EP 412. Peru Duck Hunting (Part 2): The Guides

 

The Center of the World for Cinnamon Teal & White Cheeked Pintails

Ramsey Russell: Welcome back to duck season somewhere. I am in the beautiful country of Peru. Just imagine we’re an hour and a half north of Lima. You drive through this adobe gate, the guarded gate. You walk in, we’re in a section farm. You drive about a half mile, and I’m at this estancia, 40 years old, and it’s interesting. I’ve just got to tell you the story. The man that owns this estancia, way back in the day, Peru, had this communist like law they passed, a law that said, if you own a farm, then the people that work the farm, the labor, owns that farm. So, 40 or 50 years ago, they came through the country and they took all the property, and so the owner of this estancia, he and his family had been in farming for generations, and they went elsewhere and had heard about this farm. It was for sale. The dad didn’t want to buy it because it was full of stones and didn’t look like very good farming land. And he told me he was driving a VW Bug down the road and he met the farmer. The farmer said, yeah, I want to sell my land, and he just left the courthouse with a clear title. And he was so tired of farming this property and with some of the laws that were going on back 50 years ago, he said, how much do you want for your farm? And the guy pointed at the VW bug and said, I’ll trade you even stevens. 30 days later, he had this farm and he’s lived in it, he raised his family in it. And it’s very Peruvian, it’s very nice. As many of you all know, watching social media, Jake Latondris and I spent what seems like two months, we’ve been here for a full week, and we got the full Peruvian tour. We went way up into the mountains and we trekked and hunted, cherry picked four species that you can’t find anywhere else in the world except above 10,000ft in the Andean mountains. And then we’d follow down the contour down to the Pacific Ocean, and we hunted between the Atacama desert. Just think of millions of acres of nothing but sand dune and the Pacific ocean. But there’s this little bitty narrow sliver valley that’s got agriculture and lagoons and the highest concentration of Cinnamon Teal and White-cheeked pintails in the world. Our hosts this week have been two very young men, two Peruvians, and I want to introduce you all to them. The first one, I call the head knocker, we’ve been calling him Ranieri because that’s how we say. Us gringos can’t roll in Mars like this. But I’d like to introduce you all to my tour guide and a super guy, Ranieri Kadaz. Ranieri, how are you?

Ranieri Quiroz: I’m pretty good.

Ramsey Russell: Pronounce your name for real.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. My name is Ranieri Quiroz. That’s the way that you say it here in Peru, Ranieri Quiroz. But for 4, 5 years in this, in this job with all the clients from coming from America, I’m used to Raniere Crow.

Ramsey Russell: So you entered everything. Do you have problem enter pronouncing american names?

Ranieri Quiroz: No.

Ramsey Russell: You don’t make Americans that have a funny name.

Ranieri Quiroz: No, they have regular names. But my name for, for them is really hard because of the Raniere.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, I’ve been working down here in Peru with get ducks. I’ve been offering a Peru hunt for about ten years, changed outfitters, hunted with Angelo down here. He and I have had a very good partnership for five or six years. You work for him and Chaku, and it’s been a really good hunt. Super organization. This is the first time I ever hunted with you, though. And Angelo, if you listen, I’m going to tell you, this guy needs a raise. He’s very good, he’s very organized, he’s very prompt, he’s very professional.

Ranieri Quiroz: There you go

Ramsey Russell: And we sure have enjoyed hunting with you. We really have. You’re very young. How old are you?

Ranieri Quiroz: I’m 25.

Ramsey Russell: 25 years old.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes, sir.

Ramsey Russell: What did you do before this? And how did you get into this present line of work?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, so I am from Tumbes, the very north of Peru. Bordered with Ecuador, but here in Peru, almost everything, it’s in Lima. It’s a really central country that everything important is in important places like Lima.

Ramsey Russell: Maybe 90% of the population-

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: And we googled yesterday, 30 million people live in the entire country of Peru. And probably 90% of them live in Lima.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: At least half of them.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, that’s true. So I went to Lima for college. I study international business, but I am not the kind of people that like Lima. Lima is city, and I’m from, I was born and raised in Tumbes. My father is a shrimp farmer, so my weekends are fishing, hunting, and going to the jungle, into the beach, and Lima, it’s a city town.

Ramsey Russell: And when you say shrimp farmer, you don’t mean he’s out there in a panga, in the ocean. He has a very big commercial shrimp farm.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, he has a four shrimp farms, 300 acres of shrimp farm. And he raised and then exported to Spain, Europe, Korea, Japan. Yeah, a lot of places. So when I was in Lima, I met Angelo for a friend that told me Angelo wants to buy a deer for his business here in Peru. And I have a couple deers farm. It’s really small farm of deer in Tumbes. So I sold to Angelo three deer, one female, two male.

Ramsey Russell: So these are wild deer?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah

Ramsey Russell: Okay.

Ranieri Quiroz: And I say to Angelo-

Ramsey Russell: You had a lot on your farm up near Tumbes.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes, sir. So I sold to Angelo, he asked how much? Let’s throw a number, hundred dollars. And then I said to him, I will give you a discount, 20%. But you need to take me with you with your hunting clients. I really want to know what is hunting like a business? I really want to know why all these gringos, all these people from America came here and I mean, it’s the other part of the world. Almost all America came here to Peru. For what I really want to know. At that time I was a hunter, but for me and my family hunting it was kind of like different.

Ramsey Russell: How?

Ranieri Quiroz: I mean, I grew up in a shrimp farm and we have a lot of Cormorants. Think about this. One Cormorant can eat like what his weight? 8 pounds of food a day of shrimps. And we have in one pound we can have ten Cormorants eating shrimps.

Ramsey Russell: 80 pounds daily. Eat it into your products.

Ranieri Quiroz: It’s not good for business. So that’s our kind of hunting. It’s more like protected hunting.

Ramsey Russell: Depredation hunting they call it.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: You’re protecting your crop. Did you have to get a permit from the Peruvian government to do that?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: Okay.

Ranieri Quiroz: Since you have a shrimp farm, you can go to the wildlife and say that.

Ramsey Russell: Okay.

Ranieri Quiroz: And then my other kind of hunt, it’s deer.

Ramsey Russell: What kind of deer?

Ranieri Quiroz: Peru and whitetail deer.

Ramsey Russell: Okay. What about the mountains?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, we have two sub species, the Peru and whitetail deer in the coast and then the mountain, the Andean whitetail deer. That is bigger.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. Kind of like the Coues deer back home.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes, sir.

Ramsey Russell: It’s a smallish whitetail and it’s got smallish antlers.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes sir.

Ramsey Russell: But it’s a very challenging species down here, especially when you get up in the mountains.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, the mountain deer is really hard. I mean really hard. You are about 15,000ft sea level. You need supporting stock for five days probably. I’m only walking in 5000ft above the sea is hard, right?

Ramsey Russell: Oh, yeah.

Ranieri Quiroz: So think about that.

Ramsey Russell: You were showing me some of their habitat and some of the places you all hunt the other day when we were driving up the mountains. I’m a duck hunter. I’m a flatlander. Mostly walk around to blinds and sit in waders. And I looked up those mountains and I just shook my head and said, yeah, I guess I’ll never shoot a mountain Peruvian whitetail.

