EP: 462 | The 16-Gauge

On this episode we’re joined by Rafe Nielsen of Browning to learn about the mysterious 16-gauge. It’s a great sized shotgun and many people swear by them but the 16 didn’t stay popular for many reasons. Why didn’t it take off? Is it still used much today? What sub-gauges are hunters currently choosing? We also learned some facts about Browning and also got some tips for introducing kids. It’s a fun show.

Listen, Learn and Enjoy. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

I'm Jeff Foxworthy, and welcome to Gamekeeper Podcast. If you want to learn more about farming for wildlife and habitat management, everybody you are in the right place. Join the Gamekeeper crew direct from Office Yoke Land Enhancement Studios as they discuss the latest wildlife and habitat management practices, news, and of course money. There's no telling what you'll learn, but I'm gonna tell you, I bet it's interesting. Enjoy.

SPEAKER_08 0:25

We're live in three, two, one.

SPEAKER_07 0:28

All right, guys. You know what? We're gonna talk shotguns today. In all my life, the 16 gauge has just been, I don't know, it's just been a it's kind of had a little special place. I had a 16 gauge when I was really young.

SPEAKER_03 0:41

Yeah, everybody talked about the sweet 16 that's the one. Who had one? Did you have one? I didn't know you had one. My dad actually had one too. Still never got it. Those purple shells. Yeah, the purple shells. We still got some of those purple shelves.

SPEAKER_07 0:55

Yeah. Well, so uh let me just go around the table. So Toxie's running a little bit late. Lanny, thanks for being here. Welcome, Bobby. Dudley's always here. Not always, yeah. Most times. We've got on the couch, but we got him up from uh, I guess you were underneath the John Deere a few minutes ago. And we because you're a gun nut, we ask you to sit in on this one. We got Clay Davis. Mr.

SPEAKER_03 1:16

Clay Davis, dude.

SPEAKER_07 1:16

Yeah, he gets the kazoos. That's right. But then the real special guest, we've got Laney, remember this guy? I I remember this guy. We've got Mr. Rafe Nielsen. No doubt about it. All the way from out there in in Utah with Browning. He's he's been there. Rafe, how long have you been there?

SPEAKER_09 1:35

Um, I think this week I celebrate my 23rd year here.

SPEAKER_03 1:40

Awesome. Yeah, I think you're liable to make it. What a great brand, a great place, great people. Uh been a one of our, you know, long, long-term partners. So yeah. Proud to have Rafe.

SPEAKER_07 1:51

We've we you know we've uh when you think about Browning, it it's just it's it's kind of that brand, you know, that is that butt mark. Yeah, that butt mark. Yeah, but there's so much more to them. Rafe, your job out there, you're marketing and communications, right?

SPEAKER_09 2:08

That's right. We we handle uh out here in our little our department, we have everything it's marketing advertising related. So if it's an external visual that you see of our brand, it's coming from from our department in here. So yeah, it's we got a lot. That's a big job. It's a big job. It is.

SPEAKER_07 2:23

Yeah did you did you help back years ago when you first started, did you help modify that buckmark? Because it's been through some modifications, hasn't it?

SPEAKER_09 2:32

It uh not not entirely. So the buckmark was designed by an internal uh that's a whole other story. Like you'll give me go down and wild the whole time talking about buckmark stuff, but um it was designed in 1978. Yes, 1978, uh, by an internal designer. Um and it had one minor modification the very first year, but after that it's been pretty, pretty standardized um from there on out. We play with different ways of of using the word browning um off the side or underneath it and those kinds of things from stylization. But uh the buck mark itself is uh is it's been the same for well, we're we're pushing 50 years on it now.

SPEAKER_07 3:14

So, Rafe, if you'll slide to the side so we can see that just a little bit. Uh yeah, there you go. Right there. There it is. Am I correct in saying, and I might be the only one that's ever noticed this, but there's a dough inside the buck. Is that just my eyes or is that designed that way?

SPEAKER_09 3:31

Yep. No, it would it is there, and we've we've kind of made a bigger deal of it over the last few years. We've done a buck doe logo combination, but when the guy designed it, um it was uh an unintentional uh thing that he did and didn't realize it until afterwards. So it's kind of been one of those fun things for us to for him to discover and for us to discover going forward with it. Is it wasn't it wasn't part of the design, but it's definitely there.

SPEAKER_07 3:58

Yeah, yeah. It's kind of like the era in FedEx. That's exactly right. That one's really uh interesting. So so look, guys. Let me I got a little bit about this time. Okay, here we go. When you think back, go back in time to when you were just a young child with with your dad or your uncle or somebody. Smell of gunpowder. Yes, on a September, a hot afternoon, you'd be out there. I'm there. There would always be somebody that had a 16 gauge. And they were you know, back then it wasn't stylish for people to have a 14 or a 28 back back then. But but that 16 was a little bit different, and it just always seemed to make them, in my mind's eye at least, a little cooler. Oh, that's mine you had. Well, no, not necessarily. I wasn't trying to be cooler. But look when you think about that, like John Moses Browning, God bless you. He may be the best gun maker of all time.

SPEAKER_03 4:55

No doubt about that.

SPEAKER_07 4:56

What a great name. Moses. Look, Lenny, I'm just telling you, is there anything more American than a 16 gauge?

SPEAKER_03 5:07

Not much. I mean, as far as guns are concerned, it's cool. It is very cool, there's no doubt about it.

SPEAKER_07 5:14

Yeah. All right. So that one more thing, Rafe. Hang on now. Don't leave us, Rafe. He's got more where that came from. So I got a quote. Rafe, I'm gonna see if you know who said this. And if you don't, we'll uh land him on the game. Yeah. Okay. I might have to help him out. It makes me wish things were a bit different than they are, and glad to know that there is someone carrying a little gun as much out of affection or more so than because of its proven than the uh proven belief in its ballistics. Who said that? Hmm.

SPEAKER_09 5:51

Um man, I wouldn't even dare guess who that could be any number of folks that well.

SPEAKER_07 5:57

I'm scared for Lanny to guess. Yeah, I I know. Um looked it up.

SPEAKER_06 6:03

My my default guess is Teddy Roosevelt, and I'm probably wrong. Hmm. Lanny?

SPEAKER_07 6:09

Shoot. Um no rappers. So Clay, you got an idea? I do not. Richie?

