Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 266: State of Whitetails in 2019 with Kip Adams

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Ep. 266: State of Whitetails in 2019 with Kip Adams · Wired To Hunt Podcast

0:02
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your home for
0:06
Speaker 1: deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host,
0:11
Speaker 1: Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Podcast. I'm
0:16
Speaker 1: your host, Mark Kenyanton's episode number two hundred and sixty six,
0:20
Speaker 1: and today on the show, we're joined by Kip Adams
0:22
Speaker 1: of the Quality Deer Management Association for discussion of the
0:26
Speaker 1: state of white tails in two thousand nineteen. All right,
0:49
Speaker 1: welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you
0:52
Speaker 1: by Onyx. And today in the show, we've got Kip Adams,
0:56
Speaker 1: the director of Conservation for the Quality Deer Management Association,
1:01
Speaker 1: and we're gonna chat with Kip about the recently released
1:04
Speaker 1: two thousand nineteen white Tail Report. Um. We've done this
1:08
Speaker 1: almost every year since the beginning of the podcast. Each
1:10
Speaker 1: year Quto made puts out this report and then we
1:12
Speaker 1: kind of have this state of the white tail discussion
1:15
Speaker 1: with Kip, kind of like the State of the Union address,
1:18
Speaker 1: but this is like the state of the Union for deer. UM.
1:21
Speaker 1: So that's what's gonna happen here shortly. But I do
1:24
Speaker 1: have Dan the Man Johnson here uh for our pregame show,
1:29
Speaker 1: which we haven't got to do in a few weeks so,
1:33
Speaker 1: and this is future mark here. Quick heads up if
1:36
Speaker 1: you do not care to hear about the random stories
1:40
Speaker 1: and crazy thoughts and deer hunting and shed hunting plans
1:45
Speaker 1: that Dan and I have that we discussed here in
1:47
Speaker 1: our pregame show. If you just want to get to
1:49
Speaker 1: the interview the kip, you can fast forward to maybe
1:51
Speaker 1: like the seventeen and a half eighteen minute mark to
1:53
Speaker 1: get right into that. But I highly suggest you stick
1:56
Speaker 1: around for the weirdness. It's been too too long. Dan,
2:00
Speaker 1: and I've actually been thinking a lot about you lately.
2:02
Speaker 1: I don't know if you could. I don't know if
2:04
Speaker 1: you could feel that. And and I've been thinking about
2:07
Speaker 1: you lately late at night while I've been laying in bed.
2:13
Speaker 1: I think I've been feeling that same way too. More
2:15
Speaker 1: don't want to, but it's for it's for very different
2:19
Speaker 1: reasons that I imagine why you're imagining me is because alright,
2:24
Speaker 1: just bit it out, start to watch. I'm actually reading
2:28
Speaker 1: a book where the character's name is nine fingers. Really yeah,
2:32
Speaker 1: guy's name is Logan nine fingers. And now just the
2:35
Speaker 1: whole time, I've just been picturing you, know when you
2:38
Speaker 1: I don't know. You don't read much, can you read?
2:40
Speaker 1: So what I think when you when you read books,
2:43
Speaker 1: lots of times you imagine what the person, the character
2:46
Speaker 1: might look like. So I just imagine this guy looking
2:51
Speaker 1: exactly like you. So you are this character in this book. Um,
2:56
Speaker 1: pretty badass character though. You You walk around with the
2:59
Speaker 1: sword and you kill a bunch of people. So so yeah,
3:04
Speaker 1: you're you've got a good character. Um, it's a good book.
3:08
Speaker 1: It's called I think it's called By the Blade Itself
3:13
Speaker 1: or The Blade Itself something like that, kind of like
3:16
Speaker 1: a Game of Thrones type book. Kind of nerdy but
3:18
Speaker 1: but gritty. I've been doing some Game of Throne in Yeah.
3:23
Speaker 1: I like the show. Yeah, I just started watching it
3:26
Speaker 1: last month. So how far are you into it? I'm
3:31
Speaker 1: on season three right now. Season three okay, so no spoilers.
3:34
Speaker 1: I won't tell you too much. But it's good. It's
3:37
Speaker 1: really good, and it gets you thinking about Yeah, I've
3:41
Speaker 1: been thinking about you. I'm glad you're you're watching Game
3:44
Speaker 1: of Thrones now. And um, if you pick up reading
3:46
Speaker 1: at some point and this will be a book, I'll
3:48
Speaker 1: send you too as well. So so that's all I
3:50
Speaker 1: got for the introd egge, folks, We're gonna go to
3:52
Speaker 1: Kip Adams now Dan Johnson and then uh and then
3:57
Speaker 1: you hang up all right like your style? How are you? Man?
4:01
Speaker 1: It's been too long. I know, I know, I don't know.
4:04
Speaker 1: Has uh your mouth been watering as much as mine
4:08
Speaker 1: to get out and do some shed hunting. Yeah, man,
4:10
Speaker 1: that is exactly what I was hoping we talked about,
4:12
Speaker 1: because that's especially we just had. You know, I'm sure
4:16
Speaker 1: you guys had the same thing. Tons of snow and
4:18
Speaker 1: cold and then now this warm spell, so all the
4:20
Speaker 1: snow has melted here, and um, it just looks like
4:24
Speaker 1: prime as you would say, scooping. It looks like prime
4:27
Speaker 1: scooping weather or scooping conditions, I should say, right, I'll
4:31
Speaker 1: tell you what an Instagram. There's some guys are not
4:35
Speaker 1: close to me, but in I guess in Iowa who
4:38
Speaker 1: have been finding some good sheds already. So it makes
4:40
Speaker 1: me want to get out even more. I know, I
4:44
Speaker 1: am very tempted to go out and do like an
4:46
Speaker 1: early walk, you know, at least for me. I never
4:48
Speaker 1: want to go out too much too early and start
4:51
Speaker 1: pushing things around before most of you have dropped at
4:55
Speaker 1: the same time, though, like you said, there are antlers
4:58
Speaker 1: out there, and you hate to have antlers laying around
5:00
Speaker 1: and then get chewed up. You know, right right, when
5:03
Speaker 1: do you think you're gonna start? When's your first shed plan? Well,
5:06
Speaker 1: that's funny, you asked Mark Kenyon, because there is a
5:09
Speaker 1: chance if I can swindle my mom into watching the kids,
5:13
Speaker 1: I might go on a walk Saturday with the wife.
5:15
Speaker 1: Nice main farm down south. Yeah, and not dig into
5:19
Speaker 1: the timber at all, but probably just the field edges,
5:22
Speaker 1: um where all the corn was this year, and we
5:25
Speaker 1: had some late corn and I even think we had
5:28
Speaker 1: some snow on the ground before before the harvest. So
5:33
Speaker 1: the last time I checked there was still I mean
5:35
Speaker 1: this was December, but uh still a lot of corn
5:38
Speaker 1: left on the ground from when they did the combining,
5:41
Speaker 1: and uh the beans were standing late. So hopefully some
5:44
Speaker 1: of the pods and stuff dropped off and um, hopefully
5:48
Speaker 1: that just kept the deer in the area late season.
5:51
Speaker 1: And I have kind of a repeat of late February
5:54
Speaker 1: last year when I found it was nine in one day.
5:57
Speaker 1: You know, what's the what's the situation in that little
6:00
Speaker 1: honey hoole? Is that where you saw the good food
6:01
Speaker 1: still on top of the ground. Right, it was the
6:05
Speaker 1: same field, but the let's see, this year, the corn
6:10
Speaker 1: was closer to the road as opposed to last year
6:13
Speaker 1: it was closer to the back fence line. And I'm
6:16
Speaker 1: not sure, you know, I don't know if you've ever
6:19
Speaker 1: tried to shed hunt in corn stubble. Yeah, it's not easy.
6:24
Speaker 1: And I felt like if I just go back and
6:26
Speaker 1: forth every row, maybe i'd try to, you know, i'd
6:28
Speaker 1: find some matching sets, but you know, try to match up,
6:33
Speaker 1: especially the big one. But you know I'm not going
6:36
Speaker 1: to do that, just not enough time. So you know,
6:38
Speaker 1: you hit the you hit the power places, and you
6:41
Speaker 1: move on the buffer strips. Right, absolutely. Yeah. I um,
6:46
Speaker 1: I'm a little concerned at least for my local shed
6:48
Speaker 1: hunting because you know, on the main Michigan spot, I
6:53
Speaker 1: have an average of one shed antler a year across
6:55
Speaker 1: all the properties that can shed hunt in that area,
6:58
Speaker 1: and I already have that one shed for year. So
7:01
Speaker 1: I'm worried that I haven't even started shed hunting. I
7:03
Speaker 1: have the one shed because I think I told you,
7:05
Speaker 1: um neighbor shots that buck survivor, right, I told you
7:08
Speaker 1: that story and he found a shed on the property
7:11
Speaker 1: I can hunt while he was tracking the deer, so
7:13
Speaker 1: he gave me that shed. Um. So I'm a little
7:16
Speaker 1: worried that I haven't even started yet and my shed
7:18
Speaker 1: ending is already maxed out. So traveling will probably be
7:22
Speaker 1: the name of the game for me. But yeah, I
7:25
Speaker 1: think probably mid February when I'll start maybe hitting it hard,
7:29
Speaker 1: but I'm probably tempted to do a little edgewalking, maybe
7:33
Speaker 1: even this weekend too. Yeah, it would have been nice
7:36
Speaker 1: to get out there a little bit, even before the
7:39
Speaker 1: snow melted, just to see their travel patterns through the
7:42
Speaker 1: snow and see almost where you need to concentrate. But man,
7:47
Speaker 1: a majority of the snow, I think like six of
7:50
Speaker 1: the snow is already melted, and even down south is
7:53
Speaker 1: even more so. Um. And it almost sounds like we're
7:56
Speaker 1: gonna get some snow later tonight or in tomorrow a
7:59
Speaker 1: little bit, and then it's gonna warm up again and
8:02
Speaker 1: thaw again. So Saturday could just be a mud fest. Um,
8:08
Speaker 1: speaking of snow coming in and melting off and then
8:11
Speaker 1: getting poured down again. I am trying, well, it's hard
8:15
Speaker 1: to say right now. In the past, I've always playing
8:17
Speaker 1: my Iowa shed hunting trips based off of like when
8:20
Speaker 1: the group's gonna go, and and kind of try to
8:22
Speaker 1: coordinate things with some some of my buddies here in Michigan,
8:25
Speaker 1: so we all drive out together. But I think this
8:27
Speaker 1: year I'm gonna try to stay a little more flexible
8:30
Speaker 1: and try to just make it out there when it
8:32
Speaker 1: seems like you guys have a good snow melt and
8:35
Speaker 1: just make sure that the conditions are right. Um. But
8:38
Speaker 1: I'm gonna try to get out there for like a
8:42
Speaker 1: week maybe and maybe early to mid March, depending on conditions.
8:49
Speaker 1: So we'll have to see if your schedule lines up
8:51
Speaker 1: at all to come do some walking with us again. Yeah. Absolutely.
8:56
Speaker 1: I don't know, dude. I just the older I get,
8:59
Speaker 1: the more I love hunting. I don't know what did it? Why? Really?
9:02
Speaker 1: I mean I love doing all the other things like
9:04
Speaker 1: early season scouting and doing the tree stand work and
9:08
Speaker 1: the running gun and the actual hunting, But there's something
9:11
Speaker 1: about shed hunting that I just I don't know. I'm drawn, Tom,
9:16
Speaker 1: I'm right there with you. Um. I know you don't
9:19
Speaker 1: have a whole lot of flexibility and schedule and stuff sometimes,
9:22
Speaker 1: but if you can somehow sneak away and you want
9:24
Speaker 1: to do a long drive. I'm hitting out heading out
9:28
Speaker 1: west again for some shed hunting in late March two.
9:31
Speaker 1: And um, where are you thinking? Probably North Dakota, Montana, Wyoming,
9:37
Speaker 1: somewhere around there, um, give or take. I don't. I
9:40
Speaker 1: have zero set plans yet, but I'll probably go to
9:43
Speaker 1: Montana for sure, because I'll go there for some media
9:45
Speaker 1: related stuff and hit some of the properties I know
9:48
Speaker 1: around there. Um, but I wouldn't mind trying to extend
9:51
Speaker 1: it and hit some stuff on the way or something. Yeah. Absolutely,
9:54
Speaker 1: And that's a good transition because as of right now,
9:57
Speaker 1: other than thinking about shed hunting, I've all so been
10:01
Speaker 1: doing a lot of thinking and early planning on what
10:04
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do for my Western trips next year. And
10:09
Speaker 1: I'm going to do the elk hunt, right, and then
10:11
Speaker 1: I've got the tentative. Right when I asked the wife,
10:16
Speaker 1: she was in a good mood. So I might be
10:18
Speaker 1: doing a second Western trip, a mule deer hunt in
10:22
Speaker 1: South Dakota. So if I do make a like a
10:27
Speaker 1: Western marchish type, you know, shed hunt thing, I think
10:31
Speaker 1: that what I'm gonna try to do is go to
10:34
Speaker 1: some of the places that I've scouted through Onyx and
10:38
Speaker 1: get you know, get some boots on the ground and
10:40
Speaker 1: at least just get a lay of the land out
10:43
Speaker 1: there and you know, call it shed hunting, but really
10:46
Speaker 1: scouting without giving out too much detail. Are you talking
10:50
Speaker 1: like southwest south central? Like it must be southwest right
10:53
Speaker 1: for Mely's. Uh, well, they have Muley's all over South Dakota.
10:58
Speaker 1: So I've there's basically if you cut the state in half,
11:02
Speaker 1: east west. I've had people give me information all like
11:07
Speaker 1: just all on the west west coast or west side
11:09
Speaker 1: of the state. Yeah, so north or northwest, southwest? Um? North,
11:15
Speaker 1: I think it's northeast of the Black Hills. Yes, so okay, yeah,
11:20
Speaker 1: that whole I mean, that whole area is pretty awesome.
