Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Believe we're live. We're going to do a live drone deer recovery podcast.
I'm Mike, if you don't.
[00:00:06] Speaker B: And I'm Kevin.
[00:00:15] Speaker A: Kevin is in the studio. I'm out here in Alabama. Yep.
[00:00:19] Speaker B: You see some water in Alabama?
[00:00:21] Speaker A: What's that?
[00:00:23] Speaker B: What's going on in Alabama, Mike, while we're down.
[00:00:25] Speaker A: We're down here for a drone convention that we're. Well, I'm supposed to be in session right now, but honestly, I've not been learning too much, so I'm out here. I want to do this podcast with you guys because we want to bring you back up to speed on the whole Pennsylvania thing.
Just to be honest with you guys, what I don't really like about this whole. We have to bring this news is we're turning into a news channel. And I really don't want to be a news channel. I want to be entertaining. I want to bring you new, exciting things that we're doing here at drone daily recovery. But with that, right when this whole thing went public and we're legal battles, we have to be a news channel. That's where you guys are getting your info for these situations like Pennsylvania, the state that is just.
They just have to feel a little goofy at themselves.
This rule that you can't track a deer 30 minutes after sunset. Now, we have to inform you guys, because once we put that out there, we put it on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook. We put it out there, then it's like, what? I've never heard of this thing.
Has this been an actual thing? So I apologize. We're maybe a little bit of a news outlet, but I want you guys also coming back to drone deer recovery, to the YouTube channel and the social media platforms to be entertained, educated, and that type of thing. But today, we're going to be talking about the whole Pennsylvania thing. Thoughts? Kevin?
[00:01:59] Speaker B: So, I mean, Mike, what do you think for all the other game wardens in Pennsylvania, other than the two game wardens that were involved with the staying in this specific setup or whatever, where they took the guy's drone, how do you think that they feel about having suddenly, through the court system, it being declared that the PCG is not allowing, and it's never been legal to recover any carcass 30 minutes after dark?
[00:02:26] Speaker A: The way I feel like. Right. Those wardens, they're just like me, and they're just like you, Kevin. They're just guys that have a role. They have a job.
That's what they do. And now having this thrown on them because you know, that there's a bunch of buddies calling them, let's say it's, what, what's going on with this? They're like, I know what the. Like, these two wardens brought this on us all and that type of know. I don't know that all the wardens in Pa are happy that these wardens did that, but I'm not going to speak for them. Maybe they are happy because it's going to bring clarity on when you can and can't track. And so, I don't know. I'm sure it's frustrating for them.
[00:03:10] Speaker B: Yeah. And we should say before we go on, we're going to play a clip later of them saying, hey, this is actually not legal. It's never been technically legal, but it's up to the officer's discretion, all that stuff. But this is a live podcast, and we want to hear your opinion. So if you're watching, there's a link in the description. You can click on that. You can actually jump into a waiting room. And then our producer, Austin will, if you have something to say, you have a comment. We want to hear from you guys as well. And we're doing this format live. It's the first time we're doing this so that we can experiment with having you guys jump on, talk, know, whatever's going on in Pennsylvania. We want to hear your thoughts.
[00:03:47] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:03:47] Speaker B: So you can jump into the link in the description and be a guest on the show first ever.
[00:03:55] Speaker A: So don't we just want to show them right now? That way they can see, this is what was actually said. It was said at the Pennsylvania Fishandboat Commission, Pennsylvania Fish and Game commission hearing meeting. Was that just yesterday or the day before? Kevin, do you know?
[00:04:14] Speaker B: I don't know. I think it was this week. I don't know exactly what day it.
[00:04:17] Speaker A: Was, but he definitely was asked that question, which is great. It brought it to their attention, like, hey, can you do this? So if you want to roll.
[00:04:25] Speaker B: Am I right, Mike? This was a senator asking the head of the game.
[00:04:31] Speaker A: See, I grew up amish, so I don't know how this whole legal law things like, you got committees and then you got senators and then you got state reps and all those people. I don't understand how the whole thing worked. I just know that Brian Burhans, which is the executive director of the Pennsylvania Game Commission, was asked this question directly. So we do have video of him being asked this question. And it was honestly, when he said it, I was like, this is shocking what the like you can't technically do.
[00:05:03] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, let's roll the.
[00:05:07] Speaker C: Just. Just last week, a judge in Lancaster county ruled that we found guilty a gentleman who has a business where he uses drones to recover deer.
When I asked you before about this, that was still an ongoing.
[00:05:29] Speaker A: I don't know if anything's happening on your guys'end or not, but I haven't.
