Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 736: Foundations - It's Now or Never

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Ep. 736: Foundations - It's Now or Never · Wired To Hunt Podcast

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: First Light, Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Tony Peterson.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Hey everyone, welcome to the Wire to Hunt Foundations podcast,
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: which is brought to you by First Light. I'm your host,
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: Tony Peterson, and this week's show is all about how
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: to fill one last tag before the whole thing ends
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: and we're stuck waiting on next fall. I have a
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: love hate relationship with a late season. It's a rare
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: day that I get to hunt a place that has
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: a good food source and the promise of deer just
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: pouring into the groceries to compete for some calories. During
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: the last few weeks of the season, I kind of
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: just tend to want to phone it in because I
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: know it's not going to be easy, and I'm always
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: a little burned out this time of year, and i
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: know the odds of having a fun, productive hunt aren't
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: that great. But that attitude is kind of dumb, because
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: hunting even when it's cold and the deer activity is
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: probably going to be pretty light, can still be enjoyable.
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: You just have to find the motivation to get out
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: there and then bring your a game, because tagging any
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: buzzer beater deer is a tough proposition, which is what
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: this whole episode is all about. One weird thing about
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: being a human which makes me sound I don't know,
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: like I come from the same planet as Mark Zuckerberg
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: or hell Mark Kenyan is that we have to lie
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: to ourselves all the time. Well, technically we don't have to,
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: but we do. Back when my job was just writing
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: assignments for different newspapers and magazines, and I wasn't forced
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: to be a social media influencer who wants to kick
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: his own ass every day, I procrastinated. Often having a
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: couple hundred deadlines a year keeps you in the groove.
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: But it's easy to tell yourself you'll write that piece
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: on training pheasant dogs tonight, and that you should probably
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: just go bass fishing today since it's so nice out
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: and the frog bite is on fire. And then at
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: the end of the night, the computer just sits there
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: quietly waiting for you to tap out a thousand words
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: or so, and often doesn't see your smiling mug until
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: the next morning. We lie to ourselves in a lot
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: of ways. Think about all of the fad diets out there,
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: all of the programs to take you from sitting on
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: the couch eating potato chips slathered with onion dip while
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: watching reruns of the Office, to someone with six percent
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: body fat, who can bench press a small European car,
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: and who prefers to spend his free time meditating. We
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: lie to ourselves and say that since the daily motivation
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: isn't there, we just need to commit to some program
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: like that that'll keep us accountable to ourselves. But the
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: warden is us, and he's pretty lenient and prone to
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: well lying, so we can have what we want, which
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: is not drinking a kale smoothie after running a half
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: marathon over lunch. He wants us to have cheesecake and
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: take a nap, so he tells us we can work
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: out tomorrow. When I first started working out, which was
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: a long time ago but created a lot of core
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: memories because I hated it so much, I figured out
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: pretty quickly that I had been lying to myself about
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: a lot of stuff I wasn't remotely in shape, and
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: I had the discipline of a seven year old at
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: an ice cream Sunday buffet. During my initial phases of
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: trying to be a regular gym bro, I realized that
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: lying to ourselves can go both ways, or at least,
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: you can trick yourself into doing things you don't want
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: to do, which ends up making you feel good and
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: eventually means you don't have to trick yourself a whole lot.
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: That's a tasty word salad full of mental kale, So
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: let me explain this. I love music. I think maybe
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: one of the best things about our current level of
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: technology is that you can listen to any damn song
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: you want at any time, and you can find a
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: whole bunch of new music that will make it into
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: the regular rotation. This is wonderful, especially if you're old
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: enough to remember buying tapes to listen to when you
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: were in elementary school, which sounds a little like admitting
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: that you had to dodge dinosaurs on your way to
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: drink water from the river after you woke up in
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: your cave while wearing a saber toothed tiger skull on
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: your head and a loincloth made from skunk fur anyway.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: I love music, and I thought that would carry me
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: along nicely on the current when I did some cardio
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: or picked up some heavy stuff and put it down.
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: But it didn't. The thing about trying to become a
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: runner is that your body doesn't want to do it,
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: and your brain is going to listen to your body.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: It'll ignore the sweet sounds of Reverend Maynard singing about
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: California falling into the ocean and focus entirely on the misery.
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: At least that's what happened for me. I didn't realize
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: how to take my mind out of the equation until
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: I started listening to podcasts that really interested me. Maybe
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: I'm just not a very good multitasker, but I had
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: to trick my brain in focusing on a podcast while
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: my body trudged through another slow, painful five k. That
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: discovery changed everything for me about doing cardio. It's simple,
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: kind of dumb, but it works, or at least it
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: worked for me. Now, that same strategy in the weight
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: room proved to be a disaster. I don't know why,
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: but if I am lifting weights, I need music. And
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: I'm not talking about Mariah Carey Christmas songs or the
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: theme de Frago Rock on repeat, like Mark would listen
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: to while curling five pound dumbbells. I'm talking about the
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: kind of music that makes your chest hair grow and
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: probably qualifies you to fight on the undercart of the
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: next UFC event. Think after the Burials lost in the
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: Static here or Archspire's Drone corpse Aviator. Something that turns
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: your intestines to jelly and makes you want to wrestle
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: grizzly bears. It's just a little trick to play on
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: yourself that will keep you there and working out nothing more.
