Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 742: Tony Peterson’s Biggest Wins, Mistakes, Lessons, and Book Recommendations from 2023

Transcript

Ep. 742: Tony Peterson’s Biggest Wins, Mistakes, Lessons, and Book Recommendations from 2023 · Wired To Hunt Podcast

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: the White Tail Woods, presented by First Light, creating proven
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: the show, I'm joined by my right hand man, Tony
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: Peterson to discuss his biggest wins, misses and mistakes, lessons learned,
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: and book recommendations from the twenty twenty three season. All right,
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: welcome back to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: you by First Light and their Camo for Conservation initiative,
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: which I've always been a big fan of because what
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: it does it sends a portion of all sales of
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: First Light's whitetail Camo gear to the National Deer Association.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: And I've always been a big fan of the National
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: Deer Association. But I have some news related to the NDA. Tony,
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: I'm now, I guess extra biased towards us helping the
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: NDA because I am now on the board of directors
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: for the National Deer Association.
• 1:20
  Speaker 3: Nice.
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so hopefully going to be able to do some
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: more good stuff for the NDA. Between First lights, donations,
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: and hopefully I can offer an idea two and we'll
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: keep on keeping on when it comes to making sure
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: the white tails and white tail hunt's good in this country.
• 1:36
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: That's cool man, Yeah, so that's exciting news. In other news,
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: last week, Tony, I did something that I don't do often,
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: which is a solo podcast, and you do it every
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: week on Foundations, But I did a solo one last
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: week in which I just went through the nerdy thing
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: that I do and my wife do here at home
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: for our day to day life, which is every year
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: we do this annual review where we talked through kind
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: of all of our highlights from the last year, any
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: possible low lights. We kind of review our goals from
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: the last year and then start planning for twenty four,
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: planning for the next year. So we talked through, you know,
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: different goals, different ideas, trips, all that kind of stuff.
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: So I did that last week on the show and
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: kind of talk through how I do that, why I
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: do that, and specifically how you could do that for
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: your hunting season. And since you left me all by
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: myself last week and didn't have to go through that process,
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: I thought this week I should force you to do
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: that a little bit today with me. Are you game
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: for that?
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: So hold on, I'm being vilified for you going rogue.
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: You can get a hold of me multiple ways, and
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: you didn't try to get me on there. You decided
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: you're just it's your show, You're gonna do it. And
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: now I'm at fault somehow.
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so now you really are sounding like my wife?
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah, well it felt like we got married there. I
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: was like, Wow, that was a weird shot to take
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: at me, Mark.
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: So, regardless of that very legitimate feedback, are you game
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: for the idea?
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: Sure? Man?
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: Okay, first off, though, good, good Christmas break, a holiday vacation,
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: all that stuff.
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: It was good. I've been you know, I talked to
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: a bunch of my random buddies and it feels like
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: three fold days of holiday stuff in a row is
• 3:38
  Speaker 3: a lot. Oh yeah. Like I had a conversation with
• 3:41
  Speaker 3: my wife last night where most of the Christmas stuff's
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: obviously put away now, but I just noticed this one
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: random thing and I was like, hey, can that go?
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: Like we don't need it anymore? And then we got
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: to do an argument about like Christmas spirit and you know,
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: the typical married stuff but I was like, I was like,
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: I wouldn't probably have a tree, or like, if it
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: were just up to me Christmas, we like a hell
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: of a lot different than it does.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: Are you really are you really that scroogey? You really
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: wouldn't do a tree?
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: I man, I would if the girls wanted it. Yes,
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: I would probably do it. But I mean, I think
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: I don't know if we've talked about this or not,
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: but I feel like there are times I just walk
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: through my house and you know, I'm sure it looks
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: different if you're looking at this background here and in
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: my basement where I have a lot of deer heads
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: and fishing rods and boat presses and all that crap.
• 4:38
  Speaker 3: But like, generally in my house, in the space that
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: I spend most of the time, there's nothing that I
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: bought and brought in there other than like maybe some furniture,
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: you know, Like I look at the walls and I'm like,
• 4:48
  Speaker 3: I don't know where this painting came from, or that
• 4:50
  Speaker 3: thing or whatever.
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: It's all nobody would Nobody would know that you lived there,
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: right unless they went to the missal basement.
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: No, no way, Yeah, same here.
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: But isn't that the bargain like we make like that's
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: in exchange for them letting us go do crazy stuff
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: all over the state, in the country, do our thing.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: We grant full dominion of the home and the rest
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: of the life, right.
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: I don't think we grant it, buddy. I think it's
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: a good point taken from us.
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: That's a good point. We we're lucky to get our
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: little thing in.
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: I think it's like what's going on with space and
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: the moon right now, where everybody's trying to get up
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: there and claim these resources, and whoever gets there first
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: and plants their flag wins, and I think we just
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: get into a house and we're like, I don't know,
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: I'll throw some euro amounts up or whatever. Here's my books,
• 5:39
  Speaker 3: and then all the other real estate starts to get
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: claimed real fast.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: It took all of four minutes, in fifty four seconds
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: of your first podcast episode of twenty twenty four for
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: you get a space reference in. That's good, that's real good.
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: I'm not done yet, Buddy.
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: Oh Man. Yeah, so I hear you, I hear you,
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: and all that stuff. I do like Christmas, but but
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: it does get to be a lot. This year was
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: like a marathon for us too. We had three days
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: of full Christmas stuff of family and then friends, and
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: then two additional days of my family coming to visit us,
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: and then another friend thing. So I ended up being
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: like almost seven days straight. That's that's a lot. That's enough,
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: mm hmm. But but yeah, so you survived it. It
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: was good. Do you do any kind of goal stuff
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: or annual review stuff or anything like what I'm talking
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: about here? Is that a part of your life at all?
• 6:40
  Speaker 3: You know?
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: Not?
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: I do some goals. I don't, you know, do like
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: a formal review of my year? I mean personally, because
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: you know what we do for a living. I mean,
• 6:50
  Speaker 3: I'm creating content around what I did all year, you know,
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: so I'm kind of like reminded of the things that
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: I'm like, man, that was really fun or that kind
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: of sucked or whatever. So it's it's like a soft
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: way to review just just through my professional life and
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: kind of helps guide me toward, you know, what do
• 7:09
  Speaker 3: I want to do this year with some of that stuff.