[00:05:32] Speaker D: Gotten a full briefing. But I can tell you a couple of interesting.
This individual, our officers did reach out to him before to let him know that that activity was illegal.
[00:05:41] Speaker C: But apparently this was actually a sting operation where they had someone contact him saying he had shot a deer. He was having trouble tracking it. Could he bring this drone in? He signed a waiver saying you weren't hunting it, you were just tracking it.
[00:05:53] Speaker D: Yeah, I don't have those details there. I do know that he was.
[00:05:55] Speaker C: His game commission do a lot of sting operations?
[00:05:58] Speaker D: No, we have undercover officers out there because there is a lot of bad thing that goes on. But just to go back, he was told ahead of time that this wasn't illegal activity, but he ramped up his advertising and continued on.
[00:06:11] Speaker C: And finally on that. I'll move on to other questions, but one of the things the judge says in the ruling that he interpreted your regulations, that hunting includes the retrieval and that therefore, are we restricted in when we can track and retrieve the deer after the hours that are set. So are you no longer allowed to track after sunset?
[00:06:39] Speaker B: Yes. Are you no longer technically?
[00:06:41] Speaker A: No.
[00:06:41] Speaker D: And that language was set by the legislature.
[00:06:43] Speaker A: I mean, they have.
[00:06:44] Speaker D: Legislature developed that language of what the definition of hunting is, and it does include that retrieval portion. Now, typically, when I talk to our officers, especially in our bureau, about, yes, it's illegal at night to go retrieve that deer, but they typically do not enforce that and use leniency there. What's interesting about the whole drone issue, though, this is new technology and trying to have policy, whatever policy you're dealing with, and technology, it's tough, and it'd be interesting to watch how this works its way through.
[00:07:14] Speaker C: Yeah, I think that the judge in this case said the legislature needs to address this. Everyone else is playing catch up to science. But thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Appreciate your.
[00:07:23] Speaker B: Donald. Thanks.
[00:07:24] Speaker A: Thank you.
I can't see it on my end.
What I assume happens there at the end is what doesn't make sense to me is this. He just said that those wardens, they don't enforce that. Right? So if you decide to track your deer, they don't enforce it. Well, why were they trying to entrap this pilot, right? This drone pilot in Pennsylvania, if they don't enforce the illegal tracking of a deer or elk or bear or whatever you shot in Pennsylvania when you're doing it with a dog or your buddies, right? It's illegal to do it that way. But they didn't go after those people. They want to go after a guy with a drone. Why is.
Yeah, is it just because it's new technology?
[00:08:11] Speaker B: But Mike, what's interesting to me is that the way that the senator asked the question is pretty telling. He says, is it no longer like, is it the stance of the department, it's no longer legal to track an animal after dark? Or then, because it's like, this is the first time we're hearing about this, right, that you can't go find your carcass after dark. And so the senator is like, hey, is this what the department is now saying? And then the guy answers and says, it's never been legal. Although the two game wardens testified to a judge that in both of their 30 year careers, they have never cited anyone for recovering an animal after dark. So it's been illegal for 30 years. And these gentlemen have either never done their jobs before in this doesn't make.
[00:08:53] Speaker A: Sense to me that they were so adamant about setting up a sting.
If you're going to do it, just wait till you see a drone flying around and a guy is legit, right? Legit, trying to help a customer locate a carcass. And don't be hire and just try to set them up because it's like, guys, it just didn't make any sense on the whole, like, okay, it's been illegal for the 30 plus years, then now you have to set up a drone guy just doesn't make Ertle turtles a big bear.
[00:09:30] Speaker B: Shout out. Thanks for commenting. But Mike, this guy, I totally forgot what I was going to say. Going back to the sting, the senator with a little bit of a sly grin says, do you guys do a lot of stings?
Kind of like, is this like normal for you guys?
[00:09:50] Speaker A: No, just on drone guys. Just on drone guys. Because we're scared crapless that they're going to.
[00:09:55] Speaker B: And think of this, these game ordinance have used leniency to not enforce a rule that's been in law over their 30 year career. And they set up a sting to then enforce it for the first time. What? For 30 years they've never enforced.
[00:10:08] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:10:09] Speaker B: What the heck is going on?
[00:10:10] Speaker A: Exactly. Why, and that's why I keep saying this, there's more to this story than we're being.
[00:10:17] Speaker B: There's got to be.
[00:10:19] Speaker A: I don't know, did they have something against this pilot in Pennsylvania, Josh, or what? But it's like, come on, guys.
There was other people that were flying drones in Pennsylvania last season that had wardens show up while they're doing a legit recovery. Never once did they get a violation or the drone taken. Makes no.
