התמלול המלא של #46: Ron Schara: The Man Behind Minnesota Bound

been, and the mallards were flying by us mostly out of shotgun range. But we had a nice chat. And what a lot of folks didn't know is that he was duck hunting with me on the Saturday morning, and the next day the Vikings were gonna play the Cleveland Browns for a s for a very important playoff game. And so we're sitting there in the blind and I said to Bud, I said, you know, Bud, most of Minnesota, they think you are in your office this morning concocting one more trick play to fool the Cleveland Browns. And his answer to me was typical Bud Grant. If I don't have my team ready to go by now, the next few hours won't make a bit of difference. Steve Seger: Ha ha. Ron Schara: And the bike bike has been on to beat Cleveland the next day. Steve Seger: It is. that's cool. Would he would he do that often? Would he go out like the the day before and kind of breathe a little bit? Ron Schara: Well, I don't know that for sure, but I I I was and still am a wild turkey hunting nut and I invited him on his very first time he ever even knew anything about wild turkeys and this was Minnesota didn't have a turkey season back then, but he he flew out to the Black Hills with me where I hunted and and so I introduced him to turkey hunting. unfortunately I got a turkey, he didn't, which you know, very competitive. But he he had a number of h hunting partners, not so much fishing, but he was he was into that. Yeah, he grew up in Wisconsin, you know, had a cabin up at in in Wisconsin. He collected deer antlers. I did a story with him once on Minnesota Bowen, our T V story, our T V show went to his cabin, his garage floor was full of antlers that he'd picked up in the woods. Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: Anyway. Steve Seger: that's cool. I got I got two more weird ones for the rapid fire round. I'm gonna fire them away, but Ron Schara: You're not firing very rapidly here. Steve Seger: Well, I say they're rapid every time. It's like an ongoing thing where like I end up following up and I shouldn't, but i if if you got a good story, I want to hear it. I'm not gonna miss it. is Bigfoot real? Ron Schara: Pardon? Steve Seger: Is Bigfoot real? That's the next one. Yes or no? Do you believe in Bigfoot? Ron Schara: no, that's where stories about Bigfoot by the way, we sent a cameraman to India to follow up on a Bigfoot story one time because they found a h bear a h a hare that nobody could identify. Anyway, no, the Bigfoot is what I say is where science meets bullshit. Steve Seger: Yeah. What happened with the thing in India? I kinda wanna hear about that now too. Ron Schara: Well, it was a dead end as as all of are. So I didn't go, but we sent a cameraman there but somebody else paid for it. I didn't have to pay. Steve Seger: it. last one. Do you know who Liam Neeson is, the actor? Ron Schara: I don't think so. Steve Seger: No, I'm not gonna ask it then. I always ask it's like a ongoing bit from Family Guy, where the main character of that show he drinks anytime he drinks a beer, he gets a little confidence and he's like, I could so beat up Liam Neeson. And they're like, Here we go again with this Liam Neeson crap. so I've been asking people that question and they're like, What are you talking about? And it's always kind of funny to get people's reactions. Ron Schara: I'm probably too old to be up to date on that T V show so Steve Seger: All right. Well, first one, a little more serious. I'd love to get into your background and your story. So before you got into your career, I'd love to learn a little bit about where you grew up, what your childhood was like too, before you started to get rolling with your media and writing career. Ron Schara: Well, where I grew up had a lot to do with how I ended up because I grew up in northeast Iowa and then in a little town called Postville. and it's in a part of Iowa that most people don't know exist because it's limestone bluffs, Mississippi River is just a few miles away. I had trout streams as a boy a lot of woods because the They couldn't plant cornfields on the hills, so they left the woods alone and I became a a title I gave myself, the the best squirrel hunter in Elmake County, Iowa, is what I was. And so that that was my start and so I had my on s Sunday afternoons my dad worked six days a week. He was a tremendous carpenter. I am not, but he six days a week on Sundays on in summer we would go to the Mississippi River and sit on the bank and wait for a bobber to come down to throw a gobble nightcrawlers out there and hope something took them. And because the trout stream was only six miles out of my hometown, I I discovered trout fishing. We'd beg our mothers to drop us off out there. We'd spend Saturdays out there. And then my mother's brothers were all avid fly anglers. Took me under their wing and so I started fly fishing. as a teenager and so th those were the those were the basics of my introduction to the outdoors. And being a squirrel hunter, deer weren't very common back then, but I would see occasionally in the woods and they were always a ghost, so they were fascinating. And what you