Boyd Outdoors

It’s hot out there!

🆒 😎 Mr. Moose is coolin’ down from the heat wave that continues to batter the region.

Trooper Kleich of the Nebraska State Patrol spotted this today near Scottsbluff.

If you don’t have to be outside in these extreme temperatures, please do not. Be like Mr. Moose & stay cool and be sure to stay hydrated.

https://youtube.com/shorts/lYSn1iVVUbw?is=cxCPvHvEjL_SvPO3

This was a fun lake to fish! #boydoutdoors #fishing #🎣 I took a trip to fish this lake for the first time. I was impressed...

Keep fighting for our public land!

The modern corner-crossing fight started in Wyoming at Elk Mountain Ranch, when Fred Eshelman, the pharmaceutical billionaire whose company held worldwide rights to a premature-ejaculation drug, went after four regular hunters from Missouri for stepping from one piece of public land to another piece of public land. Bradly Cape, Zachary Smith, Phillip Yeomans, and John Slowensky didn’t walk across his ranch. They didn’t tear down a fence. They didn’t damage his property. The claim was that by crossing at the corner, their bodies passed through his private “airspace.”

That’s how insane this fight got. Four Missouri hunters used mapping technology and a ladder to access public land that the public already owned, and a billionaire ranch owner tried to turn that into a multi-million-dollar trespass case. Reports put the claimed damages in the $7.75 million to $9 million range. He lost. The hunters were found not guilty in the criminal case, won the federal civil case, won again at the 10th Circuit, and the Supreme Court declined to take the appeal. This case matters because if a billionaire can block public-to-public access with an invisible airspace theory, then public land isn’t really public anymore. It’s just private land with a government label on the map.

— Stephen Ziegler
Outdoor writer | Rack Junkies Podcast

Public land!

I want to make something very clear. I am not saying all landowners are bad, and I am not saying all outfitters or guides are bad. There are good and bad people in every group. Montana’s Block Management program is a good example. When a landowner opens private land to public hunting, that is a good thing. If they are letting regular hunters access private ground they otherwise could not hunt, I fully support them being compensated for that. Those landowners should be thanked, not attacked. The same goes for honest guides and outfitters who do things the right way. In fact, a lot of the tips I have gotten have come from outfitters, MOGA members, and even board-connected people who are just as fed up with the corruption as everybody else.

But that is very different from using private corners to control public land. If a landowner is getting paid because they own the corner next to public land and hunters have to go through them to access land the public already owns, that is not the same thing as opening up private land. That is the system being abused. Public land should not be locked up just because somebody owns the land beside it. Corner crossing should be legal, and most hunters know it. This fight is not about attacking every landowner or every guide. It is about calling out the dishonest people who profit from keeping public land out of reach while claiming they are the ones protecting access.

— Stephen Ziegler
Outdoor writer | Rack Junkies Podcast

It’s about time!

Well, look at that. It only took about a week of Montana hunters blowing this issue up for Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks to suddenly decide corner crossing needs to be “front and center.” In a press release, FWP Director Christy Clark is now asking the Private Land/Public Wildlife committee to take up corner-to-corner public access at its June 1 and 2 meeting in Glasgow. That is not an accident. That is public pressure working. That is what happens when hunters stop complaining in private, start naming names, start exposing the money, the lobbyists, MOGA, the bad landowners, and the politicians, and make these people answer in public.

Now we cannot drop the ball. June 1 and 2 is when every hunter who cares about public land needs to show up, either in person or on Zoom. If you care about corner crossing, landlocked public land, and whether regular hunters can access land they already own, get on that meeting. Let them see thousands of hunters watching. Let them hear from the people they have ignored for too long. We have them on the ropes, but this is not over. This is where the posts, phone calls, messages, and public pressure turn into real action. Isn’t that right, Director Clark?

— Stephen Ziegler
Outdoor writer | Owner, DeLong Lures

Montana Outfitters and Guide Association just blocked me on Facebook. Why? They put out a press release about my posts, I responded, and apparently they did not like the response (screenshot in the comments). Does anything make you look more guilty than that? So now let’s dig into MOGA. Their current president is Rod Paschke, owner/outfitter of Sizzlin’ S Outfitters. He guides on Seven Blackfoot Ranch where a gate was put up across a public road, cutting off 20,250-acre of BLM land. Some of the best elk hunting land in the country. The same reporting says Paschke called one of the public hunters who had used that access to complain. So MOGA says they are for public access, but their own president’s outfitting business is tied to one of the biggest public-access scandals in Montanas history. Does that sound like public access to you?

And don’t worry, I’m not stopping there. I’m going to start looking into Mark Taylor, MOGA’s lobbyist, and exactly what he has been lobbying for. I’m going to look into Ben Lamb, Wiley Galt, the Montana Conservation Society, the land boards, land swaps, nonresident tag games, and every MOGA board member sitting on government-appointed boards while regular Montana hunters get left out of the discussion. MOGA wanted to put out a press release criticizing me. Fine. But people in Montana have gotten real chatty with me. Calls, texts, emails, screenshots, documents, names. So buckle up.

— Stephen Ziegler
Outdoor writer | Owner, DeLong Lures