Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 914: Foundations - Is a Guided Deer Hunt Right for You?

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Ep. 914: Foundations - Is a Guided Deer Hunt Right for You? · Wired To Hunt Podcast

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
0:05
Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,
0:09
Speaker 1: creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.
0:14
Speaker 1: First Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host
0:19
Speaker 1: Tony Peterson.
0:20
Speaker 2: Hey, everyone, welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast,
0:22
Speaker 2: which has brought to you by first Light. I'm your host,
0:24
Speaker 2: Tony Peterson, and this episode is all about guided deer
0:27
Speaker 2: hunts and what you should think about if you're considering one.
0:35
Speaker 2: Only ten percent of hunters will ever go on a
0:37
Speaker 2: guided hunt. I've heard this number tossed around a lot,
0:40
Speaker 2: but I don't know if it's actually true. I don't
0:43
Speaker 2: doubt that it's in the ballpark. Though. Most hunters don't
0:45
Speaker 2: have any desire to do an outfitted hunt, and I
0:47
Speaker 2: don't blame them, but I'd also say that there are
0:49
Speaker 2: quite a few reasons to consider one, and that some
0:51
Speaker 2: folks would really enjoy them. I'm not really one of
0:54
Speaker 2: those folks, but I've done quite a few for my job,
0:57
Speaker 2: and I guess that makes me qualify to talk about them.
0:59
Speaker 2: So either way, I guess I'm going to so buckle up.
1:10
Speaker 2: A few weeks back, I walked to a familiar gate
1:12
Speaker 2: at the Minneapolis airport to sit with the other travelers
1:15
Speaker 2: and wait for the cattle call to board my Montana
1:17
Speaker 2: bound flight. Most of you probably know that met Eater's
1:21
Speaker 2: office is located in Bozeman, and about three or four
1:24
Speaker 2: times a year I have to head out there to
1:25
Speaker 2: teach Steve how to write or cal how to train
1:27
Speaker 2: a bird dog. During this last trip, the goal was
1:31
Speaker 2: to promote our Dog Days of May celebration, which meant
1:34
Speaker 2: I got to be a part of several met Eater podcasts,
1:36
Speaker 2: record a few houndations, episodes of my own in film,
1:40
Speaker 2: some hunting dog edu content. So, in other words, for
1:44
Speaker 2: like the twelfth time in a row, I flew to
1:47
Speaker 2: Montana and didn't do anything cool but work. Until last month,
1:52
Speaker 2: I'd never hunted or fished in the Big Sky state
1:54
Speaker 2: at all, and it kind of bothered me. But on
1:57
Speaker 2: this last trip, Corey Hawkins reached out to me and said,
2:00
Speaker 2: we're going fly fishing, come hell or high water now.
2:03
Speaker 2: While I give Mark a lot of shit for being
2:05
Speaker 2: a fly fisherman, I also loved to flyfish. In fact,
2:09
Speaker 2: I kind of look at fly fishing like I look
2:10
Speaker 2: at traditional archery. The acts themselves are great. It's just
2:15
Speaker 2: some of the people who wear either activity as their
2:18
Speaker 2: full identity that made me want to smash the eject
2:20
Speaker 2: button on life. After about two minutes of conversation with them,
2:24
Speaker 2: any Huski, I was pretty stoked to go float the
2:27
Speaker 2: Madison with Corey after a week of working, but the
2:30
Speaker 2: forecast didn't look great. Now. While everyone dreams of living
2:33
Speaker 2: in a state like Montana for the natural beauty, and
2:36
Speaker 2: I don't know like the thirty seven species of game
2:39
Speaker 2: you can hunt for, I've been out there in mid
2:41
Speaker 2: May and last year in late June and dealt with snow.
2:45
Speaker 2: Our weather for the week I was there was forties
2:48
Speaker 2: in rain, NonStop cold ass drizzle. I figured the trip
2:52
Speaker 2: was a no go. But Corey isn't that kind of guy.
2:55
Speaker 2: He's as capable of an outdoorsman as anyone I've ever met,
2:58
Speaker 2: and I've met a lot. And he said, even if
3:00
Speaker 2: we get soaked, the trout will still be eating and
3:03
Speaker 2: the boat will probably still float. So he and I,
3:06
Speaker 2: along with a Kansas trapper who was in town for
3:09
Speaker 2: a couple of podcasts of her own and who was
3:11
Speaker 2: also hell on Beaver's, bobcats and most fur bearers drove
3:15
Speaker 2: to a launch site on the Madison. When I climbed
3:17
Speaker 2: into the boat after parking Corey's truck, he handed me
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Speaker 2: a rod and said, cast toward the bank, try to
3:23
Speaker 2: mend the line so there's a little drag and pay attention.