don't Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: know about me is I also had and still have a a musical talent. So I was a singer and as went through high school I was ended up being getting paid to sing in bars and and later in life I sang in a nightclub in Minneapolis, combining my outdoors with singing. But that that just gave you a a a little bit of hint of of some of the things I did. But anyway, the reason I mentioned singing is that out of high school, I had football scholarships because I was a pretty darn good football player. But I also Steve Seger: Opposition. Ron Schara: I also had this music. I was gonna be Andy Williams, okay? I was gonna be another big time singer. And I was conflicted because if I if I got to be a big time singer I'd have to move to New York and I couldn't hunt peasants there. I mean, how am I gonna how am I gonna s solve that? But anyway, I I decided to go

to MacPhail College of Music in Minneapolis and I had a voice scholarship to go there. And went there for two years, but the emphasis was on teaching music. I didn't want to teach music. I want to be Andy Williams, you know what I mean? So I left MacPhail and decided to take up my other interest, which was I was gonna be a game warden. So I went to Iowa State University. and took up fish and wildlife biology. And about my second year there, I had to take a course on writing. Because if you're a wildlife biologist or wildlife manager, you have to learn to write reports and do stuff. So it was a basic writing course. And I took that of course and my Lord, the the bells went off. Really liked it. And one day the journalism professor called me aside and said, You know, we think you have a exceptional writing ability, if you would think about it, we would suggest maybe you switch to journalism and keep your fish and wildlife biology as a minor. that way you learn more about writing, learn more about journalism. You'll still get your background in fish and wildlife and have the best of both worlds. And and that idea just sounded so great to me and so that's what I did. And Out of getting I graduated in 1966 from Iowa State, and my first job was editor of South Dakota's Game and Fish magazine because there was an opening there. Sadly, the editor of that magazine, a few months before I graduated, committed suicide. So that they had an opening. And that that started my writing career with the South Dakota Game and Fish Department. That's why I first discovered. Wild turkeys, first antelope I saw, first elk I ever saw, blah, blah, blah. So and I was only there less than two years when I got a call from the Minneapolis Tribune at that time. They were looking for an outdoor rider who could do more than just write stories about where the fish were biting. They wanted somebody who could talk to biologists and understand what the hell they were saying. And they doubled my salary from what I made in South Dakota, and so I everything Steve Seger: Yeah. Ron Schara: I owned I put in a Car and and drove to Minneapolis and I spent more than twenty years writing an outdoor column and got lucky when dabbled in some TV, got asked to do a little thing for NBC affiliate and did it and they liked it. They said, Let's have a half-hour show, and anything, one thing led to another. Won't bore you with the the idea of Minnesota Bound started and first aired in nineteen ninety five and is still on the air to this day. And t also today, we have many other T V shows we produce. So I I jumped from newspaper to television. Very few people I guess do that, but I was one of the lucky ones and the rest is history as they say. Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. What position did you play in football? Ron Schara: Well back then you did both. So I was a a guard, right guard on offense and I was a linebacker on defense. and I have one more story about I told you about my plans to be a great singer, you

know, Andy Williams. So as I said I gave up on that dream, but it w it was always in the back of my head. So one day I I'm fishing with a friend. Montanicomo, it's a reservoir in Missouri, full of trout. And it's in what's the name of that town? has all the country music stars and everything else. Anyway, Andy Williams used to have the Andy Williams Theater there when he got out of television and everything else in his later life, he would perform there in this town that I can't think of. And obviously w the day I was fishing in Tannecomo he had been long gone. And but as I'm talking with my guys we're floating down this river fishing for trout, I he he mentioned something about Andy Williams and I said, Well yeah, you know I I was gonna be an Andy Williams someday, blah blah blah. So we were laughing about that. And then as we drifted along I had a strike from a trout and turned out to be the rainbow trout of the day. And we l I landed it, he l l netted it for me, and he said the guide said, by the way, he says, see that house right in we're right in front of it now? I go, Yeah. He said, That's Andy Williams' house. And his widow still lives there. Who knew? Yeah. Steve Seger: No way. Did he did he know them at all or no know her at all? Ron Schara: I don't know if he did or not. He he may have, it's a small town, you know. Anyway. Steve Seger: Yeah. that's cool. How how did you come up with the idea of Minnesota bound? What where did that spark from? Ron Schara: Well, I'm a storyteller, and that was my strength writing columns. But I would watch some of the early television fishing shows, hunting shows, weren't so many hunting shows then, but fishing shows and I would watch them and I would say to myself, how many bass do I need to see being caught in twenty minutes here? And and th they're not telling me a story. About anything. I could they could have the the President of the United States in the back of the boat and they never tell you who he was, you know what I mean? Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: So I was a big fan of sixty minutes television, still am, where they tell stories. So in the back of my mind, if I ever get a chance to do television, I'm going to tell stories. Because A lesson that one of my journalism professors once told me when you when you're wondering how to start a story, whether it's for television or newspaper or magazines, whatever, he said, just remember, people are always interested in other people. So instead of starting this story, it was a quiet morning on the lake as the loons were singing and the bird chickadees were chirping, blah blah blah. You might say On this morning my fishing partner Billy Boy is is mesmerized because he's never been here before. So now you're saying, Well what's tell me more about Billy Boy. About me? Steve Seger: Yeah. It's good, yeah. Ron Schara: Yeah, so I got the chance to do T V telling stories. Stories about interesting people who did things interestingly. you know, paddled around Lake Superior or whatever. Stories about people who who made unique lures or painters who could do wildlife paintings, interesting places to go. State parks, other things in in Minnesota, where to go some of the best hiking trails. And we did it a variety, not just fishing or hunting, but state parks, nature. I would do stories about how do chickadees survive a Minnesota winter, this tiny little bird. How does that happen? So I'd research it, we'd go we'd film chickadees and and it went on and on. And I'm still doing those kind of stories. Nature stories, places to go, interesting people in Minnesota and and and just good storytelling and that that's a very simple secret of longevity for Minnesota Bow. Steve Seger: Yeah. When you were a young guy and you were trying to make your name and kind of build that reputation up, was it difficult at first to get people to say yes to wanting to give you their time and share information with you? Or were I mean like how are you finding these opportunities and reaching out and meeting people? Ron Schara: Well, I'm a you know, I'm always on the lookout for good stories, so I scan newspapers, I watch some television, 'cause they might do a story about somebody that w they wouldn't do it the way I would do it. I I'm a news hound and I look for stories. I just found one the other day. in Hennepin County, Minnesota's largest county, Hennepin County, not the largest county, but it's the one that Minneapolis is in. makes all Hennepin County makes all kinds of bad news like murders and I don't know. But they Steve Seger: Okay. Sounds lovely. Ron Schara: they yeah. They have a unique program trying to preserve wildlife areas and wildlife habitat within this metro metropolis, which I don't Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: think a lot of people even know that is going on. And that we do have wild critters that live in the traffic jams or amid the traffic jams and beyond the murder scenes in Minneapolis. And so you know th there it was, there there's a story. We haven't done it yet, but I'm going to do that story. So I'm still looking for stories. I at my phase of life now I'm I'm I'm I'm just the founder. I still write some scripts, still use my voice for some voice for some scripts. and I but I can't quit finding story ideas. Steve Seger: Yeah. When did you really start to feel traction with the with the business too? Did it take you a couple of years or did it was there like a turning point pretty early that you remember? Ron Schara: Well, I was writing a column for the Minneapolis paper and I got a call from the NBC affiliate in Minneapolis to if they asked me would I be interested in doing a couple of two minute one minute or two minute stories for them about the outdoors. They're sports guys. It could be the opening of deer season in Minnesota, but the sports guys are wrapped up in jockstrap sports, you know. You mentioned wouldn't mention deer. Steve Seger: Yeah. Ron Schara: And the news director, he was