11:23
Speaker 1: I mean you would you would love that terrain. I
11:25
Speaker 1: drive through it a lot when I'm going back and
11:26
Speaker 1: forth from Montana, and every time I drive through, I'm
11:29
Speaker 1: just kind of salvating, just wondering why aren't I why
11:32
Speaker 1: I'm not hunting here right right? And that's the you know,
11:35
Speaker 1: I got, I got some good intel, I got some
11:39
Speaker 1: good you know that I started doing my research. Um,
11:43
Speaker 1: and now it's just a matter of making it happen. Uh,
11:47
Speaker 1: I don't know. That's so I've been spending a lot
11:49
Speaker 1: of time on on X lately. It's easy to get
11:52
Speaker 1: sucked into that. Oh man, it's so easy to Yeah,
11:55
Speaker 1: I got I've got like two different things that will
11:57
Speaker 1: end up sucking my time in at night. If I'm
11:59
Speaker 1: not geting a book, I'm either looking at on X,
12:02
Speaker 1: looking at like public land stuff, trying to find different
12:04
Speaker 1: places to hunt, look at river bottoms or scouting this
12:06
Speaker 1: thing or that thing, or I'm looking online at properties
12:09
Speaker 1: for sale. I'm doing like one of two different things,
12:11
Speaker 1: either looking at properties I dream of buying, or looking
12:14
Speaker 1: at d I Y stuff I want to dream of exploring, right, um,
12:18
Speaker 1: and not sleeping. So we're both we're both inflicted in
12:21
Speaker 1: that way. Um, how did you manage like this? Are
12:25
Speaker 1: you cutting back on some of the rut stuff? No? Um,
12:29
Speaker 1: I don't know yet, right, I mean, I don't know.
12:33
Speaker 1: I there, I'm to the point now with I think
12:39
Speaker 1: I told you a little bit about this, But I'm
12:40
Speaker 1: to the point now with the Sportsman's Nation that I
12:44
Speaker 1: might be getting close to being able to step away
12:46
Speaker 1: from it, right and step away from my job and
12:50
Speaker 1: and potentially do this full time. Uh, you know, the
12:54
Speaker 1: next two or three months, probably actually up until June
12:58
Speaker 1: will tell me a lot. And if I can get
13:02
Speaker 1: the things that need to be gotten done done, then
13:06
Speaker 1: I'll be able to have a lot more freedom in
13:08
Speaker 1: my schedule. A k A hunt in Michigan, All right,
13:12
Speaker 1: I was just gonna say that was the next thing
13:14
Speaker 1: out of my mouth, right, so I would, Uh, I
13:19
Speaker 1: gotta make a lot of you know, some things happen yet,
13:22
Speaker 1: and if I can make that happen, you know, everything
13:24
Speaker 1: becomes a lot more flexible. And um, I really want
13:27
Speaker 1: to do I really want to do this mule to
13:29
Speaker 1: your hunt, which I think I'll probably be doing any way,
13:31
Speaker 1: regardless of if that happens. You know, my wife has
13:35
Speaker 1: given me I'm in a good mood now approval. I
13:38
Speaker 1: don't know if you know what that means. But when
13:40
Speaker 1: you take it and run though, right, that's right, that's right.
13:44
Speaker 1: So she'll be mad at me then, But right now
13:46
Speaker 1: she said, yeah, that's you know, she said, yeah, that's okay.
13:49
Speaker 1: But you're you're gonna do what you want anyway. So
13:53
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know what that means. That
13:55
Speaker 1: means you're setting proper expectations. Dan, that's good. Exactly What
13:59
Speaker 1: a sound like though, is like you're taking this week
14:01
Speaker 1: long trip to Colorado for elk. You're gonna spend however
14:04
Speaker 1: long it's gonna be out hunting mule deer. I'm gonna
14:07
Speaker 1: draw an Iowa white tail tag this year. It sounds
14:10
Speaker 1: like someone should be watching over your Iowa ground, taking
14:13
Speaker 1: care of it, monitoring trail cameras, taking a deer too,
14:16
Speaker 1: to make sure it's being properly managed. I know a
14:19
Speaker 1: guy that might help you with that. How many points
14:21
Speaker 1: do you have? I think all three. I don't know
14:25
Speaker 1: if that'll get you in my spot, but it might.
14:28
Speaker 1: I don't know. I'm in I'm in the zone south
14:32
Speaker 1: of where you typically hunt. Yes, yeah, so yeah usually
14:35
Speaker 1: I think that from what I've always heard that that
14:36
Speaker 1: was like a three or four point zone probably so,
14:39
Speaker 1: um so yeah, it's that's definitely not sure thing. I'll
14:42
Speaker 1: probably apply for the usual spot I do, um because
14:45
Speaker 1: it should be a sure thing there. But um well,
14:49
Speaker 1: that'd that would be. That's something we need to talk
14:51
Speaker 1: about a little further afterwards, because if you have enough
14:53
Speaker 1: points to draw my zone, I might be able to
14:57
Speaker 1: find some spots for you that you know they would,
15:00
Speaker 1: they'd be better than anything. Probably you hunted up in
15:03
Speaker 1: that north zone. But you might have to fight some
15:06
Speaker 1: fight with some other people. But you're doing that already. Yeah,
15:09
Speaker 1: a bunch of people. Is it like when you say
15:11
Speaker 1: fight stuff? Is it like arm wrestle? Is it? I mean,
15:15
Speaker 1: what kind of fight are we talking? Because I'm not
15:16
Speaker 1: well equipped for nest arm wrestles, but I'm kind of quick.
15:19
Speaker 1: I'm slightly surprising in certain ways. I might be able
15:22
Speaker 1: to take a guy. Yeah, you're tall, you're lanky. The
15:24
Speaker 1: lanky guys always seemed to get it done long arm,
15:27
Speaker 1: long arms arms right, so at least when you're trying
15:30
Speaker 1: to slap them to get away from you, you can
15:33
Speaker 1: keep the distance. And that's my style too, lots of slaps. Um. Yeah, dude,
15:41
Speaker 1: we should talk about it some more. Um My buddy
15:44
Speaker 1: Dustin was supposed to co out in hunt, Iowa this year.
15:46
Speaker 1: Corey hunted last year. He's not coming. Josh was talking
15:49
Speaker 1: about coming hunting in this year, but all of them are.
15:51
Speaker 1: They're all bailing. So now I'm the probably only one
15:53
Speaker 1: coming out, So my my plans are very much up
15:55
Speaker 1: in the air. But Um, it's all exciting. I'm already
15:59
Speaker 1: fully gung ho for shud hunting and it's before you
16:01
Speaker 1: know it, we'll be out there hold the bows again.
16:03
Speaker 1: So absolutely, And that's one thing, man, I'm so freaking
16:06
Speaker 1: busy right now that just with work and everything and
16:11
Speaker 1: family and and planning, and it's like I get to
16:14
Speaker 1: bed and my brain is not shut off because I
16:17
Speaker 1: know I need to be, you know, shooting my bow
16:19
Speaker 1: or doing something bow related, and I'm not and I
16:25
Speaker 1: need I need to be. So it's almost like I
16:28
Speaker 1: need to spend an hour at the end of the day,
16:31
Speaker 1: even if it's just drawing my bow back ten times.
16:34
Speaker 1: I need to be doing it. But I've been a
16:36
Speaker 1: I've been a bum when it comes to that. Yeah,
16:38
Speaker 1: I I admittedly have not been doing very well the
16:40
Speaker 1: last month either. But one thing I did do, which
16:43
Speaker 1: I need to do it again, but I set up
16:45
Speaker 1: a very short range archery range in my office. Literally
16:48
Speaker 1: it's just ten yards through a closet, but that's just
16:52
Speaker 1: enough where you can just practice like your release, you know,
16:54
Speaker 1: draw back and just focus on a perfect surprise release.
16:57
Speaker 1: And that was something that helped me all out last year.
16:59
Speaker 1: Um that you know, when you can't get outside. It's
17:02
Speaker 1: just a nice way you can get you know, a
17:04
Speaker 1: few shots and every night, just to keep that form.
17:06
Speaker 1: And I don't know, just work on some of your fundamentals.
17:09
Speaker 1: That probably helps better than nothing, right, Right, My luck
17:13
Speaker 1: is I'd probably blow through the target and put it
17:17
Speaker 1: ahole in my dry wall, or worse yet, like hit
17:19
Speaker 1: something electrical and it just like the worst case scenario
17:22
Speaker 1: happens and I burned my whole house down. Uh. I
17:26
Speaker 1: can't remember who this was. It might be our buddy,
17:29
Speaker 1: I don't want to a friend of ours. Um once
17:34
Speaker 1: was doing this inside of his house, shooting at a
17:36
Speaker 1: target inside the house, trying to practice during the offseason.
17:39
Speaker 1: And if I remember correctly, he missed the target, went
17:43
Speaker 1: through the drywall and burst a waterline. No ship, yeah,
17:47
Speaker 1: burst of waterline. So really be careful about how you
17:51
Speaker 1: set up your indoor range, right, absolutely, absolutely? Oh man, well,
17:56
Speaker 1: um we probably should. We probably should wrap this one
17:59
Speaker 1: up and get kiped on here. But um, let's chat
18:03
Speaker 1: more soon about shed hunting and uh impossible, Iowa double
18:08
Speaker 1: teams and and maybe Michigan. There you go. I like
18:13
Speaker 1: it all right, Let's take a quick break here, So
18:15
Speaker 1: we want to thank our friends at Morton Buildings for
18:17
Speaker 1: their support of this podcast. And Morton Buildings are the
18:21
Speaker 1: builders of wood frame, steel covered buildings that can be
18:25
Speaker 1: used for all sorts of different things related to what
18:29
Speaker 1: I think you and I probably want to do with
18:31
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18:34
Speaker 1: They can they can build pull barns, they can build garages,
18:38
Speaker 1: actually Paul Barn houses all sorts of different types of
18:42
Speaker 1: storage facilities, Lots of options out there, very customizable, and
18:46
Speaker 1: as I've mentioned over the past couple episodes, I've kind
18:48
Speaker 1: of been dreaming about having a Poul Barn house of
18:50
Speaker 1: my own someday. I imagine one where you've got maybe
18:54
Speaker 1: a quarter of it is a large open garage area,
18:57
Speaker 1: and then the other three cors of the building are
19:00
Speaker 1: this really open space. I imagine vault ceilings, very high ceilings,
19:04
Speaker 1: with a big open area that includes like your living room,
19:07
Speaker 1: your kitchen, your dining area. That's all kind of one
19:09
Speaker 1: big opening, and then there's gonna be aloft where a
19:13
Speaker 1: couple of bedrooms are gonna be. That's kind of like
19:15
Speaker 1: my dream little home that maybe if I someday can
19:17
Speaker 1: can afford to get a little hunting property or by
19:20
Speaker 1: a little spot maybe out in Montana. Someday I want
19:22
Speaker 1: to put that pol barn house on it. And Morton
19:25
Speaker 1: Buildings they seem to be the ones to do this
19:28
Speaker 1: kind of job. They have several things that make them
19:30
Speaker 1: particularly an interesting option. They've got some exclusive energy Performer
19:34
Speaker 1: installation which is gonna help make for more efficient heating
19:37
Speaker 1: and cooling. They have high ribs steel that requires almost
19:40
Speaker 1: no maintenance at all. And now through February two, nineteen,
19:45
Speaker 1: there are some special promotional prices for Morton Buildings, so
19:48
Speaker 1: you can learn more about that at Morton Buildings dot com.
19:52
Speaker 1: All right here with me on the line now is
19:54
Speaker 1: Kip Adams. Welcome back to the show. Kip, Hey, thanks
19:57
Speaker 1: for having me Mark always going to talk to you. Yeah,
20:00
Speaker 1: I agree. I feel like somehow I left the ball
20:03
Speaker 1: drop last year because every year since we've had the podcast,
20:06
Speaker 1: I believe we've had you on the show to do
20:09
Speaker 1: kind of a state of the white Tails address, as
20:12
Speaker 1: you kind of each year do your white Tail report
20:14
Speaker 1: and kind of share your fightings here with us, and
20:15
Speaker 1: somehow I forgot to get ahold of you do that
20:18
Speaker 1: last year. So I'm glad that we're back on it. Um,
20:21
Speaker 1: I know there's will be a lot of interesting stuff
20:23
Speaker 1: to dive into. But before we get to that, kid,
20:25
Speaker 1: I actually wanted to um to to to poke and
20:29
Speaker 1: pride you to tell a story, at least at least
20:32
Speaker 1: one story. Here, Kip, I saw you killed an awesome
20:34
Speaker 1: buck out in North Dakota, and I haven't got to
20:37
Speaker 1: hear what happened. Could you tell us that story? I
20:40
Speaker 1: sure can. And uh, and yes, that's correct, Mark. I
20:43
Speaker 1: was very fortunate and got to shoot a really nice
20:45
Speaker 1: dear on my friends land in North Dakota. And uh,
20:49
Speaker 1: there's actually a kind of two unique parts about that.
20:53
Speaker 1: Is one, Um, I met this guy through q d
20:56
Speaker 1: m A a number of years ago with a dear
20:58
Speaker 1: Stewart class and we we've remained very close friends since
21:01
Speaker 1: and hunting together numerous times. So it's it's always nice
21:04
Speaker 1: to get to go there. And uh, you know, the
21:07
Speaker 1: real value was just being with him and seeing him
21:09
Speaker 1: in the hunt. But Uh, I was very lucky this
21:13
Speaker 1: this past November, actually, my friend's young son was hunting
21:17
Speaker 1: and we were a few days into the hunt. My
21:19
Speaker 1: friend's young son had not shot a buck yet, and uh,
21:22
Speaker 1: and I was joking with my friend, said, hey, you
21:24
Speaker 1: got to take a selfie while you're in the stand.
21:26
Speaker 1: You know that'll bring your son good luck. Every time
21:29
Speaker 1: I take my daughter or my young son hunting, the
21:31
Speaker 1: first thing we do is again to stand, we take
21:33
Speaker 1: a selfie of ourselves, and you know that that's supposed
21:35
Speaker 1: to be good to the dear gods and bring us luck. Really,
21:39
Speaker 1: the the morning that I shot this deer, it was
21:41
Speaker 1: it was less than an hour after late, and I
21:44
Speaker 1: was in the stand, and uh, my buddy, I knew
21:47
Speaker 1: my buddy and his young son were in the stand
21:49
Speaker 1: several miles away, and uh and I had texted him.
21:52
Speaker 1: And I'm normally very vigial when I'm on stand. You know,
21:54
Speaker 1: I may check a text or whatever, but I'm I'm
21:57
Speaker 1: mostly impredator mode at that point, and you know, I'm
21:59
Speaker 1: w any. I text him and said, hey, you need
22:01
Speaker 1: to send me, you know, a selfie for good luck.