3:26
Speaker 2: I did my best, which was probably about one percent
3:29
Speaker 2: of what Corey could do with his eyes closed, and
3:31
Speaker 2: I started fishing. So did old trapper Kade at the
3:34
Speaker 2: front of the boat, and before long she hooked up
3:36
Speaker 2: on a rainbow, which made me jealous because I fully
3:38
Speaker 2: intended to kick her ass at fishing. We both got
3:41
Speaker 2: into the groove as Corey pointed out slicks behind rocks
3:44
Speaker 2: and runs and just about anything he could say in
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Speaker 2: a nice way to help two not very good fly
3:49
Speaker 2: fisher people catch some fish. At one point, I got
3:53
Speaker 2: so hopelessly wrapped up with my line and my tippet
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Speaker 2: that Corey took pity on me, and as former guides do,
4:00
Speaker 2: worked it out in a matter of seconds. When I
4:01
Speaker 2: was about in tears at all of the water I
4:04
Speaker 2: was drifting through that I couldn't fish because I'd created
4:06
Speaker 2: a total mess. Another time, I set the hook like
4:09
Speaker 2: a real man on a rock and left Corey's flies
4:12
Speaker 2: on the bottom of the river, and instead of handing
4:14
Speaker 2: me flies to retie, he simply took control of the
4:17
Speaker 2: situation and had me up and running in no time.
4:20
Speaker 2: I almost always fished with kids, so I understood that
4:23
Speaker 2: impulse deeply. It also felt really nice to be catered
4:27
Speaker 2: to and did not have to solve every single problem
4:29
Speaker 2: in the boat. Eventually, old Trapper Caate caught a whitefish,
4:33
Speaker 2: which put her up two to nothing, a score she
4:35
Speaker 2: pointed out multiple times without acknowledging that I had graciously
4:39
Speaker 2: given her the front of the boat. Then, as if
4:41
Speaker 2: God himself wanted me to not look like a total loser,
4:45
Speaker 2: I made a terrible cast that I tried to remedy
4:48
Speaker 2: as soon as my fly hit the water, which made
4:50
Speaker 2: it look like I had intentionally set the hook on
4:53
Speaker 2: the unluckiest brown in Montana. After that, I actually did
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Speaker 2: everything right and caught a rainbow which evened up our
4:59
Speaker 2: score or before we hit our takeout spot, which was
5:02
Speaker 2: a real bummer because I could have fished that way
5:04
Speaker 2: for at least another couple of weeks. It was really
5:07
Speaker 2: nice to have someone else do the heavy lifting gear
5:10
Speaker 2: wise and experience wise, and to just be a passenger
5:13
Speaker 2: along for the ride. The guided deer hunts I've done
5:17
Speaker 2: have induced the same kind of feeling, but with a
5:20
Speaker 2: hell of a lot more pressure. Some folks want to
5:23
Speaker 2: offshore the work, some don't. Most of us will never
5:27
Speaker 2: pony up the dough to do a guide to deer
5:29
Speaker 2: hunt anyway, so we'll never know. I know that I
5:32
Speaker 2: never would have if someone else wasn't paying for it,
5:35
Speaker 2: which is exactly how I ended up on my first
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Speaker 2: guide to deer hunt, where I found myself down in
5:40
Speaker 2: Illinois on some property that wasn't exactly known for producing
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Speaker 2: only four keys, with three other magazine writers and eleven
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Speaker 2: dudes from New York, some of whom were really decent guys,
5:51
Speaker 2: and some of whom were very quick to point out
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Speaker 2: how many elephants they'd killed. I wish I was joking anyway.
5:57
Speaker 2: I had a great guide on that hunt who put
5:59
Speaker 2: me in and stands you couldn't pay me to get into.
