This is Dusty Baker - Cross Timbers Bison Ranch

[Music] you are listening to this is Oklahoma hosted by Mike Hearn telling stories of Oklahomans and those that have made it their home what's up guys welcome back to another episode of this is Ooma podcast M and here your host back with another episode excited to share this episode with you today but before we do got to thank our sponsors first of all the Oklahoma Hall of Fame they've been a huge part of this podcast for the last few years so the Oklahoma Hall of Fame have been sharing an Oklahoma story through its people since 1927 for more information on the Oklahoma Hall of Fame go to www. oklahoma.com and for daily updates go to Oklahoma HF on Instagram and give them the follow our other sponsor today is a chicksa nation now the chicksa nation have sponsored pretty much everything in Oklahoma they're a huge supporter of Oklahoma and it's an honor to have their name and their brand brand supporting this podcast a huge shout out to governor anobi for supporting this podcast it 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bank and follow them on Instagram at citizens Edmund as well as go Bank there cuz I Bank there too it's been a fantastic personal experience for me I've had my podcast account there now my podcast business account there now for a few four years now I think and it's been fantastic so definitely worth your time they're a great group of people and they're always there to answer the phone when I forget my password because I seem to forget it daily um so yeah godesses Edmund and um check him out it's been awesome what's up guys welcome back to another episode of this is Oklahoma my K hereo host back with another episode gives me a great pleasure to introduce to you our guest today Mr Dusty Baker of Cross Timbers bison Dusty thanks so much for uh for making the trip down here thanks man pumped yeah excited to get into it uh had a lot of fun scrolling through your Instagram page sharing a lot of your videos um just Big Joe and all the other kind of amazing bison that you have on the on the property which we're going to talk about today but before we get into talking about bison the whole business um and and kind of the explosion that you've had over social media probably the last 24 months um and YouTube too your YouTube Channel's really good um tell me about you where'd you grow up so I grew up in Sulfur where we currently live um uh graduated from high school there in 2004 yeah yeah and um I don't know Liv the country life you know grew up in the country doing Hunting Fishing being a country boy I guess and got into the sports played played football and uh we all had some really good success there and um was in FFA uh showed sheep kind of did all that and uh played basketball too as well and then some track here and there and just stayed busy you know you just country boy I guess I don't know never wanted to get an office job then no not really I didn't know you know always always had this vision of uh I loved animals and I always wanted to you know kind of you know when you're a young kid you're like you want to be a zookeeper and stuff and then when you get older you're like okay there's there's some other cooler things out there um to do and so no I had the my senior year in high school I had the um I was pursuing to go to Oklahoma State to um get a wildlife ecology degree I had that that's that's what I want to do there was nothing else yeah so um but when I went there I I I was I never changed my major um which is kind of rare for lots of college kids but um no anyways I can keep going if you want me to just keep running with yeah keep running cuz I will you have to stop me no no no you're good we can edit we can edit stuff this is great you're doing no so uh I kind of go back to the Bison whenever we start talking about that but just life in general I um I did I wanted to go to Oklahoma State and I went my first semester to East Central and uh and uh kind of was stepping into college I guess and it wasn't my favorite thing I wanted to do and I figured out real quick with all some of my buddies and stuff and that Vision I had of going to still water um it was in the back of my mind but it took me about two months I'm like this is not what I like driving back in for from sulfur to Ada and uh So within I think two or 3 months I put a deposit down on a dorm room in Oklahoma State and um I headed to still water in I guess that beginning beginning of 2005 to start the spring semester anyways went to silly um and uh like I said I always had pursued that major Wildlife ecology wanted to kind of do the US fish and wildlife service National Park Service step into those positions and um in the meantime in 2006 I started working for the Oklahoma State football team and became a student equipment manager and so that honestly kind of my experience and just I mean I had so much experience I mean I basically lived the dream of a player without you playing you know having to work out I it was what an experience and I got paid to do it it wasn't much I'm pretty sure his minimum wage is like 625 yeah but man I was going to school and I got involved with the team and I mean it was it was awesome and so I did that for about 2 and 1/2 years and my last semester last year working for the football team um I was like man I really love this relationship between the coaches and the players and the community and of course in still water that town is built you know around that place so um I just loved it and um anyways I graduated in Fall of 2008 well at the same time that happened was the economy crash and so you know growing up or kind of at the um at the high school age all these older men that were working in the Park Service were supposed to be retiring and there were going to be hundreds of jobs across the country and I didn't mind moving at the time um anyways well that didn't happen with the economy crash and so there were no government jobs whatsoever um and uh so I was like okay God's trying to tell me to do something here I don't know if this is what I should be doing I'm like I don't know so I jumped into hey you know what I kind of want to coach and teach and so I uh actually from um a previous marriage I was in I was went moved to Texas got married bought a house and I started substitute teaching and from there I kind of got my foot in the door and I ended up in Plano is where I did and working at Plano east side and a guy from Oklahoma actually was a principal and he hired me I think it's said it on that resume helped him a little bit hire me cuz I was never taught before anything and of course I started coaching football that was my main sport and so that's that's my teaching career started in Plano did that for 5 years um got out of a marriage move met my current wife um and she was from Nebraska and uh randomly met her at a bedum game and then I uh we started dating and talking uh she was going to UNL she was a Husker and uh anyway she graduated and I was still in Plano and she moved to the city here she moved to Oklahoma City and she worked for a uh Oil Company here got a job and uh so I was like okay you better you better decide real quick you know and so I resigned from teaching in Texas and I moved to oklah City yeah uh did a year at Newcastle and uh then I did my next four years at Deer Creek Edmund nice and I loved that place I loved that job and um I can keep going into like after Co and how I got I do have a few questions before you do uh back to the FFA stuff why did you show sheep over every other animal so um that's a good question if you asked me that like the like how I felt about sheep then I'm from Wales and there's more sheep in Wales than people right like three to one yeah there's a lot of sheep in Wales and the Mad thing is we we export all the lamb cuz we get so much money for it that's crazy right so we don't really grow up I didn't never grw up eating lamb it was like beef and and chicken and everything else um so yeah that's why I asked the Sheep question cuz sheep's very near and dear to my heart uhhuh yeah well they they weren't very near and dear to that's what I'm saying I just to look at them onlf Coast like they would I never have to worry about sheep shearing and all the other stuff like they're mischievous little things yeah they are they're um yeah they're hard-headed for sure so uh the reason I got into that is uh my mom remarried and my stepdad Kevin uh had been raising him forever him and his mom his brother they had their own show sheet business and so kind of stepping into that FFA role that was my project I mean it was a natural fit hey y let's do this I love the farming you know work you got there's work there behind the Sheep showing deal and so that's how I got into it and I did that for like six years it's