Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 255: Whitetail Dream Chasers

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Ep. 255: Whitetail Dream Chasers · 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 Kenyan in this episode number two hundred
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: and fifty five, and today on the show, we're joined
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: by Alex Gilstrom and Cody Butler of dream Chaser's TV
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: to talk late season hunting strategies, advice for hunting a
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: single deer, and mobile hunting tactics. All right, welcome to
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you by Onyx,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: and today we're gonna be joined here shortly by my
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: buddy Alex Gilstrom and Cody Butler from dream Chaser's TV,
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: and were gonna be chatting with these guys about late
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: season tactics, and we're talking about some public land hunting ideas,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: some running gun techniques, and a whole bunch of things
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: in regards to hunting strategies. We're also gonna be diving
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: into a few stories of some of Alex and Cody's
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: recent successes, including something you might have seen the most
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: recent issue or maybe it's two issues ago of North
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: American Whitetail. Cody kill and absolutely stunning white Tail last year,
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: and that story was featured in the magazine, which is
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: pretty cool, and it was written by Alex so double
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: cool there. So that's a story I definitely want to
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: dive into. It's a buck they call longhorn. Um. But
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: before all of that, we do have my nine finger
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: buddy Dan Johnson with us for our pregame show, and
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: I'm hoping the two of us can catch up a
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: little bit. We haven't chatted and I think two weeks Dan, um,
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: So do you do you have good news to share them?
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: I'm assuming I'm hoping. I've been wishing and dreaming that
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: one of these days in your next to me and say, hey, Mark,
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: I finally did it. I bought a non resident Michigan
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: hunting license. I'll be there next weekend. Tell me that's
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: what's happening. No, that didn't happen. I think are I
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: think what was our original bed? If I can ever
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: quit my job and make the Sportsman's Nation like my
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: full time job, then then the promise, the pinky swear,
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: is that I will come up and I will buy
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: a Michigan tag and I'll hunt with you. That's that
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: is the long term plan. I'm trying to make it
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: happen right now. Right Yeah, that's uh, that ain't gonna happen. Uh,
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: but but I tell you, Um, I saw a Facebook
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: I posted a picture of my my son today Mac
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: on Facebook, and you responded with a a post of
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: your own about how your son cried all night and uh,
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: he didn't sleep unless he was in bed with you
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: and your wife. And and that makes me happy because
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: oh yeah, and when when you told me a while back,
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: oh yeah, he has no problem sleeping through the night.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: There's a little part of me that, like, I don't know,
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: whenever someone I hear another parents say that, I want
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: to punch him because it's not how stuff goes down
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: in my house. So I'm relieved to find out that
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: your kid is ruining your life too. Yeah, he's he's coming,
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: He's what do they say, Gosh, Um, I'm gonna blank
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: on this. It's something down to the mean, like resorting,
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: resorting back to the mean or something like that. I'm
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: blanking on the right word. But yes, he's gone back
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: to what normal babies do, which is cry a lot,
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: wake up in the middle of the night. Um. I
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: don't know if it's related to teething. He's he's had
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: two teeth pop out all the way, he's got a
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: third this kind of halfway, and I feel like there
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: might be another one about to about to cut because
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: he's just got a general perturbed nature all the time.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: And then he's like going down and sleeping for five
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: minutes and then all of a sudden waking up, scream
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: bloody murder. And he did that from like seven third
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: you last night all the way to midnight. I mean
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: it was horrible. Um. So that's kind of our recent
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: fun with with him. I tell you what man I was.
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: You know, on on Facebook, you flip through the feed
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: and then you have a memory that pops up, and
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: there was a memory of like, I don't know, five
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: or six years it would it would have been six
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: or seven years ago of me and my wife. I
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: think it was like before we were married. We were
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: all we were. We just looked so happy and well
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: rested and youthful. And then fast forward to like a
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: most recent picture, we look like weathered and beaten down
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: and emotionally drained. We're aging fast. Absolutely absolutely, Uh. I
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: guess that's it's better than alternative though. I suppose, Um,
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: you know, it is funny though, I'm I was up
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: at our deer camp last weekend and or last week,
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: and I talked about this on the on the episode
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: we did last week. But being in a place like that,
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: it does us like really now, every day I see
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: my son, I get reinvigorated and excited. So I'm not
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: saying that's not the case. But when you go up
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: there and you see the pictures of like me when
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: I was a little dude, and hear my dad tell
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: the stories about what when I was a little guy
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: and going up there to camp and hunting and everything, Like,
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: every time I think about that with Everett, it just
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: gets me, I don't know, just on a whole another
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: level of excitement. I'm I feel like we're getting really
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: close to the point where he's, um, you know, once
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: he can walk, then I feel like that opens up
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: a whole new set of experiences that we can share.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: Um that I'm just I'm just super excited about. So absolutely,
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: that's good stuff. It's funny speaking to kids, though, I
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: think you and we both need to train our kids
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: a little bit better because one of our buddies has
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: got us topped right now, um, you know Ross Ross Hass.
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: He sent us a text me and some of my
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: friends earlier today and he quoted his wife asking his
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: son a question. His wife's name is Kendall's son's times West.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: So Kendall said, quote, Hey, West, should we go get
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: a Christmas tree and throw it in the back of
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: the truck? End quote? And their son, who's like two,
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: he responds, no, we throw deers back in there and
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: even for dinner. How good is that? Yeah, that's awesome.
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: That's awesome. Like that's the perfect response. Uh, here's what
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: my quote would be, Hey Mac, did you flush? Mac
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: would say no, and that's it. Did you wash your hands? Buddy? No?
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: Straight to the point. Absolutely. Oh gosh. So check this out.
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: While back, my wife says to me, I wanna go
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: deer hunting, And I laughed because I thought she was joking.
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: And so last year, or it was after last season
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: was over, she's like, I wanted to go hunting. You
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: didn't take me why. I'm just like, are you were
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: you serious? She's like, yeah, I'm serious. I want to
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: go shoot a deer so we can put meat in
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: the freezer. That subtle, underhanded jab at you or something
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: I don't I don't know, I don't know, right. So
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: at the beginning of this season, she's like, Hey, are
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: you gonna take me shotgun hunting? And I said, are
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: you serious? She says yes. I say, then yes, I
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: definitely will take you season shotgun hunting. And that's this
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: upcoming season, so or this upcoming weekend. So we are.
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: We got I got a gun lined up, I got ammunition,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: I got the property. And the only thing that has
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: to happen is that the weather has to cooperate because
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: it's might be raining a little bit on Saturday, but
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: Saturday and Sunday I have dedicated to taking her out
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: to try to kill a deer. Now here's her stipulations. Yeah,
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: this is about right. She only wants to shoot a
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: big buck. What's up with her things? He wants met
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: in the freezer? Then well, I mean, obviously, you know
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: Mark can kill bucks, and you know we can take
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: the meat off of them. You know, this year for
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: me to work out. But um so I try to
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: explain to her. Listen, sweetie, you know how long it took.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: You know, I may have walked in for like two
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: or three days into my rut, vacation set up and
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: you know, hunted this deer. However, it took months of
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: planning in preparation to find out where the deer were moving,
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: you know, trail camera pictures, you know, going back to
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: the farm, blah blah blah seeing if this, you know,
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: if deer, if there were even any quote unquote big
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: bucks on the farm. And uh so She's like, yeah,
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: I just want one like what you hanging like maybe
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: what you have hanging on the wall. I'm just like, sweetie,
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: you need to lower your expectations like you did with me.
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: Because yes, so we know she can do it. You
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: said him a gun. So yeah, so yeah, So I
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: think I got her to lower expectations a little bit.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: Maybe Saturday we'll we'll try for a buck. And you know,
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: I'm thinking something along the lines of, you know, just
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: really anything. I'm gonna try to talk her into shooting
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: the first year that walks by her. Um that may
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: or may not happen. But then she said, if I
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: don't shoot a buck on Saturday, then I'll shoot a
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: dough on Sunday. And I said, sweetie, you know there's
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: a chance that if you pass a deer on Saturday,
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: that you may not get a second chance at this
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: she's and then she's she starts pulling this whole, this
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: whole type of ship that I would say, right like,
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: you know, it's not all about to kill. I just
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: want to go out and enjoy the experience, you know.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: I just like, what is going on? Because my mind
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: is exploding at this point, and you're gonna be sitting
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: out there in the blind or the three or whatever
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: you guys are hunting from, and she's is gonna be
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: telling you. Now you know, on the Wire Time podcast,
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: I heard that we need to be careful about our
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: exit route out of here tonight. Uh, do you have
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: that planned out right? Dan? Or she starts correcting me
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: when we step into the timber. She's like, Hey, your
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: sense going the wrong way, buddy. Yeah. What if she's
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: just like a deer hunting ninja and you get out
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: there and she's like telling you all the things to
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: do and then you shoot a booner the first night
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: she's out there? Right that? I don't know, Like I
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: feel like if one of let's say Gnarlie Charlie shows up,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: just hypothetically, I can myself going, Sarah, look, you probably
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: just couldn't handle that hit right absolutely, you know. Just
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: imagine a wall full of deer and the biggest buck
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: on the wall because I would have to get it mounted, right,
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: the biggest buck on the wall? Oh man, where'd you
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: shoot that one? Well? I didn't shoot that when my
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: wife did. Man, I love you, Dan, but I'm hoping
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: so badly that she does that. Oh man, that's funny.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: Would be awesome them. So not too far from where
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: we're gonna be hunting right probably, I'm gonna guess three
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: hundred four hundred yards. I got a trail camera picture
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: of a buck that it was high in the air.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: I mean it was like it was far away, but
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: it looked I mean, it was a big buck for sure,
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: but it looked like it could potentially be gnarly Charlie.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: But it was from two weeks ago, so it could
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: it may, you know. But the good news is is
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: that recently in that part of the state there has
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: been eleven or higher inches of snow. Eleven or more
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: inches of snow. There's a standing cornfield that is still
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: in place. So you know, before the season even starts,
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: we all we want is hey, man, we gotta get
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: this the corn out. We gotta get this corn out.
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: Let's get the crops out. So they head back into
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: the timber so you know, you know, it concentrates them
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: a little bit more. And now this time of year,
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: we're going, God, I hope that we can find some
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: standing corners, some standing crops or whatever. So the last
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: time I checked, there was still some corn standing in
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: this field, and I don't think it dried out enough
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: for them to combine it before the big snow hit. So, um,
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: I'm taking Friday off work. I'm gonna head down there.
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna scout out a couple of areas before the
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: season opens on Saturday. And uh, if that standing corns there,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: we have a really good shot of at least, you know,
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: at least a dough finding, finding a trail that the
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: doughs are working on. But even even something better like
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: a buck. Yeah, man, that kind of scenario with all
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: that snow and standing food. I mean, she could shoot
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: a nice buck in that kind of situation. That's that's exciting,
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: absolutely man, Absolutely yeah, I'm I'm excited just to go
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: out and see how she reacts. Now, the other thing
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: is she's used to Turkey season right where on a
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: bad day in April, the high temperature is gonna be
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: like mid mid fifties. You know, maybe maybe it's gonna
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: be you know, mid to low thirties in April, but
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: you know there's a chance in the mornings when we
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: go out that it's gonna be below freezing or all day.
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: I looked at the weather and it's not supposed to
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: be too terribly cold. But I'm to a point, you
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: know where this isn't turkey hunting. So we'll see how
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: tough she gets and uh how serious she is about it,
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: and uh play it, play it by ear Man. Well,
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: I'm very interested to hear how this goes. So definitely, well,
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: definitely check back in next week or next time. We
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: can get back here and do this. Um, this is
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: gonna be a good story. So have you have you
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: then fast forwarded to late season or you out till
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: late season or what's your deal? So since we last
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: chatted two weeks ago, I hunted some more in Michigan
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: on those main spots. Uh no, Luck, I was hoping
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: that Frank was going to be back, um, because I
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: think last time we talked about Frank, I told you
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: about the hold back and forth, back and forth with him.
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: I talked about the poop blind, I talked about the
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: close calls, and then I went to that the meat
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: eater hunt. Right. Um. When I got back from that,
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: it checked trail cameras and I got a picture of
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: Frank on the property I can hunt the morning that
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: I got there, but the morning I got back, he
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: was there half hour before dayly, So I was really
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: excited thinking that there's still a chance. Um. But I
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: know pictures of him from like the sixth of November
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: until I got back the thirteen, So like that whole
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: time I was gone, zero pictures and then the day
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: got back, here he is. So I'm thinking, oh, man,
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: like this is meant to be. This is perfect. He's
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: back maybe on a dough in the area. Um. But
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: the basically just what happened over the next five days
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: that I hunted and didn't see him. I didn't I
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: haven't checked carrel cameras since then, but I didn't see
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: him anywhere. Did not see much UM as far as
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: semi mature mature bucks. UM, I had one encounter with Tran,
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: which is a three year old that I that I'm
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: not gonna hunt, but i'd like to see um. So
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: I saw him crap ton of doze um second day
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: of guns season because I hunted a few days and
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: guns season. Second day of guns season, I got out
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: to my standard, there was a bunch of trespasser boot
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: tracks all over the proud day. Um. So that was
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: really upsetting in the moment um that was down here.