an outdoor, he says, How come well I want more some outdoor stuff on my news? So they had me do some short pieces and that went on for several months and they loved them. And so then the idea came up, let's do a half hour TV show called Minnesota Bound. And so they kicked that around and finally said, it's gonna be too expensive, blah blah. And so somebody said to me, Well, why don't you go up to the news direct or to the station manager and argue your case. So I went up and said, W what's the deal here? And he said, Well, don't take it personally. We love what you do, but just producing this show would be too expensive and I said, Well, yeah, I suppose it is. I said, I tried to produce a T V show once and kinda lost my shirt. He says, You did? I yeah. I said, What went wrong? I said, Well, I didn't have enough sponsors. He says, Phew I have a whole floor of sponsors here, or a whole floor of salespeople here. What if we did this? What if you produced the show Minnesota Bound? We'll sell it, you'll own the show and I'll buy it from you. That sounded like a deal I couldn't turn down. And so that started the first Minnesota Bound on a February day in t in nineteen ninety five, and as it turned out We were looking show number one in my kitchen or by should should I have a fireplace in the house, should we should I be by a fireplace like the old outdoor T V shows or should it be some other set or what what would it look like? So I'm in the kitchen and I have a lab in the kitchen, a three month old or six month old lab I named Raven. 'Cause she's black, she's birdie, Raven's I thought she's a smart dog, Raven's a Black birdie, they are birds, and they're smart. So finally we're trying to figure out what it should be, and my wife says, Why don't you have Raven sit next to you? Okay, we'll try that. So I have Raven sitting next to me. And the camera guy who's from Pittsburgh says, that doesn't work. I said, Well what do you mean it doesn't work? He says, Well, to the TV camera run, it looks like a pile of black blankets. The dog looks like a pile of black blankets with two eyes sticking it. He says, Do you have something bright you can colorful you can put on your dog? And I'm thinking Joe is from Pittsburgh. He thinks we dress up our hunting dogs out here. Sorry. Steve Seger: Yeah. Ron Schara: I walked down the hall of the house and there on the coat rack was something I called a farmer's handkerchief, the red one. I saw that hanging there. I think the good Lord put it there. I don't know. But I I looked at it, I said, Well maybe that'll work. I put it on the dog, we walked back out there, set the dog down. Camera guy Joe says, That's perfect. Well, little did we know. Having that dog was about was a magical moment. And just for the hell of it, at the end when I f finished saying thanks for watching, introduced the kid of the grand outdoors and the star of the show is Raven. I just said that for the heck of it. And that that bec that that did it. So Minnesota Bound was almost an instant hit to the point that I had to make a big decision. T V is a very fickle audience, as you would know. You might be here one day and you go on the next. If you don't have eyeballs, you're out. But the the show was taking more and more of my time and so I went to the tribune and I said, Hey, I'd like to just go part time, twenty hours. Okay, well what are you gonna do? Well, yeah, I'm p I'm messing with this T V show. I I just wanted twenty hours we'll we'll be alright. Okay. Then I realized I couldn't even do give the paper twenty hours. So then I had to decide, am I jumping? Am I gonna leave one of the best jobs in Minnesota where I get paid to hunt, fish, and write about it? Or am I going to jump to T V a very uncertain future there and leave behind this newspaper job I had? I jumped and I quit the newspaper. Put all my cards on the table with television and turns out it was a great decision. Steve Seger: Yeah. How how long were you trying to balance both for? Like how how long did it work before it broke and you were doing the twenty and the probably like Ron Schara: Y Steve Seger: sixty over here? Ron Schara: you know, I don't remember how long but it it got to the point where I had to be honest with the paper because they didn't know if I was giving them twenty hours or two hours. And I in my heart I knew I wasn't giving them twenty hours, so plus the the producing the T V show was demanding more and more of my time, traveling, etcetera. So so I'm not sure what how much time that took, but eventually did it. But what was interesting is Minnesota Obama was only on the air two years when through a mutual friend named Jerry McKinnis, who did stuff for ESPN, came to Saint Paul to a sports show and I knew him from from some previous times. And I'm sitting next to him and he and I said to him just off the cuff, I said, Jerry, I'm I'm in I'm getting in your T into your into your you know what what you do now, I'm I'm doing a T V show. He said, You are? Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: I said, Yeah. It's called Minnesota Bound. He said, Well, send me a couple of copies of it, would you? I said, Sure. So I sent him a couple of sh shows, Minnesota Bound, and he called me back couple weeks later and said, I love that storytelling. Do you mind if I show this to ESPN? If I shouldn't mind. So he did and Steve Seger: Yeah. Ron Schara: then I get a call from ESPN said, We love what you do. We'd like you to do a T V show for us. We're gonna call it Backroads with Ron and Raven. So that's how I ended up on national television. Yeah. Steve Seger: cool. Did you the were you mainly in the Midwest or did you ever go like farther south or other areas around the world? Ron Schara: W well w when I got the ESPN, the the world. I I was I went to Africa, I went to South America several times filming stuff, I went to the Amazon River twice, fishing. I went I was in Fin Finland on nine eleven. No, excuse me, Norway on nine eleven. Was