a great program right for kids to go through it no I mean minus the Sheep thing like there's so much that FFA has to offer um and like that I learned from that you know not only going out and meeting people and going to the FFA convention here in the city every year um it's hard work you know I I remember like my stepdad would go to work and I would go feed before I got ready for school you know 6 5:30 6:30 uh 6:00 a.m. in the morning I'd go feed go to school go to football practice come home and then you still had work to do when you got home to take care of those animals so I think that instilled a lot in me as a young person about responsibility and so yeah yeah that's awesome it's really and I mean you know Oklahoma a Department's great and obviously you know they just do so many amazing things and especially connected you know with with the school and still water and everything it's uh there's so many stories of people whove gone through FFA and Leadership skills gone to you know the egg college and still water and then and now doing amazing things and fortunately I've been I've had the experience of sharing those stories on the podcast as well and you know everything from meat science to you know showing and all the other stuff so yeah it's uh it's big business but it's um as a kid growing up the values that you get from that and absolutely you know it's a great program uh tell me about the football stuff football team being around OSU that time team wasn't that good during that time right no it was a little rough I think Gundy came in in what 04 something like that I think I should know that you know but um no he came in it was early stages but uh so yeah it was it was not the greatest time to be um you know maybe working for the football team but man there were so many great things about it um not just on the wins and losses side there were so like you know I got to see coach guny on a daily basis and and stuff and like coach glass I if I walked in there right now coach glass I mean he knows me you know like just from those relationships and like good players Justin Blackman Dez Bryant Zach Robinson Brandon Weeden like those dudes were all there and they're I mean I used to hang out with some of those guys when I was there and um they were just good dudes but traveling you know we got to go to all the games I was at every single game um you know we'd take a plane sometimes we'd fly out the players sometimes we'd go out the day before to those stadiums well we always did but sometimes you know there's 13 managers you got to go to the stadium the day before get it ready so we'd leave on a Thursday night you may go down to the strip you know that night and then catch the bus that 2: a.m. or something but um we would travel um on the Bob The Big Orange bus and we would go set everything up and basically that evening the players would come in like on a Friday um they would fly in that evening we would do a uh practice a little short practice and then um they would go to the hotel we would pack everything up we go to the hotel do whatever next day you got game day of course that's a lot of work too so no that was my life you know for several months but once you're in football season I mean it's it's a business division W football um you know and so I learned about the business side of it and you know when you're a manager you know all the ins and outs that nobody knows you know like injuries and everything and so like you kept your mouth shut essentially because you were looking out for your players you're looking out for your team and stuff and there was just a lot of inside stuff that normal people don't see but I also saw all the work that goes into it those uniforms and those helmets those managers do all that the reason those helmets look so awesome are those because those managers how everything flows on the field you know the structure and the headsets and everything that's managers and I had no idea I was a player growing up in high school and now that I'm on the other side of it lots of cool things man I mean I could talk a long time about do it we got time I want to hear about it I mean that was that was kind of the thing and then being around the players every day yeah you know like people would brag you know like oh yeah this and that this dude I'm like those are just they're just normal dudes you know and and those coaching staff they always treated us really well and uh I was assigned to a couple coaches here and there and we would set practice up every day we would run the practice and then we would after practice break down we would break it all down we put everything back up um and go back to our normal lives of being a college student again but I mean it was it was living the dream it was the best job it was a lot of work but it was the best job that if you were a student and want to be involved in something I didn't have to be a part of a fraternity that was my that was my Niche that was my group and I needed those those 13 guys and my boss or something and those players and I mean it was it blast so all of that fun and the experience and the relationships that I saw within the whole system from the athletic director to coach Gundy down to those individual players and coaches I saw that and I was like I want to be a part of I want to influence you kids' lives and so high school football was my thing and so that I did that for 10 years uh what was your favorite Stadium you went to on the road uh first game I ever worked was in Georgia um and oh my gosh I'm going blank right now who the quarterback was he's the quarterback for the St Louis Rams right now um yes is better than and oh my gosh Matthew Stafford okay Matthew Stafford was there um at the time they crushed us we still had Bobby Reid as our quarterback at the time sorry Bobby I like you man but um anyways um that was really cool to go to the SEC and do that now Georgia is a lot better than they were then but um we put in the Seattle Seahawk stadium my second game of the uh first first game of 2008 or seven we played Washington State there that was fun um we the bowl games are kind of the year the fun thing we got to play at the San Diego Stadium the Chargers Stadium we played Oregon the Ducks there um they beat us those were those are some of the stadiums that kind of come to my attention and then after I left the Big 12 kind of changed a little bit right in there so I didn't get to go to morgant town and places like that but um yeah it was uh those are pretty cool I mean might I saw the Big 12 teams or games what was bedam like did you go to bedam at in Norman yes how was that experience I I do not like Norman same I do not like let me let me rephrase that I do not like Norman in an orange shirt me and an orange shirt you working for the enemy basically yes and um I'm not a huge fan of Sooners and I'm I'm an I'm an O right born and raised here whatever I am through and through orange but I'm not a huge fan of Sooners and I really got a good taste of that when I was a manager you know you're in it then I remember going out and we would go out with the kickers and we were shagging balls for them you know and I really this is what set me off is we're a Norman and and I know going into this game 90% of the time they're going to beat us like I I just know that they're going to beat us and I shouldn't say that as a as a poke but I know the fact it is what it is probability says that you're going to lose yeah and so if we do win it's like a surprise to me you know I'm happy so um but traditionally in the past they've always been better than us and I know I shouldn't say it but I'm just trying to be realistic I have a until this year until this year right yeah stuff happens right you know I'm always my always are my heart but um man we were out there shagging balls and um these guys the student section we're kicking in the OU student section and this is before they updated the stadium at the time and the kicker was kicking them and they would toss them and you could see the ball they' catch it cuz they didn't have a Nets up they would take the ball and they'd throw it back 10 or 15 yards throw it back and throw it back and eventually they throw it over at the stadium and they did it about four or five times and uh my boss I'm probably not probably shouldn't say what he did what we started putting on the footballs like the next well it's uh the statue limitations is probably gone now so it's been more than 10 years so yeah I think that's the right phrase for it you're good yeah and they would I mean they would cuss us flip us off and I mean I'm I'm being serious like that's that's where I was like this sucks I hate being a Norman and I guess that's all part of it you know there's no telling what players go through on that you know the Big Time