SPEAKER_03 6:18

Not today. I'm I'm on go with Dudley. I'm on that was Mr. Gene Hill. Who is that? Yeah, well he oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_07 6:25

Rafe, can you believe that? You see what I have to work with, Rafe? I heard a little bit. I am hamstrung Gene Hill. He was a quintessential shotgun writer of about bird hunting stories, upland specialist. He wrote lots of cool. He his one of his famous quotes is uh that having a puppy teaches a little boy to turn around three times before he lays down.

SPEAKER_03 6:49

That was a great quote. Oh yeah. I don't know. I don't I haven't missed out on him.

SPEAKER_06 6:54

Did you know who I didn't grow up bird hunting and all that? Do you know that name?

SPEAKER_03 6:58

Rafe.

SPEAKER_06 6:59

I know I know of the name, but not uh Gene Hill. Look it up. It it's it's huge. It's it's huge. Well, I have to check it out.

SPEAKER_07 7:06

All right, so let's turn our attention to Rafe. And Rafe, can you walk us back in time? Uh it's it seems like for me the 16 gauge has so much had so much potential and promise, and and then somehow it just kind of got missed. What happened?

SPEAKER_09 7:25

Yeah, I mean it uh it it it honestly did. It had probably the best potential of any extra gauge um that was out there. And ballistically speaking, you know, the 16 gauge is arguably the best uh combination of of size and firepower um for a shotgun. And you know, the the the brief history behind 16 and how it got there and why we don't have as many of them today is just simply like the 12 gauge is the standard. The 16 gauge came along um and it really took off, and it was a great sub gauge from the 12 that everybody loved, um worked out well, then the 20 came along after that. And like how things mostly go in in development and and product life cycles, people gravitated to the biggest thing they could get, which was the 12 each at the time, and then the smallest thing they could get, or at least readily available, which is a 20. And unfortunately, the 16th just kind of landed in that really awkward in-between spot. So, you know, kind of think of the same thing along the lines of, and this is maybe a bad example, but I'll try to use it. But like the 243 and the 308, pretty good standards, but that 7 and 08 kind of sits somewhat in between them, and they just doesn't quite get the same uh attention to it, right? And so that's what happened with the 12 and the the 20. They took all the attention. Um, and everybody went either big or small, and the guy in the middle kind of got uh got pushed out of the of the mix. And so that's ultimately what happened, um, is that 20 gauge just became a lot more popular, and uh unfortunately the 16 kind of fall fell out of out of favor. Ammo companies were reluctant to continue to build a lot of ammo to support it, and then the gun companies followed suit and just started to discontinue it for the most part. So um, yeah, that's the the sad part about a 16 gauge is that it just uh it's the the victim of its time um and circumstances around the the 12 and the 20. And and so now it kind of is this um extra gauge that if you you're uh an aficionado of it or a big fan of it, um, or you're lucky to run into one, but it has made it a little more of a a collector's item to so to speak, or at least nostalgic, or like you kind of mentioned earlier, it makes you cool if you have one because not everybody does. Um and and I I've kind of fallen into that that trap as well as I've always tried to pick up every 16 gauge I'd get my hands on because not everybody else has it in the field and and they're super cool to have. And like I said, not everybody has them. Um and uh and we're lucky to to still be one of the few manufacturing uh a 16 gauge today to kind of fill that niche that's out there. And there's a lot of people who still love it and and can support it. So that part, that part's been great.

SPEAKER_03 10:16

So y'all, and I was gonna ask, y'all are the basically the only one that's manufacturing 16 gauges anymore?

SPEAKER_09 10:23

I I you know what I'm not sure if there's others who have some models that carry it. I haven't paid that much attention to it, to be honest, but uh, but yeah, like I think uh all things considered, I think Browning's about the only one who's making them in the any real configurations um that are that are meaningful. I think we have uh 10 different configurations of 16 gauges right now. Um and then that ebbs and flows as we do special makeups and and extra products um on some off years, so we can have up to 15 different models of the 16 gauge out there, and they're all in our popular platforms of the A5 and the Satori. So, you know, I think we do get to hang our hat on it from the standpoint that you know we're we're the go-to brand for 16 gauges for the most part.

SPEAKER_01 11:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:09

The Sweet 16. The sweet, the what a great name. Belgium-made browning sweet 16.

SPEAKER_05 11:14

You know why they did it to Sweet 16, don't you?

SPEAKER_03 11:16

Why did they do it?

SPEAKER_05 11:17

Because so to hit on what he said, 16 gauge has actually been around since the 1800s. And what people forget about is, and I collect them too, I love collecting all the 16 gauges. Uh the first shells were two and a half inch, they weren't two and three quarter. And uh, so they weren't they weren't that available. And like he said, it was a it was a perfect gauge, but they were still built on big frames. All right, and around, if correct me if I'm wrong, around 1937, Browning came out with a sweet 16, which was built on a lighter frame, which you could swing fast. I think they called it the little gun or something if I'm correct. But that's why it was still real popular. And to hit on what he said, then the 20 gauge came out, and then when they came out with a 20 gauge three-inch, it had the same velocity and capability as a 16 gauge, so that's why it kind of faded out.

SPEAKER_03 12:01

I was gonna ask that. So, is there a ballistic advantage or a pellet count advantage to the 16 over uh the 20?

SPEAKER_05 12:07

A one-out slow is a one-out slow, man.

SPEAKER_07 12:13

So, who came up with the name Sweet 16? What a great moniker to put on something. Was that you, Rafe?

SPEAKER_09 12:20

Personally, I did. I was uh I'm not that old. Thanks, Bobby. I appreciate that.

SPEAKER_01 12:25

Okay.

SPEAKER_09 12:26

Um uh I you know, I'm not sure what the story behind the Sweet 16, but certainly came from the company itself. Um, it was still being run by the Browning family, obviously, back then. Uh, you know, Matt Browning and John Val, who succeeded him, uh, finished those designs after John Moses passed. So I'm I'm sure it was somebody in the Browning family, and most likely John Val, uh John's son that that came up with that name would be my my guess.

unknown 15:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 15:46

Rick, I'm trying to give you a little credit for something here. Bert with me here now.

SPEAKER_09 15:51

Well, he said 1937, so I I I can't as much as I'd like to. That one's possible.

