Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 978: Post Rutcation Therapy Session with Tony Peterson and Dan Johnson

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Ep. 978: Post Rutcation Therapy Session with Tony Peterson and Dan Johnson · Wired To Hunt Podcast

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: the White Tail Woods, presented by first Light, creating proven
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon,
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on the show, I'm
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: joined by my longtime collaborators and co hosts of the
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: Wired Hunt podcast at one time or another, Dan Johnson
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: and Tony Peterson, and we are breaking down their twenty
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: twenty five rut hunts, having a little bit of a
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: therapy session here, having some good laughs, sharing some stories,
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: and discussing the lessons they've learned from these past couple
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: weeks of epic rut hunts. All right here with me
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: now on the line are two questionably chosen friends of mine,
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: to people who I frequently thought over the years, you know,
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: why have I chosen to spend time around these people?
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: They say that you are the average of the five
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: people you spend the most time with. And while I
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: don't get to spend as much physical time like in
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: real life with these guys as I wish, I have
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: spent a whole lot of hours digitally with them and
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: so I do wonder if I'm becoming more like them
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: by virtue of that, and that raises a lot of
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: red flags. But I digress. The point that I'm trying
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: to make here is that we've all just come off
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: of our big old rucations, and both Tony and Dan,
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: both you guys had some success, I think, some struggles
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: along the way. So I wanted to debrief, see how
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: you're feeling, see how it went, see if you learned anything,
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: or if you're still as blockheaded as you were when
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: this whole month started. So tell me this on a
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: one to ten scale, Dan, how are you feeling post
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: rut cation right now? Ten being you feel amazing? One
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: feeling like it kicked your ass.
• 2:11
  Speaker 3: Mentally, I was telling Tony before we started recording. Mentally,
• 2:15
  Speaker 3: I'm back in I'm back in Dad' zone, husband zone. Mentally,
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: I'm okay. Mentally I'm stable. Take that how you want
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: to take it. Physically, I'm a broken man, like dude,
• 2:28
  Speaker 3: I'm not joking. This year I had to use a
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: crutch to get to a tree stand and lay down
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: my crutch and then basically on my right knee every
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: time I had to do a step. I had to
• 2:42
  Speaker 3: do a pull up to get on to the next step.
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: And if you guys know anything about the old school
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: lone Wolf's stands that have the alternating sticks, that's how
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: all my setups are. And so I struggled getting into
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: stands for like three three days and it sucked, man,
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: it sucked, but I toughed it out.
• 3:05
  Speaker 4: A crutch, a crutch, a straight up crutch. Day one.
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: The first day was a trekking pole that didn't work
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: because I was like having to put two I couldn't
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: put any pressure on my right knee.
• 3:15
  Speaker 4: What did you do to your knee?
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: Well, other than just years of abuse them all?
• 3:21
  Speaker 4: Right?
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: So you know on some of these split trees that
• 3:24
  Speaker 3: maybe about four foot up they split, and so I
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: went two sticks on the left side and then two
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: sticks on the right side, and then my stand faced
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: the left side, so I was like wedged right in there.
• 3:40
  Speaker 3: It makes for like a really good tree stand placement
• 3:43
  Speaker 3: and going up no problem, but coming down I have
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: to cross my legs and maybe angle a little bit.
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: And then when I went to pivot back to straighten
• 3:55
  Speaker 3: my foot out on that stick, my foot didn't go,
• 3:58
  Speaker 3: but my knee did. And it's just it's like bone
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: on bone in there anyway. And I just ordered another
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: I just scheduled another knee injection for next month. So
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: so aside from that, I mean, it just took me
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: longer to get places.
• 4:20
  Speaker 4: That's about it.
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: But I've got a lot of questions.
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah, was good, man, I mean, well, I say good
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: because I shot a deer. But the first week in
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: November suck, man, it was slow. This whole nonsense that
• 4:35
  Speaker 3: you you do about sitting all day, that's all. That's
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: all lie, That's that's industry bullshit, right, Nobody like I don't.
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: I'm never gonna sit all day.
• 4:44
  Speaker 4: Man.
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: I hunted all day, but I never sat all day.
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: And but then second week, dude, one of the best
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: days of hunting I've had in several years took place
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: on November tenth, and great day, a lot of movement,
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: great coming off that cold front. And aside from that,
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: just really like that's a long way of saying I
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: had fun. It was a great it was a great time,
• 5:04
  Speaker 3: good rut. First week was slow, second week was better.
• 5:08
  Speaker 4: Wow.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: So I want to follow up on some of that stuff,
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: but I first want to get to Tony. Tony, what
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: was your just you know, one to ten scale of
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: how you're feeling post your couple of rut trips.
• 5:20
  Speaker 5: This is going to sound crazy, but I feel like
• 5:22
  Speaker 5: I'm out of ten.
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: Whoa.
• 5:26
  Speaker 5: I accomplished everything that I set out too for this
• 5:30
  Speaker 5: rut in a way that I didn't think was possible.
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 5:37
  Speaker 4: So I'm not we'll get into this. I'm sure.
• 5:40
  Speaker 5: I'm not saying I didn't get my ass absolutely kicked
• 5:43
  Speaker 5: at certain points. But I had big goals in Nebraska,
• 5:47
  Speaker 5: and I had big goals in Wisconsin, and I knocked
• 5:50
  Speaker 5: him all off the list, and I feel good about it.
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: Man, He's so good, isn't he?
• 5:55
  Speaker 4: Dan?
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: He just do just geez from way downtown. Tony just
• 6:00
  Speaker 3: man crushing his goals in life. Congratulations. I wish I
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: was more like you, buddy.
• 6:05
  Speaker 4: Well, you probably just never get there, Bud. I'm sorry.
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: Bravo, Tony, Bravo. We've got a lot to learn from
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: Tony here. But let's let's start low.
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: I don't know about you, guys, but I just showed
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: up and shot too great, dear, and I mean ship,
• 6:21
  Speaker 3: I have the best rude ever.
• 6:23
  Speaker 4: You guys didn't.
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: That's funny.
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: Let's let's start in the pits and work our way
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: up to Tony's perfection. So so Dan, uh, give me,
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: give me some more details. He just told us how
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: you destroyed your knee. Uh, walk me through it. It
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: seemed like like following you from Afar, watching you know,
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: through Instagram and stuff, you had some struggles along the way.
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: I had a friend. I had a friend texted me
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: and they said, man Dan's Instagram meltdown last night was
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: must see TV. Oh yeah, although I do feel bad
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: for him, that was.
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: That was just one hunt though. That was just one
• 7:01
  Speaker 3: hunt with a rookie mistake. And aside from that, it
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: was just like, I mean, we've all had it, those
• 7:09
  Speaker 3: seasons where you go right, they go left, you go left,
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: they go right, And it was a lot of that,
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: to be honest with you.
• 7:17
  Speaker 4: The deer were there. You know.
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: It's like, and this farm that I was hunting, I'm
• 7:22
  Speaker 3: in a position on one of these stands where I'm
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: in this awesome pinch point that connects two pieces of
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: terrain together, and I can see a long ways down
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: this pasture edge, and then you got deer popping out
• 7:35
  Speaker 3: way down there. And then I go hunt way down there.
• 7:38
  Speaker 3: And then as I'm coming out of the timber. All
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: the deer over there, right, and so it's just like
• 7:42
  Speaker 3: this zigging and zagging and things like that. But that's
• 7:46
  Speaker 3: not saying that I didn't have opportunity. I definitely had opportunity.
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: And if I had a little more time and a
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: little more patience, then I'm sure I would have connected
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: on one of the target deer that I was after.
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: But meltdown came on the best day that I talked
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: about on November November tenth, and that was.
• 8:08
  Speaker 4: I sat this one tree.
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: So we had this conversation a long time ago about
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: being too mobile. Yeah, and like in the past, I
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: would sit a stand, move, sit a stand, move, move, move, Well,
• 8:19
  Speaker 3: they're not here that night here and a little bit
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: because of my knee, and a little bit because I
• 8:26
  Speaker 3: just didn't want to move around a lot. I said,
• 8:30
  Speaker 3: I'm gonna I'm gonna try this out, and I'm going
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: to sit one stand with a lot tight access route
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: on a great wind, either a southwest west or northwest wind.
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: And it just needed to be out of the west,
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: and I wanted to see just see if that changed things, right,
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: because deer were coming through and every day I had
• 8:49
  Speaker 3: encounters that with you know deer in shooting rangs. And
• 8:52
  Speaker 3: my goal during the rut was this. It was one goal.
• 8:56
  Speaker 3: I want to have a couple dos then shooting range
• 9:01
  Speaker 3: every hunt I go on. And I felt like if
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: I could do that, then I could be in the
• 9:06
  Speaker 3: same in a good spot where bucks were going to
• 9:09
  Speaker 3: be coming to investigate. And so sure enough, on the
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: evening of the tenth two dos came through. A really
• 9:19
  Speaker 3: good three year old ten pointer, probably that one forty
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: five class came through and he's just like he's a
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: bigger buck than the one I shot. He just had
• 9:30
  Speaker 3: something a little extra that I wanted to see what
• 9:32
  Speaker 3: happened to him next year, and so I just let
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: him walk.
• 9:37
  Speaker 4: And then out of the back of the sticket, I.
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: See a little movement and there's this ten pointer shows up,
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: probably one fifty class ten great great deer, four year old,
• 9:48
  Speaker 3: I'm assuming. And so these doe walk down this trail,
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: cross this creek and there's this a gap in this
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: thicket and I ranged the gap. I didn't range the deer.
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: I ranged the gap, but comes through he just stops
• 10:05
  Speaker 3: perfectly and I'm already at full draw. I arranged that
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: gap thirty three yards, put the thirty thirty yard pin
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: just a little bit above center line on the body,
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: let one go fucking foot over his back, and I'm
• 10:23
  Speaker 3: just like, you gotta be kidding me, Like I felt
• 10:26
  Speaker 3: like I was pretty in control of everything. And he
• 10:29
  Speaker 3: bounces back into this thicket, but I can still see
• 10:32
  Speaker 3: him and he wants those dose here. He comes back again,
• 10:36
  Speaker 3: same trail, draw back, same gap right before this little
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: crit crossing, but I put the thirty yard pit in
• 10:42
  Speaker 3: dead center this time, maybe even a hair low over
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: his back again, And I'm like, what like I And
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: that's where the melk dot came from. I said some
• 10:52
  Speaker 3: bad words on internet. But so here's the deal. Instead
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: of arranging the g yeapore.
