EarthX Website: https://earthxmedia.com/
Enjoy this blast from the past from the EarthX Archives. 'Round the Fire was one of the first shows we produced and aired back in 2020. EarthX Media has grown a lot since then, but we still like to look back on these insightful conversations and see how far we've come.
How do we connect with (and protect) our local waters, landscapes, and animals?
About 'Round the Fire:
Hunters and anglers sit around the (virtual) campfire to discuss conservation and environmental issues from the unique perspective of outdoorsmen. Sportsmen and women can be important allies in America's ongoing efforts to protect its landscapes.
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Love Our Planet.
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At EarthX, we believe our planet is a pretty special place. The people, landscapes, and critters are likely unique to the entire universe, so we consider ourselves lucky to be here. We are committed to protecting the environment by inspiring conservation and sustainability, and our programming along with our range of expert hosts support this mission. We’re glad you’re with us.
EarthX is a media company dedicated to inspiring people to care about the planet. We take an omni channel approach to reach audiences of every age through its robust 24/7 linear channel distributed across cable and FAST outlets, along with dynamic, solution oriented short form content on social and digital platforms. EarthX is home to original series, documentaries and snackable content that offer sustainable solutions to environmental challenges. EarthX is the only network that delivers entertaining and inspiring topics that impact and inspire our lives on climate and sustainability.
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#EarthDay #Environment #Sustainability #EcoFriendly #Conservation #EarthX
Enjoy this blast from the past from the EarthX Archives. 'Round the Fire was one of the first shows we produced and aired back in 2020. EarthX Media has grown a lot since then, but we still like to look back on these insightful conversations and see how far we've come.
How do we connect with (and protect) our local waters, landscapes, and animals?
About 'Round the Fire:
Hunters and anglers sit around the (virtual) campfire to discuss conservation and environmental issues from the unique perspective of outdoorsmen. Sportsmen and women can be important allies in America's ongoing efforts to protect its landscapes.
EarthX & EarthXtra
Love Our Planet.
The Official Network of Earth Day.
About Us:
At EarthX, we believe our planet is a pretty special place. The people, landscapes, and critters are likely unique to the entire universe, so we consider ourselves lucky to be here. We are committed to protecting the environment by inspiring conservation and sustainability, and our programming along with our range of expert hosts support this mission. We’re glad you’re with us.
EarthX is a media company dedicated to inspiring people to care about the planet. We take an omni channel approach to reach audiences of every age through its robust 24/7 linear channel distributed across cable and FAST outlets, along with dynamic, solution oriented short form content on social and digital platforms. EarthX is home to original series, documentaries and snackable content that offer sustainable solutions to environmental challenges. EarthX is the only network that delivers entertaining and inspiring topics that impact and inspire our lives on climate and sustainability.
EarthX Website: https://earthxmedia.com/
Follow Us:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/earthxmedia/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/earthxmedia
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EarthXMedia/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@earthxmedia
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@EarthXMedia
Dailymotion: https://www.dailymotion.com/earthxmedia
How to watch:
EarthX - Cable:
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- AT&T U-verse (1267)
- DIRECTV (267)
- Philo
- FuboTV
EarthXtra - Streaming:
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#EarthDay #Environment #Sustainability #EcoFriendly #Conservation #EarthX
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TVTranscript
00:00I'm Johnny Carroll Sane, and welcome to another episode of Around the Fire on EarthX TV.
00:21My guests today are Dr. Christopher Jenkins, who is the CEO of the Orion Society, and he's
00:27also the founding chair of the Georgia Backcountry Hunters and Anglers. Also joining
00:33us is Jenna Rozelle, who is a wild food educator, and she's a hell of a poet, too. She may not say
00:40that, but I'm one of her biggest fans. She said Chris is in Georgia, Jenna is in the northeast
00:46in Maine. Is that right, Jenna? And today we're going to talk about attitudes, hunter attitudes.