22:03
Speaker 1: And uh so I'm watching and I'm having I'm sitting
22:08
Speaker 1: above with this river, real thick right parient habitat kind
22:13
Speaker 1: of open around it, but clumps of trees. So the
22:16
Speaker 1: spot that I thought I would have the most like
22:19
Speaker 1: most likely to see deer was. It was a very
22:21
Speaker 1: narrow crossing, so I had to be on guard for sure,
22:24
Speaker 1: because when something came in it could get out of
22:25
Speaker 1: it very quickly, and then I likely would never see
22:28
Speaker 1: it again. And uh so, anyway, I just text my body, said, hey,
22:31
Speaker 1: you need to send me a picture, you know, to
22:33
Speaker 1: bring Hunter good luck today. That's his boy's name, and
22:36
Speaker 1: uh so I set my phone down and watching, and
22:39
Speaker 1: literally a minute later it buzzes and I look and
22:41
Speaker 1: I can see a picture, so I know it's my
22:44
Speaker 1: buddy sending and I literally picked my phone up smiled
22:47
Speaker 1: because a there's a dad, you know, proud bad and
22:49
Speaker 1: his young son. And I started to respond and thank
22:52
Speaker 1: Gosh Mark for whatever reason. I look back up and
22:55
Speaker 1: this deer that I shot had busted into this narrow
22:57
Speaker 1: opening and was quickly closing the I set the phone
23:01
Speaker 1: out quickly through my binoculars up and saw that he
23:06
Speaker 1: luckily had he had stopped momentarily, had this big heavy
23:09
Speaker 1: chest and he turned his head and I saw that
23:12
Speaker 1: one of his uh tailer has had a big heavy
23:14
Speaker 1: blade on it, and I knew this year is at
23:16
Speaker 1: least four years old, certainly well than what my buddy
23:19
Speaker 1: would want us to shoot on his land. You know,
23:21
Speaker 1: I grabbed my rifle and immediately safety off, and so
23:25
Speaker 1: actually seeing the deer to pulling the trigger happened very
23:28
Speaker 1: very quickly. Literally got at the deer, just ran a
23:32
Speaker 1: few steps and dropped, and then you know, and then
23:34
Speaker 1: the real nerves hit you. And I looked back down
23:37
Speaker 1: and my I had just started to compose the text
23:39
Speaker 1: back to my buddy, telling him this will bring luck today,
23:43
Speaker 1: and at the smile of myself and saying, oh my gosh,
23:46
Speaker 1: you know it did bring you luck for me, not
23:49
Speaker 1: necessarily for him. So I responded to his text and said, great,
23:54
Speaker 1: you know that's a great picture. You know today is
23:56
Speaker 1: going to be the day. I can feel it thinking
23:58
Speaker 1: you don't talk about him, but you know I would
24:00
Speaker 1: tell them later how the whole sequence of events worked out.
24:03
Speaker 1: So so I guess the self he was good luck,
24:06
Speaker 1: but I turned out to be good luck for me.
24:09
Speaker 1: That the second part of that that actually it was
24:12
Speaker 1: uniquely so anybody turned out to be what I thought
24:14
Speaker 1: initially was it was a four and a half year
24:16
Speaker 1: old deer. After I got the jaw out and got
24:18
Speaker 1: a good look at it, it actually was five and
24:20
Speaker 1: a half and the incisors to Matson's lab. So those
24:24
Speaker 1: will come back here in a couple of months and
24:25
Speaker 1: I'll know for sure, but at least by tooth were
24:27
Speaker 1: it was five and a half. But I posted that
24:30
Speaker 1: on my Instagram page later. And I'm not one to
24:33
Speaker 1: share oh look what I shot, like, I've never done that,
24:36
Speaker 1: but I will always share information, you know, to try
24:39
Speaker 1: to help others be more successful hunting. And uh that
24:42
Speaker 1: what I was stating with this was, you know, it
24:44
Speaker 1: was mid November. My friend and his father had thousands
24:47
Speaker 1: and thousands of trail camera pictures of deer in their farm.
24:51
Speaker 1: You know, they scoured all the time. They had never
24:53
Speaker 1: seen this, dear. So what I had said was, you know, boy, today,
24:56
Speaker 1: you know I was blessed to get this. Here's the
24:58
Speaker 1: point of this. You know they had all his intel
25:01
Speaker 1: never see us. So you know, even if you're not
25:03
Speaker 1: seeing what you want, it's made November. Just go hunting.
25:05
Speaker 1: You never know what could happen. So I post that literally,
25:09
Speaker 1: you know, an hour later, I get a message from
25:12
Speaker 1: somebody that I do not know through Instagram that they said, hey,
25:14
Speaker 1: you know, where are you hunting? Intrth Dakota and they
25:17
Speaker 1: sent me a picture. Uh. Anyway, it turns out there
25:20
Speaker 1: was a picture of the buck that I shot. They
25:22
Speaker 1: had trail camera pictures of it. They had actually watched
25:24
Speaker 1: it h during the summer, had seen it alive, had
25:27
Speaker 1: trail camera pictures. The rack was very unique, so there
25:30
Speaker 1: was no doubt it was the same deer. Long story short, Uh,
25:33
Speaker 1: these people are from North Dakota. UM. The wife's father
25:39
Speaker 1: is a friend of my friend's father who from out there,
25:42
Speaker 1: and they know each other. It turns out they had
25:43
Speaker 1: land pretty close together. So I mean, we're lucky. I
25:47
Speaker 1: shot an incredible deer. I made some new friends out
25:50
Speaker 1: of it. Um. It was just a really really special
25:53
Speaker 1: deer and special story all the way around. That's great.
25:55
Speaker 1: That is awesome to see. Um all that all that
25:58
Speaker 1: great camaraderie with your buddy there you're hunting, and then,
26:01
Speaker 1: like you said, having someone kind enough to reach out
26:03
Speaker 1: and share pictures of you. That's that's kind of the
26:08
Speaker 1: you sometimes hear about the the downside of people taking
26:11
Speaker 1: deer hunting so seriously, and people getting jealous and and
26:15
Speaker 1: letting deer get in the way of friendships and things
26:17
Speaker 1: like that, And this is the exact opposite of that,
26:18
Speaker 1: the very um, the very best of what we can
26:21
Speaker 1: be as deer hunters. And I think that's a a
26:23
Speaker 1: great example of that. Oh, I agree, I agree, that's terrific. Um.
26:29
Speaker 1: So it sounds like where you set up in that spot,
26:32
Speaker 1: it was. It kind of sounds like a great kind
26:34
Speaker 1: of pinch point type situation for cruising buxs during the rut.
26:37
Speaker 1: Was that the setup, and it really was. It was
26:41
Speaker 1: you know, rivers tend to, as you know, tend to
26:44
Speaker 1: be great movement corridors anyway, you know, and a lot
26:47
Speaker 1: of deer coming in into and out they'll use those
26:49
Speaker 1: to travel long distances. And just the way that the
26:52
Speaker 1: brush patches were arranged, you know, it was kind of
26:55
Speaker 1: going from cover piece of cover to cover and because
26:59
Speaker 1: you know, it's perfect place for those to be in
27:00
Speaker 1: there and lay in bed, and so I think he
27:03
Speaker 1: was taking advantage of the train to make it most
27:06
Speaker 1: likely to be able to get from one point to another,
27:08
Speaker 1: but then hitting those brush patches on the way just
27:10
Speaker 1: to see if any other deer were laying there or betted. So, um,
27:14
Speaker 1: they really worked that well for me that morning. I'm
27:17
Speaker 1: very lucky for sure. Yeah, that's a that's a great
27:19
Speaker 1: kind of spot to be in in mid November, no
27:21
Speaker 1: doubt about that. UM. We'll congrats, Kip. That's a beautiful,
27:24
Speaker 1: beautiful deer awesome story too. Thank you very much, Mark,
27:28
Speaker 1: I appreciate that. Yeah. So so let's let's get right
27:31
Speaker 1: into I guess the meat and potatoes here, though you
27:34
Speaker 1: and and I think Matt Ross still is involved with
27:37
Speaker 1: the white Tail Report to you guys put out a
27:38
Speaker 1: heck of a document every year. UM. For those who
27:41
Speaker 1: aren't familiar with this, can you give us a quick
27:43
Speaker 1: rundown of what the white Tail Report is, um, and
27:46
Speaker 1: why you guys do that every year? Sure? The white
27:50
Speaker 1: Tail Report is a really a state of the Union
27:52
Speaker 1: look at what's going on in the white tails world.
27:55
Speaker 1: And we started this just over a decade ago to
27:58
Speaker 1: provide today's information on deer harvest age structures, the biggest
28:05
Speaker 1: concerns impacting deer herds, big regular regulation changes of that
28:09
Speaker 1: kind of thing for for deer hunters and for natural
28:12
Speaker 1: resource professionals and deer managers and in the media all
28:15
Speaker 1: throughout the white tails range. You know, there was no
28:18
Speaker 1: one consolidated source for all of this information. So every
28:24
Speaker 1: fall we survey every state and provincial WALEFE agency and
28:28
Speaker 1: UH and get information from them on the prior years
28:31
Speaker 1: deer harvest age structure, that harvest, timing of the harvest,
28:35
Speaker 1: and then the biggest issues impact in deer management in
28:38
Speaker 1: their state or profits. And then we put all this
28:41
Speaker 1: data together, compile it, and then go through and analyze
28:45
Speaker 1: it and see what we think will be most important,
28:48
Speaker 1: are most meaningful and helpful for deer managers and hunters,
28:52
Speaker 1: and then we put it together in this document that
28:55
Speaker 1: includes three parts. Part one is a deer harvest information
29:00
Speaker 1: state by state and province by province information on a
29:02
Speaker 1: number of antlerd buck seter shot and then uh, you
29:05
Speaker 1: know how many bucks are killed per square a mile
29:07
Speaker 1: per one deer hunters, how this compares to prior years.
29:11
Speaker 1: So it's a nice way to be able to look
29:13
Speaker 1: at how your state compares to other states in your
29:16
Speaker 1: region or other states in the country, just to see
29:19
Speaker 1: what's going on within the deer hunting world. And we
29:22
Speaker 1: find it very helpful. I literally have every one of
29:25
Speaker 1: these on my desk and use them on a regular basis.
29:28
Speaker 1: It's a it's a great source of information and UH,
29:31
Speaker 1: I tell folkus you know, if you're a deer nut.
29:33
Speaker 1: You want to get your hands on one of these
29:35
Speaker 1: just to see this kind of information and kind of
29:38
Speaker 1: how your state pairs to to others. Yeah, it really
29:42
Speaker 1: is fascinating information, and it's it's available for free to download. Right, folks,
29:46
Speaker 1: just need to go to the cut May website and
29:48
Speaker 1: you can get the whole document this year, in all
29:51
Speaker 1: the previous years still too, right, that's scratch up all
29:54
Speaker 1: free downloads and they're all listed right at our website. Yeah,
29:58
Speaker 1: it's it's great. I'm kind of cure. As you mentioned,
30:00
Speaker 1: this is about ten years guys have been doing it.
30:02
Speaker 1: Have you seen any changes in the quality of reporting
30:06
Speaker 1: and tracking from the state agencies? Have Have they started
30:09
Speaker 1: to track more things and provide more data now that
30:11
Speaker 1: there's people like you asking for this stuff? Have you
30:13
Speaker 1: noticed anything on those lines? We have had noticed a
30:16
Speaker 1: big difference in the two thousand and nineteen report that
30:19
Speaker 1: we just published, as is the eleventh annual copy of it.
30:23
Speaker 1: So back in two thousand and nine when we first
30:25
Speaker 1: did it, UM state WALRT agencies get asked or get
30:29
Speaker 1: provided surveys from you know, outdoor writers and different folks.
30:33
Speaker 1: Throughout the course of the years, and I remember when
30:36
Speaker 1: I was in New Hampshires, dear by, I'll just not
30:37
Speaker 1: remember those. And at times it can be a little overwhelming,
30:40
Speaker 1: you know, asking for all this information. So the very
30:43
Speaker 1: first year we did this, um it was met with
30:46
Speaker 1: some resistance by some agencies that you know, I handle
30:50
Speaker 1: a lot of the stuff. I don't have time for
30:51
Speaker 1: this or um. But I kept egging them and pushing
30:55
Speaker 1: them and hey, you know, can we please get this
30:57
Speaker 1: you know, this is what we're doing. But you know,
30:59
Speaker 1: we certainly get information from all the agencies then and
31:03
Speaker 1: we still go now, but we get it from the
31:05
Speaker 1: vast majority now. So in the early years we had
31:08
Speaker 1: to pay teeth from some of them to try to
31:10
Speaker 1: get information. But then over the course of time we
31:14
Speaker 1: found out that, you know, they started using it as well,
31:17
Speaker 1: and it was useful for them and helpful for them.
31:19
Speaker 1: So as soon as they realize, well, yeah, this is
31:22
Speaker 1: good and helpful, then we can get the data a
31:24
Speaker 1: little easier, which is good. And and I tell every
31:28
Speaker 1: state's dear biologists each year when we send the survey, hey,
31:32
Speaker 1: you know, we want this to be helpful to you.
31:34
Speaker 1: If there's any questions that you would like to include
31:36
Speaker 1: on here that you think would be helpful or help
31:38
Speaker 1: you in your job, you know, let me know, and
31:40
Speaker 1: we're glad to include those. So over the other last
31:43
Speaker 1: eleven years we've we've had several questions that were um
31:47
Speaker 1: asked by State Wilife Agency biologists such as you know
31:50
Speaker 1: it it would be nice to know, you know whatever,
31:52
Speaker 1: you know this is around the country. So uh yeah,
31:56
Speaker 1: so it's nice to put those in. We try to
31:57
Speaker 1: make it helpful to them. Today, it's a lot easier
32:01
Speaker 1: to get it's a much better cooperation between us and
32:04
Speaker 1: the agencies, you know, with them submitting this information. So yeah,
32:07
Speaker 1: that's a good thing, a very good thing. Yeah, that's great.
32:09
Speaker 1: So that being the case, you're getting more data than ever,
32:12
Speaker 1: higher quality data than ever. And you've been doing this
32:15
Speaker 1: for eleven years now, you've seen kind of some ups
32:17
Speaker 1: and downs. I remember, gosh, I don't remember if it
32:21
Speaker 1: was two in fourteen or fifteen, or somewhere between thirteen
32:24
Speaker 1: and fifteen in that ballpark, I remember we kind of
32:27
Speaker 1: had a little bit of a rough patch as far
32:30
Speaker 1: as um harvest trends and disease, and there was there
32:34
Speaker 1: was some concern within the white tailed world are the
32:36
Speaker 1: good old days behind us. Maybe, Um, there's some sense
32:40
Speaker 1: of concern if you look at things at a very
32:42
Speaker 1: high level right now, Kip, how what's your sense of things?
32:46
Speaker 1: What what is the state of white tails today in
32:48
Speaker 1: two thousand nineteen. Well, there's a lot of really positive
32:52
Speaker 1: trends in the white tailed world. Um, I'm an optimist,
32:56
Speaker 1: so I tend to see things with a glass half
32:57
Speaker 1: fool anyway. But there are some some really positive trends
33:01
Speaker 1: such as things like, uh, what you we talked about,
33:04
Speaker 1: we had two thousand and fourteens kind of a year
33:07
Speaker 1: or wild things were just really not good from a
33:10
Speaker 1: harvest end from a disease end um, but certainly from
33:14
Speaker 1: the buck harvest side, we have really recovered from that.