Players they get a lot of that stuff and I'm just a little manager you know I'm just running out there doing my job and they're tormenting me and my buddies and so that was kind of my I was like anyways but see my job was interesting I guess I didn't notice I didn't note this but my boss when I first started he said you're going to be on the opposite side so I was out of the out of the two years that I worked for the team I was never on our side I was always on the opposing side as a ball boy there were three of us and so and I don't know how it happened but I got placed like in the middle so I was always next to you know m brown or something like that those guys uh at the time which was pretty cool experience um to be honest with you cuz I'd be with these guys for months you know every day of the week and I could on game day I got to be on the other side and now I saw like I use m brown as an example because that guy he was so respectable and so sorry so respectful he would come over and he would Shake our hands before the game started I mean like that was pretty cool like I'm just a you know nobody and he you know would be really nice to us so that was a neat experience and I'm at Georgia first game I'm nervous right you're out there in front of a huge Stadium trying not to drop a pond or something yeah so I'm on the sideline George it's our first game I mean the stadium I want to say there's 90,000 there maybe and um I'm just hanging out on the you know on the Georgia sideline doing my thing and I turn and look and uh there's the outcast you know they're hanging out of course they're funny outfits and stuff but it's just like I was like this is going to be a fun job at that point you know so anyways Andre 3,000 yes Andre yeah 3,000 sorry thank you it's it's been a minute I hadn't listened to him in a while but anyways yeah it was like this is pretty fun we were getting beat which you know but in my experience I was like this is fun um Nebraska was a cool place um that was the year we went up there I'm going out I'm going bouncing around here but Nebraska we went there and uh we beat him and it was the first time we beat him since like excuse me since like 40s Oklahoma state had beat Nebraska in Lincoln like in a it was it was a long time and I remember uh the coach there was not doing very good maybe coach Callahan at the time they were cheering us on after we beat them walking in walking back into the stadium or into the locker room and I was like oh my gosh these are the best fans ever like they just because it had been that long it's a huge accompl accomplishment for Oklahoma State to go into Lincoln and do that and um my wife is a Husker now so I always tell you know the that story that story and anyways no I I love uh Nebraska but that was a good experience too so a lot of cool locker room stories from the guys winning whenever the games did come that you're winning and just I me you're right in the mix of it right like the best job and the best seat in the house and you don't have to play well I'll tell you a secret here do you remember when coach Gundy had his blow up on I'm a man I'm 40 yeah I was me and my buddies were in the locker room and Oklahoma State I forgot what team it was he uh the way that was structured he did his interview and he had to come through the locker room to go back to the office or whatever and all the players are gone he's the last one and we're in there picking up game cleats and he comes through there and he goes boys don't watch the news tonight that the first thing he said to us and you know he didn't talk to us a whole lot and he said that and I was we were all like kind of looked around each other like what and you know sure enough that became like one of the biggest memes ever iconic moment in Oklahoma State history yeah and I you know I I love it or whatever but I remember that specific time him walking through there and we didn't know what that would turn out to be or anything so yeah but uh no lots of good locker room memories and stuff and um you know lots of good players ex players that would come through I mean Barry Sanders would come through there you know on homecoming Thurman Thomas those guys um of course celebrities every now and then but um man I had the best job ever and I had really good bosses I had really good you know it was everybody in that business was really good and they all cared for the team in Orange so that's awesome yeah I was very lucky yeah now that kind was a lot of ground I'm glad we talked about that uh so you come back to Oklahoma City you go to Newcastle for a year then you go to Deer Creek for 3 or 4 years transition then into the farm stuff right from there how do we get into Cross Timbers and and you said mom earlier before we started recording you said mom's got a shop in s for so is it a family business and how do you get into that yeah so um I was U I was working at Deer Creek I was in my fourth year and deep into high school football 682 all that we just entered 682 at the time and um loving Deer Creek but that was 2020 and um in 2018 we started raising bison okay so we started with five bison uh me and Marissa and my stepdad Kevin went and picked five up in Stratford Oklahoma not far from us five yearlings and so we started that in 2018 meanwhile Marissa worked a full-time job I was still coaching and teaching in Deer Creek and you're like well there's a distance between Edmund and sulfur well my parents my mom and Kevin had 40 acres and it was actually an old existing dairy farm and so there was partial Barn partial Corral water there was a way to start which helped us my mom and them basically said well here you here's some land if you want to start this passion and so that's how that started so we brought them first five in there so we had Kevin there kept mom and them lived on this place they built a new home there and so they could look out their their window and see the Bison that's how close they were yeah and so Kevin luckily had a lot of experience and I remember Kevin is the guy who started me on the FFA on the sheep thing so he had worked at Arbuckle Wilderness know some people remember that place still exist there when it was good Kevin worked there he had the experience around bison and exotic animals so it was not anything for him to do that take care of so Kevin took that on uh so during the week Kevin would take care of them I would coach and teach and on Saturdays you know I'm still doing film breakdown we'd be done about one or two Marissa and I would get in our car we would drive to sulfur we would do whatever the work we had to do spend time do our family thing get up Sunday drive back to Oklahoma City and I'd have to be in film at 1 to work and uh that was our that was what we did literally for 2 years in 2019 I started the YouTube channel so so it's kind of sequential here may of 2018 we got our bison May of 2019 I started the YouTube and Meanwhile we're still doing the weekend trips and then cuz when I wasn't coaching football you do two sports you transition into basketball well there's no break so I just flew right into basketball and of course sometimes you play games on Saturdays so it veryit very busy life yeah and then 2020 um Marissa had Brooks our daughter who's a three now in February of 20 she had her okay everything was normal at that point you got lucky before yes I feel bad for all the moms of 2020 but yeah when we went uh so in March rolled around Brooks is a month old or So Co hit well we went on spring break we went on spring break and I remember leaving the class and stuff and it really there was nothing that I was concerned about I don't remember at the time went on spring break spring break came around I was like things were getting serious so we were in Sulfur now at this point um we had a house at our cabin place we have a cabin rental there in Sulfur and so that's where we lived on the weekends um so we're there Co happens they say we're not coming back and then they pushed it back and they pushed it back so everything went online well while I was at home I'm not sitting around devoting 100% to teaching because it's all online now I took care of business now I got to work on the cabins and and take care of that start projects there now I got to spend more time with the Bison and then my wife and I are spending time with her daughter and she's on maternity leave um and so this is not bad so that's whenever she looked at me and said what do you think about not going back to teaching and I super nervous with the steady income me not having that steady income and insurance and all those things and I was like okay well when may hit after school was out I'd got my five years so I was vested essentially what the state and um we decided kind of over the summer really like if we going to do