SPEAKER_05 15:57

That's when that's when they came out with the A5, the light, and they called it a sweet 16. You can Google it and see, but I'm pretty sure I'm pretty good with aging. And like so I got when I collect old guns too, and you're talking about growing up with a 16 gauge. My uncle had a uh Winchester Model 12 16 gauge, and I I don't know what it was, but what grabbed what grabbed uh what my grabbed my attention was the purple shells. I love the purple shells. Don't know why. To this day, I love purple shells. No doubt about it. To this day, I still shoot a 16 gauge. Um and what's funny about that is so I've been hunting one forever. Well, I finally found one and then I learned something on it. So my uncle's was a roughly a 40 model, model 12, 1940, model 12 16 gauge. Well, I've been hunting one. Well, I found one and it was made in 1916, and I learned that the early ones still shot two and a half inch shells, and they were actually called model 1912s. They didn't change to model 12 until like 1919, 1920, somewhere up in there. But um, so I grew up shooting a 16 gauge my whole life. All right, I shoot all y'all's browning Satori's in competition, Halice, sporting clays, stuff like that. I love them, one of the best guns ever made. All right. Um again, I grew up with a 16 gauge. So, and I shoot with all these people, and one of my friends told me he says, Well, you grew up shooting that old 16 gauge so much. Why don't you shoot it? So I did, and uh I took it to a competition, and that is the only time I've ever shot a perfect score.

SPEAKER_03 17:21

Sounds like you need to shoot.

SPEAKER_07 17:25

Yeah, he had to work in he shot a perfect score. Of course he did. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 17:30

Cool story that worked out in.

SPEAKER_07 17:32

Long story.

SPEAKER_03 17:32

Purple shells.

SPEAKER_07 17:34

So the squig, the the 16, it doesn't it, there's not a three-inch version of it. It's just two and three-quarters, is that right?

SPEAKER_05 17:41

I've never seen a three-inch version, just two and a half and two and three-quarters. And they still make two and a half to this day. This gun I'm holding right now, that's all it will shoot is two and a half. And that's a Winchester. Winchester model 1912, because it was made in 1916, 16 gauge.

SPEAKER_07 17:56

Rafe, I want to I want to ask you this. Um when I was trying to prepare for this, there's so much nostalgia around a Belgium-made Browning.

SPEAKER_03 18:06

Yeah, help me understand that.

SPEAKER_07 18:08

Uh can you walk us back and kind of tell us where things were made originally and where they've changed and and why that was so those are so sought after?

SPEAKER_09 18:17

Uh yeah, I mean, how much history you ought to know? So uh John Browning, yeah. So so John Browning's designs, uh, you know, typically he what his job was is he was a designer um and he did all the patent work, did the design, then turned most of those designs over to other companies to manufacture. Um so Winchester was the primary one, and then obviously Colt and Savage and a bunch of others, uh, Remington um picked up the designs as well. But um at one point in time he broke away from that and he made a trip um overseas to Belgium um and visited the Fabrique Nationale factory in Belgium. It's a very famous uh arms factory uh throughout the world. It's it's manufactured um military arms primarily through throughout the world. So he he visited the factory there and formed a relationship, and um they uh they started making guns for him back then in the early 1900s um and formed that that relationship. So everything from there on out he started doing via the the Belgian group um for Brique Nationale. And so that's the mystique of the Belgian-made guns. There is this state-of-the-art facility, especially back then, that was building some very cool, very high-end, very uh highly detailed firearms, and and Browning was a big piece of that. And so that's where you know the A5 starts coming out of the 1911, the superpose, um, all of those guns from the early 1900s till his death in 1926 all came from Belgium. So that's that's that's the story of how we got from the the Belgium made guns. After he passed, his brother Matt started making guns under the Browning name. Um, and so from then up through um the 70s, um most of those guns were being built, uh all most of all Browning guns were being built out of Belgium or sourced via that factory. Then about the 70s, um, costing got expensive out of there, tooling became old um and hard to redo. And so the Browning family and the Browning company looked for alternative ways of of building that shotgun. And Satoria was the same way. So we had the superpose, which is the over and under, that became expensive to build as well. So they looked for alternative places to build um their guns. And so at that point in time, they they found a factory called Maruku out of Japan, um, and moved production from Belgium to Japan for manufacturing purposes. Um and that's where the big changes. And so you have you have Belgium-made A5s um from you know the well 20s, 30s, whenever we started doing them up into the 70s, and then they became Maroku um built built guns after that. So the the mystique of the Belgian guns are they're older, they come from the original factory, they're from where John Browning designed the gun, you know, in the offices themselves. So there is a mystique behind having a Belgian-made gun. They're they're a little older and they have kind of a little more rich history behind them.

SPEAKER_07 21:32

Yeah. And then today, where where where are the guns made today?

SPEAKER_09 21:37

So there's still a lot of out of Maroku. So we've had a relationship with that uh the Japanese factory since the 70s, and today that's where all um uh most of our guns are are being built, especially the story. Now the the new A5. So we discontinued the original um auto five in 1999. That was the last year of production of the original um Auto V. Um, and then when we reintroduced uh the new A5 in 2012, if I get my dates right, um, we we did that out of our Portugal factory. And we have a factory in Portugal and we started building them out of the Portugal factory today.

SPEAKER_07 22:17

I bet that was a tough decision to stop making that original A5.

SPEAKER_09 22:22

It was uh yeah, it was just a few years before my my time here. Um, but yeah, like there's there's still some hard feelings from some old employees that hate to see that go. And but at some point in time, you kind of have to move on from things that they're not working, and we needed to modernize it and it needed uh it needed a new gun. Um, and that's when the we did the gold that replaced it, um, and the Maxfus and now the the A5 after that. So, you know, the one of the nice parts about us is you know, the legacy from the Browning side of the world is innovation, um being on the forefront of technology. And that's what John Browning did. He was always the one innovating and being forward thinking and and front-facing on that. And so, like, there is kind of this hard feeling of losing some of those old designs, but our DNA is to to build the most modern gun with the modern technology. So it really kind of fit the the DNA of our company to to move on from things that had had aged out and find a new technology to to build upon. So that that's how we we we kind of cover our wounds a little bit, but the reality is that's probably what John Moses Browning would have done himself was to to find uh find the new technology and new uh new innovation.

SPEAKER_07 23:34

Yeah, now so look, 2012, I'd had you had to be in that mix now. Were you one of the ones championing bringing it back so we can sound the horns for Rafe here, bringing back the A5, maybe?

