#382 River Klass: Preserving the Legacy of Ranching

382- River Klass
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[00:00:00] Yeah, we were already rolling river. It is a pleasure to have you on the meet mafia podcast. I am incredibly pumped up for this conversation. Welcome to the show. Thank you very much. It's a great pleasure to meet you. I've listened to your podcast quite a bit and you've had some really incredible artists, uh, guests, and I'm, I'm amazed that I'm allowed to be on this with you.

I'm very proud of it. Well, we were, we were talking a bit before we hit record and I was just saying, these are my favorite types of conversations and just the, the types of people that, you know, Um, we've met through the show. My personal, you know, favorite group is just the people who are working on the land.

Uh, there's a spiritual reverence for food and really just a deep understanding, um, of, of physical hard work. And you can attest to this cause you have your hands in a number of different pods. I'm always blown away [00:01:00] by just how many different things ranchers and, you know, And people who work on farms have going on, uh, it's, it's incredible.

And so, you know, I'm super pumped for this conversation. It's my pleasure. I, and that's, that is, if there was a, if there was a nutshell that I could say about, about the show, it's exactly what you just said. And if you go to the USDA website, the average cattle ranch in United States is 1200 acres. 55 head people think yellow stone and the four sixes and these, you know, I was just at sea punch out in Nevada, 1.

8 million acres. This is a small group of ranches, 89 percent of the ranches, 89 percent of the beef that we are getting to market in United States comes from mom and pop neighborhood ranches where these men and women are working a day. We call them town jobs. He's a welder. He's a, he's a, he's a farrier.

She's a school teacher. She's a farrier. My farrier is a gal. She's [00:02:00] fantastic. And, and we've almost had to do this. You almost have to have more than one job. Those days of, you know, when I go out and gather with families and I meet the grandparents, that's really the last group that I saw that they could ranch.

All day every day and have that one job and it must have been a glorious time to know you woke up You hooked up your horse. You ran your fence line. You cared for your cattle. You cared for your soil and you made a living That's been that's been almost impossible for a long time So for anyone who's listening we're talking about ranch america, which is the show that you host on the outdoors channel and You know I would love to just understand a bit.

Like, how did you get into all of this? Where do we start the story here with you getting into all of it? It couldn't have been more obscure. And like anything, [00:03:00] you know, when you try to chase something, you, you might be sometime you if you rarely get it. The most, the greatest gifts I've ever gotten, I've ever gotten in my life were just, I happen to be standing in the right place at the right time.

Um, I, um, I run 2 restaurants in downtown, little town of Murphy's in Calaveras County. Um, I've always raised some cattle. I like to be able to bring my beef into my restaurant for, and I can't raise enough to run all of my beef, but I do. burgers, I do some steaks, we definitely do in the roasts and the osso buccos in the winter.

And, you know, I've been going, I started my first restaurant 32 years ago. I'm 61. I started when I was 29. So I was happy as hell. I got a terrific, beautiful wife. I got a little ranch. I got some great horses. I got a couple head of cattle. We run about 2000 acres of leased ground. And there was two guys, one from Alabama, one from Folsom, and they have three or four shows on.

On outdoor channel [00:04:00] Fishmonger, fantastic show dead meat. And they have a thir, a fourth one coming out. And they were saying this, this, there's something about this Fishmonger show. We're talking about the people that, about how difficult it's for fishermen to take fish and get that to the people, how hard they work their lives.

And they're thinking, huh, Longmeyer Yellowstone. People are thinking about this cowboy thing. Is beef easy? And this is the obscure part. This guy lives in Huntsville, Alabama, another one in Sacramento. They happen to know one person that I barely know, Jack Morris. And they, at dinner one night, Jack said to him, I think if you need a host, You got to go up to Murphy's, which is about two hours away from Sacramento.

You got to go meet this guy. So I have a restaurant. I have a real good plan. When someone calls me and says, Hey river, um, so and so wants to meet you at the table. They're going to have a reservation at 6 30. I have a real system because I don't want to get caught [00:05:00] there. So what I do is I tell the server.

5 minutes before the food's going to come out. Tell them I'm, I'm, I'm coming over. And I come over, and that way I can say, Hello, how's it going? Give them the schmooze, and then the food comes, and I got it out. This time it wasn't like that. These guys were fantastic, we got to talking, they got, and they were completely, They're blindsided.

They hadn't, they didn't tell me anything about TV show. They didn't talk about anything. They were just talking about, what are you doing? What, how do you, how do you ranch run restaurants? What do you, I mean, and they said that they walked away from the table and they said, absolutely. If we can get this guy to, to, uh, to do a sizzle reel, this is our host.

