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Ryan Bassham

@ryanbassham

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Building Brands. Chasing Dreams.

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A wise man once said “I drew the duck blue because I’ve never seen a blue duck before and to be honest with you I always wanted to see a blue duck.” - Billy Madison

Thanks, Billy. You are an inspiration to us all. And for those of you that don’t care anything about blue ducks. Well, Billy’s friend Happy has some parting thoughts…. “Why you don’t you just go home? That’s your home. Are you too good for your home? Answer me! Suck my white ***, duck hater!” I am paraphrasing but it wasn’t something to that effect.

Anyways, enjoy the rest of your day thinking about blue ducks.

#roadto100 #welivethisstuff taken in Dallas, Texas by @ryanbassham

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a year ago

FREE Road to 100 hat to whoever can correctly guess what this is…

Season 2 filming is underway. @ryanbassham and @chiam_films have an announcement coming soon. Been quietly making moves in the background and planning for the future. Thanks for the patience, more to come!

#roadto100 #blindluck #welivethisstuff #waterfowl #whatisit by @ryanbassham

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2 years ago

On location in ZAMBIA 🇿🇲 THE KNOB BILLED DUCK. Africa has no shortage of strange creatures. This one just happens to wear a black helmet on its bill. The Knob billed Duck is a big, powerful African waterfowl species found across sub-Saharan Africa, including the wetlands and floodplains of the Zambezi country. The mature drake is unmistakable black and white plumage, metallic purpley green wings, red eyes, and that massive fleshy knob rising off the base of his bill. They’re not just pretty birds either. They’re strong fliers, wary, social, and capable of moving long distances when the African dry season starts taking water away. They gather on lakes, pans and floodplains, graze on grasses and aquatic vegetation, and strangely enough for a duck spend time perched in trees.

And yes, there’s a South American cousin. What was once considered the same species is now generally recognized as two closely related species: Africa’s Knob billed Duck and South America’s Comb Duck. Same family. Similar look. Different continents. Different species.

But standing on the edge of an African wetland watching a flock of these things lift off, you don’t care much about taxonomy. You just know you’re looking at one hell of a duck. Africa keeps making them different.

#roadto100 #waterfowl #africa #duckhunt #duckseason by @ryanbassham

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2 months ago

7pm MDT tonight we introduce, STATIC. The STATIC Down Hunting Jacket and Pant is purpose-built to deliver warmth when movement stops. Designed for long glassing sessions and cold, exposed conditions, it keeps you warm, focused, and in position when the wait matters most.

#peax #peaxequipment #static #thrive #backcountry taken in PEAX Equipment Co. by @ryanbassham

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6 hours ago

STATIC SYSTEM - 10/15/26
Problem, identified. Solution, created. Beneficiary, you.

#peax #peaxequipment #static #thrive #backcountry by @ryanbassham

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4 days ago

Remain STATIC. Win the wait. 🏔️

#peax #static #peaxequipment #thrive #backcountry by @ryanbassham

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6 days ago

HEROES, NO CAPES NECESSARY. You probably don’t know their names. I definitely struggle to pronounce them much less. They aren’t on magazine covers. They don’t have thousands of followers. They’re local men, and women, who know the bush better than most of us ever will, and they’re often the last line of defense between an elephant and a poacher. Anti-poaching units.

They walk miles through heat, thorns, snakes, and brutal country for pay that rarely reflects the danger. But they keep showing up. They know the land. The water. The animals. The communities. And the people who don’t belong in the bush. This is what conservation looks like when the cameras are gone. Boots on the ground. Real risk. Real sacrifice. Real results. They don’t do it for trophies. They don’t do it for Instagram. They do it because they believe these wild places are worth protecting. It’s their home. They’re the heroes nobody sees. And without them, there’d be a hell of a lot less Africa left to fight for.

Every time a hunter ventures over to Africa, they inadvertently, and in som cases, more directly fund these efforts. Some poachers are converted over to anti-poaching units. Game meat from hunts distributed to local villages to deter the need for poaching. Wages delivered to deter the need for poaching. Value created to the land and its resources for those villages that live amongst it. It’s complicated. It’s Africa. And it has its unsung heroes.

#antipoaching #conservation #africa #hero by @ryanbassham

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a month ago

Beau’s first hunt. Three years old. No passport. No plane ticket. No fancy camp. Just a shotgun, his tractor boots, and Dad. We walked to the back of the pasture at our home, and somewhere between the tall grass and the fence line, something pretty dang cool happened. I got to introduce my son to something that’s been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. Hunting.