Americans Duck Hunting in Peru

What was it about the duck hunting experience that you saw clients enjoying that compelled you to go home and start duck hunting? 

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. So that’s how I met Angelo and I said, hey, take me with you as a host, as a helper. I just want to see what is that? And he thought that this a terrible idea. I need to carry this child. I need to be worried about my clients and be worried about this child. This is a terrible idea. And I say, no, you’re not going to have trouble with me, believe me. If you’re hearing this, Angelo, you didn’t want to. But then, he got me with a client. It was one guy and his girlfriend that was actually who take the pictures. Really good people, both of them. And I ended up helping more than he thought.

Ramsey Russell: Did you all hunt over Casma?

Ranieri Quiroz: Casma? Yeah –

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, I think they were my client.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. Those are.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. When you describe. I remember. That was your first time?

Ranieri Quiroz: My very first time, yeah, five years ago. So I ended up helping more than Angelo told that. I mean, helping a lot. And at the end of that group, he told me, hey, man, you’re really useful. You really like hunting. You don’t know much about it, but you have a lot of, How do you say?

Ramsey Russell: A lot of assertiveness, man.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, skills. A lot of skills.

Ramsey Russell: People skills.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. So can you help me with the next group? That will be six. Six people coming from get ducks. But it’s a big group, and it will be perfect to have more hands.

Ramsey Russell: sure.

Ranieri Quiroz: So I say, Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: You really didn’t plan to get into, but it just happened. And you kind of found your purpose in life, didn’t you?

Ranieri Quiroz: Exactly. And I just ended up loving this, doing this.

Ramsey Russell: Back up a minute, because I want to go back to your hometown and Tumbes up against the Ecuador border. You told me it was just a few miles from Ecuador. I’ve never been to that part of Peru. I know you were shooting Cormorants, but we have some good conversation about some of the ducks.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, we have a lot of ducks.

Ramsey Russell: Did your dad and brother-in-law, you all grow up going to a duck blind? Like, getting up on Saturday mornings and going, duck hunting?

Ranieri Quiroz: No. Like I said, my type of hunt really changed when I meet Angelo and all these. And then I found that in Tumbes, we have more than Cormorants. We have whistling ducks. We have Cinnamon Teals. We have a few of Blue winged Teals. So when I came back to Tumbes after those hunt. It was like three groups. And then I said, oh, there is a good place to hunt here in Tumbes.

Ramsey Russell: And to clarify on whistling ducks, that’s the black bellied whistling duck, which is the southern subspecies, looks different in the North American variety and fuller, which are found on four continents. And you all got a lot of them up in those marsh habitats.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes, sir.

Ramsey Russell: What was it as you started working with clients and you found duck hunting at a younger age, a few years ago in this commercial industry, what was it about duck hunting. What was it about the duck hunting experience that you saw clients enjoying that compelled you to go home and start duck hunting? What was it about that experience that you enjoyed, that you liked? What captivated you about duck hunting?

Ranieri Quiroz: I will say, just beautiful. You’re sitting a blind. See all these landscape that are just insane. The very first thing that blow my mind was when I was driving with Angelo. He said, we are going to some place. Its a lagoon that we are hunting ducks. And then it was just like you said in the very first part of this audio, it was like thousand of thousand of thousand of nothing. Nothing but sand. And I was thinking, hey, are you lost your way or what? Because there is no water in here. It’s a desert. He start laughing, and then boom, you turn on-

Ramsey Russell: Paradise.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, paradise. That was the very first thing that blow my mind and really start loving this, and then you stay in the blind. You really quiet, and then again, you’re hearing a lot of pee-pee. But you’re not seeing nothing. Again, my mind said, where are the ducks? Again, you’re lost or what? And then, boom, thousand of birds coming and shooting. It’s really-

Ramsey Russell: Do you remember shooting your first duck? Your first real duck on a hunt? Do you remember the first one?

Ranieri Quiroz: I mean, I remember what it was. A Cinnamon Teal. But I didn’t remember that how was it? But I remember my very first duck in this kind of hunt. It was Cinnamon.

Peru: A Trophy Duck Hunting Destination

We get trophy hunters because there’s a half dozen birds here you want to shoot. You can import these birds, unlike Argentina, but it’s not a volume hunt like Argentina or parts of South Africa.

Ramsey Russell: Like, you and I have talked a lot about the species we hunted this week, and I know you’ve told me about a lot of the clients that show up here. First off, I’ll tell anybody listening, Peru doesn’t attract an everyday hunter, like a lot of our hunts, like South Africa, like Argentina, like Mexico, Peru, Mongolia, there are some hunt that attract a certain kind of hunter and Peru is one of them. We get trophy hunters because there’s a half dozen birds here you want to shoot. You can import these birds, unlike Argentina, but it’s not a volume hunt like Argentina or parts of South Africa. It’s a very immersive experience. We’re not coming down here and sitting in an estancia or a single lodge and going out every day and returning to the same camp. It’s a very, what I call a run and gun trip. In just the last five or six days, we’ve stayed at four different places. We’ve experienced a lot of different stuff. It attracts a certain kind of hunter. But overall, whether they’re just here to soak up the culture and do something new and, or get the species, at the end of the day, nearly every client that comes here wants those species. I know we’ve got a couple of clients that just come here because they’re already here on business, but most clients want the species.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes Sir.

Ramsey Russell: You were telling me how those species are about their birds, but you’ve learned a lot about these species, too, haven’t you?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: The way you’ve seen me fondle them and pet them and smooth them and get them dry. You’ve learned how to skin birds through other clients. Has it given you a new appreciation? All these birds that were out there on your farm or out here in the country, in your backyard all your life, and now all of a sudden, you see them differently.

Ranieri Quiroz: You have more respect to them. And this probably happens with not only hunt, but everything in your life. When you don’t see the things, you just see a duck flying, but when you really have respect from them, and then you start seeing all those colors blowing all those pin feathers. It’s really different when you really see the things. I don’t know, how do you say in English, but can I say in Spanish?

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Ranieri Quiroz: [speaks spanish] like when you really see the things farther than a new light. Yes, sir.

Ramsey Russell: You see them in a new light. You gain further appreciation. I’ve always said whether you’re an adult hunter or a child hunter is, we get into some of this stuff. I always go back to children. Children only know what they actually touch. That’s what a child knows. Think of a young child. He only knows his world is within arm’s reach, only the things he touches, and he only loves the things he knows. And so as we learn and we touch and we see things in a different light, we gain a whole new appreciation for it.

Ranieri Quiroz: You just see ducks in a lagoon. You just see birds flying. But when you have all that respect, you put so many hours working with them. You put so many hours chasing, looking, taking care not only of the birds, of the lagoon, of their environment, you start really seeing a different way.

