Loading...
Loading...

Conan talks to Mike from Ontario about working as a conservation authority (and former polar bear monitor), training bald eagles, and bear escape tactics.
Wanna get a chance to talk to Conan? Submit here: teamcoco.com/apply
Get access to all the podcasts you love, music channels and radio shows with the SiriusXM App! Get 3 months free using this show link: https://siriusxm.com/conan.
Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
With the US bank smartly visa signature card, you earn an unlimited 2% cashback on every
purchase.
No quarterly activations, no categories to track.
Just unlimited 2% cashback on every purchase, okay?
I'm telling you right now, someone out there just laid down some money for something, right?
And they didn't get 2% cashback.
Idiots.
Fools.
Fools.
Fools.
Yeah.
USBank.com slash smartly card to learn more.
The creditor and issuer of this card is US Bank National Association pursuing a license
from VZUSA Inc.
Some restrictions may apply.
The best B2B marketing gets wasted on the wrong people, man, this tears me up.
So when you want to reach the right professionals, use LinkedIn ads.
LinkedIn has grown to a network of over 1 billion professionals, including 130 million
decision makers.
Hmm.
I wonder if I'm one of those.
That's why LinkedIn has the biggest B2B row-as of all online ad networks.
Spend $250 on your first campaign on LinkedIn ads and get a free $250 credit for the next
one.
Pretty good deal.
Just go to LinkedIn.com slash Conan.
That's LinkedIn.com slash Conan.
James and conditions apply Conan O'Brien needs a fan.
Want to talk to Conan?
Visit teamcoco.com slash call Conan.
Okay.
Let's get started.
Hey, Mike.
Welcome to Conan O'Brien needs a fan.
Hey, thanks so much.
Hey, Mike.
How are you?
Where are you right now?
Oh my gosh.
Hey, Conan.
I'm in one in Ontario and Canada.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
And are you in the wilderness right now?
Or are you in a pretty urban area?
Yeah, I'm in the urban area today.
Okay.
Can I just pretend that you're way out on the tundra somewhere?
Yeah.
Let's do it.
Okay.
Can you occasionally make a sound with your mouth just so I feel like this is really authentic?
What do you want to hurry?
Forget it.
Yeah, I need it.
Perfect response.
Why don't you repeat what you asked him?
No, I'm good.
Oh, okay.
And I just wanted to get you to say Canadian sorry.
So I'm happy.
Hey, Mike, it says that you are a conservation authority.
Is that correct?
Oh, yeah.
I worked for a local conservation authority.
And in the past, you were a polar bear monitor.
That's right.
Yeah.
What does that mean?
Essentially, I would go up to the Arctic and get dropped off by helicopter with anybody
who needs a safe escort across the Arctic from polar bears.
So I would kind of track the bears, find the bears, keep my eyes on them, and make sure.
Sorry, I was supposed to do this for real earlier.
What is?
Oh, my God.
Look.
For those of you listening to it, Mike just panned to, I mean, a Hogwarts owl, a beautiful
owl, is perched right next to you.
And apparently it was just happily purvealed.
That was a perfect cinematic reveal if you get a chance to see that.
Go on your computer and check it out.
That's amazing.
That was amazing.
She's going to leave now.
What is that bird's name?
Well, Conan, I was hoping you could name her for me.
She's fairly new to my team years.
So I was going to give her an interview.
How about Interrupto?
Interrupto?
I love it.
Interrupto, the owl.
She's also sitting on my router right now, so she might even interrupt us further.
That's OK.
That bird, Interrupto just wants to destroy, like, not that guy.
Just this podcast?
Yeah, this podcast.
Why isn't it smart-less?
And he's like, crushing the wire.
Where's Will Arnette?
He's Canadian.
Hey, Mike, so I just have to ask you.
So your job was to be basically a guide who would protect people from polar bears in
the Arctic.
And so I have so many questions right now.
I've always heard polar bears are the most dangerous bear.
They can kill you so quickly, is that true?
It's true.
Yeah.