And it was just, I mean, I know the table in my restaurant. I know the day that it happened and it was absolutely, absolutely. A, a gift to me because I'm so passionate about, because I'm a first, I'm the first generation rancher and I, and I ranch all the time with these five and six and seven generation ranchers, and I know how hard they [00:06:00] work and I know the dream they come from, and I, I'm constantly amazed at what it takes to put that kind of protein, our number one protein in America on the plates and in the market.

And I wanted to tell that story and I was going on just like this with my, with my angst, with my enthusiasm and they were like, and so we did a sizzle reel, they sent it to outdoor channel and they said, hey, relax, it takes months, 12 hours later, we had a contract. They were like, done. It's in. Wow. What was it about the conversation that you knew, just, this was the right thing for you to be pursuing with all the other things that you have going on?

Um, I think mostly was that it was, it's a two part thing. They were very curious. And I really love the idea that they were curious. They didn't come from, [00:07:00] we know this stuff, we want to do a show like this, we want to show this, we want to show that. They were really just curious. They're like, how can we show this?

What happens? What do these people, what do ranchers do? And I, being first generation, I'm only just, a little bit more experienced. Yeah, I can rope and ride and yeah, I, I raise a cattle, but by no stretch, I've only, I mean, my, my, my dad didn't do it. I've, you know, I've been, I've been handling owning my own cattle for only about 18 years.

So I'm just as curious. And I think it was that point. It was them who knew nothing. Me that knows just a little. We had this incredible curiosity to just go out and not be the person, you know, not be the, the guy that says, Oh, let me show you about ranching because I know everything. No, I know [00:08:00] so little.

And every time I go out, I find out I know less. So for me being curious and having a crew that was just as curious. Was it was an absolute it was a win for me. It meant that we could put something out there. That was was entertaining and informative. And so just my main goal was to make sure that when the next time a person goes up to that.

menu at the restaurant or more importantly when they're going to the market and they're looking at tri tip or ribeye they just take a little second and they think they saw that show and they think what it took for them for that guy or gal to bring that beef from a calf To 22, 24 months through the background or through the feed logs to the markets.

And if they take a moment just to be grateful, that's that's that's perfect for me. That's amazing It sounds like [00:09:00] the perfect recipe for a really high quality show where you're telling Authentic stories. I love that. How did how did you actually get into ranching yourself? What sparked that curiosity?

Because first generation ranchers are, we've had plenty of them on our show. Jason Rick, I was telling you about Kevin Muno, who's, uh, works out at perennial pastures in California. So many of these guys are just getting into it. And, It's truly inspiring for me, someone, you know, I want to eventually run cattle at some point during my life.

And it's like, just the risk and ideas of, you know, what you're taking on all the things you don't know. It's pretty incredible. So I'm curious what that phase of your life looked like 29 years old, getting into ranching for the 1st time. Oh, no. So when I was 29, I started the restaurants, the restaurants, and I started the restaurant in a little tiny town because I really just wanted a little breakfast, a little lunch.

It was the [00:10:00] only thing I could do to make a living. I could swing a hammer. I could, you know, I could do other things, but I really wanted, I really wanted, it's the only thing I'd done before was, and I had never run restaurants. I'd never, I was not a foodie. I just had been around restaurants and I got this little town.

It didn't have any restaurants. And I thought, heck, I'll open a couple of restaurants and I did the dumbest thing. I opened a really fancy restaurant first and I'm like, wow, this is, and I was, I was in the, in the kitchen cooking, not chefing and the guys and I in the kitchen were eating tacos and burgers and burritos and pizza while we're putting out fillets and all this other stuff.

And so I thought, Oh, this is ridiculous. And so 19 feet away, I built a building and started another restaurant. That's just tacos, burgers and pizza called firewood. And then things got to get settled. I had a good staff, I think going, I was always getting home, riding my horses, going to friends, how friends, [00:11:00] there's a lot of things that, that I'm sure you've heard on your show.

Hired men are hard. You have, it's near impossible. I'm sure people have talked about how friends help friends. And, you know, when I gather, I'll call a bunch of friends. I'll, Hey, we've got, we got, um, we've got about 70 hit head. I got to gather off the PJ ranch. And they'll come out and then a couple of weeks later, they'll call me and they'll say, hey, this weekend, we're going to be some, we're going to do some gathering and some sort and come out to the, to the ranch and I'll go and it and it's it's neighbors helping neighbors.

So, I was doing that and I was getting used to people and I was, I was a little less green. My horse was a little bit better. And 1 day out of just out of. No particular reason. I had a couple 15 acres that I knew I could put a couple cows on. I said to the, the man, Mike, um, um, not really can't remember his name.

He, I asked him, I said, hey, I'll, I'll buy a couple of them, them heifers. And he's like, well, you worked hard today. I'll, I'll give you a good price. He won't give it to [00:12:00] free, but he gave me a good price. And there was, it was a thing one and thing two, these two, uh, these two red, uh, um, Hereford calves. I put them on 15 acres that I, that I had where I keep my horses.

