Anybody watch it?

The one dude begins every sentence with "I've been doing this for forty years".

Seriously, the guy could be going to take a dump and he'd pause to let everybody know that he's been doing it for forty years.

Firewood.... "we need about ten cord", the commentator then states how the firewood gatherer will have to "cut ten trees".

Really?

He also says the trees are hard to cut when they are frozen... Really?



(I guess my chainsaw doesn't know about this yet because it flat out hauls ass and the chain just loves that sub zero wood cutting)

Then they try to make me believe this kid is taking off on foot, stomping through waist deep snow for "six miles" to bring back a "cord of wood"


(Maybe six hundred yards and 3 sticks of firewood in his plastic sled)

They show the one kid riding a snowmobile, he bobbles the sled, rolls it and goes for a body slide. They show 2 kids with the hood up on a purple polaris with a hood that's been busted and patched together with strips of aluminum and pop rivets. And they say the motor is locked up......

jeezus...

So, we are to believe the engine locked up and that's what caused him to roll the sled? Then they show the kids pulling the snowmobile with the other snowmobile. They get to town with it and somewhere along the line it turns into a black ski-doo without a broken hood (previously a very beat up purple polaris).

And we're supposed to believe the dad is pizzed at the son because he was the one riding it when the engine gave up the ghost....
Snowmobile owners know that engine burn down, bearing failure etc are just part of the deal. Now broken parts due to hot dogging, jumping, running into a tree etc.. yeah that's rider error.

Anyways...

Just wanted everybody to know all the cool new things I learned by watching the discovery channel last night.

A cord of firewood is wayyyy smaller than I thought it was.

You can't cut frozen wood with a chainsaw.

If you roll a purple polaris snowmobile on rough ice it will turn into a black ski-doo with a burnt down rotax engine.

These people have annual trapping goals of $2000-$3000 to pay for the stuff they need to get through the year. (fuel, bullets mist supplies etc) We are to believe that annual income requirements are very low because these people live mostly off the land.

But I see a lot of $10,000.00 snowmobiles in certain scenes of the show...?

(Snowmobiles must be free in the Yukon)

Thanks Discovery channel for [bleep] up yet another great opportunity to accurately display the days in the lives of interesting people.

They could have just gone up there with cameras and followed people around explaining the modifications they had done to their snowmobiles to help deal with the deep snow. Let them explain their trapping methods, fishing, hunting, along with all the regular daily chores such as firewood cutting... maybe some of the local customs and traditions, celebrations, festivals etc....

But no, once again discovery traveled completely out of their element with a pre scripted story plan. They made fools of the locals by using them as puppets in their discovery channel drama fantasy.

Most of these types of shows are worthless..

'American Guns' is another joke.. I watched the first half-hour of the first show and knew THAT was full of crap..

Thanks for the warning though..

You being an actual gunsmith, yeah I bet you almost died of laughter watching those posers.

Who cares?? Helluva lot more fun than watching Daze of Our Lives, As the Stomach Turns and QVC

I've watched a couple episodes and picked up on a bunch of the same stuff as you did, Dave.

Anyone ever walk 1/4 mile in waist deep snow? ( without snowshoes )
It would be easier to swim it!

Exactly.

Six miles.... pulling a "cord of firewood" in a 2' by 6' plastic sled with a rope....

What is a cable tv or satellite?

Only character on that show to that I would have do anything is the son who seems to have some engraving skill. If I ordered a custom piece and it came with that damn huge Gunsmoke logo on it I'd be breaking a stock over someone's head.

I don't have cable.

(Intense commentator voice)

"In a world, where cables cannot reach.... Tiny satellite dishes are mounted on rooftops in effort to pull down communication signals from the civilized world."

"Sometimes the air is too cold for the signal to come through. Sometimes the snow gets so deep that Dave has to actually free climb the treacherous structure using traditional methods to clear away the snow from the tiny dish so that his family may learn the status of the civilized world."

"If these communications should fail, Dave's family will be cut off from the world. Isolated with no warnings of partly cloudy with chance of flurries, lows in the sub zero teens and a high of 22 degrees above zero for Tuesday."

Alls we has is da innanet....not sure where da signals comes from I think it is from the antannae-lope

Same with all these shows down here, Swamp People etc. It's a shame that so many people are so far removed that they don't know the difference between reality and "reality TV".

How about the guy whose .223 jams and he says he was using reloads to save money. .223 ammo is some of the cheapest out there.