Like a black bear, a grizzly bear might not want anything to do with you where a polar bear,
if they smell you see you, they're coming to get you.
They're hungry.
It's cold.
And they want to eat.
Right.
They're not sitting around on their backs, eating a bunch of blueberries that they found.
There's nothing like that in the Arctic.
So when they see a ham steak and boots walking by, they go for it.
They go for that person.
They want it.
They want it bad.
So what can you do to protect them in that situation?
Yeah.
So I care about conservation so much.
So I want to protect the bears just as much as I want to protect the humans because I
am armed.
I do use non-leafal rounds, but there are lethal rounds that need be never had to, never
want to.
So what are the non-leafal rounds made of?
Like it's like a rubber slug.
And so it would hurt the, if you hit a polar bear with it, he'll say I want to leave now.
Kind of.
But once in the polar bear just kind of like squinted its eyes and walked away.
Sort of like Clint Eastwood.
It looked annoyed and then walked away.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And can I ask you, what is the caliber of weapon if the rubber bullet isn't working that
you would use on a polar bear?
Because I would think it just has to be a, you can't just be using a 22.
No, no, it would be a 12 gauge.
Jesus.
Okay.
Yeah.
But I'm glad, but you never had to kill a bear.
No.
I haven't.
Some guys think that maybe I should have, you know, they might have pooped their pants
a bit while they hit behind me, but I wanted to give that bear every chance to get away.
And luckily, nobody got hurt in the bear go away.
I think once they pooped their pants, the bear wanted to leave.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's what saved her a lot.
It doesn't want food.
The bear was like, oh my God.
There's poop all over my hamstake.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm giving this a terrible, yelp review.
You also have worked a lot with birds.
Is that correct?
That's right.
Yeah.
Birds of prey.
Birds of prey.
And you would train the birds of prey?
Yep.
Train them right from the very beginning.
And I would use them anywhere that has a problem with birds, not a prey.
So if there's a blueberry farm and all the songbirds are eating all the blueberries,
I would, they would hire me to bring my birds of prey.
I would fly them around and it would scare all the other birds away.
Okay.
So tell me a little bit.
What kind of birds of prey are we talking about?
Yeah.
Hawks.
Girfalkins, Sakerfalkins, Parrotfalkins, Harris Hawks, Bald Eagles, all kinds of different
birds.
You can train all kinds of their own job.
I had a bald eagle named Babe.
I raised her from an egg base, basically, so you are so rugged.
Take it easy, Sonna.
You okay?
You're married, Sonna.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Wow.
Thanks, Data.
Good Lord.
Oh.
To be fair, I'm swooning too.
Oh, so why?
Yeah.
Wow.
Let's get it on.
I'm down.
I'm down.
Hey, time for some polar porn.
So anyway, moving on, I didn't think you could train a bald eagle.
Yeah.
It's possible.
They are one of the trickier to train birds because they have a natural instinct to be
a bit nasty.
Oh, really?
If they can steal prey from another bird, they will, you know, to save themselves the
energy of catching their own.
So, you know, they can be good.
I love it.
That's the symbol of America.
Oh, I know.
Our national symbol is the dickiest of the birds.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'll steal the gorgeous.
That's good before I get my own.
Yeah.
Well, yeah, babe had a, babe was her name.
She had a really good personality.
She didn't really have that nasty side except towards women, um, my girlfriend at a time
that really were near me when I had her.
But you could come up and shake my hand and she'd just be like, no, many birds have thought
I was a woman.
Trust me.
They're like, no, but so really a, so sometimes a bird will or in this case, a bald eagle or
in babe's case specifically, babe would be cool with dudes.
But if a lady showed up, would try to attack the lady or just she was super jealous.
Yeah.
I wouldn't give her the chance.
I, I, I an old onto her.
Pretty good.
But, uh, yeah, she'd think about it.
She'd let, you know, she wasn't happy.
This must have gotten in the way of your dating life, I would think that you would have
a bird that attacked women instantly.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, it did.