33:17
Speaker 1: And uh, we're are buck harvest rates are getting up
33:19
Speaker 1: to some pretty historic numbers. Or we've returned to killing
33:23
Speaker 1: a lot of bucks, which hunters certainly like. And uh,
33:27
Speaker 1: the one thing about it that that's very different from
33:30
Speaker 1: the past is that the age structure of those bucks
33:32
Speaker 1: is considerably older today. So you know, we're we're killing
33:36
Speaker 1: some really high numbers, but rather than the majority of
33:39
Speaker 1: them being one and a half, you know, today we
33:41
Speaker 1: have a very balanced age structure in the harvest where
33:44
Speaker 1: only about a third of them are are yealing bucks
33:47
Speaker 1: about another third or two and a half years old,
33:49
Speaker 1: and full third today are at least three and a half.
33:53
Speaker 1: You know, so we're killing a pile of dear today
33:55
Speaker 1: bucks that are three and a half, four and a half,
33:57
Speaker 1: five and a half are older. And so that's pretty special.
34:01
Speaker 1: And man, that really gets to two hunters excited. Yeah. Absolutely,
34:06
Speaker 1: And kind of along those lines, I saw an interesting
34:08
Speaker 1: thing kind of speaking to the tracking, the new tracking,
34:12
Speaker 1: I saw that you're also now able to get some
34:16
Speaker 1: dough age structure data, which I thought was was something
34:19
Speaker 1: I hadn't remember seeing in past years. I thought that
34:21
Speaker 1: was interesting. I'm correct me if I'm wrong here, but
34:23
Speaker 1: I think I saw the the largest group of dough
34:27
Speaker 1: harvested across the nation war three and a half or
34:29
Speaker 1: older as well. Is that is that correct? That is correct?
34:32
Speaker 1: And yeah, the dough age structure is different in the
34:35
Speaker 1: box um in, but it was different in that by
34:40
Speaker 1: far the biggest segment of those are three and a
34:43
Speaker 1: half or older. And we started that a few years
34:46
Speaker 1: into this, probably just to see, hey, what what percentage
34:49
Speaker 1: of all the analysts you're taking our bonds. Um, that's
34:52
Speaker 1: always interesting for hunters. And then uh, we started looking
34:55
Speaker 1: at that data and realize, now this is really good.
34:57
Speaker 1: You know, we need to incorporate this annually. So we
34:59
Speaker 1: have included that the last few years, and it is
35:02
Speaker 1: good to watch, hey, percentage of all the ant lost
35:05
Speaker 1: harvests that are fonds, you know versus yearlings and then
35:09
Speaker 1: those hitting that older stage class. So if for nothing else,
35:13
Speaker 1: it's it's pretty apparent in some stage, you know, the
35:16
Speaker 1: difference between percentages of those that are three and a
35:19
Speaker 1: half and older versus percentages of bucks that make it
35:22
Speaker 1: to the overage class. It's pretty eye opening for for
35:25
Speaker 1: some hunters and and even some some wilife agencies. Yeah,
35:27
Speaker 1: I imagine. So going back to the buck side of
35:29
Speaker 1: things on the age structure, Um, when we chatted two
35:33
Speaker 1: years ago during our last podcast like this, I remember
35:36
Speaker 1: that we talked about how the the number or the
35:40
Speaker 1: percentage of bucks that are three and a half are older,
35:42
Speaker 1: that number had I think was the highest that had
35:44
Speaker 1: ever been and I think you had said something along
35:47
Speaker 1: the lines of we expect that it will probably just
35:50
Speaker 1: stay around here. We don't think it's gonna keep trending up.
35:52
Speaker 1: This is probably like the natural UM, the natural point
35:57
Speaker 1: that it's going to fluctuate around, give or take. It
35:59
Speaker 1: seems like that it's kind of been the case now.
36:01
Speaker 1: It's kind of been around that, give or take one
36:03
Speaker 1: third or so. UM. As you look at our our
36:06
Speaker 1: breakout of age structure harvest across the nation, do you
36:10
Speaker 1: feel like we're kind of reaching the equilibrium across the
36:12
Speaker 1: board or do you see any dramatic changes coming in
36:15
Speaker 1: the future. I think that we have probably hit a
36:20
Speaker 1: very good point from from a health standpoint, both from
36:23
Speaker 1: a herd health and UH and hunter opportunities point UM.
36:27
Speaker 1: What I do foreseeing the future is I am guessing
36:30
Speaker 1: you're gonna start seeing an increased number of yearling bucks
36:33
Speaker 1: again and in a decreased number of older bucks UM
36:38
Speaker 1: directly as a result of the increased bread of c
36:41
Speaker 1: w D. So I think that for a while we
36:44
Speaker 1: will see some change, not a huge change, but but
36:47
Speaker 1: some And I think there's really two parts of that mark.
36:50
Speaker 1: One is you have some states that once they find
36:53
Speaker 1: out the f c w D, they are encouraging hunters
36:56
Speaker 1: to reverting to shooting yearling bucks UM, which has met
37:01
Speaker 1: with some disapproval from from some hunters. Um, not all
37:04
Speaker 1: states are doing that, though my home state of Pennsylvania
37:07
Speaker 1: is Is is firmly supportive of maintaining the antler restrictions
37:11
Speaker 1: and UH and keeping those in place and making sure
37:14
Speaker 1: that they provide some additional harvest effort to the antalist side,
37:18
Speaker 1: you know. So, So I don't think Pennsylvania's age structure
37:20
Speaker 1: is going to change a lot anytime soon. But we
37:23
Speaker 1: have seen that in some states that the find c
37:26
Speaker 1: w D and start encouraging hunters to shoot yelling bucks again.
37:29
Speaker 1: So I think it will change a little because of that,
37:32
Speaker 1: and then long term, I think it will change. And
37:35
Speaker 1: we're starting to see this, uh in the endemic area
37:38
Speaker 1: of Wisconsin right now. Um, when c w D has
37:41
Speaker 1: been in an area for a long time and uh,
37:45
Speaker 1: you just start seeing that age structure there start to
37:47
Speaker 1: decline because you're just not ending up with a lot
37:49
Speaker 1: of bucks getting it into those real advanced age classes.
37:53
Speaker 1: So so I think that what we have right now
37:56
Speaker 1: from a national harvest a structure for bucks is probably
38:00
Speaker 1: as good as it's going to get. And we might
38:02
Speaker 1: start seeing a slip here in a little bit in
38:04
Speaker 1: the coming years. Yeah, I definitely want to dive into
38:09
Speaker 1: excuse me, I want to dive into the questions around
38:14
Speaker 1: managing in c w D areas and age structure and
38:18
Speaker 1: should you be just killing every buck or should we
38:20
Speaker 1: still be trying to manage for older age classes? Um.
38:23
Speaker 1: But I guess before I go down that wormhole, because
38:25
Speaker 1: imagine that will take us further and further down. UM,
38:28
Speaker 1: I want to stick just to the generic harvest questions.
38:31
Speaker 1: One one more thing here, and that is around doe harvest. Um.
38:35
Speaker 1: Because you mentioned that buck harvest is up, but I
38:38
Speaker 1: saw that doe harvest is down, and it's down quite
38:40
Speaker 1: significantly over the last ten years. What do you make
38:44
Speaker 1: of all that? How you're write it is down, it's
38:47
Speaker 1: down close during the last ten years. And I think
38:52
Speaker 1: there's a couple of things for that one. Um. As
38:55
Speaker 1: the cd M movement really has been going to pass
38:59
Speaker 1: two decades, you know, just like anything, a pendulum kind
39:02
Speaker 1: of swings both ways, and a while back we kind
39:06
Speaker 1: of had the pendulum swinging all the way over to
39:08
Speaker 1: really aggressive dough harvest, and right now I think it's
39:11
Speaker 1: just kind of swinging back the other way a little bit.
39:13
Speaker 1: Because there are a bunch of analyst harvest opportunities and
39:17
Speaker 1: numerous states the hunters just are not taking advantage of.
39:20
Speaker 1: Your home state of Michigan is a perfect example, you know,
39:23
Speaker 1: in parts of southern Michigan, where the hunters routinely take
39:27
Speaker 1: a lot more bucks than they do antlaist deer, even
39:30
Speaker 1: though the DNR is begging them to shoot more deer.
39:33
Speaker 1: So so I think there's a little bit of that
39:34
Speaker 1: mark where you have some folks just unwilling uh to
39:37
Speaker 1: to shoot enough ant li list deer um. And also
39:41
Speaker 1: there are places where we just simply can shoot doesn't
39:43
Speaker 1: many analysts dear anymore? Um. During the last decade, you know,
39:47
Speaker 1: we had some really aggressive antalyist harvest where states were
39:50
Speaker 1: trying to balance deer herbs with a habitat, you know,
39:52
Speaker 1: and and hunters responded to that challenge and did that.
39:56
Speaker 1: So there are some agencies and now just provide fewer
39:59
Speaker 1: antalysts others opportunities because they don't need to shoot as
40:02
Speaker 1: many analysts here. So that's playing into it a little
40:05
Speaker 1: bit as well as faon recruitment rates continue to decline
40:09
Speaker 1: and particularly throughout the Southeast, mostly from prenation concerns. So
40:14
Speaker 1: when you have you know, a much higher mortality rate
40:17
Speaker 1: on phones, and you're just not bringing as many phones
40:20
Speaker 1: into those populations just simply can't withstand the same analyst
40:24
Speaker 1: harvest as the past. So it's it's not a one
40:27
Speaker 1: size fits all answer everywhere, but that there are I
40:29
Speaker 1: think those are the three primary reasons that are causing
40:33
Speaker 1: this big reduction and antalysts harvest, and you just kind
40:36
Speaker 1: of have to look at whatever states specific situation they're
40:39
Speaker 1: in to figure out, you know, which of those main
40:41
Speaker 1: three are most applicable. Yes, it seems like this is
40:44
Speaker 1: kind of to your to your point about the pendulum,
40:47
Speaker 1: this is a little bit of us seeing the results
40:51
Speaker 1: of some of the changes coming from those years of
40:53
Speaker 1: two thousand thirteen fourteen fifteen, where there was concerned about
40:57
Speaker 1: you know, populations and issues with disease and issues with
41:00
Speaker 1: all these different worries we had at that point, and
41:02
Speaker 1: into what you alluded to, A bunch of states did
41:05
Speaker 1: change their regulations there that next year. I remember Ohio
41:08
Speaker 1: cut back on dough tags a lot, a whole bunch
41:10
Speaker 1: of states cut back a little bit. So we're probably
41:12
Speaker 1: we're still seeing some of that today. But you mentioned
41:15
Speaker 1: faun recruitment too, and I recall back in two thousand
41:18
Speaker 1: and seventeen, that was again one of the things we
41:21
Speaker 1: talked about how we're seeing a little bit of a
41:23
Speaker 1: negative trend with faun recruitment. Um, can you for those
41:27
Speaker 1: who aren't familiar with what faun recruitment is, can you
41:29
Speaker 1: just explain that once and then just elaborate a little
41:32
Speaker 1: bit more on what that trend is we're seeing, um,
41:35
Speaker 1: and and a little bit more about predation versus habitat
41:38
Speaker 1: and how those things might impact it. Sure. The fawn
41:42
Speaker 1: recruitment rate is the number of fons that survives their
41:46
Speaker 1: first about six months of life and uh and are
41:49
Speaker 1: alive day one of your hunting season. So, and it's
41:54
Speaker 1: expressed as the number of fawns per adult dough in
41:57
Speaker 1: the population. So the obviously a lot more fonds that
42:01
Speaker 1: hit the ground in the spring that die to predation, disease, cars, etcetera.
42:06
Speaker 1: So the fon recruitment rate is a measure of the
42:09
Speaker 1: number that are born but also then survive to be
42:14
Speaker 1: eligible for harvest on day one of a hunting season.
42:17
Speaker 1: So it's essentially a measure of those that lived to
42:20
Speaker 1: be about six months of age. And that is an
42:23
Speaker 1: important statistic because it's a it's a big measure of
42:26
Speaker 1: how productive that deer herd is. You know, how many
42:28
Speaker 1: phons are being recruited. Um, that's directly impacted by habitat
42:33
Speaker 1: quality and predation rate, etcetera. So that as much as anything,
42:38
Speaker 1: gives you a good feel for how many analysts deer
42:41
Speaker 1: can we take from a population to keep it healthy
42:44
Speaker 1: and sustainable? Uh, you know, and it also means about,
42:46
Speaker 1: you know, how many bucks are we going to be
42:48
Speaker 1: recruiting into these deer herds because about every other phon
42:51
Speaker 1: born as a butt fond so fon recruitment rate is
42:53
Speaker 1: a very important measure for deer managers to to monitor,
42:57
Speaker 1: and we do that in this report that just to
43:00
Speaker 1: keep track over time of how that changes on the
43:03
Speaker 1: state by state basis, because that gives you a lot
43:05
Speaker 1: of information on numbers of antilists deer that you should
43:08
Speaker 1: be harvested annually. So, so would that being the case
43:12
Speaker 1: you mentioned that fawn recruitment rate has been dropping, especially
43:15
Speaker 1: in the southeast. I think I remember you saying, Um,
43:19
Speaker 1: how dramatic has this been? And is it to a
43:22
Speaker 1: point of alarm? Is it something to be expected? Um?
43:27
Speaker 1: What do we make of that. Well, over the last
43:30
Speaker 1: few years, it does seem to have bottomed out, so
43:34
Speaker 1: we've kind of hit I think, as low as we're
43:36
Speaker 1: going to go, which which is a good sign. But
43:38
Speaker 1: to give you an idea, we've been monitoring this since
43:41
Speaker 1: two thousand. Uh and in two thousand, across the US,
43:45
Speaker 1: the average of fawn recruitment rate was point eight one
43:49
Speaker 1: falls per doe, so you know, for every adult go
43:52
Speaker 1: out there, they recruited point eight falls into the deer. Now,
43:56
Speaker 1: the first thing listeners who aren't familiars will say, it's
43:58
Speaker 1: wait a minute. You know those have twins, and that
44:01
Speaker 1: is true, but you know, less than half of those
44:04
Speaker 1: twins survived to be six months of age, so point
44:09
Speaker 1: eight one falls per dough back in two thousand. Today
44:12
Speaker 1: that has dropped to point six five fons per dough,
44:17
Speaker 1: so esventially what that means is, you know today it
44:20
Speaker 1: takes three dos to to recruit two fonds, so that
44:25
Speaker 1: is very different from the past. And uh. In fact,
44:28
Speaker 1: this past year there's only two states in the entire
44:31
Speaker 1: country that recruit at least one faon per bell. Uh
44:35
Speaker 1: that those being Illinois and Kentucky. To a very productive
44:39
Speaker 1: states obviously, so the farm recruipver rates are always lower
44:43
Speaker 1: than many people think, but they have they have changed
44:46
Speaker 1: dramatically since two thousand and but it does appear over
44:49
Speaker 1: the last few years they have kind of plateaued, which
44:52
Speaker 1: hopefully means they're not going to go any lower and
44:55
Speaker 1: we can start managing more effectively at those levels. So
45:01
Speaker 1: is there uh? I imagine it's probably a combination of
45:04
Speaker 1: all the above. But from your perspective, what would you
45:07
Speaker 1: would you point to any one thing that you already
45:10
Speaker 1: mentioned that being predation or would you say it's something
45:13
Speaker 1: like predation and habitat and any other factors that have
45:17
Speaker 1: led to this decline since two thousand and and then
45:20
Speaker 1: the fall up to that question would be, then what's
45:24
Speaker 1: our response moving forward? Is there? What would you recommend
45:26
Speaker 1: we as managers be thinking about to try to move
45:29
Speaker 1: that number back up in the right direction. Um. I
45:32
Speaker 1: think the biggest reasons for this are predation as one
45:36
Speaker 1: of them. Habitat is a big one. Um over throughout
45:41
Speaker 1: the Midwest, much of that particularly agricultural Midwest, you know,
45:45
Speaker 1: the most limiting habitat component already is covered for deer
45:49
Speaker 1: and with loss of CRP during the big corn years.