this cuz you can take care of the property you can do your bison thing cuz I was starting the YouTube I already did the YouTube channel now I'm getting into that and uh so we decided that I would do that well she got to she essentially got to stay home almost the rest of 2020 she didn't have to come back to Oklahoma City cuz they didn't make them come back in the office 21 came around she had to go back so this is where it got kind of hard Marissa basically we still had our house in Oklahoma City Marissa would live up here during the week and by this time we're committed so I um I would take care of the cabins take care of the bison and I became a stay-at-home dad and so I kind of ran that operation and Marissa would work her full-time job in the city Monday through Friday she would come home uh Friday at at 5:00 and she got off and she would spend the weekend with us and then a lot of times she would get up Monday morning at 4: or 5:00 a.m. and drive back to the city from sulfur it's an hour and a half drive we did that life for a year and a half and um she got to come home right um April 30 of 2023 yeah so this year a year and a halfish is what I want to say she did the back and forth thing and you know was away from me and uh so she did most of the sacrificing and it kept up uh you know you had a great time raising your daughter I did you know but um and it was it was hard I don't think it was hard then you know now I look at mik how did how did we balance that out and you know just just a marriage itself of me trying to operate and still be a husband that you know and I only get to see my wife 2 days out of the week and Brooks not seeing her mom so um I do have to get a lot of credit to her for sacrificing that um that job and keeping the steady income you know uh coming in and insurance when you have a child so I I give a lot of that to her um because she missed out on the first year and a or you know two I guess when Brooks was two to three Mera wasn't able to do that be with her she gets to come home this year and so basically from May of 2023 she's been home and um yeah so it's been like a little normal maybe a normal life but now we're like busier than ever so what uh what I mean where does the idea the dream the passion come from to start to have you know bison on on on land like where does that come from okay so I'll I'll back up um in 20 uh sorry yeah in in 2004 when I was about to graduate high school from sulfur I had already had this vision of being a wildlife major and well fortunately we have the Chickasaw National Recreation Area in Sulfur a national park you grow up looking well there's a herd there yeah there's a small herd in the park and so you just grow accustomed to seeing them every day and you're like that's a cool animal and you lucky if you could see them at the at the at the Buffalo Lookout well my Oklahoma history teacher her husband was the chief of resource management and I know it's a fancy term but he basically took care of the wildlife side the ecology side of the park well her husband did that and he said he's I've got two spots open this summer and I'm like oh perfect I can work in the national park in my hometown I can go to stey come back and do this and so that's what I did I worked there I think four Summers I was a GS5 I got into the government um that was my first step into the National Park Service and I got to take care of those bison so I'll dive into that um he said Steve my boss he said okay one of your responsibilities on a daily basis is to take care of the bison and so I said heck yeah so me and my my brother-in-law uh he wasn't my brother-in-law at the time but Daniel um we worked there together he graduated from sufre he's a year or two older than me and we were the summer interns essentially but we were like full-time hes or whatever and uh we got in the government vehicle that we were issued and um it was a Bronco I want to say a Ford Bronco no our chef Chevy Blazer it's an older Chevy Blazer and white and we drove it out there had four-wheel drive lock in hubs and we pull out there and um there's a big bull out there and his name was crooked horn he's actually he he he passed away in like 2008 or so and he has this weird drop down horn he's his body is actually a full mounted body in the park you can go to the nature C over and you can see and we pull out there with cubes because in the summer the pasture they were on was terrible and so we would Cube them and so I dove all in I'm like heck yeah so we pull out there and we start cubing them and basically to break down what cubing them is is from from the local Feed Store you could buy a 50 lb bag of little cubes and 3/4 size cubes cattle cubes essentially like a 14% or 20% protein and that's what you gave him as a supplement because there wasn't a lot of grass back there and that's what we did and I just remember feeding him out of my hand and his massive head and his structure and his everything he had I'm like this is amazing you know this is an awesome animal and of course we pulled some Shenanigans back there to test them and figure out you know there's some stories I can't say on here like in the National Park Service you know wearing a uniform but we definitely learned a lot about bison and what they could do in that back pasture nothing bad just being just guys right being dudes you're going to test your your limits of stupidity um you know kind of being sort of safe but I just saw that interaction with them and I was just pulled in man I was done and I was like this is a sweet animal I love it this is like nothing compared to sheep right no offense to sheet people or or cattle people you know you grew up looking at cattle and it's just a normal and I love beef still eat beef um so it was just I was I was in love and so every day you know we were able to go and check them mostly anyways cuz that was that's kind of my role into Wildlife ecologies that's where I got the hey I want to go work in the National Park Service and then it didn't work out for me whatever and so that's where it led me to teaching yeah so that's my first step up close with aison and so from 2004 is really where I was hooked then when I went to Still Water there was one of our classes animal husbandry I don't know what class it was I did a paper a 20page paper on bison I got to choose what I want what animal I want to do and that's where I learned about their history I didn't know a whole lot about their backg ground and so that's where I learned about you know the 30 to 60 million populations that they had in the 17 1800s and then you know kind of the decline of them and so I was like here's an animal right here in my hometown they have such a cool story and that's where it started buzzing in my head like I told my boss like I'd love to have I'd love to be a part of this and raise these animals someday that was 20078 right 10 years later my wife supported me in that and jumped on board with me and you know now we have them that's awesome uh for some context how much does five yings cost okay well right now I don't I don't remember how much I bought my time no I do I think at the time I bought which is dumbar today dumbar and four others four other yearling heers for I want to say $1,200 a piece okay and I bought five what are they now right now you can probably buy them for about $1,500 a piece I mean the market it's you know it's not as crazy as the beef industry but it definitely fluctuates and right now it's on uprise yeah um last year you could probably go a botom for about 1,000 or 12200 it was kind of down but it also depends on where you getting them from quality but I was getting them from one of the biggest names in the Bison industry and I had no idea like Doc Parson is he's a bison vet he's a vet for the you know in Stratford and then and I go just a little bit further but I went to my first NBA Conference this is a national bison Association conference in Denver and he's speaking and I'm like maybe this guy's way bigger than I know just a guy from statford guy from statford you know it's a peaches not home of the Bison but um yeah and so like that relationship started there I was like oh my gosh what a mentor and we can go down that road but like he's been a big mentor to me but so I didn't know that at the time but yeah I'd say I think there were about 12 or 13 I still have the receipt of those first five um and so part of those first five is Dumar peaches Eleanor one the famous cows um and then B Star did I say B Star peaches Elanor anyway I'd lost one my first year too in that group her name was Lucy um first bison I ever lost at the time I didn't have a a squeeze shoot and you have to worm them or work them I say I call it work them you have to work them twice a year we'd have to load him out in the trailer and