00:55It's based on kind of an old study that's going to be our foundation. Back in 1978, a behavioral
01:02scientist, so probably heavy in anthropology and softer sciences, Dr. Keller did a study on
01:08people's attitudes towards animals, and in this study he interviewed both hunters and non-hunters
01:15and some anti-hunters, and what we're going to focus on today are the attitudes of the hunters.
01:20Dr. Keller identified three different types of hunters. The first one was the utilitarian hunter,
01:29which is a hunter that pretty much in the description hunts for meat. They typically
01:35come from a rural background and have a very practical attitude towards animal use. The second
01:42type of hunter he discussed was a dominion hunter, which I guess could best be described as
01:50quote-unquote stereotypical trophy hunter, someone that just hunts for bigger animals, mostly for,
01:58in his words, what he found out is mostly for ego purposes, and they usually come from a more
02:04urban background. And then the third type of hunter was a nature hunter, which is someone that
02:12approaches hunting not so much as a way to take something, but as a way to become part of something.
02:19And again, this study was done in 1978, so a lot of things have changed in the hunting
02:24culture since then, but as a hunter who started out in probably around 1978, I think I was
02:32seven years old at the time, that's when I got my first BB gun, I recognized a lot of these
02:37hunter types through the years, and I still recognize them today. And so today what we're
02:43going to talk about with Chris and Jenna are these different types of hunters, and so starting
02:50off, I want to talk, I want to start off with Jenna. Yeah, I didn't start hunting until my mid-20s,
02:56and I had a really hard time making that decision, and I think if you were to have asked me
03:05why I was hunting then, I would have said utilitarian, for sure.
03:13And I think that, but I think that that was born out of a place of really trying to be
03:23a naturalist and like immerse myself, participate as much as I can in my local landscape,
03:31which led me to realize that maybe utilizing animals as food was one of the best things I
03:38could do for that landscape, and now as time goes on, you know, I do,
03:46it is largely utility for me, it's largely food gathering, but I think maybe equal parts,
03:55maybe equal parts, I'm appreciating as much
04:01how that allows me to interact with my landscape from a naturalist perspective,
04:07you know, all of the other things I'm getting from the hunt aside from the meat.
04:15But also, I have a hard time with the dominion part currently, and definitely when I was younger,
04:26I don't think that I would have like wanted to acknowledge that part of myself,
04:33but I think that the dominion part, the language is kind of tricky, like I don't know why Keller
04:41chose the words that he chose to name these categories, but I think like,
04:48if I think about the dominion part of the hunter in myself, I might like, I do recognize that it's
04:56there, but I might call it something else, like I might call it maybe just like the joy that comes
05:07from successfully learning a place and learning an animal, like some people might call that,
05:14oh, you know, she's trying to master a place or master an animal or have dominion over it,
05:21you know what I mean, but I think that you could also call that something else.
05:25I agree, and before we go, Chris, and I want to get his thoughts on this, but I think that part
05:31of the problem with Keller's analysis is that he takes the position that humanity, that men
05:40and women, hunters are separate from nature, that we, I mean, for ever since we've been human,
05:46we've been hunters, we've been hunters and gatherers, and so there's really, you know,
05:51we don't go into nature, we're part of nature, and so we don't go into it with these roles,
05:58you know, already in our minds about what we're going into it for, we go into it because I think
06:04a lot of it is that's our instinct, that's who we are, and that blending of those three types
06:10of hunters is who we were through four million years of evolution. Chris, what are your thoughts,
06:18where do you fit in, do you fit in any of these boxes, or are you a blend of all three?