45:53
Speaker 1: You know, we lost a quarter of all of the
45:55
Speaker 1: land that was enrolled in CRP programs UM through you know,
46:00
Speaker 1: that's the most successful habitat program from through the federal
46:03
Speaker 1: gund we've ever had. And there was millions and millions
46:07
Speaker 1: of acres lost front of our great cover that we're
46:10
Speaker 1: put back into road crop productions. So that's a huge
46:14
Speaker 1: loss for you know, for those deer and uh that
46:17
Speaker 1: was kind of through the Midwest and much of the
46:19
Speaker 1: forested parts of the country. We have forces that are maturing,
46:22
Speaker 1: so a mature fourth don't provide anywhere near the fawning
46:25
Speaker 1: cover that young force do. So so that's the habitat
46:29
Speaker 1: component kind of outside the Midwest. So yeah, increased predation, UM,
46:33
Speaker 1: loss of habitat, and I think in some places um
46:37
Speaker 1: uh nutrition was playing a factor. You know, we have
46:39
Speaker 1: rising deer herbs again in many areas, and if as
46:42
Speaker 1: soon as you end up with the more deer than
46:45
Speaker 1: you really should have in a certain area, um, first
46:47
Speaker 1: thing that gets impacted as their health and then fawning.
46:50
Speaker 1: So UM, I think those are the big three measures
46:52
Speaker 1: with with predation and habitat lost by far being the
46:55
Speaker 1: biggest two. Yeah, you referenced the CRP issues over the
47:01
Speaker 1: past few years, how they've they've been reducing the maximum
47:06
Speaker 1: number of acres eligible to be part of the conservation
47:09
Speaker 1: reserve program and a new farm bill just got approved recently. Um, kid,
47:14
Speaker 1: are you familiar with the details of that new bill
47:17
Speaker 1: and and are you aware of how that looks as
47:19
Speaker 1: far as conservation measures for deer and deer hunters? Is
47:22
Speaker 1: it is? It looks like a good farm bill for
47:23
Speaker 1: for what we're up to. Um, what are your thoughts
47:26
Speaker 1: on that. I am not familiar mark with all of
47:29
Speaker 1: the ins and outs of that then Uh, Um, I
47:31
Speaker 1: need to become familiar with it. I just haven't since
47:34
Speaker 1: that thing finally got signed. Yeah, it was. It was
47:37
Speaker 1: a lengthy process from what I want I understand. I
47:39
Speaker 1: haven't got to dive into it too much myself, either,
47:41
Speaker 1: But I did see um that the max limit for
47:46
Speaker 1: CRP was raised a little bit over what it was
47:49
Speaker 1: a couple of years ago, UM, but not very significantly.
47:52
Speaker 1: So I have heard that some folks in the conservation
47:54
Speaker 1: in the wildlife space, we're a little disappointed with that. Um.
47:57
Speaker 1: But that's as That's as far as I went on
48:00
Speaker 1: that front. But I'll be interested to see. I definitely
48:02
Speaker 1: think to your point, it's been such a successful program,
48:04
Speaker 1: so helpful to wildlife out there. Um, we need that,
48:08
Speaker 1: we need that crap. Um. You mentioned maturing forests. Something
48:12
Speaker 1: in the White Tail Report, UM that I found interesting
48:15
Speaker 1: was what you guys are calling the Young Force initiative,
48:19
Speaker 1: which seems to be an effort to try to um
48:22
Speaker 1: address what you talked about with it, with the challenges
48:25
Speaker 1: of maturing force. Is that something you can speak to
48:26
Speaker 1: a little bit and and what's going on there and
48:29
Speaker 1: why that's a concern for for deer and dear owners. Absolutely,
48:32
Speaker 1: we are huge supporters of the jung Force initiative, and
48:36
Speaker 1: we're fortunate enough to have an employee based out of
48:40
Speaker 1: New York who works specifically with landowners to help encourage
48:44
Speaker 1: them and then help them get more young forest on
48:48
Speaker 1: their properties. And essentially, we know from from a deer
48:51
Speaker 1: habitat perspective that mature forest provide very little food and
48:55
Speaker 1: cover for deer. Somewhere between fifty and a hundred pounds
48:58
Speaker 1: of browse barakers, that's it. And uh, young forests can
49:02
Speaker 1: provide upwards of seven hundred and fifty two thousand pounds
49:06
Speaker 1: of food Baraker, and they provide tremendous cover, you know,
49:09
Speaker 1: the cover that farms need to survive, cover that adults
49:12
Speaker 1: need UH to feel secure on properties. So young forest
49:17
Speaker 1: and that's essentially you know, forested area that is anywhere
49:20
Speaker 1: from zero to about ten years of age. So think
49:24
Speaker 1: of you know, those thick areas that we're just you know,
49:27
Speaker 1: you can't see film, it's hard to walk film. You know,
49:30
Speaker 1: those places are perfect for deer from a food and
49:33
Speaker 1: cover perspective. But unfortunately, you know, many of the forests
49:37
Speaker 1: in the United States, as they mature, you know, they
49:39
Speaker 1: just have become far less valuable for deer. So this
49:43
Speaker 1: initiative helps provide information for landowners of the benefits of
49:48
Speaker 1: having young forests on their property for not just deer,
49:52
Speaker 1: but there's a whole suite of wall like species that
49:55
Speaker 1: really benefit from that component of the habitat component. So
49:59
Speaker 1: our guy works every day with folks, shows them what
50:02
Speaker 1: they can do to get that, how that will benefit them,
50:04
Speaker 1: how help them meet their personal goals on their property,
50:07
Speaker 1: and then UH helps walk them through the process to
50:09
Speaker 1: actually make that happen. And this is a really really
50:13
Speaker 1: good program for deer and a whole host of other
50:15
Speaker 1: wildlife species. Yeah, I thought that was really interesting and
50:18
Speaker 1: it's funny. I you know, came from a family who
50:21
Speaker 1: kind of was of the old guard when it came
50:24
Speaker 1: to trees. You know, I always thought you had a
50:26
Speaker 1: plant trees, you don't want to cut down trees. So
50:28
Speaker 1: my my grandpa was always planting trees and all of
50:31
Speaker 1: our old fields on our on our deer farm, our
50:33
Speaker 1: dear property of north And it was sacrilege to cut
50:36
Speaker 1: down a tree that was living, because that just seemed
50:38
Speaker 1: like not the right thing to do, right. You want
50:40
Speaker 1: to help grow things, um, not kill unnecessarily. And you know,
50:45
Speaker 1: he we had no idea back at the time that
50:47
Speaker 1: oftentimes setting things back is actually the very best thing
50:51
Speaker 1: you can do for wildlife. But I think there are
50:52
Speaker 1: a lot of well meaning people out there who care
50:55
Speaker 1: about conservation, care about wildlife and wild places, and they
50:59
Speaker 1: see a tim or harvest or something they think that's
51:01
Speaker 1: a bad thing. And there I think I think it's
51:04
Speaker 1: fair say in some cases maybe certain ways that can
51:06
Speaker 1: be done isn't as as good as possible, but there
51:08
Speaker 1: certainly are very uh, there are plenty of positive things
51:12
Speaker 1: that timber harvests done in a sustainable way can do. Um,
51:16
Speaker 1: just a lot of a lot of folks maybe don't
51:18
Speaker 1: realize that. So there's a little bit of a pr problem,
51:20
Speaker 1: I think, don't you think absolutely no, there definitely definitely is.
51:24
Speaker 1: And I grew up in very much the same way
51:27
Speaker 1: as you described, with you know, protecting trees and not cutting,
51:30
Speaker 1: and so we kind of loved our wild life to death,
51:33
Speaker 1: I guess from that perspective, and the mature trees are
51:36
Speaker 1: certainly needed and particularly feel like where you do, or
51:39
Speaker 1: even farther north where I do. You know, we need
51:41
Speaker 1: some of that cover for for winter, covering that. But
51:44
Speaker 1: you know there's a lot of tree, a lot of deer,
51:46
Speaker 1: you know, they live their entire life, you know, and
51:48
Speaker 1: never see a mature tree. You know, think of South
51:51
Speaker 1: Texas and you know Western Kansas, places that donors would
51:54
Speaker 1: love to go. You know, there's no huge trees there.
51:57
Speaker 1: So there don't need them nearly as much as as
52:00
Speaker 1: we think they do. Yeah, they certainly, they certainly appreciate
52:03
Speaker 1: diversity and habitat and edge and openings, um, all those
52:07
Speaker 1: things that are so crucial for We're not like you said,
52:11
Speaker 1: deer can survive in a whole lot of different situations,
52:13
Speaker 1: but they certainly do better with some things present. And
52:16
Speaker 1: um I was I was reading a recent issue of
52:18
Speaker 1: Quality White Tails, and there was an article talking about
52:21
Speaker 1: this on public lands and how many many of our
52:24
Speaker 1: national forests, especially in the southeast and northeast of the country,
52:28
Speaker 1: are reaching a high level maturity and and then just
52:32
Speaker 1: there's there's very little active management happening. You get out west,
52:36
Speaker 1: there's there's a little more management going on. There's certainly
52:38
Speaker 1: a lot of fire out there that is naturally setting
52:42
Speaker 1: things back and opening things up on the understory and
52:45
Speaker 1: revitalizing um kind of the the younger growth. But that's
52:48
Speaker 1: not happening on the eastern side of the country. So
52:51
Speaker 1: we're getting many of these same issues that you just
52:53
Speaker 1: talked about, not just on private lands, but also on
52:55
Speaker 1: public lands, these very large pieces of public land, and
52:59
Speaker 1: the whole pr issue. I just brought up the fact
53:02
Speaker 1: that a lot of people that are probably well meaning,
53:04
Speaker 1: they don't want timber harvest because they think that's going
53:06
Speaker 1: to be bad for wildlife, um or for you know,
53:09
Speaker 1: the natural landscape. But many cases right there actually loving
53:12
Speaker 1: it to death by not allowing active management. And in
53:15
Speaker 1: this article, um I thought the author did a nice
53:18
Speaker 1: job of talking about the fact that this is an
53:21
Speaker 1: opportunity where we can actually help as deer hunters and
53:24
Speaker 1: deer managers. We can actually help with a public resource
53:27
Speaker 1: by getting involved in meetings and making our voices heard
53:31
Speaker 1: and start spreading the good word about Hey, like, there
53:33
Speaker 1: are some positive things that can be achieved with some
53:35
Speaker 1: active management in these places that can help benefit all
53:38
Speaker 1: of us, whether you hunt or hike or whatever. Um
53:42
Speaker 1: are you familiar with with what Bruce was writing about
53:45
Speaker 1: in that National Forest article, Kip, Are you talking about
53:49
Speaker 1: Bruce Ingram? Yes? Yes, Yeah, I thought that he did
53:52
Speaker 1: a very good job of that, a very good job. Yeah.
53:54
Speaker 1: I think that just as a great reminder for any
53:56
Speaker 1: of us, even if you don't own land, UM, you
53:59
Speaker 1: certainly can find in a way to make a positive
54:01
Speaker 1: difference by just getting your voice out there locally. There's
54:04
Speaker 1: lots of different meetings going on around public management of
54:07
Speaker 1: some of these national forests and larger, larger public places,
54:09
Speaker 1: and that's a great chance to get involved and um
54:13
Speaker 1: share share this kind of information because a lot of
54:15
Speaker 1: people don't realize it. UM. So I thought that was
54:19
Speaker 1: that was worth noting. Yeah, I thought he did a
54:21
Speaker 1: good job in along those lines. That's why I'm so
54:24
Speaker 1: proud of one of our new five year goals at
54:26
Speaker 1: Q and May you knows to double the number of
54:29
Speaker 1: habitat projects that are volunteers do on public lands. And
54:33
Speaker 1: we have so many branches that like to do that.
54:35
Speaker 1: And you know, as an organization, we don't have the
54:37
Speaker 1: ability to purchase a bunch of lands to then open
54:40
Speaker 1: them up to hunting, but that doesn't mean we can't
54:42
Speaker 1: help public lands. And so that's the niche that we've taken. Hey,
54:46
Speaker 1: you know what, we may not be able to buy them,
54:47
Speaker 1: but we absolutely can help make what we have now
54:50
Speaker 1: better for folks, and uh so, particularly the North. More
54:53
Speaker 1: of our northern branches get involved with the habitat enhancement
54:57
Speaker 1: of public lands, and our southern branches to this point,
54:59
Speaker 1: but we look forward to having a lot more of
55:01
Speaker 1: our folks are doing that. And man, I think that
55:03
Speaker 1: is great for everybody all the way around. Agree. I
55:07
Speaker 1: think that's so great that I've been seeing some of
55:09
Speaker 1: that happened here in Michigan, and um, I'd like to
55:11
Speaker 1: personally get involved with some more of it because I think,
55:14
Speaker 1: you know, I know that you guys, a QT May,
55:17
Speaker 1: you're working hard to make sure that deer hunters out
55:20
Speaker 1: there know that you guys are representing not just people
55:22
Speaker 1: that manage deer on their own land, but but all
55:24
Speaker 1: deer hunters. And I think this is a really great way,
55:27
Speaker 1: um that you know, members of this organization are stepping
55:30
Speaker 1: up and doing that very thing, you know, helping improve
55:32
Speaker 1: the quality of hunting, whether you own land or not,
55:34
Speaker 1: and helping our entire herd, whether it's on private land
55:37
Speaker 1: or public land. Um. I think that's that's really walking
55:40
Speaker 1: the walk. And I was I was glad to see
55:41
Speaker 1: that happening. All right, let's take one last quick break
55:45
Speaker 1: to think our partners at Onyx. And Onyx is the
55:48
Speaker 1: producer of the Onyx Hunt app, which is just about
55:52
Speaker 1: the most handy and useful mobile application I know as
55:56
Speaker 1: a deer hunter, constantly using this thing that provides aerial
55:59
Speaker 1: view maps, topographic maps. It shows you property lines, public
56:03
Speaker 1: land borders, you can mark waypoints, you can share way points,
56:06
Speaker 1: you can see weather data. It's uh, it's it's kind
56:09
Speaker 1: of always in my rotation of tools. I'm using an
56:12
Speaker 1: actually an interesting use case of it that I just
56:15
Speaker 1: was working with yesterday I think it was driving down
56:18
Speaker 1: the road head to the grocery store and I see
56:21
Speaker 1: a field just full of deer, I mean thirty forty
56:23
Speaker 1: deer all feeding out there on some corn stubble, and
56:26
Speaker 1: I'm thinking to myself, man, I'd love to shed hunt
56:28
Speaker 1: that adjacent timberlot. What do I do in that case?