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: Before you explain that, Okay, I want to understand now,
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: for people who saw your Instagram meltown, they they they
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: got this. But for those who didn't see it, ye,
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: walk me through your mental state and like your state
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: of confusion or just like you your self analysis after
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: all that happened, Like you were talking through the how
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: could this happen? How did I do this? What's wrong
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: with me? What happened?
• 11:23
  Speaker 4: Uh?
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: Talk me through what that was?
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: Like?
• 11:26
  Speaker 4: Yeah, So the first shot.
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: The first shot goes off, and I'm a foot over
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: the back and I'm just like, Dan Johnson doesn't miss
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: like that, right, He's he's on that Tony Peterson level.
• 11:37
  Speaker 3: He just doesn't Yeah, he doesn't make he doesn't make
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: those kind of mistakes.
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: Dude, I miss like that a lot and so and
• 11:47
  Speaker 4: so I just was like, what the hell.
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: But I didn't have enough time to like break it
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: all down before the second shot, because it was fairly quick.
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: It was like forty five seconds goes by, he pops off,
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: He looks back at the does, and he's back in it.
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: I don't know about where you guys were hunting, but
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: os George balls or hedgeballs or whatever you call them.
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: We're dropping and they make a ton of noise coming down,
• 12:13
  Speaker 3: and these deer are just now ignoring that noise. And
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: so that arrow goes and my bow goes off and
• 12:21
  Speaker 3: crashes into the grass and in the thicket behind it,
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: and he's just like, oh, it must be something falling
• 12:27
  Speaker 3: out of the tree. He's got his mind on these does.
• 12:31
  Speaker 3: He comes back and that whole time, all I'm thinking
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: about is get another arrow in, get another arrow in,
• 12:35
  Speaker 3: because if he comes kind of away from me. I
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: had another shot as well, and he came back down
• 12:42
  Speaker 3: the same thing, drew back again, and the second time
• 12:45
  Speaker 3: he was just he really wasn't like crazy spooped. He's
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: just like I think I'm just gonna leave and just
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: turn around and walked away. No tail, no running, no trot.
• 12:54
  Speaker 4: Just walked away.
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: And so as I'm sitting there having this like what's
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: going on, my thought process just goes through everything and
• 13:07
  Speaker 3: I'm just like, dude, I must have bumped my sights.
• 13:10
  Speaker 4: I don't like.
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: Because the first miss I could have chalked that up
• 13:14
  Speaker 3: to like buck fever, because I get pretty fired up.
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: But the second time they came through, I was like,
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: I was like, okay, I get a mulligan and all
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: that all that tension is now gone. And so I
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: I was just I don't know, man. I just went
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: into autopilot again, got got everything straightened up, went back
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: into the same you know, same form, same shot process.
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: I do this little thing called like touch, pause, release,
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: and so like I'll draw my bow that's touch, get
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: my nub where it's supposed to be, and then pause
• 13:59
  Speaker 3: it's like an exhale, and then go through the trigger,
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: the thumb, the thumb release, and it just it's another
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: bad shot.
• 14:09
  Speaker 4: And then that's when I just kind of fell apart.
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: You gotta use different words when you describe this mantra
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: in the future. Dam when you're saying that your mantras touch, pause, release,
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: and it's all about your nub, A lot of a
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: lot of I use the other hand. But anyway, yah, anyways, so.
• 14:29
  Speaker 4: Hold on, do we do? We know what happened? Did this?
• 14:34
  Speaker 3: Well? So I go back to the truck right and
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: in the headlights, I am. I set my target up.
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: I had it in my truck in the headlight of
• 14:43
  Speaker 3: the car. Go back to thirty range. It dead nuts,
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: dead nuts, you know, Like I shoot like three or
• 14:49
  Speaker 3: four arrows at this target at thirty yards and no issues.
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: And so the only thing.
• 14:58
  Speaker 4: That I can think of that happened is that.
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: The deer walked through and instead of arranging the deer
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: at the angle of the tree stand, I ranged. I
• 15:10
  Speaker 3: was kind of on a very slight slope, so through
• 15:13
  Speaker 3: the gap I ranged thirty three yards. But when a
• 15:19
  Speaker 3: spike came through, like I don't know, like not a spike,
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: this big laid down tree, I ranged itad at twenty
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: and they were just on the opposite side of this tree.
• 15:32
  Speaker 3: So when I ranged the gap, I ranged basically through
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: the deer thirteen yards further than where the deer were
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: actually at. And so that's where the mistake calculation of
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: what pin I should have been using. I should have
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: been using my twenty yard pin, and so that's where
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: the calculation came back. That's where I'm just like rookie mistake.
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: That's where I had my melt down. And just you know, Dan,
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: did you stop him? Did you murp him or did
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: you shoot him?
• 16:03
  Speaker 4: Naturally?
• 16:04
  Speaker 3: Nope, naturally both times because he was getting ready to
• 16:07
  Speaker 3: cross this creek. So right before he crossed, he just
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: he didn't like bound into the crick and bound out.
• 16:16
  Speaker 4: He walked right to the cricket this dry creek.
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: Bed stopped and like same with the doze, they stopped
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: and then they slowly worked their way down and up,
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: almost like a little momentum going down then right back up.
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: And I feel like that's what he was going to do,
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: and he did it the same thing two times. I
• 16:32
  Speaker 3: didn't have to stop him. And that's where it was
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: just like this rookie ranging mistake where I ranged through
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: the hole, and the deer was way closer. If I
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: would have ranged the does in that gap, I would
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: have had an accurate measurement instead of ranging through it.
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: So if we were to ignore the shot mistake there, yep,
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: would you say that this hunt validated your idea of
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: during the rut sometimes just sticking it out in one
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: spot and giving it more time.
• 17:04
  Speaker 3: Oh, yeah, absolutely, especially with a lock tight access route.
• 17:08
  Speaker 3: I mean this thing on a west wind, this stand
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: is easy to get to. Deer typically don't get to
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: the east of its location. They kind of peel off
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: north or south and they don't go east. And it's
• 17:22
  Speaker 3: just a stand where you could I feel like if
• 17:24
  Speaker 3: you you could hunt a lot of a lot on
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: good winds. And I had, I had good backing to
• 17:30
  Speaker 3: the trees. I felt like I was exposed. But then
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: when I got down and looked up at my tree stand,
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: there was a lot of backing behind me and with
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: other trees, and so I was.
• 17:42
  Speaker 4: Able to get away with a little bit more drawing back.
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: And and I've had encounters in that stand before, so
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: I know that, Like there's good trails that kind of
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: crisscross through this area. And yeah, like I definitely like
• 17:58
  Speaker 3: that spot and definitely going to it again. I'm going
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: to make a micro adjustment to it probably March when
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: I go back there. But other than that, just just
• 18:07
  Speaker 3: you know, like you talked about finding that spot within
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: the spot, I found it.
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: So yeah, yeah, So how'd you end up killing the buck.
• 18:16
  Speaker 4: That you did?
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: Kill?
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: The same stand, same spot, same spot next night, and
• 18:21
  Speaker 3: so I just went back in there, same exact wind
• 18:24
  Speaker 3: direction the pre that morning, I had a different wind,
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: so I went to a different stand and I had
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: to wait until it shifted in order to get back
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: in there because it was too far north. There was
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: no west in it, and these deer almost come right
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: towards the stand and then they peel off away from
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: it just a little bit, and I needed a little
• 18:47
  Speaker 3: bit of west in that. So I waited until the
• 18:49
  Speaker 3: wind rotated back to the west. Later that afternoon, got
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: in that stand and waited, and that that do group
• 18:57
  Speaker 3: came through again. This time that buck wasn't with him
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: with him, but and then a button buck came through
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: and was kind of milling around right in front of me.
• 19:07
  Speaker 3: I had a spike buck bedded at like fifteen yards
• 19:10
  Speaker 3: in this tall grass.
• 19:12
  Speaker 4: The buck. The spike buck left.
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: The button buck was still like milling around at like
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: five yards in front of my stand. And then I
• 19:19
  Speaker 3: saw some movement in the back of this little open
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: spot in this it's not even timber, because it's all
• 19:26
  Speaker 3: locust trees and like those thorny black locusts and o
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: sage orange trees, and it's just it's like thirty year
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: old cattle pasture, is what it is. It's just gnarly.
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: It's all multiplower. Yeah, exactly, exactly. So it's a habitat
• 19:47
  Speaker 3: guy's worst nightmare, but a big but a big bucks
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: just love it.
• 19:51
  Speaker 4: Deer.
• 19:52
  Speaker 3: That farm is loaded with deer. And so I see
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: this rap coming through and and I had passed an
• 20:01
  Speaker 3: eight pointer similar to him, like the previous week, who
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: was all over the farm on trail cameras and stuff.
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: But I ended up I ended up looking at this
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: buck and he's just a little bit wider passed. He's
• 20:14
  Speaker 3: right at the ears, maybe just a little bit wider
• 20:16
  Speaker 3: than that other eight pointer. And I said, I looked
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: at my broadhead and it was drooling and it kind
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: of looked back at me, and he was like, dude,
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: it's time. And I was like I'm not going to
• 20:26
  Speaker 3: question you each time. Yeah, And I was like, it's
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: go time. And it was just one of those things
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: where and I'm sure we'll talk about this later, but
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: I just, dude, I just stop giving a shit about
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: all the things that people talk about, you know, like
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: the big buck craze and the age class age. Dude,
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: I wanted to throw a fucking arrow that day, and
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: I did, And so I got jacked up when I
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: saw him drop down out of off this hillside and
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: then he came, he disappeared, and then he popped up
• 21:01
  Speaker 3: at about thirty yards and he was wide, and he
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: was a beautiful eight point on and and and that's
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: when that old Dan Johnson, He's like the.
