EP 593. Ground-Zero Manitoba: Shifting Wildlife and Public Land Paradigm?

Ramsey Russell: Welcome back to MOJO’s Duck Season Somewhere podcast. Listen up, something’s gone wrong in Manitoba. Wildlife is vanishing. Crownland is disappearing. Crownland is being their public land. Unregulated hunting is tipping the balance. Is it a warning shot for the rest of North America? Rob Olson joins us to talk about what’s happening north of the border should matter to every hunter, conservationist, and citizen who cares about the future of wild things and wild places. Rob, how the heck are you? Good to see you again.

Rob Olson: Yeah, good to see you and doing great. Winter’s finally over here, so in Canada, that’s a big deal for us in the south. When the fall comes and you’re not sweating anymore. So you guys suffer hot summers, we suffer winters. But, yeah, we’re coming out of our cold season and no, life’s good, we’re doing really good.

Ramsey Russell: So what is spring like in Manitoba? We’re recording here in mid-April. What is spring like in deep in Manitoba? Are the lake still frozen?

Rob Olson: Yeah. I mean, you can still drive your truck on the ice right now, right? People think we’re crazy, we drive our trucks on the ice all winter and you still can. Spring’s funny here, Ramsey, it’s almost like we survived another one.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: Like, I can only imagine what the southern must have felt like when they came here and tried to get through these winters. But it’s like the life, everything starts to thaw, like, the pace of life, the ducks come back, everything’s breeding. It’s like hope.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: We made it. And we look forward to the coming season. So, yeah, spring is always exciting here because the winters are long and we have fun in the winter, you know how we are. You know us pretty well, I think, we have fun, we play, we hunt and fish all winter.

Ramsey Russell: To put a Canadian winner in perspective, I was with somebody from Manitoba in Dallas, Texas, one January day, and it was a cold day for Dallas, Texas, and we got to a red light, he’s like, golly, just listen. Oh, my gosh. I’m like, what? He said, listen and you could hear all these just big mobs of black birds up in the trees. I’m like, yeah. He said, Ramsey, in Manitoba right now it is stone silent, you don’t hear anything but the wind sweeping over the snow and the ice. And that’s hard for a southern guy to get his mind wrapped around.

“Isn’t that something? Like when the fall comes, and the fall season here is a big change, so the fall comes here and the ducks leave and the geese, they leave and everything leaves and it gets quiet, it’s unreal.”

Rob Olson: Isn’t that something? Like when the fall comes, and the fall season here is a big change, so the fall comes here and the ducks leave and the geese, they leave and everything leaves and it gets quiet, it’s unreal. It’s definitely quiet. And we don’t have a lot of birds that spend the winter. And so, yeah, life in the winter is quiet and different and changes. And then spring, they all come back. You keep them down there and send them home and we call it home, they come back to breed. So the seasons are big changes and spring’s an optimistic one, I would say. We’re always optimistic, except for the challenges we’re facing here at the moment, I guess.

Ramsey Russell: Rob, introduce yourself to everybody listening. Who are you and what you do?

Rob Olson: Yeah. Look at Johnny Cash at conservation, I’ve been everywhere. So I spend a lot, I’ve done lots of stuff. I come from a farm originally, I’m a duck biologist by training, I was trained by the Delta Waterfowl foundation and owe them a lot of thanks for my career and training. I’ve worked all over North America, I ran Delta Waterfowl for a piece. As I mentioned before we started up here, some of my best years were down in the States. Met the most incredible people down there. I got to hunt all over America and learn that the waterfowling culture down there is so cool and diverse. And so I had the honor and pleasure to work in the States and learned a lot there. I was an advocate in Washington and state legislatures. I learned a lot about what I know now about how to make change. I learned in America from lots of great folks and mentors down there. So I did that for years. I worked in environmental consulting up here, I’ve done all kinds of stuff, I’ve been around. And I worked at the Federation as a consultant back in 2014 after I left Delta back in those days. And then I went in government for about 7 years to try to make changes to the fishery here after I came home from working in the States and moved back and met my wife and had a kid and got to work here when in government still sort of suffering from PTSD from that, if I’m being honest, that government thing. But I do often think about my times in the US and since I was in government here, I learned a lot more about how it actually works. I think now I’ve learned a lot more about how to actually make change. And I feel like going back down to the States, Ramsey, and apologizing for young Rob, because I just ran through walls when I was down there, I didn’t have a soft game.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, but you got the job done, Rob.

Rob Olson: And we went like that. Yeah, I’ve been around, I’ve had a long career, I’ve been blessed. My dad always used to tease me when he was alive that I never worked a real day in my life, he was in construction and I’ve had the honor and pleasure just to do my passion my whole life, I don’t feel like I’ve worked a day in my life. And now I’m semi-retired, came out of government here in February of last year and back to the Federation. And honestly, I was contemplating doing something totally different, just taking a break, I’d been around and had a great run in conservation, but I live here, my son’s 17. The changes that I see happening here kind of mean that I can’t, I won’t leave it, and I won’t leave my friends and the conflicts that we find ourselves in now. Of all the challenges I’ve seen in conservation and facing hunters and hunting, this is the biggest challenges I’ve ever seen in my career, right now, right here.

Ramsey Russell: Right now, right here, today. Rob, backing up. Just where’d you grow up? Are you from Manitoba historically?

Rob Olson: Yeah, I am. I was born and raised right here. I had a unique upbringing where my dad and mom, my mom was from a farm, my dad was from a town. My dad was a construction man, he ran a company, built a company. But we bought a farm, and so we farmed it and also lived in the city.

Ramsey Russell: Where in Manitoba thereabouts?

Rob Olson: So down by Carmen, Manitoba a little town called Spurling, Manitoba, is where our farm was at and that’s where my mom was born and raised, and that’s where her family farm was. So we farmed in the summers and spring, summer, fall, and then spent the winters in the city when I was young and that was awesome. And the whole time I was on the farm, I was finding bird nests and duck nests and I was trapping and hunting. And so our family, we grew up trapping, hunting and fishing that was our happy time. And my dad was a busy man. And my only time I really got time with that guy because he was building hydro lines and hydro dams and big buildings and stuff. And my only time to have really quality time with him was in the bush. And so I trapped as a kid, trapping still probably my favorite, but fishing and hunting is what we did. And then I followed that into biology, and that all came from the farm, actually, to be honest with you.

“Did you waterfowl hunt growing up or was that or was that kind of a -? Because Canadians, I do know some serious Canadians, some close friends of mine are some of the most serious waterfowlers I know, but it is different. It seems like when elk season is open, when deer season is open, that’s what those guys passion is.”

Ramsey Russell: Did you waterfowl hunt growing up or was that or was that kind of a -? Because Canadians, I do know some serious Canadians, some close friends of mine are some of the most serious waterfowlers I know, but it is different. It seems like when elk season is open, when deer season is open, that’s what those guys passion is.

Rob Olson: So we’re not quite as serious as you all about it, right? You guys are serious as a heart attack when it comes to waterfowling, but we love it too. But for me, yeah, like, if you had to ask me to pick one thing, my wife’s across the door here probably would give me heck if she heard me say this because she says everything’s my favorite.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: That I would hunt fish if I had a chance. But my favorite’s water duck hunting. I shot my first duck 50 years ago when I was 5 years old, I shot a teal in the delta marsh and I’ve been hunting every year ever since. And man, I live for it. I do it all. I hunt big game, I fish, I trap, I hunt, I chase everything that lives here that we could eat, but I live for duck hunting. That’s my thing. I love it. Well, I won’t preach to you about it, I mean, you do way more than I do, but I love it. It’s like nothing else, it’s amazing.

Ramsey Russell: You talked about being –

Rob Olson: But it’s all changed.

Ramsey Russell: It’s changed. Of courses it’s change. Everything’s changed. The whole continent’s changed.

Rob Olson: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: Rob, you talked about working with Delta Waterfowl, that’s when we met.