SPEAKER_09 23:46

Yeah, I I did have the luxury of being a part of that. That was a super fun project. There it is. Uh yeah, I did. It was a fun project to be a part of. Um at the time I was over the the accessory portions of our business. And so uh I got in on the the ChowTube side of things and all the ancillary pieces to it and and got to be part of some of those meetings about what it looked like and and how we would come to to grips with the new style of A5 and how we would market that. And uh honestly, it was a great learning uh curve for us to figure out what was important about an A5, um, what we needed to hold on to from a nostalgic standpoint, what we needed to move on in new technology. Um, those are some really exciting days, to be perfectly honest. There was a lot of cool stuff that was presented, and one of the hardest things of being a part of the back side of stuff is that there was a lot of cool stuff that we got to see that never saw the light of day. And that's that's probably the hardest part of it is that we had so many great ideas and designs. And then not everything got to see the light of day on that stuff, but it was really cool to see our engineers. As part of that process and going through what we needed to do. And man, we had some really cool stuff that unfortunately never made the the off the cutting floor. But uh it was really fun to see the engineers hearken back to those days of of true engineering and design and uh finding ways of of recapturing both the the old time nostalgic piece of it, but then then moving forward. So yeah, I I was a very much a part of that one. It was a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_06 25:19

Oh, that's good. That's cool. I I love both. I've got like a 1980s uh Japanese-made A5, and I love it. And then I've I've shot Bobby's a couple times, which is the newer version, and uh you guys did a great job, you know, keeping what needed to be kept and and making the right changes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 25:39

And the the hump back, would you say that is both nostalgic and functional?

SPEAKER_09 25:46

A hundred percent. Um, so like the original build was it was required in order because it was a recoiling barrel, um, that was the only way you would fit into a into the system. Um but now as you look back on it, there's there's obviously the nostalgic portion portion of it that very distinct look. But what it does give you is a much longer sight plane. You bring that site plane instead of being a a sloped look further out, closer to your hand, you're getting a sight plane that's a straight look right back into your eye. So for those who have want to be able to see better sight plane, A5 is a much better platform because it does give you a very start and finished sight plane and it starts closer to your eye. So there is some some genuine functionality behind it that that does help you shoot a lot better.

SPEAKER_07 26:33

Yeah. And you boy, you can just instantly recognize A5. Yeah. Back in the old days, you'd see them hanging up and guys pickup trucks on the gun rack, and you'd just make a lot of things. The old gun rack days. What happened to the gun rack days? I know people should bring those back. It's those were great days. Yeah, they were great days.

SPEAKER_01 26:48

Yeah, they were good. They were green.

SPEAKER_05 26:50

Well, let me ask you this. On on the on the newer brownings, I'm just familiar with the older Brownings. You used to have to change the the thing on the magazine to you if you were going to shoot a high brass shell versus low brass shell. Did they steal that on the newer ones, or did it just you don't have to change it?

SPEAKER_09 27:04

Well, you're we're we're good to go. Everything will cycle through them. You don't have to make those are as a piston uh as a ring, as a piston ring.

SPEAKER_05 27:10

That's right.

SPEAKER_09 27:10

Um that they had on that old one uh you could change out for light and heavy loads, but now now they'll they'll all run. It's just on an inertia system on a bolt, and so no no need to swap out any parts that way.

unknown 27:21

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 27:21

Well, and if you got an old, you know, 40s blonde 16 gauge round, I s I need that to finish my collection.

SPEAKER_09 27:29

If I had I wouldn't tell you.

SPEAKER_03 27:32

So, what's the blonde part?

SPEAKER_04 27:33

It's the style of wood. Oh, really? Don't get distracted, Lenny. Well, he's talking about the wood. I'm assuming it's maybe maple. I I don't know. It's just it's it's I'm I want one really bad.

SPEAKER_06 27:45

Just a light, lighter colored wood. It's not just like the 40 people that are listening to this may can pull their resources together and find one for you, Clay. I would like that.

SPEAKER_07 27:55

Yeah. Rafe, I I I apologize. I should have let Dudley ask his rapid fires right from the start. So let why don't we do that right now, real quick.

SPEAKER_02 28:03

Our buddies at Nutrion need it need this.

SPEAKER_07 28:05

Yes.

SPEAKER_06 28:06

Uh, Nutrient Ag Solutions is a sponsor of our Rapid Fire, Dudley. Okay. Well, Rafe, I'm gonna ask you about 10 or so questions. Uh just give me a quick answer. We're trying to get to know you better. So are you ready?

SPEAKER_09 28:20

I'm ready. Fire away.

SPEAKER_06 28:21

Okay. Do you remember the first game species you ever harvested and how old you were?

SPEAKER_09 28:28

It's right there in that picture right there. It's a morning dove taken with a browning side by side. And uh that picture was taken just outside my window up on the mountain, just above the office here when I was 12 years old.

SPEAKER_07 32:20

Love it. Love it. Hometown. Yeah, he's got that's a really cool picture.

SPEAKER_06 32:25

And uh what uh what was a nickname you had in high school?

SPEAKER_09 32:31

Oh man. Um I don't uh Wraith is such a unique name. I didn't need a you uh a different unique name to set me apart. It's never changed. I've never had one that I know of. Great point.

SPEAKER_06 32:45

That that is a good point. You don't see many rafs. Um what was the first shotgun you ever owned?

SPEAKER_09 32:51

So the first shotgun was uh it was a Browning BSS, which is the Browning side by side, and they build it back in the early 80s. And that was that was my first shotgun. A little 20 gauge um English stock on it, and uh still have it to this day.

SPEAKER_06 33:04

Okay, and what would you say was your first Browning rifle?

SPEAKER_09 33:08

First Browning rifle was a Browning A bolt micro medallion in a 223, and I still have that gun.

SPEAKER_06 33:16

I know about that. Uh, and then give a shout out to a couple of your favorite local lunch places in Ogden.

SPEAKER_09 33:24

Oh man, you gotta go to Burley Burger for for a burger. Um that's the that's the best place. Um go there and then Goodworth for barbecue. That's always a good go-to spot for us. Um man, and then uh you gotta go down to 25th Street and go to Roosters. That's probably the other the other good one.