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: But as far as like, you know, what goals do
• 7:15
  Speaker 3: I make? I don't. I don't make a lot of
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: hunting goals, but I do make goals around like running
• 7:20
  Speaker 3: or lifting, or like what I want to do that way,
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: and it all it all kind of just blends together,
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: you know.
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, what's the like when you look back on twenty
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: three with those goals that you talked about, not necessarily hunting,
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: but you're running and all that other kind of stuff.
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: Is there anything that you either really crushed or really
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: failed on? Does anything stand out?
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: There's So my goal for a couple of years has
• 7:46
  Speaker 3: been seven hundred miles, to run seven hundred miles in
• 7:49
  Speaker 3: the year, because that's just like a nice one for me,
• 7:51
  Speaker 3: not to beat myself up, but it keeps me motivated.
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: And what happened I think I think it was in
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: twenty twenty I tore a muscle in my calf. I
• 8:00
  Speaker 3: was out photographing turkeys and just just had a little
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: tear in this muscle in my calf. Took me out
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: of the game for a little bit, got back in
• 8:07
  Speaker 3: at whatever, No big deal I did. I retore that
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: this year in Oklahoma packing Steve's buck out, and it
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: made it a real struggle to get back to that
• 8:19
  Speaker 3: goal because I just I had to take weeks off
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: and so that kind of stuff. If I if I
• 8:26
  Speaker 3: have something like that, happened where I'm like, this goal
• 8:29
  Speaker 3: pretty should be pretty easy. I didn't really need to
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: take that goal that seriously. But as soon as little thing,
• 8:37
  Speaker 3: a little wrinkle in the plan comes up, and now
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: you're like, Okay, I don't know if I'm going to
• 8:40
  Speaker 3: get there, And so it kind of made me look
• 8:43
  Speaker 3: at like how do I How am I going to
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: ensure that I stay healthy enough and not do stuff
• 8:49
  Speaker 3: like that to take myself out. So I didn't I increased.
• 8:52
  Speaker 3: I'm gonna I'm shooting for eight hundred miles this year
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: just to give myself a little bit more. But also
• 8:58
  Speaker 3: I'm like I'm looking at like my overall fitness and going,
• 9:02
  Speaker 3: how how do I avoid anything like that? Because every
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: once in a while, you know, I mean, you do
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: this stuff long enough and whatever, like you're gonna have
• 9:09
  Speaker 3: something that happens that takes you out of the game somehow.
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: You know, I had that happen one time with my
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: shoulder with bow hunting and or you know where I
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: thought it was going to take me out. It didn't.
• 9:19
  Speaker 3: But it's like a it's a hell of a reminder man,
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: Like this is we're on thin ice sometimes with this
• 9:25
  Speaker 3: stuff that we don't you know, like if you might
• 9:28
  Speaker 3: never be forced to face it, but you might. And
• 9:32
  Speaker 3: so I'm just looking at it that way, like how
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: how do I how do I ensure that I can
• 9:37
  Speaker 3: I can hit these goals and you know, keep up
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: doing the things I want to do and go elk
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: hunting and everything else.
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you take it for granted until all of a
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: sudden it's not. The ability is not there, whether it
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: because of an injury or whatever. I had that you know,
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: that wrist injury this summer. It was the first thing
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: that's happened to me in a long time that took
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: me out of being able to do the things I
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: want to do. Couldn't shoot my boat, couldn't row the boat,
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: couldn't you know, do some of those things that usually
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: I just be like off doing all the time. And
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: so for the first time this year, and I guess
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: coming into the new year, a I'm having like I'm
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: coming to grips with not my mortality, but just like, hey,
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: stuff's changing, Like you're approaching like middle life where stuff
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: can just not work the way it used to or
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: injuries more likely, like unless you're really thinking about it
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: and doing the kind of stuff you're talking about, like
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: staying up on your fitness and all that kind of stuff,
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: and staying flexible or whatever the thing is you're worried
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: about messing up. You kind of have to work for it.
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: You can't just assume it's all just gonna do it
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: like it did back when you were twenty. So, yeah,
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: like a lot of my fitness related goals now or
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: just to keep me in the game, like I want
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: to be able to go backpacking with my kids and
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: rafting and fishing and shooting my boat and all that
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: kind of stuff without cont only fearing about, well, am
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: I going to tear my calf or tear my whatever
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: or roll my ankle or whatever it is. So with
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: that eight hundred miles a year, what's that I'm not
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: good at math? In my head? What's that factor out
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: to a weekly average?
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: Well, weekly, I don't know, forty miles a week or something? Well,
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: actually play thirty No, no, no, no, not forty miles a week.
• 11:24
  Speaker 3: That's way too much. I don't know. I'm really really
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: bad at math.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: What do you usually run? Like, what do you what
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: are your What I'm getting is how much are you
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: actually running a week? Now?
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: So, right, now. Well, the first week of January, I
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: ran twenty one miles. But I shoot. I use a
• 11:44
  Speaker 3: running app, and I know from my trends because I've
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: probably done this for like eight years now. I'll do
• 11:51
  Speaker 3: a lot of miles in the winter. I'll do not
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: so many miles in Turkey season. I'll do a lot
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: of miles in the summer, and then in the fall
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: it really tapers off. So I always try to shoot
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: for a big January, a big February, big March, because
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: I know, I know how this is going to pace out.
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: And then in the summer, I just like running outside
• 12:10
  Speaker 3: a lot, and so I know I'll kick it back
• 12:13
  Speaker 3: up in June, July and August. So I don't. I
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: don't go like I have to do this this week.
• 12:19
  Speaker 3: When I when I was doing a thousand miles a year,
• 12:22
  Speaker 3: it was like, I think it was almost three miles
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: a day that you have to do two point eight
• 12:26
  Speaker 3: seven or something, I remember exactly, And so I was
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: like almost too aware of that, like I would think
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: about it all and then you know, if you go
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: on vacation or you go on a hunt, you're like,
• 12:35
  Speaker 3: I've been I haven't ran in eight days and then
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: you do the math and you're like, Okay, now I'm
• 12:39
  Speaker 3: twenty five miles hind or whatever. Yeah, it's it's rough,
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: and so I don't I don't you know, I don't
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: break it down by the week, but I'm real aware
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: of how my progress is going for the month.