• 21:10
  Speaker 4: Jaw dropped and the blood started boiling.
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: Man. And I was just like, let's do it and
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: boop double long, wash them fall over, and I felt
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: very happy.
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: So did you have did you have any like did
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: any of those thoughts go through your mind at the time?
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: You were like, I usually would have passed this buck.
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: I passed bucks like this earlier. I shouldn't shoot it,
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: but then you like, ask, screw it, I'm going to
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: do it anyways. Or was it like none of that
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: at all and just instantly, Oh, I just want to
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: shoot this deer.
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: Well, the expectation, I mean, I've talked to both of
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: you guys about this on previous episodes where I'm just like,
• 21:42
  Speaker 3: I'm I'm gonna go out, I'm gonna hunt the best
• 21:45
  Speaker 3: spots and if a great deer shows up, but I'm
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: past that, Like, I don't have the ability to manage farms. Okay,
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: I'm a I'm a bow hunter. I'm not a land manager.
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: I'm not a white tail like grower or whatever you
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: would call those guys, right, I'm not here to get
• 22:04
  Speaker 3: a like whatever is available, I'm gonna take it. And
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: I have also said that I am on a sliding scale.
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: I'm going to go out for my number one, number
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: two bucks every like as I'm going to go in
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: those spots and I'm going to go. But as that
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: week in my time starts to fade, and I like
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: week one was great, as I went back to a
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: wrestling tournament, week two started, you start to feel the
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: pressure as a father and as a husband and as
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: a volunteering for coaching multiple sports. You're like, I should
• 22:47
  Speaker 3: probably start thinking about getting home, and I don't want
• 22:51
  Speaker 3: to say that that buck was my ticket out of here,
• 22:54
  Speaker 3: but it was just an opportunity that I was like,
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: this is good and I had this conversation with a guy.
• 23:01
  Speaker 3: I want to hear what your guys' thoughts are.
• 23:03
  Speaker 4: He was good enough.
• 23:06
  Speaker 3: And when you say it like that, it's almost like, ooh,
• 23:08
  Speaker 3: that just doesn't that almost sounds a little icky.
• 23:11
  Speaker 4: He was good enough. But for me, I was just like, dude,
• 23:15
  Speaker 4: this his meat's.
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: Going in my freezer and his euro amounts going on
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: my wall, and man, this is what I wanted. I'm
• 23:24
  Speaker 3: a busy human and a ninety five percent of my
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: life is outside of this tree stand, and I wanted
• 23:32
  Speaker 3: to get back to it, man, And so I shot
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: a deer that otherwise, you know, previous years I may
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: not have shot. But people change, goals change, life changes,
• 23:46
  Speaker 3: and this is a result of that life that makes.
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: Love that it does. I love it. I think like
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: that's such a great for people who have listened to
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: you and us over the years too. I think we've
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: all each all three of us, have been going through
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: our own kind of journey. As we've been going through
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: this and learning this stuff and having families and all that,
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: but hearing you, you know, back in like twenty thirteen
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: when you were you know, passing Giant Bucks and talking
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: about how you had to shoot a one seventy or whatever,
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: chasing shipwreck and all these other deer, and then to
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: have this trajectory that you've been on. You've had all
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: sorts of great success, but then you've also had all
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: these other things in your life that you're realizing matters
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: so much too. I think it's just a really great
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: example of you know, it being okay to change and
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: to go through these different things, and that you had
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: an awesome hunt and it was your awesome hunt, and
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: that's all it matters. It doesn't matter what I think,
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: doesn't matter what some jerk on the internet thinks. So
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: you set a really good example, I think, for people
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: to hunt their own hunts, to enjoy whatever it is
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: they want to enjoy.
• 24:53
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: I just I really like that.
• 24:55
  Speaker 4: It was.
• 24:56
  Speaker 3: It was fun, man, And I think I don't know
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: about you, Tony, but at our age we start thinking
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: about at this halfway point, we start thinking about things
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: a little bit differently, and I just can't, like, I
• 25:15
  Speaker 3: don't know, I've had this crazy mindset change just about
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: about everything in my life and how I've approached it
• 25:25
  Speaker 3: yesterday and previously and today and tomorrow and moving forward.
• 25:30
  Speaker 3: It's just this, it's just a complete different mindset on life.
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: When I call it a mid life crisis, I guess
• 25:37
  Speaker 3: I don't.
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: Know, you know. And when it comes right down to it,
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: this whole deer thing, it it's so stupid. It get
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: matters so little in the big scheme of things, whether
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: or not you shoot a big buck, right, And that's
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: what I've just like started realizing over the last half decade,
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: or whether is that it's just we put way too
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: much pressure on ourselves or whatever to do this thing
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: that ultimately doesn't really matter. If you're not enjoying it,
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: if you're not doing it for the reasons that really
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: truly satisfy you and your family, then what in the
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: hell are we doing?
• 26:11
  Speaker 4: So?
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, cool story, cool to see all that come together.
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: I'm glad that you filled the tag and had a
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: great hunt.
• 26:18
  Speaker 4: Yeah, And it's cool that.
• 26:24
  Speaker 3: When you don't go into that you had you went
• 26:28
  Speaker 3: through this a couple of years ago where you felt
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: like you had to go shoot a big buck because
• 26:34
  Speaker 3: you were Mark Kenyon of Wired to hunt and I
• 26:37
  Speaker 3: in order for me to validate who I am and
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: what I talk about.
• 26:40
  Speaker 4: Inches of antler matter.
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: Dude, I shed that shit and it feels so good
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: sitting in a tree stand knowing that if dude, there
• 26:51
  Speaker 3: was a spike that came by and I almost wanted
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: to just shoot him and just be like got him,
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: you know, like love Ye had a great time, did it?
• 27:02
  Speaker 4: Yeah?
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: And you know it's like you when you think about this.
• 27:06
  Speaker 3: I'm sure both of you guys get a lot of messages.
• 27:08
  Speaker 3: And I'll end on this. How many people every single
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: year go out and attempt to bow hunt white tails,
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: and of those people, there are a lot that are unsuccessful.
• 27:23
  Speaker 3: And to be able to be successful on a white
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: tail with a bow is is something you should anybody
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: should be proud of, no matter what the inches or
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: sex of that animal is. That's a win, dude, that's
• 27:37
  Speaker 3: a win.
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: So yeah, there's also say though, on like the alternative side,
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: when you look at how many people kill big Bucks
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: quote unquote big Bucks. There's a whole ton of people
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: that kill big Bucks now too, right with a bow
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: And what I'm also realized is that's not that special either.
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: By that, I mean like it doesn't really matter, Like, yeah,
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: any time Dick or Harry can kill a big giant
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: buck doesn't make you special, doesn't make you an elite
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: deer hunter, doesn't make you someone who you know, Yeah,
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: I don't know. So it's like both sides. It's like, man,
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: it doesn't really matter that much either way, whether you
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: can shoot a big giant buck or you choose to
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: shoot small bucks. It's about your own hunt. I mean,
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: it's something like we said, like a decade ago hunt,
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: your own hunt. And I feel like I'm better understanding
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: that every single year. And there's few people that understand
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: this better than the spike killer himself. Tony Peterson.
• 28:30
  Speaker 5: Yeah, so that's a great sentiment, Mark to give Dan
• 28:34
  Speaker 5: a bunch of love for shooting a buck that he's
• 28:35
  Speaker 5: a little bit self conscious about it, and then immediately
• 28:38
  Speaker 5: try to give me.
• 28:38
  Speaker 4: Ship for shooting spikes. Uh huh. Anyway, I thought you'd
• 28:46
  Speaker 4: appreciate that. You have the nicest prick.
• 28:48
  Speaker 3: I know.
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: He deserves it, Dan, you know that you know that.
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: To tell us about Nebraska, Tony, you said, have went
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: so well, You are so good. You not only killed
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: a big giant buck yourself, but you guided two other
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: people to big giant Bucks. As I understand it too,
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: tell us, tell us all about it.
• 29:08
  Speaker 5: So Nebraska was NonStop stress for me since Steve called
• 29:14
  Speaker 5: me last December. But I felt pretty qualified to set
• 29:21
  Speaker 5: this hunt up because it's a low deer density deal.
• 29:23
  Speaker 5: I mean, that place just doesn't have very many of
• 29:25
  Speaker 5: a year. Like I kind of got to know all
• 29:27
  Speaker 5: of them, but I had We had three guys. So
• 29:32
  Speaker 5: we have Steve, who's not, you know, big into white
• 29:36
  Speaker 5: tail bowl hunting. We have Pottery Pat his neighbor who's
• 29:38
  Speaker 5: an awesome dude who's never really bow hunted white tails
• 29:42
  Speaker 5: this way right their Western dudes whatever, and then myself
• 29:46
  Speaker 5: And so we have three hunters, three camera guys. Who
• 29:50
  Speaker 5: the most experienced in a tree stand out of those
• 29:52
  Speaker 5: three camera guys I think was Max Barta, which is
• 29:55
  Speaker 5: pretty light I mean anyway, So it was there's going
• 30:00
  Speaker 5: to be a challenge, and I knew we had big Bucks,
• 30:03
  Speaker 5: but I also knew it was going to be like
• 30:05
  Speaker 5: You're gonna sit all day and maybe not see one
• 30:09
  Speaker 5: kind of deal and until one shows up.
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: Is this the is this property that you guys are hunting.
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: It's similar to some of the other Nebraska stuff that
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: we've hunted that's like pretty wide open and then cover
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: all by the river. Is it that kind of place?
• 30:22
  Speaker 5: So yes, but this whole place is a working cattle ranch,
• 30:28
  Speaker 5: so there's no like you walked through it, you're like,
• 30:32
  Speaker 5: there's not hardly any cover, I mean on the entire thing.
• 30:36
  Speaker 5: So the sand hills type sand hills type stuff for
• 30:40
  Speaker 5: further east, it's it's east, but it's like sand hill,
• 30:45
  Speaker 5: Like one half of this entire ranch is a moonscape
• 30:47
  Speaker 5: that sand hills. There was no deer on there, there
• 30:50
  Speaker 5: was a river bottom in there. There's some cat till slews.