in Finland doing a story in Rappala Lures. that's where Lori Rappela carved the first rappla and the rapla was the first rappla in America was discovered in Minnesota. So you need to know that. Steve Seger: Yeah, there's a fact. Ron Schara: Yes. So a trivia fact. So yeah the ESPN gave me all kinds of reasons to do things. I mean I I would do profiles of what it what it's like to fish with Bill Dance, what it's like to fish with Roland Martin, what it's like to fish with a guy he just recently died. We had this great T V show on the Espion and and so so yeah, I got I did Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. What was the Amazon like? What did you think of it? Ron Schara: Well let me tell ya, the Amazon being a kid growing up on the Mississippi River, I thought the Mississippi was big. The Amazon looks like at the mouth looks like an ocean. What we did is we went upstream to a tributary called let's see. my gosh, my mind here it's a tr a tribute a tributary to the Amazon that is more dark water and full of of of of no mosquitoes but full of of th the the bass that we're trying to catch there. And Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: but people were l still living in grass huts. We had natives there who were in canoes that they made out of logs and it was quite a like going back into a different time. Steve Seger: Yeah. Did you have guides when you were there? Ron Schara: And that one I'm sorry. What's that? Steve Seger: Did you have guides that were making sure you Ron Schara: A native guy. Steve Seger: made it through s safely? Ron Schara: Yeah, had we had native guides. I mean it w I was never felt in in danger there at all. Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: you know, it wasn't it wasn't anything quite like that. we were on a houseboat where we lived on a houseboat and they pulled our boats, Russian made engines on them. But pulled the boats and we'd go fishing every day to a different place and Peacock Bass is the one I couldn't think of, Peacock Bass. Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: It's great fish. you ever catch one? Steve Seger: No, I wish. Ron Schara: they there's some in Florida you can fish for, but they love top water lures and it in the Amazon, the tributary that we were on, you get twenty pounds or more, so it was but my biggest is twenty three, but so no, I was a I'd go back there in a heartbeat. yeah, Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: so Steve Seger: Yeah. The top top of my list is a tarpon. I want to catch one so bad. And I've I've only seen them. I've never actually been on like a specific tarpon trip. And I've heard they're just completely difficult to actually catch. Ron Schara: Well, I've been I've I took many trips for Tarpon to Costa Rica and the Atlantic side and also caught them in Florida, with a guide always, but you're right, and the reason they're sometimes hard to catch is they have a real bony mouth and so it's hard to get a hook set in them. Steve Seger: Uh-huh. Ron Schara: and as soon as they feel anything they they're they're head for the sky, you know, and they're so fast. but they're an awesome fish, a a great trophy, and you should you should pursue your quest because you can go to the Flor Florida Keys and catch tarpon if you go at the right time of year. You can go up to coast of Florida March, April at good times. yeah. Yeah you wanna catch a P you wanna you wanna catch that. And also I should tell you in the the Amazon I pitched for Piranha. Now let me tell you about Steve Seger: Pirana. Ron Schara: piranha. Everybody knows the jungle movies The red piranha, the one that goes in schools and if you wade into an it'll make you a skeleton in about thirty seconds, you know? And so actually there's a lot of truth to that because I watched red piranha in action on a fish I caught and 'cause they sensed that that fish was struggling 'cause it was f fighting against my line. And the piranha struck that fish. And and they Actually s there were so many Puranas hanging on it they pushed him to the surface and just hung on and hung and turned him around, turned that fish around. It was a small peacock bass and and l literally and it wasn't long, there was just mu the head and the skeleton from this thing. That's the red piranha. Steve Seger: Like a night nightmare. Ron Schara: Yeah, you can that's the red piranha. But I have been swimming with the black piranha because the black piranha is a solitary piranha. And it lives in current where the red piranha likes them spooky, quiet lagoons, you know, they're real quiet. The Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: black piranha is a little current in a river and and so I have been swimming with them and they don't attack you because you're