56:31
Speaker 1: I just pulled out my Onyx hunt app on my phone.
56:34
Speaker 1: I look to see who the landowners were, and I'm like, okay,
56:37
Speaker 1: I can go see where that person lives. Go walk
56:39
Speaker 1: up to the door, knock on it, try to get
56:41
Speaker 1: shed hunting permission. So I haven't done that yet, but
56:43
Speaker 1: I do know who I need to talk to, and
56:45
Speaker 1: that is one of my favorite things to do with Onyx.
56:48
Speaker 1: So if you would like to learn more about Onyx
56:50
Speaker 1: or try it out your own, you can go to
56:52
Speaker 1: your mobile app store of choice and download it, or
56:54
Speaker 1: head over to onyx maps dot com. I want to
56:59
Speaker 1: ask about something we brought up a little bit ago, though, Kip.
57:02
Speaker 1: I want to rewind the tape just a little bit
57:05
Speaker 1: and get back to c w D because I feel
57:08
Speaker 1: like if if I were taking the temperature of the
57:10
Speaker 1: white tail hunting community and asking them, you know, what
57:12
Speaker 1: do you think the state is of of white tail
57:16
Speaker 1: these days, whether it be the quality of hunting or
57:18
Speaker 1: or just what's kind of bubbling into the surface as
57:20
Speaker 1: far as tensions or questions or debates. And it's been
57:24
Speaker 1: around for quite a while now that the talk around
57:27
Speaker 1: c w D, but I do feel like more recently
57:30
Speaker 1: there's been there's been a little bit more of a
57:33
Speaker 1: vocal pushback on c w D management, on c w
57:39
Speaker 1: D as an issue at all, um some some kind
57:42
Speaker 1: of somewhat prominent voices dissenting on the public the most
57:49
Speaker 1: common opinions on it. So I guess that's a long
57:52
Speaker 1: winded way of me saying, Kip, where do you feel
57:55
Speaker 1: we stand right now with c w D as far
57:57
Speaker 1: as the threat it poses, as far as our reaction
58:01
Speaker 1: to it, And what are your thoughts on some of
58:04
Speaker 1: the I don't know if you want to call them
58:06
Speaker 1: deniers or the naysayers on how we're trying to manage
58:09
Speaker 1: c to B Where where are you at on all
58:11
Speaker 1: this and where do you feel like when we look
58:13
Speaker 1: at the state of things, which do we stand as
58:14
Speaker 1: a whole? H I've either been conducting research on deer
58:19
Speaker 1: or managing deer hunters for for over twenty five years now,
58:23
Speaker 1: and c w D is by far the single biggest
58:26
Speaker 1: issue that has arisen during my career and I'm guessing
58:30
Speaker 1: will be for for the remainder of my career. C
58:34
Speaker 1: w D is is very important. UM. I think that
58:37
Speaker 1: is a huge issue. But I also think that's one
58:40
Speaker 1: of the most complex and most misunderstood issues UM, partly
58:44
Speaker 1: because of the way that it attacks a deerheart. UM.
58:48
Speaker 1: If you take a look at the wildlife experts today,
58:51
Speaker 1: who are who are researching this and who are are
58:53
Speaker 1: studying this UM, there's a lot we don't know about
58:57
Speaker 1: the disease. UM. You know, when we've put millions of
58:59
Speaker 1: ours and then a lot of time into it. Uh,
59:02
Speaker 1: there is a lot we do know, but there's still
59:04
Speaker 1: a lot we don't know. And because of that, that
59:07
Speaker 1: creates room for a lot of people to argue or
59:11
Speaker 1: you know, dismiss a management technique strategy that somebody else
59:16
Speaker 1: has suggested. So there's there's no doubt that we have
59:20
Speaker 1: a lot yet to learn. However, if you take a
59:23
Speaker 1: look at the vast majority of the people who are
59:25
Speaker 1: really studying this UM, the by far most of them
59:31
Speaker 1: side on this side that hey, you know, this is
59:34
Speaker 1: a really big issue and something that has warmed and uh,
59:38
Speaker 1: the attention that it's getting. Um, there are certainly some
59:41
Speaker 1: who don't believe that, some wildlife experts that that are
59:44
Speaker 1: on the other side of the issue. Um. If you
59:47
Speaker 1: take a look though, that the number of folks on
59:49
Speaker 1: who don't think this is a big deal and that
59:51
Speaker 1: this is all blown smoke, the number is is very
59:55
Speaker 1: small and uh. And I think one big difference between
59:58
Speaker 1: the two sides is the side that tends to say
1:00:00
Speaker 1: that this is not a big deal and hunters don't
1:00:03
Speaker 1: need to be concerned. Um. Almost all the folks on
1:00:06
Speaker 1: that side worked primarily with captive deer hurts. Um, and
1:00:09
Speaker 1: this is nothing negative at all to captive deer or
1:00:12
Speaker 1: deer farmers. That's not what I mean. I share that
1:00:15
Speaker 1: to say, the vast majority of deer researchers and managers
1:00:19
Speaker 1: who work with wild deer with free range and deer
1:00:22
Speaker 1: think that this is a really big issue. And I
1:00:24
Speaker 1: think it's important for the hunter to understand that when
1:00:26
Speaker 1: when they hear, you know, all this is an issue
1:00:29
Speaker 1: or this is not, I think they really need to
1:00:31
Speaker 1: take a look at who's saying that you know, and
1:00:33
Speaker 1: what what side of the fence are they coming from?
1:00:36
Speaker 1: And uh, So I think there are certainly some things
1:00:39
Speaker 1: that we know with regard to c w D that
1:00:42
Speaker 1: can help. From the captive side. For instance, you know,
1:00:45
Speaker 1: there's the one genotype of deer that appears to be
1:00:47
Speaker 1: a little more resistant to the disease and uh and
1:00:50
Speaker 1: captive folks are you know, are breeding that to help them,
1:00:52
Speaker 1: And I think that's great, uh for us. On the
1:00:54
Speaker 1: free ranging side, that doesn't really help us though, because
1:00:57
Speaker 1: that genotype does exist in the wild, but it doesn't
1:01:00
Speaker 1: do very well with mother nature. She reads them out quickly,
1:01:03
Speaker 1: so you know, unless you can take care of that
1:01:06
Speaker 1: animal and then from an animal husbandry and like you
1:01:08
Speaker 1: can inside offense, it doesn't really help us. So I
1:01:11
Speaker 1: think it's very important for hunters to just realize, you know,
1:01:14
Speaker 1: who is given them information, you know, and what what
1:01:17
Speaker 1: animals are manage it. So we've fall on the side
1:01:20
Speaker 1: of we're taking care of free ranging deer and this
1:01:22
Speaker 1: is a really big issue for them, but by far
1:01:25
Speaker 1: the biggest issue of my time and then probably yours
1:01:27
Speaker 1: as well. So I think that states have tried a
1:01:33
Speaker 1: few different things. M I'm very encouraged to see states
1:01:37
Speaker 1: like Pennsylvania now actually trying something different, you know, an
1:01:40
Speaker 1: alternative management strategy, which I think is very good because
1:01:43
Speaker 1: we don't have a lot of success stories what we've
1:01:45
Speaker 1: done so far. However, what we do know is that
1:01:48
Speaker 1: if we don't uh find a success story or change
1:01:52
Speaker 1: what is going on, you know, the future of deer
1:01:54
Speaker 1: hunting is not good for any of us. And we
1:01:58
Speaker 1: have so many hunters that say, well, I'm not in
1:02:00
Speaker 1: all these dead deer. You know, it's just really a
1:02:02
Speaker 1: big deal. It really is, because even though we don't
1:02:05
Speaker 1: find a lot of dead deer from it, the research
1:02:08
Speaker 1: shows that do with c w D die at three
1:02:11
Speaker 1: times the rate that those that don't. They just end
1:02:13
Speaker 1: up dying to predators or guns or cars or something
1:02:16
Speaker 1: else first. So we don't see that oh yeah, this
1:02:19
Speaker 1: was impacted by c w D. So since hunters don't
1:02:21
Speaker 1: see it and they think it's not a big deal.
1:02:23
Speaker 1: But but that's not true, that's not true at all.
1:02:26
Speaker 1: So ut I think it's a huge deal. Um. I
1:02:29
Speaker 1: think that it warrants the attention that we give it.
1:02:31
Speaker 1: And man, I really wish that from the wildlife community side,
1:02:35
Speaker 1: you know, we could be a little more on the
1:02:37
Speaker 1: same page with what we are actually saying or what
1:02:40
Speaker 1: information we're sharing, because it doesn't do any of us
1:02:43
Speaker 1: any good to spread, you know, inaccuracies like we don't
1:02:48
Speaker 1: know if it's a disease or it's just a condition.
1:02:49
Speaker 1: That that's not true at all. We know absolutely it's
1:02:51
Speaker 1: a disease, but hunters are kind of scared of it.
1:02:53
Speaker 1: So if they hear somebody say what they want to hear, boy,
1:02:56
Speaker 1: they really gravitate to that and then hope the problem
1:02:59
Speaker 1: is going to go away. But that's not the case
1:03:01
Speaker 1: of this, and Mark, this is not going to go
1:03:02
Speaker 1: away with us without us alt. Are there any other
1:03:06
Speaker 1: common inaccuracies that you hear getting put out there today
1:03:10
Speaker 1: that every time you hear it makes you cringe? Like,
1:03:12
Speaker 1: are there any other like very popular inaccuracies that you
1:03:15
Speaker 1: want to correct? Your real quick the big ones you know,
1:03:18
Speaker 1: I often hear as well. We don't find dead deer
1:03:20
Speaker 1: all over the place. So these deer, even if they
1:03:23
Speaker 1: have c w D, you know, they're still reproducing. So
1:03:26
Speaker 1: we're okay, Um, that's that's not true because since they
1:03:31
Speaker 1: die at three times the rate of other deer, you know,
1:03:34
Speaker 1: at some point, when you get enough of that deerhood
1:03:36
Speaker 1: that is CWD positive, they are going to be dying,
1:03:39
Speaker 1: you know, quicker than they can reproduce themselves. So our
1:03:41
Speaker 1: deer herbs start dropping and dropping. And you take any
1:03:45
Speaker 1: deer head right now, all of a sudden, you add
1:03:47
Speaker 1: you know, a twenty or thirty percent mortality rate on
1:03:50
Speaker 1: top of that. That is very quickly you can realize, wow,
1:03:53
Speaker 1: I'm going to have a lot less deer to shoot
1:03:54
Speaker 1: in the future. I'm gonna see a lot fewer deer um.
1:03:57
Speaker 1: So that that is a big one part. Because a
1:04:00
Speaker 1: c w D insultrates a deer herd. You know, we
1:04:03
Speaker 1: don't really notice any difference until it gets to the
1:04:06
Speaker 1: point where it has affected a large portion of it,
1:04:10
Speaker 1: and then we are going to see dramatic population to clients.
1:04:13
Speaker 1: If the thing is though, once it gets to that point,
1:04:16
Speaker 1: you know, we have no way of stopping it. So
1:04:18
Speaker 1: we need to stop it right now, or at least
1:04:20
Speaker 1: slow the spread. While there's only you know, one or
1:04:24
Speaker 1: two or maybe even five percent of a deer herd
1:04:27
Speaker 1: is uh impacted. You know, once we get to what
1:04:29
Speaker 1: we're seeing in Wisconsin, now, you know we're or CWD positive.
1:04:35
Speaker 1: You know, we're gonna start seeing major changes in that
1:04:37
Speaker 1: Wisconsin deer heard in the near future, and unfortunately we
1:04:41
Speaker 1: can't stop it. So we need all these other states
1:04:43
Speaker 1: need to stop in their place before they get to
1:04:46
Speaker 1: what was consint is about to experience. Yeah. So so
1:04:50
Speaker 1: that brings us to the next big point of contention
1:04:52
Speaker 1: for a lot of people, which are the management strategies
1:04:55
Speaker 1: in places where they do find CWD. So a lot
1:04:58
Speaker 1: of people point to, you know, one of the commonly
1:05:01
Speaker 1: held grapes is that while we found out we had
1:05:03
Speaker 1: c w D, and then you know, then the agencies
1:05:06
Speaker 1: just kill all the deer or they come and they
1:05:08
Speaker 1: wipe out the deer herds. They kill way more deer
1:05:10
Speaker 1: than the disease does. Um, so there's a lot of
1:05:13
Speaker 1: concern around that. Um, where do you feel like things?
1:05:19
Speaker 1: I know you mentioned that we haven't really found a
1:05:21
Speaker 1: great successful example yet of the right management or reactive
1:05:25
Speaker 1: strategy is to c w D. But the Pennsylvania is
1:05:28
Speaker 1: trying something different. Um, can you speak to what Pennsylvania's
1:05:32
Speaker 1: trying and or where you and qtm A see the
1:05:36
Speaker 1: best opportunities lying as far as the next thing to
1:05:39
Speaker 1: try sure. I think that that there has never been
1:05:43
Speaker 1: an issue that's going to require more cooperation and partnership
1:05:47
Speaker 1: between the state wilife agencies and hunters than this. Never
1:05:50
Speaker 1: before we needed to work more closely together. So we
1:05:54
Speaker 1: encourage agencies to reach out and partner with hunters and
1:05:57
Speaker 1: unprecedented levels share information, um, you know, do everything possible
1:06:02
Speaker 1: to provide multiple, multiple opportunities for the information why this
1:06:07
Speaker 1: is important, how this can help? So I think that
1:06:10
Speaker 1: is what has to happen. And from the hunters, they
1:06:12
Speaker 1: need to engage the agency, you know, and ask questions,
1:06:14
Speaker 1: ask how they can help, you know, how they can
1:06:16
Speaker 1: be a part of the solution for this. So a
1:06:19
Speaker 1: good example about it right now, what's going on in Pennsylvania,
1:06:22
Speaker 1: And this certainly is not without convention. Here there's a
1:06:26
Speaker 1: lot of hunters very upset. But in one of our
1:06:28
Speaker 1: disease management areas of two counties of Bedford and Blair Counties,
1:06:33
Speaker 1: the Game Commission has been monitoring the prevalence rate to
1:06:36
Speaker 1: c w D since two thousand and twelve when I
1:06:38
Speaker 1: was first identified there. And essentially what's happened has that's
1:06:41
Speaker 1: gone from you know, less than one percent of the
1:06:43
Speaker 1: deer habit and it's climbed right up now to about
1:06:45
Speaker 1: five percent of the deer habit and if you take
1:06:48
Speaker 1: a look at that, it's following the same c w
1:06:50
Speaker 1: D prevalence rate trajectory that Wisconsin and West Virginia have.