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: And then it went up to our Northern Michigan deer
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: camp for a few days. Had a good time up there,
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: but no luck. Um. And then I kind of pulled
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: the plug on hunting for a bit. And that was
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: about a week ago. So I've been out not hunting
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: it all for the last week. Um. And that was
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: that was necessary. Um. You know two weeks ago when
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: we last chatted, you asked me if the brownie points
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: had ran dry yet, and I was like, oh, oh no, man,
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: the brownie points still good, and things like hey, okay,
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: you really really jinxed me on that. So so we
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: had our kind of annual reset. It always seems like
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: right about this time of year, it's like right as
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: gun season it's there's it's always kind of like a
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: tipping point. Um. So that happened and taking some time
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: out of the tree. And that's that's been a good
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: thing all across the board. I just needed it personally,
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: probably to UM. I definitely had worn down over that month.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: So yeah, I took a little time off, got caught
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: up on some work, and now I am going to
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: be getting back out there, maybe a hunt this weekend,
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: and then next week going back up north for a
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: couple of days, and then after that we'll be focusing,
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: you know, in the southern Michigan properties. UM, I just
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: don't know if if Frank doesn't show back up, and
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: I don't think it's it's unlikely he will, at least
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: not consistently. Right, he has never lived on the property hunt.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: He's just like showed up for a day a year
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: here and there, and then this year a little bit more. Um,
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: if he's not around, there's no buck on the property
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: that I've gotten pictures ever seen yet all year that
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: I would shoot. So it's basically probably I'm just gonna
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: shift a doughe patrol and just start kind of aggressively
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: targeting doughs because this is a property that there's too
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: many doughs every year. I say, I'm gonna take a
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: bunch of off, um, and I get try to get
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: some friends out to take some off and I always
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: get some um usually between two and four a year, um,
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: but but really probably could use more than that. So
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: this year maybe finally is the year I can really
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: do a better job managing. So that's the next couple
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: of weeks probably hold for me on that standpoint and um,
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: and then maybe get to that West Michigan property another
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: time or two. There are bucks to hunt there. Um,
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: just gonna be kind of scheduling thing. Got some funky
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: travel coming up. So you got good uh late season
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: food sources? Yeah, yeah, I do on on both those spots,
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: the main property hunt the down south property. You know,
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: I plant some food plots which are good um, and
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: really they're mostly focused for a late season. It's always
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: been great for late season. But the only the downside
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: this year to that is that usually I've got the
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: best late season food source in the area because I've
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: got a couple of acres of brassicas and stuff really
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: good late season food. Well, this year, a farmer kind
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: of nearby planted a cover crop on his place that
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: is all like turnips and brassicas and stuff like that radishes, um,
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: and the deer piling into that. So I'm kind of
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: second fiddle. I'm like the little appetizer that's like dinner. Um.
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: So I don't know how that's going to impact things.
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: I think deer will still kit my plots. Um, It's
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: just not gonna be like in past years, I don't think.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: So we'll see how that impacts things. And that's kind
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: of That's kind of what the rest of the season
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: looks like for me. I don't have super high hopes
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: from a buck standpoint, but definitely would love to shoot
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: some more doughs and fill the freezer and um, and
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: that'll be That'll be a fun way in the season.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: So that's at least as of right now, what it
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: looks like. Cool man, that's awesome. Anything else on your
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: front um? The only thing that I can think of is,
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: you know, we are recording this on a on a Tuesday,
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: which is Giving Tuesday, Yes, Giving Tuesday, and I just
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: want to you know, really push people. You know, we
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: all say we have busy lives, right, and we don't
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: have a lot of time to dedicate to, uh, you know,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: something that's outside of our family and work, like a
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: conservation organization. But one thing that's very easy to do.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: And if you have money that you can spare and
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: part with, uh, money works too, right, So don't be
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: afraid to donate some money to UM an organization like
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: I think today on Instagram you mentioned q d m
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: A or Backcountry Hunters and Anglers or the two that
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: pop out. You know, something that you're passionate about. It
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: doesn't have to be that. I mean Ducks Unlimited or
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: white Tails Unlimited, or you know anything that's you know,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: maybe a state a local state park that you enjoy
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: hiking on. You know, something like that. Uh, every penny
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: in dollar helps, so if you can do it. Yeah, man,
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: that was exactly what I wanted to close with. So
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: thank you for for mentioning that. And uh and yeah,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of organizations out there doing good work
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: that need help. They need time, and they need resources,
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: they need funding, and so is a great day to
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: do it. UM. My wife and I kind of did
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: a little brainstorm this morning and nominated we each kind
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: of nominated a couple of different organizations that we want
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: to donate to UM and did that and it's kind
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: of a cool way to UM, you know, to just
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: give back and of course you can do that anytime
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: of year, but it's nice to get a reminder like
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: we have today. Um and gosh, I mean, we're we're
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: spending a bunch of money in Christmas gifts and things
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: like that, but I don't think you can spend any
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: better money then money that goes back to fish and
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: wildlife and wild places. So and we take away from
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: that resource throughout the season, you know, whether it's uh,
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: you know, an animal or a fish or whatever. We
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: take from that resource and very rarely do we ever
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: give back outside of license and tags. So it's just
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: a great It's something extra that we can all do.
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: And you know, it does a lot. And if we
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: we kind of read the word and we all we
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: all do a little, it becomes something big. Yeah, so
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: let's let's do something right here. UM. I'm gonna do
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: a little calculation here, and I'm going to ask every
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: single person listening. Now, I know not everyone's gonna do it,
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: but I'm gonna be optimistic and say that everyone's going
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: to do it. If we take oh maybe what the
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: last podcast um downloads head and let's say everybody donates
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: ten dollars of I can get every one of you
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: guys to donate ten dollars today, just ten bucks. The
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: people that just download the podcast last week, we would
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: be pushing up towards half a million dollars to conservation.
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: So we can raise a lot of money, like we
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: can all each one of us doing a tiny little
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: thing can make a big difference if we all collectively
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: do it together. So I mean, that's a cool opportunity. Dan,
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: you did an awesome thing this last week where you
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: just said hey, I got a goal of raise or
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: something like that for q d m A, and just
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: through Instagram like telling people, hey, just don't it to
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: this thing. Um, you know, just like that, you were
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: able to raise over two thousand dollars for the Quality
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: Deer Management Association. So I think, um, you and I
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: are fortunate we have We've been given the privilege of
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: having a platform where we can talk to people and
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: a lot of people listen. Um. And I think, um,
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: I think it's cool to see someone like you using
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: that platform for something good. And I hope maybe today
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: we can use this to just you know, give a
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: few people a reminder to give back to like you
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: and you and I are trying to do and I
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: know a lot of other people are trying to do
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: and it could make it can make a substantial difference
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: if we do that. So I'm rambling now well, and
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: I just want to say, I want to end with
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: this because yes, we're talking to you know, a lot
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: of average joes out there. But if there's any buddy
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: in the industry, whether you own a hunting company or
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: you work for a hunting company, or you are another
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: let's say, like influencer or quote unquote celebrity, and you're
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: not currently helping promote conservation, you need to be. That's it. There,
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: you go, straight from the mouth of Dan nine Finger Johnson.
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: So with that, we will take a break to thank
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: our partners, and then we will get Alex and Cody
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: on the line to talk White Tails, to talk late Season,
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: to talk public land Um, and man, if the stars aligned,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: maybe one of them will have a story of a
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: very very recent kill. I'm hoping. I'm hoping that will
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: be the case. Dan. Before we get to those stories,
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: they want to take a quick second to thank our
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: friends at White Tailed Properties, and I wanted to mention
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: a recent video of their's over on the White Tailed
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: Properties YouTube channel. This one is of particular importance to
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: me this time of year because December typically for me,
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: as I was talking about with Dan just a second ago,
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: that's when I usually like to start trying to put
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: some dose in the freezer. And what I'm doing that
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: is usually time here when I've got time to go
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: ahead and butcher my own deer. Sometimes I'm out there
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: hunting in October or November and I'm traveling all over
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: the place, have a hard time having the the extra
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: availability as far as time to get that process myself.
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: But December, I like to do it and enjoy the
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: whole process. I would like to do that even more so.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: This video that White Tail Property just put out is
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: all about this deal processing your own animals, in particular,
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: talking about how to break down a deer's hind quarter.
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: Dr Craig Harper is actually the one in this video.
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: If you know who I'm talking about, you know he's
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: just a great guy to listen to, and he actually
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: shows how to process a deer's hind quarter while that
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: deer is still hanging up. So I typically quarter my
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: dear outbreak him down, and then you know the processes
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: on the table. He talks their way to do that
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: while they're actually still hanging, which is a pretty interesting
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: way to do it. So heading over to the way
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: Tail Properties YouTube channel, check out this video. It's titled
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: how to process a Deer's hind quarters And if you
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: want to learn more about the other things they have
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: going on, visit white tail properties dot com. All right
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: here with me on the line, I got rid of
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: Dan and I pulled into way more interesting people. I've
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: got Cody Butler and Alex Gilstrom. Welcome to the show, guys. Yeah, Alex,
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: I We've had a lot of good times over the
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: years at different conventions and things along those lines. So
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: I've known for a while now that I wanted to
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: pull you in here to the podcast um to chat.
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: So so I'm glad this is finally happening, and I'm
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: glad that you brought your buddy Cody along because the
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: two of you, it seems like, have been have been
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: having a good season, a good couple of seasons, and
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: I was hoping we could um dive into all of that.
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: But I suppose before of that, Alex, would you be
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: willing to give us a real quick intro to to
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: who you are, what you do in the hunting world. Um,
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: because I know that you and Cody do some things together,
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: and then of course you're doing some other interesting things
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: with our wonderful partners at White Tailed Properties. You bet. Yeah,
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: it's uh, it has been. You know, we joked about
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: it for for a number of years now, how we've
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: talked and collaborated just kind of brainstor where a few
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: different things. And just um obviously very very passionate and
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: obsessed white tail hunters and as we all tend to
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: be in this in this circle. But it was finally
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: fun to get and connect. But um, before we get
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: to to involved the two diving here, I do have
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: to take a quick sidebar with you. So uh a
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: bunch of yourself. Yeah, it's just it's interesting, so as
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: much as of yourself. Um, it's connect. The q d
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: M a huge supporter of that. We are as well
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: at white Tail. We've had a very very long stand
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: relationship here at White Tail Properties and myself personally has
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: just been really involved with it and in supporting it.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: And I get this news letter I think it was
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: the day before yesterday or so, and I was and
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: I was sitting there re something I know where you're going,
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: and I would scroll it down. When did Further become
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: a model? Oh? Man, tell you what, Further is blowing up?
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: He is absolutely blowing up. I mean it's it's a
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: little bit embarrassing because I kind of introduced him to
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: the hunting world. I feel like, and now he's outshining
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: me by far. And it's like he's standing. Yeah, he's
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: standing on your shoulders to just go above and beyond.
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: It's been a knock to my pride, but I'm glad
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: for it. Yeah. Man, he's he's the great big q
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: dum model now on the newsletter and on Instagram. Um.
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: And you see how he rocked the face paint too,
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: Like he really goes pretty hardcore with it. Oh. It
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: was the authenticity and the intensity was off the chart.
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: I mean he was he was on another level. Yeah, Man,
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: Further he's the legend. Alright, Well I digress. Yeah, I had.
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: I had to give Further a little jab there's I know,
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: he's obvious. So he's been a long time great friend
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: of yours and he's become a good friend of mine.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: And it's just it's just I couldn't believe it. I had,
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: I had to jab him a little bit when I
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: saw that. Oh yeah, there's no better way to start
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: the podcast. So so tell us a little about you there. Yeah,
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: back to your original question. Um, yeah, I got my
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: start Erry just kind of worked my way up and
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: had no real connection to the outdoor industry or anything
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: like that, and basically just through persistence and and basically pestering,
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: called as many companies as I could for as long
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: as I could until someone finally gave me the time
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: of day and uh and let me let me kind
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: of hear my spiel and where my passion was and
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: what I wanted to do and um and it actually, uh,
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: it all started with a phone call back when I
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: was you know, kind of in high school and finally
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: got connected with the company and kind of asked what,
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: you know, what things that they look for in professionals
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: and the outdoor industry and how to get in and
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: all this and that, and basically, long story short, the
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: two big resounding um answers I got was, you know,
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: a good business acumen, good business skills as well as
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: writing skills. So that's what I honed in on. Um.
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: I've always kind of had like a I guess and
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: in an eighth or or natural attraction to writing and
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: just I guess storytelling. So that kind of was a
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: natural evolution for me. And then um obviously picked up
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: a little bit of photography videography along the way too,
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: but uh, those are the things that I concentrated on. Uh.
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: It kind of led me to a career at Setlock
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: for a number of years, six years, and then um,
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: throughout those years kind of continue to develop writing and
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: and exploring storytelling in different ways on different platforms, whether
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: it be social media or magazines or articles or whatever. Um,
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: and that's can continue to kind of evolve and uh
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: and kind of grow is that's kind of come on.
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: And then three years ago now White Till Properties approached
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: me with an opportunity and it was kind of a
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: way for me us like yourself, Mark born and raised
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: in Southwest Michigan, absolutely love my roots there, my entire
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: families there, and and our outdoor heritage. You know, it's
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: something you've talked about all the podcasts a lot, and
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: it's and it's couldn't be more true, just the the
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: richness in the in how deep our outdoor heritage and
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: passions for for uh, the wildlife and the outdoors go there,
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: and it's just kind of something that everybody does and
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: that's what makes it so special. Um it can also
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: make it very frustrating, especially yeah, especially during the deer season.
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: Um So, anyway, that when White Properties kind of approached
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: me and started doing my you know, my list of
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: pros and cons and where things were and where I
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: wanted my career to go kind of evolving, Uh, they
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: asked me to come take over all creative as far
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: as the video department and our marketing department here and
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: uh there was a chance to relocate to Pike County, Illinois,
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: so that wasn't a bad thing. So over the over
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: the course of the last you know showt or eight years,
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: that's kind of kind the quick story of of how
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: I how I got here, and really kind of it's
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: been it's been nice to to kind of relocate and
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: recenter and and then as you kind of mentioned, uh earlier,
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: we're going to talk about with some some writing. It's
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: it's been cool to kind of see that evolved and
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: and grow and something I've really kind of got a
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: passion for. I mean, you want to call it a
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: you know, side hustle or side gig or whatever you
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: want to call it. It's it's been something that's really
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: kind of grown and evolved over the last few years.