• 30:53
  Speaker 5: It's an interesting property. It was a cool property, but
• 30:55
  Speaker 5: it's really light on good habitat.
• 30:58
  Speaker 4: If there weren't.
• 31:01
  Speaker 5: Cattle in there and they left it about three years,
• 31:03
  Speaker 5: it would be unreal, like literally unreal. Anyway, went down
• 31:09
  Speaker 5: there a couple times the summer hun cameras, went back,
• 31:12
  Speaker 5: hung stands, put up blinds, and then Steve for like
• 31:17
  Speaker 5: a month and a half before this haunt is like,
• 31:20
  Speaker 5: send me pictures of coyotes, fox, bobcats because I'm going
• 31:24
  Speaker 5: to trap. And at first I thought he was messing
• 31:26
  Speaker 5: with me, and I was like I'm not sending you.
• 31:30
  Speaker 5: Just on the off chance that he's not joking, I'm like,
• 31:32
  Speaker 5: I'm not sending you any pictures of coyotes or anything.
• 31:35
  Speaker 5: I'm like, no, way, don't trap this, Like, don't freaking
• 31:38
  Speaker 5: do it. So as we get closer, he's like, send
• 31:42
  Speaker 5: me pictures of coyotes, and I'm like, no, I'm not
• 31:45
  Speaker 5: gonna do it because I had I had all the
• 31:47
  Speaker 5: I had all the cameras, so I have the Moultary
• 31:49
  Speaker 5: app So we get there, drive down there Monday night, right,
• 31:54
  Speaker 5: those guys have like a fifteen hour drive from Bozeman,
• 31:56
  Speaker 5: however long it is.
• 31:57
  Speaker 4: Pull a camp or big production deal whatever.
• 32:00
  Speaker 5: The night before, you know, we're looking at wind and
• 32:02
  Speaker 5: it's like I learned my lesson in the last couple
• 32:04
  Speaker 5: years on the RUT. I'm like, I'm setting up for
• 32:06
  Speaker 5: south winds and I'm setting up for north winds because
• 32:08
  Speaker 5: we've been getting a lot of south the last couple
• 32:10
  Speaker 5: of years, and I'm like, I'm not gonna get burned
• 32:12
  Speaker 5: this way, right, So we have a limited number of
• 32:14
  Speaker 5: setups for each wind, and you know, you look at
• 32:16
  Speaker 5: the forecast and you're like, okay, we got a north
• 32:18
  Speaker 5: in the morning. And a south in the afternoon, north
• 32:20
  Speaker 5: in the morning, south in the afternoon, or vice versa.
• 32:22
  Speaker 5: So I'm like, we got to be we have very
• 32:25
  Speaker 5: few spots where you're gonna sit all daycause you're gonna
• 32:26
  Speaker 5: have to shift anyway. So we're going through the plan
• 32:29
  Speaker 5: and I'm like, okay, I have two really good river
• 32:32
  Speaker 5: bottom stands with killer pinch points by them, but they're
• 32:36
  Speaker 5: not that easy to get to if you've never been there,
• 32:38
  Speaker 5: Like you got to cross this big river. And so
• 32:40
  Speaker 5: I'm like, I'm going to go into the farthest river
• 32:44
  Speaker 5: crossing stand. I'm gonna map, you know, put my tracker on,
• 32:47
  Speaker 5: map my route so you guys don't get dunked in
• 32:49
  Speaker 5: the night, you know, or when you're walking in there
• 32:51
  Speaker 5: in the morning.
• 32:51
  Speaker 4: Whatever.
• 32:52
  Speaker 5: And then I'm like, okay, Pat, I'm gonna send you
• 32:54
  Speaker 5: to this ground blind I have on this pinch point
• 32:56
  Speaker 5: on the other side of the ranch that just turned on.
• 32:57
  Speaker 4: There's been tons of deer going by there.
• 33:00
  Speaker 5: And then I had a spot for Steve, and Steve's like,
• 33:02
  Speaker 5: I'm gonna go set a trap line in the morning
• 33:05
  Speaker 5: on November fourth, of course, so I'm like okay, So
• 33:12
  Speaker 5: I go out it takes me way longer to get in.
• 33:16
  Speaker 4: I gave it a lot of time.
• 33:18
  Speaker 5: A couple fall starts in the river where it got
• 33:20
  Speaker 5: too deep, and you know, you're filming stuff in the
• 33:23
  Speaker 5: dark and whatever. So it's like getting to that point
• 33:25
  Speaker 5: where I'm like, we got to we got to get
• 33:26
  Speaker 5: in there, right. We get to the stand. Camera guy
• 33:29
  Speaker 5: goes up. He's never been in a tree stand before.
• 33:32
  Speaker 5: He's kind of banging, clanging around tree arms, the whole thing,
• 33:35
  Speaker 5: and it's like starting to look light. And I looked
• 33:37
  Speaker 5: at my phone and I'm like, by the time I
• 33:38
  Speaker 5: get into that stand, it'll be shooting light. But I'm like,
• 33:41
  Speaker 5: I don't I don't know what to do, like whatever.
• 33:43
  Speaker 5: So he gets up, kind of gets settled in. I
• 33:45
  Speaker 5: send the camera up. I climb up, pull my bow up,
• 33:48
  Speaker 5: hang my pack up, hang my bow up. And I
• 33:50
  Speaker 5: hear something and I look and there's a deer like
• 33:52
  Speaker 5: forty yards away, and I tell I tell Drew, I'm like, hey, buddy,
• 33:57
  Speaker 5: you gotta get your shit together because we have something
• 33:59
  Speaker 5: here right now. And he like clangs his carabineer on
• 34:03
  Speaker 5: a safety harness on the on the stand, and so
• 34:06
  Speaker 5: I reach up and I moved his lifeline up so
• 34:09
  Speaker 5: he wouldn't keep banging on the stand, and he's like
• 34:13
  Speaker 5: doing three sixties up there right, and I bring my
• 34:15
  Speaker 5: binos up and I see this great big time and
• 34:18
  Speaker 5: I go, dude, you got to get your shit together
• 34:20
  Speaker 5: because this buck's coming now.
• 34:21
  Speaker 4: And he's right there, and so I have.
• 34:24
  Speaker 5: A beautiful little lane right in front of me where
• 34:29
  Speaker 5: I mean, the reason I set up for it is
• 34:30
  Speaker 5: like a twenty yard shot. They go through this pinch
• 34:32
  Speaker 5: point where this low land meets the river, so there's
• 34:35
  Speaker 5: like one little high spine they cross, otherwise they're waiting
• 34:37
  Speaker 5: a swamp.
• 34:38
  Speaker 4: It's like it's money right.
• 34:40
  Speaker 5: Well, that deer starts walking up and I'm like, man,
• 34:43
  Speaker 5: I should shoot him in my first big window because
• 34:46
  Speaker 5: it's low enough light where I'm like, if he gets
• 34:49
  Speaker 5: into these other smaller ones, I'm like, I might clip
• 34:51
  Speaker 5: something that I can't see or whatever, you know.
• 34:53
  Speaker 4: And so he walks in and I don't stop him
• 34:56
  Speaker 4: or anything. I shoot here it hit and.
• 35:00
  Speaker 5: He runs about twenty yards and stops, but he stops
• 35:04
  Speaker 5: like not very far away, and I'm just like, you
• 35:07
  Speaker 5: can you'll see it on the film. I'm kind of like, uh,
• 35:10
  Speaker 5: just reach and grab another arrow. Like I didn't. I
• 35:13
  Speaker 5: thought he would be gone, you know, So it like
• 35:15
  Speaker 5: took me a second to catch up to the moment.
• 35:17
  Speaker 5: I'm like, I better get another one in him because
• 35:18
  Speaker 5: I know I hit him pretty good. So I grab
• 35:21
  Speaker 5: an arrow, put the you know, put my pint on him.
• 35:23
  Speaker 5: Shoot arrow, cracks into him. He runs twenty yards to
• 35:26
  Speaker 5: my left and stops. So then I'm like, okay, grab
• 35:30
  Speaker 5: another arrow. And I had to lean out because I
• 35:33
  Speaker 5: could only see like two thirds of his body, so
• 35:35
  Speaker 5: I had to lean out to get you know, get
• 35:37
  Speaker 5: a little closer to the shoulder.
• 35:39
  Speaker 4: I lean out and shoot My arrow.
• 35:41
  Speaker 5: Goes right underneath him, and so I range him and
• 35:43
  Speaker 5: I'm like, oh, he's farther than I thought. I was
• 35:45
  Speaker 5: just guessing twenty because I was in total panic mode.
• 35:49
  Speaker 5: So I dial in, lean out, shoot the fourth arrow,
• 35:53
  Speaker 5: and that ro oh my gosh. So I shot him
• 35:56
  Speaker 5: three times and I missed on the third shots. I
• 35:59
  Speaker 5: shot four. That arrow looks like it's good. Every one
• 36:03
  Speaker 5: of them had looked like it was good.
• 36:05
  Speaker 4: Hits.
• 36:05
  Speaker 5: He runs off, and I was just like it was
• 36:09
  Speaker 5: like the whole thing happened within like four or five
• 36:14
  Speaker 5: minutes after I climbed into stand and so we have
• 36:17
  Speaker 5: this whole week, we have like a full week to hunt,
• 36:19
  Speaker 5: and I'm like, I just killed a deer. And then
• 36:21
  Speaker 5: so the second guessing started to come in. I was like,
• 36:24
  Speaker 5: you know, what if he's not that big? Like my
• 36:26
  Speaker 5: initial impression was he was big. But then I'm like,
• 36:29
  Speaker 5: what if I shot like a scrapper the right of way?
• 36:31
  Speaker 5: And then I'm like what if I don't get him?
• 36:33
  Speaker 5: And I shot four times at him like kind of.
• 36:36
  Speaker 4: You know how it is.
• 36:37
  Speaker 5: You're like, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna get down
• 36:38
  Speaker 5: yet because I don't want to blow this spot out.