too big. I mean that a single black piranha's not gonna take you on. You know? So and I I've eaten both. They're like bluegills, they're delicious. So there you go. It's more trivia. Steve Seger: Yeah. What part of Africa were you in? Ron Schara: Went to South Africa and Zimbabwe and again I had no ambition to be some big game hunter and put a bunch of heads on the wall. I I went there primarily to observe some big game hunting, tagging along with a friend of mine that was gonna hunt for for the that's a bull that's early anyway, gosh my mental memory but so I d I basically mostly tagged along with some hunting and but I also was interested in the fact that a lot of people who don't hunt or don't like hunting would always say, if you hunters would stop shooting lions and elephants and everything else. We'd have all kinds of lions and elephants, or any other African game. And I wanted to show people that Cape Buffalo is the one I couldn't think of. I wanted to show people that in Africa, Africa might have wonderful array of wildlife, but a lot of that wildlife is under the same human pressures that our wildlife is in the United States, where you have people getting rid of the habitat moving in, houses moving in, people poaching, illegal hunting, no s no management, no seasons, no nothing. And that and that

so just simply s wishing that we would all put our guns away and quit going to Africa, that's not going to stop the decline of elephants or anything else in Africa. I wanted to Point make that and it was easy to show because in some areas we would run into poacher patrols, they're can't they're carrying AK forty sevens and if they saw you out there and you weren't supposed to be there, you're dead. They don't even ask questions because they would show me a hole in the fence where some poachers came in, shot a giraffe, cut it up and had it out of that fence in one night looking for protein. The protein was big demand. You know what I mean? So that's Steve Seger: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: that's the main reason I went to Africa to well one, to see it and see everything, but to make a point with with non hunters or anti hunters that their solution is not gonna work. Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. You know, I listened to you you it was you and your daughter Laura talking about monarch butterflies migrating. Ron Schara: Yeah. Steve Seger: and I learned a ton. I I know nothing about butterflies, but you guys were talking about how they'll fly like thousands of miles to warmer weather. Were are you are you like super interested in monarchs? or was that just like a one off when I was listening kind of a thing? Ron Schara: Well, it's just one of many nature stories we've done. Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: the monarch is also a butterfly that's easily identified, people love it, but it's it it's been in trouble. You know, its population is going down as again we got rid of the habitat. milkweed is something they absolutely need. And what do we do? We spray it all and get rid of it with chemicals. So, there's a message there. But yeah, the Just the fact that monarch butterflies, they don't all go it's to a wa it's to a place in Mexico is where they go. They don't all get there, but a l thousands of do. And others stop in Texas, etcetera, and some a lot of them die along the way. But then they make their way back in the springtime. But you think about that. if you ever watch a butterfly fly, there's like like it goes Three steps forward and five steps back, you think. How Steve Seger: Yeah, it looks exhausting. Ron Schara: do you ever get to Mexico? I guess Steve Seger: Yeah, I can't believe that. Ron Schara: Well see, this is the marvel of this is part of the secret of Minnesota, because there's these natured things. I didn't I d you know, I didn't study monarchs, but I know how to research stuff. I know I know the experts. These are fascinating things. So keeps you hooked to the TV set when we're doing a story about monarchs. So Two years ago I found a f a guy in i in Brainerd, Minnesota, in his backyard. He was very interested in purple martens. That's a small bird that feeds on mosquitoes and insects. They migrate. And he and he they'll they'll live in houses that you provide for them. So he had ten of these purple marten houses in his yard, and he was an expert about them, he well read about them, he belonged to the Purple Martin Association which I never knew existed, etc. So we're talking about stuff. And I said to him, where do they migrate to in the wintertime? When do they when they leave Minnesota, where do they go? He said, Well I'll show you something. He said, A few years ago, some of my purple martens in my backyard, we captured and we put little transistors on their backs so like GPS signals that we could follow them. So here's a question for you. Where do you think a purple marten goes when it leaves the backyard in Brainerd, Minnesota? Where do you think it goes to spend the winter? Steve Seger: I mean it's gotta be south. I mean when I was little we always used to say my mom be like the birds are heading south for the