And, um, but that's all right.
I know what you mean.
Yeah.
Full of bears, the monitor.
You get to live alone.
You know, yeah.
Um.
Wow.
So you have all these different birds and then you would use them like, oh, damn, there's
some seagulls that are hanging around my house by the ocean and they're real drag and
they're pooping all over the place.
Yeah.
I'm going to get one of these birds of prey to chase them out of here and it works.
Yeah.
I'll get rid of them right away for you.
But, um, we do something called car hawking, um, which is essentially the hawk will ride
in the front seat of my car.
Uh, we will do a drive by of your house, I'll do down my window and the hawk will just fly
out.
Um, she might grab a seagull, she might miss, but either way, every seagull in the area
is going to disappear pretty fast.
And how long do they stay away for?
When does it, when do people think, okay, the coast is clear now?
The guy who has a hawk in his car, what left?
Yeah, it depends.
Uh, they will.
The dominoes guy with the hawk left.
Yeah.
If it's a food source, like a landfill, they will keep coming back daily to check and
see if I'm still there.
Yeah.
Um, and, and I would be, but I love that you would ride up with a hawk.
In your front seat, riding shotgun.
And then you'd pull up to the address and go, here we are, 34 Crenshaw road, put the
window down and that's, that's so amazing.
And the hawk scares them all and just comes right back into your car.
Uh, if they catch a bird, they'll stay out there.
I didn't have a hawk train to come back right in the window, um, and I drove the Dodge
Dakota at the time and she went out of the window and I was driving behind the Dodge
Dakota and they had their windows down.
And they didn't know that they didn't know me.
And she flew straight into their window and the car hit the gravel and everyone can run
it out of their cars.
You know, I love the hawk being embarrassed.
Yeah.
I'm just thinking of the hawk going, Oh, God, I'm sorry.
Oh, God.
I'm so sorry.
No, it's the same.
It's the same.
It's the same.
It's the same.
Maroon.
It's the same color.
It's okay.
It's okay.
No, no.
Oh, God.
Oh, God.
What did the hawk just cover its face when it got back to your car with its two wings?
She walked back to me.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Just give me home.
Just give me home.
Oh, my God.
The walk of shame.
Yeah.
The walk of shame for our hawk.
Bird of prey.
Walk of shame.
Oh.
Oh, my God.
Wow.
Wow.
That's so amazing.
Man.
Tax time.
Tax season.
It's stressful.
Yeah, it is.
In the old way of doing taxes was such a pan that gave you a shoe box.
Just with your receipts.
Yep.
You're scared.
You're nervous.
You're like, why did I buy this?
You know, the April 15's tax deadline will be here before you know it.
It's coming fast.
Doing taxes used to mean sitting in a waiting room, handing over a pile of papers, and then
staring across a desk for hours while someone berates you.
Yeah.
You've run your life terribly.
I'm sorry, dad.
Or finally.
What?
Or finally finding an expert, my dad always did my taxes.
Or finally finding an expert.
But their only appointments are weeks out and right in the middle of your work day.
This year brings a major upgrade into it, TurboTax now has in-person locations nationwide.
You can walk into a tech-enabled TurboTax location near you and meet face-to-face with
a real tax expert and have your tax documents uploaded to your TurboTax app on the spot.
Hey, we're always hearing about the future.
It's here.
Just like that, you're done.
Your new TurboTax expert stays back and works tirelessly to get you every dollar you deserve
while you get real-time notifications as you go about your day.
Head to TurboTax.com to find a store location near you and get matched with a TurboTax expert
with real-time updates in the iOS app.
JustWorks helps small businesses support their teams with everything from HR to better
benefits.
Whether you're hiring, automating payroll, expanding globally, or tackling compliance,
justWorks offers transparent pricing in 24-7 human support.
Hiring managed talent without juggling multiple platforms or hidden fees and get your team access
to premium benefits like health insurance for a 1K in commuter perks.
Learn more at justworks.com.
They do your human resources right so you can do right by your people.
JustWorks for your people.