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: And I've been doing a lot more projects, uh digitally
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: and and and with with print magazines and other things
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: like that. It's been it's been just a lot of
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: fun to kind of talk about how, you know, I
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: do things and how I make it work out there
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: and and kind of just go from there. Yeah, And
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: speaking of your writing, it was a piece of your
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: writing that I was reading, I don't know, a few
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: weeks ago that just reminded me that I needed to
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: get you on the podcast, and that I had to
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: get Cody on the podcast because that was an article
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: you wrote about a hunt that Cody was on and
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: you actually got to be a part of it, filming him. Um,
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: and then you told the whole story there in North
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: American White Tail Magazine. So Cody, then, UM, can you
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: give us a quick intro to yourself and then also
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: maybe how you and alex Um start working together with
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: treen Chasers and everything. Yeah, definitely. Um. So born and
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: raised out here in Nebraska, right on the Kansas Nebraska border.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: So I kind of joke around tell people like, it's
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: almost like living in Iowa because I can kill a
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: deer in Kansas and then too in Nebraska, so I
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: can get three every year. UM, so it's kind of
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: a fuel deal out here. But no, you know, I
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: grew up in a hunting family. UM just always had
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: a huge passion for it. If you would have told me,
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: you know, when I was younger, that I would get
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: into video and photography, I would have told you you
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: were crazy. UM. Just didn't have a passion for it
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: when I was younger until a guy moved to town
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: here that was actually filming for the Archer's Choice UM
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: with Ralph and Vicky, and he asked me to become
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: a part of their team and started filming and just
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: fell in love with it. Realized I had an eye
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: for video and photography and and it kind of took off.
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: Started my own business, and you know now we're we're
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: doing Dream Chasers UM as a digital show on Carbon
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: TV and YouTube. UM. I also have a company that
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: does video photography work for hunting companies. UM. That's kind
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: of how Alex and I actually got started. UM. We
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: got hired by a guy to do a pilot for
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: a show Um, gosh, Alex, how long has it been now?
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: The story is crazy enough as it is. I'll let
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: you go, but it's that I'll let you keep telling,
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: but it's done. Like I think that was. I was
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: trying to think about this the other day, and I
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: think what I was actually it was actually when I
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: was driving back from Camas we're hunt together, but I
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: think it was. I think it was like nine years ago,
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: and that's what I was thinking too. Is it getting
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: close to ten years now? We both got hired, we
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: knew knew each other through social media and stuff, a
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: little bit um back and forth. Um, a friend of
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: our has kind of introduced us through social media. I
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: think we had talked on the phone one time, and
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: then all of a sudden, we both get hired to
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: go do this pilot down in Kansas, pretty and we
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: had no idea we had gotten hired at the same time.
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: And Foxy got there before me, and I walked in
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: the door and I see him. I'm like, what the
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: heck are you doing here? Man? So then we just
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: we sat down, we did the pilot, we filmed it
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: for this guy and put it all together and and
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: the rest is history. I mean, we've we became great friends.
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: I invited him to come out here in turkey hunt
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: that next spring and he's been coming out here turkey
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: hunting and deer hunting every year since and it's just
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: been quite a roller coaster ride. Yeah, that's awesome, And
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: you guys are doing a good job. I've been on
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: the watch some of your video episodes over the years,
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: and uh, you're putting out a great product and obviously
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: living there in in pseudo Iowa, Kansas Nebraska border, that's
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: a pretty good spot to be. You guys. Guys are
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: putting them down. Um. So on that note, then I
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: have to ask because the other thing, they're two things
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: that that made me think of you guys to get
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: on the podcast. One was that article I mentioned, and
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: number two, it was something you posted on Instagram. I think, Cody,
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: that just got like the drama sensors in my body
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: going on overload. You said that there had been this great, big,
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: giant buck that you've been keeping tabs on all year
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: and you thought that with this late season cold weather
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: and snow, that you finally might have an opportunity for him.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: I think you said that you got pictures of him
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: like five days in a row on this little camera
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: in this section, and and last night, So the night
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: before we recorded this was the night you thought you
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: were going to kill him. So I was sitting here
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: in my in my office looking at that crossing all
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: my fingers and toes and just saying, oh, please Cody
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: kill that buck so we can hear that story today.
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: On the me too, I was. I was doing the
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: same thing, so so please tell me. Did you kill
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: that buck? Um? No, we did not, but I did
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: pass like a hundred and fifty seven pointer last night
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: in order to that year. I'm kind of kicking myself
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: a little bit now. Uh No, we call that, dear
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: epic um kind of a crazy story. So spring of
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: two thousand sixteen, I found a shed on that farm,
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: actually his left side. That's the only history I had
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: with that dear. Ever, I've never had a picture of
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: him nothing. I just found this big six by side
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: on that property during the sixteen shed season, and I
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: had never got a picture of him until this year
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: he finally showed back up. So I'm guessing off of
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: his shed. I really have no history, but shed was
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: already pretty big, so I'm guessing he was probably a
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: four year old. Then probably he's either six or seven
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: this year, is what I'm guessing. In Matt he shows
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: up this summer and instantly I'm like, Okay, that's the
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: deer I'm hunting in Kansas this year. I've got several
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: other really good deer, but I just kind of fell
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: in love with him. As soon as he shed his velvet,
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: he just disappeared. Um, I didn't it hardly. I think
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: the last picture I got of him was October the
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: fifth or something like that, and then he just recently
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: showed up again about six days ago. And he's been
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: on that trail camera on that food plot almost every day,
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: I think five out of the last six days. And
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: of course last night I have to have a perfect win.
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: I have to have a south or southeast wind to
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: hunt that. And of course last night was the only
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: night he doesn't show up in daylight. I get home.
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: That's a cell cam. It's a spartan cell camera. There.
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: I get home, my phone goes to Dink and he
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: was there. So the drama continues with the deer we
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: call epic. You know, I haven't hunted him hardly all year,
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: just because he hasn't been around, he's kind of waiting,
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: not really hunting any other deer. Finally get a chance
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: to hunt him, and the one night that I hunt him,
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: he doesn't show up, So he's kinda he's kind of
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: pushing my boot that a little bit. Yes, And I
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: passed the big seven And Alex actually had an encounter
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: with that deer when he was out here. Uh so
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: he knows how big that deer is and he's I
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: texted him last night and he was like, oh oh boy, um, yeah,
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: it was tough, but definitely my eyes definitely on epic
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: and and hopefully we can get him killed here by
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: the end of the year. But we'll see the market
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: a couple of Michigan boys for Michigan. Don't you know
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: he starts to talk about passing a hundred fifty inchineer,
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: especially on her fifty and seven point. We can't relate
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: to that. Oh no, It makes my makes my mind
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: like slowly explode or melt or something. When I hear that.
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: I know I gotta give him at all serious. I
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: gotta give him credit though he's been he's been incredibly
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: patient and man, when he gets his mind set on
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: one deer as what was we'll talk about it's you
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: can't you can't change it. Yeah, he no, it's it's
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: a problem. I have an issue. So so this dear epic?
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: Can you can you describe this dear for us? What?
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: What's he? What's he looked like? What makes him so epic? Um?
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: He's just actually kind of crazy. Way how he got
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: his name epic is I had the owner of Big
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: and J long Range Attracting has come down and hunt
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: with me this year, Jeremy Atkins, and I sent him
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: a trail camera picture that dear this summer and he
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: texted me back and goes, Man, that deer is so epic,
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: And I was like, Bam, there you go. There's his name.
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: But so we just kind of started calling him epic
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: after that. He's kind of he's actually a main frame
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: six by six um, really tall and narrow. His right
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: side is kind of goofy. He's got a big split
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: brow on that side, and his G two on that
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: side it's only like I don't know, maybe three inches long,
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: four inches long, kind of curls back and then the
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: rest of his times are real big on that side.
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: And then his left side is just a real big
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: six point side. I mean he's got or six points
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: on that side. He's got big two, big three, big four.
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: I mean he's just he's got everything good role want
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: and he's heavy mass. Um, I've actually got his shed.
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: I'm just looking at his shed right here in the
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: in the house. And I mean clear back in sixteen
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: when we found on that side. I mean it's I
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: think I scored it it like seventy seventy seven or
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: sees back then. So he's he's special. His beams curl
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: up what really way high in the front. He's just
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: just a really cool deer. He's an epic deer. So wow,
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: So this spot where he's been coming in these last
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: five six days, what you know, why do you think
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: that's happening? Can you describe that area and then how
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: you had set up on it? Yeah, you know. Um,
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: I actually tried something different there this year. I've had
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: a food plot there for a few years, but it's
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: kind of an early season spot because this farm is
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: really good early season. Uh, this year I decided to
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: try to put a late season plot in there, um,
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: because I wasn't gonna hunt the early season quite as much,
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: and it just seems to be working really really well.
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: I think it's only a half acre food plot, and
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: it's a mix I did. I believe it's critically black
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: oats and uh went to rye a mix that I
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: put in there, and on a half acre. Last night
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: we had thirty two deer on a half acre food plot. Um,
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: it's just been a magnet right there. All the neighboring
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: farms were soybeans this year and those crops are obviously out,
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: and my property there was corn. So I've got this
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: little half acre rye field and then I've got the
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: corn field, so I basically got all the winter you know,
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: the good winter food sources on my place, and the
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: ruts really starting to wind down here, and I think
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: those deer has just found it, and it's just it's
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: become a magnet right there. It's really been blowing my
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: mind how many deer are hitting that small little area
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: and consistently. I mean there was I think I think
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: we had eight different bucks in front of us last
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: night at one point in time, um, two of which
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: were mature deyear, including that seven pointer. And then, like
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: I said, epic shows up right after dark when right
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: when I get home. So he was there hopefully, hopefully
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: maybe we can get after him again tonight, if not tomorrow. So,
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: you know, so often in the late season you find
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: it just becomes more and more difficult to get in
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: and hunt these spots sometimes because Does many times they're
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: bedding closer to the food source, and if you're trying
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: to hunt the food source, it just seems so easy.
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: If you spook one dough that might be betted close.
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: If she runs back, they might send everything cascading back
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: and shut down the whole night. Um, how do you
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: have this set up on this little food plat so
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: you can hunt it that, To be honest with you,
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: that's almost exactly what happened to us last night. We
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: had a bunch of Does. There's a big seedar thicket
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: real close. I'm talking twenty yards off of that, and
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: there will be deer betting in there sometimes. And as
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: we pulled up on the property last night, my phone
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: was going off and there was already Does in the
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: food plot, so I could see him while we were
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: in the truck. Um, So we actually sat in the
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: truck and waited for them to go off the camera
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: and then we snuck in, and we actually snuck in.
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: I've got a redneck blind sitting around the edge of
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: the food plot and it's pretty easy access to get
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: in and as long as you have the perfect wind,
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: you can. Actually there's a lot of tall CRP there,
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: and you can actually sneak into the back door of
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: this blind really easy with dear bedded close. We actually
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: got up in the blind and I started scanning and
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: we had I think seven does bedded within eighty yards
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: of us and got in clean. So it's just the
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: deal where you gotta go in really early, just gotta
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: take your time. Like I said, there's really tall CRP
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: there and you can kind of come right in the
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: back door of that blind, super easy to walk in.
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: It's just it's just one of those spots that's just
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: money for getting in and out. Wow. So then what's
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: the game plan moving forward? Then he shut up after
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: dark last night? Um, what do you? What do you
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: do now? Well, to be honest with you, rifle season
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: opened up today in Kansas, and I really want to
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: kill him with a bow. As much as I want
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: to kill him with a bow, I'm not gonna pass
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: up an opportunity to put a deer like this on
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: the ground. Um, I'm not sure if I'm gonna be
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: able to hunting the night. We've got a west wind tonight,
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: which is not very good at all. Um for that spot.
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: We gotta actually a northeast wind tomorrow, which I can
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: get away with with a bow or a gun. I've
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: got a blind um sitting off that food pot about
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: a hundred yards as well. So whether we go hop
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: in a tree stand on the other side of that
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: food pot tomorrow with a bow or break out the
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: old gun, I'm not sure what I'm gonna do yet.
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: But uh, we're just gonna keep watching that spart in
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: camera and kind of let him tell tell me what
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: he's doing. I really thought last night was gonna be
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: a night because it was about a high at twenty
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: six degrees yesterday, real cold. We got highs in the
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: forties now, So I thought last night was gonna be
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: the night. But um, you know he's been showing up.
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: He showed up the other day at four or fifty
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: in the afternoon it was fifty degrees out. So he's
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: really got no right the reason to what he's doing. Um,
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: I think the biggest thing is just being persistent with
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: him being smart only going in there on the perfect days,
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: the perfect winds and uh not boogering him up and
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: and eventually I think if I'm just persistent and patient,
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: we'll be able to put him on the ground. Yeah,
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: Is that is that kind of the name of the
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: game for you? When it comes to you know, we're
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: we're I feel like we're really close to being able
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: to say that we're transitioning to the late season. I mean,
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: we're we're still in November as of right this moment,
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: but I think that most people are kind of transitioning
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: their mindset to the late season kind of hunt. Um. So,
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: so what you just described there is that what you're
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: typically doing this time of year, whether it's a specific
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: buck here after or just waiting for any immature buck
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: or or if not, what else would you add as
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: far as your general late season tactics. Honestly, I mean,
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: I think that's a great late season tactic. Um, you know,
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: just being patient. But in all honesty, as far as
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: you know, like we talked about earlier, I get pretty
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: obsessed with a certain deer every year. You know, after
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: we killed the deer that we were going to talk
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: about later that was in the article last year. You know,
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: I told myself, you know, this year, I'm just gonna
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: go out and I'm gonna shoot, you know, a good
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: mature buck. I'm not gonna be picky. Well I actually
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: told my mom that. She looked at me and laughed
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: and said, yeah, all right, you're gonna get a picture
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: of a deer. You know, that get you get you going.
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: And that's the deer. But and like I said, I
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: kind of have a called them when it comes to that. Um.
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: I think, honestly, when you get fixed on a certain deer,
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: patients is the biggest thing you can possibly do. I
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: mean it took me, you know. I followed the deer
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: that we're gonna talk about later for four years and
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: hunted him for two years. Um And I only hunted
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: that deer maybe a handful of times in two years
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: on the perfect conditions. And we saw that dear almost
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: every single time we hunted. So I think being patient
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: being persistent Now obviously, you know, if you're hunting, you know,
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: a small track of land or public land or something
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: like that, a lot of times you can't be as
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: patient because somebody else might be in there hunting. You know. Luckily,
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: I've got some pretty good neighbors in the area. The
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: property to the east to me there where Epic is living,
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: nobody can hunt. Um, so it's pretty there's not a
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: lot of pressure there, I guess in the day, so
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: I can be patient. But you know, if you're hunting
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: private ground, you know you've got good neighbors stuff like that.