06:22Well, the first thing I'd say, Johnny, is that, you know, my hunting, I guess I'd call it a
06:29career, I hunt, you know, and fish somewhere 150 plus days a year, I mean, it's an integrated thing
06:37into my life, and to me, my entire, it's just one big lifestyle, and that, you know, as you mentioned,
06:46reptiles and amphibians, you know, going out and looking, say, for a rattlesnake as part of a
06:50project I'm working on, going out and hunting a black bear, growing a pumpkin in my garden,
06:57they're all one thing to me, they don't, I don't really differentiate. The way I think of
07:05this whole, these categories presented by Keller, I almost think of them like a triangle,
07:09and I think if you put them on that two-dimensional space where you've got,
07:14you know, kind of, let's say, the dominion at the top and the other two at the bottom,
07:18you know, and then you could start to figure out where you would put that dot within there,
07:23how close or far you are from those. I'd say I'd probably put myself, I'm pretty close to the
07:30middle, but, you know, a little closer to the bottom of the utilitarian and naturalist. Again,
07:37my whole life is built around procuring food in different ways, as much as I can from nature,
07:45as well as, you know, I'm a naturalist, that's what I do every day for work. I'm constantly
07:54spending time in the woods, just engulfing myself in nature and learning about it, but I will say
08:00on that dominion side, you know, I'm going to be, you know, pretty fired up if I can grow a giant
08:07pumpkin versus a tiny pumpkin, right? But I am also going to be, I get very fired up about big
08:15animals, and, you know, I hunt all kinds of animals all over the country, but in particular,
08:21hunting mountain whitetail deer here in the Appalachian Range, I get really, really fired up
08:28about trying to find the big mountain deer, trying to outsmart them. I will always shoot my three to
08:36five deer, but I can do that in other ways, and then I can have another part of my hunting time
08:40that allows me to really just kind of, you know, challenge and outsmart this monarch of the
08:47mountains. So, again, I'd kind of put myself somewhere in the middle of that triangle as I
08:51described it. I think that's probably a good description of me as well. There's an argument
08:56to be made that trophy hunting is simply an extension of the desire to get more food.
09:04You know, like, well, I go back to, I've read a lot about the people of the
09:12Kalahari Desert, the San people, who are one of the last hunter-gatherer cultures, and I think,
09:18I'm not exactly sure where they are now, but they're quickly diminishing. Their culture is quickly
09:23dying, but I watched a video narrated by David Attenborough where they chased down a kudu,
09:31and they chose the biggest kudu bull to chase down precisely because he offered more meat,
09:37and because his horns weighed him down, they caused him to tire quicker. So, I think
09:44there's an argument to be made for, again, trophy hunting is an extension of that.
09:51A desire to get more meat, and I'm not going to deny that there's, you know, not ego involved in that,
09:56because there is. I'm with you. We live on venison. I need three to four deer every year
10:03to get our family through because we don't like to buy meat from the grocery store, but
10:09I've got two buck tags, and the first legal buck that walks by is probably going to get an arrow
10:15or an arrow shot at it, but the second one, I'd kind of like to play the game. I'd kind of like to
10:22learn his habits. I'd kind of like to learn the country better, learn where he sleeps, where he
10:27eats, how he moves through the day, and I don't know that I do that to stroke my ego so much,
10:32but it's actually a way to, in some ways, become more of a nature hunter. I have a
10:39better understanding of not just that deer, but deer in general when I spend that amount of time
10:45chasing one particular animal. I know Jenna, in the conversation we had, I think over email,
10:51Jenna said she was trying to target a specific buck, and it was the first time she'd ever done
10:56that. Would that be something similar to what you experienced, Jenna, that it was a almost a deeper
11:02relationship with the animal by targeting that one specific animal? Like my coming from a
11:11like a naturalist intent kind of begets the utilitarian intent and then kind of begets the,
11:20we can call it dominion because that's the word we're working with, but I would call it something
11:25else. But yeah, I think that's where that drive comes from for me. Like I'm not going to say that
11:34there aren't purely like doministic hunters out there that really are just trying to like conquer
11:40things. Oh yeah. But I don't think there's that many of them, honestly. I think that they maybe
11:47are portrayed badly, but if you were to dig in and see like what is actually driving them
11:53to maybe be a trophy hunter or, you know, whatever else, I think a large part of it is
12:01that joy and satisfaction that comes with feeling like you're starting to really get to know a place
12:09and that you know your place in that place and like you know how to relate to everything else
12:16in that place. Like that's a really great feeling. And so yeah, I have not seen that book again.