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting the way you're doing that with your
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: mileage goal. In the way I'm trying to achieve my
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: running goal is by putting a big stick, you know,
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: in my future that being a race that I've got
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: to make sure that I'm ready for. I haven't gone
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: the weekly or yearly kind of tally, but this year
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: I think I haven't. I haven't told my wife this year,
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: but I think I'm going to try to run a
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: marathon this year. And the thing keep the thing keeping
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: me from doing that to this point has been the
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: fact that I don't want my training to take any
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: more time away from the family than my half marathon
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: training has. But I'm thinking, like I'm trying to figure
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: out if I can figure out a way to be
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: ready for a race like this. I just want to
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: finish without getting injured. I'm not trying to like do
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: it fast, but but if I can do that in
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: a way that's not significantly different than the amount of
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: running I was doing leading up to this. I think
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: I want to try to do that, So that's my
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: big fitness goal twenty four.
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: Let me ask you this, how do you figure that
• 13:59
  Speaker 3: you're going to be able to do a marathon with
• 14:01
  Speaker 3: roughly the same amount of training as a half marathon.
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm just not going to, like, if there's certain
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: training plans where I guess I'm going to train lightly
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: for it, I'm not going to like go buy the book.
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: But it seems like from some of the talking I've done,
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: like I don't need to train to crush a marathon
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: right where I'm doing like twenty mile runs all the
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: time or twenty five mile runs all the time. You
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: know I can do you know, I can make sure
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: that I'm doing the occasional extra long training run, so
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: making sure I can do my sixteen miles or eighteen
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: miles a few times. So there'll be a few days,
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: you know, over the course of a few months where
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: I'm gone three hours instead of two, but not so
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: much that the family notices is basically what I'm getting at.
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: So there'll there'll be a few more long runs, but
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: not so much that I'm an absentee parent anymore than
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: I was before.
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: Right, are you what's the longest run you've ever done?
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: Is it?
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: There's a half?
• 15:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah?
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, So, I mean it's a dramatic. It's a
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: dramatic bump bump man.
• 15:06
  Speaker 3: More power to you. I I kind of toyed with
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: that idea for a while. But if when you run
• 15:13
  Speaker 3: thirteen miles, I'm like, or you know, thirteen point one miles,
• 15:15
  Speaker 3: I'm like the idea of doing that again twice?
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Like no, See, my thing with it is and
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: this is kind of I think one of the maybe
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: a thing that's helped me from a hunting perspective too,
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: is that I can do almost anything for a long
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: time at like a modern pace, Like I could hike forever.
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: I think that I can run forever. Not forever, but
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: I think I can run. I think I just go
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: and I'm just determined enough as long as I'm not
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: like trying to beat some kind of pace or or
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: race someone like individually, Like I can hike all day.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: We do like big hikes and stuff. That's something I've
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: done before. I've hiked, you know, twenty miles or something
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: of that in a day, so I can do like
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: a heavy loaded pack hike. Can't be that much easier
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: than a no pack very slow job, is my mental
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: math I'm trying to convince myself of.
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: At least it sounds good. Sounds good, buddy, on any
• 16:17
  Speaker 3: of those runs, did you ever did you ever have
• 16:19
  Speaker 3: that experience where you just chafed the crap out of
• 16:21
  Speaker 3: your nipples.
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: I haven't had the chafing, so we'll see you haven't. No,
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: oh man, nope, So we'll see. If that's something that
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: pops up a mile twenty in a run, well, it's TBD.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: But that's the thing I'm floating around on my head
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: right now.
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: Because I'm just envisioning you finishing the race with like
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: the blood spots on the front of your chest, and.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: God, that would be bad. That would be bad. I
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: don't know. We're getting ahead of ourselves. I want to
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: talk about twenty three with you before we get to
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: twenty four. But somehow here we are. So so I
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: said last week, I reviewed my twenty three season and
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: we've done. You know, we talked about our twenty three
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: season more this past year than we did in the
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: last like three or four years, which I think has
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: been good because people people enjoy getting to follow, you know,
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: I think it's useful for people to hear how we
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: are trying to take the things we talk about every
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: week on the podcast and actually put them into action, right,
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: And so I was hoping we could better illustrate that
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: this year, which I think we did. But looking back now,
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: if you were to start a list, like a two
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: column list, here, on your left you've got your big wins,
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: and on your right side of the column, you've got
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: misses or mistakes or you know, low lights, whatever you're
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: gonna call them, namely a few things that would be
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: on that list for you, Like what stands out as
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: far as like the highlights or things you're most proud of,
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: or the things you did really well this year. What's
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: on that side of the column for you.
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: I was real happy with the way I shot this year,
• 17:58
  Speaker 3: you know, shot quite a few and I felt really
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: good about that. I also felt it just you know,
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: we've talked about this. We talked about this a few
• 18:07
  Speaker 3: times last year. But you know, for the last couple
• 18:09
  Speaker 3: of years, I haven't done a ton of public land hunting.
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: I've been I've had just a different couple falls because
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: of the filming with Meat Eater and everything, and last
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: year doing the Oklahoma thing and then doing the North
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: Dakota thing again and kind of getting back into the
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: swing of public land hunting that was that was my
• 18:26
  Speaker 3: most enjoyable stuff. And then doing the muzzloader hunt here
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: in Minnesota. Just that for me, those were highlights, right.
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: I mean, obviously hunting with my kids was really fun,
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: and getting my daughter that decoy buck was really cool.
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: Like I think about that a lot, Yeah, but personally
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: for my own hunting, where I'm like, Okay, what's the
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: arc of the next year, look like I wanted to
• 18:47
  Speaker 3: contain a lot more of the public land stuff where
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: I'm like, I'm kind of feel like I slipped back
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: into that groove of having to scout right in the moment,
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: get mobile, react and just kind of you know the
• 18:59
  Speaker 3: things we talk about all the time, you know, those
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: are muscles you gotta work. And I felt I felt
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: like I was missing something for myself, Like I'm a
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: this drives my wife absolutely crazy, but I'm just like
• 19:11
  Speaker 3: I don't like doing the same stuff over and over again,
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: you know, Like I don't I know that people are
• 19:16
  Speaker 3: like my dream is to have this land and build
• 19:18
  Speaker 3: it up, and and I get that one hundred percent.
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: But for me, I know what that would be for me,
• 19:25
  Speaker 3: Like I wouldn't I wouldn't enjoy it as much as
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: some people because I don't want to go to the
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: same box blind or like, I don't want to get
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: myself into a position where I'm like I know, if
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: I stay out of there until Halloween and I go
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: in there, it's probably over. Like I don't want to
• 19:38
  Speaker 3: I don't want to make a deal where I'm going
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: to have good hunting but I don't get to hunt
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: as much or I don't need to scout as much.