[00:10:45] Speaker B: And then to the head of the game commission's point, he said, hey, this pilot was advised prior to the sting operation that it was not illegal activity, and he continued to do it. It's almost like saying he was advised that recovering any carcass after dark is illegal and for 30 years, it's never been enforced. And then he had the audacity to go ahead and actually continue doing that thing that had never in the last 30 years.
[00:11:15] Speaker A: So that's what they're trying to, the media is, they're trying to say that they've contacted Josh multiple times. Multiple times. And that's actually not true.
They can have their side and we can have the truth. And I have made contact with Josh, and he just says that's flat not true, that they've tried multiple times contacting him. So that part, they're trying to put it out there to make him look bad. Right. They're trying to look like Josh is wanting to break the know. See, they got a hold of him multiple times.
No, it's not like I.
[00:11:56] Speaker B: Am I remembering this incorrectly, Mike? Or was Josh the pilot that actually had an attorney request, like a letter of opinion to the state and never heard back from the state?
[00:12:06] Speaker A: Yeah, well, see, that also happened to us because when this was first getting started, I had a guy reach out to me from the Pittsburgh area, and he's a very well known guy, and he knew guys in the game commission. And so he reached out to the game commission, was, you know, I'm thinking about doing this. I want to do it. Can I do it? And the Pennsylvania Game commission was going to send a letter of opinion to drone deer recovery. They were going to do it. Never heard from them. Never heard from, like, we tried multiple times.
Let's have a conversation. Never worked, to your point, about an attorney reaching out to the game commission? I can't speak on that. I don't know for sure. But I do know that Josh had an attorney look into the statutes and how it works. And outside of that, I don't want to talk on legal.
[00:12:59] Speaker B: Yep. I just think it's interesting that the thing that the department is saying, that they're trying to nail him on is recovery of a carcass after dark instead of any, specifically using a drone in the aid of hunting. Why do you think that is?
[00:13:17] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't know why that is.
I don't know. The whole thing doesn't quite make sense.
Another reason is why can't you track a deer after 30 minutes after sunset? It's probably because 90% of drone recoveries are done after sunset. So even if this new legislation gets passed, and I hope Senator Coleman or some of his staff see this, you're going to want to put it in there that not only is drone deer recovery legal in Pennsylvania, it has to be legal at night as well. Because if you say it's legal, it's one thing, but to say that you can't do it 30 minutes after sunset, that kind of defeats the purpose. Because if you're doing this thermal drone, most of the time, you wait till it's dark. So they're pushing this thing about it not being legal 30 minutes after sundown. Is that their way of basically saying that, okay, Senator Coleman, if you're going to put this new bill in, well, then you technically still can't do it because it's 30 minutes after. You know what I'm saying?
[00:14:27] Speaker B: Yeah, I know what you're saying. It seems like the head of the commission does at the end kind of accept or admit that this is a new technology.
But, man, comparing, I think, was it the state of Missouri that last week is making the move to be one of the first states that actually updates their laws to allow this within regulation?
What a drastic difference.
[00:14:52] Speaker A: Which just makes sense, right? Some of those commissioners on that wildlife board were like, thanking Jason, the guy that brought this forward, about this new technology, and they're, it might we have to look at it in the future. How are we going to regulate and do this and do that? But it's like, let's move forward. Let's see what it looks like. Let's see how people use it. And if we have to really lock down on certain situations about drones, then let's do it. But let's not stop the good people from using it just because the bad person is going to go out and try to use it in a bad way. That shouldn't stop the good people from being allowed to use it to recover their carcasses.
I tell you what, hats off to Missouri coming to it and being good to go. And then on side of that is Indiana Senate bill one eight nine. That's getting really close to being put on the governor's desk to be voted on. So there's definitely a lot of states coming around to.
[00:16:00] Speaker B: You think Pennsylvania will eventually come around?
[00:16:04] Speaker A: I do believe they.
Yeah, it just takes some time.
Pennsylvania.
Yeah, I don't want to just keep going on.
They have a certain way of doing things and, yeah, we're going to try to push them. We will continue pushing them.
[00:16:23] Speaker B: What's other news, Mike? What else is happening since we're a news organization?
[00:16:28] Speaker A: Right, right. So drone deer recovery is throttling down as far as doing recoveries across the country. So what are we focused on now is agricultural.
If guys are listening, if guys are watching, if you love drones, I'm telling you right now, the industry to get in to really make life changing money is ag. It's agricultural drones used to spray whatever you want to spray. And so that's what I'm doing down here in Alabama. We're down here.
It's basically a ag drone convention.