Ramsey Russell: Back up, let’s change gears just a little bit and talk about some of the mountain whitetail, but you’ve also got other animals up here. There’s some animals I know you can’t even hunt. There’s some rare animals in there.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah we have a lot of animals-

Ramsey Russell: A lot of game animals. You were showing me pictures of that are protected, we can’t hunt. That I’ve never even heard of.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, we have a lot of animals. Remember, we have the coast, and then you drive up into the mountain, and if you keep going east, there is a jungle.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, a real jungle.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes Sir, a real jungle. We have the Amazon. So you have different kind of species in even that environment, right. So in the jungle we have thousands of animals, but you cannot hunt all of them, right?

Ramsey Russell: You can’t hunt them. All our hunters come here primarily for the waterfowl. Let’s just recount our week a little bit and talk about going into the mountains, that first day. That was a hell of a drive from here. Yeah, four or 5 hours climbing up the mountain, plus 2 hours of stopping and filming Torrent ducks and yeah, we went to some little mountain village. I mean, you’re just on this single

Ranieri Quiroz: Single road.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, just a single, if two small car, if a Chevrolet trucks run up his mountain and somebody’s coming another way, you’re just shit out of luck. I mean, they all drive smaller trucks here, and still you might have to back up to find somewhere to kind of pull over to the side and just bumper to bumper let somebody ease by you and just mountain road, just wind and kind of hugging the terrain. You’ve got a cliff on one side that you look down. And if you’re scared of heights, it makes your palms sweat like it did mine. And then you look up the mountain and you keep going and you keep going. After we got to be about 7000, 8000, 9000, 10000 feet, we started seeing some of the birds. The geese were out in the alpine meadows. There were torrent ducks.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: You know, and we kept wanting to stop and film the torrent ducks. And you can’t hunt them anymore.

Ranieri Quiroz: No.

Not Setting Out Decoys?

Andes mountains there’s rock outcroppings, there’s natural topography, sometimes the birds are somewhere you can’t get them. Then you have to hatch a plan.

Ramsey Russell: And there’s really no biological reason that you can’t hunt them. You just can’t. I was introduced to SEFCOR, who was kind of the US Fish and Wildlife Service of Peru five or six years ago. We went to Lima, we knocked on doors. We finally got past that main secretary and got to meet with one of the administrators. And he wasn’t a biologist, he was a lawyer. They’re all bureaucrats and politicians and they make these rules, but they really don’t reflect, like in North America. They really don’t reflect surveys and counts and harvest data. It just throw it out there. I don’t think we ought to shoot this bird, but it’s still a very interesting bird. Let’s talk about how these species are hunted, if you can, because when most people think of duck hunting or goose hunting, we think of setting out decoys like we did for the Cinnamon Teal. Yeah, but we don’t do that up here. We can’t do that up here.

Ranieri Quiroz: In the mountains you cannot. It’s really different. You go first, you have that drive that you mentioned, and then when you arrive, you start feeling the altitude.

Ramsey Russell: I really felt the altitude. It doesn’t knock me down. It makes me Rocky Mountain high. I just get this sensation, and when we stopped at the path at about 15 or 16,000 foot, and got out and pictures, I said, okay, I’m at some elevation right now. Thank goodness. We don’t have to walk 10 or 15 miles, spot and stalk. But it’s short little stalks.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. It does a different thing that you are spotting stalk birds. You go with it with the car using vinyls and spotting one bird that you really like. I will tell you, that’s a young bird to do. Not shoot that way. That’s a really beautiful one. You want that one? And then get down in the car, make a plan, be really still and well, easy. And then approach-

Ramsey Russell: Andes mountains there’s rock outcroppings, there’s natural topography, sometimes the birds are somewhere you can’t get them. Then you have to hatch a plan.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: And it’s like deer hunting, like stalking.

Ranieri Quiroz: It’s really stalk. Yes.

Ramsey Russell: I noticed on the drive up, I’d say about halfway up, we drove into this little village, and this family was skinning this large animal on the side of the road just right there in the middle of town.

Ranieri Quiroz: It was a llama.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, llama. That’s kind of interesting.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, it is.

Ramsey Russell: He said that’s why they don’t have COVID up there, because they eat those llamas. Remember he’s telling us that.

Ranieri Quiroz: He said that we don’t have COVID here because we chew cocoa leaf and we eat llamas. We don’t do oreos or sneakers or all that. Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: All organic food healthy up there.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes, sir.

Ramsey Russell: And then we kept going. But I noticed you kept rolling down the windows.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: You kept handing water over to us and say, drink water. What was up with that? The water and the windows?

Ranieri Quiroz: After five years, I have a little bit tricks that can help you a lot with the altitude. Number one is that you don’t want the windows up the entire trip. Some of my clients tell me it’s cold or, I just want.

Ramsey Russell: It is cold up in the mountain.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. But I always tell them, we need to roll the windows down unless every 30 minutes, because all the pressure. Do you remember when we opened the cooler, you see the snacks. Yeah. Or just your water?

Ramsey Russell: They were compressed.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. Really compressed. So that’s the thing that you don’t want inside of your car. You feel good in your car and then you-

Ramsey Russell: You let that altitude in to kind of get you adjusted as you’re rolling.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. So-

Ramsey Russell: And drinking lots of water, for some reason helps. Also, I noticed that we didn’t eat very much at all that day.

Ranieri Quiroz: Just little snacks, even the day before. I don’t recommend to eat too much. Go light.

Ramsey Russell: I know. I’ve had some clients come down here. I say, the pressure.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: Some clients struggle with the altitude.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, and some clients don’t hear you because they say no, that’s not true. There’s no problem with the windows. Just put it up. And then you don’t feel it until you really walk, like 2 meters.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Ranieri Quiroz: You just feel it in the first 2 meters that you walk. And some people pass out.

Ramsey Russell: The altitude did not bother me, Ranieri. I did take about a 15 minutes nap in the truck, not because of Altitude-

Ranieri Quiroz: but because we was tired.

Ramsey Russell: Jake got hung up in customs over that camera stuff, and we ended up getting 2 hours of sleep. And that’s what kind of, I struggled with that 2 hours of sleep.

Ranieri Quiroz: If you hear me, if you roll down your windows, if you drink water, if you do easy, if you take really light dinner the last night, there is no problem. You can handle it.

Ramsey Russell: We saw those Puna Teal by the lake and right about time, I think I’ve seen and done it all. I’ve sneaked up on ducks. I’ve shot them at night. I’ve shot them by light. I’ve shot them legally over bait. I’ve shot them over live decoys. Here’s these birds, we’re in the middle of the mountains. There’s nowhere to hide. There’s no terrain. There’s some Puna Teal. And next to the road we’re driving on, and you say, walk by the truck.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: So I get out and load up and I walk by the truck. The truck washer was driving. We’ll introduce him later.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, later.

Ramsey Russell: And then you stop the truck. They weren’t spooked by the truck because they see the traffic come by. No, it’s unbelievable. Ten trucks come down that road while we were fooling around with it. And then I stepped out. Got my Puna Teal. The geese were easy. As we were filming something, Jake was flying the drone, we heard those geese whistling. They went and landed in a little alpine meadow. We glassed them and said, there’s a nice rock outcropping. Walked up, bam! Speckled Teal, no problem. Sharp winged Teal, he was no problem at all. But we couldn’t close the deal on that freaking crested duck. That’s the one I really wanted.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: I felt like we were leaving. It was 3:00 and I felt like we were heading down the mountain. And you’re like no, it’s not over yet, and we found them, bam! But, but I want to talk about this, because this was the highlight of my day.