• 19:45
  Speaker 3: And so I just when I look at like the
• 19:47
  Speaker 3: highlights from last year, the things that really meant something
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: to me, just just getting into that process again and
• 19:53
  Speaker 3: trying to find deer on public land and dealing with
• 19:55
  Speaker 3: that whole aspect, I just it just does something for me.
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: Is there anything that you think you got better at?
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: Like is there anything that you have known like, hey,
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: I've got to work on this, or this is an
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: area of focus, and then you actually executed on it,
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: Like I know you did things that were more fun
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: you did the thing you liked, But was there a
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: thing that actually, like a change you made or a
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: shift in mindset or anything like that actually paid off.
• 20:33
  Speaker 3: I think what I'm getting what I think one of
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: the things that happened to me last year that I
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: actually like felt kind of tangibly was I'm getting just
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: so much more confidence in calling my shots and being
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: like this is I'm going to do this whether it
• 20:48
  Speaker 3: works out or not. I feel like this is the
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: best and not and not second guessing myself, you know.
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: I mean I went through you know, and a lot
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: of people do right where you go through like, well,
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: you know, what if the conditions or what if somebody
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: came through here, what if I'm not set up right?
• 21:01
  Speaker 3: And I'm kind of like, yeah, I'm kind of I
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: kind of feel myself getting to a point where if
• 21:07
  Speaker 3: I if I feel like I'm putting in the effort
• 21:10
  Speaker 3: to figure out a spot or figure out a location,
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: I'm like, Okay, here's my plan today, and if this
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: doesn't work, this is what I'm gonna do tomorrow. And
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: if that doesn't work, this is what I'm gonna do.
• 21:21
  Speaker 3: And I feel like I'm just getting to a point
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: where I'm just believing in that process more and being like,
• 21:27
  Speaker 3: don't like, don't overthink it, like if you if you're
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: you know, the spidy senses are like, this is where
• 21:33
  Speaker 3: he's gonna be tonight or in the next two days.
• 21:36
  Speaker 3: Figure this out and forget about those other options, forget
• 21:39
  Speaker 3: about everything else, and then if it doesn't prove to
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: be true, Okay, that's fine, move on. But I just
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: kept finding like it it kind of kept being true.
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a really good feeling when you when the
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: second guessing is is not the loudest voice in your head,
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: when you're instead sitting there like, hey, I feel confident
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: in this thing, and I have an idea and I
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: have a plan. B if that doesn't work out, I'm
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: I'm sure I'm not to the same point you are
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: because you've got a decade on me. But I definitely
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: can see like the change in that for myself over
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: the over the last decade and just how much more
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: confident I am out there and how much more comfortable
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: I am with like, Okay, this is what's in front
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: of me, this is my plan and why I think
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: this will work, and I feel very confident in why
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: this is something that should work, but if not, I'll shift,
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: I'll shift. But yeah, like that sense of I don't
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: want to say certainty because I don't think you're ever
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: certain out there, but just confidence and like and comfort
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: maybe with what's happening and why you're doing it. That
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: is a really reassuring feeling out there versus you know,
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: ten fifteen years ago when I was out there, like
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: should I be doing this or this or this or ah,
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: I don't.
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: Know, dude, it's important, man. And I think like on
• 22:59
  Speaker 3: that line too, if you're like, this is this is
• 23:03
  Speaker 3: where I think it's gonna happen, not not how necessarily,
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: but if you're like I'm hunting this farm or I'm
• 23:08
  Speaker 3: hunting this property and you're like, the signs pointing here,
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: the conditions are pointing here, then you go, Okay, I
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: have that thing I believe in, and so now it's like, okay,
• 23:19
  Speaker 3: if the conditions aren't ripe for it tonight, it's like
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: I don't I don't mind backing off and doing something
• 23:25
  Speaker 3: else then, And it sort of gives you a little
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: leeway with a lower confidence hunt. If you know, like
• 23:31
  Speaker 3: in your back pocket, you're like, okay, I'm when it
• 23:34
  Speaker 3: when it breaks right, I'm going right there and that's
• 23:37
  Speaker 3: where I want to be the most. Then I don't
• 23:40
  Speaker 3: like I noticed this a lot of my public land hunts,
• 23:42
  Speaker 3: because I'll find a few places like that. But you know,
• 23:45
  Speaker 3: as well as I do, like front's roll in, people
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: walk in, trucks are parked there, whatever, And if that's
• 23:50
  Speaker 3: like all you're hanging your hat on, then it's it
• 23:53
  Speaker 3: messes with you bad. Or if you you know, if
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: you have a four or five day hunt, you look
• 23:57
  Speaker 3: at the forecast, you know, like like when we went
• 23:59
  Speaker 3: to Oklah it was eighty five degrees when I got
• 24:03
  Speaker 3: down there, and I'm like, I'm gonna kill them on water,
• 24:06
  Speaker 3: and a cold front came in, which happens to me
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: all the time, and the entire plan changed. But I
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: had I had run across some mast while scouting and
• 24:14
  Speaker 3: some other stuff, and so it was like, even though
• 24:18
  Speaker 3: that thing might not work, I found another thing that
• 24:20
  Speaker 3: I feel just as good about. I just might have
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: to tweak it a little bit or whatever. But you
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: just like when you when you get into that state,
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: it's sort of like you don't have a bad sit
• 24:30
  Speaker 3: because even if you go do a backup one because
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: you're playing it safe or you couldn't get in there
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: for some reason. You're like, I still have that, and
• 24:37
  Speaker 3: I'm still doing something at a certain level up to it.
• 24:41
  Speaker 3: And I just I think that that feeling of just
• 24:43
  Speaker 3: going in there and being like I believe in this
• 24:46
  Speaker 3: enough for that, and then the backup enough for that,
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: it's just it's a game changer for you.
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I hear you in that. What about the flip side, though, Like,
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: what's what's the thing? Is there anything still this year
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: that gave you the eh feeling that gave you like
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: the that left a bad taste in my mouth, or
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: a regret, or you left something on the field that
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: you you know, no looking back, you could have done differently,
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: you could have em better, or anything like that.