I saw that too.

His 223 had that old M-16 look to it with triangle profile heat shields...

Bitchin sling too, looked like a boot lace.

You could re-badge old Beverly Hillbillies reruns as a reality show and they would swallow it.

And it would actually be more realistic too.

I would like to know the fur buyer that is paying $100 for a beaver.

I would have made over $8000 last winter after paying for fuel.

Thanks for the critique Dave. I will readily admit that I don't know doodly squat about the Yukon, its weather or people or any really cold weather for that matter. I don't particularly want to learn either. I figured the show was mostly BS as are all of them.
I always thought a chord of wood was a pile 4' X 4' X 8' closely stacked. Glad to learn I can haul that on a kids plastic play pool. Through the snow too.

I want to see an intense "reality" show on a few folks from a bigger city. With the same sorts of scripted modifications to their "reality".

Me being closer to the outdoorsy themed reality shows (in actual reality). I'd watch a show that dramatizes a subway commute or a stop at a coffee shop.... Taxi ride, bus ride, carpool.... Lunch breaks, shopping for "crucial supplies" in "a world where money is traded for goods."

Maybe include a bus ride to a democratic convention, perhaps they could showcase the anguish that goes along with trying to vote without any ID? And the grand challenges to acquire said ID so that they can cast their vote?

Showcase the local culture and traditions of baby mamas and the numerous non supporting daddies to the 14 babies? Show how the mama�s of 14 babies from 14 daddies artfully work the system for the entitlements they have �earned�?

Just think of the adventures that are being overlooked by discovery channel.

These are survival methods. Hey, parasites gotta survive too right?

I'm not sure why you want to attribute these idiots to be Canadians? They're not in the Yukon. They live along the Yukon river in Alaska. They keep talking about Tanana, which is in Alalska. They're Americans, who apparently can't trap very well. A coil spring trap sitting on top of bare snow, set for a $100 marten? No bait, no cubby, etc.

The snowmobile issue was a joke too.

I like the scene where the one dad is going to take his twenty year old son out and teach him how to trap. Kid pulls up to the gas pump with his sled and ends up pouring gas all over the place, including his clothes.

I'm not a big believer in scent elimination products, carbon suits, etc., but sprinkling gasoline all over the place seems like something I'd want to avoid if I were relying on furs to make a living.

Reality shows are cheap to make (i.e., popular with producers) and appeal to those swimming in the shallow end of the gene pool. Someone watches them.

Good points, Yeah I'm not sure why they call the show "Yukon men"?

I was wondering the same thing when they showed the location of the show on the map.

I liked the part where they dropped a caribo in its track at about 150 yards with a .223. Just bang-flop. I'm using way to much gun on these desert mulies it turns out.

"Yukon Men" is a test product to see just how bad television has to get before people will turn it off.

Actually I have a Inuit cousin.His big Rifle is a 223.He uses it for Caribou and Walrus.Pretty much does the job.

We are saved, the Tuetels are coming back to fake argue...sometimes a motorcycle gets built amongst the contrived angst and drama...pure drivel.

After using that saw last weekend, I'd say it does flat out hall ass. That thing is the Ford F-250 of chain saws.

So far this year I've paid about $175,000 for one. I'd glady pay $100 for one.

dont expect much from tv, and you wont be disappointed.

know why divorces are so expensive?
cause their worth it.

N Dave,
This show must be produced by someone from Los Anchorage. The part that gets me is that people are always "dangerously low on food, or about to run out of wood." All this happens in winter when it is 35 below and they stay outside at night without a tent. Either these people are the losers of their village and need the money provided by being followed around by cameras all the time, or the whole thing is made up by someone who has never been in the Bush. I agree with you completely.

By early September, the montra in the North is "now I need to get a moose and 8 cords of wood."

Ten cord of wood? Geez! That's 1,280 cubic feet of wood. Four x four x 80 feet. What are they heating? A three sided shed with a door left open? Hope they have some serious timber to cut, as one would be there forever if he was lopping lodgepole pine.

I tried to watch that "Survival" show a few years ago. I thought it may have potential.

Then I found out that people could be voted off the island.

What kind of survival is that?

I thought they were gonna give a bunch of people a pocket knife and a can of Beanie Weenie,...dump 'em on an Island, and the last one who hollered for his mama won.

Instead,...people were "voting".