SPEAKER_06 33:44

Roosters. Okay. Burgers, barbecue, and roosters. We had a roosters growing up where I grew up. Um if you paid attention to the World Cup, uh, who was a team other than the USA that you were also cheering on?

SPEAKER_09 34:00

Was there another team to cheer on?

SPEAKER_06 34:03

Well, I I enjoyed following Norway, for example.

SPEAKER_03 34:07

But uh there you go. There you go. Norway had a strong following.

SPEAKER_08 34:11

Yeah, I was a fan of following them too. Yeah, Holland there, that guy Holland.

SPEAKER_06 34:15

Yeah, he's a he's an interesting person.

SPEAKER_03 34:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 34:18

Um what is the most anemic round you would ever feel comfortable using on a whitetail?

SPEAKER_09 34:30

I I honestly don't want to go much below a 243 or a 6.5 Creedmoor. I know there's a lot of people that will there's a big push right now to do smaller stuff, those 22 Creed Moors, 22 arcs, and I think they'll probably be perfectly fine. I've never done it. Um, and I'm sure I'll give it a try, but I I do like to use a little extra firepower for a few things. So I don't go much below that.

SPEAKER_06 34:54

All right. I like that good answer. And uh, where is the furthest place you've ever traveled for a hunt?

SPEAKER_09 35:03

Uh probably Africa to to Mozambique.

SPEAKER_06 35:07

Okay. Pretty good. If you were forced to choose one and only one choke to use for the rest of your life, I'm assuming lead, what choke would it be?

SPEAKER_09 35:18

Light modified. It's the way to go. That's why I put that in every gun I have.

SPEAKER_07 35:23

Boom. Yeah, okay. I agree. That's what I shoot in every game. Yeah. Yeah. Rafe, didn't you kill a muskox a few years ago?

SPEAKER_09 35:30

I I did, yeah. That was that was the other one. It was was Greenland. It's not that far away, actually, surprisingly, but yeah, I did Greenland and shot a muskox and caribou over there.

SPEAKER_07 35:40

Yeah, we just did a uh an episode about how they brought them the muskox back from extirpation in Alaska. From Russia, didn't they? Well, they brought them from Greenland. They brought them from Greenland. They brought them from Greenland. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 35:54

I get confused with Greenland and I think. We need to go back and listen to that.

SPEAKER_07 35:56

Yeah, we did. It was really interesting, though. That's a good story. And what a neat animal. And the the lady that was on here said they are delicious.

SPEAKER_09 36:03

Yeah. They are. Um we had um we shot both caribou and muscox there, and the muscox was ten times better than the caribou was for sure. Wow.

SPEAKER_03 36:14

It was caribou's supposed to be good too. Yeah. Probably why they were extirpated. Yeah, probably were. So delicious. You love that word. You've been saying extirpated since my learned. Since you learned.

SPEAKER_06 36:23

Yeah. Is that your word of the day? Good word.

SPEAKER_07 36:27

Word of the month. So um, one of the things that I've always liked about Rafe, he's got three kids, and he's always about those taking those kids, and I I kind of kept up with one daughter that he was really trying to we always like to hear stories about kids, hoping that somebody listening might could take a little nugget from your story and help introduce their kids to the outdoors. So would you kind of walk us through how you introduce your kids and if you have any really good advice for anyone?

SPEAKER_09 36:57

Oh man. Yeah, and you get with my kids, and I I'll go down all kinds of stories with them, and and I've got some really special stories with all three of them that um you know we we talked briefly about. I've hunted all over the world and done some of the coolest things you could ever imagine. And um my best memories are with my kids for sure, and the things they've they've hunted and done. And um, if you're talking what to do with kids, I mean the the lifestyle is a is an enormous piece of that, right? You walk into my house and there's mounts everywhere up on the walls, and uh and we talk about hunting, and and it they've just grown up with it. That's what they know is what dad does, and that's what's made us who we are as a family. And and I think just having the lifestyle in your home is a huge component to bringing kids into the into the mix. If they've they've normalized that, it's outside of the there's the scope of most people right now, right? And so helping people normalize that and make it that it's a normal thing to come. I love when my kids bring their friends in and they're shocked to see this caribou hanging in the wall or a kudu or a deer or elk or whatever it is, and and just normalize that um and and make it feel like that's part of the the unique story of you and your family, um, and it makes them want to be be a big part of it. I'll uh I'll tell one quick story about the middle girl, and and there's actually quite a few really cool stories, but uh I took her prairie dog hunting, and uh she shot one of the biggest prairie dogs I've ever seen. It was an absolute giant. And um we took pictures of it, did the whole thing, and they're like, all right, let's all let's head on and keep going on. And she's like, well, no, we're we're taking this back, right? And I go, what do you mean? She's like, well, I I want it mounted. I want it mounted like your like your bear rug. And so so we picked up that that prairie dog and we took it to the test and said, Listen, I have a a prairie dog rug in my house because my at the time, my little nine-year-old daughter wanted to have a rug just like my bear rug. She wanted to be like dad. And and that's when you say, What should you do with kids? Normalize it, make them want to be a part of that culture, and and uh it makes a big difference to them uh from that standpoint. So, yeah, I've got a I've got a prairie dog rug uh at the house, and then when my my youngest, she was 10, 9 last year, um, she shot a prairie dog, and and the the middle one wouldn't let her do it, and so we had to go find a jackrabbit. She shot a jackrabbit. So now I got a jackrabbit at the uh at the tax nervous. We're doing a a soft mount for her on a jackrabbit. So um that's uh that's you know that's how you get them involved, is is just make it normal and make it part of the process and and have fun and obviously take them. I mean, that's a big giant piece of it, of course.

SPEAKER_06 39:46

That's great.

SPEAKER_03 39:47

A groundhog rug, prairie dog, prairie dog, yeah. Bobby, what is the first thing you ever had mounted? Probably a fish, probably a fish.

SPEAKER_08 39:56

Richie? Uh that'd be the elk I got. Okay. Yeah, what eight years ago.

SPEAKER_03 40:02

Clay? Uh Banded Wood Duck. Okay, Lanny. The first thing, you know, I ever got mounted. Now like really mounted, you know, not just horns, was uh my first bowkill, uh, which is ironically out here at Cotrel Lake when I was uh 15 years old.

SPEAKER_06 40:23

So yeah, mine was a very immature-looking fox squirrel. Ah, yeah.

