the value that they bring or have always brought and could continue to bring or bring more. UM, it's really necessary. When we talked about creating UM climate policy. Yeah, so you guys are telling me that grasslands are good for deer, they're good for pheasants, they're good for quail, they're good for bugs, they're good for hunters, and they're

good for the environment. Uh. That all sounds good. That sounds great. But I was out in Iowa. I saw grasslands. I've seen some grasslands here in Michigan. When I go out west, I see grasslands. It seems like we've got a lot of grass Is there a problem here? What? What's what? What is the problem? I see that. I say that jokingly because I know actually that grasslands are maybe one of the most imperiled ecosystems across the world.

I think I've read before, But can can you elaborate in that a little bit, Bethany As far as what the trend has been with grasslands because I mean, like I just kind of jokingly said, sometimes it can feel like there's plenty of it, but there's a whole lot less than there used to be, isn't there? There is um and we are kind of we're working with different partners right now to come up with an exact assessment

of how much has lost. For a year right now, we you um a metric that we were losing about We've already lost about the size every ten years, the size of kansas of grassland. And I can't tell you right now without avan my resources in front of me how much we're losing. But we know that we are losing a lot of acres of grasslands, and they're in places where there's a ton of urban sprawl, for example

where I'm from in southwest Montana. You know, places like the Gallanton Valley or just expanding h rapidly, and people want to live on these landscapes. They're beautiful. And when I mean when I'm just talking about habitat change or destruction in terms of urban development, but when when you subdivide a field that was once a grassland, whether it was cattle ranching or just an open field for you know, whatever, like you're disrupting migration route. Um. It's all sorts of

ecological disruptions happened when there's a subdivision. We're also talking about farmland conversions and know there's a lot of pressure on these really special places, um, that are great for different forms of wildlife. UM. And so we're just looking to do something that keeps more of these special graphlines places be intact. Yeah. Yeah, I read somewhere that we lose a million acres of this habitat every year. UM. And like you said that since two thousand seven is

about the size of Kansas gone. Um And so am I right that A lot of what has happened recently and you kind of alluded to this with that crop conversion is some grounds that were protected in c RP were then converted back to row crops, and that's been an increasing trend in recent years. Prices and different things like that. UM. Is that something that is this is well, we're gonna get into this bill. I guess a little bit more. Maybe maybe maybe I retract my question, Maybe

I'm getting ahead of myself. UM, torn I guess let me let me pivot and just ask if you would have anything to add when it comes to the problems we're seeing what I guess when I mentioned the CRP thing, I remember talking to Kip Adams, the director of Conservator chief conservation officer there over with you guys, n d A, and he talked about back in like twousen fifteen sixteen seventeen, when we were worried about some potential trends with white

tailed deer. One of the things we were worried about was this loss of habitat. A tremendous amount of c RP was converted back to crop lands. Can you elaborate on that? Can you speak to any other things we're singing along those lines? Um? And how you guys see that impacting what tails? Yeah, so a lot of the concerns outside of even just habitat conversion with you know, uh,

suburban sprawl and UM landscape use changes. Um, we're seeing that a lot of the native grasslands are are seeing the inversion of non native species, which are negative for a lot of reasons, UM, but up in their value to the native wildlife and the overall landscape. But UM, we're seeing a lot more wildfire risks, both in sage brush and grasslands with the introduction of more non native

or invasive species of grasses and forbes. Um, they're less fire resistant, and so when they're introduced to these landscapes, these landscapes become more fire susceptible UM. And so we're seeing destruction in that sense um too. And then we're just seeing, as you mentioned, with farming and grazing practices, UM, we're not doing enough to incentivize folks who own these lands as working lands to keep them in their sort

of natural and native grass land states. And so there are absolutely ways that we can keep these landscapes as working landscapes and still provide all the wildlife and environmental benefits that they have, but we need to provide incentives and knowledge um for people to do that. And so nothing like this really exists. And even with the the CRP program, it's been UM severely under enrolled in recent