It would have been fun if the producers had stumbled upon some *real* nutcase survivalist and gave him a part.

As soon as the first vote was cast against him, he'd club the cameraman upside the head with a coconut lashed to a stick of bamboo then eaten the liver of the person who voted against him.

They added corporate 'values' to it. Conventional programming suggests that no pruduction can be successful without people fuggin each other over.

Well thanks for pointing that out. We gots own very own Alaska rednecks!!! Whoda thunk?

I watched about 5 minutes of the martin and beaver trapping stuff. I knew they weren't Yukoners, eh?

I was scratching my head at all the pan traps too, wondering where the bucket sets where? No conibears?

IMHO Most of these show stink, I kinda like 1 of the mix

American Guns, I have non hunting/rarely shoot friends who watch it all the time and were surprised I didn't

Yukon Men, Could not stand it!

Mountain Men, I just watched it last weekend for the first time and kinda liked it, well at least the Alaska, Montana guys but the Dude "eustace" I can not stand. Yet if you google the show he has the most hits, go figure!

Right, isn't he the guy that has the kid sight his rifle in for him? Then blames the kid when he misses a shot with it?

All you need to know about Eustace. A man with a sawmill will not be driving spikes in his own trees. miles

Useless is a first rate [bleep].

I'd never let anyone else sight in a rifle for me. Not to mention he said the rifle never "misfired", which I guess is hillbilly for being "off". How often do open sights move around on you so that you have to resight them?? Different ammo?? Useless just missed........

About the only "reality" show worth watching at all is Survivor Man. It is still pretty scripted at times, but the guy at least has some common sense.
That Eustace dude is just an old hippie trying to hide in the woods from his past.

Cannot figure out how they got down to next to zero wood left half way through the winter so had to go cut trees in sub-zero temps.

Then they run out of meat and talk of starvation if they don't find the caribou Really??

I don't live in the Yukon, but have no trouble keeping the wood pile and freezer stocked for the winter.

They constantly talk of how life is "hard" up there. It's must be pretty damm hard if you're that damm stupid.

It's just made up drama......

That is a good show.

A lot of the time they're talking about a face cord, not a full cord. A face cord is 4' high and 8' long but it's only 1 cut stick in width, more or less 16". It's only about 1/3 of a full cord.

Lizard Lick........ Them boys are nuts and crack me up.....

However it is better than "Mountain Men" because they actually trap something and shoot something rather than rome around the woods lost.

I think it's more of the producers not knowing what the heck to look for in the first place or the real McCoys don't want any part of Hollywood.

If they did more of a daily documentary style rather than a daily script for the locals to perform, I do believe it would be interesting to watch.

Stan ate his dogs to survive during a tough winter and made a set of chopper mitts out of one of his fav dogs...

Yeah, I think there is enough real "reality" there to do a show on without a fake hollywood script.

I actually know the Lizard Lick crew - lifted with them in a bunch of meets. Everything else aside, they are SERIOUSLY strong folks. (including Amy, a world champion powerlifter). They are pretty good people. Ronnie Shirley is a BIIIIG dude, but was kinda puny next to his best friend, Johnny Perry, a worlds strongest man competitor. Sadly, Johnny died of a heart attack at 29. Truly a gentle giant.

No joke. I mean, the portrayals of the coonarses in that show is so ridiculous. I saw a bit of one show where they even had them using plates and forks and having a few teeth left. I mean, really...



The one thing I will say about the two episodes of YM, they show some dead critters--and a few alive, soon-to-be-dead ones. That wolverine in the trap scene had me rolling, though. "I'm going to have to stun him". Dude then takes out his handy dandy hatchet and whacks a sapling down to use as a club. He then approaches the beast all sneaky-like, then bats the thing on the forearm. Missed him by THAT much!

Also, this may be a trapping thing that I'm clueless about, but can predator carcasses not be used as bait for some reason? I guess I can see that a top tier local predator's smell may put off critters willing to come eagerly to a game animal's, but the part I thought a bit comical is when the guy that shot the woof hauls the skinned carcass to a ditch on the side of the river and chucks it in. "Nuttin' goes to waste out here!"

I'm with ET, though. It beats Extreme Animal Hoarders and My Bizarre Rituals with Balloons...

Works on flocks of geese on the wing, too. I saw a guy 'subsistence hunting' with one. Emptied it at a flock overhead. Got one, too. 1 for 30 ain't bad...