• 36:40
  Speaker 5: I don't you know know. So we're trying to look
• 36:42
  Speaker 5: at the footage and it's like I can't tell on
• 36:45
  Speaker 5: the little screen and I'm like, you know, we have
• 36:48
  Speaker 5: another little buck come through, and then we have some
• 36:50
  Speaker 5: doze and I'm like, let's just ride this out, give
• 36:52
  Speaker 5: it a couple hours, get down and you know, go
• 36:57
  Speaker 5: find the first arrow.
• 36:57
  Speaker 4: It's broke off and covered in blood. Well it's a
• 37:00
  Speaker 4: good sign.
• 37:00
  Speaker 5: Find where he stopped and I shot him the second time,
• 37:02
  Speaker 5: found another arrow covered in blood. So after the second arrow,
• 37:06
  Speaker 5: walk over to where the third and the four shot happens.
• 37:09
  Speaker 5: Find my third arrow that I miss clean with and
• 37:12
  Speaker 5: I just like, look down the blood trail, or look
• 37:15
  Speaker 5: down where this deer traveled, and I'm like, I can
• 37:19
  Speaker 5: see blood like sprayed all over.
• 37:22
  Speaker 4: I can see part of a lung.
• 37:24
  Speaker 5: I'm like, Okay, this dude's you know, this dude's in trouble,
• 37:28
  Speaker 5: right walk down little ways. I mean we're only I
• 37:31
  Speaker 5: don't know, sixty seventy yards from the stand and he's
• 37:33
  Speaker 5: laying there on the river bank. Awesome buck, like the
• 37:37
  Speaker 5: same buck that literally, this never happens to me, you know,
• 37:40
  Speaker 5: because I don't get to run trail cameras and kind
• 37:42
  Speaker 5: of do a lot of setup work like this hunt specifically,
• 37:45
  Speaker 5: you know. And that buck that I killed super unique.
• 37:51
  Speaker 5: I actually watched that buck. It was the first deer
• 37:53
  Speaker 5: that I ever saw on this ranch. I watched him
• 37:56
  Speaker 5: stand up out of his bed on July fourth weekend
• 37:58
  Speaker 5: when I was in hanging camera us and I was like,
• 38:01
  Speaker 5: that is a giant deer.
• 38:03
  Speaker 4: Walked back in.
• 38:03
  Speaker 5: There, hung a camera, got a picture of him. He
• 38:06
  Speaker 5: was the first year I got a picture of And
• 38:08
  Speaker 5: so that buck had been he'd been like consistent then inconsistent,
• 38:12
  Speaker 5: then consistent, and then inconsistent where he was there and
• 38:15
  Speaker 5: then he disappeared for like three weeks. But leading up
• 38:18
  Speaker 5: to the hunt, that was the buck we talked about, Right,
• 38:21
  Speaker 5: he's just bigger than everybody else, and he seems pretty
• 38:23
  Speaker 5: pretty much like a resident. So Pat and Steve are like,
• 38:26
  Speaker 5: we're going to hold out for that you know, split
• 38:28
  Speaker 5: browtime buck. And I was like, literally driving down there,
• 38:31
  Speaker 5: I'm like, guys, I haven't had a picture of that
• 38:32
  Speaker 5: year in three weeks. And he was there, I mean
• 38:36
  Speaker 5: obviously showed up like four or five minutes into my
• 38:40
  Speaker 5: sit killed him the biggest deer there.
• 38:43
  Speaker 4: And it was great because I.
• 38:44
  Speaker 5: Mean, not only you know, like you know how it is,
• 38:47
  Speaker 5: getting one on film right away is like a it's
• 38:49
  Speaker 5: like a blessing, right, But also then those guys were like,
• 38:52
  Speaker 5: now they're not holding out for that deer because I'm like,
• 38:55
  Speaker 5: you're not going to get that many chances here, you know,
• 38:57
  Speaker 5: it's like a low density thing. So that was like
• 38:59
  Speaker 5: a like the pressure was kind of off, but you know,
• 39:02
  Speaker 5: I still had to get Pat and Steve on deer.
• 39:05
  Speaker 5: And so Pat, you know, he sits all day the
• 39:07
  Speaker 5: first day, never sees a deer in this blind that
• 39:09
  Speaker 5: had just turned on like there was the trail cameras
• 39:13
  Speaker 5: showed a lot of activity, but I think they must
• 39:15
  Speaker 5: have known they were in there or something. Anyway, you know, whatever,
• 39:20
  Speaker 5: he blanks all day, Steve traps, goes out, sits a
• 39:23
  Speaker 5: little bit. The next day, I put Steve in a
• 39:27
  Speaker 5: natural blind on this place that just had like a
• 39:30
  Speaker 5: I found a scrape in there in August, a bunch
• 39:32
  Speaker 5: of old sign And then I put Pat in this
• 39:35
  Speaker 5: crossing where they kind of just go through this swampy part.
• 39:39
  Speaker 5: Steve has a pretty good one walk up on him,
• 39:42
  Speaker 5: gets busted. He's pissed about that, but that deer runs
• 39:45
  Speaker 5: off and goes down the next pinch point, which is
• 39:48
  Speaker 5: where Pat is. Pat smokes him. So we have a
• 39:51
  Speaker 5: seventy five yard blood trail there. And then we're two
• 39:53
  Speaker 5: days in. We've got two dead bucks. And Pat's buck
• 39:55
  Speaker 5: was great, like a great deer. So then I'm just like,
• 40:00
  Speaker 5: and now it's just Steve, right, we have Steve left
• 40:02
  Speaker 5: to fill his tag. But Steve's been trapping, and every
• 40:05
  Speaker 5: day he's leaving his stand or is blind to go
• 40:08
  Speaker 5: run that trap line. And you know, you know how
• 40:11
  Speaker 5: it is like, you know me right, Like I'm pretty
• 40:14
  Speaker 5: keyed up a lot of times. I'm like, let's get
• 40:17
  Speaker 5: out there, get this done, like next, next, next, And
• 40:20
  Speaker 5: Steve's like gonna tell you all about the trap line
• 40:23
  Speaker 5: and the badgery caught, and you're like, dude, it's freaking
• 40:25
  Speaker 5: November fifth, November sixth, whatever. But anyway, so Steve. I
• 40:30
  Speaker 5: put Steve in a couple spots, you know, for the
• 40:33
  Speaker 5: wind whatever. On day three does not go well, He's
• 40:37
  Speaker 5: he's getting Steve feisty, right, I'm like, just gotta we
• 40:41
  Speaker 5: gotta get you down the river. It'll happen. Day four,
• 40:43
  Speaker 5: I put him in this stand. They just had this
• 40:46
  Speaker 5: really cool pinch point on it. You know, it's a
• 40:48
  Speaker 5: river place, so you have good wind blowing out over
• 40:50
  Speaker 5: the river the whole thing. And like an hour into
• 40:53
  Speaker 5: the hunt, just like just like it's supposed to write
• 40:55
  Speaker 5: through that pinch point, here comes a nice buck fifteen yards.
• 40:58
  Speaker 4: Steve smokes it.
• 40:59
  Speaker 5: I'm like, four days in, we have three good dead
• 41:04
  Speaker 5: bucks and we've hardly seen a deer, you know.
• 41:06
  Speaker 4: What i mean.
• 41:06
  Speaker 5: It wasn't like the kind of hunt where you're like, oh,
• 41:08
  Speaker 5: they're chasing here, they're chasing there or whatever, Like it's
• 41:11
  Speaker 5: literally like you're not gonna see one, and then when
• 41:13
  Speaker 5: you see one, it's probably gonna be a good one
• 41:15
  Speaker 5: and it's gonna come through.
• 41:17
  Speaker 4: And so it was. It was a very successful hunt.
• 41:21
  Speaker 4: Let me put it that way.
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: I got a question for you real quick. How does
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: Steve handle you putting him places by that? I mean,
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: does he just say, hey, Tony, worship hunt? Or is
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: he going to argue with you about it? Because I
• 41:36
  Speaker 2: feel like, you know, Steve likes to have opinions on things.
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: Has he given you opinions? It's been a while since
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: I've white tail hunted with him, so I'm just curious
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: how does he take your suggestions these days?
• 41:45
  Speaker 5: Steve is a He's an interesting guy to guys. He's
• 41:52
  Speaker 5: actually very willing to sort of accept like hey, I'd
• 41:57
  Speaker 5: go here or i'd sit here, or don't do this
• 41:59
  Speaker 5: or don't do that. He's always looking for something else,
• 42:02
  Speaker 5: like should it be rattling?
• 42:03
  Speaker 4: Should it be?
• 42:03
  Speaker 3: Like?
• 42:03
  Speaker 5: He's always looking for something because he's got that Western
• 42:05
  Speaker 5: impatience kind of where he's like, I gotta make something happen.
• 42:11
  Speaker 4: And he's really good until.
• 42:13
  Speaker 5: It's not going well, and then he starts to question
• 42:17
  Speaker 5: you and start to needle you a little bit, like
• 42:19
  Speaker 5: do the Steve thing like the sunshine, and then that's blind.
• 42:22
  Speaker 5: It's terrible, Like I don't like, what do you want
• 42:24
  Speaker 5: me to do, buddy? Like I have to set it
• 42:26
  Speaker 5: up for certain wins. I have to do certain things.
• 42:28
  Speaker 5: So on the third day he got a little spicy,
• 42:32
  Speaker 5: but I ended up just telling him, hey, go trap
• 42:34
  Speaker 5: some skunks, and I left him alone for a while.
• 42:36
  Speaker 4: I'm like, I'm not going to.
• 42:37
  Speaker 5: Talk to you. And then the next day he killed
• 42:40
  Speaker 5: his buck. So it's an interesting dynamic guiding Steve.
• 42:46
  Speaker 4: Most it's mostly.
• 42:47
  Speaker 5: Good, but you can feel where it's about to break bad,
• 42:49
  Speaker 5: and you're like, I got to head that off because
• 42:51
  Speaker 5: that could get ugly.
• 42:52
  Speaker 6: Yeah, okay, I got a question.
• 43:08
  Speaker 3: Is this like an official trip that's going that has
• 43:12
  Speaker 3: been recorded and like Buck walks out, cameraman's not ready
• 43:17
  Speaker 3: tough shit for Tony type of type of hunt.
• 43:19
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean it was.