Learning a bunch of stuff as far as rules, regs and new products and this and that. But I'm excited about the agricultural. We've already talked about it a little bit, is we are going to be releasing our own agricultural drone trailer because it starts with that and then getting drones set up to spray hundreds and thousands of acres.
[00:17:29] Speaker B: And there's different options when it comes to agricultural drone trailers. I think where we're coming from with our design is maximum efficiency for the operation that wants to cover thousands of acres in a season.
[00:17:45] Speaker A: Chad Freeman asks, what's going on with Michigan? Michigan is like every other state, just a slow process.
We're still in a suit with them, right?
[00:17:57] Speaker B: Yeah. They recently filed an appeal to dismiss the whole lawsuit on grounds that it's not relevant or something. So we're responding to that with like, no, it is relevant, and I don't think they're going to get it dismissed, but it just takes so many.
[00:18:15] Speaker A: Yeah, it's going to be a long, long, drawn out process for sure.
[00:18:19] Speaker B: I think there's a good chance that the state's going to come around and actually update the regulations around this in the state of Michigan before the lawsuit actually settles or before it is driven to a conclusion.
[00:18:32] Speaker A: Yeah, I could see that, which just makes sense. I mean, we can talk about it all day long about how valuable it actually is to hunters to be able to use it to recover a carcass. And my thing is, I always go back to the conservation side of it. If these people are for conservation and they're for having their tags be used on deer that are shot, why would you not want to find yourself with time? They're going to see that there's still good people in this world and they're going to allow it. Because if we think it's so bad, then the whole thing would be crumbling down and burning to the ground.
[00:19:11] Speaker B: Yeah, I think, Mike, you told me off camera that you've met a couple of guys this week that got started flying with a matrice that they bought through us, got thermal, and now they're exploring and getting into ag, which I think is so cool. And that's the route we took. I think that's the route a lot of guys are going to be taking. Start with the thermal drone.
[00:19:31] Speaker A: Yeah, because it's drones. They get into it in a slow way, like getting into deer recovery and then see how much fun it is to fly drones. And they're like, man, I really like to figure out how to do this full time and make a lot of money. And agricultural is one of those avenues. Spoke to a guy, I think he's from Florida here at the convention, bought him a 330 t from drone deer recovery and said that he's now looking into the agricultural side. And so that's why he's at this convention, is just to learn more about it. I was telling Kevin before we got on here, I kind of feel bad for some of you guys that have been watching along. And we've been saying that we're going to do ag, and we got ag coming ag this, and we are really close to being able to start producing that content and having you guys watch along. We will be releasing some on the drone deer recovery YouTube channel. But you're also going to want to subscribe to the new way ag. So it's new way ag on YouTube. N-U-W-A-Y. Ag on YouTube. That's where we're going to be putting a lot of our drone ag stuff on.
[00:20:39] Speaker B: Already. For anybody interested. It's like the trailer. You can see photos and we have a video coming later this week. But it's here, there's photos. You can see exactly what it's like, how it's set up. That's all on the website.
[00:20:55] Speaker A: So there's a question by rich. How do we charge for ag spraying? Very interested in having it done. Depends on the location where you're at. If you're asking for Ohio, that's where we're from. If you're close and if it's row crop, if it's a bunch of acres, pricing is a little difficult just to say it's this much per acre, because if it's $12 an acre and you got five acres, it's not going to be enough to get us out. But overall, row crops, corn, beans, that type of thing, you got lots of acres. Anywhere from twelve dollars to seventeen dollars an acre is what we would charge to apply. Now, that's not including your chemical. You, as the farmer, would buy the chemical and then we would apply it for you.
[00:21:44] Speaker B: Another question. Often people have a follow up question of, well, how many acres can you spray in a day?
[00:21:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
And that varies a lot on your field. Like, is it wide open? Is it just flat? Is it smooth running?
It's just hard to say that. So if you take flattest of handcake field, no obstacles, no power lines, no trees, no nothing, your drone, with peak efficiency, you should be able to hit anywhere between 32 and 40 acres per hour per drone is what you should be able to do if you're running peak efficiency. But that's a field that's super flat. Nothing. In a way, when you start getting into hills and trees and power lines and that type of stuff, then it takes a lot longer and there's a.
[00:22:32] Speaker B: Little work, right, for each field, like setting up each boundary and stuff. So it also depends if it's a single field or if it's like ten smaller cut up pieces.
[00:22:41] Speaker A: That's why we want to educate you guys how this whole process works. So make sure to go over to the new YouTube channel. Like I said, we'll have some on the drone deer recovery YouTube channel as well. But we're going to get into that. We're going to show you how we run an efficient operation.
