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Appalachion Outlaws

Deaner

Member
Since its pretty much the slow time of the year I thought I would throw this question out there...
Is Appalachion Outlaws for real?
Does anyone else watch that show on the History Channel on Monday nights?
Its a supposedly reality show following rednecks in West Virginia digging up ginseng and selling it.
Its almost too stressful to watch with the way they are sneaking in and out of the woods digging up seng and they are always robbing each other and buyers are competing against each other to buy the most...
Now this year a gang of thugs from (I think) North Caorolina is coming in and stealing the seng that the guys dig up and strong arming the locals to bring them to their honey holes to poach every little bit of seng out there.
Its hard to believe some of that stuff could be legit with the way "The Lumsford Gang" this season are threatening everyone with their guns and robbing those good ol boys for their seng...

I know "reality TV" these days (if ever) has really been all that "real" but I'm just curious if this show is actually legit.

I used to like watching the Duck Commander shows when they actually went duck hunting. But now that they have a "reality" show its just too scripted for my likeing...You can;t tell me Uncle Si is that dumb or they make all their calls in that room they all hang out in and package it up and sell it...

How many people ginseng hunt on this site? Is it worth as much up here as it is in West Virginia?
A couple episodes ago the guy named Obie dug seng for 3 days and was able to sell it for $25,000. Even he said, what other job can you work for 3 days and make $25,000?
The other night Gregg Shook dug seng for 2 days and made $35,000!

I mean if that stuff is worth that much around here, hell I'd take a week off in the fall and Hide-the-Hipe and I could go all over hills back home and make THOUSANDS of $$$ digging it up for all the land we have access to!!
 
I think it is kind of like the Moonshine shows. That stuff probably does happen somewhere, but not when a tv camera is around. Those shows are all scripted, I think those shows would be a lot more interesting without all the BS.
 
I think that kind of stuff is happening or was last year in certain areas. If I remember correctly last year was a really good year price wise for ginseng. The stuff on TV is fake for sure though. I actually remember reading about a fur/gingeng buyer from that area having his shed broken into and over 100,000 dollars worth of seng he dug or bought was stolen. And yes our ginseng is worth just as much as theirs but just less areas where it is able to grow and mature like they have there with the mountains.
 
Don't forget your license if you hunt ginseng in Iowa.
There are licenses to buy and sell and even seasons to follow.
Wish I knew more about it too - not sure how much is around here but surely there is some?
 
You want to get on areas that aren't hit often by humans and they say places that have never been pastured. It has to have a certain number of branches also.
 
I didn't know that you needed a license and/or there was a season for it. A really long time ago ( would say 35-40 years ago) a guy that my dad workeed with at the time brought my dad and I out Ginseng hunting. We went all over the land that Hide-the-Hipie and I hunt on. From what I remember of that day was him telling us the woods couldn;t be pastured for at least 5 years and better if it never was. But I remember the guy giving dad $500 dollars for bringing him around to dig it up. My dads always said he wondered how much ginseng we brought him to cuz the guy was kind of a shyster so if he felt guilty enough to pay us $500 he had to make a ton of money off of us...
 
I used to work for the state of WI and one small job duty I had was to certify the ginseng that a local dealer was looking to ship overseas. Woods grown plants have crazy random roots, lots of branching. Cultivated plants had roots that looked like carrots. We also weighed out a pound of roots, and then counted the number of roots in that pound. This data collection would show you if plants (roots) were getting smaller over time. 5 years ago, this dealer was paying between $250-500/ lb dry. Roots per pound varied, but on average were about 150 roots/ lb. That equated to about $1.50-3.00/plant. Most sales tickets I saw were for hunters selling between 1-5 lbs. I would guess if you had a "good" season of hunting it, you might make $1-2,000. In WI, the season only ran for the month of September.
 
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