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: These types of things happen in everyday life all the time.
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: We play mental games. Think about how you envision time
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: passing as you work. You probably try not to look
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: at the clock for as long as possible, sometimes so
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: you don't obsessively focus on how slow the day is
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: moving and how your boss sucks. And sometimes you just
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: want to swan dive right out of the tenth floor window.
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: These little personal lies, these mental gymnastics, they happen to
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: us all the time. In hunting too. Think about how
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: often you talk yourself into not hunting. Why, Because hunting
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: is work, it's supposed to be fun. But there is
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: a lot of labor built into everything. If not on
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: the front end of just going out and being around deer,
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: or trying to be around deer anyway, the back end
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: is certainly work. Even if you don't process your own deer,
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: killing one or shooting one is going to result in
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: some work somehow, probably stress, possibly frustration too. So we say, well,
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: you know, I'd like to go hunting before the closing bell,
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: but I only hunt public land and there aren't any
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: deer left after gun season. Or you think, the last
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: five times I set my stand, I never saw a deer,
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: why would one walk by? Now, if we do decide
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: to go, we might lie to ourselves a little more
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: since we don't expect much. We might just go someplace easy.
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: We might think, while this guy in the Outdoor Channel
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: who has killed five two hundred inch bucks said, if
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: you're not sitting on food, you're not in the late
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: season game. So you just go out to a stand
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: that you hung in September and you hope something picks
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: its way through a chisel plowed beanfield. Never mind that
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: that hunter spends his entire season hunting what is essentially
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: high fence deer without the fences, never mind that the
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: stand you hung for September deer actually sucks for a
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: north wind, and there hasn't been three calories worth of
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: food left available for the deer there since early November.
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: To put yourself in the game right now, you have
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: to trick yourself into believing you have a good plan,
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: that you have at the very least a chance. I
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: often think this is something we never talk about, but
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: it's essential to enjoying a hunt. Most of us don't
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: need to be fully snowed in with deer on any
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: given sit to enjoy it, but the mere promise of
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: seeing deer can be enough. If you don't believe you're
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: gonna see one, hunting's gonna suck, especially you know when
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: you don't see one, So you have to trick yourself
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: into believing you'll see one. How do you do this well?
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: For starters, If your cameras are pretty slow, which they
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: probably will be this time of year, and they show
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: mostly nocturnal movement, which they probably will this time of year,
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: you need to forget about them. If you don't have
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: a really good spot to hunt, cameras during a late
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: season are just playing dangerous. They will almost inevitably give
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: you a reason to not hunt, but don't fall for that. Instead,
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: ask yourself what you need to do to be in
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: the game right now. For me lately that has been
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: a lot of scouting and a lot of observation. I'm
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: not that great of a late season deer hunter. I
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: struggle with it every year, but I have killed some
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: deer up until the last day of the season, and
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: I find as the years pass, I'm more tolerant of
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: going out just to go out, even if I know
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: the odds of filling a tag are super low. But
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: it all starts with believing that you're in the game.
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: You have to put yourself there. So look at it
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: this way. How are you going to be around deer?
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: Where will they be moving? What setups do you have
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: or could you have to make it happen. A good
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: way to look at this is to think of it
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: like an early season hunt, only much much harder. You
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: want to know where the deer are likely to eat,
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: which probably isn't too heavy of a mental lift. A
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: destination food source, or the oak flat with all the
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: red oak acorns still laying around, or that prime age
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: clear cut whatever, you know, what it is. If you
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: don't start with the idea of where they'll go to
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: fill their bellies, you're in trouble. It's also a good
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: idea to make a real educated guess on where they
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: are likely betting, kind of like, well, the early season,
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: this is point a to b hunting, really, but that
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: distance might be short, at least shorter now than it
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: was three months ago, and the woods will be open,
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: and the deer aren't all that excited to deal with
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: another hunter after months of dodging arrows and bullets and
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: crossbow bolts. While this reality would, at least on paper,
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: lend itself to a turn and burn scouting mission to
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: look for sign, that's also a high risk move because
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: you're likely to bump them. Maybe that's not too big
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: of a deal, but it all depends on their sensitivity
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: to pressure where you hunt where I hunt. Mostly that
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: pressure makes them real sensitive, so I'd rather not send
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: them scrambling and blowing across the land. If you're paying attention,
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: I've recommended forgetting your trail cameras and not putting your
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: boots on the ground to cover every inch of your property,
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: which leaves what observation kind of like early season. The
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: one good thing about the late season is that the
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: deer are visible, or at least they can be if
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: you have a way to watch them. Do it. Play
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: it safe at first, if you have the time. I'm
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: always amazed when I go out in the late season
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: how easy it is to pick up movement in the
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: cover and watch as deer do their thing. Why is
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: this important? Well beyond the obvious, it gives you a
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: glimpse in of their world. If it's forty below, they
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: might be ling it straight from their beds to the food.
