The Hunting Stories Podcast
Elk. Bear. Hog. Turkey. Deer and More. Hunting Stories that will make you laugh or maybe cry; real life chronicles from the field.
The Hunting Stories Podcast
Ep 129 The Hunting Stories Podcast: Joel Pouliot
Join us for a riveting conversation with Joel Pouliot, a seasoned security professional whose journey from private contracting in the Middle East and Africa to the rugged wilderness of Canada offers a unique perspective on the great outdoors. Joel’s story is rooted in his family's deep connection to British Columbia's logging community and his early hunting adventures with his grandfather and uncle. Rediscovering his passion for nature, he offers a fresh look at the blend of tradition and technology, teasing an innovative AI project that promises to transform outdoor experiences.
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Howdy folks and welcome to the hunting stories podcast. I'm your host, michael, and we've got another great episode for you today. Today, we actually connect with Joel Poliat. Joel reached out to me basically saying he wanted to come on the podcast. He has some great stories and he's got a really cool app that he wanted to talk about as well. So we get into that a little bit at the end, but he's bringing AI to hunting, which is not something that I could have comprehended, but he's doing some really cool stuff. So, first off, joel, thank you very much for reaching out and coming on the podcast. I really do appreciate you A few listeners. Thank you guys for tuning in. Appreciate you guys as well. If you have a story, don't hesitate to reach out. I'd love to have you on the podcast. But yeah, that's that man, let's let's go ahead and kick this thing off and let joel tell you some of his stories. Thank you all right, joel. Welcome to hunting stories podcast. Brother, how are you? Thank you very much, michael.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me on brother. I'm stoked about this.
Speaker 1:I don't get to tell stories too much.
Speaker 2:Uh, I'm more of the reclusive type, that uh doesn't like people too much, so that's funny.
Speaker 1:So you are can Canadian. My wife is Canadian and she's the exact same way, buddy. So, uh, maybe, maybe that's something about being North of the border.
Speaker 2:Who knows? But?
Speaker 1:either way, I'm glad to have you here, joel, I'm glad you reached out. I love it when people reach out, cause I think my least favorite thing is scouring the internet for people. So thank you for for reaching out, and I'm super excited to hear your stories, man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love, I love hearing all the stories that everybody else has. You never get sick of the big buck stories, that's for sure. I'm going to come at it with a little bit different of approach. I have some very, very learned experiences that I wanted to share with some people and I think that sometimes, as hunters, as outdoors people, I think we kind of sometimes miss the basics and I think sometimes we kind of oversee things that we might've learned when we were younger, that it really trails on to when we're older and really helps our experience when we're on the outdoors.
Speaker 1:Gotcha man. Well, two things, two things First, we don't educate too much, all right. So keep that on the low end of actual education. We'll keep it towards the stories. But the other item which is really more important right now, joel, why don't we start by just letting you?
Speaker 2:introduce yourself. Who are the people actually going to hear some stories from today? Absolutely so. As we mentioned, my name is Joel Pouliot. I have been in the security industry for about 20 years now. I was a private security contractor overseas for about 10 years. I worked in the Middle East and Africa. Mainly Africa was basically my stomping ground. Then I got married, moved back to Canada I guess for a better choice of words had a kid and all that came to a full stop of my overseas adventures. So ended up Understandably, yep, and then ended up having, like I said, having a child sitting down. I got hired by a security company here in Canada and I've been the director for them and then now just a another director for another security firm here in Canada. So for the last, say, 12, 10, 10 to 12 years, that's what I've been doing, and then the 10 years prior to that overseas cool let me ask you something here, joel?
Speaker 1:uh, you obviously are a hunter. Hopefully we have some hunting. Yes, sir when did you start hunting?
Speaker 2:so when I was about, I would say I was about six or seven when I really got my my. So I come from, um, basically the kootenays up here in canada. It's a rural area, british columbia, and up there you're either in a logging family or you guys do something else, but it's usually either logging or mining.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I come from a long line of loggers, um, people who are out in the outdoors their entire lives and just kind of grew up around uh, not necessarily the hunting aspect of it, but definitely the outdoors aspect of it okay um, sadly, I moved to the coast, which is the brick city, and I lost a lot of that when I was about 10 years old I moved, uh, back to just see my family a little bit, and that's what my grandpa, grandfather and my uncle really got me involved a little bit more into hunting.
Speaker 2:So around 10 years old is when I really started getting into it. Um, then I did the transition back to the city again and lost it for quite a while until I was older. Um, when I was working overseas. You didn't have a choice. Uh, we were working in the rural areas of Africa, so I learned a lot of that. And then when I came back to BC and settled down, that's when I basically got back into hunting, um, as more of a like. Now it's time to really get in depth into it.
Speaker 1:Got it. Okay, man, that's cool, that's very cool. Well, if, unless there's anything else you want to share about who you are and kind of where you got to where you are today, let's dive into some stories. Joel, what do you think?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. So I kind of want to go back on to when I was younger and the whole grandfather and uncle situation, because I think that, um, there was a situation that really kind of opened my eyes to hunting um on on how it, how I actually perceive it. Um, you know, when you're younger, you, yeah, if you're, if you got family that loves the outdoors, they're going to give you a some sort of gun, the bb gun or 22 or yeah, something in along those lines, and say, go, go at the back 40 and have at her right. Yeah, something that won't knock you off your feet, but something yeah exactly.