years and underfunded. And so this this piece of legislation, and again we'll get into some of the more specifics, but it tackles that by helping to encourage folks who own um lands that are in grasslands. And it's like something like eight of our our grassland ecosystems are privately owned. Um, it's getting them the tools and incentives to keep these lands intact outside of you know, urban development and outside

of crop usage and sort of conversion for agriculture or grazing. Yeah. Um, so So Bethany, do you want to kind of help us take that next step then? Because I think you've been pretty um integral in driving the direction of the North American Grasslands Conservation at can you can you spell out for us exactly what this is and how it's

going to help us solve the problems that we just discussed. Sure. Um, And the first thing I'll put out there are two words tour and already said them, but I'm gonna say them again. They're the most important part of this discussion.

Voluntary and incentive space. So we at Presents Forever and Quail Forever have a long history of working in partnership with landowners, and UM, we do not agree with taking any sort of regulatory approach that makes life more difficult uh for private landowners and that we want to construct policy that is complimentary in incentive based to grazing operations. So the concept that we're talking about in name now is the North American Grasslands Conservation Act. Which includes stage brush.

So it didn't coudn't quite make the formal title, but it's in there. And UM we've worked very closely with UH Senator Ron Wyden from Oregon his wonderful staff to start putting pen to paper on what this legislative language will look like. And so UM as we're talking about it right now in draft form, it would be quite

similar to NAKA, the North American Wetlands Servation Act. So NAKA is a program um that's administered at the Department of Interior by the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and it's a grant program um and their UH and see Grant program Um and Eavenent program for wet land conservation on private land. It's been torn right now. I can't remember how many years KNOCK has been around, but I think it's over over thirty or forty, very very effective

increasing waterfoul production numbers. And so we started to take a look and say, okay, when just looking at like grassland birds, like all of them are in decline and we land birds are not. What's different? And we recognize that there was policy out there, specific policy to protect wet lands and habitats, and so we started to say, well,

let's model that and let's do it for grasslands. So we're looking at a much bigger UM swaths of land than wet lands UM, and so it's going to be a program that will be we're looking somewhere between two hundred and three hundred million dollars per year every year UM an authorization that would go through an annual appropriation cycle and it would again, you know, we don't have the language. It hasn't been introduced yet, so it's still

being drafted. You could look a lot of different ways, but it would include UM a tribal component which would be unique and so that tribes could participate in this UM just pretty incredible program and and do habitat improvement on tribal lands UM. That kind of is one of the more unique angles that we've taken and have support from UM several different tribal organizations and UM as it

as it relates to naka UM. The grant program would allow for different UM flexible landowner based approaches, so I think Thorn mentioned earlier like wildfire prevention so prescribed by would be one of them. UM. You could do things like um uh rant or like educational programs on different UM you know, ranching transition UM plans. You could perhaps do like different fencing projects that could be funded through this UM, perhaps of water quality or water management irrigation plans.

And it also allows for easement UM. At this time, the language is not being considered for any sort of fee acquisition, but easements that could be held either by the US Fish and Wildlife Service or independent land trust. We know there are a lot of independent land trust UM that works throughout almost every state and they hold easements, they monitor easements, and a lot of times that's a more comfortable approach for landowners that maybe don't want a

government agency on their property. So when an independent land trust holds the easement UM that sometimes it's just a more comfortable approach for landowners. So we're trying to construct a flexible program UH that's compatible with grazing and complementary to UM. It would it would fund SHAN in conjunction with us d A programs like the RP, but it has the added flexibility of NAKA that some of the

U s d A programs don't have. I also adds UH that U s d A conservation programs UM there's more demand than there is money, so we see a need to do something in addition to the farm built programs and like the idea of having it at the Department of Interior UM and so that's kind of the direction that we're moving UM. As I mentioned, Senator Widen has worked very closely with us on this, and well,

