Montana Realtor Gets Jail Time for Sneakily Poaching Trophy Mule Deer 🦌

The weekend might not be here just yet, but your favorite dispatch from the great outdoors is. 

So grab your coffee or whiskey (no judgement) and let's get caught up on the outdoor news and views from the past 24-or-so hours. 

Here's what's worth reading about today:

TAKING THE PROPERTY FOR A TEST RUN
MONTANA REALTOR GETS JAIL TIME FOR POACHING TROPHY MULE DEER USING LISTING ACCESS

In an era of OnlyFans, crypto rug pulls, and LinkedIn influencers, you have to admire the sheer creative degeneracy of one Montana real estate agent who used his unique level of property “access” to poach a magnificent mule deer. After obliterating the client-realtor relationship, the Lewiston-area agent is set to spend much of the upcoming 2026 fall hunting season behind bars after finally being sentenced in court this month.

According to Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks, Hyatt Voy used his real estate license during the 2024 general hunting season to stroll on to a ranch property that the owners were attempting to sell. While on the property under the pretense of, you know, evaluating it as a potential listing, he went ahead and tagged a trophy mule deer buck without landowner permission…

🐻 Japan Trains Civilians to Shoot Darts at a Guy in a Bear Suit as Bear Attacks Skyrocket. Faced with a surge in aggressive bear encounters, Japan has moved past polite PSA flyers and straight into full-contact training. In these government-sanctioned exercises, civilians and hunters are now practicing by blasting darts out of shotguns at a guy wearing a questionably realistic bear suit. In the simulation, a man in a full bear costume lurks in the bushes and when hit, the “bear” dramatically drops and plays dead.

The training comes after Japan recorded 230 bear attacks in 2025, including 13 fatalities, prompting declared states of emergency in some areas. The government, clearly not messing around anymore, just greenlit the culling of up to 10,000 bears this year and has authorized local emergency hunts, potentially involving civilian squads. This comes after a disastrous mast crop failure left the bears (Asiatic black bears, mostly — the kind that look like our American black bears but with worse PR) hangry and wandering into towns looking for their next meal.

It’s a far cry from how we handle bears stateside as Japan doesn’t have dedicated wildlife agencies, leaving the burden on local law enforcement and trained civilians. As it would turn out, when gentle management isn’t an option, you end up with shotgun darts, bear fursuit cosplay, and the blunt realization that sometimes you have to thin the herd the old-fashioned way.

🐺 Texas Officials Forced to Calm Wolf Panic After Vague Facebook Post Sparks Reintroduction Fears. A single Facebook post from the Texas Department of Agriculture this week triggered a wave of confusion and anger across the state. The post showed a crated Mexican gray wolf at Laredo export pens and celebrated it as “history in the making,” claiming the animal would play a key role in restoring the endangered species. Many Texans assumed it meant wolves were being released locally.

In reality, no wolves are being released in Texas, and state officials have no plans to do so. The wolf was simply being transported through Texas by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as part of a binational conservation effort. With Mexican wolf numbers now exceeding recovery goals in Arizona and New Mexico, some animals are being moved south to help bolster populations in Mexico. Texas is essentially serving as a transit corridor, which requires state or local escorts under Texas law.

Texas Parks and Wildlife Department had to issue a public statement clarifying the situation after their phones started ringing off the hook with concerned (and often unhappy) callers. The agency reminded the public that Mexican wolves dispersing naturally into Texas remains extremely rare, and any that wander outside the designated recovery zone in the Southwest are typically trapped and moved back.

🦏 Rhino Conservationist Gored to Death by the Very Animal He Spent His Life Protecting. A 58-year-old South African anti-poaching champion was tragically killed last week while on morning patrol at the Samara Karoo Reserve. Schoeman van Jaarsveld, director of Milk River Security, was tracking a black rhino fitted with a GPS collar alongside other rangers when the roughly 2,900-pound animal suddenly burst from cover and fatally gored him. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Van Jaarsveld was a lifelong rhino conservationist who dedicated his career to protecting the endangered species from poachers. The incident is especially poignant because he was killed by a black rhino — the same animal he had worked so hard to safeguard on the private 68,000-acre reserve. In the past year alone, South Africa has lost hundreds of rhinos to poaching, and friends and colleagues described the loss as one that will be deeply felt across the conservation community.

🦊 When it comes to protecting their nest, peregrine falcons have no quit. Watch as the falcon continuously dive-bombs this young red fox.

Would have been enough to make me take off…

The pull of the weekend.

📸 by: @beauhunter66

 Oh, and one more thing…