Speaker 2:Um. So while I was there, we were living in an area population probably about, maybe less, maybe like 500 to a thousand tops, like it was. It was a small area, um, but everybody went outdoors, everybody was. They would. We'd go out there and shoot, shoot some targets, shoot some cans. That was kind of our thing. And my uh, my uncle at this time said, uh, hey, just go have at her, just obviously be careful with what you're doing. And um, by this time I'm pretty confident in using a firearm. Okay, so I've head outside and I'm shooting every branch I can find. And then this crow lands on one of the branches and I'm sitting there looking at it and I'm like I can shoot, that I could hit it. I could definitely hit it from here, yeah. So I line my sights up and I fucking send it. Sure as shit.
Speaker 2:The crow falls out of the tree like no tomorrow yeah so I come up this just a happier than a pig and shit. That I actually killed something showed my uncle, and the first thing he did to me was he turned around, he walked in the house, he came back with a frying pan oh, put it down on the ground, eat some crow yes, sir okay, okay he made me got that thing.
Speaker 1:He made me take every, every feather off there and we cooked it up that's amazing at this point I was trying to find a way to sneak in that saying you know, eat some crow, and there you go. You just winded it yourself. This is perfect, yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Now this part I'm a little bit vague on, but I'm pretty sure I ate it because that's one of my stronger memories of the situation. Yeah, but I remember we're cooking it up and he's telling me the story about listen, you want to go out, you want to shoot things, that's fine. But whatever you shoot, you kill. Whatever you kill, you eat that. But whatever you shoot, you kill, or whatever you kill, you eat. And, um, that's a great lesson.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a great lesson, especially how he taught it to you, I mean, and I'm sure he was chuckling inside You- probably at that point in your life did not know eating crow was an actual saying, but yeah, I bet he's told that to all his buddies and they love it yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I definitely feel that that was a learning lesson that he expressed to everybody afterwards that his nephew was an idiot. But yeah, so after that point I think I really kind of took well, I definitely did take another look at what I was out there to do. There's a difference between target practicing and obviously taking the life of an animal. There's a difference between target practicing and obviously taking the life of an animal. I'm not a religious man by any means, but I do feel that that was the start of my conservation journey, if that makes sense.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that makes total sense.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so, and then honestly I would say, probably a month later, if not that my grandpa took me out, ended up shooting a rabbit. Month later, if not that my grandpa took me out, ended up shooting a rabbit, I mean I couldn't have. I could have aimed better at its asshole and shot right up there. Then I swear it was an act of fate. But when I took that thing back, he it was ruptured inside and I spent hours. I think I was again I'm not sure if I was crying or not yeah, but I was like this is the most horrible thing I ever have to do. And again, like my grandpa, just like my uncle, no, you shoot it, you eat it. So let's clean it, let's do it properly, let's do all that stuff. And I remember that situation. We did eat it. We had rabbit stew. So I definitely remember that.
Speaker 1:That's funny. I have a rabbit stew story, so that's funny. That's funny, I have a rabbit stew story.
Speaker 2:So my buddy and I we were elk hunting.
Speaker 1:This is a quick one, but we were elk hunting and the blizzard rolls in it's rifle elk.
Speaker 1:So you can't see 30 feet, so you're really not going to have much luck elk hunting in a blizzard, but where we had hunted, we'd hunted there before we knew that there were a lot of snowshoe hares, which are these huge rabbits, right, just huge. And so I'm like, well, let's get a shotgun and just walk around and maybe we'll kick something up. We can follow the tracks. And so we're walking around I think I actually have a .22 with like shot pellets. And then my buddy has my 12-gauge. So we're walking around, I bump one, it runs towards him, he shoots it and it runs off and it's running away and he shoots it again right in the ass, but with a shotgun. So it's a little bit different. But, man, what I remember most is we carved that thing up. First it's red meat, which was unexpected but delicious. But he had pre-made a gumbo, so we warmed up the gumbo and then we threw that rabbit into that gumbo, which was so delicious, especially because we're camping, it's November.
Speaker 2:It's a blizzard.
Speaker 1:It was the perfect thing, except for the fact that I don't know how he did not get one pellet and while eating I probably got like 12.
Speaker 2:Oh no.
Speaker 1:We thought we cleaned it, but I just was like I got to go to the dentist. All I remember is just one of the best meals I've ever had, just completely ruined by constantly chewing on metal.
Speaker 2:It was awful. That's good, though. Gumbo and rabbit stew mixed together. Oh, that must have been amazing.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness, it was delicious. It was delicious. Sorry to interrupt. Okay, keep going, joel. No, that's all good.
Speaker 2:I love hearing those. You know, it's funny, sometimes the smaller prey, we tend to take it for granted, but uh, it's usually some some of the best delicacies. We have not the crow on that that hand, but uh, definitely rabbit, um, delicious, yeah. So so just basically like lesson learned I think I learned it at a young age. Just to you know again, whatever you're going after, you know, make sure that you have a a plan for it after, after you do what you're going to do, right, um, so, yeah, so that's that. Um. I have another one about, um, uh, kind of a nerve wracking trip. Uh, I'm a solo hunter.