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: But if it's not, they often take their time. They browse,
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: they might even lay down a little sign, but generally
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: they kill time. They're not in a hurry. To most deer,
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: an open field or other food source is probably the
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: greatest threat to their existence. It's where the danger is
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: most concentrated all season, and by now, believe me, they
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: know it. They don't want to go there in daylight,
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: and often they don't. But they also don't just lay
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: down for all daylight hours either. Pay attention to the deer.
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: You see, how do they navigate their way through the cover.
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: What trees do they walk by? What patches of brush
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: do they disappear into where do they stop and stare
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: for two minutes at a time. Don't just watch them,
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: observe them. I talked about this last week too. This
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: is important, and while you're at it, plan to hunt them.
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: This might seem dumb, but the reality of watching and
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: then moving in to hunt isn't what most people think
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: it is. It takes skill. It immediately exposes you to
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: holes in your game. When you thought you just walk
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: in and saddle up. Where they went turns into a
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: mission to just find a suitable tree, because everything looks
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: different at twenty yards versus one hundred and fifty. The
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: more info you have on the way in to hunt,
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: the more likely you are to find a suitable ambush point,
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: or realize you can slip into a stand or blind
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: you already have and use that to your advantage. While
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: you're doing this, do something else for me. Forget about
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: big bucks for a few days. Forget about the fact
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: that you started the season thinking it would be a
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: one forty year bust. Those days are gone. That goal,
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: which is great, is an early season goal for most
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: of us. This is the time to do something I
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: preach about a lot, which is to just hunt deer, dose, pahone,
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: scrapper Bucks, two hundred inch typicals, they're all on the menu.
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: But here's the thing. If you can't get within range
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: of a button buck right now, you're not going to
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: get in range of a five and a half year
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: old stud. Remember when I told you that I listened
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: to an alarming amount of German death metal when I
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: lift weights so that I keep going when I don't
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: want to hunting any and all deer is like that.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: It's the Romstein of late season deer hunting. It's so
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: much easier to go hunting when you know it's going
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: to be really difficult, and you lower your standards right
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: to the floor. Do you want to know what's crazy
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: about that? Even if you wouldn't stoop so low as
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: to ever consider shooting a fo, you probably can't get
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: one in front of you in the last week of
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: the season anyway. It's that hard. I think that rattles
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: around in the back of our minds and we know it.
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: I think that's a big motivator to stay home, because
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: we don't want to encounter the reality that we might
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: not be the trophy hunting studs we'd like to be.
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: But this is exactly how you get better at this stuff.
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: You recognize whatever opportunity is in front of you, and
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: you figure out a way to lace up your boots
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: and get out there. You don't acknowledge that nagging voice
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: that says it's not worth it. You find a way
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: to go. It might just be that you want to
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: doe in the freezer, or you just don't want to
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: waste the last days of the season, whatever it is,
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: find that motivation. And if you're worried about shooting a
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: scrapper or a dough fund and having your buddies give
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: you shit, forget it, or worse, you're worried about keyboard
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: warriors you'll never meet giving you shit, forget it. They
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: aren't out there arrowing the hardest dear to kill all season.
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: They're sitting at home, eating chips lathered an onion dip
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: and laughing at Michael Scott's management style. They aren't getting better.
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: But you will be, or you could be. It just
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: takes the right motivation and a plan to get out
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: there and see some deer, and if you're lucky enough
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: to see them, you're lucky enough to have a loose
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: foundation for a successful late season deer hunt, and you
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: know what, if you go out and do this, even
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: if you know the odds are low, you're going to
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: carry that lesson with you. Sometimes the late season deer
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: do cooperate, and a little bit of that success, mixed
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: in with the reality of not filling tags is enough
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: to change you as a hunter. It'll make you better
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: next year when the clock is ticking and the days
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: are short, but it will also make you better next
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: October when the lull is supposed to keep all the
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: bucks from moving. It'll make you better when it's seventy
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: degrees and the rut's supposed to be raging but mostly
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: feels like a lost cause. It'll make you a better
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: hunter because you won't be like most hunters. You'll be
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: out there scouting and learning and hunting when most folks
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: just don't see the value in it. So your job
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: is to find the value in it. Do this anyway,
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: you have to lie to yourself, trick yourself with the reward,
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: lower your standards to where you'd never lower them. Whatever.
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: Just find a way to get out there because the
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: season's going to be over soon and that well sucks.
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: Don't waste what's left, you've got this. That's it for
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: this week. I'm Tony Peterson. This has been the Wire
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: to Hunt Foundation's podcast, which is brought to you by
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: First Light. As always, thank you so much for listening,
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: and thank you so much for supporting us here at
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: med Eater. You guys have been buying that new Mediator
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: trivia board game like crazy, which is awesome. I hope
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: you're having a ton of fun with it. If you
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: want to buy that, or you just want to read
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: some articles on deer hunting or listen to a podcast, whatever,
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: the Mediator dot com is your place to go. Check
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: it out.