SPEAKER_07 40:29

Well, taxidermy plays a big part, and uh Rafe spoke to it, but when these kids see stuff in the house and he verbalized it perfectly, normalized.

SPEAKER_01 40:39

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 40:40

Yeah, I was thinking when he said that, I was like, wow, my kids uh like it's uh yeah, very normal, I guess is the best way to put it.

SPEAKER_07 40:48

I can remember being little and just oh if I could ever kill a buck big enough to have mounted. No, that's right. And and I I mean that was like a goal. And then I got one that really wasn't big enough to be mounted, but imagine We did it anyway.

SPEAKER_03 41:02

Well, the first deer I killed I thought was a doe, and I turned out it was, wouldn't you know it, a button buck. Yeah. And I I made a I made a strong push to get that mounted. Uh that didn't work out. But uh I do have them on a key ring. That's how little they are.

SPEAKER_05 41:19

But what are you considering big too? Because I I know I've seen some mounts, and we got some in our camphouse actually, that is a six-point, and then the eight-point in there, that was just like unheard of back then. Oh, it's all by points, right?

SPEAKER_03 41:29

Yeah, yeah. It might be this big, but he's eight point, yeah. That's right.

SPEAKER_07 41:33

That's right. Yeah, it took a long time to really understand that.

SPEAKER_03 41:36

But yeah, yeah, sure it did.

SPEAKER_07 41:39

You know, um, Rafe, if correct me if I'm wrong, but you mentioned uh that Belgian factory and you mentioned FN. And y'all still have a relationship with those folks, don't you?

SPEAKER_09 41:49

We yeah, we sure do. Um the uh the Browning family sold the the company to Fabrie Nationale to the factory back in the late 70s, and so we've we've obviously had a working relationship with them ever since. And uh the holding company is over there now. And uh so yeah, so we we've had a great relationship with that factory. They're a wonderful group of people over there. Um, and uh we're we're super proud to still be be associated and and working with that that group over there. They've been they've been great for the Browning brand, and and you know, it's been a hundred plus years now that we've worked with them and and it's a it's a great partnership.

SPEAKER_07 42:28

When you kind of look in your crystal ball, what what's what's the future look like for shotguns? Are are they gonna become more in fact modern looking, or are people wanting more vintage uh looks? Or what are you thinking?

SPEAKER_09 42:41

You know, I think the fun part about a shotgun is that you're gonna get both of both of those things. Um, because you have guns like Satoris or even any over and under, um those are classic guns that are always be classic. Everybody's monkeyed with trying to change them into some modern version of what those guns are, and they always are rejected to some degree. And everybody harkens back to building just the most classic, beautiful woodstocked, um, engraved guns. So you'll always have this component to shotguns, uh, at least in the over-under side of the business, um, will always be beauty guns. Um, and that just that just seems to be the way that one goes. Then you flip it over to the duck guns and you get those autoloaders, and you are starting to see more and more trends to to modern designs and getting into more modular stocks of being able to change your your cast and your shims and uh length of pull. And so you are seeing uh some modernization of that kind of stuff. And I I would anticipate that would continue to progress that way of performance grade guns, adjustable stocks, getting into that modern, I don't want to say tactical look, that's the wrong word, but but far more modular and and more edgy and and forward and and futuristic looking guns that that behave that way as well. So I think there's a I think you're gonna get both. I think you're gonna get uh those guys that still love the classic look of a shotgun and those that want more of that um new modern look. Rifles have gone through the same thing, um, you know, all the way into the modern sporting rifle, um, which is obviously very you know forward-edge thinking. Um so so I think shotguns have both. You're gonna have high technology, and then you're gonna have some just just the classic over and unders that are always gonna be what they are, and uh and they're always gonna be great sellers. So it's I like the fact that we get both of both worlds in the shotgun world for sure.

SPEAKER_05 44:36

Well, let me ask you this. I I shoot a lot of y'all's guns, especially in competition. I shoot the 725 Sporting Pro. Love that gun because you like I said, you can balance it, length of pull, all that good stuff. Um, do y'all make or are y'all gonna make a 16 gauge in something like that? And the reason I ask because a 16 gauge is obviously my favorite gun. Um, and you can shoot down in a caliber, like I can shoot the 12 gauge sporting clay or halise with a 16 gauge. So I've been looking for something like that. And you said y'all made several different 16 versions now.

SPEAKER_09 45:05

Yeah. So the the problem with the 16 gauge in a sporting configuration is ammo. Uh nobody's building uh trap or sporting clays or or any target loads for the 16 gauge to speak of. And so that's why we'll always have a hard time you know breaking into that competition um standpoint of a target gun. Um, you know, if they started to build those guns and then had a handicap for them, and I know you can shoot down, of course, but unless you have a category for those competitions, guys are just gonna get really dedicated into them. So uh unfortunately the the 16 gauges will always, or at least today and in the near future, will always stay as a field gun. Um and and I would not want to blame, but I would blame the ammo companies for for not creating uh a spec that that fit into that that sport. So that's unfortunately that's one of the sound parts about the 16 is it never did break in really well into the competitive side of the world, but it it'll always be a good field gun.

SPEAKER_05 46:04

And one last thing, one other thing I like to collect, and I don't know if y'all make any of them I hadn't looked up, is the side-by-side. I've gotten I've gotten where I like them a lot lately.

SPEAKER_09 46:13

Yeah, no, we um the last side-by-side we did was like they talked about that uh the BSS that we did back in the 80s. That was the last one we did. Um, I know 15 years ago, 10 years ago, whatever it's been, we did a real good deep dive into the side-by-side world. And, you know, I love them, you love them. There's a little bitch of folks that do love them, but there's just not enough uh love for those those guns just yet to bring them out in a in a large capacity. So we're probably not gonna be in the side-by-side game anytime soon, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_07 46:47

You know, one of the Lane, one of the things that they did that make their guns so iconic looking. It at some point they did this gold trigger. And even the new ones that are camoed, they've got like a it's a matte gold finish. Was that your idea, Rafe?

SPEAKER_09 47:01

That was mine. Yeah, I'll take credit for that one. Um, we've been doing that since I was born in the 70s, so yeah, uh, I'll take credit for it. Uh we do love the gold trigger, man. That's given us a lot of uh credibility and uh distinguishes the look of the gun uh from a distance. And you know, you see that gold trigger, you know what you're you know what you got on your hands, and it's kind of a nice nice feather in our cap to be able to kind of use that as a as a trademark for us. We love it.