Speaker 2:Um, I love going up the mountain by myself. Um, I usually tend to go pretty far away from everybody in anything.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Now let me ask is that how you've always done it? It's just like you just go out and do it, or is it because you couldn't find people to go with? Or like, where did you get to the point that you're like this is I'm a solo hunter. I don't like people.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, back to that. Okay, that makes sense. No, no, no. So let me, let me. Let me actually explain the situation a little better. So, um, basically what it is is um, um, I guess for myself, um, I've been around kind of some very bad situations um, overseas and I think that, um, I kind of use going up to the mountain is kind of my, my safe space and my, my deep decompressing, and just I'm I'm able to not answer to anybody. I don't have to make a plan with anybody, I don't have to, I just can. And it's not to say that I don't like going with people, cause that's that's not's not true. But for the most part, when I'm up there, it's just kind of my time, it's it's my self-reflection time understandable man.
Speaker 2:It's uh, some people's church, right, you say you're not religious, but there you are, that's 100 yeah, no, I agree, 100 um, and I think that that's kind of where I go when, um, when I'm at the mountain, I mean honestly to me, um, besides obviously being with my kids and my family, that I do honestly really love going up with and having that, having that family time with, yeah, um, for me, the sound of just wind when you're at the top of the mountain is just there's nothing better like just this, the calmness of the world. Like you're not hearing. You're not hearing screeching of tires, you're not hearing. You're not hearing, you're not hearing screeching of tires, you're not hearing, you're not hearing people yelling and screaming, you're not seeing. Like, and again, I work in the security industry and I'm a director, so there's a lot of stuff that we deal with every day that's just the average person just doesn't deal with and doesn't need to deal with but it gives me that time to kind of fuck off and just be by myself.
Speaker 2:Um, couldn't put it better, yeah, so, um. So, as I, as I usually go out, um, I do obviously have my, my backup plans. I let everybody know where I am, I give them a general idea, idea of where I, where I'll be hunting from. I'll send a map or something to my wife and all, like a couple friends or something, just so that they're aware. But during this one time I went up by myself, drove the truck up as far as I could up a cut block, parked it and just got out and started hiking. And so it was kind of this ravine area. There was a small, I guess creek or river kind of going through it, and on the side there was this it was basically these pine trees, but it's kind of that ground area where there's not really much vegetation on it, and then the start of the pine is maybe four feet high and then the trees are maybe, I don know, 15, 20 feet, but it's new growth, I guess for that better choice of words after they've gone in and done a cut block, and then they go in and they regrow all the, all the trees. So I'm going through and I'm following this. Uh, couple tracks, a couple, uh, what what I determined was would be a mule deer and I'm about 30-45 minutes in and the tracks. There was two sets of tracks. One started veering to the right and it looked like the hooves were getting or the the tracks were getting closer together. So I was determining that it was either maybe sorry, farther apart. So I was determined it was probably just it was running off, something had scared it. And then the other one was just go, kick, cutting straight. So I started following the one that was going straight and then all of a sudden, within those tracks, there was a predator track that was right beside it and I'm thinking, okay, like I've dealt with wolves, I've dealt with cougars, not really that big of a surprise to me. I I really don't care too much. Just obviously now my senses are a little heightened, because when something is going after its prey, I don't really want to be going after it, for better choice of words. Yeah, so I start following this track and I'm like I'll give it another 5, 10 more feet or meters, and started going a little bit closer. And then two more predator tracks kind of kick in and I'm like, okay, so these are now wolf tracks.
Speaker 2:I very clearly determined these are wolf tracks and I stopped and I just looked around and I'm like, okay, I can't see anything because, again you can, they're four feet, there's nothing you can really see. Or you could see, basically I can't see anything because, again you can, there are four feet, there's nothing you can really see, or there, you could see, basically I don't know, 30, 40 yards in front of you. So basically I felt safe. And then I started hearing about to my left. I started hearing rustling way up past where I could see, and I thought, thought, okay, they might have got the one, that was that, they that veered off. So I wasn't concerned. So I went another about 30, 40 meters and this is where the tree line met the um, that that brush, that those, that new growth that I was at. And at that point I looked down and I saw fresh, fresh scat and it was definitely wolf scat and I thought to myself okay, now I'm getting a little too close, now it's time to back off.
Speaker 2:So I turn around and I start walking a little bit further back, obviously checking my six every time, every few seconds, yeah. But now I can hear them moving a lot more in the tree line, and they're not moving as if they were got a kill. They weren't, they weren't making any noise, but I could hear rustling back and forth at a very high speed, okay, and I was like okay, now it's time to pick up this pace a little bit. So I, so I start kind of moving a little bit faster. And then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw one wolf come out of the tree line to my left and one to the right, and at this point I've always been told granted, I see two of them, but I've always been told if you ever see one, that's when it's the worst time, because you don't know where the rest of them are.
Speaker 2:And up here in Canada, same as you guys down in the States. But wolves can be extremely unpredictable. You could run into a pack of them and they could fuck off or they could just be there to hunt you.