On March 27th, the Aztec and Comedy event of the year arrives.
Mike and Nick and Nick and Alice is streaming only on Hulu.
It starts Vince Vaughn, James Marston, and Asa Gonzalez.
Okay, here's the twist.
There are two Vince Vaughn's.
I've always said we need two Vince Vaughn's.
Yeah.
One is not enough.
His character time travels back to fix a night that went horribly wrong.
Who wouldn't want the chance to time travel back and change a bad night?
And paired with James Marston, what more could you ask for?
Mike and Nick and Nick and Alice streaming March 27th, only on Hulu, right at our.
You know, there are days that the travel perks that you get with T-Mobile really come in handy.
But then there are days that you just want to embrace couch life.
And you love you some couch life.
Oh, loves me some couch life.
Without ever leaving the house, T-Mobile still has you covered.
Find plans including Netflix plus deals on DoorDash, the more benefits you use, the more
value you get.
I mean, why go anywhere when you can get your favorite takeout, binge a show and brag
to all your friends?
You won't believe what I'm not doing tonight.
That's a brag when you get to hang out on your couch and live life at its most supreme.
It's so comfortable.
I have T-Mobile.
It's great.
I like to watch those survival shows and I like to get meat.
It's like a steak and then like a survival show.
Yeah.
That's my monster's eating the person.
You like to eat the meat for the time of the monster, because you're a sick guy.
Check it out at gmobile.com slash magenta status.
Wow.
Receive Netflix standard with ads while you maintain a qualifying line in good standing.
See dash pass details in the T-Life app.
A bunch of fascinations here, I love the birds, I love, did you always, did you ever work
with other bears, other than polar bears, grizzlies, because grizzlies fascinate me.
Yeah, they are incredible.
I didn't work directly with them, but I was a guide on horseback in the Rocky Mountains.
Yeah.
And I've had a few run-ins with grizzly bears, but nothing too crazy.
Yeah.
Oh, God.
But they are also quite incredible.
Yeah.
I mean, take it easy.
I'm sure a tack has been around.
This is one thing after the other with this guy.
Didn't tack?
Hasn't tack worked with some lethal animals?
No.
Wasn't there, no, there was a sickly hamster that he befriended.
No, he's like cuddling with our poodle at home, like, you know, that's what I have.
Okay.
Take it easy, I'm a big tack fan.
Wow.
You can have him.
I'm going to move to Canada.
Yeah.
No.
That's coming back immediately by one of his birds.
I won't allow it.
I'll cut a bitch, go, go, go, I'll cut a bitch.
I'll die immediately.
I forgot, I'm not sorry.
Take it easy, pretty easy.
Take it easy, interrupt El.
Wow.
Wow.
Wow.
You know, I'm fascinated by grizzlies and it's this crazy fascination where I find it
terrifying the idea being mulled and eaten by a grizzly.
But I'm also, I just find them so fascinating that part of me wants to have a grizzly encounter,
just as much as I don't want to have a grizzly encounter. Is that makes sense to you?
I totally get it. I try to tell my mom and family things because it's a bit of a dangerous job,
so they worry about me, but not to be morbid, but like, I don't want to, you know,
die of old age working in an office my whole life if I had a, you know, a barren counter,
and that's what happened. Like, I don't want it. It would be awful, but like, you know,
yeah, that's like, that is a closed casket funeral. I'm telling you right now, if, yeah,
or if there's a, I don't know, we even know what's left at that point, you know, they have to follow
the bear for three weeks. Keep tricking it to use a toilet, then put your wool cap on whatever's left.
I'm sorry, but that's exactly what would happen. Yeah, nobody would go to that after you, dude.