• 25:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah. So my Wisconsin hunting, you know, I kind of
• 25:21
  Speaker 3: take it for granted that I'm gonna take my girls
• 25:22
  Speaker 3: over there. It's gonna be pretty easy. They'll kill a
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: couple deer and then I'll do my thing. And my
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: biggest regret from last year was, even though I knew
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: that winter was rough, I was like what I saw
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: in the spring and the early summer over there, I
• 25:37
  Speaker 3: was like, man, these deer came through really well. Heard
• 25:39
  Speaker 3: from a forester who said they came through really well.
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: And so my plan I got lazy thinking there were
• 25:46
  Speaker 3: enough deer there to work with. And then once we
• 25:49
  Speaker 3: started hunting, even when I was running trail cameras over
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: there and not seeing very many deer and not seeing
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: the fawns that you should, I still in my head
• 25:58
  Speaker 3: I was like, this is not going to be a
• 26:00
  Speaker 3: heavy lift this year, Like you don't need to devote
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: a bunch of energy to scouting over here, Like you
• 26:06
  Speaker 3: kind of got this thing figured out. And then you know,
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: my daughter killed a deer. My other one didn't got
• 26:11
  Speaker 3: into the rut. She finally killed one, and then it
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: was my turn. And I felt like when I was
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: hunting over there, even though I did kill a deer,
• 26:18
  Speaker 3: I felt like I was way behind because I believed
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: something that wasn't true and it kept me. It kept
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: me from doing what I needed to do. And so
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: when I actually got into the woods for myself, I
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: was like, I knew it. I'm like, you're not working
• 26:33
  Speaker 3: with nearly as many deer as you thought, and this
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: is going to be just way tougher than you expected.
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: And I and I live through it, and I was like,
• 26:43
  Speaker 3: that was so dumb, Like you had all the evidence
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: all year long that what you were believing going into
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: spring wasn't true. And I chose to believe this fake
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: thing because it made my life easier until I had
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: to face the reality of hunting, and then it got
• 26:57
  Speaker 3: a hell of a lot harder because that was what
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: I was actually dealing with.
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: What could you have done differently though?
• 27:03
  Speaker 3: Scout? I just needed to scout more. I mean I
• 27:08
  Speaker 3: just took it for granted that I was going to
• 27:11
  Speaker 3: have way more dear to work with, and so some
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: of my old reliable stuff was going to work. And
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: you know, I'm real confident during that time period if
• 27:19
  Speaker 3: you have multiple all day sits in a row, somebody's
• 27:23
  Speaker 3: coming by, you know, like if you have enough spots.
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: And I just didn't. I did way more scouting after
• 27:29
  Speaker 3: I killed my buck. Let me put it that way,
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: just because I was like, don't, don't do this to
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: yourself again, like this will be an easy trap to
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: fall into. And so it was just a matter of
• 27:40
  Speaker 3: just putting myself in more high odd spots more often
• 27:43
  Speaker 3: that I didn't do.
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: What did you learn that additional scouting or did you
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: did anything light up for you and when you did
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: do that post kill scouting.
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I did. I'm I'm really starting to into this
• 28:00
  Speaker 3: when I I do this in the big woods a lot.
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: If I shoot a deer and I still have some
• 28:06
  Speaker 3: time to play around, because you know how it is
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: by the time you get to like your fifth or
• 28:10
  Speaker 3: sixth shoot of the season, or you know it's two
• 28:13
  Speaker 3: and a half months into it, if you kill one
• 28:15
  Speaker 3: when you're on the road, You're like, I just want
• 28:16
  Speaker 3: to go home. I want to go see my kids.
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: I'm sick of doing this, but I'm starting to go
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: if you have a day or two that you can
• 28:23
  Speaker 3: play with, go walk, get out there and just go
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: look in the moment, see that sign And dude, I
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: ran cameras, I covered some ground and I just I
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: just looked for what I was missing. And what I
• 28:36
  Speaker 3: found was I was missing a lot and it was
• 28:41
  Speaker 3: just dumb. It was just it was just purely because
• 28:44
  Speaker 3: I went into it think it was going to be
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: easy and I wasn't going to have to figure out
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: in the moment what I needed to do. But you know,
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: when you're dealing with a low, low deer density, it's
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: all about finding just any deer first, like where's that
• 28:57
  Speaker 3: little tiny concentration? How do you work off of it?
• 29:02
  Speaker 3: And so after I killed that buck this year, I
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: spent you know, almost two days just walking and I
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: found some stuff and ran some cameras and I was like, okay,
• 29:11
  Speaker 3: they were they were close or you know, there there
• 29:14
  Speaker 3: were deer, good deer close that I was just missing
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: because I was working off of old information. And it
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: was just a it was just like a good reminder
• 29:22
  Speaker 3: of how easy it is to just sort of be
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: a little lazy and expect the rut's going to deliver
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: to you, and it just it's it's never that easy.
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, So coming in twenty four, do you have is
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: is that it is that the thing that you want
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: to work on more is like more and more scouting
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: or is there anything else that you're thinking this season
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: that's like on your to do list as a big
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: shift or a big focus or an area like hey,
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: I gotta I gotta start working on this next thing,
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: Like what's that next focus point for you this year?
• 29:55
  Speaker 3: So I'm gonna a couple of things I'm focusing on
• 29:58
  Speaker 3: for this year. I'm definitely gonna do probably three states
• 30:03
  Speaker 3: for just public land. I want to I want to
• 30:05
  Speaker 3: do a new state that I haven't hunted. I'm kind
• 30:08
  Speaker 3: of looking hard at Missouri because I've scouted it a
• 30:10
  Speaker 3: few times, so I've never actually deer hunted down there.
• 30:13
  Speaker 3: I want that part. I don't I don't know what
• 30:16
  Speaker 3: states exactly it'll be. I should draw Iowa this year,
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: so one of them will be Iowa. Uh, that's going
• 30:22
  Speaker 3: to be real important to me. My one daughter, my
• 30:24
  Speaker 3: daughter who killed that decoy buck, has been talking a
• 30:27
  Speaker 3: lot about doing that more and so, and I killed
• 30:30
  Speaker 3: my buck with the decoy this year over there too,
• 30:32
  Speaker 3: and so I'm kind of like, I've never even hardly
• 30:35
  Speaker 3: considered them a viable option for most of my deer hunting.
• 30:38
  Speaker 3: I mean, you know me, like, I'm not I'm not
• 30:41
  Speaker 3: a big caller, I'm not a big sense guy whatever.