Speaker 2:It's just. It's just that black or white situation, it's. There's never a happy medium. So I, uh, I, I, I had, I had one round that was chambered um, and then I had two more that was in the cartridge and I started going a little bit further, a little bit faster, but this time because I felt comfortable that I could walk backwards through the through the area, because there again there was there's very little vegetation, it was basically just gravel. I turned around and I was watching both of them. They were just, they were staring at me like I was their next meal, like just didn't give a shit that I was there, but either mad that I was there, or they were looking at me like I was their next target.
Speaker 2:So I'm thinking to myself okay, what do I do? Do I do I do I shoot one of them to kind of show that there's a presence here, or do I just shoot around just in their direction? What is my next move? To kind of get myself out of this situation? Because I can see two but I can hear more. So my thought was okay, if I kill one and this is probably hindsight it was probably stupid. But if I kill one, is that really a reason to kill a wolf for no reason? Now also, I also there's times where you think, okay, we also hunt predators for a reason, and in certain areas that we're going to hunt the predators, they're going to be for wildlife management. Obviously they're either taking up too much of our herds of elk or whatever it may be, because here in canada we do have pretty large wolf packs that end up doing that. So I mean predator management. I'm totally all for if it's done for the right reasons and obviously to protect yourself.
Speaker 2:So, uh, the one that was chambered, I ended up pointing it towards the wolf on the left. I took a shot and it jumped back into the tree line and it just stayed right there and it just stared at me as if the shot didn't mean anything to it. It just kind of startled them. That was about it. Okay, that's interesting. So, yeah, so I so at this point I'm getting a little sweaty, I'm getting a little nervous. They're, they're, they're getting fairly close. I start moving back and back as far as I could. There was three more that I could see in the tree line just kind of moving back and forth, um, and then I kind of just said, fuck this. And I I started kind of putting some feet to some, put some feet to some dirt right you you.
Speaker 1:You decided a lot later than I would have to go fuck this well, yeah and see, you know why I think I did that.
Speaker 2:I think I did that because I felt in the moment that they were doing the same thing I was doing and that was curiosity.
Speaker 2:I didn't think that they were, and the end of my story is they didn't actually do anything further than what they did. But I think that my curiosity for them was the same as what they were for me, because I was thinking that if, when I was up to that tree line, they had all the ample amount of time they wanted to strike me down right there. I was three feet from the tree line. There may have been six or seven in there why didn't they do it then? Why did they wait to to when I was kind of at full tilt to kind of come out of the bush and kind of check around and stuff like that to me seems more curiosity. I mean, granted, they didn't look too happy that I was there, but, on a brighter note, I don't think that, uh, their intentions, I guess and call me stupid, I guess I just felt differently about the situation, which, as a hunter, you shouldn't do that Obviously, you should do what you're trained to do or what you know is right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. But there's also a sense of like being in the moment. You know and like, and feeling your gut and knowing what is right, what is wrong. I believe your gut knows what's supposed to happen, so I understand that.
Speaker 2:Right, right. And I felt that in that situation that if I was in harm, I felt that I knew how to probably get out of that situation. But at the same time, I think I was just as curious as they were, like I really wanted to see, um, I wanted to see what the hell they were doing out there. To be honest, like that's kind of what was going through my head, like did you get? Like, did you get the deer that I was supposed to be getting? What did you get that I'm not getting out of this. So I got back to the truck and didn't see them. I mean, we're talking now, we're talking 50, 60, 70 yards away.
Speaker 2:But at that point I just kind of sat down, I breathed it out. I was like I probably could have done this differently, but all in all, my heart was going about a million miles an hour. Just, basically nothing happened. But I think my premonition of what could have happened hit me when I was in the truck, not when I was out there, but it was like when I was relaxing, that's when it was like shit, like that was not smart about the situation that I put myself in. So, but, but I think, uh, I think, going back to it when I was, when I was first noticing the tracks of the predator and, like I said, my story my brain was going okay, they're after the same thing I am. This is where I should probably stop my hunt and turn around and go back, but curiosity got the best of me, so luckily it turned out Okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah, man, man, okay, yeah me. So luckily it turned out okay. Yeah, man, man, okay. Yeah, I'm glad that worked out and it's, it's, uh, it's a kind of eye-opening. I love hearing wolf stories. So I'm in colorado and we just had wolves reintroduced, so, um, yeah, and I, I hunt in an area specifically where they are. Um, there's signs all over the place that say if you voted for wolves, turn. You are not welcome to recreate here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, all over that area and, man, it's interesting. I don't know how I feel about when I will eventually have a wolf encounter. I'm sure I will at some point, especially if I keep going up there and they keep breeding. And they were actually there before the reintroduction. They were coming south from Wyoming so they just added to them. But yeah, man, those stories are so interesting, wolves are such interesting critters, man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's funny because, like I said, I've been around cougars or, I guess, mountain lions, and I've been around wolves. I've been around lots of bears, a lot of bears, but wolves are always the ones that give me the creeps, and so a little bit part of my background. I also did canine handling for security. So I had dogs, quite a few dogs, and we used them for protection and narcotics and explosive detection. So when it comes to training dogs, I totally get it. I get the mentality of a canine. I understand what I guess what, what they're going through.