They prospered beautifully. And then one thing just accidentally led to another where this lease came up and I, and they, they had bulls and they had more cows and we just started putting it and two became eight and eight, and then I bought some and all of a sudden I had, you know, a smaller, like 20, 25.

And now I'm looking at these calves and I was just taken to market and, you know, and I'm like, so I work all day. I work really hard to serve to make sure the soil is perfect. The water's perfect. I serve these animals and then they get to a certain age and I take them to market and I get a, you know, a buck 60 a pound.

I'm like, there's got to be something better. And so that's when I started thinking I have a restaurant and, you [00:13:00] know, and some people love the grass that's finished some like the corn finished. I'm I'm a little lazier. I didn't have the time to do the corn finish, so I found a really incredible spot that has a huge amount of different vegetation, rose hips, pond fronds, watercress, lagoons.

And so, even though they're grass finished. Their flavor is is remarkable and a lot of times I'll take these instead of cutting out the primals because if I'm only going to, you know, if I'm going to harvest 15 animals a year, you know, that's not that's a weekend of revised at my restaurant. So, right. I take a lot of times I take out, grind the entire animal cheeks to tail.

So you've got tri tips and fillets and I put everything into that. I'll get 500, you know, 400, 500 pounds of ground beef and I'll do specially smash burgers will do [00:14:00] incredible meatballs. And I'm telling you, if you've never had a full carcass ground, the flavor is absolutely undeniable. The, the beefiness of getting all of those really rich ones.

In with the other with the stuff that we normally make you know, hamburger out of which doesn't have the flavors. It's it's absolutely delicious. And it was, it was purely, I don't, it was, it was purely like, why am I taking this and, you know, and getting a check for 1. 60 a pound? Now it's a little better.

Thank God. Um, when I can actually take this to market, it costs me, you know, after I USDA, I'm in for about 1. 2 a pound, and I've got them wrapped and ready USDA expected. So my cost is now 2 a pound. And now I can go ahead and sell these really high end density, nutrient dense meat, but at a premium at my [00:15:00] restaurants and people absolutely love it.

Wow. Well, now that my mouth is watering, uh, just thinking about a full carcass, I don't think I've ever had full carcass ground before it's that much better. Well, it's, it's, it's a great flavor. Most won't do it because of the economically. You know, if you pull the rib eyes, you know, and you can get 30 for this and 20 for this.

But also, like you said, I've got the restaurants to run. I've got the ranches to run and I'm on the road doing the, doing the, uh, the TV show. A lot of times it's just easy for me to take, take the steer in and have it harvested, ground up, put it in the restaurant. I'm still making money. It's a really healthy grass finished beef.

That makes it easy for me. It makes it easy for everybody. Wow. Wow. That's incredible. So since you started the show, I'm sure you have so much context around some good ranch stories. I'm curious if you have any of your own that haven't been told yet, um, that stand out to you as you were getting going. Um, yeah, I would just love to, to [00:16:00] hear some of those stories of you just, just getting things going and piecing it together.

Um, it just, it sounds like you, you have this story where You almost fell into this, the ranching lifestyle a bit. And, uh, the ranching, I fell on TV. The only thing I did try was to open a restaurant. And, uh, but it was supposed to be just breakfast and lunch home to ride my horses by two. And then it, and I fell into the fact that there was a town had an incredible need.

A bunch of wineries opened up and we became some kind of big tourist town. And there I am working all day and night. My poor horse is getting lazy and sway back. I probably the funniest was. that, um, I have, you know, virtually no tv experience. I got a couple of stores, my, um, and, and the, and the crew, which the crew that we have is, it is Jim Torres and Bill and Scott, Nick.

These guys are artists with their cameras. Unbelievable what [00:17:00] they will do and they know nothing about cattle. My favorite was when we first went to the first ranch, one of the producers said, Hey, you know, I heard that if, um, if cows are all laying down, that means that, um, the rain is coming. I look at him like, no, it just means they're chewing their cud.

He's like, Oh my God, my whole life. He's got a six year old man. My whole life. I thought if I saw a bunch of cows laying down, I, the rain was coming. So there's, these guys are so naive, but so interested in getting great shots. What's better than a drone? Well, we go out to a ranch out on, uh, out in Petaluma.

And, uh, um, I'm gonna try a Stemple Creek Ranch. Great guy, Lorenz Poncha. Fantastic meet you can get them online. And he's like, he's like, let's go get a aerial of the of your of your herd as they come up the hill in this beautiful sweeping thing. [00:18:00] drone goes out, goes over those cattle, the cattle look up and see it, and they scatter.

It was, they were gone, through fences, down the hills, and everyone looks at each other and goes, Hmm, bad idea. But, we did learn, we can now gather. With the drone, so we can take it, sneak that drone down and sometimes come up and give them a little, we can't gather, but we can give them a little punch on the edge and they will move away from the drone.