I can't speak for him. His staff is, you know, expressed, you know a lot of concerns for wanting to do something UM to help the farming and ranching community compatible ranching operations, but they're also very interested in what it does UM for climate policy. And so we've been pretty fortunate to have him lead this effort. And right now we're really looking hard to generate additional Senate support so that at some point, hopefully in the next couple of months,

we can have a bipartisan introduction. So so real quick, before we get into that, which is like the actual actions that are happening to make this a possible reality, I want to clarify one thing as far as the types of actions that this bill would a lot or would would create with the with the CRP program, the way that you know, to oversimplify that works with a landowner, let's say a farmer rancher. A farmer says, Okay, I'm gonna put these two acres of my land out of

crop production and into crop reserve. It will be a contract of some number of years in which I can't plant corner beans. Instead, I will plant this grassland blend or whatever, and in compensation for that, the government pays me a certain amount of money, so that he makes money off of this land, just like he would if he was planning corn, but instead he's planting wildlife habitat. So,

to oversimplify, that's the general gist of CRP. It sounds like with this it would not necessarily be like contracting land to come out of production. Instead, it's going to be, hey, we will pay you to do an action a habitat improvement of some kind of habitat improvement project of some kind of will give you X amount dollars for that action. Am I am I reading this right? Is that what

you're describing here? Or will there also be more CRP program type things where they'll say, hey, we can also pay you to take this out of production and contracted into this type of deal as well? Is it? Which is that? Um? Your earlier assessment um to pay you for an action. I mean, most of these lands that we're looking at are currently not in a production or story, not in crop production ranching, yes, but would be able to maintain. The idea is to keep kind of establish

what's already there. Now as we get a little further along, UM, could it be that the language does include if UM conversion vaccinative. That is a possibility. We just haven't haven't gotten to that point yet. Okay, that makes sense. So I'm a landowner, I ranch cattle, or I do whatever. This program would open up a pool of funds that I could then access potentially by doing good things for my land. So I'm you know, I'm a rancher, landowner.

It's tight when it comes to money already. This is a way to buffer my bottom line, help me pay the bills, and also do something good for the land and the wildlife out there. That's what we're doing here right exactly. So if you're a landowner and you wanted to do some prescribe fire right like, you could then receive a NAGA grant the contract and you know, for fire management, and that would be paid for the good habitat improvement, probably improved improve the infrastructure of your ranch.

You know you're not going to be set on fire. Everything's gonna look a lot better. So yes, broadly habitat improvement projects UM and as I mentioned to easements, So

that's other another components. Now, do you to anticipate this being just UM accessible by large landowners or landowners that are currently in agriculture or is this something where somebody who lives in Kansas and owns two acres to hunt deer on would they possibly be able to access these grant funds to do improvements on their land like you're describing, like prescribe fire or something else. Sure. Yeah, we don't have any UM size states. I think it will be

similar to KNAKA. The project will be ranked and selected accordingly UM, but there's no size limitation or restrictions. Cool torn from a white tail perspective, when you and Nick and anyone else in the team, Kip, who's who was looking at this project in this potential bill? When you look at this and you read through how would this impact deer and deer hunters? UM? And when you when we talk about you know, the language here and the

projects that can help fund. Is there anything else that stood out to you, is is why this is a win for deer and deer hunters, why this is something you guys wanted to stand up for. Yeah, Mark as you as I think you said earlier, and it's accurate. Grasslands are like our most imperiled ecosystem on the continent, and so we're losing more grasslands than any other habitat type UM in North America. And so when you're losing that significant habitat of any type of habits a lot

of something to concerned about. But when it's the habitat type that so deer across the country rely on, you know, it's certainly shows up large on our radar UM. And so the Act, as Bethany said, provides UM voluntary incentive based measures to help protect and conserve these resources. UM. It aligns perfectly with the work that we're doing on the thirty by thirty initiative, which I know you've covered, UM, which is to help conserve thirty of the nations lands