1:06:55
Speaker 1: So if we continue what we're doing right now, which is,
1:06:57
Speaker 1: you know, trying to manage it and shoot some extra deer,
1:07:01
Speaker 1: it's very realistic market in the next decade that prevalence
1:07:04
Speaker 1: rate is going to go from five percent of the
1:07:06
Speaker 1: deer to the deer so not good. We know if
1:07:10
Speaker 1: what we're doing right now continues, the future is very bleak.
1:07:13
Speaker 1: That's not going to be good. So with the Game
1:07:15
Speaker 1: Commission said, hey, let's do this. We want to reduce
1:07:18
Speaker 1: the number of deer in that area to a certain level.
1:07:22
Speaker 1: And the good thing is they feel that looking at
1:07:25
Speaker 1: data from Colorado and Illinois, they both have some success
1:07:29
Speaker 1: stories of doing what are doing something very similar to
1:07:32
Speaker 1: what the Pennsylvania Game Commission is going to try. Now
1:07:35
Speaker 1: by reducing those numbers, they can maintain the prevalence rate
1:07:39
Speaker 1: where it is and not allowed me to climb. And
1:07:41
Speaker 1: that's really what we need to do is slow the
1:07:43
Speaker 1: spread of this disease until the science can catch up
1:07:46
Speaker 1: and you know, and help us solve this problem. So
1:07:49
Speaker 1: what the Game Commission said is, we know, if we
1:07:51
Speaker 1: continue what we're doing now, the future is not good. However,
1:07:55
Speaker 1: let's go in reduce the number of deer and try
1:07:57
Speaker 1: to hold this rate right at this five cent level.
1:08:01
Speaker 1: So to do that, they increase the antalyst tags for
1:08:04
Speaker 1: that area. They increased our d map coupons, which is
1:08:08
Speaker 1: Deer Management Assistance Program coupons, which allow landowners to harvest
1:08:12
Speaker 1: additional antalysts deer. You know, we want to take this
1:08:14
Speaker 1: deer level down to what they're saying, there's two thousand
1:08:19
Speaker 1: deer in this study area. So hunters got the first
1:08:23
Speaker 1: chance to do that, and they certainly took some. They
1:08:27
Speaker 1: didn't take as many as a game commission wanted. So
1:08:30
Speaker 1: here in the very near future, Wildlife Services is going
1:08:33
Speaker 1: through the U. S d A. It's going to go
1:08:34
Speaker 1: in and sharp shoot some additional deer to bring that
1:08:38
Speaker 1: deer herd down to about two thousand. They think that
1:08:43
Speaker 1: they can hold the level there. Well, what's going to
1:08:46
Speaker 1: happen is, you know, hunters here, Oh my gosh, they're
1:08:48
Speaker 1: killing all these deer. You know, and then you see
1:08:50
Speaker 1: the size. It's a deer slaughter, it's a dearer eradication,
1:08:53
Speaker 1: and those are the things that we really have to
1:08:55
Speaker 1: guard against because, yes, they are taking some there, they're
1:08:58
Speaker 1: probably going to shoot about two thousand deer in there. However,
1:09:02
Speaker 1: they're not eradicating the deer. There's still going to be
1:09:05
Speaker 1: a very honorable population left. And what the deer bods
1:09:08
Speaker 1: from the Game Commission estimate is once they reach that
1:09:11
Speaker 1: target goal, the deer density in that area is still
1:09:15
Speaker 1: going to be equivalent to the average deer density in
1:09:18
Speaker 1: every state that surrounds Pennsylvania. So there'll be fewer deer, yes,
1:09:23
Speaker 1: but still a very honorable population, you know, and in
1:09:26
Speaker 1: the name of protecting our future. So that is very good.
1:09:30
Speaker 1: So we support that. Now, what really needs to happen
1:09:34
Speaker 1: is better messaging from the Game Commission to just be
1:09:37
Speaker 1: out talking to hunters everywhere saying we're not eradicating deer.
1:09:40
Speaker 1: We're not, you know, eliminating your dear herd. You know,
1:09:43
Speaker 1: we are reducing it, but you're still gonna have a
1:09:45
Speaker 1: very honorable population, and kind of explain all that. You know.
1:09:49
Speaker 1: Messaging I think is key on this because you know,
1:09:52
Speaker 1: a lot of hunters don't hear from the game commissioner,
1:09:55
Speaker 1: hear what's happening, and as soon as their body tells
1:09:57
Speaker 1: them all they're gonna wipe all the deer out, Well,
1:10:00
Speaker 1: then they are just a bad trash and then that's
1:10:04
Speaker 1: not good for anybody. Yeah, it seems like so much
1:10:08
Speaker 1: of c w D management is hunter management, and that
1:10:14
Speaker 1: you have to find a way to address the disease
1:10:16
Speaker 1: concerns while also maintaining collaboration with the hunting public right
1:10:20
Speaker 1: and I feel like that's where we're losing in some
1:10:22
Speaker 1: areas in some states, there's a lot of nectivity around it. One, um,
1:10:28
Speaker 1: one aspect of this in which I know that I've
1:10:30
Speaker 1: read some stuff from you guys where you've specifically that
1:10:35
Speaker 1: it's really important to try to address c w D
1:10:37
Speaker 1: in a way that still maintains hunter engagement. And one
1:10:39
Speaker 1: of the things you talked about was maintaining the ability
1:10:42
Speaker 1: for hunters to still managed for older age class box
1:10:46
Speaker 1: and hunt older age class box if they if they
1:10:48
Speaker 1: choose to do so, because that's obviously been something that
1:10:51
Speaker 1: a lot of hunters are interested in doing these days.
1:10:53
Speaker 1: Um So this brings us to one of the management
1:10:55
Speaker 1: strategies c w D. You, here's some folks saying, well,
1:10:59
Speaker 1: Buck are if I if I get if you've got
1:11:02
Speaker 1: this ratio right, correct me if I'm wrong, But I
1:11:04
Speaker 1: believe that on average two out of three c w
1:11:07
Speaker 1: D positives are Bucks, So Bucks, for whatever reasons, seem
1:11:11
Speaker 1: to have it more often. And then also I think
1:11:13
Speaker 1: I remember reading that older age class Bucks tend to
1:11:17
Speaker 1: have it more often. Um, if I'm wrong there too,
1:11:20
Speaker 1: But all that's to say that I've heard some people
1:11:23
Speaker 1: say that some people that are very aggressive with managing
1:11:25
Speaker 1: c w D has said we gotta kill them all,
1:11:27
Speaker 1: like kill or sorry. They want to kill Bucks right away.
1:11:31
Speaker 1: So they're saying, no more managing for older age class Bucks.
1:11:33
Speaker 1: We're gonna kill them in a year and a half old. Um,
1:11:36
Speaker 1: while I've heard others say, well, does that mean you
1:11:38
Speaker 1: can't have any kind of quality deer management anymore? While
1:11:41
Speaker 1: also caring about c w D. What what is your
1:11:45
Speaker 1: take on that? Kip? And I know that QDA may
1:11:47
Speaker 1: has has kind of shared some thoughts on that as well.
1:11:49
Speaker 1: Can you elaborate? Sure? There's really two different main strategies
1:11:55
Speaker 1: of agencies have taken with regard to managing c w D,
1:11:58
Speaker 1: you know, focus on harvest effor really on the buck
1:12:00
Speaker 1: side to drive that age structure young. And many states
1:12:07
Speaker 1: have followed that. Those are the states that then remove
1:12:09
Speaker 1: the ant the restriction on yearling bucks and you try
1:12:12
Speaker 1: to kill those years before they can disperse, because you
1:12:15
Speaker 1: have bucks tend to have a higher prevalence rate than
1:12:17
Speaker 1: those and then as they get older, that prevalence rate increases.
1:12:21
Speaker 1: So on paper, it says, you know what the best
1:12:24
Speaker 1: way to fight this disease is to keep populations low
1:12:28
Speaker 1: and to keep age structures very young. And U That
1:12:31
Speaker 1: works great on paper, but that's not the real world.
1:12:35
Speaker 1: And you know, in the in the real world, you
1:12:37
Speaker 1: need hunters to execute your plan. So you can have
1:12:40
Speaker 1: the best CWD plan from your state Wilde agency, but
1:12:43
Speaker 1: if hunters don't support it, they're not going to execute it.
1:12:46
Speaker 1: And if they don't execute it, you know it's not
1:12:47
Speaker 1: gonna work. So what we have said is sure we
1:12:51
Speaker 1: understand that oldest bucks tend to have a higher prevalence
1:12:54
Speaker 1: rate to c w D. However, for hunters to want
1:12:58
Speaker 1: to stay engage and in you to be supportive of
1:13:01
Speaker 1: agency programs and harvest analyst, dear, you know, they need
1:13:04
Speaker 1: to be motivated, and in many cases that motivation comes
1:13:07
Speaker 1: from the opportunity to photograph and hunt older bucks. So
1:13:11
Speaker 1: we feel this far better to have some older bucks
1:13:14
Speaker 1: in the population if that keeps hunters engaged and then
1:13:18
Speaker 1: keeps them supporting the agency harvesting at Lewis deer and
1:13:22
Speaker 1: supporting overall wildlife programs. So that that is our take
1:13:26
Speaker 1: on it, and partly that comes from research out of
1:13:29
Speaker 1: Wisconsin that shows that, uh, from the dough side, if
1:13:33
Speaker 1: for an adult dough is CWD positive, uh, any of
1:13:37
Speaker 1: her relatives nearby are ten times more likely to be
1:13:40
Speaker 1: c w D positive than another dough in area that's
1:13:43
Speaker 1: not related to her. So essentially what happens is, you
1:13:46
Speaker 1: know these aunt Lewis dear they can become reservoirs of
1:13:50
Speaker 1: c w D. You know that we may never get
1:13:52
Speaker 1: rid of. So we don't think that you should allow
1:13:55
Speaker 1: all these bucks to become fully mature. That's not it
1:13:57
Speaker 1: at all, But we think it's far it are to
1:14:00
Speaker 1: allow some of them to do that, to keep those
1:14:03
Speaker 1: hunters hunting and keep those ant lists, deer herbs or
1:14:06
Speaker 1: anti aside, you know, trimmed down, so the deer herds
1:14:09
Speaker 1: don't grow, you know, to be far too high and
1:14:11
Speaker 1: then spread it from the antles side as well. And
1:14:15
Speaker 1: that's really the tax that Pennsylvania has taken. You know,
1:14:17
Speaker 1: they maintain their antly restrictions. They are really focused on effort,
1:14:22
Speaker 1: harvest effort on the antlest side and UH and Q
1:14:25
Speaker 1: and ay's opinion, and in my professional opinion, that is
1:14:27
Speaker 1: a better tax to take. And then partly because UM
1:14:32
Speaker 1: with regard to UH sex ratio differences in CWD prevalence,
1:14:37
Speaker 1: some states tend to be you know, a lot more
1:14:41
Speaker 1: positive in bucks. As you said, nationally, about two thirds
1:14:44
Speaker 1: of vologer that a CW deposit that we've identified our bucks.
1:14:49
Speaker 1: Some of that's a little bit of a sampling bias though,
1:14:51
Speaker 1: where we just sample a lot more bucks, because you
1:14:53
Speaker 1: have some states like Pennsylvania and Illinois and Texas that
1:14:58
Speaker 1: of all the deer they found it CBD positive, it's
1:15:01
Speaker 1: a lot closer to fifty bucks and does so so
1:15:05
Speaker 1: it's not always just the bus um. We have to
1:15:08
Speaker 1: really do a good job to manage both sides of
1:15:10
Speaker 1: the deer population to be effective at this. Yeah. So
1:15:14
Speaker 1: so everything you just said there I think supports what
1:15:17
Speaker 1: I'm next going to say, and you set it yourself
1:15:19
Speaker 1: a few minutes ago. That being that, a lot of
1:15:22
Speaker 1: what we're trying to do, it seems from a management
1:15:24
Speaker 1: side of things with c w D is simply stem
1:15:28
Speaker 1: the stem, that stem the tide a little bit, slow
1:15:30
Speaker 1: things down enough so that the research and science can
1:15:33
Speaker 1: catch up until we can find real concrete solutions. Um,
1:15:37
Speaker 1: is there anything on the research side over the last
1:15:39
Speaker 1: year or two and anything positive that's worth sharing? Have
1:15:42
Speaker 1: we learn anything new that's substantial? Have have there been
1:15:45
Speaker 1: any advances or anything encouraging that's that's worth the mentioning? Well,
1:15:49
Speaker 1: there there's always continue to try to develop a better
1:15:52
Speaker 1: live animal test, which is very good. Um, we don't
1:15:56
Speaker 1: have a great one yet, but just the fact that
1:15:59
Speaker 1: we continue to try to find one is very good. Uh.
1:16:02
Speaker 1: They're recognizing the need to have a quicker and more
1:16:05
Speaker 1: reliable field test for hunters as more hunters now have
1:16:10
Speaker 1: to hunt in these areas you know, as you know
1:16:13
Speaker 1: in Michigan where if you shoot a deer in the
1:16:15
Speaker 1: c deer you have it tested. Anyway, you will have
1:16:18
Speaker 1: it tested. And then Uh, Michigan last year said a
1:16:21
Speaker 1: goal of having the fastest turnaround time in the country
1:16:25
Speaker 1: hunter turns that test in, they get the results within
1:16:28
Speaker 1: two weeks. And for hunters who are not impacted by
1:16:31
Speaker 1: as I think two weeks, you have to wait two
1:16:33
Speaker 1: weeks to know. Um that is much clearer than others.