Speaker 2:I can see signs of, uh, what is aggressive nature, especially in wolves too. It's kind of it's very similar. But I noticed that, um, like when it comes to in the wild and I I mean I've heard it said best you know, you see one of them, but you don't know where the rest of them are yeah, and it's always that case Like, unless you're, unless you're dealing with a feral one or one that's been kicked out of the pack, they're not something to screw around with. Cougars. Cougars are more scared of you than anything else. They'll, they'll, they'll fuck off faster than anything. Unless they have a cub or a baby, then that's going to be a very different outcome. But I mean, they're going to probably false charge you before they actually really do anything same with bears, but when it comes to wolves, I just feel it's a different nature, that's all yeah, interesting, man interesting yeah well, I don't have that kind of experience.
Speaker 1:It has me like, like I said, very interested but also terrified. So, uh, thank you for sharing the story man Cause. Uh, I'm just. I don't know how I feel about when I'm. I know I eventually will have that experience. That's just the way Colorado is going, so um.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think you guys got a lot of our wolves, didn't you? When they reintroduce them, didn't they come up from can, then they come down for canada originally they came from oregon.
Speaker 1:I know that, and uh but but I'm sure they came from different areas, and the ones from oregon were like literally a pack of wolves that kept killing cattle. And so oregon's like, yeah, go ahead and take them, and then we get them here, and now they've been killing cattle and it's like what do you think is gonna happen? Um, and so they've. They say that they're moving them, but they won't tell anyone where to. So who knows what's going on there?
Speaker 1:I do know that there's been a couple, um, like native native american groups that have wolves that originally were like yeah, we'll give you those wolves. And then the native american populations of colorado were like, hey, can you guys please respect us and not send those to colorado? It's a I don't know, for lack of a better term. It's a shit show. Who knows.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:Just got to deal with. It is what I'm guessing. I mean, like I said, they're coming south from Wyoming anyways. So we had wolves before the reintroduction.
Speaker 2:Now we just have a bunch more, and I think they're going to add a bunch more in a couple months. Yeah, have a bunch more. And I think they're gonna add a bunch more in a couple months.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you guys got cougars down there on mountain lines right yep, yep and in fact, they just try to vote the uh this last election, they try to stop us from being able to hunt them, which was voted down by the public, which was a surprise. Yeah, uh, the wolves passed by one percent, like less than one percent the cougars being able to hunt them. It was shot down by like there was like a 12 point gap. So pretty, pretty awesome that, uh, people realized, okay, wait a minute, maybe we shouldn't vote on wildlife, we should. We should let the biologists take care of that stuff. So right, yeah, that's not why we're here, joel. I don't like talking politics. I hate that stuff. It's not thanksgiving dinner with my family. What other stories do you got man? Yeah, I got a I got another one.
Speaker 2:Uh, so about two years ago. Yeah, give or take. Two years ago, um, again, do another solo hunt. Um, went up north, probably a little farther than I usually go. Uh, my dumb ass didn't check the weather prior to me going out and as I'm up there.
Speaker 2:I spent the whole day tracking, trying to look for something, didn't find much and uh, thought you know what, instead of traveling back because I think it was about a three-hour drive home, uh, from where I was I thought, you know, I'll just, I'll stay the night up here and I'll just go go check in tomorrow. So pulled off to the side of the uh of the road and, you know, just packed the truck down and got a little sleeping bag and had a good night's sleep and at about three o'clock in the morning I wake up and it's just absolutely freezing, absolutely freezing, yeah. And I'm like that's weird. And so I turn on the truck, I turn on the lights. It must have snowed a damn near a foot, so like six inches, and I'm like, okay, well, this is going to be a little bit interesting to get out. So it's about three in the morning.
Speaker 2:I'm thinking I can try to get out and I thought of one or two things. One either I stay there for a little bit longer and hopefully it calms down, because I did end up checking the weather and it said that it was going to calm down and that the snow should light up and by noon it's going to be sunny, but, as I know, when you're up in the mountains the weather can change on a dime. So I started driving out and got massively stuck. Um could not get my truck out and we're in a logging road that's up in the middle of nowhere.
Speaker 1:Nobody was coming up there, and were you solo hunting or did you have someone with you? I'm sorry I was solo again yeah, oh, getting stuck solo would be so bad we got stuck this last year, when there's four of us, and it was miserable. I can't even imagine solo. Sorry, go ahead yeah.
Speaker 2:No, no, and I and I get it, and I get it. And so, um, luckily, I had some chains. I put them on, didn't do fuck all. Um, it was. I was in a situation where these logging roads were so, so ice down and the, the, the snow was literally worse than I've seen in a long time. It was heavy, heavy, uh, just wet, damp, thick snow. It wasn't like the, the fluffy, powdery stuff that you see on the movies, like it was like the, the shitty 40 minus 40 degree weather snow that we get up here in canada. Um, gosh. And so so I I had enough food. I wasn't so worried about the food situation. If I had to, I had my gun. So I was going to be doing some winter hunting, I guess.