winter and I I would always just be like, Florida, I guess. Do they make it that far? Ron Schara: Well they make it to an island in the Amazon River, my friend. Yes, that's what I said. I have no idea but that Purple Martin could tell you. But here's another Steve Seger: my god. How many miles is that? Yeah. Ron Schara: fascinating part of that. He this min Brainerd Minnesota fella told he had a female Purple Martin that made that trip six times. And w w each time when she would come back in the spring, she'd land on the same house that she left. months earlier. Yeah, Steve Seger: Unbelievable. Ron Schara: that's but those are the those are the things that in my case kept Minnesota Bound on the air. Steve Seger: Yeah. Do you do you have any stories that you're still hoping to eventually tell? Like is there any like North Star out there that you haven't been able to either track down or Ron Schara: Well, yeah, there's always there's some I have to admit I've I've taken the easy fruit for nature often and sometimes it's hard to get footage. For example, I wanna do a story about flying squirrels. They're fascinating, they're nocturnal, they don't really fly, but they're a squirrel that has skin on from its front leg to its back leg that when it lifts off of tree it can float, sail. But they call them flying squirrels. And but I've had no cooperation from some of the University of Minnesota biologists who are studying plant squirrels. And it's hard for us to get footage of them because they're not common and they're at night, active at night. So how do you get that? But that's one story I'd like to do. Yeah. Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Is it are you like when you're reaching out to people to try to set these stories up, are you like just doing like a cold email or are you guys reaching out through connections that you have one way or another? Ron Schara: Well it often starts with email, but I you often need a fone conversation or face to face conversation because what what we do, the big question is, what can the camera see? Steve Seger: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: I say if the camera doesn't see it, it didn't happen in our business. So the camera has to see this. Or if if the camera doesn't see it, do you have video that you can share with us that we can use? Because this is this is television. Now there's a lot of stories that w make it for a newspaper because you don't need to see something. You can describe it. But in television you gotta see it. Steve Seger: Mm-hmm. Ron Schara: I have one more story. Okay. Steve Seger: Yeah. Ron Schara: A lot of people ask me, What's my favorite story? Or they ask me, What's my favorite fish? And I always my favorite fish I always tell is the one I have on the end of my line at the moment. But my favorite story, I have a lot of but the one I usually share with people is the day I went fishing with a guy in northern Minnesota in his little tin boat with an outboard motor that you have to start by pulling the cord, you know. the old fashioned way. And he drove the boat. He went out to a place on the lake and dropped an anchor. And he picked up his fishing rod and he got a minnow out of the minnow bucket and he put this minnow in a little tiny three sixteenth ounce jig. And he cast out until his bobber started to twiggle and go down and he Reeled in a small bluegill and he took it off the hook and he held it up the camera for me to see and he tossed it, let it go again. And he did all of these things with no hands or arms. He did everything with his feet. His Steve Seger: What? Ron Schara: toes. His toes were as nimble and as your fingers are. I mean tell Steve Seger: Okay. Ron Schara: me he picked up a minnow scoop. Grant dipped it in the minnow bucket, got one minnow, put the minnow on the floor of the boat, held the minnow down with one foot, picked up this tiny jig with his toes other toes and his other foot, and daint daintily slipped the hook through the lips of that minnow. Got it? Steve Seger: How did you find this guy? Ron Schara: Somebody saw him fishing a few weeks earlier in a boat, in a different boat, and got his name and sent it to me. They said this would be a good story. Yeah. Yeah, Steve Seger: Awesome. Ron Schara: but here's the here's the corker. So, you know when men first meet? You look up if I had just first met you we in person, w what what would we do? We'd shake hands. Right? Nice to meet you. So I meet this guy with no hands or arms and what do I do? Not thinking? I put I reach my hand out. Steve Seger: Yeah. Ron Schara: He wh he holds his foot up, his bare foot. And I I'm not gonna go, ugh you know. I shake his foot. Okay, no big deal. But as I'm but as I'm Steve Seger: Noble of you. Ron Schara: about to leave, he says to me, Ronnie says, I want to thank you for shaking my foot. No big deal. What what what's the problem? He said, Well, everybody thinks feet are dirty. I eat with mine. So there's the Steve Seger: Ha ha. That's fantastic. And that's a good way to wrap it up too. Thank you for taking the time. Yeah, this Ron Schara: Thanks for having me. Thanks for having me. Steve Seger: a lot of fun.