Just leave me out there. It's okay. Okay, leave you out there. Got it. Okay. I think this is
very cool. Now, be honest with me. Mike, if you've been listening to me at all or familiar with my
work and know me as a person, what you see is pretty much what you get. How would I do in these
situations, you think? If you were with me, terribly, whether it's in the Arctic and we're approaching
a polar bear, or in a grizzly encounter, I'm, I want to know. I want to know. I'm constantly
wondering how I would measure up. I think you know, I don't know. No, I don't. Go ahead. Let's see,
how big can you get? How big can I get? I'm six, four without doing anything. And if I,
when I'm, when frightened, my hair gets much taller. So I could be six, six maybe. Okay,
and I'm longer than me. I'm bald. So I'm six, four, but I'm bald. So you're, you might
standing behind me, we'd look even bigger. So you know what? We might, we might survive together
out there. Would you think that I'd be the kind of person to panic and runner? Do you think I'd
become? I want to believe you'd be, be calm. Why do you want to believe that? Why can't you just
believe that? I don't know. You might try and like use calm. Do you think it out of it? Yes.
Hey, here's my question. Do grizzlies like bits? Do they like like sort of cartoony physical
stick? Little bits. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay. So I'm just thinking, yeah, that's the problem.
The biggest problem is I might see a comedy opportunity. Yeah. Yeah. And start, you know,
pretending to be another bear who's kind of a wise guy. And I could see that really irritating
not just a human, but any member of the animal. If the bear wasn't going to kill you after your
bits, it would want to kill you. Yeah. You would be doing yourself a disservice. The bear might
befriend me. And then I would start to show the bear stuff from the podcast and old Conan episodes
at which point the bear would reduce me to a pile of ground chop instantly. You're still going
to be doing bits during the attack? Yeah. Even during the pet. I'd be like, Oh, no, I'm being murdered
by a bear. Moth, moth, I tell you. Moth. Look at me. I have one leg. Look at me. Oh,
happy, happy. I've got one leg and a happy, happy. Yeah, Mike, I'm going to cancel this idea right
now. I need to change tomorrow. No, you know, we can go out of there. I'll make sure. Yeah. Yeah,
we have a good time. We'd have a good time. I like this guy. I do too. Yeah. And I think you and I
would do well hanging out. I think would be good buddies. And I think I think I would try to
I think I could I think I would be a little, you know, the way I you've seen this sona and David,
I kind of become the person I'm with. If I'm with them for a while, I'm very zelig that way.
I think I would become more like Mike. And I would I would might calm down. I really like being
out in nature. I chill out a bit. There's way too much stimulation around me all the time. This
might calm me down and maybe battling a bear of some kind would, you know, make me realize what
it's all really about. Yeah, battle a bear. Yeah. Like you think you have a chance. I have a very
good chance. Okay. If maybe maybe Mike is there. Yeah. Only if Mike is there. Yeah. I will be in
the car. The car will be locked. I'll be in there with your hog. There's no cars out in the Arctic.
Yeah, dropped off. So we get dropped off. Okay. Yeah. So there's there's no obviously no
Wi-Fi no reception. You're in the middle of nowhere. I love it. And that's it can get quite boring.
I'd go out for 30 to 60 days at a time. So I basically downloaded a good
Julian hours of your podcast. And trailer park boys. And that's a big compliment. Thank you.
That's a look at that. That is very cool. That's really cool. Well, I've been, yeah,
been watching you for ever Conan. I just have so much respect for you and your team. You can
bring in comedy and kindness. And we just need so much more than you're bringing it away.
It just reaches everyone. That's so nice of you. Me getting to tell you this is changing my life.
Oh, wow. Like I just I want you to know how how incredible you're changing people's lives.
Whether you know it or not, it's got such a good way. Well, all I know is we keep our head down
and we we do this stuff. And we do it because I can't not do it. Does that make sense? I'm not
trying to do public service. I do this because it just has to happen. You guys have been around
me when I haven't been able to do this for 10 minutes. And it's not pretty. But Mike, getting to
talk to you is a real it's a real pleasure. You seem like a great person. And what you're doing
is really cool. And I love that you have found this life for yourself. Those are I say this all
the time when we talk to fans, people that have found what they love and that what they're passionate
about. And then they manage to will that to be their career, their life. I think that is the
best way to go, you know, through our time here. I really do. I managed to do it. You're doing
it. It's a beautiful thing. So I hope our paths cross in person because I'd love to shake your hand.