Ranieri Quiroz: Me too. I know you want to talk-

Ramsey Russell:, This duck was sound asleep. Nowhere to hide. But he was asleep about a hundred yards away on, this little pond, there’s a pair of Andean geese walking around. And you said, well, let me go knock on this little bitty farmhouse in the middle of absolute nowhere up in the mountains. I call them Incans. So you went and knocked on the door. What was it? Tell me about knocking on the door.

Ranieri Quiroz: So we saw that crested duck, and it was the last species that you need, and it was inside a private land. But I remember one time I met the owner, the father of the family that owns that private land, he was walking by the road, carry a really heavy stuff, and I was with two clients and Dwight. And I said, let’s give him a ride. I mean, it’s heavy stuff, and you’re really high. So I give him a ride to his home, and then that’s how I met this guy the very first time. And the second time was that day. And I knocked his door. And he’s sister, right? No, daughter.

Ramsey Russell: Daughter, yeah, his daughter. Father and 3 daughters. The 4 sons were out working.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, you’re right. The daughter show up, and I said, can we go? I want to hunt. That duck is in your land. Is your father here? Because I know your father. No, he’s not here. You cannot hunt. I think she thought that I was lying.

Ramsey Russell: Well, she didn’t know who you were. Their nearest neighbors, 20 miles away, I’m going to say.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: You think these are mountain people and they burn, There’s no firewood. These people live with a wood stove and a little gas and maybe one light bulb in this house. It’s a small house. It has 8 people. And the mother died of COVID we found out. And she don’t know who you are.

Ranieri Quiroz: She don’t know you. And she leave, though. They are just-

Ramsey Russell: They burn sod. I mean, that’s what you were showing me, how they carve off some of that sod. They’re scooping up sod and then they burn it. That’s how they live.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, they dry and then burn it. That’s the fuel. They don’t have wood right up there.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. So anyway, the dad walked.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. Dad happens to show up, thank goodness. And he remembered me. Oh, hello. How are you? And I said, can we go inside and hunt that duck? He said, of course. So we went inside. You sneak into the duck, and we start talking about. And he asked me, what are you doing? I mean, who were these people? And I said, people from America, and when he heard that, people from America. Oh, I want to invite you all, to my house. So that’s how we-

Ramsey Russell: He gave us the thumbs up, and for those of you all listening, I’ve been to Peru several times. I’ve shot these species. I’ve shot the Torrent duck, shot the Ruddy duck, shot the 6 pound Coot just now. All those three are now protected. But it’s a great time of year. I wanted to get these birds, and I really wanted this crested duck. It’s my favorite waterfowl in Peru, for some reason. And so with the whole family and everybody watching, I walked across the pasture, and the duck never woke up. And I ranged him. I go, well, he’s 60 yards. That’s a little far. But he’s asleep. So I just walked straight to him, and I counted my paces. When I got to within 40 yards, I started to smile. I’m like, okay, I got this bird. And when I got to 30 yards, his head stuck up. Too late to get out of Dodge. And I got my bird.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes, sir.

Ramsey Russell: And we walked back up, and we were fixing to leave, and he came up and asked, do you think the Americans would like to come into my home?

Ranieri Quiroz: To my home, yeah. And drink coffee?

Ramsey Russell: Have coffee. And we’re like, hell, yeah and that was amazing.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. Really.

Ramsey Russell: And the contrast is like, relative to the average lower middle class American, these people really live very simply. On the side of a mountain with little to nothing, they learned through our interpreter, Ramiro. Excuse me, Raniere. That’s what we’ve been calling you, Ranieri. We learned through you that they grow alpaca and sheep for wool.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes, sir.

A Hunting Ghost Town

Because everybody was sheltered in place like the apocalypse.

Ramsey Russell: Probably not many, but enough. And they just work. They get up very simply, and it was interesting to me that it was an older father. I’m going to say he was 60, 65, with 3 daughters. The sons, we learned, were out working and. But the mother had just died of COVID. We asked a question, I can’t remember what we asked, but we started telling.

Ranieri Quiroz: We asked, how was it during the COVID?

Ramsey Russell: That’s what, it was interesting to me. The whole world.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: I don’t mean just America. I mean, everybody was locked down.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: I was, what’s happening? All my friends around the world, and it was so eerie to see pictures of cities like Lima or Buenos Aires or Mazatlan. Like a ghost town.

Ranieri Quiroz: Just close. Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: Because everybody was sheltered in place like the apocalypse. So I just wondered, these people got it figured out. They don’t worry about the war in Afghanistan. They don’t worry about the stock market. They don’t worry about all this crap in the news. I just wondered, what was COVID like here?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes, sir.

Ramsey Russell: And so we asked that question, and that’s how he said that his wife had, considering his wife forever in a long time had died.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: That was kind of a humbling conversation.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. It was really hard. So I asked, what was the COVID like? And he started, he was upset and then he said, it was really tough, and my wife just died. Passed away 3 months ago. And it was quiet for 5 minutes.

Ramsey Russell: What can you say?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, exactly.

Ramsey Russell: But he indicated that their life had just gone on like normal.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: One of his neighbors had gotten COVID and his wife went to attend.

Ranieri Quiroz: To attend. Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: And contracted COVID and died.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: What was that we ate there? I’d have called if we were at a carnival in America. I’d have said they were elephant ears without.

Ranieri Quiroz: We call it here, Kachangas.

Ramsey Russell: Kachangas.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. They put some baking soda. How do you say?

Ramsey Russell: Eggs and flour.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: It was just a simple pastry. Fried like a donut.

Ranieri Quiroz: Fried, yeah.

Ramsey Russell: And it was tasty.

Ranieri Quiroz: Little bit sugar, that’s it. Pretty much simple. That’s what they eat in the middle of the lunch and dinner about 06:00 P.M. These people eat four or five food day because in the day they get up really early to go outside and see what, everything going on. Really good or not. And then they came back to the home, take breakfast and then lunch, and then between lunch and dinner, that’s what they eat Kachangas. Elephant ear for you. Easier.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. But it was very good. As somebody that don’t eat a lot of stuff like that, it was absolutely delicious. The hospitality was unbelievable. I don’t like to use the word poor, but for extremely simple people, they rolled out the red carpet, and it was just wonderful. You know, we were sitting in this tiny little house sitting on wooden benches covered with alpaca hide and this red painted table and just a wood stove in the corner and a gas burner and man, they were pros at turning that stuff out, and the hospitality was unbelievable. Jake and I both just counted as one of the highlights of the trip, beyond shooting the duck. It was so much more than that.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, it’s always more than shooting ducks. It’s about the culture. It’s about the new people. It’s about the experience.