actually take him back to Doc cuz he had a really nice system and he would um give them their vaccinations or what we just call warmer well we brought them home one time and I'd had more i' went out and bought some buy some I got some from the quapa nation actually so some um of those animals so I was trying to grow a little bit and uh we had to go warm them cuz we didn't have a facility for them yet and we came home and I unloaded them back into the Corral off the trailer and I counted them as they came out and I'm like feel like we're missing one and I all of them were out I thought and I went in there and looked and she was laid down like complet like just she was dead and um I went in there and started feeling around I was like there's no blood or nothing I'm like what is going on she just got is it a shot I mean was it their warmer can't be and so I called doc immediately I'm like hey Doc one of these yearlings is down and she's she's dead and he's like well he goes feel around feel around he's like check behind her shoulder do you feel any holes and I flipped her up on her side I mean by this time they're 600 lb so it's not just something you just pick up and throw around and sure enough I found there was no blood I found a hole like basically where you would shoot a deer okay right there in the vitals area and she had been gored oh and the sucky part about it was she was just wormed which means you can't eat them at that point it's you have to wait you know 45 60 days for all that to get hit them so there was nothing I could do at that point so we took her hide I still have her hide we we we we got her hide and uh we got our school and that was about us all we could do um because you at that point you can't take him to a processor um you know brutal yeah and that was ccle of life big time that was in my first year and you know it's it wasn't just a little calf that had issues or nothing it was like it was one of my core females and yeah I still think about it today so from then on yeah my wife looked at me she goes we're getting a squeeze shoot yeah we're doing we're doing we're going to do it and we're going to build it and I said okay so you know dive into that business what um talk talk to me a little bit about kind of like why you dove into the YouTube and the social media side of things and like what also when you started like what was the business plan did you have social media in the plan and did you think we're going to have clothes and hats and we're going to have an online store like tell me about like how all that is unfolded because I mean I just checked you have 214,000 subscribers on YouTube you know you've I think it's 115 114,000 on on you know Instagram and got one video that's done like 23 million views like it's wild right like it's incredible but my my questions are you know kind of multiple questions is you know what was the business plan starting out and then the social media side of things how has that like come in and also positively impacted the business um I my wife would laugh but I don't have a business but I'm not a business minded so you just wanted buy yeah this is cool this is fun you know I now I've grown to think a little more like that but you know I'm just um I think uh for me it was I wanted to support something and I was like there's a really cool story here these animals why can't I take them and try to help the conservation restoration side of these animals and then after I have them then you start thinking about well yeah you got to pay the bills you got to you got to build more fences you want to buy some more okay well how are you going to get to that point so I didn't really have the business mindset I was like I could take these animals we could create some really good breeding stock and I could sell them you know to other producers that takes a lot of time of investment in those animals to get to that point where they're reproducing and having good stocks you could sell so I have to be honest I didn't have the business mindset my wife has the business mindset and so we kind of I have the I feel like that the work ethic into putting everything like I'm I'm going to go all in and I'm going to try to do the right things for these animals you need good handling equipment I can do that you know I'm I'm going to work I can weld I can build fence I can do those things I can feed them and and tend to them and be the best producer I can be so I was like I can be that guy the work the Rancher whatever you call it um so that was the first side of it now how did I get on YouTube I have to be honest and there's a little story here I'm sitting in my classroom what year was that 2019 early 2019 um my brother-in-law at the time Daniel from R my Homestead had been talking to me about it he said you need to do it you need to do it and I don't know what he was at at this point he's like a homestead Homestead guy he had been doing it for five or six years so he was kind of one of the first Homestead guys on YouTube he' kind was one of the pioneers of that that time I think he's got 400,000 I mean 3 or 400 so yeah 400,000 followers and he had a lot of followers I'm sitting in my classroom and somehow some our family message pops up and uh they're like Daniel's out with the Bison I think my wife sent me a message said Daniel's out there with the Bison video on him I'm like what of course he's doing a live right on YouTube and he's at the place he's at Mom and Kevin's and he's out there with the bison and um I guess he needed some content at time he want to show something different and he's out there telling his followers that he's trying to get me to do this and so just calling you out basally was and uh and I saw that and I showed my kids of that my class that day I'm they were like what what is it and so anyways that was kind of the push I like to say that was like well he just called me out now I need to do it because IID kind of thought about it here here's the deal is like I remember Marissa and I sitting in our living room when we could do this and didn't have a child didn't have to watch all the other shows but we got to watch YouTube and um this was something that kind of influenced me or encouraged me to do this is we would sit there and you couldn't find anything on YouTube or really social media about bison and I'm like this is crazy you're telling me this is America's mammal and there's not that much out there there's there's Ted Turner stuff there's old documentaries out there um but there was nothing consistent there was I'm like this is a shame yeah and so that's kind of the background I'm like hey I need to uh there needs to be more information out there on these anim and of course growing up in Oklahoma yeah it's our state Mano I'm like it's everywhere you can't drive in Oklahoma City and not see a b somewhere and all the statues across the the state um so this very symbolic animal they've gone through tragedy where they almost disappeared you know from us we have the Native American culture and that they were so essential to them why aren't we there's something missing right and so I took my natural teaching mindset I think you know from teaching and and so in 2019 in May I did my first video and naturally when I went out there I was because there was nothing on YouTube I went into the teaching mindset of showing people hey there's people that raise these animals let me talk to you about what's going on here and um man I refuse to watch those videos by the way like I first did you edit them at all I did yeah yeah yeah I it's tough to do that to keep stay keep up with it and do all that stuff like it's not easy it it is man and I remember editing and I could do a little bit of edit but I wasn't great at it and I just used iMovie on the Mac to do it and figured out a group but my five my first five or six were I I refuse to watch them cuz it's embarrassing the the hardest thing was was seeing yourself in in your phone like the camera yeah um and hearing yourself talk when you go to edit it and you embarrassed cuz other people we're going to listen to you edit yeah um so I had to get over those things and um that's kind of where that went um and how it started and then how it how it grew I tell you what um it really grew this past summer there was so YouTube's funny um and you may get this with others on social media but you know of course all the analytics and everything on it it's wild so I just kept posting that was my thing and I was still coaching and teaching at the time and I would come and fil I think I was doing one video a week that was my goal and I think Daniel was doing at the same time CU of I just kind of structure okay well he's doing this you know so I did the one video week so I'd film that on the Saturday you know in between football work days and uh it