Rob Olson: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: I think for those listening, let me tell you when and kind of how I met Rob Olson, it was 25 maybe years ago right here in Jackson, Mississippi and it was the exact time in history that Delta Waterfowl transition from a research unit to that trained practically all of the waterfowl biologists to your local banquet. And we were a part of the first Jackson, Mississippi chapter. And that’s who Rob Olson was. You were the guy running, I’ve been everywhere, man, like Johnny Cash all over the United States getting this set up, you got to be proud of that.

Rob Olson: You know what, I get emotional thinking about it. The people I met, like yourself and I think of Jackson and all those years in that time that could, by the way, that food, what the people, my goodness. It was an honor. I remember, right now I’m doing town hall meetings here to try to rally humans around the idea that we need to push back on these things, people forcing change on us.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: That we don’t hunt like in Creighton parks, we can’t hunt in all this kind of thing. But I did that down there too. Like I remember doing at one point, I did 10 cities and 11 nights. And back then it was where were the ducks? And we saw issues up here with duck production, my own research was on the impact of predators on ducks, which was devastating and in the potluck country where I did my work and I just remember doing all those cities and I was younger then, I can’t do it like I used to, like 2 cities and 5 nights is my speed now. But back then, when I was young, I did 10 cities. I started in Atlanta, I ended up in Houston. And the people I met, I will never forget those people. The best freaking people I ever met in my life. And I won’t start shouting out names because I’ll forget some. But in those towns and all those little towns and Lafayette and Beaumont and Houston and Dallas and all everywhere in between and Jackson and all through Arkansas and I never met more passionate hunters in my whole life and they wanted to know and they wanted to understand and they wanted to help, and they were generous and thoughtful and the best humans I’ve met. And actually, now that I’m doing those meetings here, Ramsey around prairie, country of Manitoba, it’s the same thing and it’s hopeful. In a room and guys are passionate and they want change and they want to make a difference, like, it’s hopeful because you get these forces that want to hurt you, right? And then the people are terrific. And as long as people will show up and nudge back, we have a shot to maintain our lifestyle. So those were the greatest years, I’ll never forget it. When I eventually do semi-retirement, I’m going to go on a reunion tour down there.

Ramsey Russell: Well, come on, man. We’d be glad to see you and feed you some of that good southern hospitality.

Rob Olson: I need more of that food one more time, I need that food again.

“You mentioned the most challenging times in wildlife conservation, this coming from a guy that spent 30 years pushing conservation initiatives that basically brought delta waterfowl to the local zip code that everybody listening has seen and heard about, you’re that guy. But now you say it’s the most challenging of times. What is the growing crisis in wildlife management in Manitoba?”

Ramsey Russell: You mentioned the most challenging times in wildlife conservation, this coming from a guy that spent 30 years pushing conservation initiatives that basically brought delta waterfowl to the local zip code that everybody listening has seen and heard about, you’re that guy. But now you say it’s the most challenging of times. What is the growing crisis in wildlife management in Manitoba? What’s the big picture of what’s happening right now and why groups like Manitoba Wildlife Federation are raising the alarm?

Rob Olson: So the simplest way I can say it is we’ve got a combination of our current provincial government and our federal government are push programs to control land, create parks, protect land in Manitoba. And the processes that are happening, and I’ll give you examples in a bit here, but like different names and acronyms and different approaches, but the same theme which is kind of controlling the land and taking the control out of the hands of, of some of us. And one of the things that started happening like it started with moose and I noticed, ready to talk to you, you asked about declining species, one of our biggest declining species is moose. And so as our moose populations have declined, and that’s its own story in itself why that’s going on, there became sort of conflict over who should get the moose. And something that people, folks might not understand, your listeners in the US is that in our constitution, Indigenous rights to hunt are protected in under section 35 of our constitution. And that means that Indigenous people here have the right and the priority to harvest game on all of our public land. We call it Crownland here, you’d call it public land, but our public/Crownland, Indigenous people have special rights to harvest. And so governments have always had the challenge of having to balance those constitutional rights with people like me who don’t have harvesting rights. But we also have section 15 of our constitution which says we’re all equal. So governments have to balance those two things. And so what happened here and why I came back, my life changed June 17^th last summer and it starts this whole thing for me. And I was talking to friends in the Delta because I know all these guys and gals in conservation and they were concerned about these things going on, and I saw there was a Facebook post by, there’s an organization called the Northern Chiefs Organization in Manitoba, the north half of the province, there’s the chiefs of all the Indigenous communities come together to govern and to collaborate. And they put out a Facebook post on June 17 and the Facebook post basically was them with our current premier and some of the ministers saying, that basically they demanded that licensed moose hunters, licensed being non-Indigenous licensed moose hunters, they demanded that those seasons be stopped in their area. And they demanded that law enforcement, conservation officers, you’d call them game wardens, we call them COs, should not be enforcing mantle laws on Indigenous people, made a bunch of demands in that regard. And we saw that and we thought okay. And then about 2 days later I got an email from government. And up here, if you want to hunt moose, you got to put your name in a draw, like a lottery. Like you folks would know about hunting elk in the mountains, there’s lots of draw hunts, so we have the same thing. Not enough for everyone to shoot them. So we all of us draw on applicants, licensed hunters, non-indigenous hunters, we get this email saying that the draw has been paused at that time because that’s about when the results were going to be coming out for the draw. So we knew change was coming. And that’s like, no, that’s 2 days after this meeting. And I was in government long enough to know they don’t do anything in 2 days. Like, government takes weeks, months and years to get stuff done, much to our chagrin often. We’re like, come on guys, let’s go. But so we saw that and then by sort of July, I think it was July 12^th is when government came out with this decision was that they were cutting 75% of the licensed moose tags in 4 game hunting areas. So those communities that went in and made the demands got that response like immediately. So demand made and decision given. And that decision we took great issue with it Ramsay, because in our view like, we had a pretty good idea they didn’t have good moose data for the area. So, we’re for science based conservation, so why are you cutting tags unless the moose are the moose declining in that area and that’s pretty far north and kind of remote and our members up there didn’t feel like the moose had collapsed to that extent. The second thing was, there was no process there in terms of engaging with licensed hunters, they were only talking to the Indigenous hunters in that area and communities, but not talking to the rest of us. So that all goes on, so we did the thing with something we’ve never done before we filed for judicial review. We took the province to court and said, we don’t believe your decisions fair or just based on science, based on good practice and good policies and based on how they would normally set regulations and with breaking from all those norms and not reasonable in our view. So that case got heard on November 12 and 13, it’s an ongoing decision now. The justice system has not decided on that process going forward. So that was the first thing that got our attention to say, holy mackerel, like demand made decision given capitulation and not inclusive. And the worst part of it is that approach, it alienates people. We have a term up like reconciliation, and it’s about Indigenous people and non-Indigenous people coming together to work together, we’re all living here now, right? We all live here. We have to learn to share this thing we call Manitoba one way or the other, we’re going to have to share it and respect each other and be at the table. So when government only works on one side, it drives wedges between all of us. We have enough trouble reconciling already without government pitting us against each other and only talking to one or the other. And I have lots of Indigenous sort of contacts and different friends and from over the years and like, we talk about these issues all the time. And one of the points one of my friends made was, this is what’s happened for years to us. And I think government policy in Canada has largely failed Indigenous people here, it just has. It hasn’t worked. And so they were shut out of these conversations for years, they didn’t get a say in moose management. And now, unfortunately, pendulums never stop in the middle with change. We see that I think –

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, right.

Rob Olson: Like, so you’re way over here, you’re not talking to First Nation hunters about moose enough or even at all. And then you go all the way over here where you don’t talk to us at all. And so, why can we never find the middle of Ramsey where we all get to be at the table? Like, stop driving us apart. So that was the first piece and that was just the beginning. It was like every week. So the next piece that came was we became aware of something called the Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas, IPCAs and this is part of a UN movement. 30 by 30. You probably heard about it. It’s at the UN, there was a vision there to protect 30% of the world’s lands and waters by 2030. So protection vision and on the surface, you were hunters, we want to see –

“Going back just a little bit, you’re talking about them locking up, making all this green area, which sounds like a good thing. We’ve got all these national parks and wildlife refuges and all this green space, sounds like a noble and great idea.”