1:16:36
Speaker 1: So that's a long time to have to wake. So
1:16:38
Speaker 1: if we had a more quicker test, you know, the
1:16:41
Speaker 1: hunters could find out you know, within you know, a
1:16:44
Speaker 1: day or an hour or something. You know, we're not
1:16:47
Speaker 1: there yet, but that would be so helpful. And at
1:16:49
Speaker 1: least people are looking to try to do that. UM
1:16:52
Speaker 1: So no success story there yet, but the fact that
1:16:55
Speaker 1: we are looking and trying just lets us know that,
1:16:57
Speaker 1: you know, we are one step closer to the up
1:17:00
Speaker 1: and and that's very important. Yeah. I actually just saw
1:17:02
Speaker 1: an article yesterday, I think UM talking about a new
1:17:06
Speaker 1: test that they're working on over in Minnesota. I think
1:17:09
Speaker 1: the University of Minnesota is is seeking some funding for this.
1:17:12
Speaker 1: I think they just asked for a two million dollar
1:17:14
Speaker 1: grant from the state legislature to to look at something
1:17:17
Speaker 1: that it's I can't remember exactly how this works, but
1:17:20
Speaker 1: there's a way that they're able to take samples from
1:17:23
Speaker 1: even something like saliva or deer droppings and they can
1:17:26
Speaker 1: test it and instead of a two week turnaround period
1:17:29
Speaker 1: on getting that positive result back or whatever result back,
1:17:32
Speaker 1: they can now see a positive or negative result back
1:17:35
Speaker 1: and just hours with this new tool they have kind
1:17:37
Speaker 1: of it's more of a camera based tool. UM. So
1:17:41
Speaker 1: I don't I don't know if that's gonna end up
1:17:42
Speaker 1: being something that ends up being the solution, but it
1:17:45
Speaker 1: was interesting to see something new being tried there, and UM,
1:17:48
Speaker 1: like you said, we we certainly need some some wins
1:17:51
Speaker 1: on that front. I also saw um and wrote about
1:17:53
Speaker 1: this late last year. There's been a handful of different
1:17:56
Speaker 1: bills introduced nationally to try to increase funding for new
1:18:00
Speaker 1: research UM and an additional testing and science done around this.
1:18:05
Speaker 1: I think that's that's an easy thing that we as
1:18:07
Speaker 1: deer hunters can do is kind of get behind some
1:18:09
Speaker 1: of those things, right kick and encourage our lawmakers to
1:18:12
Speaker 1: to to appropriate some funding to that research, to to
1:18:15
Speaker 1: prioritize that kind of stuff. UM. Is there anything on
1:18:19
Speaker 1: that front that you think is worth us mentioning and
1:18:21
Speaker 1: touching on? Absolutely? And you are exactly right. You know.
1:18:25
Speaker 1: Back in another early two thousand's one CWD was first
1:18:29
Speaker 1: identified in Wisconsin and uh, there was a fair amount
1:18:33
Speaker 1: of federal funding funding I'm sorry, you know, close to
1:18:35
Speaker 1: twenty million dollars a year to provide help and information
1:18:39
Speaker 1: on that. And really once they decided that, you know what,
1:18:42
Speaker 1: this probably cannot impact humans, almost all of that federal
1:18:46
Speaker 1: funding dried up. So because of that, there's a real
1:18:49
Speaker 1: lack of funds for research today on this. So yeah,
1:18:53
Speaker 1: those bills that you mentioned, there's actually three main bills
1:18:56
Speaker 1: that would all help tremendously from from the government and
1:19:00
Speaker 1: with regard to funding for research and funding for state
1:19:04
Speaker 1: agencies to try alternative management strategies. Um, those are really big.
1:19:09
Speaker 1: So yeah, that's something every hunter can do is let
1:19:11
Speaker 1: their his or her legislator no, you know what, I
1:19:13
Speaker 1: support these, you know, please you support them as well,
1:19:16
Speaker 1: and they'll take a big sportsman's push to make that happen.
1:19:19
Speaker 1: But that would that would be a huge step forward
1:19:22
Speaker 1: in the battle against c w D. Yeah, I'll make
1:19:24
Speaker 1: sure to include in the links on this podcast post
1:19:29
Speaker 1: the names of those specific bills and and how you
1:19:32
Speaker 1: can take some action on that and let your lawmakers know,
1:19:34
Speaker 1: because I think that's that's a simple thing we can
1:19:37
Speaker 1: do that could really help whether you. You You know, and
1:19:39
Speaker 1: I mentioned this last December when I wrote about this,
1:19:42
Speaker 1: whether you believe everything we're talking about here that CWD
1:19:46
Speaker 1: really isn't a big issue, or even if you are
1:19:48
Speaker 1: on the other set of issue and you think it's
1:19:50
Speaker 1: all overblown. Either way, both all of us want answers, right,
1:19:54
Speaker 1: We want more research to clarify whatever position is, and
1:19:58
Speaker 1: so getting funding for that additional research UM is crucial.
1:20:02
Speaker 1: And we all want answers, whether that's going to agree
1:20:04
Speaker 1: without our preconceived notions or not. We need answers, and
1:20:07
Speaker 1: I think this is one way to do that. So
1:20:09
Speaker 1: highly recommend everyone, if you've got an extra five minutes
1:20:12
Speaker 1: to just send a quick email to your senators or
1:20:14
Speaker 1: your representatives and UM and ask them to focus on
1:20:17
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff and keep I know you're you're
1:20:19
Speaker 1: coming up on time here, So I guess I kind
1:20:22
Speaker 1: of just want to give you an opportunity to to
1:20:25
Speaker 1: a share if there's if there's anything else to top
1:20:27
Speaker 1: of your mind as far as what's encouraging or what's
1:20:29
Speaker 1: concerning moving forward. UM would love to hear any final
1:20:33
Speaker 1: other points you think are worth mentioning, and if not
1:20:36
Speaker 1: anything on that front, just what call to action you
1:20:38
Speaker 1: might have for all of us as far as UM
1:20:40
Speaker 1: what we use deer hunters can do moving forward to
1:20:42
Speaker 1: make sure the state of white tails is even more
1:20:45
Speaker 1: positive in two thousand twenty got you. Well, there's a
1:20:49
Speaker 1: tremendous amount of other information in the white Tail Report
1:20:52
Speaker 1: that the hunters would be interested in, such as where
1:20:55
Speaker 1: you can use tracking dogs to to locate multi big game,
1:20:59
Speaker 1: UM do processors, what states you what do wildlife surveys
1:21:03
Speaker 1: or habitat surveys, and a whole host of other things.
1:21:06
Speaker 1: But the one point that I will end with and
1:21:08
Speaker 1: in action market. This is the first time that I
1:21:11
Speaker 1: have shared this data because I just found this out
1:21:14
Speaker 1: and uh it actually every year in the report where
1:21:17
Speaker 1: I said we have the total number of antlid bucks
1:21:19
Speaker 1: harvest and anatalists deer harvested UM this year that that
1:21:23
Speaker 1: total list actually lacks one state, which is Alabama, because
1:21:27
Speaker 1: there was an issue with their deer harvest numbers that
1:21:30
Speaker 1: wasn't resolved by the time we published our report. So
1:21:33
Speaker 1: we published the data from everybody accept them. Well, now
1:21:37
Speaker 1: I have their data. So this literally is the first
1:21:40
Speaker 1: time that I have shared this information with anybody. So
1:21:43
Speaker 1: you you have to sell ss of this um last
1:21:48
Speaker 1: year to the two thousand seventeen hunting season, uh is
1:21:52
Speaker 1: the first time since, so it's been a long time.
1:21:58
Speaker 1: The season was the first season since the season that
1:22:02
Speaker 1: hunters in the US shot more antler bucks than antalyst deer.
1:22:07
Speaker 1: There's a big deal, you know, in the first time ever,
1:22:11
Speaker 1: we shot more analysts deer and then got on the
1:22:13
Speaker 1: road to really balance and deer hers of habitat and
1:22:16
Speaker 1: being good deer stewarts, and uh, following that, we had
1:22:20
Speaker 1: big gaps. You know, we shot way more analysts in
1:22:23
Speaker 1: the bucks. But the last few years that's been getting
1:22:25
Speaker 1: closer and closer and closer together for the reasons that
1:22:28
Speaker 1: we talked about early in this show, where we're just
1:22:31
Speaker 1: not shooting as many analysts deer as the past, and
1:22:34
Speaker 1: now that we have Alabama's data, and last year, for
1:22:37
Speaker 1: the first time since, we shot more antler bucks than
1:22:41
Speaker 1: analysts deer. So that's a milestone, you know, in waite
1:22:45
Speaker 1: tail deer management in the United States. So you're gonna
1:22:49
Speaker 1: hear a lot more about it, and you literally have
1:22:51
Speaker 1: the data first. So so what do you take from that, kid,
1:22:55
Speaker 1: when you say it's a milestone, do you view as
1:22:57
Speaker 1: a positive milestone as a negative milestone as Uh, I'm
1:23:01
Speaker 1: not sure. I mean, we talked a little bit about
1:23:03
Speaker 1: this earlier, like, what does it mean that dope antlers
1:23:05
Speaker 1: doe harvest has been going down? But when you see
1:23:07
Speaker 1: this kind of shifting of the equilibrium at a high level,
1:23:11
Speaker 1: what does that mean? I don't see it as a
1:23:14
Speaker 1: positive thing. Uh. And partly because in the vast majority
1:23:18
Speaker 1: of deer management programs, we need to harvest more ant
1:23:21
Speaker 1: lily list deer than antler bucks annually to have a
1:23:24
Speaker 1: healthy situation. Now, there are certainly some states that should
1:23:28
Speaker 1: shoot more bucks annually than than analysts here, places like
1:23:32
Speaker 1: northern New England. Um. And there are some states like
1:23:35
Speaker 1: even Nebraska, that aren't as productive as much of the country,
1:23:39
Speaker 1: so they just simply can't sustain h harvesting as many
1:23:43
Speaker 1: analysts here as bucks annually. However, for the vast majority
1:23:46
Speaker 1: of states, we absolutely should be shooting more does than
1:23:49
Speaker 1: bucks on it in any given year. Um So, the
1:23:53
Speaker 1: fact that last year we shot more antler bucks than
1:23:56
Speaker 1: does is not a positive sign for us. For a
1:23:59
Speaker 1: handful of state that's okay, but big scale across the US,
1:24:03
Speaker 1: that is not a good thing. And uh, even you know,
1:24:06
Speaker 1: we don't have to be shooting twice as many analyst
1:24:08
Speaker 1: deist bucks nationally, but the total at the end of
1:24:12
Speaker 1: the year. Uh, we're focused on too much effort on
1:24:15
Speaker 1: the buck side of up and not enough on the
1:24:17
Speaker 1: anialist side and too many states. Interesting. Well, UM, that
1:24:22
Speaker 1: is that is very interesting to hear, and to your point,
1:24:25
Speaker 1: it's probably something that we need to talk about more
1:24:27
Speaker 1: about why that's happening and what weice hunters need to
1:24:30
Speaker 1: be thinking about moving forward and making sure that we're
1:24:32
Speaker 1: not um getting too tied up in in targeting big
1:24:37
Speaker 1: mature bucks and big antlers and and forgetting about the
1:24:39
Speaker 1: management responsibilities really that we have to um. But that's
1:24:43
Speaker 1: probably a conversation for another day. So kip. For folks
1:24:46
Speaker 1: that want to find the White Tail Report who want
1:24:48
Speaker 1: to learn more about the Quality Deer Management Association and
1:24:51
Speaker 1: become members, um, where can they find that stuff? That's
1:24:55
Speaker 1: all our website market QDMA dot com And uh, and
1:24:58
Speaker 1: we'd love to say that that q d m A
1:25:00
Speaker 1: is where deer hunters belong. So anybody's deer hunter would
1:25:03
Speaker 1: love to have them be a member and help support
1:25:05
Speaker 1: the future of hunting excellent. Well, I can't, um, I
1:25:08
Speaker 1: can't recommend what you guys are doing enough to other
1:25:11
Speaker 1: folks out there if you're not a member of the
1:25:13
Speaker 1: q D may yet. It's really a terrific organization. As
1:25:15
Speaker 1: you can see from what Kip has shared, just the
1:25:18
Speaker 1: knowledge and resource of data they have out there for
1:25:20
Speaker 1: hunters is is is second to none, and they're doing
1:25:24
Speaker 1: a lot of great things for what we care about
1:25:27
Speaker 1: as well. Not to mention, they're keeping Further employed. And
1:25:30
Speaker 1: if Further is not employed, what's the wire tup podcast?
1:25:33
Speaker 1: So very good. So Kip, thank you so much for
1:25:37
Speaker 1: taking the time to be with your day. Absolutely, it's
1:25:40
Speaker 1: always good to talk to you my friends. You have
1:25:42
Speaker 1: a good day too, And there you have a guys
1:25:44
Speaker 1: another podcast in the books. I think the only thing
1:25:48
Speaker 1: worth mentioning right now is just I mean, you know,
1:25:52
Speaker 1: I say it all the time, but it's one of
1:25:54
Speaker 1: those things where I tell my wife you know, I
1:25:56
Speaker 1: love you. I tell her that all the time, but
1:25:57
Speaker 1: sometimes maybe I wonder that I tell her too many
1:26:00
Speaker 1: any times, and now she doesn't it doesn't mean anything.
1:26:02
Speaker 1: She just heard me say it so many times that
1:26:04
Speaker 1: now it's just kind of an assumed deal. Um. So
1:26:07
Speaker 1: maybe I'm making a mistake here by thanking you guys
1:26:10
Speaker 1: every week on the podcast, because maybe you just here
1:26:12
Speaker 1: and you don't even think twice about it. But I'm
1:26:14
Speaker 1: just gonna keep on doing it because it's not something
1:26:16
Speaker 1: I'm just thrown out there. It really is the truth.
1:26:19
Speaker 1: Every morning, I wake up and I go to my
1:26:21
Speaker 1: office and I start working on a podcast or an
1:26:24
Speaker 1: article or an Instagram story or whatever is I'm doing
1:26:27
Speaker 1: that day, and I have to pinch myself and I
1:26:29
Speaker 1: have to remind myself how nuts it is that I
1:26:32
Speaker 1: get to talk about deer hunting in the outdoors and
1:26:35
Speaker 1: and write about it and share my thoughts and experiences
1:26:39
Speaker 1: about it. I get to do that every day. It's
1:26:40
Speaker 1: such a blessing. It's something that I I do not
1:26:43
Speaker 1: take for granted, and I find it to be a
1:26:45
Speaker 1: responsibility that I take very seriously to us. Isn't just
1:26:48
Speaker 1: something I'm doing for myself. I'm trying to find a
1:26:49
Speaker 1: way to do something that that's helping and serving people too.
1:26:52
Speaker 1: And uh, and I thank you because you guys are
1:26:54
Speaker 1: the ones who make all that possible. So thank you
1:26:58
Speaker 1: for listening to this podcast. And I think I will
1:27:02
Speaker 1: just wrap it up by saying until then, until next time,
1:27:07
Speaker 1: stay wired to huh.