SPEAKER_07 47:28

Yeah, that that's really neat.

SPEAKER_05 47:29

I got one with the well, I got one you need to shoot, Bobby, and it's a browning, and it's got a gold trigger, and it's a 10 gauge. We need to make a video.

SPEAKER_07 47:35

Oh I'll shoot it. Shoot the BPS in there. That's right. Yeah, well, so Rafe, what's uh what's what you're working on now? What's the latest thing coming out? Are you you got anything exciting you can tell us about?

SPEAKER_09 47:51

Yeah, I can tell you, but I have to kill you. Um there's uh there's a lot of things. We're doing uh some new logo work for some some new guns that are coming out. So uh honestly, uh you know, 26 uh we did left-handed expolts and and sub gauge 825s and some some really cool stuff. I think in 27 we've got a lot more coming out. Um for Shot Show. If if anybody's listening and paying attention long enough, that Shot Show 27 I think is going to be a pretty robust year for us. We've got a lot of really cool new uh export configurations coming out. There's some shotgun offerings that are that are in them in the works right now that'll be really exciting for us. Um so we're we're just continuing to expand uh what is successful for us. We do really well in in export rifles, we do really well in A5s, we do really well in Satoris. And uh we continue to to push the limits on on all those categories, um, as well as stay true to the to the old stuff. Uh, you know, we're still making B ARs and we're still making uh BLRs, the lever action guns and and silvers and Maxis, and we just got so much to to deal with um and to work with, I should say. That there's always something new in the works. Um unfortunately, we're kind of in that really odd time of the year in July where we're just a little early to have any breaking news on new stuff. Um we're still rolling out most of 26 right now, anyway. Excuse me. That uh, but yeah, there's there's plenty to look forward to.

SPEAKER_06 49:30

I always love checking their website, you know, right before shot show time, around the end of January, and see see the new stuff that rolls out.

SPEAKER_03 49:39

It's a good reason to get a shot show, Bobby.

SPEAKER_06 49:41

It is a good reason. It's a long way to go, though.

SPEAKER_07 49:43

So uh Rafe, you got any big hunts planned this fall?

SPEAKER_09 49:47

Uh yeah, we've got uh a couple uh pheasant hunts planned, I know, because you got a couple guns coming out for that. Uh a New Mexico elk hunt, and then I am gonna make another trip. That'll be good. And then I'm I'm making a trip over the pond. We're gonna do uh red stag in Scotland this year, too.

SPEAKER_07 50:03

Heck yeah, man. You'll have to you'll have to dress the part over there. Yeah, we've got red stag and elk.

SPEAKER_09 50:08

Yeah. Yeah. Plenty of innocent. Go buy my tweed. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 50:12

So, Rafe, I've got an assignment for you. I have always I have always wanted to have a real gamekeeper from in from Europe. Oh, yeah, yeah. And just to tell us about what they do. And yeah, I know there's a time change and all that, it'd be difficult, but we'll figure that out. But with if you find the right guy, we don't I'd love to interview somebody like that.

SPEAKER_09 50:33

Yeah, I I think we got the right guy. Honestly, it's a really cool plantation. Not plantation, it's an estate that we'll be at. And um stay in an old um old Scottish castle. And uh we got the the they're they're called stalkers instead of guides, right? And uh we got the guy's name's Ian, so it's a perfect Scottish name. And uh I I think he's your guy. I think we could probably hook that up for you.

SPEAKER_07 50:58

Well, I could probably go if I need to. That's where I knew Rafe, you were getting ready.

SPEAKER_03 51:02

He sorts you up. Well, I'll just get packed my bags.

SPEAKER_07 51:06

That sounds like a fun trip, though. You know, that'll be good. Pretty excited for it. The word gamekeeper really originated over there. A hundred percent. And those guys, uh, there's like at their colleges. There's a gamekeeper curriculum. That's right. That's right.

SPEAKER_03 51:20

Yeah. I got college parts and wildlife management here.

SPEAKER_05 51:23

I got a question for you. You're talking about on the hunts you're gonna go on and stuff like that. And the 16 gauge, like I said, that's what I grew up hunting. So I got like traditional when I do stuff when I start hunting. Um, I'm gonna go dove hunting every year, and the opening day, I'm gonna take the gun I grew up with. I know I got different guns and better guns, but I'm gonna use that old gun. Do you still use your side-by-side dove hunting?

SPEAKER_09 51:44

I I absolutely do. Yep. As a matter of fact, it'd be funny you mentioned doves, um, because that's that's what I start with. I always take my my side-by-side, it's a 20-gauge, and then I've got uh an old Belgium-made um A516 gauge, and those are the first two in the truck. Um, we start them off on on the dumb fields. So, yes, I still do that exact thing with those two old guns. Yep.

SPEAKER_05 52:04

Me too. It's nothing like it.

SPEAKER_07 52:05

How about that? Yep, that's great. Wow. Richie, why don't we ask him a trivia question and we'll let him get on out of here. So all right.

SPEAKER_08 52:13

Our trivia today is brought to us by our buddies at the Peanut Pass.

SPEAKER_03 52:17

We love those boiled peanuts.

SPEAKER_08 52:19

You know what? Rafe may not know what a boiled peanut is.

SPEAKER_07 52:21

We need to send him some out there. Yeah, we could.

SPEAKER_09 52:23

I do. I've I've spent time in the South. I know what that is.

SPEAKER_07 52:27

Yeah, okay. All right. But we'll send you some you can take to Scotland. That'll that'll really impress everyone. Yeah. So it's very cultured.

SPEAKER_08 52:35

It fits here that you guys were talking about muskox earlier. So our listener who left a review uh listened to our episode 456, a story of the muskox of conservation of conservation. Uh, so our listener, One Sweet World, left a review. It says, My seven-year-old boy chose to do his first grade project on muskox this past year and was thrilled when I told him that a muskox pod podcast had come out. I had a great time listening to it, to the one, to this one on the road with my little guy, and he loved that he got to hear such a great conservation story for his first ever Gamekeeper podcast. Keep up the good work.

SPEAKER_07 53:13

Oh, look at that. Helped him get a good grade in school.

SPEAKER_03 53:16

I hope we did. Yeah, let us know how the grade turned out.