So that, that was, that was a, that was a lot of fun. My most fun thing, though, is not that much about ranching is about me and trying to do voiceovers. We get the first season done and I got to do the voiceovers where I got to go into my little labels, um, voiceover closet and my wife's there and this producers and everything.

And I'm, I'm reading the script and it's terrible. It's like about 9 o'clock in the morning and it's so stiff and sounds so bad compared to my personality on, on, on the show. My wife comes [00:19:00] in. She's like, Do you want some wine? She was like, that's the worst. And it, it's been a huge learning curve having never done it.

Um, I, I think the thing I get the most of all the time is I'm from California. A lot of America is a little sick of her hearing about California. So, I often introduce myself as being from very, very, very Western Nevada. I like that that kind of it kind of breaks the thing. California is a beautiful state.

It's expensive. It is. We got some wicked competition, um, government, but if you ever came here and you went to reading a red bluff or Bakersfield Fresno, this is a bag state. This is a state where hard people work really, really well on their soil and the product. So I've, um, it's a lot of fun every time I show up at a ranch and I'm in South Dakota or [00:20:00] Wyoming or, and they're like, they've, they've agreed to have this guy from California, 61 years old, come work with them for a day branding.

They're like, Oh, great. Like this guy's gonna know what the fuck about that. So I show up in it in the morning. It's always like, all right, how are you? Very like, okay, we'll do this, but who knows? And I, um, and inevitably the same thing happens and I love it's my challenge. I go in and I start working and I work the way I work.

I'm there. I don't think about cameras and I love it. I love when I start seeing these guys start looking at me. seeing me, we start to work together. And I remember, I remember being in Lewistown, Montana and one of the guys at the end, we get back, we're done long day. We only shot for a couple hours, but the day went on for 10 and I just kept going.

I kept doing shots. I just kept sorting. We get done, we get back to [00:21:00] the house, we're having a drink and having something to eat. The boy looks up, says River, I had my doubts. I love that. I love that. That's something you'll probably take with you for the rest of your career. That is absolutely called a hand.

It's the most important thing. And there is, and it, it, it, it, for me, especially because these guys aren't knowing me from nothing. And for me to come in and be able to, to, to see what they do and be helpful and feel that camaraderie. It's my favorite thing because I actually love ranch. I love mended fences.

I look, you know, everyone wants the brand I will gather. I love chasing cattle. We just were up in in a part of California up near Stumpy Stumpy Meadows Reservoir. This guy uses GPS colors, so he's on his phone and he goes to these little spots where you can pick it up and he can see where there's a group of 20.

He's like, okay, I know where that is. And then we write off and there's 20 [00:22:00] cow and we can move them up the up the draw and bring them up into the catch. It's so fascinating for me every single time I go someplace. Why do you think you're drawn to that? What's kind of the wiring that you have that makes you like that line of work?

Um, I know for sure, I love the fact that it's two prongs. One, I love working with a horse. I love this is something and if people will look at this and you'll see there's some places we go. Yeah. A T. V. will do fine. You know, those they're bucket baby cows and and the ground is dead flat. It's no problem.

Most places I go, you're either going uphill or you're going downhill and you can't see more than 30 yards. You're going to need a horse and you need a good horse. And if you got a couple of good dogs, that's even better. So I love that teamwork where I got to trust this guy. [00:23:00] And this horse has got to trust me because he doesn't know where he's going.

He's going to, he, and he's got, he's got to feel that connection. And I love when I have that connection with my horse. So that work is just a beautiful thing. And then that team, that quiet, especially the system of. You know, slower is faster. No, no crashing into the roadie or no crashing into cows quietly move, move to their shoulder, move to their hip, block an eye, and you can just direct these cattle quietly, safely.

It's for me, it's the most challenging and inspiring thing. Mostly because, and it's what I get from people that don't raise it. cattle. They ask all the time, like, how do you love on an animal? Watch it be born, serve it, [00:24:00] care for it, um, you know, treat its pink eye, you know, bottle feed it if you have to, and then know that you're also going to harvest it.

And I say the same thing, you know, if you eat meat, gratitude. And I love serving my animals. Or other people's animals until it's time for them to serve me. And it's an absolute pleasure with a horse, with a team and the cattle doing their job. What have you learned through ranch America, just about the personification, the characteristics that make ranchers different?

Um, first off you've, um, unlike me, I have to go in and literally squeeze them to get a word out. You, I'm sure you've had that where you get these good old ranchers when they're 4th and 5th generation. 1 word answers, [00:25:00] um, they'd rather just hook up a horse and go out and run a run a fence all day long by themselves than to get into town and and do a bunch of meetings and talking.

What I've learned is that the people that I meet, whether they're in North Dakota, they're on the reservation in South Dakota, they're here in California. Tyler up in Riverton, uh, Wyoming at Wyoming cuts. Um, they all seem to have the same spirit. They number one love the land, that land, even if it is the scrubbiest whites, you know, it's white sage and horse rush and, and just an iron weed.

