Mountain Men

Coming up on "mountain men"...

Whoo!

Holy big water.

Hopefully we can split these rocks.

All right. Now you all get down.

This is a lot to handle right here.

- This is good old southern pine. - Yeah.

Predators come out at night.

It's time to get these dogs home.

This overhang

I'm gonna be cutting it off with a chainsaw

because it's rotten, sagged.

Hey!

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On idaho's salmon river

late winter is spawning season...

Nice and easy.

Watch it doesn't hit that big Boulder on that side.

Yeah, big one on this side.

There we go.

And time for fishermen to fill their nets

with some of the best steel head trout in the lower 48.

There's lots of different fish that live in Idaho,

but steel head are just unique. They're special.

Got the Poles.

They're born in the river up here in Idaho.

There's this tiny little smolt.

They get washed out in the spring flood.

They go all the way out to the ocean,

live in the ocean for three to four years.

And then when they decide that they're big enough

to come spawn, they'll come back up,

usually in the same general area where they were born,

and that's where they'll live their life

and have a bunch of babies.

To give themselves an edge, Harry and kidd hand-built

a traditional pram boat.

Its flat bottom and lightweight hull

are designed to navigate the shallows where the fish are.

Its shape and maneuverability are also ideal for taking

on the rapids that have earned the salmon

- its ominous nickname. - - the river of no return.

We're good to go.

All right, you go ahead and hop up front.

We'll push off and start this journey.

Normally when we steel head fish in Idaho,

you're competing with a bunch of different people around you.

Well, good, bad, or indifferent, here we go.

But this new boat that we made, it's light enough

and small enough that we can get into some places

that no one else can really get into this time of year.

Hey, girls.

They're looking pretty good for the winter.

Not too many ribs showing.

Young deer.

12 miles downriver are the shallows

where the salmon and steel head trout gather to lay their eggs.

And while yesterday kidd and Harry

proved their new boat could float...

It goes fast. It goes slow.

Yeah, it goes fast.

You can move wherever you want to go quick.

There's plenty of rapids ahead today

that will put it through the ringer.

We're gonna hit some bigger water,

I'm guessing, by the size of this river.

Yeah, no, there's definitely some big whitewater

down in the start of the canyon stretch.

We're gonna hit a few class 3's in there... 3's plus.

And then once you get down in there quite a ways,

it's like the sun doesn't shine down

in the bottom of it and there's a good chance

we hit some ice jams down in that end of it.

- I hope the fishing's worth it. - Me too.

Some people call the steel head the ghost in the river

because they're really hard to catch.

But we brought our camping gear,

so if we end up staying the night, it's not a big deal.

If the fishing's good, it'll be worth it.

This looks like the first serious rapid right here.

Well, it's a little more serious than our test rapid.

This one is gonna be a little bit of a wave

to climb up and out of, so we're gonna hit it with some speed.

Hopefully there's not a rock in it then.

Yes.

Whoo-hoo-hoo.

This water is a whole lot bigger than you think it is.

Yeah, it is.

Whoo-hoo-hoo.

Holy drop.

Aah!

Holy, kidd.

- It's a little wet! - Brr, that's cold.

Yeah! It handles the whitewater all right,

but it's a little wet.

Aah!

The sides aren't nearly as high as my other boat.

Water came right in over the handrails,

kind of splashed on Harry.

So far, I'm liking the way the boat handles.

Hopefully there's not too much bigger rapids than that.

Yeah.

As the timeless battle between man and predator rages on

in the kootenai national forest

expert trapper Paul antczak is making a stand.

And so far, this season's face off is ending in a draw.

Son of a buck!

We got a mess.

Shoot.

That's a wolf.

I can see the hair.

Right there.

Nothing more depressing

than having a wolf pull out of the trap.

We've got some toenail marks right on the pan.

Probably just a toe catch.

This is where you got have thick skin

because a misfire like this can really hurt the ego.

Over the last two weeks,

Paul set up shop in an area called cow camp

and worked to outsmart the wolf pack

that claims this land as its hunting ground.

Cow camp is where the ranchers bring their cows

to graze during the summer.

Not only am I helping the rancher,

but it's a big income for me.

Most of the money goes towards my goal of getting my property.

Despite his vigilance, he's only trapped one wolf...

Two short of his goal.

I've been at cow camp for a couple weeks.

Today's the day to pull traps

and I'm gonna head back to the house.

Now, with less than a day left on the line,

he's making his final rounds,

hoping to haul in one last paycheck

to make the trip worth the effort.

What a loss. But, you know, that's trapping.

Wolves are the hardest animals to catch.

You know, they are tough. They are tough.

But, you know, that's trapping, though.

That's trapping.

You got to have a strong mind to trap wolves.

If you don't, you're gonna get your feelings hurt

because they will hurt your feelings.

Check some more traps. Let's get them pulled.

In the great far north,

winter is starting to loosen its grip.

Straight over. There we go.

After months of brutally cold weather,

Aron and Jen Toland are back outside and back to work.

Get the snow off of here.

Winter is ending, and there's a lot of work to do.

And what I'm doing right now

is... I am putting a good roof on a cabin.

I've got lots of cabins that need roofs,

but this is the one that's in the worst condition.

When Aron and Jen bought the abandoned fishing lodge

seven years ago,

their goal was to renovate all 12 cabins.

But so far, they've only managed to complete three.

Now, you can see what we inherited

when we first moved here were these cabins.

Now, this is what the typical cabin looked like.

And there was more rain happening inside the cabins

than outside of the cabins,

so the best thing to do is get that roof fixed

and then work on the rest.

This far north, outdoor construction

is nearly impossible in the winter.

And the to lands are far too busy in the summer.

Summer is when our fishermen

come from all over the world to fish our lake.

We have great rainbow trout fishing.

Our busiest season, our money maker is the summer.

Which is why when the weather is right,

they have to make the most of every minute.

Time to warm up the saw.

I'm building a roof on top of a roof to support the metal.

Sheet metal is ideal for the top layer,

but everything underneath has to be reframed

with new hand-cut lumber.

What I'm cutting from this log are two-by-sixes.

They're going to be the joists for in the roof.

It so happens that the trees I had to take down in the yard

are the trees I'm milling into lumber for this project.

We don't let anything go to waste out here.

That's it. I got all the two-by-sixes I need.

I can get on to building that roof.

Perfect.

Back in the day, this place was booming.

Every cabin was full.

This place was busy every day all through the summer.

Hey!

Wow, that's a big load!

Yeah! We got a little bit of lumber here.

Our vision was to bring it back to its glory days

and that's our goal.

This overhang, I'm gonna be cutting it off with a chainsaw

because it's rotten, sagged.

It's just a hindrance at this point.