12:24But that's when it goes a lot. Yeah. But I'll be back Saturday and you know it's all I'm thinking
12:36about. Yeah. And when you learn a country, and I think both of you are again very similar to me,
12:46that's one reason I wanted you part of this conversation. Your relationship to the animals
12:51is very closely tied to the land. You know, Chris is big on those mountain deer in Appalachia.
12:58Jen is big on the northeast, pretty much all the wildlife and the flora and the fauna.
13:03And I'm the same way. I'm in the Ozarks. Knowing these specific deer are what's important to me,
13:10or knowing these specific ecosystems. So you know, like we talked about targeting one specific
13:16animal because it's big or for whatever reasons you want this specific animal. And you know,
13:22in the process of trying to figure this animal out, you learn the land, you learn the ecosystem
13:26better. Isn't that kind of a, you know, it's a backdoor way I guess to introduce, I don't even
13:33know if introduce is the right word, but it's a backdoor way for hunters and anglers to realize
13:38that they already are invested in our lands and waters, our public lands and public waters.
13:45And that, you know, to tie this into environmental issues, that protection of these
13:52places, these sacred places, are vital to this relationship they have with these animals.
14:00It's all connected. And you know, I come from a background, again probably similar to both
14:05you guys, where I was catching animals, little lizards and frogs and mice and
14:10already caught bats, which I probably shouldn't have when I was a kid, you know. And just to look
14:15at them and try to understand them a little bit. But a lot of people, you know, and in the course
14:22of that, I was probably at a younger age more aware of dangers and threats to waters and lands.
14:32But is this an avenue that you think the hunting community maybe could use to bring more hunters
14:41and anglers into environmental awareness, to into that fold, and maybe even environmental activism?
14:49You know, here in Georgia, and this is not knocking any type of hunting, but you know,
14:54we have a lot of people hunt here. We have one of the largest hunting populations in the country,
15:00and you know, there are a whole variety of styles and interests. But we do have a fair amount of
15:07hunting where, you know, somebody will drive an ATV 20 yards from a metal tree stand above a
15:15human cultivated patch and, you know, shoot the animal and then bring that animal off to
15:19the processor. And you know, one of the things that we're working on doing at, you know, Georgia
15:27chapter of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers is really trying to get a little bit more of this,
15:33let's call it the naturalist, you know, hunter thought process into these people. Because one,
15:42as you mentioned, I think it will help the environment overall, because everything is
15:47connected. And, you know, and make their hunting better in the long term. But the other piece I
15:52often like to use is to turn that around and say, you know, I think one of the most valuable
15:59things that helps me be so successful in hunting is my knowledge of nature. It is, you know,
16:08that I can identify different mushrooms and the timing of certain flowers and all these,
16:15the phenology of these woods and, you know, just piecing it all together. I think it gives you a
16:22much more holistic view of nature, helps you understand more what that particular animal,
16:29let's say a deer, is doing at a given time. And it's going to make you a much better hunter. And
16:35really, I think it's going to make you enjoy it a lot more. It's when you're sitting in that
16:40highly contrived situation that I talked about. Don't get me wrong, I sit in tree stands at times.
16:46But, you know, when you sit in that highly contrived situation, I can see where it becomes
16:51more about the amount of bone or antler on an animal's head. You know, you've just taken so
16:56much of this, you know, the whole picture, you've taken it away, you've controlled it all. And
17:03people would be better hunters and I think would enjoy it more if they would really link into
17:07nature. And again, to finish up, you know, I think it would be important for maintaining hunting for
17:13the long term because it would help conserve the environment, as you mentioned. Yeah, I agree. It
17:18makes the experience richer. And I come from, you know, I've hunted over food plots. Now, I still
17:24hunt out of a tree stand, but I'm a bow hunter and I have not figured out how to kill these super
17:29wired whitetails from the ground with a bow consistently. So, I hunt out of a tree stand, but I
17:35hunt public land. I usually try to get off in places that other people don't go. And since I've
17:41really made an effort to do that, I guess probably five or six years ago, I do that exclusively.