• 30:43
  Speaker 3: But seeing the way that DSD dough worked twice last
• 30:48
  Speaker 3: year and how fun it was, I'm like, is there
• 30:50
  Speaker 3: more ways I can kind of build this in and
• 30:52
  Speaker 3: have some fun with it and just try to like
• 30:54
  Speaker 3: learn more, Because that's that's one of the things I
• 30:57
  Speaker 3: love about turkey hunting, when you start to figure out
• 31:00
  Speaker 3: the decoy game, especially if you both bohunt them a lot.
• 31:04
  Speaker 3: It's it's like really a game changer for the entire experience.
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: Like it's I know it's that sounds like duh, but
• 31:11
  Speaker 3: it's it's big. Like a lot of people, especially a
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: lot of people who only gun on them, don't quite
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: get there, like to understand how important certain decoy setups
• 31:18
  Speaker 3: and how you're gonna do them throughout the season. And
• 31:21
  Speaker 3: I just like, I feel like I'm kind of missing
• 31:23
  Speaker 3: that with white tails too, And it's this thing that
• 31:26
  Speaker 3: I could involve into my world a little bit more,
• 31:29
  Speaker 3: and so I'm kind of looking at that too.
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: M Okay, So three new states are not new states,
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: but one new state, three public land hunts, more decoy
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: what's what's like the what's like on your bucket list
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: still that you haven't done white tail related? That's like
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: the golden goose you're chasing, all right, Maybe maybe there's
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: not a thing like that, but is there anything? Like
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: you've been doing this a long time, Tony, You've done
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: the public thing a long time. You don't really need
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: to prove that to yourself anymore or anybody else.
• 32:10
  Speaker 3: I do.
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: So like I'm talking more, I'm talking more overarching here
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: and maybe okay, so maybe that's the case, but like,
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: what's the next thing you're chasing? Like we always have
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: like personal somethings that we're chasing. Do you have anything
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: like that? Like is that like do you want to
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: kill a giant or do you want to kill an
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: X or a Y or every state that has public landway,
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: is there anything like that that's like in the back
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: of your mind?
• 32:32
  Speaker 3: Ever, my, my, the things that just eat away at
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: me are always different environments. So you know, the big
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: Woods thing is I'm I'm I'm like I have that
• 32:44
  Speaker 3: sort of on pause since my daughter started hunting, because
• 32:47
  Speaker 3: that's most of my time over there is for them,
• 32:49
  Speaker 3: and so it's like, I don't I kind of know
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: I don't have enough time to do what I need
• 32:53
  Speaker 3: to because even when I had more time, I couldn't
• 32:55
  Speaker 3: get it done. And so I'm like, where I'm at
• 32:58
  Speaker 3: now is it's sort of like just in a holding
• 33:00
  Speaker 3: pattern for me, but that that won't go away, Like
• 33:03
  Speaker 3: killing a big one in the big Woods on public
• 33:04
  Speaker 3: land is it's just always there. This this thing I
• 33:08
  Speaker 3: did with the muzzloader hunt in western Minnesota and the
• 33:10
  Speaker 3: cattails in that environment that I I'm you know, like
• 33:14
  Speaker 3: I'm only familiar with it through pheasant hunting and a
• 33:16
  Speaker 3: little bit of rabbit hunting, and just like a very
• 33:18
  Speaker 3: you know, I've only spent five days in my life,
• 33:21
  Speaker 3: well maybe six days of my life deer hunting. That
• 33:23
  Speaker 3: stuff that's like under my skin because I see, you know,
• 33:27
  Speaker 3: I told you this, We talked about this on the podcast.
• 33:30
  Speaker 3: But the one day that I was down there with
• 33:32
  Speaker 3: my muzzleloader and I and I followed those tracks and
• 33:35
  Speaker 3: jumped all those deer in the in the cattails, those
• 33:38
  Speaker 3: deer were as unkillable as they're gonna be. And now
• 33:43
  Speaker 3: you would think that's an open environment and that wouldn't
• 33:45
  Speaker 3: be the case. But when you're in cattails, I'm six
• 33:47
  Speaker 3: to two. Those cattails are way over my head, and
• 33:50
  Speaker 3: I'm like when you walk in there and they're bedded
• 33:52
  Speaker 3: there before first light and you go, you know, you jump,
• 33:56
  Speaker 3: you jump them right there, and you have a gun,
• 33:58
  Speaker 3: and it's like, unless you have buckshot, that would be
• 34:02
  Speaker 3: the only chance you might have there. And I just
• 34:05
  Speaker 3: I go, how do you figure? Like how do you
• 34:08
  Speaker 3: solve for this? Like how do you And that's that's
• 34:12
  Speaker 3: like the stuff that I love is like it's not
• 34:14
  Speaker 3: you know, it's fun to go back to some places
• 34:16
  Speaker 3: you like the Western River bottoms I love, and it's
• 34:19
  Speaker 3: it's fun to do that kind of stuff. But when
• 34:20
  Speaker 3: you get into an environment that says you can't do
• 34:23
  Speaker 3: this easily here, like trust me on this. They're here
• 34:26
  Speaker 3: and you're not going to get them that. I love that,
• 34:29
  Speaker 3: and so I kind of look at it that way, like,
• 34:32
  Speaker 3: you know, I'm not like I got to kill a
• 34:33
  Speaker 3: one seventy or something like that. That just it doesn't
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: matter to me as much. But doing it right in
• 34:40
  Speaker 3: these environments where I just walk in and I'm like,
• 34:42
  Speaker 3: I don't I don't have a strong basis here and
• 34:45
  Speaker 3: I have limited time, and you know there's a lot
• 34:47
  Speaker 3: of hunters using this stuff. I love that.
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I can, I can relate. I'd say that's that's
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: where a lot of my just a lot of my
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: interest is like the the experiential aspect, like, man, I
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: want to kill one in this kind of way, and
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: I'm going to try to figure out this kind of place.
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: I when to figure out this kind of adventure and
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: now right now, like the thing I talked about this
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: last week a little bit, I need like some new
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: adventure in my hunting, like I want to shift it
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: up again. And I'm not sure what that's going to
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: look like yet, but but I have some ideas and
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: and and just like give it.
• 35:29
  Speaker 3: What's an example, Like what's one thing you're thinking about.