and waters by UM. Again, it aligns really well with the climate work that we're doing. And then from just like a very much on the ground UM you know type habitat management work UM, as I said, earlier. These these lands are important to deer for both cover and forage. But it also incentivizes folks to use prescribed fire to

remove in basive wood woody species UM from from these landscapes. UM. It incentivizes people who have a grasslands on their property to keep them as grasslands rather than convert them to you know, housing developments or or row crops or something like that. And so there's a lot of really cool UM provisions in the language UM, and it's sort of outlines, as Bethany said, projects are ranked, and so there the bill UM the reps UH councils and the like to

sort of outline and prioritize different projects. But some of those priorities as I said, or prescribed fire, UM, invasive species management, restoration of crop land and especially marginal crop land, so the crop land that's not incredibly productive UM. And then areas that are are prioritized are those that provide significant ecological benefits or areas that provide habitat for at

risk species. And so all these things are incredibly good on the ground incentives but UM which we're absolutely interested in and are incredibly important for deer. But from even a larger, sort of sky high perspective. This does so much more than just um local on the groundwork too. It seems like a no brainer. This seems like a wind win. This is a wind for animals, as a wind for the environment, This is a wind for ranchers

and farmers and landowners. Uh So, as a average American citizen, I might be sitting here thinking, Man, this is a slam dunk. This should happen right away. Why aren't we doing it? Um? But I remember in fifth grade or second grade or whatever it was, I remember watching this film on the TV about I'm Just a Bill, and I'm sitting here on Capitol Hill, and I know there's a there's a whole lot of steps. Yeah, school Us Rock, There's a lot of steps the stand in the way

from this seemingly good idea to someday being a reality. Uh, Bethany, can you can you take me to Capitol Hill? Can you walk with me on this bill to explain what where things stand right now and what has to happen for this to become reality? Sure? Um, I love the school House Rock reference. That's so good. Um. I mean, the first thing that we had to start with was a ground swell of interest, right, and so TORA and NDIA were very early partners that joined up with us

in National Wildlife Federation. Hero was about conservation partnership that came together and said all right, we need to do something. And so we began UM building a coalition of people int been doing something for grasslands like a year and a half ago, or doing something more for grasslands, I should say. And we do have a website, it's www dot act for grasslands dot org where you can kind of keep track of our progress and some of the

stuff that's spent out in the media. UM and so were you know, the first first step was to form this coalition, to get basically like a a union together of conservation groups that said, yes, we need to do this um TO, and to work through UM conversations with the agriculture and ranching community to say, okay, how do we do this so it really is compatible with what landowners want to do, like you know, because this isn't gonna function if it's not like and compatible and additive

to a ranting operations. So got to make sure we got that wet. We've worked very hard to do that UM and then to start recruiting interest on Capitol Hill, and it depends on who you're talking to and where you're from. Like grasslands have um an appeal for different reasons. If you're an urbanite in interested in climate policy, there's the angle. If you're a rancher who um, you know, wants to make some infrastructure improvements to the ranch, um and m gonna get paid to do it, Like, that's

the feeling. If you're conservationists like tornanized two groups like wild by habitat, there's your angles. So you start having different conversations in different ways with different members of Congress. We found that the Senate was a little more interested in this idea in the beginning. We do have some members of the House of Representatives that are interested, um, just for you know, the start. We've kind of put

our energy into the Senate. So then we've got now we've got a legislative language that's pretty close to being ready to be introduced. We're working with members of the Senate to have a bipartisan introduction hopefully that will take place,

you know, in the next month or two. And then we go through a process of recruiting co sponsors for the bill, getting a House Companion UM and then likely it would go through regular order, so it would be assigned to in the Senate Um Environment and Public Works Committee EPW gets the hearing gets voted out. Like I'm not gonna go through the whole Schoolhouse Rock process. But there are a lot of different steps. There are a lot of different stuffs, and there are different Sometimes the

steps aren't so straightforward. It's not as linear as Schoolhouse Rock makes it down. It could be included in a bigger package at the end of the year. It say, for example, in the fall, there's a broad wildlife package that comes together, Well, this could be part of it. So we've got a lot of different plays, and we keep watching to see kind of how things are trending