6:02
Speaker 2: Now that I'm older and wiser and not quite ready
6:04
Speaker 2: to eat every meal through a straw. When I killed
6:08
Speaker 2: a barely pope and young level ten pointer, he gave
6:11
Speaker 2: me a hug and was truly happy. That's where the
6:14
Speaker 2: fun ended, though, and while the outfitter didn't say anything,
6:17
Speaker 2: I could tell they really would have preferred that buck
6:19
Speaker 2: to get another year or three under his belt. That
6:22
Speaker 2: was a good lesson on guided hunts, because I hate
6:26
Speaker 2: following someone else's rules on what I can shoot. When
6:29
Speaker 2: a great buck comes in and works a scrape at
6:31
Speaker 2: twenty yards, I don't want to think about whether I'll
6:33
Speaker 2: get fined if I shoot him. I did a hunt
6:36
Speaker 2: in Texas one time for the same TV show I
6:38
Speaker 2: filmed the Illinois Hunt for where the outfitter scared us
6:41
Speaker 2: all so much with the orientation meeting that the decks day,
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Speaker 2: no one shot, despite several of us having good bucks
6:48
Speaker 2: in range. The meeting consisted of a quick lesson on
6:51
Speaker 2: how to tell if a buck was five and a
6:52
Speaker 2: half years old or older, but every one of us
6:54
Speaker 2: was from someplace very far away from where the mesquite
6:57
Speaker 2: grows thick. A text is dear to me is a novelty,
7:01
Speaker 2: and I am absolutely terrible at judging them because they
7:03
Speaker 2: are literally like half the size of the deer I'm
7:05
Speaker 2: used to And I wasn't alone in that issue either.
7:08
Speaker 2: So while I did get to see crazy running activity
7:11
Speaker 2: in more big bucks in one sit than I'll see
7:13
Speaker 2: at home in a season. It wasn't all that much fun.
7:17
Speaker 2: Constantly worrying about making a mistake that could cost you
7:20
Speaker 2: a lot of money and be embarrassing as hell makes
7:23
Speaker 2: hunting something different, especially because the main thought process for
7:27
Speaker 2: most of us is not to screw up to begin with.
7:31
Speaker 2: I guess since I'm focusing on the negative side of
7:32
Speaker 2: outfitted hunts, I'll keep going before I switch gears. A
7:36
Speaker 2: common horror story among folks who go on their first
7:39
Speaker 2: guided hunt is really shitty guides or over hunted stands,
7:43
Speaker 2: and a general lack of deer activity, which goes with
7:47
Speaker 2: the other two. Now, hunting skill varies a lot, but
7:51
Speaker 2: there's also the reality that some outfitters engage in a
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Speaker 2: volume route to make money. Instead of say, like ten
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Speaker 2: spots a season that all cost six thousand grand apiece,
8:01
Speaker 2: they'll open up forty spots that cost two grand. This
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Speaker 2: is kind of like buying a new bird dog. There
8:07
Speaker 2: aren't any really good deals out there for outfitted deer hunts,
8:10
Speaker 2: just like there aren't too many good deals when you
8:13
Speaker 2: want to buy good blood in a dog if you're
8:16
Speaker 2: not paying very much for either, the odds of getting
8:19
Speaker 2: burned increase quite a bit. The free market has these
8:22
Speaker 2: things figured out pretty well. This brings me to the
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Speaker 2: due diligence stage of guided hunts. If you want to
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Speaker 2: do one or just intrigued by the prospect, the work
8:42
Speaker 2: you put into research operations is going to be worth it.
8:46
Speaker 2: References matter, call them. If an outfitter won't provide them,
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Speaker 2: move on. That's a giant red flag. Also, don't get
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Speaker 2: lost in the thought of a region or area being
8:58
Speaker 2: so good for deer huntrunning that you assume any outfitter
9:02
Speaker 2: there will be able to put you on big bucks.
9:04
Speaker 2: Deer hunting quality tends to boil down to individual property management.
9:09
Speaker 2: Ask potential outfitters lots of questions. Ask about how many
9:13
Speaker 2: people they run through in a season, whether they cater
9:16
Speaker 2: specifically to bow hunters if that's of interest, what their
9:19
Speaker 2: stands and blinds are like, and the hunting methods that
9:22
Speaker 2: are allowed. Ask about meals, lodging, travel, and everything that
9:27
Speaker 2: will be a big part of the hunt that doesn't
9:29
Speaker 2: involve you just shooting a good deer and then getting
9:31
Speaker 2: picked up by a guide on a side by side,
9:34
Speaker 2: and speaking of guides, ask plenty of questions about their
9:37
Speaker 2: experience levels. There is something wild that happens with a
9:40
Speaker 2: lot of outfitters where the guide turnover rate is really high.
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Speaker 2: This makes sense if you ever get to do any
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Speaker 2: guiding at all, because the job mostly sucks. Just as
9:51
Speaker 2: there are shitty outfitters, there are also shitty clients. It's
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Speaker 2: not just on the guides and the outfitters here. Now,
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Speaker 2: there are clients who don't want to work. They don't
10:00
Speaker 2: know how to hunt, but their egos won't allow them
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Speaker 2: to realize that, and some people just can't be made happy.