17:46Yeah, my experience has been richer. Yeah, I think the enjoyment and like the reverence
17:54that comes with spending time in wherever your place is, is maybe not highlighted enough in the
18:07hunting world. You know, I don't think everybody needs to hunt in order to, you know, love their
18:14place. There's a million different ways to love a place and like everybody can find their own way.
18:19I think that, but I think the fast track or really the only way to foster that kind of
18:27relationship is to have direct experience with your place in whatever way you prefer. You know,
18:35take a walk, have a sit, look at birds, whatever. It doesn't have to be hunting.
18:41Like you said, the hunting kind of has been like the culmination, like that's where I've ended up
18:47through years of, you know, stepping from one kind of direct experience with a place to another,
18:53to another, to another. I have ended up as a hunter, but I'm still many other things
18:58and they all bring me equal joy. It might be like the only way to protect these places,
19:06but just any place, any place that we still have access to is worth
19:10knowing and loving and using and protecting. I would say that, you know,
19:16again, I do think a sense of place is a really valuable thing as you're talking about. It's a
19:23really rich thing, as you say, and it's so important to me, you know, whether it be here
19:30or other places that I hunt around the country, they're so special and kind of like, you know,
19:38kind of like I'm talking about this, you know, the value that understanding the whole of nature,
19:47you know, brings to your hunting experience and, you know, and how valuable it is and
19:52helping you be successful. You know, I think developing this sense of place and
19:58whether it be tradition, through your understanding of the environment, just really
20:02makes hunting such a better experience for people. And so, you know, here in Georgia and beyond,
20:10you know, we're hoping to, you know, get those messages out to the hunting community and
20:17get some of those people who try to completely control everything and detach themselves from
20:22the environment while harvesting an animal, to just take some of that in, because I think it'll
20:27make hunting much more rich. I think that's a great word for it, and I think it will help
20:33perpetuate hunting into the future, because again, it just makes it such a better activity. Sense of
20:38place is great. I, you know, I mean, place has always been important to me, whether it be hunting or
20:43other things. You know, I have two children and, you know, I take them all over the world and they get
20:48to see great things, but there are certain places, you know, whether it be like one little high
20:52mountain basin that's so special to me in Idaho or, you know, swamp bottom down in Georgia,
20:59and so what I'm doing in my will is I'm having them pre-mate me, and then they need to take me
21:06and they need to bring me to these different places, and they're all places like that, that I
21:12wish for them to see, and that we're, you know, I have an important sense of place around. So,
21:17so yeah, I'm going to force my kids to spread me in all these places, but it's for their own good.
21:25That's a morbid note to end on.
21:32But I'm kind of excited about it, actually.
21:38But you did make a great point there that we should have talked on earlier,
21:42that I do believe that these attitudes, this attitude that we're talking about, this holistic
21:46view as a hunter of the natural world, is absolutely essential to hunting going forward
21:53in the future. I'm not so much concerned about anti-hunting sentiment, of shutting down hunting
22:03in the future, but I am concerned about apathy toward these places that we must have to hunt and
22:10fish. That's what concerns me more than anything, and so if we can get this, not only the next
22:18generation, but our generation. I know Chris and I are Gen Xers. Aren't you, Chris? You're not,
22:25you're not much younger than me. I'm 46 years old. Okay, yeah, you're just a few years younger than
22:30me. Okay, so we're Gen Xers. You might be grayer, but I'm, but I'm younger. I've got three years on
22:36you, and then Jenna's generation, and my kids, and I've got grandkids. For those, these generations
22:46to have these places, I think that this is very important that hunters and anglers, again, take,
22:52like you said, take this holistic view of what we do, of our lifestyle, and turn that into
23:03not only acknowledgement of the need to address a lot of these environmental issues,
23:10public land issues, but also to advocate for these places, vocally, at the ballot box.
23:17That's where we're going to make a difference, and I think we're out of time now, for sure.
23:32We are sportsmen, and we are in trouble.
23:38We've learned what happens when we underestimate a serious threat.
23:43We can't make that same mistake with climate change.
23:49We need to stand up for America, and for our kids and grandkids. Make your voice count in 2020.