The fact that they look at that and they say, here's something that nothing else will grow. Nothing. A human could eat not enough water, [00:26:00] but I can put cattle out on this. And they can take and they can eat this and produce a protein that then I can consume. Everywhere I go, I see that respect and gratitude for the soil first, and then the animal.

And I, and I love being a part of that. I love being a part of the fact that It's really hard work. It's sometimes really dangerous work and they do it with joy. And here's my favorite part. I'm getting ready with my wife right now. Do the same thing. They work all week, fixing fences, running cattle down the alley, sorting them, roping them, treating them for pink guy, you know, you know, taking care of if, you know, if moving them to a different section of the ranch, gathering them up and then they drive on the weekend to go to a rodeo where they pay money to compete.

At doing what they were just doing as a job. I mean, I don't know a [00:27:00] single chef that goes at the end of his night comes home and practices or competes in cooking. I don't know a lawyer that competes in lawyering or a doctor that goes home and can't wait to go doctor on the weekends at some competition.

Ranchers do it every single weekend in every state in the United States. Is there anything that concerns you like the, the number of ranchers in the U. S. I think over time has just been shrinking so much. How do we see a revitalization of people who actually have this reverence for the animals, this, uh, co creation, uh, spirit of wanting to actually steward the land and make sure that these animals are living the best lives that they can.

Like the way you were describing moving the cattle, it's like this artistic skill. And actually being good at it to the point where the animals trust you is a whole different thing. So how do we like inspire people to [00:28:00] want to live that life? I mean, it's, uh, it's hard work, but like, what's the, what's the golden nugget?

Why, why are these the types of people that are just practicing what they, their profession is outside of the hours? Like. You know, what makes this different? Um, I'm not sure. And I think that's what this show is investigating right now. I can't say I keep meeting young people, Caleb Holly over in, in, at the C punch for one right out.

Um, I do see young people where that, that bug has bitten them and they want it. One, the problem is, is there's not a lot of money. More importantly, you, you know, it's not something you, you just don't decide one day I'm going to ranch. I'm going to go buy some, like you said, I'm going to go down to the local market, buy a bunch of cattle and just put them out on that land that I bought.[00:29:00]

You will go bankrupt faster than a guy that bought a winery. I think it's, if I had to, not to get too political, but. Origin of beef would be really a big help for us. You know, um, if a side of beef comes in from Brazil, Nigeria, and we cut it up in America, it can be called a product of the United States.

The big four do that because they need a certain number of cattle coming through every day. And if you went into the market and just like fish, it said, this is United States beef. This is Canadian beef. This is Brazilian beef. People might be going, Oh, you know what? I really would prefer the USA, USA beef.

I know that I know that we have the USDA. I know that we have inspections. This just might be a healthier meat. That's beef gets starts getting popular. There's not enough USA beef to supply what [00:30:00] America demands in beef in in beef. If we did that, maybe there'd be more opportunity. Maybe there'd be more money because there'd be more demand for American beef.

That's on the big side.

The barrier to entry in ranching is so difficult. There's a great saying, how do you, how do you, how do you get into cattle womb or matrimony? You either marry into it, or you're born into it because, you know, unless you're Taylor Schrodinger, you're going to go buy the 4 sixes and you have millions and millions of dollars.

You can't just, I mean, and I, I did it where I made, I made a living. I'm making a living on my restaurants. And I was able to then start with small, and you know how I get my leases? This is the set. My leases come because of [00:31:00] a generational ranch, that now has kids. And the kids are like, No dad, I saw how hard you worked your whole life.

I saw how hard grandpa worked his whole life, while working a town job. I'm going to go to college and I'm going to get a job as a welder. I'm going to get a job as an electrician. I'm going to get a job as a, as a, as working in the County because it's Monday through Friday, your weekends off, you know, um, you're not, you know, you're not calving in Montana in February.

That's hard, but there are professions and ranching is one of them where the horse. The trucks, the soil, the lifestyle, the camaraderie, the cowboy ethics are so strong that it does draw people. I was just at the sea punch. Like I said, in in Nevada, it's outside of Lake [00:32:00] Pyramid and they're still an old school.

They've got a bunkhouse. Breakfast is at 5 a. m. And they mean 5 a. m. That means at 5 a. m. They're grabbing hands and making a prayer ladies eat first and then they're they're getting that they get in their trucks are on their horses and they take off. They have Charlotte is the is the is the cook and she's amazing.

And they're getting people. It's not easy, but they're getting gals and guys around the United States that come in that want to not only can do something. They bring a small toolbox. But they're there to get that toolbox bigger. And if they're open, Scott and Andrea, they can, Scott can add to that toolbox.