Speaker 2:So I start pulling out a little bit more and I start rocking the truck and trying to get it out by myself and putting some 2x4s under and trying to get some traction. And so, again, it was 3 o'clock in the morning when I started. It was about six or seven in the morning when I finally got the truck to the next set of the fsr, where I thought that I was going downhill. So I figured most of the? Um, most of the weight would just kind of push me down the hill, even if I was going slow as hell, um, so I got there and sure as shit, that didn't work.
Speaker 2:I ended up putting the truck next to a tree and then getting out and thinking about my situation all over again. So at this point I still, unfortunately, don't have cell service, I don't have anything, and my thought process was I'm going to wait a little bit till the snow lightens up, um, and then I'm gonna reassess and then try to get the truck out. Um, and I was actually kind of just exhausted, dehydrated, so I had a little bit to drink, I had some to eat just to kind of build up my energy okay and then I started saying thinking, well, I'm not gonna freeze out here, so if I'm gonna freeze, I'm to freeze on the way down the hill.
Speaker 2:So I packed some stuff, started walking down the hill and, luckily luckily I mean this is where you can believe in God Because luckily there was actually a forestry vehicle that was coming up just as I was walking down, and I always flagged him down he uh came up and he started talking to me. He's like what are you doing here? This is the word. He's like we all knew this is gonna be the worst winner that we've had in like five years or something like that. And you know you get that. You put your head down and you just like accept the shame. And so that's what I did. And uh, he said, well, let's go take a look at your truck. And uh, we got some. Uh, they had some sleds coming up after him to check on some trails. Uh, they were actually looking at some of their trail cams for some elk that they were. Uh, they were looking to tag. So, like it couldn't have been any better luck on my side. And so they came, came up, they looked at the truck they're just shaking their heads, they're laughing and pointed at me and all that good stuff which rightfully deserved. I deserve that because I should have known better. A hundred percent, yeah. And so, yeah, luckily enough the weather did start panning out. They ended up tying my truck up to one of theirs and winching it out, just enough to get me kind of moved around the tree. And, surprisingly, no damage to the truck, I think.
Speaker 2:When I slid I kind of been banked it in the snow next to the tree, so it was just, it was just stuck stuck. There was not really much, any body damage. So I get it out and then they kind of coax me down. I feel like a child at this point because they're like right behind me or and in front of me and they're just kind of making sure that I get off the mountain. So we get to the bottom of the hill or the mountain and uh, and I said, well, I guess I owe you guys something. So I said, should I go pick you up some beer or a bottle of vodka or something? And uh, and they're like no, no, no, they're like just as long, as long as you're safe. And one of the guys is like how about, don't be stupid next time I was like yeah, it's a reasonable, yeah, I deserve that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, 100 percent. Uh, yeah, no, I, I won't be how about that? Yeah and then uh, yeah, and then I just got in my truck, I drove, the roads were just horrid on the highway. Getting back it was, it was a slow grind getting back, um, and then uh, and then yeah, just uh. I guess the learning lesson. I mean not much out of the story, but, um, definitely next time. Uh, I'll check the weather yeah, man, gosh, uh, gosh.
Speaker 1:This year we had such a bad experience driving. It wasn't weather-related specifically, but it had snowed, it had melted, it had iced, it had snowed again, so it didn't look as bad as it was. And you're giving me flashbacks and it's making me upset Joel because it was just such an awful experience.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because it was just such an awful experience. Yeah, the only thing I'll say that came out of it is like one of my buddies he did shut down and just like quit, like we were going down this road and like we have to go forward to at least turn around, to go back, right, yeah, and like he shut down at one point, just stopped moving, stopped going anywhere. Yeah, he's like nope. And so we had to walk the road for a while. But the one positive I will say is like it took us probably four to six hours I'm not sure exactly to get like, get unstuck and turn around and get out of the woods. We all stayed pretty positive. We had a good time making fun of each other, basically building a road out of rocks, because we didn't have chains, we didn't have law or we didn't have you said you had boards, we didn't have any of that stuff.
Speaker 2:So it took us a long long time but we stayed positive and I think we're still friends. We should probably reconnect. Yeah, that's, that's always the case. Yeah, you know, it's just um, it's a little nerve-wracking when, when you're, when you're solo and you just uh, you have no other options other than to for better choice of words?
Speaker 2:figure your shit out, and you just don't. It's it options other than to for better choice of words? Figure your shit out, and you just don't. It's not an option, it's this is you need to take a moment, think about what you're going to do and then just act and just figure out how you're going to solve this problem. So my plan, if they didn't come up the hill, was I was walking, that I mean, it was probably only 16 17k down down the mountain, but 16 17k in a foot of snow and walking at probably two kilometers an hour with some gear on your back is it's gonna take you some time. So, yeah, um, so, yeah, so, but at that same time, I think that, uh, just being smarter next time, when, when I'm out there and just checking, doing something simple is checking the weather could have saved my ass, but you know it is what it is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the best lessons are self-taught, joel, that's all there is to it you got to make mistakes to uh, to have all that extra fun that was in that story. So yeah, yeah. So those are my three stories that I want to share with you today.
Speaker 1:That's awesome, man. Okay cool, okay cool. Well then, let's talk. I want to talk about your, your app. Tell me a little bit about this man, cause it looks super interesting, and I've recently dove into AI for like everything, yeah, and so I'd love to hear how you guys are using it. So let's, let's do that real quick, absolutely.