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm gonna hold off on the on the one
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: I'm really really thinking about, but I'm like an example
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: of one I have talked about in the past that's
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: probably not next year, but like a backpacking, backcountry whitetail hunt,
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: like that kind of thing, like something that's like truly
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: different or you know, like going in. I mean, yes,
• 35:55
  Speaker 2: that kind of thing is the general idea. I'm thinking
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: of a rafting white tail trip something like that that's
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: just you know, different than the usual get on like
• 36:07
  Speaker 2: park the truck by the road, hike in, hunt for
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: the afternoon, hike back out, go to your tent, or
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: go to your house, or go wherever. I just think
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: so much of And I love that, right, I love
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: my everyday deer hunting, But I also like, you just
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: want new and I want to grow, and I want
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: to try new things, and I want to see what's
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: at the at the boundaries. Of this whole thing and
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: what else is out there? And one of the coolest
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: things about white tails, and some of my adventure seeking
• 36:40
  Speaker 2: is outside of white tails too. But a really cool
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: thing about white tails is they are almost everywhere, in
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: almost every different type of habitat, and you can hunt
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: them in so many different ways. It's very easy to
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: get like locked into the usual, which is like, well,
• 36:54
  Speaker 2: we're in hunt them from a tree in the Midwest
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: in farm ground, right. It's especially for those of us
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: that live in this area, it's very tempting to just
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: get sucked into that basic template. And so I still
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: want to do some of that, of course, but I
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: want to continue to explore outside color, outside of those
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: lines some and so this year one of my goals
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: is to do that. I've got I've got one very
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: very different idea, which which we'll talk about a later date.
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: But uh, but in the meantime, I'm still thinking of
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: like what a what a second option might be. So
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: so yeah, that's that's the kind of stuff that's on
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: my mind right now. I do want to do when
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: it comes to this year, I want to I got
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: a question for you related to one of my ideas
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: for a project this year and it goes like this,
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: you know, the Working for Wildlife to it. Right, You've
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: heard me doing this whole thing last year, right, traveling
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: around volunteering on public lands, doing various habitat projects, encouraging
• 37:56
  Speaker 2: volunteers to come out. So we're gonna do that again
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: this year. But I want to figure out a way
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: to tell that story through a film. And my idea
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: is to do this, Go do more projects, but find
• 38:13
  Speaker 2: one of these projects where we can do a Working
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: for Wildlife event. Go out there and improve wildlife habitat
• 38:19
  Speaker 2: volunteer and public land, but then come back and do
• 38:23
  Speaker 2: a hunt or a fishing trip or whatever, Come back
• 38:26
  Speaker 2: and do a thing on that piece of ground and
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: showcase like you do the work and then you reap
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: the rewards down the line. Like that's possible. My worry though,
• 38:37
  Speaker 2: is like how do you do that without spot burning?
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: Like how do you do that without ruining the place?
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: You know, because by doing a project like that, you're
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: people are going to be out there like we're gonna
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: be talking about, hey, we're on this piece of public land.
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: Or is there way I can do that without talking
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: about the place. I mean, this is something that you
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: and I and really anyone now with a social media
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: account has to think about, which is, we want to
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: share what we're doing, we want to talk about what
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: we're doing, We want to enjoy these places, but at
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: the same time, you don't want to unnecessarily, you know,
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: drive more people to a sensitive location that ends up
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: making it worse for wildlife, worse for hunting, et cetera,
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: et cetera. How do you do that? Like, that's what
• 39:17
  Speaker 2: I'm trying to figure out that I don't know how
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: to do that, but I think there's got to be
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: a way.
• 39:23
  Speaker 3: I think you would have to. I think the easiest
• 39:26
  Speaker 3: way to do that, or maybe the most responsible way
• 39:29
  Speaker 3: to do that, would be to find some category of
• 39:31
  Speaker 3: project in a region and you know, planting trees or
• 39:35
  Speaker 3: whatever whatever it is, something like that, and then find
• 39:38
  Speaker 3: a different property that had had that ten years ago
• 39:41
  Speaker 3: or twenty years ago, or you know what I mean.
• 39:43
  Speaker 3: It wasn't the same thing, but it was the same
• 39:44
  Speaker 3: concept of here here is like a look into the
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: future of it instead of just going right back. But
• 39:50
  Speaker 3: even then people would figure it out. So I don't know,
• 39:53
  Speaker 3: I don't know if I want to touch this one
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: because I feel like you're going to get yourself into
• 39:56
  Speaker 3: trouble with the audience here, Mark.
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: Or what about this? What if what if the place
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: where we go do the volunteer work. What if I
• 40:16
  Speaker 2: do go back and hunt, but I shoot a tony buck,
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: I shoot a spike on day one, and it's so
• 40:25
  Speaker 2: I shoot a deer, but it's not the kind of
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: deer that's going to drive a thousand people to go
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: try and hunt there. Is that effective?
• 40:31
  Speaker 3: I think you should absolutely do that because I think
• 40:33
  Speaker 3: you think that's going to be easy, and I want
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: to see you do it. Just go shoot a quick
• 40:37
  Speaker 3: little buck, Mark, no problem.
• 40:40
  Speaker 2: I I'll follow a tony methodology and uh and we'll
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: report back here next year. I don't know that's one
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: of my ideas, but I want to figure out a
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: way to do it responsibly. But I think, like I
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: think it's a it's an idea that I want to
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: get out there, which is the idea of giving back
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: to the landscape more right, getting out there doing this,
• 41:00
  Speaker 2: doing good things, and then it being a reminder like, hey,
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: you can also benefit from it, Like you can go
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: out there and you don't have to benefit from it,
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: do it just for the sake of doing it. But also, hey,
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: like it's pretty cool to get out here, and it's
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: super satisfying to enjoy the fruits of your labor. I
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: think anyone who owns private land knows that. Right, you
• 41:18
  Speaker 2: go out there, you do the work, planning your food
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: plots or improving timber or whatever, and then you get
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: to go out there and hunt and do your thing. Well,
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: that's possible to some degree on public land too, for folks,
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: for sure. I mean, even if it's just you going
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: out there SOLbo and picking up trash.
• 41:33
  Speaker 3: So yeah, if anybody who's listening is down in Oklahoma
• 41:37
  Speaker 3: and they want to do that, I recommend it. I've
• 41:40
  Speaker 3: never been in a place that had more garbage in
• 41:42
  Speaker 3: the woods really, yeah, just weird. I mean some of it,
• 41:46
  Speaker 3: some of it was floodplain stuff, you know, but a
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: lot of it. I was just like, and maybe it's
• 41:51
  Speaker 3: just more part of it. Might be because then you
• 41:55
  Speaker 3: get into a drier climate, stuff sticks around longer a
• 41:57
  Speaker 3: lot of times, so maybe that was part of it.