in which way we can go. UM. I will say that what we've been very careful about doing at this point is that we aren't asking our members to take action on things when there's not really an actionable item. And so in September earlier this year, we had a call to action for people to call their member of Congress and tell them they wanted in a North American Grasslands Conservation Act. That was wildly successful. UM. We had many members of the outstand and send it right us

back and say okay, we hear you. You know, how do we engage on this concept um And we haven't issued another call to action sense then, because we want to make sure that we are respectful um of our membership time and energy, and we don't want people making a call when there's not really a time to move

the needle. So if you, if our members are you know that our communications say you know, the time is now, pick up the phone, make a call, send an email, it's because the time really is now, and there might be more than one inflection point there probably will, but we're not going to ask people to pick up the phone or make a call and it's not really a

time to do so, and we won't do things. It's just you know, clip bait, like trying to scare people or entice people into doing something when you know, we as lobbyists and and government affairs experts like no, like

this isn't a real threat. But if it is a real threat, or if it is a real time to move, we're gonna let you know it is a just as a citizen, Bethanie, like just as a regular person, like take off your job hat and put on your just ham an American hat, and you care about wild places and wild animals, how do you go about vetting those things? Because you just described a situation I think a lot of people are in these days, which is we get

a million emails from all sorts of different groups. If if we're tapped into this world, we we hear about a thousand different threats in problems, and and many of them are real and true and concerning. But how do you individually sort through all this? How do you choose what to take action on and what is important versus what heck isn't important enough. I'm just curious, like, being a person who also works in this world, how have

you gone about trying to figure that out? Because I worry about you know, the issue fatigue and people kind of like the boy that cried Wolf effect happening, and eventually people just stop paying attention or we get so sick and tired of the bad news that we just turned to video game games are basketball games or whatever?

How do you deal with that? Yeah, well that's been a really important thing for us, is to make sure that our credibility right, like our credibility with our memberships, like we don't use scare tactics and we don't ask people to do things when they can't really move the needle. And that it really comes down to just like we have people in the ground, myself and my colleagues, UM and touring his colleagues and others in the conservation community

that are here. We are tracking this stuff in real time. We are having the conversations with Stash on Capitol Hill, like you're reading the tea leaves every single day, and then we kind of make an assessment like is this gonna move? Is this does this have real traction? I mean,

you see a lot of different things. It's not that these meetings or conversations aren't taking place, but you really kind of have to have just a gut instinct on like does this really have momentum too to happen or to inflict harm or change, And then you just have to use your professional assessment and say, okay, yeah, this is this is really a thing that's going to happen. We need our members to pick up the zone now.

And if we're like no this, you know, sure this bill was introduced, but it's really not going anywhere, and then we can make that a confident assessment. Then we don't ask our members to call to action like we don't. We don't use clickbait and be like be afraid now, Like we just don't think that's fair and it fatigues people, it really does. That was a good word. Um, So we're be've been very cautious as a group at a

coalition that's working towards this offer. It to make sure that we communicate authentically, um, and only when you know there's real progress or really something happening, so that we don't fatigue our members, and that we maintain our trust level with the people that are following us and and really want to help us and engage. Now, what about for just people like me just sitting here at home who get these emails and to hear these calls to action?

And you know, what's your recommendation for the average American author who's trying to just id Like, how do I make sense of all these different things coming down the line? Which ones do I take action on? When is it important to take action? I mean, should we try to tackle every single thing we hear about or do we

need to pick and choose? Like what's your if you have any advice for just the average person who's caring about these things and wants to help but sometimes feels overwhelmed or feels like I don't know how to make a difference. I can try them and hear too bad to me if if that's all right? But um, Mark, I think it comes down to finding an organization that