Ramsey Russell: Going back just a little bit, you’re talking about them locking up, making all this green area, which sounds like a good thing. We’ve got all these national parks and wildlife refuges and all this green space, sounds like a noble and great idea. On the surface it sounds like a great idea. Why isn’t it a great idea?

Rob Olson: So here’s what happens. So one of the tools government’s been using here, this is the federal government’s been pushing this green vision 30 by 30. One of the tools is IPCAs. So indigenous protected Consumption Served Areas. And right now, Manitoba, they’ve planned for, there’s nine of them being planned. And so one of the first ones that we became aware of at the same time the moose thing was going on, it’s called the Seal River Watershed Protected Area. And for folks listening, that’s way in the northern part of Manitoba, right on the border of Northwest Territories. And it’s an area west of Churchill, it’s a huge watershed. Like it’s 50,000 square kilometers. So it’s like 12 million acres of land. It’s 8% of the province, it’s huge, it’s 1 of 9 and we become aware of it. And the idea, as best we can tell, and I say as best we can tell because one of the problems is none of it’s transparent enough. Like, we can’t get great information about it, we can’t engage in it. But it looks to be a form of a federal park where the province would sign off on control of that land to the federal government and then federal government would either keep that control and make a park or pass the control to First Nation communities. So we became aware of it. We have lots of friends that hunt and fish there, I have. We have lots of friends who have lodges up there. I think, Ramsay, there’s something like 47 tourism operators in that area who make their living on it, who bring critical economic benefit to that northern region. We don’t have a lot of economic activity up there. A lot of those operators actually employ indigenous people from communities, like it’s critical. So the park comes along idea and we’re looking at it, we’re asking questions and then they’ve had public meetings, but they wouldn’t let us attend.

Ramsey Russell: Anytime, there’s a lack of transparency, I get suspicious. Call it tinfoil hat, call it what you want, but man, I mean, when government entities, especially when you start getting up to the Wildlife Economic Forum and United Nations and all these cloak and acronyms, when there’s a lack of transparency, my radar goes off. Why wouldn’t they be transparent?

Rob Olson: Well, and like, for sure. And so when we started being concerned, but some of the advocates on the other side are organizations like there’s environmental groups up here called, there’s one group called Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, CPAs. So they partner with first nation communities to partner with government, provincial and federal to promote this idea of a new park, a new protected area. But we’ve been through this before, we’ve seen this before. So they’ve accused us of fear mongering, but we’re actually just afraid and I think legitimately afraid. So in that same area, if you can think of, if folks look at a map and see Churchill, it’s the polar bear capital of the world, right? We have a lot of polar bear tourism there. And you look south at Churchill, there’s a park called Wapusk National Park. And we know enough old timers that were around when that park was established that they were promised they’d be able to hunt and fish there. And now non-indigenous hunting is not allowed. So when people say in the front end, they’ll say, don’t worry, you’ll be able to hunt, but you laugh.

Ramsey Russell: Trust me –

“And one of the problems with this, and I’m going to tell you more examples of it, one of the problems with these schemes is that the people telling us not to worry aren’t the ones with the authority. So if an environmental group like CPAS says don’t worry, we support hunting, except on their website it says that they support aboriginal hunting on parks, not licensed hunters.”

Rob Olson: Ramsey, you’re a scaremonger, you shouldn’t be laughing. Don’t worry, right? And one of the problems with this, and I’m going to tell you more examples of it, one of the problems with these schemes is that the people telling us not to worry aren’t the ones with the authority. So if an environmental group like CPAS says don’t worry, we support hunting, except on their website it says that they support aboriginal hunting on parks, not licensed hunters. So when people like that tell us that don’t worry, you’ll be able to hunt, well, they’re writing checks that we can’t cash, they don’t have the authority and their words won’t mean something 40 years from now and my 17 year old doesn’t get to go there anymore. So we’re legitimately concerned and I think if we weren’t concerned we would be foolish and naive. And so that’s the first one and now more of them are rolling out. There’s been a couple since. There’s one called the Fisher River Protected Area, which you probably know about because it’s right in the Interlake.

Ramsey Russell: So I don’t get too confused. We were talking about the UN endorsed ICPA 30 by 30, that was locking up 12 million acres of pristine wilderness in northern Manitoba.

Rob Olson: That’s 1 of 9.

Ramsey Russell: 1 of 9. And in those areas they’re saying that licensed hunters, that is non-indigenous, cannot consume or enjoy it in consumptive recreational purposes. Is that the gist of this?

Rob Olson: The people that are advocating are saying we will be. But the problem is, if it’s a federal park reserve, a federal park, licensed hunters are automatically banned. Indigenous hunters are automatically exempted and allowed. So now the federal government would have to make an exception to let non-Indigenous people hunt and fish there, so this is why people are concerned. And they went through this with another park in that same region, they’ve had a history with this. And so they’re jaded, they’re cynical and they should be. And so the assurances haven’t been coming, the information’s been too slow by half and the interests that don’t support the scheme haven’t been allowed to be part of the problem process yet. So the engagement’s been not good enough by half. So there’s that and now there’s more IPCAs we’re hearing about and learning about the other ones. And another one now is right in the inner lake and it’s called the Fisher River Protected area by Arborg, just north of Winnipeg in that southern, sort of mid interlake country that you’ll know and remember and you’ll know from a hunting perspective. So there’s a protected area being promoted there. And again it’s CPAs and First Nation communities promoting it. And one of the First Nation communities in particular, we have a deep admiration for, because we work with them in the past in different ways on the commercial fishery in Lake Winnipeg and they’ve been, I don’t know, frankly, outstanding in terms of their conservation ethic. Like there’s really good people involved on that side, but there isn’t trust of CPAs. And in fairness to CPAs in leading these protection programs, it shouldn’t really be them leading these things. By the way, Ramsay shouldn’t be us either. Like when you’re talking about land decisions that affects sovereignty as a province, it can’t be one group or the other, the elected officials they have to have a role to be in the middle that we elected them, it should be for them to govern this process and bring us all to the table. Because it’s got to be an impartial third party. It can’t be us, it can’t be that other side. And so the other side’s driving the process and being funded by millions of federal dollars. And Ramsey, we’re being funded by donations at town hall meetings, selling 20 raffle tickets, that’s how we’re funded. But those other groups are getting millions of public dollars to promote that vision that’s coming from the UN. So it’s from the UN to Canada to the province and we’ve been shut out of it.

Ramsey Russell: What might the UN have to do with this?

Rob Olson: People are furious about it.

Ramsey Russell: That’s where it goes off the rails in connecting the dots to me is, what might United Nations have to do with a project like this?

Rob Olson: In our view, they shouldn’t. I mean, look, the United Nations –

Ramsey Russell: It’s got to be coming from somewhere. It’s got to be a long term play, a long term vision well beyond my thought process.

Rob Olson: Yeah, like, I mean, on that side, your guess is as good as mine. I mean, who knows? I mean, my basic thing is, here’s what I do know. I know now when I look at this, and I learned this through all those years of working in the States as well, is that all politics are local. It should be. And by the way, good management should be too. And the one thing I’ve never been let down by is local people. And I’ve seen unbelievable indigenous people in communities that knew stuff and were smart and knew how to manage moose. I’ve seen non-indigenous people in local communities. Hey, the locals know where the elk are, they always have. To me, local communities, whether they’re indigenous people or not, to me in my career have been undefeated in terms of their knowledge and their idea of what should happen. So the closest we get to local people having a say, the better. The stuff from the UN to me, that to me, that’s not compelling for wildlife. It all depends on the local people and what’s going on. And so the whole thing about the protection is taking access out of everyone’s hands. It’s like, if that’s the case, what are we doing here? What are we living here for? Like, I had a meeting in Thompson about the moose and there was guys up there working the mine and they said to me, if I can’t access this land efficient hunt, what am I doing here? Like, I don’t live in Thompson, I live to fish and hunt, that’s why I tolerate -42. In January because that moose camp in September gets me to the next one. So this is a struggle for control of the land. So whatever vision’s driving it at 50000ft, Ramsey, you tell me, but I’m telling you this is a struggle for absolutely for the sovereignty of our province in my mind. And the thing is, we have to have reconciliation here to progress as a province. You have a very different situation vis a vis your native peoples. Ours is like here, probably one of our number one issues is we need indigenous communities to be successful economically, we need it, they want it, we need it, we have to share resources, we have to work together. And I think they need us and I would suggest we need them.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: This kind of policy from the UN delivered by these governments where they separate us and they pit us against each other is devastating. Like, I just hope we can put that back in the barn, that horse, it’s because feelings can get so afraid and people get so angry that you can’t come together again. So this is a pivotal moment for our province. And it started with moose and now it’s just about who owns the resources. It’s about minerals and forest and rivers, it’s about can my kid actually go to that land at all? I mean, that’s what it’s blowing into. It’s way past moose. Moose is just –

Ramsey Russell: In your experience, how did it go from moose to essentially land ownership or resource? I mean, because it’s gone from most to precious minerals and access.