And there's places all over the United States that are doing that. There's, there's ranches all over my area that if you go up and say, Hey, on a, you know, when you're going to be gathering, I'm not that good. But I won't, I won't get you hurt. And I won't, I won't get in the way. It, [00:33:00] it is going to be tough because this is, this is the number one protein we have in the United States and I don't want it to be, I don't know, I don't want to see us eating only beef that comes from outside of the country.

We do really, really well to raise the most amazing beef in this country. And I think that's why a lot of people like 5 Marys and all these places are, are, and White Oak are looking to go directly from the, the producer to the consumer. And I say that, I say there's money to be made. It's not easy.

Ranching ain't easy. Restaurants aren't easy. I don't know a job that is easy. If there was, let me know. I'll go do that one. Um, the direct to consumer could be something terrific. And people ask me all the time. I saw your show. Where do I get beef? Like you had, I said, and I tell them every state, every county is got ranchers go to a farmer's market.

If you're in [00:34:00] Petaluma, if you're in Riverton, Wyoming, go to Bozeman, Montana, go to your local market, go online, find a rancher within 40 or 50 miles. Try their beef. You don't have to love it. Try it. It's like wine. Try this wine. Try that wine. Try this Coors. Try this IPA. Find what's good for you. That's good.

That's good wine. That's good beer. Not whether someone says it's good, but if it tastes good to you, same with beef, because everybody's grown beef on different soil. They're finishing on, on grass. They're finishing on grain. They're fishing, finishing on corn. Find the one that matters to you. Eat that.

Support that local rancher because then we can get more ranchers. Yeah, this is, it's really a core tenant of our show, at least like just something that we fully believe in, in terms of reforming the [00:35:00] health of America. Is food should be like, it's only recent until, you know, the past several decades where we were able to have access to food being flown in from all over the world, um, at a, you know, at the snap of a fingertip, you can have basically any type of cuisine that you want.

But at the end of the day, Local food that's grown from the earth that's raised in a way that is best for the animal is ultimately going to be best for the animal or best for the plan is ultimately what's gonna be best for us. And we've just grown so distant from our food systems, the point where we don't have that.

Connection to the local food sources were even on our show. Like the most common question is where, where can I get connected with a local rancher? And, and I think like 50 years ago, you know, like my grand grandparents, I think that question would have been like a little bit of like, what are you, what are you talking about?

Like, these are the people who are, you know, stocking the shelves at [00:36:00] the grocery store because you would only be able to buy locally. Uh, you don't get tomatoes in, you know, you didn't get tomatoes in January, unless it was canned. Right, right. Yeah. So I really, um, I think that we're going through a, we're obviously going through a massive transition with how, what paradigm should we be living in when it comes to food and health?

And, you know, I think that. It's tough to watch. You said before we hit record, I think 1 percent of people in America make all of the food. This is farmers and ranchers. So think of everything you're eating in America that's produced in America. Only 1 percent of the people are growing it or raising it.

To bring it to you. And like only two generations ago, it was 30%. Wow. How, how do you, [00:37:00] do you think we can go lower? Like it is, is this something that's just, we're just going to continue to drift and, and grow further and further away from our food source? Um, I hope not. I think I don't know if it was Aristotle.

I mean, I think that we were considering this, you know, as food is being part of a healthy lifestyle. Food is medicine. Medicine is food. That's something that, you know, the Greek, I think it was Aristotle. Someone said it. You know, thousands of years ago and knew it then we should know now. And I think people are becoming much, much more aware.

I know when I go to my farmer's markets and people ask me, you know, men and women will ask, you know, where was your cattle raised? How was it raised? What, what did he eat? Because just like my wife who raises some of the most bizarre and wonderful chickens in the world, and we eat their eggs, I haven't eaten a store bought egg.

And I don't know, I can't, unless I'm at a restaurant. And [00:38:00] I, you can tell it with chickens, the minute they eat it, it's in their system, it's in that egg. So I'm actually just eating what they're eating. Same with cattle, same with asparagus, same with everything. So it all starts with the soil. It is incredibly important that we are, we are preserving this.

And do I think it's going to get smaller? It might get a little smaller, but only because technology has become really good. I know farmers are able to do a lot more than they ever could with that, with technology, with their tractors, with the thing. And I love the fact that they are now really thinking about rotations, the way we're doing regenerative.

With our ranches where you just can't leave cattle in one spot that we're moving them. Jeff Mundell, we're going to, we're going to go see him over here in California, the way you move cattle from, you know, this 20 acres, let them eat everything down poop all over [00:39:00] it, use their codes that loosen up the ground, get the biomes going, and then you move them off and move them over to this 20 and that way, this gets the rest and it gets all the good grasses get to come up and the roots get to get long.

And then they get to, and then you aren't using fertilizers. You aren't using, you aren't having to do any pesticides. And farmers are seeing the same thing. Someone, everyone should look up is Benny Paulson, one of the greatest bull riders ever. Like all bull riders. You don't get to do it forever, and it was funny because we were talking to him, and I said, every time you see a bull, because he had a bull riding squad, every time you see a bull, do you think about getting on?