grew and I had an initial push from him I think he you know he threw me out there and so I got some of those followers so I'm very thankful for him to kind of give me that boost because um if you tried to do that today it's very hard starting from scratch it's extremely hard yeah starting yeah absolutely and so I had a I had a little little uh forward end there and an initial following and so from there I just kept posting and I tried to grow tell the story why am I doing this what and and give them background history of what I knew of the B just basically replicating my experience and and what my visions and stuff so that's kind of how it grew but then of course as you start diving in more and more to YouTube there's videos that have stood us apart and um I I think one video you know the working videos is where it gets really does that like and then that does that surprise you uh well when you go back and watch watch the older the old videos it really I'm like what the heck was I doing but you know you have to do it cuz we committed to um we committed to having our own squeeze shoot and setup and so we started working on there and I was like uh the first couple ones I posted did really well of us actually working because why people like the working videos at Mom and Kevin it's because it's a manual squee you there's a lot of moving Parts just like I mean yeah just pushing a button yeah like a hydraulic you know there's a lot of movement and it's there's a lot of sound there's a lot of banging it's a giant animal yeah and you know I'm we're all learning at the same time my animals have never been through this system and then you just do all these things and it's it's very empowering there's a lot of adrenaline and like I would be so tired after working them just because not that I work that hard it wasn't that it was mentally stressful I want to make sure I keep all my animal safe and on the people helping me okay so those those those videos always did good and I think they gave me pushes through YouTube um one video that really stood out was lumpy uh we went my uncle called me I mean this is a good this a long it could be a long story but basically in Lindsay Oklahoma yeah um around lindsy croner area my uncle called me call him my uncle he's my dad's best friend um he called me and said hey there's a bison out here he's got this funny accent and he said there's a bison out here with her cows I'm like what he's like yeah there's a bison out here with her cows and I'm like okay and he's like I don't know he's like well we don't want it he's like do you want it I'm like he's like it's got a big lump on it and I'm like like a hery or something he's like yeah I'm like okay well a month went on whatever I didn't really think anything about it and he's like hey can we get this bison out of here not that he was hurting anything he was just a yearling I'm like sure well I'm like how are we going to catch him I was like you got a good Corral and he's like n ours is not very good of course when you push bison you know you better have some good equipment he's like no he's like okay well let me call Doc let me call my vet and I was like Doc can you meet me at crowner at this place and you bring the tranquilizer you know and cuz only vets are legal to do that with the drug and so yeah and that's like shooting them with a tranquilizer dot way to do it yeah because he's out in the pasture yeah you're not going to run up to that thing I mean you would have to get you'd have to feed him and train and he could have done that with his cows but this his Corral was yeah not par to catching a bison um so we just tranquilized him we went out there and everybody's watching and Doc just walks up there shoots him and then like he has waited about 15 minutes he staggering but he wouldn't go down he shot him again and then finally he went down and so that was the story of where lumpy started yeah and I think I don't know now but it was my biggest video at the time I think it has 8 million now but that is like We rescued a bison we did we brought him back we put him with other bison I raised him for a year I took him to Oklahoma State he had a massive hery like the size of a girl's basketball and I think the story what doc said is probably they're like well how did he end up in this pasture how did he jump the fence in up these cows doc said that a lot of and I'm not calling cutting uh horse trainers out sure of this situation not all of them do this but they use bison to train uh cutting horses okay um and so more than likely he was used for that he got gored he got injured he either got out or they let him out so he ended up on my uncle's place Dean's and then we went and rescued him brought him back anyways like I felt really bad for him he he came home or he came to our place got weight on him his hair started to shed he started looking better now he was stunned because of his life he wasn't the by no means this guy was not going to be a production bre you know I took meom state did an x-ray basically Ally he you know bison had five stomachs like a cow and one of those stomachs protruded through that opening through the wall and so you just have this massive hernia and so I went to Oklahoma State to show the followers and and myself this could be a really expensive surgery and if you do that he could stress out and die just because of their socialness in a facility by him something like it's not worth doing the surgery plus he's not you know he's fine yeah yeah I mean he's for now for now and so that was one of the first videos that really really did good and so from then on you know it's like this summer we had a really big boost um where I think I hit the 200,000 Mark and we jumped quite a bit there so you're still staying consistent one week was trying to stay consistent no I'm two two yeah so I think in 20 21 it we've been doing it a while I started going two a week and so I post on YouTube on Sundays and Thursdays typically and fully monetized and you know it's helping pay for you know stuff so yeah So eventually you know on YouTube and Facebook you have to hit so many followers and you have to hit so many hours on each one of those platforms to start earning an income and getting the AdSense or getting the paid views or the paid advertisement whatever and so I started earning an income off of those Facebook and YouTube and it you know like here's the difference what we do versus lots of YouTube or influencers they're not spending you know tons of money you know on like there's there's there's a lot of money going on in the background yes um you know so like we're ranching we're raising animals you got to pay for feed you got to pay for Fen You got to pay for land you got to pay for all those things and so I'm not employed I'm self-employed now and so just from the YouTube thing so we we started to uh be able to earn enough income I could pay my bills that's amazing yeah and so basically I was like this is going to work and I love yeah the connection with the followers people just love they're like people didn't even know that bison still existed MH like there's people out there that didn't know that and they don't know anything about the American Bison and I still get that today and so that's my job to keep you know promoting these animals and so I just took that on and I I just yeah I I love doing it I love showing them and you know it's a family thing are our daughters going to as a part of it you know and and uh hopefully she will in the future and we're trying to build something else that's bigger than ourselves yeah so no it's awesome man it's great that you know you can have and it just by making money from it it just reinforces the you know the fact that you should double down on this go to two videos a week and really use your teaching skills to share this message and the money you make from it goes it's not like you're going out and buying a brand new truck because you want to buy a new brand new truck like this is going to build a new fence or the feet or like vet bills or whatever it is like and people watching the videos get to see that as well so they just reinforce that and then you know you tie into hey you you're selling hats and you got merch and now you're on the the the meat side of it too right so you've got all of this kind of just kind of works together in this giant Circle of like hey now we have this business that has you look at a spider web and it's got bunch of different arms off it that all generate income for the main goal which is Raising bis yes yeah that's it I mean you said it really well that's cuz we had the following MH and I always I always think well we started with merch I remember doing it out of one of our spare bedrooms you know Marissa and I in there printing labels and and packaging them