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: I think patience is the biggest thing you can do.
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: You know, hunt really smart. I think Alex can kind
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: of say the same thing. Um where he comes out here,
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: you know he doesn't. He stays very persistent, and I think,
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: like I said, just patience, I think is the biggest
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: thing you can do when you're hunting a single deer,
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: and just I mean, when you're hunting these five six
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: seven year old deer, do you booger him one time?
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: You might not ever see him begin So I definitely
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: think that's that's what you gotta do, is be patient. Yeah, yeah,
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: I've certainly seen the same thing. Um, what about you
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: mentioned the fact that you've got this right old Ryan
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: black oats and Tragic cant or whatever that's called. What
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: as far as like food sources, right, so much of
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: our late season plan is around those food sources. Where
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: you're in Kansas. What what's the kind of progression of
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: attraction as far as as far as what dear king
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: in on this time of year for you guys out there,
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: is it? Is it usually the corn like you mentioned,
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: um or what are the different things that you're focusing
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: on hill late season? Like now, if you're doing food plots, um,
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: you know, grains are are are great right now? UM,
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: A lot of times we'll leave standing beans. You know,
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: late season staying beans are great. They're high protein, high energy. UM.
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: Corn is definitely probably the winner around here as far
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: as late season, just because it's a high energy food
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: source for them. Um. They don't hit like cut bean
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: fields real great late near UM they'll hut you know,
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: standing beans a lot better. I will say one thing
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: that is huge out here in Kansas is Milo. If
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: you have standing Milo somewhere, Uh, it will bring dear
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: from miles. I don't know what it is about it,
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: but Milo is just insane, crazy late season attracted out here.
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: If it's standing. Um, you know, if it's harvested, they'll
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: still hit it. Uh. As far as harvested core or
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: harvested fields though, corns definitely number one. UM. As far
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: as just you know, your regular agg fields. If you
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: go into you know, food plots and stuff like that,
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: you know Braska plots. I've had really good luck with those. Um.
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: But it seems that you know, the wheats, um, the
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: black oats, the rise, those cereal grains, uh, seem to
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: be just a really good magnet and a really good
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: food source out here for the late season. And they're
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: also fairly decent throughout the whole hunting season. Um. That's
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: what's kind of nice about them. I went, I kind
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: of go in, no tell them in around the first
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: part of September, and they'll start coming up good for me,
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: and it's just a good, lost green food source through
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: the entire hunting season and you know, clear into January
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: and February. M Yeah, I've always been surprised, you know,
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: up here in Michigan. I've always worried that those grains,
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: cereal grains like like oats, would lose attraction once you've
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: got into the really cold weather. Um. But the oat
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: I plant. I plant kind of a similar combination to
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: what you're alluding there too. I usually plant oats in brassicas,
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: and I'm always surprised every year in December. These deer
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: are still now. Of course they prefer the Brascas, they
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: spend most of their time in the Braskas, but they're
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: still hitting those oats. Um. It always kind of eye
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: opening to me that there's there's still value, you know,
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: clear into clear almost at the end of the year.
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: So UM, it's interesting that you're seeing the same thing Um, definitely,
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: And there's different variety of oats as well, like the
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: black oats that I um put into this mix in particular,
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: or they stay greener longer as far as when the
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: temperature gets down. And the reason why I picked the
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: triticale um, triticale some people called triticale, some people call
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: it trit to klee Um. The reason I picked those
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: three is your rye is gonna stay green the longest,
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: but your triticale is gonna be more palatable earlier in
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: the year, and then your um oats are gonna be
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: kind of it kind of goes from triticale to the oats,
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: um to the rye. So you've got kind of three
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: different varieties. Each one stays green, you know, a little
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: bit longer. So you know, we noticed last night when
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: we were sitting there that some of the some of
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: the oats were starting to get a little bit yellow,
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: but yet your eyes are still green. So you know,
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: if you can play a good mix like that with
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: you put in Nebraska, then you know they're great really
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: late into the season, I mean clear in the January maybe, um,
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: if you've got a mix that's got a little bit
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: of everything to get them through the entire season, I
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: definitely think that's a great way to go. Yeah, I've
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: always liked to do that, and it also you know
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: by having a mix or you know what I've done
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: is I do strips, So in the same plot, I've
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: got oats and then a strip of bras because and
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: the strip of oats. Either way, I feel like by
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: having an all season attraction in a plot, it helps
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: you develop an all season long or all year long
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: in some cases, depending what you're planning in all season
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: long pattern um that you can then identify and hunt
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: off of versus. You know, if you have one plot
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: of clover over here and then four hundred yards away,
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: then you've got a plot with your Brassica's and then
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: all of a sudden you've got deer that are doing
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: one thing in September and then they're completely doing something
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: different in December and completely doing something different maybe in November,
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: and then that can you know, then you're bouncing around
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: a whole lot more and it becomes harder to figure
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: out a specific deer in some cases, um, especially where
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: they're in bed and things like that. Um. So it's
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: an interesting point, Uh, Alex, would you add anything more
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: as far as late season tactics, I don't know, you know,
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: outside of just hunting food, is there anything else we
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: keep in mind, you know as we head into December. Well,
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: and Cody, I mean he hit it ready pretty much
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: right on. He's got He's got this this thing down
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: to a science. The deer don't always cooperate necessarily, but um,
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: I mean the guy has been the guys have been
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: passionately in you know, consistently doing it, doing it right
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: for years to come. So he's I agree with everything
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: he said, especially with the milo. That's been an interesting
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: thing because we don't really have it, you know, in Michigan,
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: we don't a lot of people don't really grow at this,
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: you know, sore gum or milo, and it's not a
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: common crop there more for sand, you know, sandy or loami,
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: or more loamy soils out there and um, but it's
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: been that's been an eye opener for me is just
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: you know, we Cody and I get together quite a
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: bit throughout the here and stuff. So I'm out there
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: kind of not just in the spring of the fall necessarily,
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: but throughout the summer. I can see the growing seasons
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: and the progressions and things like that, and it's, uh,
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: it's amazing. And one of the cool things about it,
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: I mean is, like Cody said, one of the standing
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: crop like that, it's nice, but I'm like corn, when
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: it's standing, you can still kill him in it. So
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: that's that's well. I always say its detractive, is corn,
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: but when they stand up, you can still shoot them.
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: That's right, that's awesome. So actually, I've actually got a
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: farm this year that does have a little patch of
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: or not a little, a decent patch of milo planted
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: in it. Um, So I'm going to try to take
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: advantage of this this December, right, I would definitely keep
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: an eye on. I'd say it's definitely food. You know,
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: food is food is king like Mark Durry always says,
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: their slaves to their stomachs and um. But for me,
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: it's a little bit different. Uh. I just don't have
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: property here, especially in western Illinois, where I can you know,
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: plant food plots or anything like that. So I'm upon
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: a lot of public ground and uh, it gets a
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: little tougher as it gets later, mainly because they just
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: they bed so much closer to food depending on the pressure.
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: It's it's actually kind of weird. I actually prefer I
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: almost prefer more areas in the late later in the
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: season than unpressured areas because it's still forces them to
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: bed a little bit farther away from the food sources,
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: so you have more opportunities to get tighter to that
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: bedding or tighter to that security cover and have less
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: of a chance of of bumping on when it When
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: they're on unpressured property, especially when it's late and they've
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: got plenty of food around, Um, they can, I mean
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: they can bed right off the food source and it's
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: almost impossible to get in there a thought without screwing
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: it up. So that's kind of my is just trying
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: to get between the bed and food a little bit,
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: uh and still hug closer to that that betting side
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: of things. That's that's kind of my It's the kind
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: of the crux for the main I guess center point
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: of my strategies anyway is just is just really understand
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: how and where and when they're betting and then try
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: to adapt and get as close to that as I can. Yeah,
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: and I feel like both of you guys mentioned this
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: and it's it's worth I think noting again so much
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: of this late season time period. Of course, food is king,
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: like you said, ex slaves of their stomach. But then
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: because of the pressure aspect, I feel like, even more
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: so than any time of the year, picking your days
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: is more important than ever as far as making sure
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: that the times that you do strike really have to
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: be well timed, because I just don't think you can
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: get away with any more mistakes at this point. Once
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: you get to December. These deer have been hunted for
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: several months. Probably they've dealt with a lot of humans.
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: Probably they're very pressure, they're very on edge. Especially mature Buck.
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: You know, he he just is not going to tolerate things.
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: Maybe he tolerate a little bit in November, um, but
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: once December rolls around, all he wants to do is
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: refill his stomach, get you know, fattened up. For the
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: winner and you know, just avoid anything that's gonna bug him.
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: And so I just think being careful about just like
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: you're doing Cody, you know, not going in there if
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: things are not just right, like waiting for just that
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: right situation to get in there after him. Um whether
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: that when yeah, I mean I was getting pictures of
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: him for five days in a row and daylight. I mean,
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: so if you think it was you know, if it
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: was very difficult not to go in there and try
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: to hunt him. But at the same time, you know,
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: I know that if I go in there when it's
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: not perfect conditions, it's not a perfect wind, and he
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: smells me one time, or you know he watches does
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: smell me and and blow and take you know something
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: like that. I mean, one little slip up and he
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: might go, you know, not show up at all, or
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: go nocturnal on me. And I it's it's just not
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: worth it, just from experience in the past, you know,
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: Like we were talking about the deer we'll talk about
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: here later, Like I hunted him five times that whole
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: entire year, and we saw him every single time and
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: finally kill him on the fifth time. So patients and
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: Waiting for those perfect moments is definitely key. Yeah, so
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: let's talk about let's talk about this book. This is
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: a buck you call Longhorn, and um, I want you
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: to tell us the store from the very beginning. And
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: then Alex, you in the background, listen to him and
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: whenever he whenever he gets something wrong or whenever he's
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: not quite coloring things as much as you know, you know,
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: being a friend in the background, feel free to jump
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: in and be like, no, you weren't that calm, you
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: were you were a mess or whatever it is. Well,
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: and that's the thing, like I will say, it's it's
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: so funny because m it's like we're it's what's funny,
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: we're joke like we I mean, it's we're so close,
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: and like even what's so cool about our friendship and
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: just the way we get to hunt together and do
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: dream chasers and things like that, Like our families have
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: like become like our mom's talk all the time, and
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: our friends like my dad, like we come out in
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: our dad's hunt. We like it's like it's become like
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: this big family thing. So I know him super well
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: and and he just it's so funny to watch to
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: watch how like he ties himself up and not almost
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: with anxiety just because he's like, oh, well, this one's
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: wrong here, but I gotta go hunt him here. But
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: I know we showed up here, and it's just like
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: this back and forth like like we all do at
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: different times. But the one thing I do have to
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: tip my hat to himployer though, is what we talked
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: about patients and and that's kind of what he's gonna
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: get into. But it's he is a much more patient
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: hunter than I am. I I probably take risks a
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: little bit more or get a little bit more aggressive
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: on certain times and certain things, and it's probably it's
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: probably cost me then, So I've I've learned definitely some
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: patients is key. But I'll definitely make sure that he's uh,
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: I'll make sure he's staying on point, all right. So
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: with that, with that, cod take it away, all right. So, uh,
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: the story of Longhorn, you know, he kind of starts, uh, gosh,
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: I kill you when he's five years old. So we
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: first started seeing when he was a two year old.
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: My wife and I were actually just around the corner
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: from my house watching a big bean field on a
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: place that we lease that is right next to our
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: home farm. And we're actually watching a different dear, a
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: real big tin pointer out there, and this two and
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: a half year buck comes out and he's already a
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: six by six and he just he stood out from
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: the crowd like big time. Um, he was wide already,
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: just had this really great looking frame. And I remember
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: looking at my wife and saying, like, man, that deer
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: right there is gonna be special. Like he's just got
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: unreal genetics. Um, to be a two and a half
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: year old deer and be a six by six already
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: is ridiculous. And I say six by six, I'm talking
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: a perfect main frame six by six, typical, just beautiful,
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: what you dream of. And he had this, you know,
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: real wide frame, and I remember thinking to myself, like,
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: you know, you grow up watching TV and stuff like that,
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: you know, hunting shows, and you see these big wide
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: frame bucks in South Texas, and I, uh, he just
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: instantly kind of looked like a Texas dear to me. Um,
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: So we called him longhorn. And uh, you know, not
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: only that he looked kind of like a Texas longhorn
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: because he was so wide with this little two and
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: a half year old body. Um. So anyway, I kind
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: of knew at that point, like, hey, I need to
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: really keep tabs on this deer. Try to keep him
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: on you know, our home farm and our lease right
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: next door to our home farm, and hold him there
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: because when he gets to be you know, four or
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: five six years old, he's going to be a giant.
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: So that year, I can't remember even what deer I
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: ended up killing that year, but we watched him. We
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: saw him several times. I had him Josh less than
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: twenty yards, I don't know how many times that year,
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: and every time I saw him, I was just mesmerized
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: at how awesome he was. So then the next year
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: he explodes as a three and a half year old.
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: He was like one low one sixties already as a
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: three year old. And I remember another friend of ours,
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: Cody Jarrett Uh comes out here and he's filming all.
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: I'm filming him one morning and Longhorn come down the
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: river with a dough and he was snort weas and
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: another bucks and just being crazy. It ends up bedding
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: down twenty yards right behind us, and he's, you know,
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: hud in sixtienth three year old. And I remember Jared
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: turns around and looks at me. He's like, man, all
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: I gotta do is tell me he's four. All you
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: gotta do is tell me he's four. Will kill him
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: right now. I'm like, no, Like, we gotta wait, you know,
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: we gotta wait. So we saw him several times that year. Um,
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: we actually did find his two year old sheds and
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: its three year old sheds. So moving on, um to
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: now he's four years old. UM, most of the time
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: up here, my home farm is kind of unique. It's
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 1: part Nebraska park Kansas. It's right on the line, UM,
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: so I can actually hunt him. I was hunting that
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: deer in both states. So it just depends on where
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: the block of Tember that he was in. He could
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: be in either state. Uh. Just so basically just depending
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: on winds, depending on you know, how the situation was.