Ramsey Russell: That’s what I love about it. We came back, we regrouped. We went down considerably north. We drove for hours seeing nothing but sand and, ironically, chicken farms. And because it’s so dry, so little humidity, there’s a lot less disease, and they can grow chickens there. We went, stayed at a beach hotel. It so much reminded me of coastal Mexico. We ate fresh seafood, and then we went out and shot. Just three or four mornings of just unbelievable Cinnamon Teal and White-cheeked pintail hunting.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. Ramsey. What do you think about the changes of the landscape? One day you being in the Andean mountains, and the other day, just like that, you’re in the coastal with everything –

Journey Through Peru: From High Mountains to the Pacific Coast

You know, it’s very diverse and understand, I’m not on a sightseeing tour, I’m chasing ducks, but I get to see and experience all this, and I’ll tell you one of the greatest highlights, and it’ll take me a while to think through all this was cockfighting is legal.

Ramsey Russell: It’s unbelievable. I mean, we end up doing some driving. Now we’re talking about, about a 5, 6, 7 or 8 hour drive, all said and done to get from the high mountains where the wool growers were, down to the Gulf coast or down to the coast Pacific Ocean. I’m talking, 8, 9 foot breakers, people surfing if they want to. Pretty incredible. You know, it’s very diverse and understand, I’m not on a sightseeing tour, I’m chasing ducks, but I get to see and experience all this, and I’ll tell you one of the greatest highlights, and it’ll take me a while to think through all this was cockfighting is legal. It’s a big sport here, and bullfighting, spanish bull fighting has existed for centuries. And you introduced us to a family. We went hunting that morning. We wrapped up and took a shower, haul butt up to this town, another town in Estancia, I’d call it a sprawling, massive, affluent generations. Those people have been raising prized fighting bulls forever. They have raised those Peruvian horses, and I could never seen an operation like this with so many roosters, fighting chickens. It was incredible. And they gave us the dog and pony show.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: I just thought I’d always kind of want to see a bull fight, but I really wasn’t expecting everything that rolled like that. That’s how we knew, this gentleman is your brother?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, sir, my brother is a cockfighter. He’s probably right now in the top five of cockfight in Peru, and the guy that I introduced you, Anivil, he’s in the top five, too. So they’re really good friends. They have a champion that’s going on right now, private champion.

Ramsey Russell: I’m sure in this community and every community we’ve passed through, there’s cockfights going on in dark alleys every night. There’s a lot of stuff going on. You were explaining to me that one of the big public spectacles that some of my clients went to, they weren’t open on weekdays, they’re open on Saturday nights. That’s when all these laborers have money to gain.

Ranieri Quiroz: Exactly.

Ranieri Quiroz: And so-

Ramsey Russell: These gentlemen are in more of an elite or private organization. I tell you what, that was a heck of a setup he had, and I’m sure your brother’s got one. He spoke very highly of your brother.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: And some of the genetics and it just amazed me. Everything I know about that sport would fit the snuff can or less, but it was unbelievable what he was looking for. Cultivating genetics of a rooster to fight was something else.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, it’s more than just two cocks fighting. It’s about the reason, because there is a lot of type of fights.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Ranieri Quiroz: Just like a fighter. And so you want your cock bigger or rooster, bigger or longer

Ramsey Russell: Taller, heavier.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: More aggressive. So you’re even a genetic fighting style. How he was saying some would come in low, some would come high.

Ranieri Quiroz: Exactly. Some kick in the body, some others kick in the head. So it’s just what you are looking for and then raise them. It’s incredible.

Ramsey Russell: I’m going to interview him for a future podcast next. I’m down here because I want to get into that. I don’t know what I was thinking about bullfighting. I really have no idea what I was thinking, but I really knew nothing about Spanish bullfighting, and he gave us a ground floor education, that this man has got a herd of 800 Spanish bulls, and that he has been cultivating genetically and providing some of the most elite bullfights in Lima and around the country. He’s been supplying those bulls, he’s built a huge industry, and I don’t know what I was expecting, but it was something else. He was telling us, Ranieri, that some of these calves come out of their mother a week old and they’re ready to fight.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, it’s in their genetics. They don’t train it to fight or to be aggressive. They just born aggressive, like that.

Ramsey Russell: And he was a matador.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, he was a matador.

Ramsey Russell: and went all over.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes, sir.

Ramsey Russell: I’m going to talk to Jake in depth about this in a future episode. What I didn’t realize until we sat down at lunch, was the matador from Columbia, who’s a very prominent Peruvian matador. There was the nephew, who’s up and coming, there was his father and I know there’s a lot of spanish conversation going on, but I just didn’t recognize the similarities between bullfighting and duck hunting in this regard. Hunting today in the year 2021, is so misunderstood by people that don’t hunt. I have seen bullfights, and I don’t understand, it’s not my culture. I don’t understand why they put the spear in the back and why they put the little darts in the back and why they drag this thing out. I don’t understand that culture. But it is centuries old. It goes back thousands of years, and he was explaining to me that one of the very first things that the conquistadors brought to Peru was the bulls.

Ranieri Quiroz: The bulls.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, that was one of the very first things. So for as long as Peru has existed-

Ranieri Quiroz: Bulls and horses.

Ramsey Russell: Bulls and horses. And they brought this thing with them. We posted some pictures on social media, and some people got upset, some duck hunters got upset.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

The Culture of Peru Waterfowl Hunting

You’re born and raised as a hunter or you became a hunter. 

Ramsey Russell: What I realized is, for the first time, I was on the outside looking in. I get a lot of hate and have experienced anti hunters criticizing duck hunting. I’m not going to quit shooting ducks. That’s my culture, that’s my tradition. But I’m not going to judge Spanish bullfighting either, something I want to know more about. Yeah, but it’s perfectly legal here.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, it is. And it’s more about just hunting ducks.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Ranieri Quiroz: Is about the culture.

Ramsey Russell: Talk about.

Ranieri Quiroz: You’re born and raised as a hunter or you became a hunter. That’s something that I will ask you later, and it’s the same with the bulls. People that don’t know about that, will say you’re killing a bull. No, you’re not killing. It’s an honor to them to fight them.

Ramsey Russell: That bull’s purpose, for centuries, he’s been bred to fight and to go into that ring. That is his purpose for existence.

Ranieri Quiroz: Exactly.

Ramsey Russell: I did not realize it until accidentally, at the very end of that exhibition, they gave us a practice run. It was an old bull that was blind in one eye from fighting other bulls, he could no longer. He was explaining to me, said, I know you think this is awesome, but I can tell that the way this bull is hitting the flag, he’s blind in one eye because he’s not penetrating through like he should. It’s not quite the shot I would want of him, or, like, what he would have done had he had both eyes, but his genetics are very good, and after today’s exhibition, we’re going to put him out in the pasture, and he’s going to pass his genetics on to all our cows.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: You know, and a lot of people misunderstood that, when they saw him get speared or jabbed with that. Jabbed in the back off horse, they thought he’d been killed, and that’s not the truth at all. That’s a part of that fighting pageantry. That’s a part of that drama that’s unfolding. That’s a very ceremonious process, but at the very end, after they brought out the bull, brought out some younger stuff, that the younger people could mess with, you know, at the very end, that little 6 or 7 year old boy walked out.

Ranieri Quiroz: Oh, yeah.

Ramsey Russell: And holy cow, that’s when I realized that’s just like, a child wanting to duck hunt, like his daddy, who learned to duck hunt from his daddy. That’s all he’s known for generations, and he wants to be a matador.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes, sir.