up and of course it's grown from there but I saw an opportunity here we've got all these B it's a it's a bison focused Channel you know there's lots of channels that are super diverse and doing lots of different things mine was just bison I found that Niche that that's reason I think that helped me is I was one of the only ones that did it consistently yeah there were some guys out there that would film it and it doesn't have to be a high production or nothing but you know we started being consistent and I think that's what helped us so we did the two a week every Sunday Thursday that's where the consistency helped us grow so we saw the people people we saw the followers saw the loving and the care and I'm like I think about Ted Turner he made a quote one time in one of those YouTube videos I saw a documentary he did he said if you want more bison you got to eat more bison and I'm like like that doesn't make any sense you know you're telling me I got to kill this animal and eat it so we can have more yeah you really think about it I mean that guy that guy owns an eighth of the Bison population in our country that nuts that tells you something yeah he's a huge huge part of where we are today with the Bison you know I think we're 600ish thousand now in North America and so you look at that and you're like he's right and so I am a huge fan brought you jerky today fantastic by the way I love Jerky like I remember making jerky uh with my mom's dehydrator it was dear jerky you know I was in high school I'm like this is I always been a fan of and I always wanted to do jerky and I'm like how do you reach people by you know here's a chance have some B and it's healthy for you you know all the benefits of it and uh that's where the jerky and the Sticks came in um we started doing that uh in 22 I believe yeah and the meat side of it came into play because man it just takes a lot to get there to that point because you know see by quickly for for for people to understand something cattle half of the time to get to a certain weight what we call 1,000 lb takes a bison about 2 years will say a bull to reach that 1000 lb Mark well now you can go slot you can go process a bison you know 11 1200 P whatever your desire is of that weight you can also breed a bison at 2 now steers can do that in a year a year and a half depends on how fast they're pumped so your return on investment is a lot faster than bison you have to wait till they get that big and so you know it takes a long time for a guy like me that started with five yearlings to get to that point and so by 2022 we had built up our following and stuff I felt like well we've got to give back somehow we've got to and try to create a business off of this and promote the animal it's not just about going out here and filming and and showing these awesome animals and the breeding side of it there's a whole business side of it too so that's why we did it and they taste great as well right like Bon some of the best me out there yeah it is and and you know it's like in Oklahoma you don't think about it it's kind of hard to find and even maybe across the country like we ship from California to Florida like in the east coast people can't maybe not reach it and maybe it's a a decent price for them to ship it so uh to that point what is your favorite cut of meat man I really like the filet my wife likes to riby but they're both really good I like a thick cut fillet okay um from a bison and that's because I like mine about medium rare yeah and just have you had a bison steak I don't think I have okay I want to say I have but I I I can't remember I've had elk and other things but um you know a friend who's gone hunting like hey I've got some meat do you want some yes especially yeah so um you know it wasn't it was wasn't really a it was like a corporate hunt thing he what his company he's a Salesman we like hey take a bunch of clients out there and you know it wasn't it wasn't hard work let's just say that um but every year he goes and he's like I don't have enough room in my freezer do you want yes bring as much as you take exactly which is great but no I don't think I've had I mean I've probably had like a bison hamburger or whatever like you know uh the garage theage I had one of those you get there yeah but I haven't um I don't think I've had a steak um here's the thing about bison is what what's sad is is if you've never had it before and you went to a place that had it on the menu and you had it and and the cook didn't do a very good job of cooking it and maybe overcooked it because it Cooks so much faster than beef there's not as much fat it's very lean so if you went out somewhere and had it and it wasn't very good now you have a bad taste your mouth like why would I ever eat eat this again and that happens more than we know and I've been a victim of that too and I'm like that g it no you got to cook it a certain way you can't overcook it cuz it's like a deer or an elk if you cook that those are lean animals deer elk and bison they're all on that same picture because they're lean animals um and so that's what happens a lot with bison people were like well I'm not going to pay two or three extra dollars for that burger patty or 20 more dollars for at Steak whatever it is they're not going to do it and so you know we're set back but um if you really look at the benefits of it though it's second highest like right next to Elk I think elk is one of the highest proteins you can get you know as far as a game animal bison is right up there with it and low in ch low in cholesterol lower in fat than chicken you know I mean lots of minerals there's a lot of good things about it um but you got to have it cooked right is what what I was asking any uh any like uh tips and tricks on how how how do you like obviously you said your you like your medium rare but like most of the tips and tricks on like cooking it just for the masses out there yeah I mean for me I'm a medium rare guy okay and some people don't like that but if you eat a bison well done I don't think in my opinion if it's well done like you may like your beef steak or whatever I don't think you're getting the full taste of it because because it's so lean and it gets to that temperature so much faster it to me it's just not going to taste the same um so for people who like their meat well done you may not you may try something different like a burger or or something or um you know I don't know what else you can do but back to the uh social media side of things have you had people like want to come visit do you think about having people out have you had people out like what's the kind of thought on that well I get we get we get a lot of inquiries of people wanting to come do tours and stuff and I'll be honest with the only people that really have came out to the ranch besides friends and family are people that are wanting to raise bison I'm very open to that more of an educational tour rather than hey come see America's animals yes yes and we're just I'm not I weren I'm not we're not declining those people yet we definitely want to do that and so I can kind of make that up right now with my my our social media presence so here's what I I we will allow people to come to the ranch and we give them a tour of our facilities and how we work them um we show them our fencing we show them what we feed them we give them a breakdown you know a learning strategy on if they're interested in raising B cuz like excuse me I want people to we we need more bison out there you know well we'll never get to 30 60 million we know that but there's nothing wrong with people raising bison and so um like beef people there's people that raise cattle that have come to our Ranch that want to switch to bison how creative how how awesome of a story is that you know there's nothing wrong with beef I want people to know that but we if you're into the regenerative thing like we are and you're wanting to do those things and make the land better your water better your soil better look at bison and see what they they've did it for hundreds of years on Great Planes there's a reason why the Great Planes are the way they are yeah dive into that for me then their their their preservation side of things like that's obviously a huge you know pot of why you do this what's the kind of nuts and bolts behind it well I mean so I look at genetics okay and I'll learned a lot of this from Gerald Parsons my bet my mentor I was talking about so he is kind of the genetic uh guy he he's one of them there's a lot of Bison people out there but when you go he said the first thing that you need to do is when you if you're starting to raise bison he said you need to start with good ones first don't just go out and just buy some random bison because some producers or ranchers may not have good ones