Speaker 2:I Absolutely. I'll give you a story on how I thought of it. Perfect. So we had some property up north, we had a trailer up there and every morning and every night I would do my little hike or jog up to this gate four or five times just to get my energy out or do my little workout before bed or in the morning, and I stumbled on some tracks. They were just obviously deer tracks. And then there was some smaller predator tracks coyote or something and I started taking pictures of them. And then I went on to Google and a few of the other ones and I was trying to get the AI on there to determine what they were. And I remember the first predator track.
Speaker 2:It's like this is a lion. I'm like a lion. How the fuck do you get a lion out of that? I'm like I'm getting frustrated with those tracks. I'm like forget it. There's nothing that I can really find that's going to tell me exactly what it is. I don't want guessing, I want absolutes. That's the reason I'm asking it.
Speaker 2:Then I'm going up a little bit further and I find some mushrooms and I take some pictures of those and I find an app that's like oh, you can determine what mushroom it is. So I open the app up and it's like $49.99 a month. I'm like, nope, not happening. So, remember, this is Canadian, so for you Americans that's like $10. So I'm checking out this app and I'm like I'm like, okay, cool, it told me what the mushroom was. And then I find some vegetation. I found like a flower or something and I'm like, okay, well, I'll check this out. Well, I can't use that app because that app's just for fungi. So I gotta find another app for vegetation. So I found another one for that uh, people that like love doing, like love planting and gardening and stuff and so I download that one, do the same thing and I'm like, okay, why isn't there one app that just tells me if I take a picture of something, I want to know what it is.
Speaker 2:that's it yeah, yeah so, um, so I'm getting frustrated at this point. I'm like you know what I'm gonna make one. So I go back to the trailer, I sit down, I open up my laptop and I just start building. Like I know enough code that I could kind of fumble my way through what I was looking for, like trying to do Okay, and then so I start building this app and then I realized that I'm just not confident enough to do what I wanted to do. So, anyway, I reached out to a bunch of people and I said, hey, this is my idea. What do you guys think? I want to incorporate some AI into like an outdoors app with kind of these mapping features and everything else. And everyone was fully on board and we just started building it and then, about a month and a half ago, we released it.
Speaker 2:And so, in a nutshell, what it does is we've dumped a ton, a ridiculous amount of information in the back end of the machine learning. This is every single hunting and outdoors regulations and synopsis from Canada, the United States, new Zealand, australia, england. All that's in the back end. We have hunting manuals, we have tracks, we have vegetation. It's just ridiculous how much stuff we have in the machine learning portion of it, and what you do is basically for the app itself, wherever your location is based. It's going to take that first and then it's going to take the data or the question that you're asking. So if you're taking a picture of a track somewhere in Colorado, well, there's no elephants in Colorado, so you're probably not going to get an elephant as a reply, but it's going to give you exactly what it is apply, uh, but it's going to give you exactly what it is, so a white-tailed deer, or you're going to have some type of predator, or if you're going like uh.
Speaker 2:Last week we had one of the hunters send us a photo. Um, he was going, um, uh, he was going hunting for duck and uh found some tracks, took a picture of it and it came back that it was wild turkey, not ducks, and you can tell the difference between wild turkey and ducks. But it's just to show how our machine learning works and how it determines different types of bird species as well. So, um, and then we've had people take pictures of their, of uh tree lines and say that I'd like to set up my uh tree stand here. Is there any safety hazards? That you would see and it would pop. And we had one last week. Again it popped out and said that the trees don't look healthy and that you should probably check the trees before you go and check them. And sure as shit, the guy went up to it, tapped on one of the trees and it was hollow as hell.
Speaker 2:So no way huh, yes, so we're we're working on making it more as an outdoor app, as as it should be, because we want to have the, the information for the adventure, to be able to understand what's, uh, what. Their environment is 100%, and we can go on to like all the things I even talked about. If I was to put those into our app, it would generalize what, um what we should be doing, um, in the outdoors outdoors, as opposed to what we sometimes think we should do. Um, so, uh, especially when it comes to health and safety and just making sure that, um, our hunters are are safe at the end of the day, um, so, and then we just have the other portion, yeah, and then the other portion is just the mapping features so you can pinpoint your waypoint markers and stuff like that, just like you can on other apps.
Speaker 2:But we have tons of features coming up that are AI driven. I can't go into too many of them.
Speaker 1:Understandable.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but there's a lot. So we wanted to give an all-around tool for a question and answers, not a. If you're looking on Google, you're spending 10 times the amount of time just searching for going through 40 or 50 different pages to find what answer, or Facebook forums or whatever it may be. Whereas you ask it a question, it'll uh take the data that's closest to you. So if you're asking about any hunting regulations, uh, it will scour your hunting regs and give you the answer in real time.
Speaker 1:That's super helpful. Okay, that's awesome. Um, okay, you haven't mentioned the name yet let's give the name is dryads uh, you can download it at wwwdryadsapp.
Speaker 2:That's uh d-r-a-y-d-s dryads and, um, yeah, it's uh. It's definitely a tool that I'm happy to promote, because uh I feel very strong about the fact that there's been situations where I again, either I wanted to know something immediate and I didn't want all the fluff, and then I hate using regulation manuals. I think sometimes you got to be a rocket scientist just to figure out half the stuff, or you get sent from page to page to find what the answer is.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know how many times I've.