• 43:20
  Speaker 5: We filmed it for a meat Eater episode, and it
• 43:22
  Speaker 5: was a big ask because you know, three hunters, bow hunters,
• 43:29
  Speaker 5: three camera guys, and you know, we had three guys
• 43:32
  Speaker 5: who have pretty limited experience in tree stands. And because
• 43:36
  Speaker 5: of the you know, you guys have been to the
• 43:37
  Speaker 5: sand Hills and you've kind of been to this area.
• 43:40
  Speaker 5: It's like you don't have a lot of trees to
• 43:42
  Speaker 5: work with. You sure don't have a lot of trees
• 43:44
  Speaker 5: where you can put two people in them. So it's
• 43:46
  Speaker 5: a lot of ground blind stuff. And it was just
• 43:48
  Speaker 5: like a tough hunt, but yeah, it was. It was
• 43:50
  Speaker 5: the kind of deal where, you know, if that buck
• 43:52
  Speaker 5: that I killed had you know, come in five minutes earlier,
• 43:56
  Speaker 5: we'd have to let him go, you know, or if
• 43:58
  Speaker 5: he would have been if just like if the camera
• 44:01
  Speaker 5: guy hadn't been ready, which is probably a more likely
• 44:05
  Speaker 5: thing to happen, where it's just.
• 44:06
  Speaker 4: Like you're getting there and he's just setting up.
• 44:08
  Speaker 5: Then you you know, you gotta let that deer go
• 44:10
  Speaker 5: and that happens, you know, I mean, Mark, you know
• 44:12
  Speaker 5: this when you when you film, like filming costs you deer.
• 44:16
  Speaker 5: It just does just like a different kind of stress, right,
• 44:18
  Speaker 5: Like we put pressure on ourselves to kill big Bucks
• 44:21
  Speaker 5: and like kind of represent the brand and all that stuff.
• 44:23
  Speaker 4: But like that kind of hunt where you have a
• 44:26
  Speaker 4: meat eater.
• 44:27
  Speaker 5: Episode sort of hinging on your calls and you're setup
• 44:30
  Speaker 5: and like do this, don't do this. It is a
• 44:33
  Speaker 5: weird It is a hard to describe, and I don't
• 44:35
  Speaker 5: want to bitch about it because I don't want people
• 44:37
  Speaker 5: to be like, oh my god, you think your job's
• 44:39
  Speaker 5: hard or whatever, like I don't.
• 44:40
  Speaker 4: I don't want that.
• 44:41
  Speaker 5: It's just a different level of stress guiding Steve Vanella
• 44:45
  Speaker 5: to a deer and setting up a whole meat eater
• 44:47
  Speaker 5: shoot like that.
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: I think it's the exact complete opposite of the freeing
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: sensation that Dan described earlier when he said that he
• 44:56
  Speaker 2: didn't care about any other people and all that stuff
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: and he could just hunt free. You were experiencing is
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: the exact opposite emotional state. So give us the give
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: us the quick rundown of Wisconsin. You're back on your own.
• 45:07
  Speaker 2: You're not filming. This is just a Tony for Tony hunt.
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: And that was tough until it wasn't.
• 45:14
  Speaker 5: Yeah, man, I mean that That's part of the reason
• 45:16
  Speaker 5: that I went right from Nebraska to Wisconsin, no cameraman,
• 45:21
  Speaker 5: no kids, just like I'm like, I'm gonna go hunt
• 45:24
  Speaker 5: for five days, do dark to dark, sits hunt whatever,
• 45:27
  Speaker 5: we'll walk by. And it was very tough until it wasn't.
• 45:32
  Speaker 5: I mean, I blanked for almost four full days, which is.
• 45:39
  Speaker 4: I shouldn't say it's like uncommon over there.
• 45:41
  Speaker 5: I mean a lot of times if I go sit
• 45:43
  Speaker 5: over there, I won't see a deer all day, or
• 45:45
  Speaker 5: I might string together a couple of them.
• 45:47
  Speaker 4: So but during the rut, you.
• 45:48
  Speaker 3: Know, I was.
• 45:49
  Speaker 5: I got over there on like November eleventh or tenth
• 45:52
  Speaker 5: or whatever. You would think just by sheer chance a
• 45:55
  Speaker 5: four ky or somebody would come swinging through at some point.
• 45:58
  Speaker 4: They just didn't.
• 45:59
  Speaker 5: But I started thinking about it, and this won't be
• 46:02
  Speaker 5: that quick of a rundown, So sorry, Mark, but I
• 46:03
  Speaker 5: got to it's there's a lot of lessons in this hunt.
• 46:07
  Speaker 5: I started thinking about it, and I had dropped off
• 46:10
  Speaker 5: a couple cameras right when I got there, and i'd
• 46:12
  Speaker 5: found this scrape earlier when I was hunting with one
• 46:14
  Speaker 5: of my daughters, and it was in a place where
• 46:16
  Speaker 5: I was like, this just this is like a curiosity
• 46:18
  Speaker 5: to me. You know, you kind of go over and
• 46:20
  Speaker 5: you hunt a place, you bend do a lot, and
• 46:22
  Speaker 5: you're like, I'm hunting off memories and usually they use
• 46:23
  Speaker 5: the swamp this way and whatever else. So I hung
• 46:27
  Speaker 5: this camera and I'm like, man, it's pretty active. And
• 46:31
  Speaker 5: not only that, I had another camera not too far
• 46:34
  Speaker 5: away on this crossing between these two you know, lowland
• 46:36
  Speaker 5: spots in the swamp, but a weight away from the
• 46:40
  Speaker 5: main swamp, and I kept getting coyotes, like coyotes in
• 46:43
  Speaker 5: the day, multiple coyote pictures when you kind of just
• 46:48
  Speaker 5: don't expect it. And in fact, the night before I
• 46:50
  Speaker 5: saw a coyote come out there at four o'clock and
• 46:53
  Speaker 5: I was like, why why are the deer here in
• 46:57
  Speaker 5: this spot where historically I just wouldn't even con and
• 47:01
  Speaker 5: why are there Like why is there so much coyote
• 47:03
  Speaker 5: activity out here? So I started thinking about it, and
• 47:06
  Speaker 5: there were two things that came to mind. Uh, we
• 47:09
  Speaker 5: we have a farmer up there around us who's taken
• 47:13
  Speaker 5: out so much woods and planted crops in places that
• 47:16
  Speaker 5: they're just like historically wasn't. And one of those places
• 47:19
  Speaker 5: was a standing cornfield still and it was like I
• 47:22
  Speaker 5: measured it on a X, it was it was eight
• 47:24
  Speaker 5: hundred yards from where I was hunting. So I'm like,
• 47:26
  Speaker 5: they got across the highway, they got to go between
• 47:28
  Speaker 5: some houses, Like is that the thing?
• 47:30
  Speaker 3: Like?
• 47:30
  Speaker 5: Is that keeping them there? But the other thing was
• 47:33
  Speaker 5: I took my daughter down there in October, and uh,
• 47:38
  Speaker 5: we heard a pack of wolves light up in the swamp.
• 47:42
  Speaker 5: And we have we have wolves right like, you'll get
• 47:44
  Speaker 5: pictures of them sometimes we'll see them grouse hunting or
• 47:47
  Speaker 5: you know, fine tracks in the winter or whatever. But
• 47:50
  Speaker 5: it's not like you're never like we have a constant
• 47:53
  Speaker 5: presence of wolves right here, you know, like there's like
• 47:55
  Speaker 5: it's like a different thing. But hearing a whole pack
• 47:58
  Speaker 5: light up in the swamp when we were blanking again
• 48:01
  Speaker 5: for like four days, I was like, okay, So I
• 48:03
  Speaker 5: started to put this together. I'm like, maybe those wolves
• 48:05
  Speaker 5: push those deer out and those coyotes out, and they're
• 48:07
  Speaker 5: all kind of hanging closer to civilization, closer to houses,
• 48:11
  Speaker 5: closer to the highway. And so I just on a whim,
• 48:15
  Speaker 5: took a stand into a place where I was like,
• 48:19
  Speaker 5: I had such low confidence. I didn't even bring my pack,
• 48:21
  Speaker 5: I didn't have my camera gear. I didn't even have
• 48:22
  Speaker 5: a deer call with me. But I put the decoy
• 48:24
  Speaker 5: out because it should be visible set up, and I'm
• 48:27
  Speaker 5: sitting there and you know, keep in mind, I am
• 48:30
  Speaker 5: almost four full all day sits deep on this hunt,
• 48:33
  Speaker 5: and I haven't laid eyes on a deer yet. And
• 48:36
  Speaker 5: I hear something and I look to my right in
• 48:38
  Speaker 5: this kind of swampy patch of you know, brush and whatever,
• 48:41
  Speaker 5: like really good kind of betting looking stuff, but it's everywhere,
• 48:44
  Speaker 5: and I see this buck running and he's like a
• 48:46
  Speaker 5: one forty which over there is like a giant deer
• 48:51
  Speaker 5: right like you just I was like, oh my god,
• 48:53
  Speaker 5: holy shit, like and the wind was blowing like thirty
• 48:57
  Speaker 5: miles an hour, so it was like I did everything
• 49:01
  Speaker 5: I could to get that buck's attention. He was chasing
• 49:03
  Speaker 5: a dough I'm I was screaming. I was like me, me,
• 49:07
  Speaker 5: like look over here at this decoy, you know, and
• 49:10
  Speaker 5: he was mouth open chasing all day. Like you could
• 49:12
  Speaker 5: tell he was not gonna look like. There was nothing
• 49:14
  Speaker 5: I was gonna do that was gonna get that buck
• 49:17
  Speaker 5: to look over at me. Doe runs through the tree line,
• 49:20
  Speaker 5: crosses the highway and I can hear cars coming and
• 49:22
  Speaker 5: I'm like, I'm gonna hear this bucket hit. And he
• 49:25
  Speaker 5: kind of weaves his way around and then makes it
• 49:27
  Speaker 5: through the tree line. Gone out of my life, you know.
• 49:29
  Speaker 5: They crossed that highway you're like, they're not coming back, right.