[00:22:58] Speaker B: And actually, for anyone buying a t 40, we're doing live, in person weekly training events.
[00:23:03] Speaker A: So at our headquarters, anybody that buys a rig from us, you are going to want hands on training, because there's just so much more to learn. It's not like unboxing a baby drone or a matrix 30 t or something like that.
You're flying down low, you're around obstacles, you are in the soup like you are in the stuff. You don't want to be where those drones. Right? You go up high and you're up where there's not stuff to be hit. And so, yeah, there's a lot to.
I don't know how long you were thinking of keeping this rolling, but basically that was my biggest thing is I wanted to hit on the Pennsylvania thing and get that back out.
[00:23:51] Speaker B: So, Mike, is there any update on the case in Louisiana? You can bring us up to speed on.
[00:23:57] Speaker A: The only update that I have is I text him the other day, Matt, he's the pilot that had his drone confiscated in Louisiana, asked him if there's an update, and he said, well, do you have it, Kevin? Because I can't reference it right now in front of.
[00:24:17] Speaker B: So he got a letter.
I don't know if you can read that if you're watching, but, yeah, tell us what it says.
Are you able to see it, Mike?
[00:24:27] Speaker A: No, I cannot see it.
[00:24:31] Speaker B: It's too small for me to see.
[00:24:34] Speaker A: I'll just reference it. Don't hold me to this. Basically, I asked Matt, hey, what's the update? And the update is that their local court threw it out, said, get this junk out of here. It's no bueno.
[00:24:48] Speaker B: We're not going to prosecute.
[00:24:50] Speaker A: Yeah. Yep. Not. Not doing it. And so they're trying to get federal charges on them, but they said that it's very unlikely that the federal would do anything if it's already been thrown out by local.
Just another one of those cases that it's like, oh, it's this new technology. Let's try to charge this guy. It's like, come on, guys. Come on.
[00:25:15] Speaker B: And Mike, I don't know if you remember the first press release that the game department in Louisiana did about this case. They were like three men cited for.
[00:25:26] Speaker A: They made it look like they're just out there using this drone to poach deer. They were not trying to use the drone to poach deer.
That's news media. That's how we can get stories and sides. And so it totally wasn't like that. We will release the full phone recordings once it's all done so you can hear it exactly how it was from the hunter's perspective and from the drone pilot's perspective.
[00:25:54] Speaker B: We've been asked to not do that until the case closes due to their legal advice, but, yeah, that'll be good. Austin, is there anything else? Anybody with questions or wants to jump in?
Not so much. Okay. This is the first time we're doing a live show like this. So we probably do these in the evening. Mike, at some.
[00:26:16] Speaker A: Agree. Yep. I want to do it to where a lot of. Because most of our audience currently on YouTube are older folks that are probably hold a job. And so we want to do when you guys get off of work and you're at home and you're able to jump on with us live. So that will be something that we'll look at in the future.
[00:26:38] Speaker B: Yeah. So future shows, man. We're going to want to hear, like every show. Want to hear from you guys. You can jump on, have conversation, ask questions, give your opinion. We want to hear from you. That'll be a normal part of the show going forward. Got another question here.
[00:26:53] Speaker A: No, we are not going to the Iowa Deer classic. As of right now, there might be some drone guys there, but not drone deer recovery.
[00:27:07] Speaker B: Our next show is on.
It's the open season expo in Columbus, Ohio on Thursday, March 14 to March 17. So if you're in Ohio, you can see the booth, see the drones. Had a gentleman call me this week and say, hey, I just want to see a drone. I want to see how it works. And I told him there's probably no better way to really get a feeling for how the technology works than just to come to an expo. Speak with Mike, speak with our team, see the thermal cameras, see the thermal drone, see the big drone.
Just videos, bunch of tvs playing, or I guess two tvs playing. So that's a great way to interact if you want to see it hands on and actually look at what it feels like. So we'd love to see you there. Other than that, Mike, I don't think I have anything else on our side.
[00:27:55] Speaker A: No, I think I've hit what I wanted to hit today. Like I said, I do appreciate all you guys tuning in and listening to drone gear recovery and supporting it, but I feel like, like I said in the beginning, I don't want to just turn into a news channel, right? Like bringing you this news, but I want to inform you guys. So it's going to get lightened up, right? We're going to start doing some really fun stuff and new footage and that type of thing. So do stick around for that stuff and we'll keep bringing you guys entertaining content here on drone deer recovery.
[00:28:31] Speaker B: Thanks for tuning in. I guess this means we'll see you on the next episode of the Drone Deer Recovery podcast.