There’s something different about passing down the things you love to your kids. You realize pretty quickly that it’s not really about the animal. It’s about the time together. The stories. The quiet. The anticipation. The lessons that don’t need a classroom. Maybe one day Beau will love hunting as much as I do. Maybe he’ll want to chase ducks at daylight, whitetails in the woods, elk in the mountains, or whatever crazy adventure his old man can convince him to go on. And maybe someday he’ll be the one dragging me out the door. For now, I’m just grateful he wanted to walk along. Hopefully this is the first of a whole heck of a lot of adventures.

As long as Beau, his sisters, and his mom are willing to tolerate hunting with me… I’m going. The passport can wait. Our back pasture will do just fine.

#dovehunting #firsthunt #tradition #fieldandstream #hunting by @ryanbassham

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a month ago

Africa’s rivers doesn’t belong to us. It belongs to them. We just try to survive it. The hippo spends its days buried in the water, looking slow, fat and almost harmless. That’s the trap. When the sun drops, these massive herbivore beasts come ashore to graze, covering miles of riverbank under the cover of darkness. Territorial, unpredictable and capable of moving a hell of a lot faster than something that big has any right to move. They look prehistoric because they damn near are. And when you’re sitting quietly on the edge of an African river and a hippo surfaces ten yards away, all you hear is that deep grunt breaking the silence. You are too close. Respect the river. Respect what lives in it. Know that you can’t outrun a hippo and your ass is now grass.

#africa #hippo #safari by @ryanbassham

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a month ago

THE SPUR-WINGED GOOSE. Africa didn’t build this bird to be pretty. With only the face a mother could love, it’s built it to be tough. The Spur-winged Goose is one of Africa’s biggest and strangest waterfowl. Massive body, dark plumage, a bright red. and blue face, and that unmistakable spur on the wing. They haunt Africa’s rivers, swamps, floodplains and shallow lakes, feeding on seeds, grasses and aquatic vegetation. They’re strong fliers, powerful swimmers, and when a big flock gets off the water, it sounds like a B52 Bomber taking off. They look like a goose. They act like a goose. But they came stab you.

#africa #roadto100 #spurwinggoose #waterfowl #goosehunting by @ryanbassham

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a month ago

THE WHITE-FACED WHISTLING DUCK. Africa’s wetlands have their characters. This one comes with a whistle. The White-faced Whistling Duck is a striking African waterfowl species dark body, chestnut flanks, white face, and a zippy whistle that carries across the water long before you see the bird. Yes they are also found in South America. They’re super social, often gathering in big flocks on lakes, floodplains, pans and swamps. They feed mostly on seeds, grasses and aquatic vegetation, moving with the water and the seasons. At first glance, they look almost too clean and refined for Africa. Then a flock gets airborne and you remember where you are. I feel like they are crazy little bastards because I’ve often seem them loafing next to basking crocs. If they had balls they probably wouldn’t be able to fly because they’d be that big.
Wild country. Wild birds. Big invisible duck balls.

#roadto100 #waterfowl #africa #welivethisstuff by @ryanbassham

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2 months ago

Elephant hunting with a double rifle. You can go ahead and check your ego at the door. There’s nothing easy about it. You’re walking into the country where generations of professional hunters carried walnut and steel doubles because when things went sideways, they wanted two rounds ready. The .470, .500, .450/.400, these rifles became part of Africa’s hunting history because they earned their reputation the hard way. But elephant hunting isn’t about killing an elephant. It’s about understanding Africa. Wildlife needs habitat, water, food, and space. Every ecosystem has a carrying capacity. When elephant numbers exceed what the land can sustain, the consequences aren’t theoretical. Habitat gets hammered, other species suffer, and conflict with people increases. Done properly, regulated hunting can be one tool in the conservation toolbox. Those dollars pay for anti poaching teams. They employ trackers, skinners, guides, and camp staff. They put money into communities living alongside wildlife. And, most importantly, they create measurable economic value for keeping elephants and their habitat intact within a man made changing landscape outside of their control. That’s the part the internet arguments usually miss. Conservation isn’t about choosing between loving elephants and hunting them. It’s about making damn sure there are elephants left to argue about. I love Africa too much to pretend conservation is simple. The bush is complicated. The solutions have to be, too. All of that creates a highly debatable narrative to be discussed. And there is nothing quite like carrying a proper double rifle through that country, knowing you’re walking through a piece of wild Africa that is worth fighting like hell to keep wild. The complicated depth of it runs deep, few can understand. We need more to try and understand.

#zambia #elephant #africa #safari #zambezi by @ryanbassham

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2 months ago