Rob Olson: Yes.

Ramsey Russell: How did you follow it? Like man, you become aware in your current position about this moose issue, and here we are months later talking about total control of land and resources. What was the step process for you to uncover all this?

Rob Olson: So for us, first, I’ll say what uncovered it. What uncovered it was holding those town hall meetings because we just had a sense of let’s go out on the land and talk to communities and see what they’re seeing and hearing. And to a large extent, and I think I’ve done 25 meetings in towns now and they’re always full rooms. Like some of the rooms are standing room only people are concerned and they told us. Here’s my thing, the reason I wanted to do town hall meetings for Delta back in the day is, I always have this belief that you go talk to duck hunters going to, everything’s possible with knowledge and they’re going to tell you what’s going on. So for me, when we were in the community, they were telling us about things we didn’t even know about. And that’s the power of, I think what we’re building here is that people, we’re all connected now. Now we’re effective because they were tipping us off on things that we frankly didn’t even know about. Because, by the way, the government’s engagement – So I’ll give you an example, have a town hall meeting, and I’ll say, hey, who in here feels like they understand that they know about the Seal River Watershed Indigenous Protector, show of hands, it’ll be a hundred people, 2 hands. And they’re probably the 2 people I talk to. So part of this discovery is we’re all discovering together at the same time. Because I don’t think government has done nearly a good enough job of telling people. And I won’t go so far as to say it’s on purpose. You tell me, I won’t put that tinfoil hat on. But I’ll just say, either way, it’s no good. So you can’t make these kind of decisions without people really knowing and understanding. But the two things that drove it to me are several indigenous communities started suing governments saying, this is our land, these are our resources, so there’s multiple communities doing that. So that’s going on. We intervened in one of those cases that’s over here. So it’s community suing for control. The other part of it is the governments with this protection vision, is a way to protect the land from resource development and then kind of pass control to indigenous people. So they both have the same outcome from different directions potentially. And so both need to be sort of nudged back on. And our challenge is, how do you nudge back on that Ramsey in a way that doesn’t divide everybody, and I’m real careful when I make these presentations. I say at the start, I say, listen, if you’re in the room and you’re an indigenous person, you’re welcome here. This is a meeting to organize licensed hunters and anglers. But if you’re here and you’re indigenous, you’re welcome. And I’m going to talk about some sensitive stuff, and if I make you mad, will you tell me at the end? And so far, it’s been well received by all people. We got to talk about these sensitive things or we’re not going to get anywhere. And if we don’t nudge back, what is the outcome for my son at 17 years old? You got to nudge back, like, we got to try to get this thing in the center, and it ain’t in the center right now, I’m just going to tell you that. So and those are just a few things that are happening.

Ramsey Russell: Rob, how would you assess provincial government’s response to these concerns and how are their policies helping and exacerbating the situation? You’ve been all over it, talking about it, but just sum it up. It almost sounds to me like the provincial government’s response, it’s like it’s almost being decided beyond them.

Rob Olson: Well, here’s the thing. It feels like to me Manitoba is almost the show home for this vision in Canada. It almost feels like, back in the day we had this crazy idea at Delta called ALUS Alternative Land Use Services and it was about paying farmers to leave land for ducks and it was working with farmers for conservation. It wasn’t buying whole quarter sections and competing with farmers for land, but it was definitely doing conservation on farms. It was a working lands farm program that raised ducks. And we were trying to get it started, this vision in Canada and little old Prince Edward Island is on the east coast, the nicest humans, well, they remind me of some place some people I met in Louisiana, go there and stay for a week and they feed you and hang out, they’re that kind of people, those kind of people. And so a little tiny province in island and they adopted the ALUS concept and it gave us a chance to have a show home. This was a way to show all the other provinces, hey, this is a different way of working with farmers. In that case, it was potato farmers, there was massive trout die offs because the runoff from the potato fields was turning the rivers red and it was killing trout and salmon. So we got that province to buy into, because a couple incredible individuals in government bought into it and allowed us to talk to all the other provinces. And I believe, I suspect that’s happening here is that Manitoba has been identified because you’ve got a situation here where the current provincial government and the federal government have joined forces on this 30 by 30 vision. And so you ask about what the provincial government’s role’s been. Their role has been, they’ve been very clear, they support 30 by 30, they’ve been encouraging this protection vision. We believe that the non-indigenous interests have been not included by the province nearly enough. We believe that the provincial government has not effectively been in the middle and led the process to have fair outcomes, to make sure that we’re all at the table, to do what they’re supposed to be doing, in our view, which is be fair arbiters for all sides not picking sides, saying, we represent all Manitobans and we need to have good conversations with everybody involved. And we don’t feel like they’ve done that to this point. And we’re hoping that they will. We’re hoping they’re going to change course and bring all the rest of us to the table before more harm is done to reconciliation here.

Ramsey Russell: What is 30 by 30 exactly? Is that township ranges? What is the context of 30 by 30?

Rob Olson: So it comes from the UN. It’s the UN plan to protect 30% of the Earth’s land and waters by 2030. So that’s where the 30 by 30 comes from. 30% protected by 2030. So that’s the idea.

Ramsey Russell: In North America or worldwide?

Rob Olson: Worldwide. They want the whole planet. And then the countries go away and they adopt it, the idea. And we could probably agree the intent of it on some levels is, there’s good intentions in it. They want land, they want biodiversity, they want conservation as hunters, we want that too, but without losing access to it. Oh, and by the way, we do need to have an economy too?

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: Like, I think right now, Manitoba is probably, it might be last in Canada. Like, I think we get the second most transfer payments up here. Rich provinces support the weaker ones economically and so I think we’re second in transfer payments only to Quebec, which tells me we need the money worse than everybody else. And you only got to drive around here. You asked about the spring, spring’s pothole season, Ramsey. So as soon as the ice melts and you drive around these streets, like these streets that we have here in Winnipeg and in Manitoba at times look more like a developing nation than a G7 nation. Like, we are financially in trouble here, in our view. So protection’s fine, but also we do need to have forestry. Like, we do need to have these things happening. And by the way, isn’t that the best way to provide employment for our indigenous communities in the north? But listen, that conversation has to involve everybody. Like, everybody’s got to be at the table for that. Like, these decisions are being made are potentially going to alter the course of our province forever. And people don’t understand it, and it’s happening without their full knowledge, and it’s not okay. Like, I’m coming at it from a hunter’s perspective, I’m a moose hunter and a duck hunter, and all those things, but everyone else that uses that land, either for their livings, for their survival, their careers, feeding their families, or for other uses beyond hunting. And whether it be camping, cottages or whatever it might be, nobody feels secure right now. And I don’t think they should because the assurances aren’t there and it’s not open, not transparent, it’s not cool on any level.