• 49:33
  Speaker 5: But I was like, I can't believe that I had
• 49:35
  Speaker 5: that encounter. And almost instantly I looked up and on
• 49:39
  Speaker 5: my side of this like waterway, here's a buck standing
• 49:43
  Speaker 5: there and he's like a ninety inch two year old,
• 49:45
  Speaker 5: which I will shoot all day over there, and I'm like,
• 49:48
  Speaker 5: this dude's here with me, and he's gonna look over
• 49:50
  Speaker 5: see this decoy. It's gonna be over because he was
• 49:52
  Speaker 5: like two hundred yards away, this freaking deer. I would
• 49:55
  Speaker 5: call to him and he would look over like eighty
• 49:57
  Speaker 5: five percent of the field and he wouldn't turn his
• 49:59
  Speaker 5: head to the left and look at my decoy. So
• 50:01
  Speaker 5: he would stand there and I'd go me, and he
• 50:04
  Speaker 5: would look pick his hat up and look over the
• 50:07
  Speaker 5: whole field except that part. I'm like, just look over here, asshole,
• 50:10
  Speaker 5: Like right here, there's a dough. And finally he walked
• 50:12
  Speaker 5: straight away from me and disappeared. And I'm like, I
• 50:14
  Speaker 5: cannot believe I couldn't get that dear to see this
• 50:16
  Speaker 5: decoy because I'm just like, if he sees it, he's
• 50:19
  Speaker 5: coming right.
• 50:21
  Speaker 4: So he disappears.
• 50:22
  Speaker 5: I'm like, oh my god, Like I had two cool encounters,
• 50:24
  Speaker 5: they're gone whatever, sitting there. Like two minutes later, I
• 50:27
  Speaker 5: look up that buck walks back out and I'm like,
• 50:30
  Speaker 5: I'm giving him everything. I'm like me, and he won't look,
• 50:34
  Speaker 5: and he's like looking across the field, and so I
• 50:36
  Speaker 5: glassed him. And then I just turned to my left
• 50:39
  Speaker 5: and here's this buck standing like one hundred and twenty
• 50:41
  Speaker 5: five yards away another like a good one, and I'm like,
• 50:45
  Speaker 5: holy shit, there must be like a hot that must
• 50:47
  Speaker 5: be like the hot dough. Right, So I switch my
• 50:50
  Speaker 5: attention to that buck because he's in play. If he
• 50:53
  Speaker 5: just takes a right, he's he's going to see that decoy.
• 50:56
  Speaker 5: So I snort whe he's at him. He looks over,
• 50:59
  Speaker 5: looks back at that other buck. Snortweez again, and it's
• 51:02
  Speaker 5: like this thing where he's like, do I go fight
• 51:04
  Speaker 5: that guy? Do I go over there? And you can
• 51:06
  Speaker 5: see in his head like he knows where he wants
• 51:08
  Speaker 5: to go. He wants to go cross that highway, and dude,
• 51:11
  Speaker 5: I threw every call I could at him, and he
• 51:13
  Speaker 5: started to walk out, and I looked and that smaller
• 51:16
  Speaker 5: buck walked up to him and they squared up, and
• 51:19
  Speaker 5: he did the whole sideways kind of side eye crab
• 51:21
  Speaker 5: walk thing, you know, like they were gonna fight. That
• 51:24
  Speaker 5: littler buck takes off and I'm like, okay, start grunning,
• 51:29
  Speaker 5: I start bleeding, and that buck takes an interest, but
• 51:31
  Speaker 5: he's like I'm gonna just cross this field and not
• 51:33
  Speaker 5: coming over there.
• 51:34
  Speaker 4: So he walks way out.
• 51:35
  Speaker 5: I'm like, he's out of my life, but I have
• 51:37
  Speaker 5: nothing to lose, right, so I keep calling. He finally
• 51:40
  Speaker 5: stops and he just turns like ninety degrees to the
• 51:43
  Speaker 5: right and starts walking, and so like I'm like, now
• 51:46
  Speaker 5: he's in the right direction, but he's still going to
• 51:48
  Speaker 5: pass by one hundred yards.
• 51:49
  Speaker 4: Away, and so I just I keep hitting him.
• 51:51
  Speaker 5: I've never in my life called to a deer that much,
• 51:55
  Speaker 5: cause he was like you could just see He's like
• 51:57
  Speaker 5: I don't want to.
• 51:57
  Speaker 4: I don't want to. I don't care what you say.
• 51:59
  Speaker 5: And I'm like get over here, like get your ass
• 52:01
  Speaker 5: over here, buddy, And he finally got straight in front
• 52:04
  Speaker 5: of my decoy, but like one hundred yards out, and
• 52:07
  Speaker 5: he took another ninety degree turn and started walking in.
• 52:10
  Speaker 5: I'm like, I called this buck in like a square,
• 52:12
  Speaker 5: like it was crazy, and he walks up and I'm like,
• 52:16
  Speaker 5: oh my god, like I thought he was. I thought
• 52:18
  Speaker 5: he was like one hundred and ten inches. I didn't
• 52:20
  Speaker 5: know he was like a one thirty Like I didn't
• 52:22
  Speaker 5: he was. He was way big for over there, and
• 52:24
  Speaker 5: I kind of stopped paying attention to what he was.
• 52:28
  Speaker 5: That dude comes in and I'm like, should I shoot
• 52:31
  Speaker 5: him at forty cause he's like kind of squared up,
• 52:33
  Speaker 5: But I'm like, I don't like taking forty yard shots
• 52:35
  Speaker 5: at white tails anymore. I'm like, I want twenty yards,
• 52:37
  Speaker 5: so I'm like, I'm not gonna do it super windy,
• 52:39
  Speaker 5: blown around on that tree, and he just does it
• 52:42
  Speaker 5: perfect where he squares up again and swings all the
• 52:44
  Speaker 5: way around like they're supposed to, and you could tell
• 52:46
  Speaker 5: he's like, I don't know if I'm gonna fight or
• 52:49
  Speaker 5: this is a doe, Like I don't know what's going on.
• 52:51
  Speaker 5: But he walked into twenty yards and I just I
• 52:54
  Speaker 5: shot him really well, ran fifty yards and tipped over
• 52:57
  Speaker 5: and it was one of the cool like literally one
• 53:01
  Speaker 5: of the coolest encounters I've ever had. And I've been
• 53:03
  Speaker 5: hunting that area since two thousand and eight and I
• 53:08
  Speaker 5: have never gotten a shot at a pope and young buck,
• 53:11
  Speaker 5: and I've spent more time there than anywhere. It's like
• 53:14
  Speaker 5: it was like the most like vindicating, like satisfying kill
• 53:18
  Speaker 5: that I've had in a long time.
• 53:21
  Speaker 2: That's nuts loves. So, uh, where does that rank, like
• 53:28
  Speaker 2: with all of the bucks that you've killed. I mean,
• 53:30
  Speaker 2: it's not the biggest buck you've ever killed, but is
• 53:32
  Speaker 2: that maybe one of your most hard earned or appreciated
• 53:36
  Speaker 2: of all time?
• 53:37
  Speaker 4: That deer is one of my favorites for sure, I have.
• 53:42
  Speaker 5: I don't other than maybe some of the first bigger
• 53:45
  Speaker 5: bucks I killed when I was younger, I don't know
• 53:47
  Speaker 5: if I've ever earned one more like I literally when
• 53:51
  Speaker 5: I tell people, you know, like a couple of years ago,
• 53:54
  Speaker 5: it took me twenty one days over there to see
• 53:56
  Speaker 5: a dough like I almost never see deer there, and
• 54:00
  Speaker 5: so to kill a buck like that that way after
• 54:03
  Speaker 5: so long, was it was like I rediscovered you know,
• 54:06
  Speaker 5: like there's just certain things that happen in your life
• 54:09
  Speaker 5: where you're like, I want to kill a buck here
• 54:12
  Speaker 5: at the you know, the the family land, or I
• 54:15
  Speaker 5: want to kill one at like you you know, you
• 54:16
  Speaker 5: travel somewhere and you're like that that thing gets its
• 54:18
  Speaker 5: hooks in you and you're like, I got to get
• 54:20
  Speaker 5: one here, and for whatever reason, it's like your nemesis spot.
• 54:23
  Speaker 5: This place had had my number, yeah for so long,
• 54:27
  Speaker 5: So yeah it was I ranked that one way up there, buddy.
• 54:30
  Speaker 2: Well, I think like the story of our three different
• 54:34
  Speaker 2: rutcations are really interesting illustrations of maybe like the whole
• 54:39
  Speaker 2: theme of this conversation, which has been like this idea
• 54:42
  Speaker 2: of like success is going to be different for everyone
• 54:46
  Speaker 2: and maybe different different parts of their life or in
• 54:48
  Speaker 2: different weeks of their life, even right. I mean, like
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: your hunt there in uh, Wisconsin wasn't because it was
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: like so hard earned, like years and years and years
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: and years and years and you finally kill a good buck.
• 55:02
  Speaker 2: Dan's was hard earned but also fun because it was
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: kind of like this this culmination of like just hunting
• 55:07
  Speaker 2: for the fun of it and shooting a deer that
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: made him happy in the moment and not worrying about
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: all this other stuff. My rut cation was really really
• 55:14
  Speaker 2: satisfying because I went into it kind of similar to
• 55:17
  Speaker 2: Dan and that I was like, you know what, the
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: most important thing for me on this trip is actually
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: like the friends I'm with and like just having fun
• 55:23
  Speaker 2: and doing stupid stuff and hunting things that I wouldn't
• 55:26
  Speaker 2: hunt in the past because I thought I had to
• 55:28
  Speaker 2: be tough, macho guy. And instead this time I just
• 55:30
  Speaker 2: did the fun thing to enjoy the full experience with
• 55:33
  Speaker 2: the guys and had so much fun. And whether the
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: buck I killed was one twenty or one sixty, I
• 55:40
  Speaker 2: would have been just as happy because of the laughs
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: along the way and like getting to share it with
• 55:44
  Speaker 2: my buddies. And all of us had these different things happen,
• 55:48
  Speaker 2: but we all left our rut trips very satisfied, very happy,
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: having great hunts, even though they were completely different. And
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: I think that's a pretty cool thing, Tony. I'm going
• 56:00
  Speaker 2: to give each of you guys like a set of
• 56:02
  Speaker 2: like rapid fire questions here to wrap this up. Just
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: kind of want to tie a bow on some things,
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: so so kind of quick succinct. First thing that comes
• 56:08
  Speaker 2: to mind here, but what is the biggest learn sorry,
• 56:11
  Speaker 2: the biggest lesson you learn, the greatest lesson you learn
• 56:14
  Speaker 2: from this year's rut so far? Like one quick thing.