and here's what happened in the bottleneck in the late 1800s when those populations decreased rapidly and they got smaller cattle were brought into the bis some were brought into cattle ranches and it was great because they were catching them out on the frontier you know which was awesome they were bringing them in ranches well a lot of people started the B thing and so you have a little wash wash up there of genetic diversity um and then you know if you take an animal from Millions down to less than a thousand there's going to be some interesting things that happen with any animal and it's happened with many animals and in our country and so um I kind of keep that in mind but I think that whatever animal that we have today left of the genetics of when the Native Americans were living off of them and everything that we had in the before we were here whatever we have of them we try to keep that and hold on to it now I don't know what the correct term for that is if you call that restore conserve I don't know the correct term for that but that's what we try to keep is what we have and so when you do that you keep you you can test the there's ways that you can test to see what your animals have and the number one thing is let's keep cattle jeans out so if there's a if you've got bison out there that have it in them and people still breed them to to cattle and make still make beef which I highly discourage um you you know we need to hold on to that because um we almost lost that animal I'm almost gone you know the genetic diversity of where those first those bison that we have today you know survived the last ice age like and so you've got to hold on to that and so that's that's kind of where that passion of genetic diversity comes from and paying attention to the genes and um God we're so fortunate do you know that the witch mountains is one of the most prestigious people don't and people don't know that right like it's very underrated Place yeah it is a yeah for and not only is its own unique World down there in you know loton or Medicine Park area but those bison there are some of the most genetically diversed bison from the last Rescue of them and they all started from the Bronx Zoo well where did those animals come from because they were caught out on the the range when they started to disappear and then the Bron Zoo started their own conservation program well I want to say and it's down there in at the Museum there at the W mountains I left Refuge I think in 19 I don't know 1900s 19152 somewhere in there they loaded them up on a rail car hauled them by rail down there I think 15 or 20 animals something like that dropped them off at cash and then drove them like cattle drive to the to the witw mountains ref Refuge yeah and said there you go you know and when you drive down there you pass that you drive over the cattle Garden it's like yeah it's pretty awesome you know um but no those animals there are I mean there's people that talk about three or four places in America that have the best genetics of what's left of American bison bison bison genus species Yellowstone and you talk about the wtow mountains and there's a couple more in there like Wind Cave or something but there's two or three places and when you talk about it compared to Yellowstone you're like oh my gosh yeah those animals now they're not going to be as huge and magnificent because of location there's a difference in Yellowstone and difference in lot in Oklahoma right but the diversity side of it is there I mean one of the biggest bison in the world which is black dog you can find on the Oklahoma historical soci I have a picture blown up put him in my classroom it's one of the biggest bison ever recorded guess where he was W mountains while life Refuge awesome yeah it says 2,800 lb that's a massive animal yeah and uh you know so you don't like you don't think about that those are they're just down the road yeah and so like you you said underrated that's a good way to put it and so that's where the YouTube side of underrated I think about that all the time so sorry I get drifted off dude this is awesome like this has been this whole thing has been amazing uh and I'm glad we finally got to do this uh so people can go to Crosstimbers bison.com find everything they need to there Crosstimbers bison on Instagram same with Facebook um and then I need to connect you with um an artist friend of mine who's kind of big in the Bison painting world as well because I think you guys had hit it off um love I'll do that once we stop recording but appreciate you coming down mate this is awesome thank you so much for the gifts thank you Marissa for everything um the hats I will wear I love hats so I will wear every single one of them um The Jerky isn't going to last long that's going to be gone by the time car but yeah I really appreciate you coming down it's awesome we need to do this again in a couple years just to check in yes I look forward to doing that um and and and you have by the time this goes out you will have new beef sticks in the Bison sticks sorry see look at that just like force of habit you will have new bison sticks in the um in on the online store and um people listen go if you haven't tried it go try it and and don't don't cook it too long yeah right yeah that's right yeah do you have any YouTube YouTube videos of how to cook no okay so here the video here's what yes here's what I was going to add for for for you and for others is we're renovating our barn there's a 60x 80 Barn that existed there when we bought this property the Ponderosa and um we've been renovating it and we're getting really close so we're what we're trying to do is make a place where we can have people come and visit and see the animals you can see Big Joe you can see some of those original animals um I don't know what we're doing how we're doing it but that was my vision and so my wife and I are working towards that serving a meal maybe maybe yes and but and filming yeah you know showing people how to and I'm not I'm the cook of our household but that doesn't mean I am a perfect bison cook you know you know how to cook it your way yeah so um but we definitely want to show that and we want to the people out there that ask me and I have to turn them down you know there's a liability when you pull in that ranch and stuff but um we're going to have it available to them eventually where they can come to the Ponderosa across Timber bison Ranch and see some of the bison and experience it I will come out and look forward to it absolutely thank you mate it's been an absolute pleasure uh for people listening uh thank you so much and we'll catch you next episode cheers thank you hope you guys enjoyed that great episode thank you so much for listening as always huge shout out to our sponsors the Oklahoma Hall of Fame Shar an Oklahoma story through its people since 1927 for more information on the Oklahoma Hall of Fame go to www. oklahoma.com and follow them on Instagram for daily updates at Oklahoma H our other sponsor the chickasa nation amazing sponsor they do amazing things for the state and they're always sponsoring something in Oklahoma they're a huge supporter of Oklahoma and without their support we wouldn't be able to do what we do our third sponsor is Diffy Ford Lincoln down in El Arena now this one makes me so happy because these guys great friends of mine um play a lot of golf together I've bought my cars from them do most of my o changes down there have a cup of coffee hang out down in Al Reno it's a good spot to go and not only they great friends but they provide a great service so for over 60 years uh third generation family-owned Oklahoma business down in aleno they were also in Bethany as well so people in the Bethany area know the Diffy really well but if you're looking for anything new used um Ford lincol or whatever I'm sure they could find anything you want um check them out Diffy for.net and then on Instagram at Diffy for Linkin this episode is presented by Citizens Bank of Edmond Citizens Bank of Edmund has been serving Edmund since 1901 they Pride themselves on investing in the community and are here for all your personal and business banking needs for more information go to my citizens. bank and follow them on Instagram at citizens Edmund as well as go Bank there cuz I Bank there too it's been a fantastic personal experience for me I've had my podcast account there now my podcast business account there now for a few four years now I think and it's been fantastic so definitely worth your time they're a great group of people and they're always there to answer the phone when I forget my password because I seem to forget it daily um so yeah go to Citizen's Edmund and um check them out it's been awesome thank you 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