Ramsey Russell: It punched me to see that child want to be that matador.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. He walked by to the center of the arena, and everybody’s quiet, and this little child is doing the paso, and it’s-

Ramsey Russell: He’s got the straight back. He’s got the form. He’s got the whole elegance of it all and it just hit me like a ton of brick. This is so deep, this is just like hunting or duck hunting. It’s a culture.

Ranieri Quiroz: When we were in the table-

Ramsey Russell: It’s not about the animal, it’s about the culture.

Ranieri Quiroz: Exactly. It’s not about hunting. It’s not about the bullfight. It’s about the culture. When we were in the table, the matador from Colombia, he was asking, who are these people, and I said, he’s Ramsey, really famous people from duck hunting. He asked me, why he’s duck hunting around the world? I mean, for what? And he said, for me, I would not like to kill a duck. You are killing ducks. And then I said, I know, you know what, We’re not killing ducks. Are you killing bulls? No, I’m not killing bulls. I’m a matador, and I would go into the arena, and it’s culture, and I say is the same. Ramsey is doing the same in a different culture, but the same way. It’s not about the animal, it’s about the culture. How long do you are doing this?

Ramsey Russell: Long time. 25, 30 years old.

Ranieri Quiroz: You’re not just killing ducks. You’re studying them, you love them, you respect them. You’re looking for and-

Ramsey Russell: Via podcast and Social media, I like to share it with that. I like to show everybody else.

Ranieri Quiroz: So when I said that to the matador, he immediately said, you’re right, it’s just exactly the same. And here in Peru it’s getting bigger, but it’s a group that’s against bullfight. We have people 50-50, Jake said.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Ranieri Quiroz: And so now it’s getting bigger, that people don’t want these shows. And they are saying, it’s not culture, you need to stop them and they were talking about that, and he said, something is really important in it. The parallel or the similarity between hunting and bullfighting. He said, do you think what is going to happen if we don’t go more with bullfighters? What’s going to happen with all those bulls that are unable racing. Nobody’s going to take care about those bulls.

Ramsey Russell: This ain’t no pet.

Ranieri Quiroz: Exactly. People saying, you are killing bulls, you don’t take care about that.  What are you going to do if there’s no more bullfighters in the world?

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. The people don’t want sad world.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. It’s exactly the same that happened with hunters. I put this example that show up in my mind to the matador, it’s the same with hunters, Père David’s Deer.

Ramsey Russell: Yes, Père David’s Deer in France.

Ranieri Quiroz: So that what I said, it was a deer in, in Asia or I don’t know which place in Asia that there is no more in Asia because you cannot hunt them, because if you don’t hand them, then people don’t care. They don’t take care about the animal, but if you hunt them and then you put a price or respect of that animal and people are interested in that animal because of the culture or wherever. Then it’s a much bigger, healthy population in United States of that deer that in his own country.

Ramsey Russell: You go to South Africa, you go to a lot of different places, demonstrate that.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. It will be exactly the same if there is no more bullfighters in the world, people only will raise cows for meat. But no bull fights. Just milk cows or regular meat bulls.

Ramsey Russell: I’m just going to say something about those bulls because his niece said, would you like to go see the bull?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: Before we let him out, I remember. I figure we’re just like going to walk to a barbed wire fence and look at a cow. Yeah, sure. I like to see him. Well, we climb up these stairs and look down this wall, and she’s putting her hand on my chest. If you come to break at a red light and you put your hand on a child so you don’t go flying through the window. She’s like, be careful, be careful. I look up, this is how it goes, [imitates bull breathing] drool coming out. I’d never seen something. He was pawing the ground, there was this cloud of dust and he was like, snarling. He’d look up at us, snarling. She’s like don’t fall in. I’m like, I ain’t going to fall in. You can’t push me in there with that thing. Then I don’t know what I was expecting when they opened the gate. I was expecting him just to come trotting out in the field. He come out looking for somebody’s ass to kick.

Ranieri Quiroz: Oh, yeah,

Ramsey Russell: There were four or five guys in there with towels, I was wondering what those little walls were. Those little hide behinds were on the edge of the arena. I thought someone going to come out and look like a pinball. Bing.

Ranieri Quiroz: Exactly.

Ramsey Russell: Freaking banging everybody, son. Like a Tasmanian devil. He come in there ready to kick some butt. But then we drove through the pasture, there must have been 700 bulls out there. And we drove through and they looked like they sitting there just chewing on a piece of grass and we wanted to get out and hit and they’re like, no, don’t get out. Yeah, they changed when somebody’s on foot instead of a truck. Yeah, it was interesting, but I sure had a good week. It was a really good time. We got deep into the bushes and experienced a lot of Peru. Those were the people again, you, the wool growers up in the mountains and the bullfighters and they sure treated us well. It was just a very immersive and awesome experience.

Ranieri Quiroz: Thank you. I’m glad to hear that.

Ramsey Russell: What would you tell anybody listening about Peru? What’s maybe something I didn’t see or something everybody should see. I know a lot of my clients don’t want to go to see the Incan ruins or don’t want to go see that kind of stuff, but just kind of them it up. Give me a parting shot here, that’s what I’m asking. What was something about your country that you like to show the duck hunters that come here?

Ranieri Quiroz: First of all, all those species in the mountains are beautiful. All that experience in the real indies of 15,000ft above sea level and then all the coastal experience. Probably you have Cinnamon Teal or White-cheeked pintail in other part of the world, but it’s all together. All that culture, all the bullfighter, the rooster fight, the people. It’s different right here. You can go to another place, I’m not going to mention a country, but you can go another country and probably you’re going to have more volume of ducks, but here it is different.

Ramsey Russell: 15 or 20 Cinnamons is decent volume. I mean, that’s very nice volume. If you can’t be happy with that, I can hardly make you happy.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, exactly, but even with that, you have all the culture, all the rings, all the markets, all the Inca store, all the rings, the bullfights, the rooster fights, the cocoa leaf.

Ramsey Russell: Wait a minute. Talk about that because Jake and I were noticing. We’ve been here for a week and we haven’t seen one person smoke a cigarette. I have not seen a single person smoke a cigarette and when you get off of some of these poor communities, you do see a lot of litter on the roads. But as we’re driving down the road and I’m looking, I’m seeing cigarette butts, around the world, it seems like, as you get around impoverished communities, my observation, you seem to see a lot of smokers because, it’s one little pleasure of life they can afford. But there’s no cigarette smoking. But what we do see is everywhere we go to these little stores, we went to the market a little while ago, you see these great big 55-gallon drums slap full of these green bay leaves. As you’re walking along, you see people chewing by the fish camp like a major league baseball pitcher from 1970s had a big old chaw, but it wasn’t tobacco, it was cocoa leaf.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. People here chew cocoa leaf.

Ramsey Russell: Now. We’re not talking about cocaine.

Ranieri Quiroz: No. It’s completely different. Just the cocoa leaf. It’s a plant.

Ramsey Russell: It’s just the leaf.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, the leaf.

Ramsey Russell: And everybody chews.