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Speaker 2: But there is truth about guides too. Hunting is an
10:09
Speaker 2: experience game, and the more of it you have, the
10:11
Speaker 2: more likely you are to be good at it. I
10:13
Speaker 2: know that's not exactly revolutionary, but the people who are
10:16
Speaker 2: most likely to take a guiding job and work their
10:18
Speaker 2: asses off on no sleep for the promise of decent
10:20
Speaker 2: tips and a job that at least revolves around hunting
10:24
Speaker 2: aren't exactly forty five or fifty year old dudes with
10:27
Speaker 2: thirty some deer seasons under their belts. Guiding is often
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Speaker 2: a young man's game, and while a twenty five year
10:32
Speaker 2: old can be one hell of a guide if the
10:34
Speaker 2: stars aligned and they understand the properties well. It's a
10:37
Speaker 2: bit of a red flag when an outfitter talks about
10:39
Speaker 2: young new to the scene. Guides ask a lot of
10:42
Speaker 2: questions about this before booking, because it is important and
10:46
Speaker 2: remember to look past just the trophy photos and to
10:49
Speaker 2: ask who actually is in the photos, like are they
10:52
Speaker 2: paying clients or are most of them outfitters, friends and family?
10:56
Speaker 2: Do they look recent or does every picture kind of
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Speaker 2: seem old? Ask about the hunting methods and what will
11:02
Speaker 2: be expected of you if you book a rut hunt.
11:05
Speaker 2: Are you going to be expected to sit all day
11:08
Speaker 2: from dark to dark? And if so, are you the
11:10
Speaker 2: kind of person who can do that? Maybe you want
11:13
Speaker 2: nothing more than to hunt from dark to dark because
11:16
Speaker 2: you're wired a little goofy and the protocol for a
11:18
Speaker 2: specific outfitter is to hunt until ten in the morning
11:20
Speaker 2: and not get back into stand until two. If that's
11:23
Speaker 2: the case, you might find yourself feeling cheated out of
11:27
Speaker 2: some really valuable standtime. That's a conversation you have to
11:30
Speaker 2: have long before you send in your deposit and block
11:33
Speaker 2: your PTO off on your work calendar. And when you're
11:37
Speaker 2: chatting with the outfitter, or you're showing up to the
11:39
Speaker 2: lodge for the start of your hunt. I'll say this,
11:42
Speaker 2: be careful about what you think you know. It's pretty
11:46
Speaker 2: easy for me to believe that I know more than
11:48
Speaker 2: most of the guides I've met, and on a general
11:50
Speaker 2: deer scale, that's probably true, I guess, but it's not
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Speaker 2: true on specific properties and in places I've never been.
11:58
Speaker 2: That's a hard one for the ego to process. But
12:00
Speaker 2: one of the best reasons to do a guide of
12:02
Speaker 2: whitetail hunt isn't just to kill a big one while
12:04
Speaker 2: someone holds your hand. Is to learn about deer in
12:07
Speaker 2: a new setting and to experience hunting someone else's way.
12:11
Speaker 2: I've been in enough deer camps to see the way
12:13
Speaker 2: that this plays out, and I can tell you that
12:15
Speaker 2: you're genuinely way better off following the guide's advice. This
12:19
Speaker 2: is true for two reasons. One is, even if they
12:22
Speaker 2: are young and not overly experienced, they probably still have
12:25
Speaker 2: a pretty good idea what to do to get you
12:27
Speaker 2: on deer right where you're hunting. The second is that
12:30
Speaker 2: you won't get very far if you're butting heads with
12:32
Speaker 2: them all the time, at least you won't get anywhere good.
12:36
Speaker 2: Getting along with your guide will buy you freedom. It'll
12:38
Speaker 2: open up opportunities that you might not get if you
12:40
Speaker 2: constantly remind them how much better at this stuff you
12:42
Speaker 2: are than them. I learned this lesson when I got
12:45
Speaker 2: the crazy chance to go to South Africa a long
12:47
Speaker 2: time ago. It was a hunt I never thought would
12:50
Speaker 2: happen for me, and when it did, I shot horribly.
12:53
Speaker 2: I just fell apart, and on one of those shots
12:56
Speaker 2: I hit a big I paul A square in the
12:57
Speaker 2: joint where the shoulder meets the leg. African critters are
13:01
Speaker 2: notoriously tough. While I did a lot of damage to
13:04
Speaker 2: that in Paula, he didn't give up the ghost easily.
13:07
Speaker 2: I did get along very well with the outfitter and
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Speaker 2: his son, unlike the absolute dipshit I went over there with.