My wife gave me a wide-eyed incredulous stare when he said that. I just shrugged and pointed out that he was being practical.

was listening to an interview with Les a few years ago about the time the show hit Season 3.....first season and a half he didnt have a back up crew, he just went by himself, after that Discovery insisted that there be one for safety and insurance reasons but Les said they had to stay atleast a half mile from where ever he was or he wouldnt do the show....the reason? he wanted to keep the show as real as possible and by day 3 he would do a flying tackle on a camera man if the guy had a granola bar in his pocket

Mohave Mauler - you sayin a .223 can't drop a scrawny caribou in its tracks????? Them is fightin words here on the fire!

Practical? Sheeit. In parts of the world he'd be called a gourmand!

"stunning" the wolverine only to put a bullet hole in the hide after "stunning"..

I was cringing the whole time while he was clubbing away at the wolverine, missing him and hitting the trap and the trapped leg instead. I figured for sure he was going to knock that critter free from the trap and have a real mess on his hands.

He had an axe for pete sakes, spin it around and use the axe handle to deliver a quick and more accurate "stun". Then put a block under the critter's head to support while you give a real good finishing whack to the skull.

If you're gonna put a bullet hole in it, then just do that! Dont risk knocking it out of the trap with a log pole only to shoot it anyways!

lol!

I was incredulous at that also! If you're gonna shoot it, carry a rifle and shoot from 10 ft, rather than what he did.

A wolverine sure isn't like a fox you can walk to the end of the chain, or a lynx over whose neck you can slip a choking snare loop. Wolverines (and wolves) are worth a 5� bullet IMO. Walking into the trap circle of a live wolverine is foolishness IMO.

And firewood is a winter-long effort for many folks in the north. Transportation of such loads is generally easier when there's ice and snow. I seriously doubt the cameras, equipment, and crews would work well in tough conditions.

I'm just sayin, if yer gonna club it, club it, if yer gonna shoot it, shoot it.

I prefer winter for wood cutting too.

The cutting is awesome, and the plitting is even better when cold.

"hard to cut because the trees are frozen" LMAO!!

They have, it is called "Big Brother"....I saw the ad acouple of nights ago.

I get you on that. It just seems kind of 'greenhorn' to bash a wolverine, but maybe that's just me. I don't like being within spitting distance of critters with their attitude.

And while I always like to tap winter-cut birch into halves at -20�, I can't imagine using the stuff to replenish a woodpile that has been burned through with more weeks of heat yet needed. Dead standing dry spruce sure isn't any harder to cut cold than warm and I imagine that's what they were after - or should have been. Either that or some of the millions of trees that topple into the river when the banks are eaten away during the summer.

Discovery did a nice job with Flying Wild, but that probably had a lot to do with the help of the folks they chose to center their show around. Most real "Yukon Men" wouldn't put up with the nonsense of having a camera crew traipsing in tow - or having to constantly drag their sorry asses out of the trouble they would be sure to get into. That's too bad. It could be an enlightening thing for many folks.

Me personally, I'd be fine with a .22 short to the ticker and hope for no exit hole.

You want reality. I watched this yesterday and thought it was very good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEVB0cpEPVA

Great post Northern Dave,
I had all of the same thoughts when watching the show. What about when the kid was yanking on the birch tree to pull up the beaver? Wouldnt it be much easier just to pull up the pieces of wood that had the snares (and beaver)? Does anyone know if the charachters get paid? I cant imagine they do this for free.

Welcome to the campfire, I see this is your first post.

What brings ya? How did you find the forums?

I've noticed quite a bit of the same thing pointed out in this thread. I actually enjoyed watch the Alaska guy and the Montana guy from "Mountain Men" a bit more than the "Yukon Men" show. Tom seems like a genuine guy that was more than likely told he needed to say "dangerous" and "it could kill us" to make the show.
Survivor Man is a good one IMO as was The Wild Within. I thought Steve was on to a sure thing with that show.

Dave,

You have a shop and some cool car projects. WTF were you doing wasting your time watching wanna be movie star poser "mountain men" on the idiot box?

LMAO

I trap and carry a leaded pipe about 3 foot long with about 12 inches of lead in a 1" black pipe.Stoves their skulls in one hit.

I gotta lay off that stuff now and then too lott, I love a good reuben sammich too but I'd hate to ruin that for myself by eating em 3 times a day every day.

It's good to build a little hunger for your hobbies, it keeps the hobby fun and hobby-ish.