Ranieri Quiroz: It’s legal. Completely legal. I mean, you see it.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, I’ve seen it everywhere. And you were telling me that there are laws, you can’t grind it, you can’t process it, you can’t do it. Just a leaf picked off a bush here in Peru.

Ranieri Quiroz: It’s legal. Sell it or buy it or chew it, but it’s just leaf. You cannot process them, you cannot be doing something with them. If you are selling just leaf, cocoa leaf, it’s completely fine. And they make-

Ramsey Russell: Tea.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, matte with coca leaf. Even in the most expensive hotel that you’re in, if you go to Cusco, Machu Picchu, even in the most expensive hotel in Machu Picchu, they will offer you matte of cocoa leaf because it will help you with the altitude sickness.

Ramsey Russell: I heard this on good authority, today’s pope is from northern Argentina, and it’s also customary in northern Argentina way up in Salta, they drink a lot of coco de mate and they say every day the pope drinks his coco de mate. Takes a nap and gets up and drinks coco de mate.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: That’s interesting to me. We’re not talking about a narcotic.

Ranieri Quiroz: No.

Ramsey Russell: We’re talking about a leaf and truthfully, I would bet it’s probably lot healthier than tobacco products. I bet it’s not as addictive. It’s nothing.

Ranieri Quiroz: It’s not addictive. It’s just leaf.

Ramsey Russell: They say it helps with the altitude.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah, it helps a lot.

Ramsey Russell: It’s like a lot of locals, especially up in the mountains, use it medicinally.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: Isn’t that interesting?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah. So, we don’t have much cigarette here.

Ramsey Russell: What are some of the things we wrap up for a moving hunt like this? We go to a lot of different stops, loading the truck, unload the truck, the drink.

Ranieri Quiroz: That’s why we have the car washer.

Ramsey Russell: Car washer. What are some of the challenges in dealing with american clients that come here? Some of their expectations and keeping up and keeping everything rolling fine, because everything’s worked just perfectly, as always. Do you have any challenges doing that? Are there any challenges? Is there anything hard about it? Do you ever have any clients show up with expectations that are difficult to deal with?

Ranieri Quiroz: No. I’ve been working five years and I don’t have any client complain or any client with-

Ramsey Russell: I’ve never had a client come back from here complain about anything.

Ranieri Quiroz: Couple times we have this guy, I don’t remember the last name, but he came from get ducks and he’s 82 years old and even these guys, he loved Peru.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Ranieri Quiroz: Like you said, it’s really moving. Today we are here in this place. Tomorrow we’re going to be there. But there’s-

Ramsey Russell: It’s got to be that way for it to be the full experience to me, because it’d be like if you came to America and went to Chicago and came home, your only glimpse of America is Chicago.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: That’s not America.

Ranieri Quiroz: That’s what we try to sell. The whole experience about Peru. You will be in the mountains and then after that, you will be in some place in the north, and then you move to another place, different landscape, different lagoons. That’s the experience. I have a question for you, because that question it’s always in hunters here in Peru. It’s been forever, but it’s getting popular, and a lot of my friends that I speak with them, he always gives me this question. Do you think that people can become a hunter, or you need to born and raised as a hunter?

Ramsey Russell: Are you born a hunter, or you can become a hunter later in life? Yeah, we talked about that in the truck the other night and you’re asking me that because Dwight is a new hunter. He’s about your age, all same age, but he become a new hunter. You asked me that question on drive the other night, and I think, and we agreed that, I think we’re all born hunters. When we were driving up to the bullfight exhibition and the cockfight exhibition, we had this conversation about how it’s human nature to want to see that, and the gambling and the sporting aspects of it is almost like a human nature. We’re born with that, and, I think Ranieri, that modern day civilization suppresses those urges. Men ain’t supposed to be men like they were. We aren’t supposed to do things. It’s like there’s a part of society that wants to progress us beyond that but I think, and I’m going to ask our friend Dwight here, I think that whether you’re 20 years old or 6 years old, if you’re introduced to hunting, similarly to bullfighting, I think that human nature comes out. It’s in all of us. It makes us better people.

Ranieri Quiroz: That’s what I said, I think hunting is an instinct, like survive or being a mother or father is an instinct. So, but you just need to wake up that instinct.

Hunting for Enjoyment or Sustenance?

We eat venison, we eat wild game because we enjoy it. It’s a proper tribute to the wildlife resource. It’s not a need anymore. I think what the greater need is for us as humans to interact with our environment.

Ramsey Russell: And we don’t need to duck hunt or deer hunt now to subsist. We don’t need it for meat. We eat venison, we eat wild game because we enjoy it. It’s a proper tribute to the wildlife resource. It’s not a need anymore. I think what the greater need is for us as humans to interact with our environment, like we started off and you gained this further knowledge and this understanding and this appreciation for the ducks as you began to hunt. Then with this operation here, that transferred into you going and beginning to duck hunt with your friends and up there at your home farm where you all had just shot Cormorants as depredation in the past. I think that’s just living proof that whether you want to go shoot a bunch or you want to collect them, I think it’s just in our DNA to be a part of nature, not an outsider coming in, shooting something and leaving. That’s the perception, it’s like bullfighting. As a hunter, as we begin to make ourselves better hunters, like I told you, it’s not the top of the mountain, it’s the climb. I think once you get in a part of that environment, you begin to progress. You know, the more I understand this species and where he lives and his habitat and his life habits and how to hunt him, the better hunter I’ll become, but the better person I become and the more I want to learn, it’s like the deeper into the swamp I get. And I think that’s in our DNA, and I think that’s a big value that we bring to society, into the world at large as hunters. So I absolutely welcome older hunters. I welcome anybody into the field of hunting, into waterfowl, hunting public land, private land, whatever we need that. I think humanity needs it, and I think, having been here for a week, Latin America needs bullfighters. I really think Peru needs bullfighting. But speaking of Dwight, let’s get him on the other horn. Also kicking around in the truck this week with Peru is Dwight Romero. See how easy that name is to pronounce? Did I pronounce it right?

Dwight Romero: Romero.

Ramsey Russell: Romero.

Dwight Romero: Yes.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, Romero. I can’t roll my tongue like that, especially if I chew tobacco. Dwight, how did you get into this? Because you’ve only been involved for a year, and we call you the truck washer kiddingly, but you are an asset to the team. What led you to get involved with this operation?

Dwight: Well, first I met Angelo, friend to friend Ranieri.

Ramsey Russell: And you’ve known Ranieri since you were 5 years old?

Dwight: Yes. Ranieri and me are friends since 5 years old. Yeah. And he introduced me to Angelo in the world of hunting and then I start hunting. Maybe one year ago, I started as a helper for a guide in Chaku, and then like a guide and sometimes we work together.

Ramsey Russell: We had this talk in the truck the other day that you did not grow up hunting at all.

Dwight: No.

Ramsey Russell: In Peru, your dad didn’t hunt?

Dwight: No.

Ramsey Russell: What, what did your dad do? He just worked probably like most of dads, like a lot of dads probably just worked.

Dwight: Yeah, my dad is economist.

Ramsey Russell: Okay.

Dwight: He is working in Tumbes. But he isn’t a hunter, nor my mom nor my grandfathers. I started like a hunter for Ranieri.