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: We might be hunting him in Nebraska all night, we
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: might be hunding him in Kansas the next it was.
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: It's just kind of a cool, cool situation right there.
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: So we decided, because I do have a decent amount
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: of pressure up here, um around my home farm, that
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: as a four year old, we were going to start
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: hunting him. Um. He was in the upper seventies, I
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: got both of the sheds guessing spread. He was around
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: one seventy seven UM as a four year old, and
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: we decided we're gonna start hunting him. And the crazy
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: thing is I did not buy a regular Kansas tag
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: that year. I bought a land on her tag, and
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: part of the property in Kansas that he was living
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: on mostly is actually what we lease next to our
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: home farm. So through a lot of the year when
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: he was a four year old, I couldn't legally hunt
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: him where he was staying most of the time because
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: I had a land on our tag exactly. Yeah, because
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know why I did that. Honestly,
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: it was kind of a stupid, stupid decision on my
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: part um but a good buddy I didn't want. They
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: were hunt him in Nebraska and that's where I was
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: getting most of his summer pictures. Is probably why I
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: did it, because I was thinking, so like, I'm like, Okay,
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: well he's gonna stay more on the Nebraska side this year,
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: so I'll get a Nebraska tag and hunting with that
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: um and get a landed at tag just because the
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: fact it's cheaper for me but it was a dumb decision. Directly,
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: if I remember correctly, I think you had a project
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: or you were doing something and got we got busy
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: doing something or whatever, and I think you forgot to
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: apply or like you had missed. Honestly, that is exactly
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: what happened. That is what happened. Yes, I missed the deadline.
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 1: I was gone. I was actually out of town filming
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: something with Big and J is actually exactly what it was.
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 1: And I remember I missed the deadline. UM to put in,
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: that's what it was. That's exactly what it was. UM.
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: But anyway, one of my real good friends here UM
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: in town that actually goes in on that lease with
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: for me next door or a home farm. Um, he
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 1: did have a regular tax, so he actually got to
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: hunt him more than I did. UM. And there's a
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: field right next to the block of timber that that
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: deer was living, and he lived and basically a forty
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 1: acre block of timber his whole life is was his
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: home range. I mean he would he would go other places, obviously,
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 1: but that forty acre block of timber is where he
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: spent nine time. And it's a perfect square. It's it's
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: difficult to hunt because he can literally if you get
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 1: you can't really get too close to him in there,
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 1: because they can see you coming from quite a distance.
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 1: And he can literally get up and say, Okay, I'm
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: gonna cross the river and go to knap Off the field,
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: or I'm gonna go to this cornfield, or I'm gonna
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: go to this cornfield, or I'm gonna go to this
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: mile of field. Like there's really no rhyme reason. There's
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: so many agg fields right around that little block of
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: timber that he would just go to whichever one he felt,
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: And that's what make made him so hard to pattern,
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 1: so hard to hunt. Um. But one of the fields
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: is our neighbor's field that we don't have permission to hunt.
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: And we were literally ten yards inside the timber one night,
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: facing you know, facing the timber, and he comes out
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: probably seventy or eighty yards around, and this is when
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: he was still four and a half year old, seventy
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: eight yards around us and ends upcoming and stands thirty
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: five yards broadside, dead to rights, right behind us, but
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: in our neighbor's field, so we couldn't shoot him. And
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: we've got footage of all that, and we ended up
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: watching him for over an hour that night chasing does
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 1: We actually had like a oh mid one forties tin
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 1: pointer that come out clearly on the other side of
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 1: the field and sidestepped with his head sideways going to
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: him like he's gonna fight him, and long Horn just
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: stands there, never moves, just stares at him until he
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: gets about thirty yards from him, and he just lets
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: out the nastiest nortwes you've ever heard, and that tin
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: pointer tuxis tail, and ran for like three nerd yards
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: across the field and went in November. That's all it took.
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: It was the craziest, craziest night. But um. And then
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: we had another encounter that year where we had a
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: dough lead name right to us and he actually kind
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: of bull rushed the dough when he got to about
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: fifty yards and she turns for her left and ended
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: up going around like We ended up having six encounters
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: with him inside sixty yards when he was a four
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: and a half year old and just couldn't couldn't getting killed.
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: It was miserable to watch him. Um. So then we
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: ended up finding both of his sheds that year. Um.
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: He lived good. Uh, he did have a limp though
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: at the end of that year, and I was a
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: little bit nervous he had an injury, either from fighting
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: or just run himself down. And he we hardly had
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: any summer pictures of him next year, and I was
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: scared to death that something had happened to him. He
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: got infection, um, he had moved. I didn't know what
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: in the world was going on. And finally he started
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 1: showing up. I can't it was end of I want
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: to say, at the end of August. I think he
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 1: showed up last week in August something like that. And
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: then he was pretty consistent for a while, and he
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: was right back in that um patch of timber. And
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 1: of course this year, I that year I did get
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: the right tag so I could on him, remember to
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: put in, definitely remember to put in because he was
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: he was in the mid one eighties now, Uh so
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: I wasn't gonna screw that up. But anyway, he he
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 1: he did grow some, but he did not blow up
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: near what I thought he was gonna blow up to um,
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: but still just an unbelievable deer. And uh it was
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 1: it was time. I was gonna put all my eggs
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: in one basket. Basically and just hunt that deer. And
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: that's what we did. And I hunted him, like I said,
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: about five times. I think the first time I went
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: in to hunt him was the twenty sixth of October.
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 1: I got a picture of him working a scrape line
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: that I had found just across the river from his
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 1: main cop area, and we went in and hung a set.
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: My wife and I went and hung a set and
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 1: hunted it that night, and we saw him boom right away.
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 1: I kind of had a guest to where he was betting,
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 1: and he was one of the first bucks we saw.
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 1: And I actually drew on him that night. Um and
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 1: right as I draw, he lunged after a dough and
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 1: went through my shooting lane and then he stood at
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: like forty one yard's kind of behind some stuff, worked
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: some scrapes. I granted at him a few times, and
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 1: he just he was with that dough, didn't want anything
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: to do with me, and so he moved on. I
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: waited till hall ween night, moved to a little bit
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: different location. I actually rattled him in on Halloween night.
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: He came into about fifty five yards in Noeptember, just
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: kind of stood, didn't see if I I didn't see
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 1: a deer, you know, just a smart five and a
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: half year old deer. He just slowly turned around and
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: went back into timber. Um. At this point, Alex is
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: starting to get out year and Alex being a good
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: guy that he is, uh, he says, he's like, man,
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: he's like all film you. You know, anytime you need
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: to be filmed, we'll get it done. We need to
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: get this deer killed. You know, I know how much
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: he means to you. You know when I say this
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: dear means something to me, like you know, watching him
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: as a two year old, three year old, four year old,
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: you know, basically raising this deer like pets almost. I
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: mean he felt like he was my dog, you know,
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: or something like that. All the pictures you got of him, Um,
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: everybody knew what he meant to me. And for Alex,
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 1: you know, to sacrifice some of his hunting time to
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: go film me, you know, it was awesome. Um. You
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: know he enjoyed it too. So I think Alex helped
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: me out here a little bit. Wasn't like the third
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 1: of November, when when did you and I see him
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: the first time? It was like the Yeah, it was
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: it was it was later than that. It was it
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 1: was later than that. I think I've seen him any
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: more time. The first week in November with another friend,
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 1: another buddy of mine that was stewing me. And then
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: when Alex got here, we saw him I think what
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: four days before I killed him. Yeah, it was, it was.
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: It was like it was like the tenth It was
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: like the tenth or eleventh or something like that. Yeah,
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 1: So we went in on the tenth or eleventh and
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: had a perfect condition. I saw him again and I
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: couldn't get on him. He was actually out kind of
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: with a dough again, got a bunch of good footage
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 1: of him, and I remember saying that night, like, you know,
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 1: you think I'd get tired of hunting this year and
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: seeing him, you know, every time that we've seen but
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: every time I see him, you know, it just gave
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: me that much more motivation, you know, to get after
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 1: him and getting killed and back to the patient's thing.
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 1: After we saw him there, the winds kind of got goofy,
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 1: it got warm, conditions just weren't perfect, like we were
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: talking about, Um, I needed a north wind, a perfect
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 1: north wind and a cold morning, and I had a
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: feeling I had hung a set earlier in the year,
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 1: clear back in the summer, real close to the edge
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: of his betting that I knew I could probably kill
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 1: him in the morning, but I had to have the
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: absolute perfect conditions. And we finally got that on the
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 1: fifteen in November, and I got permission from the neighbor
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 1: to go in and cross the river and come right
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: in the back door to this place. And Alex and
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: I have a deal. So every time something goes wrong,
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 1: like we forget stuff or something just silly happens, we
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 1: end up killing a deer, Like it's it's science that
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 1: that happens every single time. So we pull into the
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: neighbors and we hear this weird noise, but we pull
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 1: into the field and we hear this weird nors like
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: what in the world was that? And we get out, Well,
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: the guy had just strong and electric fence in this
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: corn field to put his cows in there, and we
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: hit the fence and with the truck and it just
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: explodes like forty yards in both directions bit posts and
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 1: we're like, oh my gosh, saw him calling the neighbor
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 1: at five o'clock in the morning, like, dude, hit your
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 1: fence or their cows in here, and he luckily was like, no,
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 1: there's no cows in there right now. He's like I'm
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: putting them in there like tomorrow or something like that. Um,
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: don't worry about it. We'll fix it, you know later
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: when you get done hunting. And I'm like, oh my gosh,
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 1: thank gosh, because we're thinking, like man, we're not gonna
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 1: be able to hunt. We're gonna have to fix this fence.
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: It was, you know, a crazy deal. So we kind
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: of gathered ourselves, got our clothes on and started walking in.
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 1: We get to the stand and our camera arm, so
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 1: we're using a fourth thereo camera arm, and we have there.
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: They got this little cam lock on the bottom of them.
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: Well I wasn't paying attention and that thing wasn't twisted on.
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 1: They're very good. So when I go to lock it down,
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: it unfreads and the screw and that camlock fall to
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 1: the ground, and like like hey, tiny, the tiniest little
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: things you can think. I look at Alice, I'm like
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: I should have just stayed in bed this morning, Like
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: this is ridiculous, And he starts laughing. He's like, no day,
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 1: He's like all the steps, going all we're gonna kill
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: him this morning. I'm like, we're kind of laughing. At
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 1: that point, I climb all the way down, miraculously find
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: these little pieces and leaves that are a foot deep,
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 1: and climb back up. We get that situated. Then I
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: go to pull my bow up, and my bow is
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: literally caught on the bottom step of like the limb
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: is caught underneath the bottom rail of the steps going
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: up the tree. And I cannot get okay, not get
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 1: it on attack. I cannot get it off no matter
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: what to do. So at this point, I'm like, we're
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 1: almost hysterically laughing in the stand like that. It's starting
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 1: starting to get light, like we're like this unbelievable, Like
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: this is ridiculous. So I climbed down again, unhooked my bow,
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: climb back up, pulled up, knocking arrow. We didn't even
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 1: do an interview, I don't think. And it's I mean,
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: it's still fairly dark, and I hear something walking and
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: I looked down and the second biggest deer in that timber,
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: which I ended up killing later with a muzzleowner a
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: hundred and fifty six in ten um. Is it six
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 1: yards right below and We have no idea where he
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: came from, no idea how he got there. But we've
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: got this. But at this other deer at at six
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: steps right below us, it's not camera light yet. Um,
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 1: he's the only other deer. I'm willing to put a
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: Kansas tag on in that area. Uh. Anyway, he he,
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: he didn't spook, he didn't know we were there. Uh,
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 1: he goes off. But we kind of thought he almost
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 1: acted like he had just got his butt kicked, like
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 1: he was leaving an area, like he was like getting
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: out of there, and so we thought that was kind
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 1: of weird. So we let the sun come up, and I,
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: at this point, getting mid November, I'm like, you know,
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: I would kill, probably kill that deer and you know,
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 1: try to hunt longhorn on the Nebraska side of things
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 1: or whatever later in the year. Uh. So I hit
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: the horns together actually to try to rattle that deer
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: that we had just seen back in and I'm hitting
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: the horns together, I hang them up, and Alex goes, hey,
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: there's a buck in the field. And I turned around
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: and no more than get my binoculars on him for
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: two seconds and realized it was long horn and he's
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 1: loping across the field right to us, and I'm like,
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 1: oh my gosh, it's him, you know whatever, grab my bow.
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: He comes right to the edge of the field right
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 1: and he's just looking in the timber. Again, smart five
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 1: and a half year old deer doesn't see a fight,
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 1: and I'm like, he's gonna walk out of my life again,
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm I'm getting a little nervous. He finally
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 1: starts to come into the timber and he stops about
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 1: fifty yards away, and he's just looking and looking, and
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 1: he's got basically two options. If he goes to our right,
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 1: he's gonna go around us and possibly get down wind,
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 1: or he's gonna come right underneath the stay. And if
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: he goes on this trail that goes straight and goes
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: to our left, he's gonna walk by first at twenty
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 1: five yards and then even closer when he comes around
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 1: the front of the stand. He stands there for what
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 1: seems like an eternity and finally flix his tail and
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 1: we knew he was come. And he goes left and
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 1: I'm like, I remember, I was the calmest I think
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 1: I've ever been. And I remember I told Alex I'm like, Okay,
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 1: here he comes. He's gonna come right here, and he's
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: gonna be perfect. And so I wasn't you out we
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 1: can going? Yeah, I was like insane calm, probably just
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 1: because I've seen him so many times, you know, I've
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 1: been dreaming to that moment and had my game face on.
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 1: I guess, and he's coming. I remember Um saying out
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 1: you know you're on him right there. I remember drawing
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 1: while he goes behind a tree, remember Alex say, And
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 1: you can hear him in the footage. He goes, I'm
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 1: not a hone him. I'm not, you know, because he
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 1: I think he thought I was gonna shoot him right there,
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 1: and I'm like, no, no, no, Like when he comes
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 1: right out right here, I'm a shooting right in this opening.