Ramsey Russell: The UN involvement is what’s so interesting to me, and I just kind of looked it up so I could talk about it. It’s 193 countries that exist for the purpose of peacekeeping, humanitarian aid, climate and sustainability, global health, human rights and justice. So I can see where they might want to set aside 30% green area. But the interesting part to me that hasn’t yet been mentioned is that this fall, I believe it was this fall in comes the World Economic Forum. And what was their involvement with the Indigenous communities. Here comes something called the World Economic Forum that gives the Indigenous communities a, let’s call it, unprecedented platform. And somehow another, I just don’t think the two are mutually exclusive.

Rob Olson: And I have to tell you, I’m just going to tell you, I admit I’m not up on the World Economic Forum’s impact on this. I have to tell you, I don’t know that part and I’m kind of reading up on that part –

Ramsey Russell: But they did have. Part of their global platform this year was empowering, let’s call it Indigenous communities worldwide to speak. And I don’t believe in coincidence, Rob. I don’t believe that they give them a global and then boom, here we got this little show home of a new way of managing land and business and resources in Manitoba. And I had to look up, like, I don’t know what World Economic Forum is, they’re an independent international organization founded in 1971 that meets every year in Switzerland. Mission statement, improving the state of the world, global initiatives, economic growth, climate change, understand, these aren’t government agencies, these are people, these are capitalists, these are the global financial elite. Criticisms have been, they represent a global elite disconnected from everyday concerns, potentially leading to politics favoring the wealthy. Their criticisms involve having a lack of transparency and they’re able to influence, they’re able to shape global agendas without being an elected body. And they do that through these kinds of movements and these kinds very subtle, like smoke moving through the woods, subtle, very subtle.

Rob Olson: I hope you don’t mind, but I wrote that down, I’m going to use it in my presentation going forward. Ramsey Russell said today, I don’t believe in coincidences.

Ramsey Russell: I don’t believe in coincidences, there’s no such thing as coincidence. There’s too much at stake right now.

Rob Olson: 100%. And so I don’t know how old you are, but I’m 56. I don’t believe in coincidences much either.

Ramsey Russell: No, I’m 58. I don’t believe in coincidence.

Rob Olson: So let’s talk about that for a bit because I saw some of that stuff with WF, I saw that. But I’ll say this, is that all these things connect. So it’s like every time I come back, I see this thing where it all connects to this idea of the land back movement where, indigenous people were wronged and we’re going to give it back to them. And you see it across the world, you see it in Australia, you see it New Zealand, you see it in Canada, you see this kind of movement and there’s WF, there’s trust, charitable trusts are donating to this. You’ve got the federal government putting money into it and our provincial government. And so here’s my sense of it is that the first time through here we had a lot like, now we have the tariff conversation. In Canada, we rely on natural resources to survive. You’re our biggest trading partner, we send you most of like so much of our natural resources. And so our natural resources are our economy. And so in a lot of the first rounds of the development of natural resources in Canada, first nations were left out of it. Like the indigenous didn’t benefit from it right to a fault. So this time round, as things get developed in the north, the indigenous communities have to, I think they have to benefit. There’s got to be employment. We need them to build wealth. We need this to be an opportunity for them to get up where they want to go. And if we don’t get that in Manitoba, they’re in trouble, we’re in trouble. So in a sense, and I’m going to say this in these town hall meetings, when I say something like I just said nothing but support in the room. I’ve heard not an inkling in these meetings or from anyone on our team that is anti-Indigenous, not even a little bit.

Ramsey Russell: Well, it’s because you won’t, no matter what their background, their color, their culture, you want your neighbors to succeed. Successful neighbors make everybody a success, see that’s the whole purpose of it.

Rob Olson: Well, and the other thing is we have so much in common as hunters, like, so much in common. And I’d make the case and in some of the cases, some of these indigenous folks that we’re talking to, we have more in common than they do with CPAs.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: Like we all make moose sausage. Like we have things in common. And so this time around now there’s a sentiment amongst our crew and at these meetings where they want to see indigenous people do well and they understand that resource development going forward, this is an opportunity now for first nations to excel and succeed and improve their lot in life financially and it has to happen that way. But then the problem is, and I have some indigenous friends that are saying, well, that movement, that 30 by 30 thing, that global land back thing and parks and new parks, they’re happy for us to stay poor.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. What about – With respect to Manitoba?

Rob Olson: That we need them to succeed here –

Ramsey Russell: I was over at the visitor center –

Rob Olson: By the way, Ramsey, parks provide dozens of jobs, we need thousands of jobs.

Ramsey Russell: Thousands. I was over at a visitor center up in Interlake region one time looking at a map in the history of Manitoba and stuff and it’s pretty astounding, the percent, the relative percent of the earth’s fresh water supply that exists just in northern Manitoba. It was mind blowing. I’m like, golly, I couldn’t imagine that.

Rob Olson: We have so much water here, we’re blessed here. It’s funny, when I was younger, I spent almost better part of a year walking around Africa when I was young with a backpack, just seeing, I wanted to see the wildlife, and I was going from park to park, and that’s when I remember going there and thinking, wow, is water important? Because in so many areas where I was in Africa, water was the limiting factor for life, whether it be human life, goats or wildlife, whatever they needed. But we have so much water here. Like, we’re so rich here in North America with resources, we’re so lucky and we have to share them and we should all benefit from them and all have access to them. And I think this is ultimately seems to be about resources, land and access.

Ramsey Russell: Let’s talk about shrinking Crownland or public land access in Canada with more Crownland being, with hunters being excluded from increasing amount of Crownland, how is this directly affecting hunters, anglers and outdoor enthusiasts right now? You talked about a 75% decrease in licensed hunter allotments. How else is it affecting people?

Rob Olson: Well, our biggest challenge here right now is like, hey listen, I’ll say I followed the crown, the public land conversations in America, right? People are concerned down there about the loss of access. And by the way, you have the best big game hunting in North America. I love big game hunting in the States. The opportunities you have there, it’s so well managed, you’re so well-funded. And you guys will probably laugh and say, oh no, we got our problems too, but we’re envious of it. But here, it’s not as much at being leased or sold, it’s more about just having public access to it. And so all of these lawsuits that are going on currently where indigenous communities are suing for exclusive access to land or where the federal provincial government coming along saying we’re going to have a park here and we don’t know if we can access it like parks that have been established here before from the federal perspective. So for right now we have access to Crownlands, what’s starting to happen though is as all these threats lining up, we’re not really sure we’re going to enjoy that in the future. And to this point we haven’t had tremendous success with the federal or provincial government in really, we think, getting their attention. Not yet. In spite of all the meetings, we haven’t had assurances from either level that we are going to have access to those same Crownlands we’ve enjoyed in the past. And so for right now, our access is quite good. So we’re trying to hang on to that. And you don’t know what you had till you lost it, right? So that’s the battle for us right now. But we don’t have the same tensions as much as it being sold or leased at the moment. But in a sense, I guess you can say the lawsuits and the proposed parks, I guess in a sense is giving it away, just not necessarily a lease and a sale, but you lose it just the same potentially.

Ramsey Russell: Well, if they win the lawsuit and they win control, does that mean they can then exclusive of Manitoba government or on behalf of them own selves as almost a separate nation, does that mean they can deed or sell or lease or do something beyond the wildlife with the natural resources?

Rob Olson: I mean, it’s a great question and no one’s been able to answer that.

Ramsey Russell: Nobody knows, do they? Because the lack of transparency.

Rob Olson: Hey, Ramsey, they not been worked out or do they already know and haven’t told us yet? So part of what we’re trying to do is we’re trying to use mechanisms to find out what government has agreed to and what they’ve done here, because we don’t currently know. But I can tell you one thing, like the national park up by Churchill, which is right by Seal River, we know we can’t hunt there now, we can’t hunt that land that’s gone. So, will these be different or the same? Time will tell. And we’re hoping that attention and awareness will help encourage governments to be balanced and disclose and be transparent with everybody involved. But we haven’t had much sign of that yet.

Ramsey Russell: Canada has the same crowdsource funded model of conservation that we do as your neighbor south of the border. What are some of the risks if these lawsuits were to prevail? What are some of the long term risks to wildlife populations? If moose aren’t doing well now, how are they going to be doing? What’s going to happen to all these wetland resources that produce waterfowl?

