About my generation of fish and wildlife officers. So the book is called the game wardens son. Being with my dad during those years when he was a game warden was like having a storybook childhood. I did things that most kids would dream of. He was, when he started out, he was on what they call marine patrol, and his duty was patrolling the channel, the California Channel Islands which are fantastic, ask theyre anywhere from, like, 26 miles across the sea like the song says or clear out in, you know, way out in the ocean. So i got to go on these excursions or these patrols out into the, out into the Channel Islands and see things that most kids would only dream of. There was one particular chapter i wrote about in the book, i called it a trip to the islands where we went out and took these two National Park scientists from washington, d. C. Out to Santa Barbara island, and it had been declared by Franklin Roosevelt president Franklin Roosevelt as a National Monument years before. It was their job to turn this island back to its natural state because during the previous century all these ranchers had come in and brought in all these exotic animals. They brought in cats and goats and pigs, and they were literally destroying the island. So anyway, while we dropped these scientists off on this island, we went on an adventure of our own, and my dad made this great lobster poaching case while we were there. That was just the beginning. Here i am peeking up out of the galley watching this whole thing take place, and hes got these guys yelling and screaming, you know, these lobster poachers. It was quite an experience. And then later on there was a case where i was with my dad when i was a teenager on a night patrol, there was these duck poachers down in the willows area which is south of here. A lot of rice fields and this kind of thing. And what they call market hunters would go out at night, and theyd sneak up on these huge flocks of, you know, in the thousands of ducks and geese and then theyd just fire their shotguns into them and kill hundreds of them at the same time. So one night were working that, and i ended up there were three or four wardens in the same, you know, working in the same place. So they all go in different directions, and one of the oldtimer warpeddens said wardens said why dont you ride with me. So he parks and starts to get out of the car, and i get out of the car, and he says, oh, youre not going with me. You stay here and watch my car. Im thinking, man, i dont want to do that. Watch your car . I wanted to go out, you know . So about halfway through this night, you know, while hes out there on this levee, i thought, well heck with this, im going to walk back to my dads car. Its just about a mile away. So i walk out to the road, and im walking back down toward where my fathers patrol car is, and i hear this, these voices. And coming across the field i hear these people slopping through the mud, and here comes these two duck poachers out of the field. So im ducking, im hiding behind the tooleys while these guys come slopping through the mud, over the road and then they disappear. And they ended up hiding all these gunny sacks full of these illegal ducks that hay had killed in they had killed in a culvert. So anyway, i ended up making this case later showing my dad and these two wardens where these guys had hidden their ducks, and the next day they catch em. So it was quite an adventure for me. Thats just two examples, but i had all kinds of them, and the books full of those kinds of investigations. Watching my dad, learning the little tricks to being a good wildlife officer, you know, like dont slam the door when you get out of the car, you know, that kind of thing, because theyll hear you and then its over and all these little things. So i couldnt wait when i got old enough and i graduated from college, you know, i wanted to be a fish and game warden myself. So i had a head start whereas a lot of these wardens when they start the job, they had to go through a process, a learning process. Well, i had already gone through all that onthejob training for the last ten years of my life, you know, riding around with my dad. So being a fish and game warden is not an appointed position. Its just like any other Civil Service job, you have to take a test. You pass the written, then you take an oral. And then youre on a list, and if youre lucky and you do well enough, your name will come up on the list, and theyll do an investigation, and theyll background check and everything else. And if all that goes well, then theyll, youll get a call and say, hey, we decided to hire you, and your first positions going to be, in my case, my first position was in a place called earp down on the Colorado River which was one of the hottest places in the world on the summertime. I didnt care. I was so excited, i couldnt believe it. So thats how it all started for me. At the same time, working down in the Southern California area was a great learning experience, and i had a lot of fun down there and learned a whole lot. Later on in my career i was, or, in fact, i was there on the Colorado River for three and a half years, and then i got promoted to lieutenant and went to the San Bernardino riverside area and worked all kinds of interesting investigations there related to exotic animals