I believe a disgreement over content rights brought down The Wild Within. Steve wanted more rights to the content and the producers wouldn't budge, so he left and started Meat Eater.

Good for him. I haven't seen a single episode of Meat Eater because I don't get the channel. I don't watch too much TV in general but that's one show I may have to pony up and buy.

Just funnin you. My garage is so full of crap I can't work on projects, so I guess I was just expressing some grief over that situation.

I used to get into project mode and just work night after night after night until the project was done. Don't know if I'm wiser or just older, but I can appreciate taking ones time and taking a break now and again.

If it's something new to me, something I'm learning on and challenging my mind with, yeah then I can't walk away either, I gotta go until it's done.

But I can't run that hard all the way to completeion on "it's gonna be cool when it's done" anymore.

Body work and especially paint prep just plain suck!

I'm been halfheartendly looking for an early 70's skidoo tnt on craigslist as a restoration project. Not that I need another project, but they're pretty cool sleds and a small enough project that it won't drag out too long.

Right, vintage sleds can be a little quicker reward project wise, byt I know some guys that know how to stretch them projects out too, making the sleds WAYYYYY better than they ever were originally.

We have a 72 ski jet I need to restore, father inlaw purchased it new.

My wife still doesn't understand why I was so upset when we were watching the very first episode of the very first Survivor season.

I thought they would leave some dumbasses from NYC on an island until they begged off and quit. Last one to stay wins. Then they started the popularity contest...and I started drinking...

Thanks Dave,
This site is great! I actually found the forums just by Google, one of the search results was one of your posts. More like Campfire Big Kahuna if you ask me ; )

This show should be retitled "Yukon Wimps." To trap small animals in metal leg trap should be illegal. It is cruel and inhumane. I realize nature itself is cruel at times in the way animals die so that others may live. That is part of the cycle of life and death.
These so called men who trap animals the way they depict on this TV show is hypocritical on the Discovery Channel's part.
These guys ought to get a real job.
On the one show where he attempts to club a trapped wolverine over the head and then shoot it is pathetic. He barely knocked the thing unconscious and then when he attempts to shoot it in the head to finish it off, his gun jams. Give me a major league break. Then he says that these are very rare animals (meaning the wolverine), then he kills the poor thing. Any wonder why they are extremely rare? That's why I say it is hypocritical. It's like those commercial fishermen fishing out groups of fish and then complaining about how there aren't many fish left.

GFY

Watched them wound and lose a moose 2 weeks ago.

, I think its dramatized a bit to make the show, but there "LIVING" up there were not !!! so more power to them and their way of life, I find it entertaining, and i guess most here who dont like it can just change the channel !!!!! Don

I haven't had the opportunity to trap wolverine, but I've "clubbed" (can you call it "clubbing" when it's about a 1" hardwood dowel?) a hell of a lot of muskrats and 'coons when I was a youngster.

Had one big ol' 'coon grab onto the end of my "club". That one got the .22 from my big brother.

George

Bums

Chit....Do you really think any of that is real?Do you reaally think loggers are like axmen?Do you really think reality tv is real?

But you watch it and talk about it.That's real and keeps these phonie thngs coming....

Now off to Wild west alaska to see some real chit....

All for the concrete cowboy's that watch it wishiggggggggggggggg.....

Jayco

Logcutter, The guy that provides the firewood for the rest of the town,really dont have a clue how to drop a tree,that 45 degree angle backcut tells us that!! but i never made a living cutting dead standing timber either!!! Don

My brother knew 'em quite well before they were famous, says they were always arguing just like on the show.

Don't mean what you see is real tho'

Ya,and he almost broke his arm using a chainsaw winch.The man is a nut case....Common sense does not run in that family nor does experience.

Jayco

So you dont consider us part of nature.Thats pretty arrogant.

Found this guy linked on the "Big Game" forum.

He has the best f'in Far North reality show going ennit?

Check out his youtube videos ("TheWildNorth", one guy with a camera. F'in A )

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwMedsAkj-s



Birdwatcher

I have comm tuna buddies who know a couple of the players in Wicked Tuna. It's wicked all right. Wicked phony. I have it on good authority that virtually ALL of the 'fights' are made up, as required by the producers to jack up the drama factor.

I mean, fishing giants is amazingly exciting--when you're tight. When you're not, it can be pretty GD boring...

Tuna fishing offshore. Slow day.