He goes, I sure do. But the fact that both my hips are have been replaced, I think twice about it. But Benny's gone back to North Dakota, and he's on a ranch and he's thinking, this just makes sense. We grow here, you know, just like the animals move [00:40:00] from one spot to the next. So can the, so can the forage. So we're going to grow something here.

Then we're gonna let it rest. We're going to put something else on it and we're going to move it around. Maybe you're going to make a little bit less in tonnage. But you're not, but you're going to make that up on the hundreds of thousands of dollars that you're going to save in pesticides and petroleum based fertilizers.

There's people really think, and I've seen this everywhere. People that are coming into this industry that are in their thirties and early forties that are starting to take this over from their parents. They're thinking this way, they're thinking, and this is what I hear all the time. I know I say that a lot.

They, every rancher, every farmer I meet says the same thing, but the ones that are serious, that want to do this, I can't imagine doing anything else. They want to do it with a white hot passion. They love the early mornings. They [00:41:00] love the, the, the, the, the growing, the soil, the animal. So they have to think.

I have to make a living. So how am I going to do it? And they are, they absolutely are. And I have, I have very, when I first started the show, I wrote in my little journal, I was like, am I doing a show that is eulogizing because I was really nervous when I first started. I'm like, this seems impossible to do this.

You work this hard, you pay all this money, you take the animal to the market and you get this much money and it costs you that much. Am I going to eulogize the cowboy way and now 3 seasons going into our 4th season. I'm inspired. I'm inspired by people that are out there and are changing and thinking.

And I remember in the 1st season, there was a young lady in in Lewistown. I wish I remember names of terrible names and she said the worst thing we can say in this industry [00:42:00] is. That's how we've always done it. And I love that. And it sticks with me because I hear, I see that if you're saying, well, that's how we've always done it, you're going to go away.

What has to happen now is you're going to have to say, what can we do to improve? It's it's soil management. It's animal management. It's rotational cropping. It's it's regenerative animals. It's using the NRCS to to get water supplies to different parts and these younger ranchers that might be not many 1st January, but it may be the 3rd or 4th generation that they absolutely want to take over from their grandparents and parents.

They're thinking this way. They're thinking smart while they're riding like an old cowboy. Yeah. You have me just thinking about so many conversations that we've had over the last few years on the show with, you know, all the amazing ranchers that we've had on Joel Salatin, uh, [00:43:00] you know, Will Harris from white Oak, just, you name it.

Jason. Right. And John was like a God in our world. I mean, it's like, but, but the, the thinking that. All of these icons of the last several decades have had to adopt is the system is currently broken under, you know, high uses of pesticides and all the different chemical inputs. It's so expensive. It's basically leading to farmers being slaves to the costs to do it.

As opposed to maybe taking a potential risk, breaking the mold, but really trying to intertwine all of the different species or, or just thinking about land management differently. And it's so inspiring. I totally agree. Just hearing, hearing how people are really approaching, just improve making these improvements, these, these big decisions to not use fertilizers and pesticides is massive.

I mean, it can have a huge, [00:44:00] huge impact on our food system if we could. Have more and more people take those out of the food supply. So it's exciting to hear that there is hope. And I'm curious that leads me to my question is, where do you find hope in the food system? What keeps you optimistic? Like, what's, um, you know, are you optimistic about where we can get to with the food system?

I am I am very optimistic and I wasn't when I first started the show. Um, I am optimistic because the people I've met and I'm not out there meeting with people in their 70s and 80s that have been that I meet them. They're around. But the ones that I see that are actually doing the work that are taking over from their grandparents, they are enthusiastic.

They have more than 1 job, you know, they know, you know, Matt like this on the weekend. He's got a, he's got a camp ground on his [00:45:00] ranch where he has to help people back their trailers in because they 52 foot. Um, gooseneck, but they're enthusiastic, they love raising food and they will do it. They will even take on a second job so they can continue to do that amazing job.

It's means that a lot of them, you know, I mean, I go to brandings and they're mostly on weekends. People like, good Lord, why is it always weekends? Because they got to work during the week, you know, and they need a bunch of friends. They can't hire a bunch of cowboys. You got 60 head, you aren't making enough to have cowboys on payroll.

So it's the weekends when your friends aren't working at the market. They aren't working as a welder. They aren't working. And I see the enthusiasm. I see great people. I see people doing incredible things to train their horses in a loving, passionate way. [00:46:00] And I see them, I see the art of, of, of, of handling the cattle in a quiet, respectful way.

I see this all part, and I see it from the youngest of people. Everywhere I go, every rodeo, I, and I do big loop. Um, so it's quiet, you know, fancy loops to, to handle. There's always a novice green junior. There are always three or four kids that are, that got good horses, that could, that can throw better loops than me.