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Speaker 2: So when the time came to trail that in Paula,
13:17
Speaker 2: they told me I could go along and try to
13:19
Speaker 2: get in a follow up shot, which was way outside
13:21
Speaker 2: of their stated policy. It was one of the coolest
13:24
Speaker 2: experiences of my life to crawl along that blood trail,
13:27
Speaker 2: scanning the bush for that better at Impaula. In fact,
13:30
Speaker 2: I almost passed out from adrenaline when I finally shot
13:33
Speaker 2: him again, which is no joke. I wouldn't have gotten
13:37
Speaker 2: to do that if the outfitter didn't like me. I
13:39
Speaker 2: promise you that now. While it's common courtesy to just
13:42
Speaker 2: not be a prick, it's also a good way to
13:44
Speaker 2: get to do more stuff on a guided hunt and
13:47
Speaker 2: enjoy yourself a hell of a lot more. Be nice,
13:50
Speaker 2: and relinquish some of the control to the folks you're
13:53
Speaker 2: paying to help you on your quest. It's that simple,
13:56
Speaker 2: but it's sometimes not simple. It is worth it for
13:59
Speaker 2: the right person, or the person who draws a coveted
14:01
Speaker 2: tag like I talked about last week, and has decided
14:04
Speaker 2: that you know, it's time to reduce I was deer
14:06
Speaker 2: population by one. I also think that guided hunts are
14:09
Speaker 2: going to become more of a popular thing, as non
14:11
Speaker 2: resident hunting generally just gets run through the paper shredder
14:15
Speaker 2: over and over again, and we have more limited opportunities.
14:20
Speaker 2: While it may not be your jam at all, if
14:22
Speaker 2: you've ever considered it or thinking, you'll take some time
14:25
Speaker 2: in the future to treat yourself to a hunt in
14:27
Speaker 2: a state where the boomers are thick. Guided hunts are
14:30
Speaker 2: a real option, but you got to treat them like
14:33
Speaker 2: you would any kind of big business or investing decision.
14:36
Speaker 2: Got to do your research. Don't just trust what you're
14:39
Speaker 2: told by someone who's looking to make money off of you.
14:41
Speaker 2: Dig into the operation, talk to the people who've gone
14:44
Speaker 2: through it with them, and then figure out what you're
14:46
Speaker 2: really looking to get out of the hunt. If it's
14:48
Speaker 2: just to shoot a deer bigger than your personal best,
14:51
Speaker 2: the process for booking a hunt will be vastly different
14:54
Speaker 2: from looking to, you know, have the time of your
14:56
Speaker 2: life rattling in two dozen bucks just north of Mexico somewhere.
15:00
Speaker 2: There are a lot of options out there, and a
15:02
Speaker 2: few of them like that last example, might allow you
15:05
Speaker 2: to hunt some pigs or some other non deer animals
15:08
Speaker 2: that could flavor the whole trip in a much better
15:10
Speaker 2: way than just a single minded pursuit of a big buck.
15:14
Speaker 2: This is a good time of year to think about
15:16
Speaker 2: this kind of thing, because there's still plenty of time
15:18
Speaker 2: before November rolls around, and one thing you don't want
15:21
Speaker 2: to do is to impulsively book a guided hunt and
15:23
Speaker 2: then cross your fingers in fact, booking a hunt for
15:26
Speaker 2: this year is already a situation that can lead to
15:28
Speaker 2: trouble because the lead time isn't great and like finding
15:31
Speaker 2: that perfect German Shorthair pup or labrador puppy with just
15:35
Speaker 2: the perfect blood to suit your hunting needs, time is
15:38
Speaker 2: your friend when it comes to outfitted hunts, So give
15:41
Speaker 2: yourself enough of it to make the best decisions possible.
15:44
Speaker 2: Do that, and then come back next week because I'm
15:46
Speaker 2: going to talk about how deer hunting success doesn't just happen.
15:49
Speaker 2: You can't just wish for it. You have to understand
15:52
Speaker 2: what it takes to be successful and then put your
15:54
Speaker 2: mind to those things. That's it for this episode. I'm
15:58
Speaker 2: Tony Peterson. This has been the Wire to Hunt Foundation podcast,
16:00
Speaker 2: which is brought to you by First Light. As always,
16:02
Speaker 2: thank you so much for listening and for all your support.
16:05
Speaker 2: If you need some more hunting content, and you probably do,
16:08
Speaker 2: you know, whether that's an article, maybe you want to
16:11
Speaker 2: listen to a podcast, whatever, The Mediator dot com has
16:15
Speaker 2: you covered. We drop new content every day. We're dropping
16:19
Speaker 2: bird dog stuff. There's been some really cool trapping articles
16:22
Speaker 2: put up lately on the website. Tons of good stuff.
16:26
Speaker 2: Go check it out at the Mediator dot com