Ramsey Russell: Right.

Dwight: He introduced me in this world, maybe when I was 13 years old, and first of all, I didn’t know about hunting, but then I was learning about deer, ducks, doves, and I like this work.

Ramsey Russell: You like it?

Dwight: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: You like to hunt now?

Dwight: Yeah, I like the hunt.

Ramsey Russell: What do you like about hunting?

Dwight: Well, everything together.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Dwight: The landscapes, the species of the animals, the brotherhood.

Ramsey Russell: The camaraderie.

Dwight: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: Social aspects.

Dwight: Yes.

Dwight: The experience about since you start, you wake up early in the morning, and then you finish all the experience. I like-

Ramsey Russell: The whole process.

Dwight Yeah. All together.

Differences in Duck Hunting: Peru and the United States

We are interested in this world, taking care of this world, the animals, the landscapes, the natural, the plants, everything.

Ramsey Russell: How would you describe the difference between the average Peruvian that does not hunt versus your American clients that hunt? They’re avid hunters, they’re passionate hunters that come to Peru. How would you describe to someone the difference between a hunter and a non hunter? Just because you’re sitting in the backseat or you’re loading the truck or you’re with these hunters and you’re guiding them, how would you describe the difference in their relationship with nature or with the resource?

Dwight: The difference between a hunter and not hunter. The hunters see the world different like-

Ramsey Russell: I see the world different.

Dwight: The nature, the animals. We are interested in this world, taking care of this world, the animals, the landscapes, the natural, the plants, everything.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Dwight: Because if we don’t take care the nature. we don’t have hunting.

Ramsey Russell: Right.

Dwight: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: We’re more caring for nature.

Dwight: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: They want it to persist. Their conservation.

Dwight: The conservation.

Ramsey Russell: Conservation would be a good word for that.

Dwight: It’s important for the hunting, for the hunter, the conservation of the ecosystem.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, versus a non hunter. Or that just is he’s busy in the city and he just doesn’t see this.

Dwight: Yeah. You know-

Ramsey Russell: They don’t care.

Dwight: You know, the not hunter, they have other interests.

Ramsey Russell: Interest. They have other interest.

Dwight: How do you say, another interest in other things, but not in the nature. Maybe in the builder, in the business. I don’t know, in other things.

Ramsey Russell: Do you think after college you’ll stick with this industry? Do you think this is a field that you would like to continue working with American hunters here in Peru? Because you’re very natural at it. You’re very good at it. One of these days you’ll evolve past washing trucks into something more professional, but is it something you would like to continue to be involved with? I know you’re in business management in college. Can you see yourself pursuing this as a career, the hunt guiding? Can you see yourself pursuing this as a future, as a career?

Dwight: Yes.

Ramsey Russell: You think maybe you’ll go back to business management?

Dwight: Why not mix it, the business management and-

Ramsey Russell: Yeah, absolutely.

Dwight: The hunting.

Ramsey Russell: Because it is a business.

Dwight: Yeah, why not? I will be a guide hunter for all of my life because I like this life.

Ramsey Russell: The other day when we went to the exhibition bull fight, you got in there right?

Ranieri Quiroz: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: Was that the first time you’d ever done it?

Dwight: First time.

Ramsey Russell: How many beers had you had when you got in the ring?

Dwight: Only one

Ramsey Russell: Okay.

Dwight: Only one.

Ramsey Russell: You’re a cheap date.

Dwight: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: What did it feel like holding that flag?

Dwight: Very nervous.

Ramsey Russell: Nervous. Your hand was shaking when you got out?

Dwight: First of all, very nervous. How do you say [speaks spanish] How do you say, adrenalina? The adrenaline.

Ramsey Russell: Adrenaline.

Dwight: Yeah, the adrenaline grows up in your body.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Dwight: And make the senses is very.

Ramsey Russell: You’re not going to quit business school and duck guiding to become a matador, are you?

Dwight: Sorry, what?

Ramsey Russell: You’re not going to quit business school and duck guiding to become a professional matador.

Dwight: A matador, maybe not but a guide hunter. Yes.

Ramsey Russell: I do very greatly appreciate you, Dwight. This has been a wonderful week. You’ve been a huge asset. You two guys just really delivered it and I’ve heard a lot from clients. We had a lot of clients down here this year because Peru was open, and I’ve heard absolutely nothing but plus a good thing about Ranieri and Dwight the entire year. I do have one of the interesting things we did. I wanted to show Jake the market, because you all do have little supermarkets around here. We went to, a very small shopping center to get something, but I’ve always enjoyed because it’s so different than America, walking in a Peruvian market? Is that where we went where the seafood and the beef and the fruit, a Peruvian market? And just imagine 10 acres of little, 10 by 10 booths, and people bring in their produce or they bring in a cow or they bring in fish, or they bring in clothes. Some parts of it’s almost like a thrift shop. Maybe the clothes used, some of it are just potatoes just dug up, and it’s just interesting to me, walking around and seeing and you shop at those places. I mean.

Dwight: Yes.

Ramsey Russell: Peruvian. It’s natural.

Dwight: Yeah, it’s natural.

Ramsey Russell: You know, you can buy anything there from knives to freaking potatoes or whatever else, but as we were leaving, you said something about the economy.

Dwight: Yeah.

Ramsey Russell: It really hit home. It’s the truth. Tell me, why you think that system of open market is better for a community than some of the way we do things, big box stores in America.

Dwight: This kind of market for me is better for the local economy because the money is divided between little shops.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. All are family owned.

Ranieri Quiroz: Yes.

Dwight: And not to a big shop –

Ramsey Russell: Big corporation.

Dwight: Big Corporation. So for the family-

Ramsey Russell: I say there were hundreds of those little shops in there represented by families, and every one of them got a piece of the pie.

Dwight: Yes.

Ramsey Russell: They woke up every morning, they had a job, they were self employed, and they brought their stuff to market and all of society benefits. It’s like America back 50 years ago, 100 years ago. What a great system.

Dwight: I don’t know how many years ago, but I think that system is better right now.

Ramsey Russell: I think it is better for everybody.

Dwight: Better for everybody.

Ramsey Russell: Folks down here in Peru, you all been listening to Duck Season Somewhere. What an incredible hunt. You can go to getducks.com and check it out. The season runs May through August and it is into September even, but it is an absolutely incredible experience if you want to go the mountains and chase some of these crown jewels of the waterfowl world. If you are wanting to go down the coast and hunt Cinnamon Teal, and I don’t mean just a couple Cinnamon Teal like we see in Mexico or a couple Cinnamon Teal like we see in Argentina, I mean flocks numbered in the dozens plus White-cheeked pintail. Then get off the beaten path and go meet the people and become immersive. The folks you’ve been listening to, Ranieri and Dwight, are very capable hunting guides, very capable tour guides. It’s just an absolute wonderful immersive experience because it really is Duck Season Somewhere. Hope you all have enjoyed this episode. Please log into iTunes. Give us a star rating. Give us some comments. We’d love to hear your feedback. Thank you all for listening to this episode of Duck Season Somewhere, we’ll see you next time.