And they're, they are enthusiastic. Now, maybe they aren't all going to go into it, but the seed is still there. They still look up to the cowboys and cowgirls out there, and that's going to continue on. It's so exciting. It's so exciting. It is for me because. This isn't, you know, ranching almost has become this, this, um, what do they call those?

Um, side jobs or [00:47:00] you're, you know, like, uh, you know, something, but it's our number one protein. How did, how did 89 percent of the beef raised in America become people's side job? Right. That's crazy. And it plays such a fundamental, like everything downstream from the food that we eat is You know, fundamentally important to our quality of life, you know, the things we pursue, the relationships we have, they're all better if you're eating better quality food and.

Protein raised from, you know, nearby local sources that are doing things the right way is kind of the backbone of that. It's, and I think that when you eat well, it's not, it's immediate. It's like taking an Advil. I mean, you, you feel well right away. Definitely, you know, you eat your burger king or what are you one of those things?

You're gonna feel it right away, too And I think people are really reacting to that in the greatest way [00:48:00] and they're still in the markets They're they're going and they're getting the fresh veggies and they're concerned about the proteins and I love that Yeah. Yeah, it's cool seeing just the movement pick up steam like elon musk the other day tweeted about Uh, beef tallow, French fries.

And it's just, it's reached a point where it's like, it's a tipping point. The problem is big enough. Everyone realizes it. And the solutions are so almost obviously simple. Um, I guess there's just this feeling that. There's risks or there's corporate interests that we'll have to break in order for us to start to reverse some of this stuff.

But I think that the actual movement in terms of the grassroots nature of it has picked up enough momentum. Even just in the last three years. It's unbelievable. I mean, no one, no one knew about TALO three years ago. Now everyone's talking about TALO. I think that is such a fantastic thing. I think [00:49:00] COVID, if for all the bad things COVID gave us a little repro, like everyone was just kind of settled down for a second.

And all these other things came up like TALO. I just got. My wife was, I have a big pot of tallow in my, in our refrigerator and my wife was feeding it to the dogs with some ground beef and I was like, where'd you all go? She's like, oh, I've been given to the dogs. I'm like, that's the most precious thing I have in the refrigerator.

So, it is amazing what's going on. I'm very glad that someone as big as Elon must have all that has that kind of a reach can say that to things because now, when these animals, they become even more valuable because. Every single part of that animal, the bones, the, the, the blood, everything can be used and used for very important things.

And, and tallow is exactly right there. And that only makes. More opportunity for younger people to make, because in the end they got to make a living. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. [00:50:00] Absolutely. Well, River, this has been an incredible conversation. We're so excited to have you on the show and just being able to share what you've been doing with Ranch America.

Uh, it's awesome. And I think the message getting out there and just being able to Bring life to this industry is such an incredible pursuit. So thank you for everything that you're doing. Where can people find you? So that's what I want to say. So it's on right now. We're airing the 2nd seasons out right now.

Um, it's on outdoor channel. It premieres every Friday at 5 30 pacific time. So you can just mouth play that out and it's on the outdoor channel. So the outdoor channel is on, is, is on all the major like dish and Xfinity and things like that. But if you're a streamer, then you'd have to, you'd have to go to like a friendly tv and, and, and get it through one of those networks.

It, they're, they are moving, they're moving along to get it into a streaming platform. There's a, um, um, my, My [00:51:00] outdoor channel which you can subscribe to and then get all of it So there's different ways to be able to get it, but it's right now It's it's right. It's through the outdoor channel either through my outdoor tv Friendly tv or the first season's out on amazon prime.

You can get by that You can get the first season that way and it's it's I get a lot of people. Um, I get a lot of real nice compliments about it, and I'm really proud of that show. And if I have to say anything, it's editing. Boy, those guys out there that film and then take it to editing. What we, we filmed terabytes of, of digital thing when we're out for a, for a 30 minute show and the way they bring it all down and make this beautiful storyline.

I'm so impressed. That's incredible. Just having that quality of people around you to bring the show to life is, uh, it must be fun just being able to be out there and be yourself. Well, I don't know when this will air, but this, this Friday, the, that'll be what, 23 to 25th. [00:52:00] Yeah. The 25th. That's a good one.

We're in, we're in, in Utah and it's my wife and I. And we're, we're rounding up bison on, in, in, on the, on, on the island and it's 800 head of bison and it was cold that morning. And I got, my wife was on with me and she, she couldn't wait and she did an incredible job. We had a ball out there. Wow. All right.

Well, I'll be tuning into that for sure. A river. Thank you so much, man. This has been such a great combo and I just appreciate you having or coming on the show. I appreciate it. Anytime I do it. Anytime. I really appreciate you there. Let's go. Let's do a part two soon. I appreciate that. Thank you. Talk soon