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: And he finally comes out there into that opening, and I,
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 1: you know, gave me a little bit and he stops
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 1: and kind of looks towards us, and I let her
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: fly and it just hit him perfect. The whole story
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 1: came down to a twenty five yard shot, as Alex
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: said in the article, and he kind of wheels runs
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 1: out into the field, kind of stood there for just
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 1: a second, got one little last burst of adrenaline, Uh,
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 1: disappeared kind of on the edge of the field there,
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: and we knew, I mean, at that point, I knew
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 1: he was down. I knew he was he was dead.
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 1: It was just a matter of finding him. We called
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: my dad, called my wife. Unfortunately, my wife who had
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 1: filmed me most of the time hunting him and had
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 1: been you know, the biggest part of it, she was
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 1: doing a continuing ed for her job, so she wasn't
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 1: even in town. I couldn't get ahold of her. But
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 1: we got everybody together, Hak, my buddy Ryan, Alex's dad,
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 1: my dad, Um, another buddy of my Nathan Will. We
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 1: all came down there, gave him probably an hour. We
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 1: just walked out into the field to the spot, uh
• 1:19:05
  Speaker 1: where we last saw him. And as we're walking to
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 1: that spot, we actually saw him laying just right on
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 1: the edge of the field and he literally died right
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: underneath the tree stand that Alex and I had hunted
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 1: just like three or four days prior. Um and saw
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 1: him out of that stand and he was literally dead
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: ten yards right underneath of it. It was just just
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 1: all meant to be. It was pretty pretty crazy deal.
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 1: Definitely a story I'll be hard pressed to ever top Wow.
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 1: So Alex, you were you were pretty shook up in
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 1: the moment trying to film him. How was Cody after
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 1: the shot? Oh? It was yeah, I mean it was
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 1: just it was so crazy. I mean, like the hard
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 1: part was this this block of timber around the edges.
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 1: In the inside the timber, there's some blow down and
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 1: stuff like that, but it's not like it's crazy be thick.
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 1: There's little pockets, but all around the edges it's pretty
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 1: dang thick. So, um, I was having trouble. I was
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 1: a little bit higher than Cody. Obviously when you're setting
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 1: a stand up the film, you're a little bit above him.
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: I couldn't and I couldn't see. I didn't have the
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 1: line of sight that Cody did, so Cody could kind
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 1: of steem really well, and I was like, dude, we're
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 1: not going to get this on toll because I can't
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 1: freaking fine the deer. So like I'm like, just I'm
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 1: kind of getting more more front literally around the tree.
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 1: I mean, he had the whole tree in the way.
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 1: He did a great job. So finally when I finally
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 1: picked the deer up and then go and then that's
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 1: actually when I got on the deer and I I was there,
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 1: all right, we good, We're good. I started calm down,
• 1:20:36
  Speaker 1: and then we were and then we were in when
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 1: it was go time. But yeah, I mean once after
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 1: the arrow hit him, I mean we both knew instantly
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 1: that he was smoked. And it was just a crazy celebration.
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 1: I mean we were just we're laughing, high five and crying, hugging.
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 1: I mean, it was. It was. There's definitely a few. Yeah,
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: it was just one of those just crazy it was.
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 1: And like not to get like super philosophical or anything,
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 1: but it was like, at least with me, like there's
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: always times like in the woods and life whatever where
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 1: it's like, man, I wish I would have savored the
• 1:21:07
  Speaker 1: moment more to like have more of a memory, like
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 1: I like looking back at things, but like that, like
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: in that at that time, in that moment when it
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 1: all kind of came to a point and it happened
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 1: like it was, I remember actually having like thought about it,
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 1: like I knew we would remember it for like it
• 1:21:25
  Speaker 1: would be a memory that we have forever, Like it
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 1: was something like I experienced it like this was because
• 1:21:29
  Speaker 1: this is a big, big thing that we'll never forget
• 1:21:31
  Speaker 1: and um, and it just meant a lot to to everybody,
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 1: you know, all of our group of friends and and Cody,
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 1: and it was just it was pretty pretty unreal. Yeah,
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 1: I little thing that I remember the most. It's almost
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 1: iconic to me now, and so many people have you know,
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 1: commented on is you know, we realized we hit him,
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: We realized we made a great shot, we realized, you know,
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: he was gonna be dead. And then you know, I
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 1: kind of lost my mind, got pretty emotional, and you
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 1: know I remember turned around putting my head on the
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 1: tree and you know, thanking God that this would you know,
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 1: finally happened, that we put the story together, and I
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 1: remember Alex crabbing me and doing you did it, man,
• 1:22:09
  Speaker 1: you finally did it. You know, it just it was
• 1:22:12
  Speaker 1: just just a really cool moment between friends. Wow. Yeah,
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: I can't imagine that is that's pretty special. I I
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 1: can relate to you, you know, as far as having
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 1: those long multiple years of chasing one single deer and
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 1: uh man, it doesn't come together all that often when
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 1: it finally does. I know, that's a pretty special thing.
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: So I enjoyed. I enjoyed that story. Although it's a
• 1:22:39
  Speaker 1: little bitter sweet because I'm thinking of a Buckeye hunter
• 1:22:41
  Speaker 1: for four years that I won't get that anything for um.
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 1: But have we have we changed his name now to
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: just like he who must not be named? Yeah, it's exactly.
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 1: He's the Baltimore of the hunting world now that buck.
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: So moving on personally and in this podcast, Um, that
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 1: you mentioned earlier when we were talking about epic, you
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 1: know how so much of hunting one single deer for
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 1: you it's just about being patient? Um hm, is there
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 1: anything else you would add? Any other lessons you learned
• 1:23:18
  Speaker 1: from hunting longhorn as far as targeting and getting that
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 1: one deer other than just being patient and careful about
• 1:23:26
  Speaker 1: hunting him? Was it? Were there any other things as
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 1: far as like learning the deer, patterning the deer um,
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 1: anything else you would add? Yeah? I think, Um. I
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 1: think just just educating yourself on every deer is different. UM.
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 1: I've noticed if you really pay attention to to certain
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 1: bucks mannerisms. UM. You know, I have hunted deer, they
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 1: are extremely aggressive. Longhorn, for instance, was probably the most
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 1: the single most aggressive white tail I've ever seen. Um.
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 1: I think almost every time we saw that deer. Literally,
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 1: I bet of the times that we saw that deer,
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 1: we watched him either run another buck off or snort
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 1: reason buck off. Um. He was constantly aggressive towards other bucks,
• 1:24:16
  Speaker 1: but he also knew he was the king in the
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 1: woods there, um, So you know for him, you know,
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 1: I think noticing deer's mannerisms and stuff like that as
• 1:24:25
  Speaker 1: far as being able to kill. You know, at the
• 1:24:27
  Speaker 1: end of the day, a rattling sequence is what killed
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 1: that deer. You know, he probably had just got done
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 1: running the buck off that came right underneath of us,
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 1: and he probably assumed that that buck had went back
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 1: inteptember and was fighting another deer in his territory, you know,
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 1: real close to his bedroom, and he wasn't gonna have it.
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 1: You know, he was coming in to kick somebody's butt
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 1: and say, hey, get out of my area. Other bucks
• 1:24:52
  Speaker 1: I've hunted. I mean, for example, that same year, I
• 1:24:56
  Speaker 1: was hunting a seven pointer on the Nebraska's out of
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 1: our ground. He was extremely non aggressive. I actually grunted
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 1: at that deer a couple of different times and had
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 1: him run off like leaves. He didn't want anything to
• 1:25:11
  Speaker 1: do with any other bucks. He was always by himself.
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 1: So I think kind of educating yourself a little bit,
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: really trying to pay attention to the attitude of that
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 1: certain deer can help you kill him, you know. I mean,
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 1: like that seven pointer. Basically I just had to hunt
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 1: him in his core area to and from food. I
• 1:25:29
  Speaker 1: hunted those around in his area, and we ended up
• 1:25:31
  Speaker 1: killing him. I think I killed him on like the
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: third of November last year, and he was literally just cruising. Um.
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 1: I don't think I could have ever ratted or called
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 1: that deer into me unless he just made he was
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 1: in that right mood. Whereas Longhorn, I mean, if you
• 1:25:48
  Speaker 1: saw him, I don't know how many different times in
• 1:25:51
  Speaker 1: the two years we hunted him that you would grunt
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 1: at him back in the timber to try to get
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 1: him come in, and he would just stop and start
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 1: ripping trees and grunt at yet or snort, we's at yet.
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 1: But he wouldn't necessarily every time come in because he
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 1: knew he was the king of the woods. He knew
• 1:26:04
  Speaker 1: he didn't have to. But three different times the year
• 1:26:08
  Speaker 1: that I hunted him and killed him seventeen, three different
• 1:26:12
  Speaker 1: times I rattled him into fifty yards or less and
• 1:26:15
  Speaker 1: just couldn't getting killed until the last time. So I
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 1: guess you know another great you know good thing. If
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 1: you're targeting one single deer, just really pay attention to
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 1: that dear's attitude. Um. You know, if he's really aggressive,
• 1:26:29
  Speaker 1: you might be able to call him in. If he's
• 1:26:31
  Speaker 1: not aggressive, you might not be able to call him in.
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 1: You might be doing more harm than good. So that's
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 1: a that's a good tip, I guess um as well
• 1:26:39
  Speaker 1: as far as being patient, Yeah, that's a great point.
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 1: These these deers really do have unique personalities. The more
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 1: I the more I see it, it's it's just so true. Um. Well,
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 1: one thing that I've noticed with Epic here recently on
• 1:26:52
  Speaker 1: the cameras, when he comes in, he's usually not around
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 1: a whole lot of other gear. And I almost wonder
• 1:26:59
  Speaker 1: if that's why we didn't see him last night, because
• 1:27:02
  Speaker 1: there was so many deer in such a small concentrated area.
• 1:27:06
  Speaker 1: You know, he might just kind of be a loner.
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 1: And I've definitely seen that maturity here where you know,
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 1: they basically during the rut, they have their certain does,
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 1: but they don't like to be around a ton of deer,
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 1: you know, And when he come in after dark, he
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 1: was all by himself, didn't have a single other deer
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 1: with him. When he comes into that camera, he's usually
• 1:27:25
  Speaker 1: kind of off by himself and some of the other deer,
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 1: you know, it might be farther out in the food plot,
• 1:27:29
  Speaker 1: so maybe you know, I don't have a ton of
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 1: history with him, for the fact that I only have
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 1: one shed and pictures just this year, but just going
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 1: off trail camera intel, when I see him, he seems
• 1:27:40
  Speaker 1: to be alone most of the time with a single
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 1: dough so you know, he might be one that's not
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 1: very aggressive and doesn't like to be around deer. So
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 1: that's another reason why I've been really patient and not
• 1:27:51
  Speaker 1: being really aggressive at trying to hunt him. M Yeah,
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 1: that's that's a very interesting observation, um. And it's funny
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 1: how you can know if you're if if you're open
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: to paying attention to those kinds of things within trail
• 1:28:03
  Speaker 1: cameras and you're not just looking, oh, there's a big buck,
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 1: but if you're actually looking at what's going on around it,
• 1:28:08
  Speaker 1: you can learn so much more of those pictures. I
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 1: think that can help you understand a buck's personality maybe
• 1:28:13
  Speaker 1: or some of its tendencies. Before moving on to our
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 1: next topic, though, I want to take a quick second
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 1: to think our partners at Onyx and Onyx is the
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 1: producer of the on X Hunt app. This is a
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 1: mobile application that I have been using all season long
• 1:28:30
  Speaker 1: and have been using it for a number of years now.
• 1:28:33
  Speaker 1: If you're not familiar, you probably haven't been listening to
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 1: this podcast because I talked about a lot. But just
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 1: in case you are new, this app will show you
• 1:28:41
  Speaker 1: aerial views of your hunting area. It will show you
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 1: topo graphic views. It overlays with the borders of private
• 1:28:47
  Speaker 1: property and public property. It'll tell you who owns those places.
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 1: It'll tell you what kind of public property you've got.
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 1: It'll allow you to save way points, measure distances, measure areas.
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 1: You can even take away point and just tech sit
• 1:29:00
  Speaker 1: to a friend. So when my buddy further is lost
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 1: in the woods and he can't find his way of
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 1: the tree stand, he texts me or calls me. He's
• 1:29:06
  Speaker 1: all stressed out, he's sweating. Maybe he's got to go
• 1:29:08
  Speaker 1: to the bathroom and he needn't bring a toilet paper.
• 1:29:10
  Speaker 1: This kind of scenario happens all the time. And when
• 1:29:13
  Speaker 1: that happens, now I don't need to try to explain
• 1:29:15
  Speaker 1: things to him. I don't need to say turn right
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 1: at the big oak, turn left of the creek bed. No,
• 1:29:19
  Speaker 1: I can just text him away point, send him right
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 1: to the tree stand, and not need to worry about
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 1: all that drama. So i'd recommend you check this one out.
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 1: If you haven't yet, you can learn more by searching
• 1:29:30
  Speaker 1: for on X on your favorite mobile app store, or
• 1:29:33
  Speaker 1: you can visit onyx maps dot com. Um. Speaking speaking
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 1: of loaners, UM, I gotta I gotta shift gears here
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 1: a little bit before we run out of time, because Alex,
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 1: you're kind of one of those loaners who's always floating
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 1: around the woods with a stand on your back, hopping
• 1:29:51
  Speaker 1: into new trees every single time. And I want to
• 1:29:54
  Speaker 1: make sure I want to make sure we hear a
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 1: little bit about what you're doing. UM. In particular, you've
• 1:29:59
  Speaker 1: told me a lot in the past how you're really mobile, right,
• 1:30:03
  Speaker 1: You're you're running gunning a lot, and I love that
• 1:30:06
  Speaker 1: I've been doing it more and more myself. UM. Can
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 1: you talk a little bit about your season. You've had
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 1: a great season, um, and maybe you know kind of
• 1:30:17
  Speaker 1: mold a little bit of your tactics into how you
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 1: pulled off this these couple of hunts. Well, it's it's
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 1: it's all pretty much like look and then the rest
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 1: of it just kind of happens. So there's not really
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 1: much strategy involved. But no, it's and and honestly it's
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 1: it's just more because I have to be um, you know,
• 1:30:36
  Speaker 1: with public ground and and I I do go to
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 1: every extent to follow the letter of the law. And
• 1:30:44
  Speaker 1: and you know a lot of our regulations here. You know,
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 1: you can't leave stands, you know, fixed stands in place,
• 1:30:49
  Speaker 1: and and you know from day to day in the
• 1:30:52
  Speaker 1: tree and you can't. You gotta take your stuff in
• 1:30:54
  Speaker 1: and out with you. And and that's just kind of
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: how I just you know, that's abiding by the law.