you just align with and that you trust. And so if you go to the coalition website to Act for Grassman dot org website, you'll see all of the groups that have formally endorsed this legislation. And one thing that's really cool to me is the broad range of groups on there. And so there are some names that absolutely makes sense, um or that folks listening to this podcast would know, and then there's some groups that they probably wouldn't and who aren't historically, um you know, in this

sort of hunting conservation space. We've all worked incredibly well together to get this back to where it is. But um you know some of the names, of course, we're on there in Pheasants, Quail Forever, back Country Hunters and Anglers have endorsed tr CP, ISAAC Walton League, National Wildlife Federation, and others. Those are just some that you know your listeners are probably familiar with it. I think it's finding an organization that that you align with and that you

you trust. And so our coalition, UM, this sort of has two meetings. We have a meeting that happens weekly, UM was sort of the policy folks that uh, you know, update each other on things that are going on in the hill and any movement and next steps and outreach

and all that sort of stuff. But then there's also a communications meeting where the communications staff from each of our organizations meet and sort of um strategize how we're talking about this and when it's necessary to take action and so UM every step that we make with this is deliberate and thought of aught out for those reasons is that we don't want to fatigue our members across the board and so uh, you're not going to hear from any one of our individual organizations until it's really

go time. And I can speak for the Deer Association, but Lindsay Thomas, who has been on your your show multiple times, Mark is uh, he runs a type communications ship here at the Deer Association, And so you are not going to see anything, UM, especially on the federal level or anything that goes out to our FO membership unless it's it's important and it's go time and so UM that's how it's just how we operate, and I think that's how a lot of the other organizations operate

to including Bethanese Group, is that we're very cognizant of UM the fatigue that's going on, or cognizant of not

cluttering in boxes. And so for listeners, you know, I get that you get this stuff coming in from a lot of different organizations, but I think it just comes down to finding that one organization that that you feel really good about, or finding the two or three that you feel really good about, uh, and that you trust them that when you're getting something from them that it's really important, that it's really time time to take action. And there is UM a place to take action on

the actor Graphs and dot org web website. When you get to the website, just click to take action tab and there is a populated form there. And while we're not actively pushing that right now, that form is there if you feel so desired to take action and to let your lawmakers know that you support this effort. Yeah, would you add anything to that bessiny. I think tour

and Summarize do very well. Um. And we are broadly and it's not just related to conservation, like so many different media blasts, and I mean we communicate all the time, all day. We're messaged on like every single thing that's going on in the world, and it's just built overwhelming. It's like, oh my gosh, Like what problem do I pick to get involved with? Like it's not just related to conservation, It's related to everything. And I think myself is just a citizen, Like I just don't even know

where to get worried sometimes. And I live and work in Washington, Um, but I am zeroed in on conservation policy. So like with my family calls you like what's going on with like healthcare, I'm like, I have no clue. I don't follow it, Like I'm zeroed in on a very specific niche um. And I think that's kind of what I would relay to members too, is like find your niche, like or the listeners, Like, you know, if it's grasslands policy, um, you know, follow your trusted organization

that really focuses on grasslands. If it's fisheries, you're probably gonna be looking at different organizations and news sources. But you know, I personally just kind of have to filter my areas of concern or of conservation concern um, because it is really broad. Yeah, uh so wrapping things is

up here. Then you've mentioned that, you know, there was a period a year, year and a half ago or whatever it was when we were kind of putting this coalition of supporters together that you had to get some action going. But the bill has not been introduced yet, and I know it's important not to push people to action until it's really go time. Uh. Where where do we stand, like how soon until go time? Bethany? And what should we be waiting for or what should we

be doing now? Um? If there is something we can do now, what what should the listeners be paying attention to or doing? Sure? Um? Well, you know, as I said earlier, there's many paths, um. I think the most likely is a Senate bill introduction sometime this spring. I can't give you or we can't give you an exact date because we don't know. Um. Probably again that all change, but my projection would be that you'll you'll hear from many of our POLISHIP members about a bill announcement sometime