and these reptile collectors and a lot of things youd never do up here. So i worked a case for over a year involving a, there was a bald eagle which is an endangered species was shot and left at the front gate of the fish and game office here in redding. And i, one day i showed up at work, and they told me about this, finding this eagle. And everybody thought, well, well throw it in the freezer. Theres not much we can do. Well, there was a note attached to this eagle, to the leg of the eagle, threatening the life of one of the wardens i supervised at the time. It was kind of like a message, you better leave us alone, or more than this was going to happen. So rather than give up, i started doing a lot of research, investigation and asking around, and i started getting little tips here and tips there, and i came up with two suspects and ended up giving these guys a handwriting exemplar exam where i tested their and then i sent off the handwriting to the fbi, you know, with this note. And the fbi confirmed that my suspects were the ones that wrote the note. And i ended up sending the feathers of this bird to the Smithsonian Institute. We did a search warrant, search warrants on both of their houses and came up with a lot of different evidence, different feathers and everything. So we ended up sending them off to the Smithsonian Institute in washington, d. C. , and they pinpointed one speezs these were, and this was another example of that was some of the evidence went to the San Francisco homicide forensics unit. And here these guys only investigate murders, but they were thinking, this is great. Im tired you know, this is i get to work an eagle case . So they ended up telling me the exact position that eagle was in when it was shot, and, you know, the angle that the bullet came into the eagle and whether it was a female or a male, the whole thing. And so anyway, after all that was done, i narrowed it down to these guys and convicted them, and one of them ended up going to prison. The other one spent about six months in jail. The greatest issue is habitat loss. If were going to have wildlife, we have to have habitat, places for wildlife to live. They need water, cover and space. And more of that space is being covered with houses and Shopping Centers and buildings and highways. And the longer we go, the more of its being covered. And thats a huge issue. And for what little wildlife we have left, you have to have somebody to enforce those laws to keep people from going out and killing it illegally. The biggest problem is money. If theres a way to make money, somebody will kill it to get money. And the ocean is a huge problem. Weve got, you know, theres 1100 miles of coastline in california where and along the coast theres all this, a lot of illegal commercial fishing going on, and this is only just a few officers to go around and enforce the laws so that well always have fish and wildlife. Theyre setting up marineprotected areas where theyre closed to certain activities to allow these overfished species to come back. And then theres a huge issue on the federal level with, well, an example of whats going on right now in washington, d. C. Where a lot of the agencies are being defunded and environmental agencies are being defunded. You cant have your cake and eat it too. If you dont fund these agencies, dont count on there being much wildlife left in a few years. Cant take that away and expect to have wildlife. Californias fortunate because california has always been a state that values its resources. And so the policies have remained good. And one of the issues has always been the fact that not being near enough wildlife officers to go around because theres im not sure right now what is there, like, almost 40 Million People in california . The number of wildlife officers in the field is probably around 400. So that gives you a little example. But working with the legislature, california officers have done fairly well. Theyre pretty well supported. I wrote both books for three reasons. The first reason, i had all these Great Stories to tell, and i wanted people to enjoy, enjoy these Great Stories and understand. And the second run was for reason was for people to understand that the game wardens job is a lot more than checking fishing licenses and writing fishing tickets. Theres a million things a game warden has to do. And the third and most important reason was i wanted to include a resource, a conservation message in everything i write. So is thats what i want them to take away from it, is each one of those stories has a message about how valuable these resources are and what it takes to keep them, you know, to keep them there so people can, future generations can enjoy them. And thats what i would say. And everybody thats talked weve had hundreds of people tell us how much they enjoy the book, and its not just hunters and fishermen, weve had a lot of people that say, man, i love your book because theyre Great Stories, and i understand the message youre trying to convey by writing them. Im standing in front of the Redding Library which is the main branch of the public libraries. Come inside with us as we learn about the early history of shasta county. Today we are here in redding, california, and we are at the Redding Library of the shasta public libraries, and we are on th