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 1: And not only but it's just I found it's the
• 1:31:01
  Speaker 1: most it's the best way to continue to find the
• 1:31:04
  Speaker 1: deer with me. It's pretty much everything center is kind
• 1:31:06
  Speaker 1: of around location. So um and and that's on you know,
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 1: public ground or private ground or whatever. And uh, you
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 1: know a name that gets thrown around a lot, it's
• 1:31:17
  Speaker 1: been getting thrown around a lot just because of his success.
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 1: And and it's you know, all all rightful hole, rightful
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 1: praise for sure as his dan infall. You know, I
• 1:31:25
  Speaker 1: learned a lot from him growing up in southwest Michigan. Uh.
• 1:31:28
  Speaker 1: The really the property that we had that I had
• 1:31:30
  Speaker 1: permission to hunt, that was behind my neighbors. My neighbors had, sorry,
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 1: my grandparents had, uh just you know, a few acres
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 1: and then behind that was a big farm with a huge,
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 1: huge marsh and a huge swamp. So I remember I
• 1:31:43
  Speaker 1: was at the Landing Deer in Turkey Expo when I
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 1: was like fifteen or sixteen and walked by a booth
• 1:31:49
  Speaker 1: and I mean I was a sponge. I still am,
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 1: like I grab every you know, try to grab every one,
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 1: especially when I was at that age, grab every article,
• 1:31:56
  Speaker 1: every DVD, every video I can, just because I love
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 1: watching I love watching hunting, I love I just try
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 1: to learn as much as I could. And I walked
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 1: by this table and there was a DVD sitting there
• 1:32:05
  Speaker 1: called Marsh Bedding, and I was like, wait a second,
• 1:32:07
  Speaker 1: Like I hunt around marshes, I probably should know something
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 1: about this. So like I grabbed it, and sure enough
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: it was like an infults first ever video that he produced,
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 1: like with like the Blood Brothers or whatever it was
• 1:32:17
  Speaker 1: called with UM the other other Michigan come with Michigan
• 1:32:20
  Speaker 1: and Wisconsin guys and UM, and it just like everything
• 1:32:24
  Speaker 1: he said was just like wow, like I was just
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 1: this is like this is makes so much sense for
• 1:32:28
  Speaker 1: I was seeing. And I think a lot of it
• 1:32:30
  Speaker 1: comes from I've always just asked the question why, Like
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 1: I want to know why a deer is over here.
• 1:32:34
  Speaker 1: I want to know why sign is here. I want
• 1:32:36
  Speaker 1: to know why, you know, deer moving over here and
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 1: not over here. And so I'll just try to figure
• 1:32:41
  Speaker 1: out answer those questions those wise all the time, and
• 1:32:43
  Speaker 1: and a lot of it just boils down the location
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 1: for me and and how habitat and terrain funnel dictate, uh,
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 1: manipulate um or I should say, just um kind of
• 1:32:57
  Speaker 1: make deer move and live where they where they do
• 1:33:00
  Speaker 1: so and for me, just like you know, like we
• 1:33:04
  Speaker 1: can all relate to and pressured areas, especially like like
• 1:33:08
  Speaker 1: something like public ground. You know, deer going to spend
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 1: especially mature books like we're targeting, are spending majority of
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 1: their time and daylight and their betting, so figuring out
• 1:33:17
  Speaker 1: ways to maneuver around that you get in it and
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 1: stay around the outside of it being travel corridors close
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 1: to it. That's really where my thought processes start out
• 1:33:28
  Speaker 1: from there, how terrain and habitat dictate that and how
• 1:33:32
  Speaker 1: I can how I can manipulate and move around some
• 1:33:34
  Speaker 1: of that too, And and the biggest thing is is
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 1: like and again it's nothing nothing new really, but just
• 1:33:39
  Speaker 1: like we talked about all the time, when you think
• 1:33:41
  Speaker 1: about your times of success, um, you know, majority of
• 1:33:45
  Speaker 1: the time, your best chance to kill that deer, especially
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 1: the maturity ar is your first time. And so having
• 1:33:50
  Speaker 1: fresh sits and maneuver around and be able to be
• 1:33:55
  Speaker 1: able to move around and I and essentially have a
• 1:33:58
  Speaker 1: sit every time based on Now. Granted, I mean I
• 1:34:00
  Speaker 1: might hunt, and especially especially especially here in public some
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 1: of the public ground right hunt in Illinois. You know,
• 1:34:07
  Speaker 1: I've stayed relatively and kind of one section or quadrant,
• 1:34:12
  Speaker 1: and we can kind of get into that a little
• 1:34:13
  Speaker 1: bit too, kind of how I personally break down like
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 1: public hunting areas or just break down larger areas in
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 1: general in my mind. But I've hung around this one
• 1:34:21
  Speaker 1: area because it just is I'm magnet for big deer
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 1: because of a thick cover that just it can hold them.
• 1:34:25
  Speaker 1: They can feel safe. So it's like I'm not saying, like,
• 1:34:27
  Speaker 1: you know, I hunt here once and then move, you know,
• 1:34:29
  Speaker 1: a quarter mile over here and hunt. I mean it
• 1:34:31
  Speaker 1: might be a hundred yards, it might be a couple
• 1:34:33
  Speaker 1: hundred yards, just setting up for a different wind or
• 1:34:35
  Speaker 1: a different situation or a different trail or travel corridor
• 1:34:38
  Speaker 1: or wherever, and um. But I think staying mobile like
• 1:34:43
  Speaker 1: that it keeps you in the game. It keeps you sharp.
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: You don't get complacent, you don't get um, you're just
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 1: you're you're staying mentally focused more often more of the time,
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 1: as well as the deer don't pattern you as much.
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's been in credible, especially watching it on
• 1:35:02
  Speaker 1: this particular property here in Illinois, which it's really hilly.
• 1:35:05
  Speaker 1: There's a lot of high kind of high bluffs and
• 1:35:07
  Speaker 1: ridges and low bottoms and stuff, and you can actually
• 1:35:10
  Speaker 1: watch deer kind of crevent the hunting pressure, hunting traffic
• 1:35:17
  Speaker 1: based on like entry parking areas and how they access
• 1:35:20
  Speaker 1: and how hunters leaving, like where they typically set up,
• 1:35:22
  Speaker 1: you know, not that far from hunting areas and these
• 1:35:24
  Speaker 1: certain ridges and stuff, and to watch the deer just
• 1:35:28
  Speaker 1: pattern hunters as hunters are trying to pattern the deers
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 1: has been incredible, um, you know, over the last five
• 1:35:35
  Speaker 1: or you know, six seven years of really hunting aggressively
• 1:35:39
  Speaker 1: kind of in the style, it's really been awesome to
• 1:35:42
  Speaker 1: learn and see how they can, how they can kind
• 1:35:44
  Speaker 1: of do the same thing to us as we're trying
• 1:35:46
  Speaker 1: to do to them. And I think avoiding that. One
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 1: way to avoid that, or one way to stay ahead
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 1: of that is just by kind of moving and and
• 1:35:54
  Speaker 1: understanding trying to and obviously it's a it's a cat
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 1: and mouse game you're trying to get You're trying to
• 1:36:00
  Speaker 1: predict where they're going to be, when they're going to
• 1:36:02
  Speaker 1: be there, and how to set up accordingly based on
• 1:36:04
  Speaker 1: the conditions. So it's, uh, it's definitely my preferred method
• 1:36:08
  Speaker 1: and one that I've had pretty decent success, especially in
• 1:36:11
  Speaker 1: the last few years doing that. Yeah. So was that
• 1:36:15
  Speaker 1: the case with either of your kills this year, the
• 1:36:16
  Speaker 1: Kansas or South Dakota where those first sits? Um my, yes, actual,
• 1:36:22
  Speaker 1: well kind of my my South Dakota one. Absolutely, that
• 1:36:26
  Speaker 1: was that was one. Um uh, it's it was pretty uh,
• 1:36:32
  Speaker 1: pretty straightforward. I mean I found this place on the
• 1:36:35
  Speaker 1: map I had not counted I hunted the same general
• 1:36:37
  Speaker 1: area in past years, but I've not been to this
• 1:36:39
  Speaker 1: like this specific kind of area, and I had to
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 1: stand on my back first night. I was kind of
• 1:36:45
  Speaker 1: more of an observation set than anything. I just want
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 1: to like see what's happening in this area and look
• 1:36:50
  Speaker 1: at the map. So it was like this kind of
• 1:36:52
  Speaker 1: brushy crp. It looked like a big CRP field, uh,
• 1:36:57
  Speaker 1: next to this creek that had this finger timber that
• 1:36:59
  Speaker 1: kind of wrapped around it. And I was like, it's
• 1:37:01
  Speaker 1: got some great transition areas, some transition lines. I said, well,
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 1: this this just the natural shade of vegetation habitat will
• 1:37:07
  Speaker 1: funnel deer movement. So kind of dropped down in winning
• 1:37:10
  Speaker 1: early just kind of wanted to scout and look my
• 1:37:12
  Speaker 1: way um and kind of scout my way along and
• 1:37:16
  Speaker 1: just kept seeing better and better sign and I was like,
• 1:37:18
  Speaker 1: all right, this is this is really good. So I
• 1:37:20
  Speaker 1: kind of found this area that I could I could
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 1: get up in this tree and it was like literally
• 1:37:25
  Speaker 1: one of the only trees I could get in, and
• 1:37:27
  Speaker 1: it was kind of low in that sense where it's
• 1:37:30
  Speaker 1: either like you have monster cottonwood trees, are these like
• 1:37:32
  Speaker 1: scrub oak trees that are like a ninety degree angle,
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 1: so it's at a nightmare. But um, I found this
• 1:37:37
  Speaker 1: little tree. I got eight feet off the ground, uh,
• 1:37:40
  Speaker 1: and I got set up. And another big thing that
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 1: that has really helped me that I've I've kind of
• 1:37:47
  Speaker 1: written a lot about or try to try to maybe
• 1:37:49
  Speaker 1: right about this success that I've seen from it is
• 1:37:52
  Speaker 1: is that hundred yard mark where it's like you're a
• 1:37:54
  Speaker 1: hundred yards from where you want to be, or you're
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 1: even within the hundred yards of where you think deer betted.
• 1:37:59
  Speaker 1: And a certain it was the case based on the
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 1: habitat that I was seeing and how how this the
• 1:38:03
  Speaker 1: spot set up. But it's just slowing everything way down
• 1:38:07
  Speaker 1: and taking your time and like and and and approaching
• 1:38:10
  Speaker 1: a location as if like you knew there was a
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 1: buck within a hundred yards. I mean just three step,
• 1:38:17
  Speaker 1: just super slow. You're hanging you're you know, putting the
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 1: climbing sticks up incredibly slow. You're hanging your stand quietly,
• 1:38:23
  Speaker 1: no tanks, no, you know, And I do a lot
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 1: with my gear to make sure that it's not making
• 1:38:27
  Speaker 1: any noise and anything like that. So it was a
• 1:38:30
  Speaker 1: perfect transition and habitat and that's something that Dan you know,
• 1:38:32
  Speaker 1: in Fault, talks about a lot about the transition lines,
• 1:38:34
  Speaker 1: and that is like one of the major takeaways in
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 1: my opinion as far as thick security cover. Where one
• 1:38:41
  Speaker 1: type of cover meets another type of cover, that's where
• 1:38:43
  Speaker 1: you're gonna find a sign. That's where they travel, that's
• 1:38:45
  Speaker 1: where they stage a lot um And I have seen
• 1:38:48
  Speaker 1: that time and time again. This case was no different.
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 1: So approach to say, it was right on the edge
• 1:38:54
  Speaker 1: of the thick brushy CRP and is even thicker than
• 1:38:56
  Speaker 1: I thought it was by looking at the map. So
• 1:38:57
  Speaker 1: I was happy. It was kind of a happy surprise
• 1:38:59
  Speaker 1: when I saw like, all right, this is awesome. And
• 1:39:01
  Speaker 1: then the thick brushy creek creek bottom, and so I
• 1:39:05
  Speaker 1: get set up on in this tree and just kind
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 1: of sitting there and it was kind of slowing. I
• 1:39:08
  Speaker 1: could see a bunch and I was like, it was
• 1:39:10
  Speaker 1: kind of an observation point. So I was happy because
• 1:39:12
  Speaker 1: I could see over the top of the CRP across
• 1:39:14
  Speaker 1: the whole field, and I was just trying to get
• 1:39:16
  Speaker 1: get an indication of where dear movement might be happening
• 1:39:19
  Speaker 1: in adjustment for the next day. And I was sitting there.