I really would. Incredible Conan. Incredible. Did you have a question for Conan?
A question for him. Well, I got him to name Interrupto over there. Yeah. She sat beside me perfectly
through all the tech checks as soon as we got off. She got away. So yeah, I know she saw which way
this was going. She's really standoffish now. Just get back to our net. I brought her to a staff
meeting earlier today as she was interrupting everyone. So they're going to love that name.
Great. Well, say hi to everybody. And Mike, a real pleasure. And I mean it. I hope we cross paths.
That'd be fun. That would be a hard to miss. So keep your eyes peeled. Okay. Well, thank you so
much. This was incredible guys. Thanks for believing in you. Take care. We'll see you soon. Bye.
Thank you. Bye. Conan O'Brien needs a fan with Conan O'Brien, Sonom of Sessian, and Matt Gourley.
Produced by me, Matt Gourley. Executive produced by Adam Sachs, Jeff Ross, and Nick Liyah.
Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Take it away, Jimmy.
Supervising producer Aaron Blair. Associate talent producer Jennifer samples.
Associate producers Sean Doherty and Lisa Burm. Engineering by Eduardo Perez.
Get three free months of serious XM when you sign up at seriousxm.com slash Conan.
Please rate, review, and subscribe to Conan O'Brien, needs a fan wherever fine podcasts are done.
On March 27th, the Asking Comedy event of the year arrives. Mike and Nick and Nick and Alice
is streaming only on Hulu. It starts Vince Vaughn, James Marsden, and Asa Gonzalez. Okay,
here's the twist. There are two Vince Vaughn's. I've always said we need two Vince Vaughn's. Yeah.
One is not enough. His character time travels back to fix a night that went horribly wrong.
Who wouldn't want the chance to time travel back and change a bad night?
And paired with James Marsden, what more could you ask for? Mike and Nick and Nick and Alice,
streaming March 27th, only on Hulu. Rated R.
You know, I value hard work. I just do have an incredible work ethic. Yeah.
And that brings me to NutraGrain. NutraGrain is a hard working snack. Okay.
I'm just wondering where you're going. They fit into real. Well, of course, the minute David
knew, the minute I said hard work, he knew NutraGrain is coming. It's a hard working snack.
It fits into real life and it helps hard working people get it done. Let me explain.
Yeah. It's made with 10 grams of whole grains, 10 vitamins and minerals, and no high fruit,
toast corn syrup. NutraGrain's portable. And I demand that of a snack. Yeah.
I demand that it be portable. Sometimes a great snack will come out and it's over 600 pounds.
I can't lug that around. It's a great for a grab and go option busy. I'm going to grab my
NutraGrain bar, chomp chomp. I'm doing my best work ever. Yeah. You can choose between
strawberry flavored NutraGrain for delicious classic or new NutraGrain crunchy for something new.
You didn't see that come and did you? Do you guys think you're hard working enough to merit
these new NutraGrain bars? I'm obviously. I don't know. I don't know if there's more hard working
assistance. Tell me what you do and I will assess if you're hard working enough. You know what?
You look really nice today. I massage your ego, which is important because you go up in front
of an audience. So you don't mean it? No. Okay. I look terrible. Yeah. Okay. Well, you know what?
That does take a lot of energy to lie to a man with an incredibly fragile ego. Yeah. And you've
been doing that for years. For years. That's a ton of work. I think you might merit a
NutraGrain bar, but what do you see about David Hopping? David, what do you do? I want to say
the obvious. You're here right now, which means that this recording was in your calendar.
There you go. You look back there. So you think you are hard working because you clicked
into a computer and typed. You know what? And then hit save. I'm proud of both of you.
You're welcome. You're both hard workers. Yeah. Find nutritious and always delicious NutraGrain
bars at your favorite store or online retailer today and look for new NutraGrain Crunchy Bars
in stores near you.