Speaker 1:I download the regs always onto my phone like a pdf version and I'm always doing like the find feature to try and figure out something and turns out that, like the sage grouse has a two-day long season and then, oh damn it, I'm not here for those two days, and whatever it may be. So that's, that's awesome, that it does all that different stuff, yeah yeah, like I said, I've fallen into an AI rabbit hole recently, so it's super cool that you reached out to me right when I started doing all of this stuff.
Speaker 2:And it's super interesting to hear the feedback, too, from people who may not use AI, or the ones that have never used it and don't want to use it oh interesting, ones that have never used it and don't want to use it, oh interesting. So yeah, because, like you know, again, it's a tool to use. Whether you use it or not, it's up to you.
Speaker 2:Um, but, like for myself, if my grandfather knew I did this, he'd probably be rolling around his grave like I can see that some of them old school guys yeah yeah right, like, like, they're like, they didn't even use a map, like, and for them, I mean I remember showing some, some of the older ones, uh, technology based apps and they're just like, nope, would never use this. This is not me and I get it, I get it, I totally do. Um, it's all preference. Um, we're just giving you the information and what the, what the hunter or the person hiking or camping does with it, that's completely up to them.
Speaker 1:That's cool man, that's very cool. Um, and then you also tell me uh, I'll let you speak to it, I guess, but you sent a code for me to share.
Speaker 2:Yes, sir, Uh, so uh, the code for you guys I sent is a one month free. Give her all. You can Please try to break it, because that's how we know how to fix things better. But yeah, your code is I believe it's hunting stories. I'm sure it'll be in the show notes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'll put it there. I don't know what it is, I'm not looking at it right now, but I'll figure that out and make sure that the actual code is correct so that people can go check out this app, man, cause it sounds awesome. I want to like go around my backyard and start identifying stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. And you can even take pictures of your pantry or your fridge and say hey, I'm going camping this weekend, weekend. Uh, give me a list of what's in my fridge or my pantry that I can take with me and it'll pop you out a list.
Speaker 2:Yep, um, or you can do. Uh. Actually there's another good one. That I did this summer was uh, me and my wife we picked all the vegetables from our garden and I took a picture of all the vegetables on the on the table and I said make me a salsa recipe. And it pitched out a salsa recipe with all the vegetables that I had there.
Speaker 1:That's so cool. I'm going to take pictures of my pantry all the time. What should I have for dinner? And it's going to give me something. Yeah, exactly that's. My biggest struggle of the day is what am I going to make today?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it can help you with that too, and it's pretty interesting, on the data sets that we're putting in there, to be able to do those type of information grabs.
Speaker 1:Huh of sets that we're putting in there to to be able to do those type of uh, information grabs, huh, man, that's so cool. All right, joel, anything else you want to share?
Speaker 2:um, some social stuff like that, or yeah, if you want, uh, you can check me out on ruck up media. That's pretty much what. Uh, that's the company that's backing um dryads. That's my social medias. We have, uh, 110 000 on t on TikTok, and then 25 on Instagram and 25 on Facebook. So, yeah, we're there. I love to just make videos and make people laugh. So if you don't like my nature, well, fuck you.
Speaker 1:That's a good attitude.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you can't ban somebody who already banned, so, um, but no, I I love it and thank you very much for having me on, michael. This is, this is awesome. I'm happy to share those stories, um, and they're just, it's just fun. It's fun listening to the rest of your guests, um, because it's just it's interesting to hear so many people's variation of what they would do in in the situation. Like, we all have hunting stories, and but listening to your guests is what I find better than just listening to somebody or a two hosts just talk about stories all day long.
Speaker 1:Like I love hearing it from other people. I'm with you. That's what I wanted. I didn't want to hear why this guy thinks you should do this when this scenario happens in the woods, because I don't care about that. But a great hunting story. You're going to learn something from it and hopefully you're going to be entertained too. Oh, absolutely. I think what we're doing here is working and hopefully all the people listening do as well. But, joel man, you're doing awesome. I appreciate that, brother. Um, this was fun, man, and and we'll definitely have you back on. I want to have you back in a year, just hear how the app is going, but I'm sure you'll have more hunting stories for us then too.
Speaker 2:Man will do, sir will do. Thank you very much for having me on and thank you to all your uh, your listeners and followers. Much appreciated and uh have a great day. Guys, stay safe out there.
Speaker 1:You too, joel, you too, all right guys. That's it. Another couple stories in the books. Again, I want to thank Joel for coming on the podcast and being brave enough to kind of open the door for us to connect. So thank you, joel. I really do appreciate it To listeners. Again, thank you guys for tuning in. Please check out the app. I got a link to everything in the show notes. The code is also in there and, if you need to know I did look it up it is Hunting Stories. Again, the code will be there, as well as the link to go check out everything you need to check out this badass app. So thank you, guys again for tuning in. Again, if you have a great story or if someone you know has a great story, please connect them with me. Beyond that, guys, whatever you're listening to, please give us a five-star review and a follow. Now get out there and make some stories of your own. Thank you.