Rob Olson: Well, listen, that’s a heavy –

Ramsey Russell: At face freaking value they’re already running that – everything that’s going on right now is exclusive of a scientific based model. Why would it change back?

Rob Olson: Well, 100%, because one of the signals that we saw here with this court case we’re involved in is, they didn’t seem to care about the moose population numbers. So yes, Ramsey, that’s scary. Because if that doesn’t matter, then what? Yeah, that doesn’t bode well for sustain of populations. And the other thing I’ll add to that is, because our natural resource regime is so different than the US. In the US, here I’ll say is that what we need here is something we’re calling shared management, which is, for species like moose, so for species that don’t have enough young and there’s too much mortality. So moose are kind of the biggest, strongest of the deer family, but they’re the most fragile by far. They’re not reproductive like whitetails. Like a whitetail deer, I don’t know, 80% of the whitetail deer here have a fawn in their first year as a yearling here. Moose aren’t having a calf till they’re 2 or 3, they don’t do until they’re 6 or 7, they’re just not productive. And they’re susceptible to parasites and diseases in ways that white tailed deer aren’t. For example, whitetail deer here in some areas are, most of them carry something, carry a brain worm, parasite organism in their brain, but they live with it. But it’s fatal to the moose, doesn’t kill the deer. We have winter ticks here that are getting worse with warming temperatures and they’re devastating to moose populations. You could lose as much of a third year moose in one winter from ticks, but not so much for the other deer species. So the moose are really fragile and they’re at a tipping point. And so for the moose, we’ve had incredible declines in moose in a lot of the accessible kind of Crownland areas, and yet they’re doing great on farmland. Why is that? Well, private land access is controlled. It’s not open access, open harvest. And so what we got to get to here for certain species, I would argue moose, caribou and elk, you have to get to where everyone’s at the table, indigenous hunters and non-indigenous hunters. Harvest has to be known by all people. Yeah, not for coyotes and beavers and Canada geese and northern pike because people aren’t harvesting enough, black bears, wolves, people aren’t harvesting enough of them or they’re very reproductive. But for moose especially, there needs to be shared management here. And so the other thing is, part of the solution we think to bring back moose is forestry. As long as you control the access roads and control the human harvest side of it, moose prefer young forest, typically, they do better in a young up and coming forest, whereas caribou do better in old forest. So to bring back moose, parks alone aren’t going to do that. What we need to do is manage all harvest and yes, respect the indigenous rights and their prerogative and local communities to get a moose. I don’t believe I should come before someone living in northern community get their moose, they’re living there. God knows beef is, they can’t afford hardly to buy meat up in the north. Like they should have access to the moose before me, rights or not. I mean, we respect that. But at the same time, for certain species like moose, everyone’s at the table or ain’t going to work. My training as a biologist tells me you got births and deaths, and if deaths exceed births, we got a problem. And you don’t know how many moose you have, and you don’t know how many certain groups are harvesting like, indigenous harvesters. If they’re not part of the conversation, they’re not part of the management regiment and they’re harvesting. And by the way, if people are harvesting female moose, you could almost just about forget it in this day and age. So, the solution for wildlife isn’t just simply putting a park out there and you got to get people and everyone’s got to be at the table in the management. It’s got to be shared, share in the harvest and share in reporting and sharing the work. So that’s the future for some of our species like moose and if we don’t get to that future, we’re just not going to have moose in very many places and we’re kind of there now, I think.

Ramsey Russell: A few years ago we interviewed Manitoba Wildlife Federation and in the heading off of the fear that Manitoba could be heading towards a more privatized form of hunting and outdoor recreation at the exclusion of local hunters, Manitoba adopted a draw type system for waterfowl hunters. Perfectly reasonable. Do you see the ongoing dilemma over this 30 by 30 and the shift in management? Do you see that as maybe reopening that door to where Manitoba could become increasingly privatized?

Rob Olson: Like in a sense? Yeah. Let me see.

Ramsey Russell: I mean, that’s where this is going.

Rob Olson: Well, I’m telling you. And by the way, I want to come back and talk to you about the waterfowl policy. Because I was in government when that happened, I wasn’t allowed to talk to you, so I want to talk to you, that’s a whole another thing, man. I can’t wait to tell you about that. But yes, the short answer is yeah, because if you’re sitting there and you’re a US hunter and you want to come to Manitoba and hunt, and you want to come and hunt ducks let’s say, yeah, like, especially if you’re going to hunt on public land, for example, you need access to that public land.

Ramsey Russell: That’s right.

Rob Olson: And I hunt in the delta marsh and I run into a lot of US hunters out there when I’m hunting and they’re almost always awesome people, as you know how it is. You meet a guy in the marsh, they’re going to be great 99% of the time, but they enjoy access to public land as a visitor, which is, it’s a lot more like a privilege than a right.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: So the whole thing about really, one of the saddest things about the Manitoba just wasn’t communicated really well. I think US hunters initially thought it was against them when in reality it was to protect them.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: It was to say, hey, here’s a place, maybe you can’t go knock on a door in Kansas and get permission for a goose field like you used to 30 years ago, but you can still do it in Manitoba, you can still come knock on a door and hunt. And by the way, that’s for the private land, now this is the Crownland. So this, what we’re doing now in access for all is protective on the public land side to say, yeah, and you know how we are up here, we’re friendly and come on and we want to share it, we just don’t want people to privatize it and tie it up and exclude me or exclude you.

Ramsey Russell: That’s right. Like they have south of the border in a lot of places, right.

Rob Olson: Like, I probably won’t offend people by saying it’s probably a little over commercialized in the US maybe more than folks would maybe want. Maybe people want and would like to go back to something if you can, I don’t know if you can or can’t. But yeah, like this Access for All campaign we’re running here is to protect public land access for all users, including US duck hunters. And it is a form of privatization in a sense, not in the way we were thinking before where guys would form clubs in lease land or outfitters will lease up land, but it’s another form of it. It’s giving exclusive access and rights potentially to one group and it ain’t you.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: So it’s just the same concept, just trying to keep it open, like sharing the land. Like everybody gets a shot, everybody gets to hunt, everyone gets a piece. And if you think of the hierarchy, it’s indigenous subsistence hunters first and I don’t think any of us people I’m talking to begrudge them that, I mean this is their food source in many cases, right? So sure, that’s in the constitution. Residents next, people from outside country. But there’s room for everybody.

Ramsey Russell: That’s right.

Rob Olson: There is.

Ramsey Russell: Right. It was a little bit of a misunderstanding, but it was perfectly understandable. I mean, it really and truly throughout the United States right now, a lot of state agencies are wrestling with the same issues. You know what I’m saying? Nobody’s excluding anybody, but how do we work this out?

Rob Olson: Well, 100%. And my dad used to negotiate labor agreements when he was in construction world and he said, he wished everyone was slightly happy with the solutions that he negotiated, but he would sell it for everyone being a little bit mad.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: If anyone group is too happy or too angry, he knew he got it wrong, he was a wise man. But when it comes to sharing land for waterfowl, probably no one group gets to have it their way, everyone got give a little and share. Maybe it’s not just perfect for everybody involved, but everybody gets access.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. As I was doing a little background research for our visit today, looking through the headlines and different things, came across the topic of unregulated hunting. What’s going on with unregulated hunting in wildlife north of the border and how’s it related to this topic? Or is it?