SPEAKER_08 53:19

So here we go, Rafe. What does the term riding shotgun mean and where did it come from?

SPEAKER_03 53:29

Oh man.

SPEAKER_09 53:30

If I remember correctly, it was a guy who would ride next to the uh the driver on a wagon um or a stagecoach, uh, and he was the guy that was uh riding next to him and and would be able to fend off anybody who was trying to rob the stagecoach. That's exactly right.

SPEAKER_03 53:46

So, do y'all still use the term out there in Utah? I'm riding shotgun.

SPEAKER_09 53:50

My kids fight for shotgun every day in my class. More often than I would like to admit. We still do, too. Everybody clamors to ride shotgun.

SPEAKER_06 54:00

Yeah, I'm embarrassed to say I didn't I didn't know the origins of riding shotgun. Dudley. Now I've learned something. There you go. This is an educational podcast. For sure.

SPEAKER_07 54:09

Yeah. Wow. Rafe, is there anything else we need to ask you? I can't uh but uh I've got one thing I want to go over before we we close out. I I want to get serious for just a second. There was uh I'm gonna put my glasses on. Uh-oh. So in Mississippi, uh recently there was uh there was a car accident, and uh uh uh a man named Robert Aiken, he listens to our podcast and all that. His son, Rhett Aiken, was burned pretty bad. And I think they're going through a pretty tough time. His his wife, uh his name's Corey. Yeah, and he's got a sister, Allie Aiken. They're just great folks. And we just wanted to reach out and say to Rhett, hey man, we're pulling for you. We're rooting for you.

SPEAKER_03 54:52

Hang in there, buddy. Thinking about him for sure. Yeah, keep it up. Hang in there, Rhett.

SPEAKER_07 54:57

Yeah, that that's some tough. That's a tough thing. So uh anyway, Rip, we we are thinking about you.

SPEAKER_03 55:03

All right, uh, Rafe, is there anything else?

SPEAKER_07 55:06

Any stone unturned?

SPEAKER_03 55:08

Is it do y'all I have a quick question? Is there any way to even put a number on how many Browning guns are out there in circulation?

SPEAKER_09 55:21

Um, sort of. Um, so we know we have two million A5s out there. Wow. Um we just did a story, and if you we did a really cool story on the two millionth A5 um on our YouTube page. So I'll I'll give a little plug for that. We it's a cool story. It's called Forever the Best There Is. We did one on the B A R and we've done one on the A5, we did one on the on the two millionth A5, and and some of our employees got to actually shoot it out here. Travis Hall, I know we Bobby knows Travis way down.

SPEAKER_03 55:52

Travis, yeah.

SPEAKER_09 55:53

Um he he was the first one to ever shoot that gun here on our range. So uh that's all on a cool little video we did uh on our YouTube channel. So I'll plug that for us and go see that. It's a real cool video. We know there's two million of those out there. Um probably could look back on it. Uh there's probably about a half million Stories, that would be my guess. Um, so yeah, I mean it's it's in the millions for sure. Um and you go back to go back to all the designs of Browning and you get into 1911s and VARs and and what Colt did and what Remington made, all those designs. It's it's millions, millions of guns. Um it's it's a huge legacy.

SPEAKER_03 56:32

It'd have to be over, I mean, over half the guns that are out there, I would think, were influenced by Browning. Browning designs are related to that in some way, shape, or form.

SPEAKER_09 56:41

Yeah, there's there's a total of 128 patents that John Browning did. Um, and and most of the iconic ones are still in production to some degree. You know, 1911's one of them, and in Winchester, um, you know, they're still building a lot of them, the the the 92, the 95, um, 94. Like, and and that's one of the cool stories that we get to look at is you know, this guy was around, we're almost to 150 years from his first design, and there's still a half dozen to a dozen of his original designs that are still being built today. They're still using the the 50 BMG and the military side of things, and so you know, we're pretty proud. Like, I'll I'll be honest, like we're proud of our founder and what he did from the standpoint of it wasn't just a flash in the pan, and we've built beyond that. There's his designs and what he built are still in production today, and still part of today's fabric of of uh American gun owners, and and we're just really lucky to have the ability to to carry on that that legacy, and hopefully we're living up to his name. And I sure hope he's proud of us at the end of the day because uh he's left us a legacy for us to work on the yeah, and we take that very seriously.

SPEAKER_03 57:55

I mean, just the 1911 in itself is just yeah hard to get your head around. The guy had to be a just a genius, a mad scientist, yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_07 58:04

A gunny. Yeah, for sure. All right, Rafe, we've enjoyed it. Yeah, thank you, Rafe. We know you uh we know you need to. What do you what do you what's next? The young and the restless. Does that come on? Is that one you think you gotta watch this afternoon?

SPEAKER_09 58:18

Yeah, but flip on flip on a baseball game now and be done with the day. No, we got lots to do today. There's a lot on the docket, and uh uh we got some media events coming up. Um, and uh so yeah, so we we got a lot to do still today and the rest of this week.

SPEAKER_07 58:33

All right, that sounds good. Well, uh looking around, is anything uh, you know, we've got guys that need to, Landon, they need to sign up to win that Rambo bike. That ramp bike.

SPEAKER_03 58:44

Electric bike, exactly. So coming up for hunting season, uh get ready. Got when we give it away, October, end of September, 1st of October, something like that. Boy, it's that's a it's got it's a nice rig for sure. Yeah, and deer season starts now. We're putting out some moultry cameras, the edge for uh today, actually. So hey, everybody get out there, get your cameras up. Uh deer season starts now. Some good stuff going on at Biologic and Native Nurseries, too. So there's our selfish uh plugs, if you will. There you go. Good job, Lenny.

SPEAKER_07 59:10

Richie, you okay?

SPEAKER_03 59:11

Yes, sir.

SPEAKER_08 59:12

Doing just fine. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 59:13

Glad to have you back at the board. So why don't you say goodbye, Dudley?

SPEAKER_08 59:17

Goodbye, Dudley.

SPEAKER_07 59:18

Get us out of here, Richie.

SPEAKER_00 59:19

Thanks for tuning in to this week's episode of the Gamekeeper Podcast. And be sure to tune in again. Subscribe to Game Keeper Farming for Wildlife magazine, and don't miss the Machio Properties Fistful of Dirt podcast with my good buddy, Ronnie Cut Strickland.