• 56:17
  Speaker 4: Ah too, It's a lesson we all learn over and over.
• 56:21
  Speaker 5: But to not hunt off of memories, to just take
• 56:25
  Speaker 5: what they give you and work with that instead of
• 56:26
  Speaker 5: being like, I'm going to force this old program.
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: What is one thing you wished you did differently, If
• 56:34
  Speaker 2: there's anything you could have changed about the last two weeks,
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: what would that have been?
• 56:37
  Speaker 5: You know, it just ties into my last answer, right, Like,
• 56:40
  Speaker 5: I just wish I would have adapted earlier instead of
• 56:43
  Speaker 5: just like trying to make something work that wasn't working.
• 56:46
  Speaker 5: Like I just I thought I could out I thought
• 56:48
  Speaker 5: I could wait them out right and just be super patient.
• 56:51
  Speaker 4: And it's like it's a low deer density thing. You
• 56:54
  Speaker 4: got to go find them.
• 56:54
  Speaker 5: And so I wish I had just like accepted my
• 56:57
  Speaker 5: fate earlier and went looking.
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but thinkingnes see did finally pivot? Uh, And then
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: what is one thing you're really glad you did do?
• 57:06
  Speaker 4: Man? I know so full. Here's a disclaimer.
• 57:10
  Speaker 5: We own Dave Smith Decoy's right, Like I get it.
• 57:15
  Speaker 3: Uh.
• 57:15
  Speaker 5: Using that dough decoy and plugging a Doe decoy into
• 57:18
  Speaker 5: my strategy has changed everything for me. Like two years
• 57:23
  Speaker 5: ago we started using it. My daughter killed one, I
• 57:25
  Speaker 5: killed one, brought it home and started working. I think
• 57:28
  Speaker 5: I think we've killed five bucks off of it in
• 57:30
  Speaker 5: the last couple of seasons and it and it really
• 57:33
  Speaker 5: has opened my eyes to different types of setups where
• 57:36
  Speaker 5: I can sort of play it a little more safer
• 57:38
  Speaker 5: and try to get them to work in exactly how
• 57:40
  Speaker 5: I want them to. And it's like the with the
• 57:43
  Speaker 5: right buck and that decoy, it is like hunting on
• 57:45
  Speaker 5: a cheat code. Man, it is just different and it's
• 57:47
  Speaker 5: and it's fun. So I'm like, I think, I think
• 57:50
  Speaker 5: that's the thing I've been most excited about, Like leaning
• 57:52
  Speaker 5: into is like how do you how do you plug
• 57:54
  Speaker 5: this decoy into these different situations because man, the right
• 57:58
  Speaker 5: buck lays eyes on it and it is.
• 58:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I gotta try it. I tried a dough decoy
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: for the first time a couple of weeks ago in Iowa.
• 58:05
  Speaker 2: I didn't have a DSD with me though at DSD dough,
• 58:08
  Speaker 2: so I just used kind of a you know, cheap
• 58:11
  Speaker 2: plastic one that was okay, but I could see the
• 58:14
  Speaker 2: utility and so I want to try that someday. Okay, Dan,
• 58:18
  Speaker 2: the greatest lesson you learned on this raccasion?
• 58:23
  Speaker 3: Who this was a year of just doing it. I
• 58:30
  Speaker 3: don't know if there's a lesson. There's not really a
• 58:32
  Speaker 3: lesson there I mean I could, I could say don't
• 58:35
  Speaker 3: ever give up, because then I went back out and
• 58:37
  Speaker 3: I shot a deer the next night. But I've done
• 58:39
  Speaker 3: that before. I'm just like, the lesson is is that
• 58:45
  Speaker 3: this season comes by, comes so quick and it's over
• 58:51
  Speaker 3: so quick, and it's just like now I've tagged, you know,
• 58:55
  Speaker 3: I did my mule, my annual mule deer hunt archery season.
• 58:59
  Speaker 3: My tag is punched, and it's over, right, like my
• 59:05
  Speaker 3: I checked the box, I punched the tag. Yeah, I
• 59:08
  Speaker 3: could go out and maybe try to shoot another dough.
• 59:11
  Speaker 3: I'll probably go out for a firearm season. But as
• 59:13
  Speaker 3: far as bow hunting for bucks in Iowa, dude, it's
• 59:19
  Speaker 3: over for me. And it's just the lesson there is
• 59:22
  Speaker 3: to just stop for just a moment and just be
• 59:27
  Speaker 3: thankful that you're in a tree stand because someday you're
• 59:29
  Speaker 3: not going to be. I don't know, you know that.
• 59:31
  Speaker 2: Was It's funny you mentioned that because I remember being
• 59:34
  Speaker 2: in the tree one day in Iowa and thinking to myself,
• 59:38
  Speaker 2: you just need to stop a second and stop obsessing
• 59:40
  Speaker 2: over like constantly scanning, constantly searching, constantly thinking about what's
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: the wind, where should I go next? What should I do, next,
• 59:48
  Speaker 2: where's the deer looking this way? That way? This way?
• 59:50
  Speaker 4: That way?
• 59:50
  Speaker 2: Is like just stop and close your eyes and like
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: take a deep breath and listen, like listen to the leaves,
• 59:56
  Speaker 2: listen to the wind. Just take a second and look
• 59:58
  Speaker 2: at it all and just look at the scenery, like
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 2: I don't think about the deer, just like take in
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 2: the moment. And I tried to do that a few times,
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 2: just like reminding myself to just soak in the setting
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 2: and the place and that that day rather than thinking
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 2: all the time about you know, the actual hunting side.
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 2: And that was really nice to do.
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 4: There was a couple moments like you're your search for
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 4: these they're the.
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 3: Moment of clarity where I wasn't on my phone, it
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 3: was tucked in a pocket, and I wasn't thinking about anything.
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 3: I was just there. Yeah, And those are the moments
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 3: that like for five minutes, there was no stress, My
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 3: blood pressure was low, Like it was just an amazing
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 3: it was just amazing to be out in doing what
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 3: we were doing.
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: That's the good stuff right there. Yeah, all right, one
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 2: thing you wish you did different, one thing you're glad
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 2: you did.
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 3: Okay, the one big, big This is big because I
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 3: think it's going to alter my trajectory on how I
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 3: hunt my Iowa farms moving forward. And I probably, like
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 3: I say this, it's gonna be hard to do. I
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 3: say it now, but I truly don't think I'm even
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 3: gonna start hunting until November fifth or sixth next year.
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 3: Well as far as as far as rut is concerned,
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 3: I have had two. I've spent too much time sitting
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 3: in these pre rut type conditions where you're just hoping
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 3: a big dog steps up into some kind of staging
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 3: area or thicket when the dough groups are not ready yet,
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 3: and so I feel like I would rather put more
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 3: time into this. I don't know when this is going
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 3: to launch, but we're recording this on November seventeenth. I
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 3: would rather go from November seventh November seventeenth than from
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 3: November first to the eighth or something like that, right,
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 3: I would go the second and third week. And I
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 3: think I'm gonna I'm gonna try to force myself like
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 3: I even left a note in my phone on November
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 3: one next year that says, don't start hunting yet, and
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 3: maybe I got a year on camera and some things
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 3: like that. But I just feel like I spent way
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 3: too much time hunting iffy type conditions when if I
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 3: would have waited an extra week, it would have just
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 3: been prime time.
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 2: Very interesting. That's a that's a hot take, Dan, Yep,
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 2: that's a hot take. One thing that you're glad that
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 2: you did do.
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 4: I'm glad I kind of stayed put. Man. I had
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 4: a lot of encounters on.
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 3: The fourth, fifth, sixth time hunting a tree stand, and
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 3: I feel like the thing that I'm glad I did
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 3: is I'm glad I kind of slowed down and just
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 3: sat good, good, good good my best tree stands. And
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 3: I just cycled through really four tree stands the entire one, two, three, four. Yep,
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 3: I only sat in four different tree stands this entire year,
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 3: and so well four on one property. And I'm glad
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 3: I toughed it out and I just rotated through the best,
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 3: the best possible stand locations.
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 2: I feel like that's something that I'm I've been dabbling
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 2: more and more with.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 4: You know.
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 2: I feel like a lot of us start and want
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 2: to hunt like the same spots a lot, and we
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 2: do that too much and screw it up, and then
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 2: we're all of a sudden we realize like, oh, yeah,
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 2: being mobile is great. You should bunce around all the time.
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 2: And new spot, new spot first it's the best sit
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 2: and then you go too far that way sometimes yep.
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 2: And I kind of feel like I'm kind of finding
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 2: that middle ground where there's there's utility to both, but
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 2: balancing it. Knowing when to move and when to stay
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 2: is maybe more of an art than a science.
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 4: And yep, starting to figure that out.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 2: So very good, guys. I feel like we all had
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 2: a heck of a start in November. Great first half
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 2: of the month. I appreciate you guys sharing it with me,
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: talking about it, breaking it down. Uh, that's all I got, gentlemen,
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 2: So best luck the rest of the season. Congrats you
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 2: two fellas, and congrats Tony. Really big big round of
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 2: applause here for Tony though, because he really did knock
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 2: it out of the park ten out of ten, achieved
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 2: all of his goals. Piss shit smells like roses.
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 3: So when are we going to get the book how
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 3: to Hunt White Tails in the Rut coming out?
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 5: What, don't don't ask me to rate it, Mark if
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 5: you don't want the honest answer. If you want next
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 5: time be like on a scale of two to four,
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 5: tell me how.
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 2: And on that note, everyone, thanks for being here, Thanks
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: for tuning in. Until next time, stay wired to hunt
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 3: Y