Rob Olson: I’m not sure how it’s related. I mean it probably, I guess in the sense it probably is because again, it’s another thing that just diminishes our access and our enjoyment. Like, unregulated hunting can either tie up land we can’t, none of us can get on or it diminishes population. So it hurts us, I guess, in a sense. But unregulated hunting has always been an issue here, like everywhere else now. When I was in government, we worked really hard to revitalize our conservation officer service. And I’m going to go ahead and say that was probably one of the coolest things I’ve done in my career. I had the honor to work with the seal service here and listen to them and we had a session, we talked to almost all the COs and they had a common vision for what they wanted to do to make it better. But we were probably last in Canada in terms of investing in, in conservation officers. I think they were the lowest paid, I mean, I think they didn’t have adequate funding just to have basic equipment for themselves, I mean it was pitiful. And I was taken aback at how good they still were. Like you’d forgive them if they were more angry and more cynical than they were. But for example, I think they were the only service in Canada that didn’t have a central dispatch to know if they came home at night. These folks are out there in the middle of night running around chasing unregulated hunters or poachers or night lighters and in some cases having to come face to face with serious criminals and literally nobody but their black lab probably knew they got home at times. And so that wasn’t okay. So we worked pretty hard on that, we came a long way there. I think it’s better today than it was 10 years ago, if I had to say, I think it’s better. If a CO was sitting here right now and we asked him how is the unregulated hunting and management? I mean, I don’t know what they would tell us, did we get halfway to our goal? I’m not sure more to come on that, by the way, but a lot was invested in stopping night hunting, for example, including using thermal imaging and night flights of helicopters and lots and lots of technological advances that we invested in to try to clean it up and I think they’ve made a real difference. Like when I talk to COs they say night hunting things way down and so that part’s good. The other part is the illegal trade in fishing game. So commercial trade, so people selling thousands of kilograms of fish or hundreds of kilograms of elk or moose meat and I don’t know the statistics on that currently, I don’t know what the COs would say about that, but we were able to revitalize our undercover research unit, it was down to basically one or two people. So the resources have been reinstated to a certain extent, probably the biggest investment in that service that they’d seen in their lifetime. So we’ll see where that goes from here. The other side of it is illegal leasing of land and tying things up and I think the waterfowl policy was intended to send a message to curtail that.

Ramsey Russell: That in and of itself is a multi billion dollar industry throughout the western provinces, I know that to be true. In my humble opinion, and just from the outside looking in, having traveled through those provinces, I think Manitoba is the least of western Canada’s concerns. The one neighbor to the west is where a lot of that shenanigans are happening.

Rob Olson: I think so. And I’ve been engaging in conversations with a lot of people in Saskatchewan here and trying to help them develop a policy there. And my initial take is that whatever we were dealing with here, it’s far harder there.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: It’s way worse and way more need of some management and policy than we even were. And yeah, so to me, that’s the privatization part of it and the illegal part of it. I think we’ve made a lot of headway in Manitoba, I’m not going to say we’re done or it’s perfect because I still see people selling illegal fish off the tailgate and stuff like that. So we’re not done. And Ramsey, I don’t know that you ever win that war, I think you chip away and you just continued to fight that one over time.

Ramsey Russell: You described Manitoba as a model home for this new policy, this potential new policy. This is going to be maybe ground zero of something far bigger than Manitoba, especially with power to be like the World Economic Forum and UN involved. What can other jurisdictions learn from what you all are seeing and experiencing in Manitoba right now?

Rob Olson: Yeah, like I would say, I actually think, at the risk of being overly dramatic, I think Manitoba is a thing place to watch now, certainly for other provinces and I would say states as well. It’s a cautionary tale for sure. And what can they learn from it? It’s a great question. I think the biggest thing I would say is never give up control of your state or provincial lands to anybody.

Ramsey Russell: No, don’t do it. Here in the United States in the lower 48, imperialism created a far different outcome for our Native Americans than north of the border with the exception being Alaska, which is very similar. I mean, for example, emperor geese are now closed to, we non-residents can’t apply, we licensed hunters can’t apply for it because there is a significant take that has been allowed by the Native Americans, okay? That’s a whole different – Alaska would be the toehold in the US for a movement like this. It would be Alaska working through those communities. But then I start thinking to myself, Rob, well, wait a minute, there are millions of acres of Native American reservations across the landscape and many of them hold enviable populations of wildlife, of minerals, of oil, you know what I’m saying? I mean, that’s a lot of stuff to get to. So I mean, we’re not immune to it. And still throughout the United States puts your ear to the rail, you’re hearing a lot of rumors going on, this administration, the last administration, the one before it, about the transition of this abundance of public land we got into the private sector. We’re not immune to it. That’s what so interests me about what’s happening in Manitoba right now as we’re not immune to it.

Rob Olson: No, I imagine you’re not. And to me, one of the greatest things, one of the greatest legacies I saw when I was in the US was all that public land, particularly in the western states, my goodness, what a legacy, what a rich thing, to have that privatized to me would be one of the worst things that could ever happen. What a sinful thing for hunters. Like it’s funny, when I was in the States, I always had this idea that Canada had so much public land and we had the best big game hunting and it was incredible. And then when I wandered in the US and hunted big game a little bit in the mountain states, I thought, oh my goodness, this is the greatest hunting experience of my entire life. It’s like, in Saskatchewan and talk about you can watch your dog run away for 3 days? I’d park my truck and walk for 3 days in one direction and still be on public land. Like, what an incredible legacy for US hunters and what a treasure and what a shame to lose an inch of it. I mean to me that was something that if I was down there, I’d be starting a movement like we’re starting here. I would resist that all day long.

Ramsey Russell: On both sides of the border throughout North America, we hunters have historically been at the forefront of conservation. You’ve talked about delta marsh several times, historical hunter presence there, what it became and much more the crowd source funded conservation thing. But what can we hunters do to ensure that wildlife management remains scientifically viable and strong? I mean, is there anything we can do but keep our ear to the rail and hope for the best?

Rob Olson: Well, like the biggest thing for me is you have to organize. And then ideally there’s a group already formed that’ll organize you. So I know for us here it’s the Wildlife Federation because we have an existing infrastructure of 100 clubs and 15, 000 members and don’t fix it, if it ain’t broke. I mean, it’s there, right? So we just need to pour some gas in the tank of that vulnerable. It’s 80 years old. It’s been around. It’s got incredible people and incredible track record. So to me I’d be looking around the US and say what organizations are going to fight for me. And I’d be asking my organizations to rally. Like whatever the issues are like let’s rally to this. Like let’s make people aware, like right now, like we’re going to relaunch our website on Monday to house this campaign access for all. So for me, when you get to these situations and it’s kind of separates the wheat from the chaff a little bit, Ramsey? So organizations that are for you are not for you. You quickly find out who your friends are when you get threatened. And I’ll tell you, is it ever obvious here now the groups that are part of this and the groups that aren’t part of this, like it’s they’re there and we’re here.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: And it’s so clear. And I hate to be that way, it’s not my nature personality but it’s for or against, but that’s kind of how it shakes out. So organizations are going to have to make a decision here. Are you with us or against us ultimately? And so who’s going to fight for you guys to maintain access and maintain public land staying public? Who is that group? And it’s got to be a coalition of groups. The thing I learned in the US more than anything about making change is the bigger the change you’re trying to achieve or the bigger the policy when you’re trying to achieve, the more humans you need around it to win. Titles, acronyms, organizations, humans, eyeballs, governments react to that. So that’s what you have to do. You got to mobilize, you got to inform each other. So we have a network now. We hold these town hall meetings here, Ramsey, we have a sign up sheet and we get people’s emails and we have any newsletter we send out pretty much every week to keep everybody connected. And so we have this network now of hundreds and hundreds of people. And the ones that come to those meetings, by the way, they’re not average Joes and Janes, like these people would drive 3 hours to come hear the message. And I talk to them like, oh yeah, I run the local fire hall and my local little town coaching hockey. I work for that group, but I coach hockey, I’m the fire guy and this and that and that person may join. So the people that come out, when you rally and you hold meetings and you get a campaign going, the ones that come are, they’re usually the right ones. They’re the organizers. They’re the people that make that community go. But you got to network, you have to inform, and you got to mobilize, and you got it –

Ramsey Russell: It’s too darn easy to sit on the sidelines today. It’s just too darn easy to sit on the sidelines. And you started off this whole conversation talking about, we’re in the most challenging times, not just in Manitoba, not just in Canada, not just in the US or North America, I mean, we’re in the most challenging times we’ve ever been. And you can’t sit on the sidelines. You just can’t sit on the sidelines. None of us are political, but you have to be.