• 1:39:22
  Speaker 1: About an hour before dark, I saw a doll working
• 1:39:25
  Speaker 1: towards me that right down the transition line between the
• 1:39:27
  Speaker 1: c RP and the and the creek bottom, and she
• 1:39:29
  Speaker 1: just kept coming, kept coming. She got about forty yards
• 1:39:32
  Speaker 1: away and and made a hard made a hard turn
• 1:39:35
  Speaker 1: into the timber, and I thought she was gonna come
• 1:39:37
  Speaker 1: around behind me, uh and next to the creek and
• 1:39:40
  Speaker 1: get down wind. I was like, oh, this is gonna
• 1:39:41
  Speaker 1: be great. The only deer I've seen so far, she's
• 1:39:43
  Speaker 1: gonna get right behind me. But anyway, she comes in
• 1:39:46
  Speaker 1: and it's here kind of walking in the in the timber,
• 1:39:50
  Speaker 1: and I can't see her. And finally I can get
• 1:39:52
  Speaker 1: to where I can just see the bottom of her legs,
• 1:39:54
  Speaker 1: and she stops and she just stands there, probably a
• 1:39:59
  Speaker 1: minute to stand in there. And all of a sudden,
• 1:40:01
  Speaker 1: I'm just sitting there and I out of nowhere. There's
• 1:40:04
  Speaker 1: no other step, there's no other you know, no noise,
• 1:40:09
  Speaker 1: and I just hear this and this buck, this buck
• 1:40:13
  Speaker 1: story that I'm sitting there. The only thing I remember thinking,
• 1:40:14
  Speaker 1: I said, well, that wasn't the dope. The only thing
• 1:40:18
  Speaker 1: I could think is is doing that is I actually
• 1:40:22
  Speaker 1: got into the tree and got into this location, and
• 1:40:24
  Speaker 1: he was betted. He was betted right there. And then
• 1:40:27
  Speaker 1: eventually and I'll get to it a little bit here,
• 1:40:29
  Speaker 1: but I know for a fact he's better because I
• 1:40:31
  Speaker 1: actually found his bed. Um. But um. Anyway, he goes,
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 1: you know, snort weez is and she she, she kind
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 1: of takes off, kind of running a little bit, does
• 1:40:40
  Speaker 1: this little semi circles half moon shape. It comes right
• 1:40:43
  Speaker 1: between me and the creek and she comes by me
• 1:40:44
  Speaker 1: like like okay, and I'm sure it's enough, you know
• 1:40:47
  Speaker 1: that that head down and kind of that that fast
• 1:40:49
  Speaker 1: stop where they just his nose to the ground and
• 1:40:52
  Speaker 1: I could just see I'm like looking and looking and
• 1:40:54
  Speaker 1: looking and looking. I can't see anything. I'm like, what
• 1:40:56
  Speaker 1: where is he? And then finally he comes underneath this
• 1:40:59
  Speaker 1: low branch and I finally seen him. And literally the
• 1:41:01
  Speaker 1: first time I laid eyes on him, he's yards right
• 1:41:03
  Speaker 1: underneath the tree. So it's so funny. I can't I
• 1:41:07
  Speaker 1: can't make it up. So like I saw a mass
• 1:41:10
  Speaker 1: with and and times I couldn't tell like how tall
• 1:41:14
  Speaker 1: it was or anything like that, but I was like
• 1:41:15
  Speaker 1: I didn't then just big barrel chest and I could
• 1:41:17
  Speaker 1: again he was so close. I was actually I saw
• 1:41:19
  Speaker 1: the top of his back and his wide shoulders and
• 1:41:22
  Speaker 1: thick forehead, and I was like, he's a mature I
• 1:41:24
  Speaker 1: was like, he's mature shooter. Like this is what I
• 1:41:26
  Speaker 1: came for. I got, you know, a week, five days
• 1:41:28
  Speaker 1: to get this done out here and do it yourself
• 1:41:30
  Speaker 1: out in South Dakota. I was like, I'm not being picky.
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: So um. Anyway, he comes down at the tree because
• 1:41:36
  Speaker 1: I was so low as only I used three lone
• 1:41:38
  Speaker 1: wild sticks. I had four with me, but I just leaned,
• 1:41:41
  Speaker 1: so I just leaned the fourth stick up against the tree.
• 1:41:44
  Speaker 1: He actually knocks the stick off of the tree as
• 1:41:48
  Speaker 1: he's coming by. So I mean he literally brushed the
• 1:41:51
  Speaker 1: tree that I was in, and at this time I
• 1:41:54
  Speaker 1: swap it was in. It was unreal. So at this
• 1:41:56
  Speaker 1: time I swung around. Come to full draw or Matt
• 1:41:59
  Speaker 1: like that stop Matt a little bit louder. He hits
• 1:42:02
  Speaker 1: twenty yards, Matt, you know, tried to stop him. Get
• 1:42:05
  Speaker 1: gets that out five or thirty Matt a little louder
• 1:42:09
  Speaker 1: makes a turn. So now he's finally he's finally like
• 1:42:13
  Speaker 1: perfectly broadside and he's that like I ranged the edge
• 1:42:16
  Speaker 1: of this this kind of this thick brush stuff right
• 1:42:20
  Speaker 1: in the edge of this carp He's run, he's just
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 1: passed it. I ranged the edge of that at thirty
• 1:42:23
  Speaker 1: yards and he was just passed that. So I figured
• 1:42:25
  Speaker 1: he's about thirty five. And then finally when he made
• 1:42:27
  Speaker 1: that turn and he stopped. I finally I literally yelled
• 1:42:31
  Speaker 1: hey like that, and he just stopped and kind of
• 1:42:34
  Speaker 1: like he literally yelled at him. It was pretty awesome.
• 1:42:40
  Speaker 1: He literally he literally snapped his head or anything. He
• 1:42:44
  Speaker 1: just he was so her that he kind of just
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 1: like just kind of nonstantly turned his head back to me,
• 1:42:50
  Speaker 1: and I just I just I settled in on him
• 1:42:52
  Speaker 1: for thirty five yards and smoked him. He went, he went, uh.
• 1:42:55
  Speaker 1: They ran off and then went back in this back
• 1:42:58
  Speaker 1: into the draw for about two seconds and pop back
• 1:43:00
  Speaker 1: out and she kept running and he tipped over. So
• 1:43:03
  Speaker 1: it was it was it was pretty awesome. And it's
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 1: it's like Cody and I have this running joke because
• 1:43:08
  Speaker 1: we you know, I hunt by myself so much and
• 1:43:10
  Speaker 1: and don't don't have a camera guy with me very
• 1:43:12
  Speaker 1: much that we sell film a lot. And I've had
• 1:43:16
  Speaker 1: just a bear of a time the last like two
• 1:43:18
  Speaker 1: years of getting killed actually on film, and this was no,
• 1:43:22
  Speaker 1: this was no different. The tree was all, you know, uneven,
• 1:43:25
  Speaker 1: so the arm wouldn't stay level and a kind of
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 1: drifted out of ange. But you can hear the audio.
• 1:43:28
  Speaker 1: And then finally got the go pro a lot and
• 1:43:30
  Speaker 1: I actually got him tipping over but didn't get the shot.
• 1:43:32
  Speaker 1: But anyway, it was it was kind of it was
• 1:43:34
  Speaker 1: just a crazy It was a crazy deal. It was.
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 1: It was a textbook, you know, the way that you
• 1:43:40
  Speaker 1: you kind of plan or the way that you want
• 1:43:42
  Speaker 1: things to kind of carry out. It actually did it
• 1:43:44
  Speaker 1: to a t, you know. It was snuck in perfectly
• 1:43:47
  Speaker 1: found a place on a map, went to it. Uh
• 1:43:49
  Speaker 1: it looked like a good you know, a place where
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 1: they would stage up or where a buck with bed
• 1:43:53
  Speaker 1: before moving off, and and perfect transition cover and good
• 1:43:58
  Speaker 1: security cover both in the crpry um and it there
• 1:44:03
  Speaker 1: was one betted. I mean he was he was betted.
• 1:44:05
  Speaker 1: He had to have been betted with yards and as
• 1:44:08
  Speaker 1: soon as that doe came in it was enough to
• 1:44:10
  Speaker 1: get him up and he was all all about it then.
• 1:44:13
  Speaker 1: So yeah, it was just uh, it was finally uh,
• 1:44:15
  Speaker 1: it was it's always nice. You know, we all know
• 1:44:18
  Speaker 1: his Passinger Hunters stuff. Enough stuff goes wrong in the wood,
• 1:44:21
  Speaker 1: it's nice. One want to finally goes according to plan
• 1:44:23
  Speaker 1: man that the truth or what something? Yeah, that's that's
• 1:44:33
  Speaker 1: a great feeling when it does come together. Um Man.
• 1:44:37
  Speaker 1: So we have an issue, which is that there's about
• 1:44:40
  Speaker 1: twenty seven other things I want to ask you as about.
• 1:44:43
  Speaker 1: But I am coming up on a hard stuff because
• 1:44:46
  Speaker 1: of a meeting, which is stupid, but I guess I
• 1:44:51
  Speaker 1: guess to make sure that, um, that we get this
• 1:44:54
  Speaker 1: last important thing in here. I'm gonna say we're not
• 1:44:56
  Speaker 1: to put time out on the questions I have for Alex.
• 1:45:00
  Speaker 1: I don't have to pull you in here another time
• 1:45:01
  Speaker 1: soon so we can hear about your Kansas hunt. Um.
• 1:45:04
  Speaker 1: I just want to make sure to give you guys
• 1:45:06
  Speaker 1: an opportunity to to tell folks though about where they
• 1:45:09
  Speaker 1: can get more from you guys. So we have to
• 1:45:11
  Speaker 1: we have to close this one out. But if people
• 1:45:13
  Speaker 1: want to see your videos, if people want to follow
• 1:45:15
  Speaker 1: you on social media anything like that, UM, what either want?
• 1:45:18
  Speaker 1: Do you want to jump in here and just tell
• 1:45:20
  Speaker 1: folks where they can find that stuff? Do you want
• 1:45:22
  Speaker 1: me to do? What do you do with Alex. Go ahead,
• 1:45:24
  Speaker 1: go ahead, you're all right, scientists behind it something like that. No,
• 1:45:31
  Speaker 1: um so, Uh, Dream Chaser's Hunt is what. You can
• 1:45:35
  Speaker 1: look us up on Facebook their Instagram as well. UM.
• 1:45:39
  Speaker 1: I think our YouTube channel is also called dream Chaser's Hunt. UM,
• 1:45:44
  Speaker 1: so you can look us up there. We also have
• 1:45:46
  Speaker 1: a channel on Carbon TV. Uh, we're a little bit behind.
• 1:45:50
  Speaker 1: So we do weekly episodes on the YouTube channel. UM,
• 1:45:55
  Speaker 1: and then through the summer, we actually did a new
• 1:45:57
  Speaker 1: series this year called Whitetail Weekly or every single week
• 1:46:00
  Speaker 1: we just did tech tips or product reviews, UM, trail cameras,
• 1:46:05
  Speaker 1: what deer we were going after, stuff like that. We
• 1:46:08
  Speaker 1: did a whole bunch of those. Um. Right now we're
• 1:46:10
  Speaker 1: doing the weekly weekly episodes through the season on our
• 1:46:13
  Speaker 1: YouTube channel. UM. I think we're maybe two or three
• 1:46:17
  Speaker 1: weeks behind. On Carbon TV. It just takes in a
• 1:46:19
  Speaker 1: little longer. UM. It's hard for them to do this
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 1: semi live things, so it takes them a little longer
• 1:46:23
  Speaker 1: than them uploaded. UM. But either or Carbon TV or
• 1:46:27
  Speaker 1: YouTube look us up Dream Chaser's Hunt and you can
• 1:46:30
  Speaker 1: check out the Longhorn Hunt, Alex's Kansas Hunts on there.
• 1:46:34
  Speaker 1: We haven't got a South Dakota one together yet, but
• 1:46:37
  Speaker 1: if you want to check them out, go for it. Awesome. Well,
• 1:46:40
  Speaker 1: I definitely recommend folks do that, and Cody and Alex
• 1:46:43
  Speaker 1: I appreciate you as taking the time to share your
• 1:46:46
  Speaker 1: stories and some of your thoughts on how you how
• 1:46:48
  Speaker 1: you kill these mature deer. And Cody please just do
• 1:46:52
  Speaker 1: me a favor and kill epics soon and we'll have
• 1:46:55
  Speaker 1: both of you guys back. I'll let you know as
• 1:46:59
  Speaker 1: soon as we do play. There's a picture going up
• 1:47:01
  Speaker 1: soon on him. Awesome. Well, good luck and thanks again, guys. Well,
• 1:47:05
  Speaker 1: that will do it for this week's podcast. I hope
• 1:47:08
  Speaker 1: you guys enjoyed that one. Um I gotta kick out
• 1:47:10
  Speaker 1: of their stories had some great tips to share as well.
• 1:47:13
  Speaker 1: And uh, I need to get out of here though,
• 1:47:15
  Speaker 1: because I've got to hit the woods. I got a
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 1: trail camera picture just last night of the buck I'm
• 1:47:21
  Speaker 1: after in Michigan. It's very exciting news. This is hot
• 1:47:24
  Speaker 1: off the press. I just just check that camera a
• 1:47:27
  Speaker 1: couple of hours ago, so exciting stuff there. I'm gonna
• 1:47:30
  Speaker 1: see if we can get one more great late season
• 1:47:32
  Speaker 1: story for you. But um, I will leave you with
• 1:47:34
  Speaker 1: two quick plugs. Number one. As I've been telling you
• 1:47:38
  Speaker 1: guys about the last couple of weeks while you're to hunt,
• 1:47:40
  Speaker 1: merchandise is back and available, and it's over on the
• 1:47:44
  Speaker 1: meat eater dot com. That's where all my new content is.
• 1:47:47
  Speaker 1: That is where our gear is now being sold. If
• 1:47:49
  Speaker 1: you're going over to the meat eater dot com go
• 1:47:52
  Speaker 1: to the shop, you're gonna see all the white you're
• 1:47:53
  Speaker 1: done gear, their shirts, hats, even details, good stuff, So
• 1:47:58
  Speaker 1: check that out. Speaking of the media here, gotta recommend
• 1:48:01
  Speaker 1: Steve's new Meat Eater cookbook. It is full of great
• 1:48:04
  Speaker 1: wild game and fish recipes. Tried a couple of different
• 1:48:07
  Speaker 1: ones out for venison. They've been really good, So check
• 1:48:11
  Speaker 1: that out over an Amazon or Barnes, Noble or wherever
• 1:48:14
  Speaker 1: it is that you buy your books, and with that
• 1:48:16
  Speaker 1: will shut it down. Thank you so much for your support,
• 1:48:19
  Speaker 1: Thank you for listening. Man. I know we're pushing in
• 1:48:22
  Speaker 1: December here, but there's still a lot of hunting out
• 1:48:24
  Speaker 1: there to be had. Good things can happen, so so
• 1:48:28
  Speaker 1: stay positive, stay up in the true you're in the
• 1:48:30
  Speaker 1: ground blind, and until next time, stay wired to hunt.