in the spring. UM, that would be our goal, and then the next step would be recruitment, and that would be the active step I think UM for our members, it's like, okay, now we have a bill introduced, we're going to ask you to contact your senator and to join the bills in order, in other words, to become a co sponsor. I perceived those as the next step, UM touring you that you're what your crystal ball is

telling you to. Yeah, I think that's spot on. UM. We as best any said Senator Widen has really taken the lead on this and we're sort of waiting to see how it plays out with UM original co sponsors and sponsors to you know, get this introduced. But once that happened, it's go time. And so we will be asking folks to contact their senators UM to ask them to join the legislation and then move it through committee and ultimately to the Senate floor, and then from there

we'll will tackle the House. And we do have UM pretty good support in the House already too, and so that would likely be you know, a secondary effort UM. But right now we're really just focused on by getting it introduced in the Senate this spring and then making

headway in the Senate. So then in that case, it sounds like the most important thing that we as the listeners can do is just make sure that we're connected to a group like the National Deer Association or Pheasants Forever and making sure that we're on your news list so that when this happens, you will be able to tell us, Hey, it's been introduced. Now it's go time.

Am I right on? That is that the number one thing we should do right now is make sure everybody listening is signed up for one of your groups news lists so that we can get the call to action when the time's right. Yeah, that's the best. That's the best for us too. And so we put out our weekly newsletter and then on big items, um and like this one, when it is good time, we'll send a separate action or email to everybody that signed up. Perfect. Well,

that's easy, everyone listening. This is the easiest action I've ever asked for. Just sign up for a newsletter. This is great. Um. I appreciate you guys walking us through this. I appreciate you helping us kind of connect the dots between this this landscape back to the things that we love. UM, I'm glad to see that there's something coming down the pipeline that's going to help put more of this ground out there and keep it healthy and intact and able

to support wildlife populations. This is uh, this is good stuff. So uh, Bethany, do you have any closing thoughts? Are you? Are you good to go? Yeah? It's want to thanks thank you for inviting us on and sharing this concept with your listeners. And uh, I would ask for folks to just please uh stay tuned and and follow this effort as it moves and when we ask for your help, we very much appreciate if you'd pick up the phone and call your member of Congress excellent and torn any

last thoughts from you? No, I agreed, Thank you for the platform. Mark, You're always always willing to tackle sort of these big conservation issues that aren't always or at least outwardly don't always direct Um. It seemed to be directly tied to the hunting and the hunting strategy that you typically talk about. But it's important that we have these conversations and that its hunters and outdoor enthusiasts and conservationists that we are engaged, you know, in the back

end on on these policy initiatives. So I appreciate that. And the same thing, um, once you do get those auction items, whether that's from the NBA or Pheasants or from any of the other organizations, we really appreciate you taken action it. It does make a difference, um when you submit that form. And I know it's such an easy task and it seems so simple that it doesn't always seem like you actually make the difference, but it does perfect well, Uh, Torn Bethany, thank you as well.

I appreciate this is this has been interesting for me. I'm excited to see where this goes and uh hopefully we'll have some good news to discuss uh later this year, next year, or however long it takes. So so thank you for doing the good work. All right, that's it. Thank you for tuning in. I appreciate it. I think we now know, um, we now know our our action,

we know our our our orders. We know we gotta do we gotta stay tuned, we gotta keep our ears to the ground so that when this thing is ready to get out there, when this thing's hitting the pavement, we can make some noise about it. We can call our representatives, our senators, our congressmen and women. We can sign the petitions, we can leave the comments, we can send the emails. Whatever we gotta do to make sure that we can keep more grassland habitat out there, we

can do it. So appreciate you listening to this. I appreciate you all being a part of a community that makes a difference. We're not just hunters. Were advocates for these animals and for these places, and that is a powerful and pretty special thing. So I'm proud to be standing side by side with all of you and uh making sure that deer hunters give back just as much as we take. That's what it's all about. Friends, I'll

appreciate it. Have a great day, a great week, a great weekend, and until next time, stay wired to hunk M