Rob Olson: You have to be. And it’s like, the thing for us is, whoever’s in power, we need them to represent us. Like, we’re still democracies here. And so you can’t sit on the sidelines if you don’t like what’s going on and you don’t get involved, don’t complain to me about it. But here’s my thing, one thing I’ll say so when I do these town hall meeting presentations, my last slide is always a picture of my kid. And every time that I put that up there and even saying it now, it makes me emotional. How do we fight back? We tap into that. Like, even when I think of that kid right now, because I’m thinking about that kid not getting to do this anymore, not on our watch. And I see in the room all the time, I say, okay, why are you here tonight on a Wednesday night? It’s minus 32, you drove two hours, why are you here? What got you to come tonight? Is it your memories? Was it memories of your dad? Is it that place? Like I always say, if you put me in the delta marsh, blindfold me, I could smell it, I come from that mud. I’m going back into that mud. I shot my first duck 50 years ago, I’m going back in that mud, Ramsey. I told my kid, that’s where I want to be put. You put me back in that marsh, I’ve taken so much from that marsh all these years. But you think about your kid and your dad and your grandma and your grandpa and the places and the things. And it’s not a sport, it’s a religion, it’s spiritual. And if you can tap into that, and you can tap into people in that regard, saying this, and people here will joke and say, I’m going to move away, this is unbearable.

Ramsey Russell: Where are you going to go?

Rob Olson: Nowhere. This is our last stand, there’s nowhere else to go. One of the things we saw from government was there was a statement in a mandate letter from our current premier to the minister, and it said something to the effect of, we’re pursuing protected areas with indigenous people and then find other places for non-indigenous people to hunt. And when I saw that, I thought, what? Other places? So which of us have already been written off then?

Ramsey Russell: That’s right.

Rob Olson: So you talk about no coincidences. So, okay, well, that was written for a reason. So where’s this other place? And who are these people and who are these places that don’t get to do it anymore? But you’re not taking it from me, from my kid, you’re not.

Ramsey Russell: Not without a fight.

Rob Olson: And my wife across here, she always shakes her head because we get worked up.

Ramsey Russell: I know the feeling.

Rob Olson: She loves to eat the deer meat and she loves the fish and all that, but she doesn’t hunt herself much, she fishes, doesn’t hunt. But she says, what does winning look like? And I don’t know that any of us can define that yet. You ask about what people can do and I think, hang on to the idea that if you – winning is not losing as much, if you didn’t do anything. You got to nudge back. And we’re trying to keep our sense of humor, we’re trying to keep it friendly, we’re trying not to get to a point where we drive people So far apart and so angry, we can’t be friends again here. But if you fight back and nudge back and organize and rally around each other and communities and organizations and organize and nudge back, you’re going to lose less than if you had done nothing. And that’s what keeps me going here. Whenever it gets tiring or exhausting or people are upset or angry, whatever it might be, I just think of my kid and I keep going. That’s it.

Ramsey Russell: Rob, if you had the power to reshape Manitoba’s Wildlife management policies, what would be your top priorities?

Rob Olson: My number one priority would be a government that brings licensed hunters and indigenous people to the table to talk about how to share this land and resources. That would be my number one dream. I had a meeting when I was in government before COVID turn the world upside down, I feel bad for all the young people having to deal with all this crazy, we’ve had it pretty good? So COVID washes through and we had a meeting before that happened, and it was in a little town north of a place called the Porcupine Hills. And it’s a place where the moose have collapsed, pretty much. And we had a hall meeting there, it wasn’t on a reservation, it wasn’t on a community, it was neutral ground kind of thing in a small town. But we had, I think 5 different first nation communities came, hunters from the community, like people on the land. We had Metis hunters in that room, we had a bunch of non-indigenous people, a few angry kind of grumpy Ukrainians, which we have in that part of the world out there, right? God love them. But a mix of humans, right? We shut the doors 120 people and we talked about moose all night, and it was awesome. There was no sides. And you know what we started with? We started with a concern for the moose and a passion for the moose because it defined all of us in that room. We all eaten moose, gutted moose, hunted moose, whatever the case may be, we’re moose hunters, most of the people in the room. And so a passion for the moose and a caring for the moose and concessions were made and it was collaborative and people were willing to give and take. And we basically came up with a moose vision there. And we weren’t fighting about rights, we were respecting each other. The non-indigenous folks in the room were respecting the indigenous folks right to harvest and we got past it just because we were in a room together. So separating everybody up here anyway kills it.

Ramsey Russell: I think that’s worldwide. When you get people together, they communicate because they’re people. They’re talking as people, not as political parties, that’s it.

Rob Olson: And find ties that bind. Like you think about the different humans that hunt ducks, we have that in common. And so when I meet up with guys in the marsh, doesn’t matter where they come from, what they sound like, we got the same DNA because we have the same love of shooting ducks out there. So it’s finding common things. So if the government could stop dividing us and put us in rooms, call it what you want, don’t have to call it shared management, call it whatever you want to call it, that’s my number one dream. Because I think that leads to the other things. Everything would come from that. And that’s, I think, our only hope here actually at the moment. And other than that, could they just stop raining things down on us for two minutes?

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: And reset.

Ramsey Russell: Rob, your wife asked the question, what does winning look like? I’ll ask the question and end on this last question. What does losing look like? What does the future, if this trend continues and I’m not asking you to be dramatic, but worst case scenario, what does the future look like for public land access into Canada and I think the United States for your kid mine. What does losing look like?

Rob Olson: I think worst case scenario, it’s pretty grim. We get forced into small little areas where we all go and do what we do together and the quality is going to be poor. It’s not going to be where we were born and raised. And what people will do is they’ll quit.

Ramsey Russell: They’ll quit.

Rob Olson: What’s going to happen is you’re just going to stop doing it. And we’ve seen that already. Like with the loss of moose populations, we used to have 10,000 12,000 moose hunters, they’ve got about 3,000 now. And I guarantee you right now, around the city I’m living in right now in garages are dusty old moose camps up in the attic that haven’t been used but they stopped doing it. It’s like when the shortbird season got closed there at the turn of the century for conservation, for shorebirds. And they were going to close it for a few years, remember that story? All the shorebird decoys we have, people don’t even realize shorebird hunting was a massive thing back then. They closed it for a few years and it just died. Gone. So if you pressure it too much and you shrink it too much, you lose people, they’ll stop doing it. And when you lose the people – One of the points I made to my US buddies when we were talking about the waterfowl program and I was telling them, this is for you, this is for freelancers, and we were having that conversation and I was saying to him, once we get to too small a number, we lose our voice. So the cascade of effects, if you shrink the land and you shrink the resource, you’re going to shrink our numbers. You shrink the numbers, you shrink our voice. Now we’re not at the table to make sure there’s conservation funding to fight for the land and the species. We are the best conservationists. We’re the ones that fight for the animals that we hunt for, like to the end. Like we tell kids in our youth hunts and I started a youth hunt program up here back in the day when I was young. And we always told the kids, you’re going to hunt those ducks in the morning, now you’re responsible for them forever. You hunt them, now they’re in your hands, man. So you’re going to hunt with me tomorrow, you’re signing on to a deal here now, that means that you got to fight for those ducks till you die.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rob Olson: Shake on it. So, yeah, reduced access, reduce hunters, reduce voices, more gun control, all the things start to happen. And part of keeping residents in the game up here, so we can fight for you, Ramsey. So you can come up here and hunt, right? I mean, we got to fight your own bull.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. Well, we’re all in the same life raft, Rob. I appreciate you coming on. What a great conversation, a big picture conversation of the future battleground, which is the present battleground in the model home of Manitoba of wildlife conservation.

Rob Olson: Yeah, it’s been a fun to talk to you again. And Jackson, Mississippi, seems like a long time ago, but it also seems like yesterday. So coming back, I’m going to need some of that food, Ramsey. That’s the deal.

Ramsey Russell: Come on.

Rob Olson: Coming down.

Ramsey Russell: Thank you, Rob. Folks, thank you all for listening this episode of MOJO’s Duck Season Somewhere podcast. See you next time.

[End of Audio]

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