• 42:00
  Speaker 3: But I was like, man, there's a lot of just
• 42:02
  Speaker 3: trash here we're hunting specifically, I hate that.
• 42:09
  Speaker 2: I got to the point though, with so we try to.
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: Like when we're out hiking around doing whatever, the kids
• 42:16
  Speaker 2: and stuff, we try to pick up things and you
• 42:19
  Speaker 2: know when you can clean up. And we were on
• 42:22
  Speaker 2: a hike over Christmas break and we passed like what
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: looked like dirty toilet paper and my three year old
• 42:31
  Speaker 2: like ran to pick it up, and no, no, no, don't
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: touch it. Don't touch it. We can't pick that up,
• 42:35
  Speaker 2: and he got so magic, No, we have to pick
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: up the trash. You say, we have to pick up
• 42:40
  Speaker 2: the trash, Like, no, that might be like something really gross.
• 42:44
  Speaker 2: Don't touch that.
• 42:46
  Speaker 3: Same rule as apply if you find like one glove
• 42:48
  Speaker 3: in the woods, just leave it.
• 42:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, anything anything like that dangerous? Yeah, man? So
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: any other any other big plans thoughts? Uh for twenty
• 43:00
  Speaker 2: four other than the new state? The decoy in public land?
• 43:05
  Speaker 2: You're gonna go back to your buddy's lease anymore? Or
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: you you done with that?
• 43:09
  Speaker 3: I'm not sure or not lease.
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: I guess he owns it right, well, but it's farm.
• 43:14
  Speaker 3: Oh, I'm not sure. So I didn't hunt it this year.
• 43:19
  Speaker 3: I'm you know, I'm going a turkey hunt it. It's
• 43:21
  Speaker 3: it's always there. I don't know, it's just if I
• 43:25
  Speaker 3: go down there to southwestern Wisconsin, and I hunt that place.
• 43:28
  Speaker 3: It's awesome, but I just want to be in the
• 43:32
  Speaker 3: north woods. Man. I don't know how to describe it.
• 43:35
  Speaker 3: The you know, my odds are killing a one forty
• 43:37
  Speaker 3: on that southwestern place or like at least a decent
• 43:40
  Speaker 3: buck or so high compared to you know, northern Wisconsin.
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: But I just love the environment. Man. So I don't know,
• 43:49
  Speaker 3: I don't know I'm I'm looking at. I mean, you
• 43:52
  Speaker 3: know how this goes. This is a this is definitely
• 43:55
  Speaker 3: a dumb complaint. But when you do what we do,
• 43:58
  Speaker 3: I'm always like, should I film in Minnesota or Wisconsin?
• 44:02
  Speaker 3: Which you know, Minnesota is my home state, but I
• 44:04
  Speaker 3: Wisconsin I just hunt a lot too, is right there
• 44:06
  Speaker 3: and whatever. And you know how it is when you're like,
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: you don't save something for yourself and it changes your
• 44:13
  Speaker 3: entire season. And so I'm like, I don't I don't
• 44:17
  Speaker 3: know what I'm gonna do with Minnesota and Wisconsin this
• 44:20
  Speaker 3: season as far as filming. And it like you talking
• 44:22
  Speaker 3: about you know, a back like a backcountry hunt for
• 44:25
  Speaker 3: white tails or something. I've had this hunt in the
• 44:28
  Speaker 3: back of my mind. I've got this old town kayak.
• 44:30
  Speaker 3: It's a badass fish in kayak, but it'd be good
• 44:32
  Speaker 3: for getting into a hunting spot too. And I have
• 44:34
  Speaker 3: this chunk of public land in Minnesota that I think
• 44:38
  Speaker 3: I could go in and kill a pretty good one
• 44:40
  Speaker 3: on if I brought my buvy stuff and camped and
• 44:44
  Speaker 3: paddled in there and did that kind of adventure type hunt.
• 44:47
  Speaker 3: And I'm I'm kind of like, should I do that
• 44:50
  Speaker 3: this year? You know? You know? The downside is like, Okay,
• 44:54
  Speaker 3: I'm probably gonna draw Iowa. Something else will come up
• 44:57
  Speaker 3: for work, and I'm like, I don't. I don't know
• 44:58
  Speaker 3: if I want to hang my hat on. But it's
• 45:00
  Speaker 3: just like one of those things that you think about
• 45:02
  Speaker 3: a lot where you're like, I really just should just
• 45:05
  Speaker 3: carve it out and say I'm just doing it, just
• 45:07
  Speaker 3: to do it, get it out of the way, because
• 45:09
  Speaker 3: you know how it is like some of this stuff
• 45:10
  Speaker 3: you start thinking about and you're like, I've been thinking
• 45:12
  Speaker 3: about doing this for ten years and haven't. It's like,
• 45:16
  Speaker 3: come on, man, just do it.
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and you blink and it's like you're, however old,
• 45:22
  Speaker 2: and you've been saying you want to do it someday
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: forever and all of a sudden, You're like, what can
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: I do it anymore?
• 45:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah? Well do you want to? And I mean that's
• 45:30
  Speaker 3: you know, something that I thought of when you were
• 45:32
  Speaker 3: talking about like just twenty four goals and just you know,
• 45:36
  Speaker 3: setting them, maybe the marathon goal, that kind of stuff.
• 45:38
  Speaker 3: I had a conversation with Eddie Claypool, you know, who's
• 45:42
  Speaker 3: a phenomenal hunter several years ago, and he told me,
• 45:48
  Speaker 3: you know, because he was one of those guys who
• 45:50
  Speaker 3: got after it so hard, like Western game, white tail,
• 45:54
  Speaker 3: you knit turkeys. I mean, I would have conversations with
• 45:57
  Speaker 3: Eddie Claypool and I'd be going to Nebraska to turkey,
• 46:00
  Speaker 3: and he'd like, oh, where are you going? And I'd
• 46:01
  Speaker 3: be you know, like we trust each other, we're friends.
• 46:03
  Speaker 3: So i'd be like, oh, I'm this WMA and and
• 46:05
  Speaker 3: he'd be like, yeah, just walk in here, and usually
• 46:07
  Speaker 3: the birds are back in this corner. And I'm like,
• 46:09
  Speaker 3: I could not bring up a place and he doesn't
• 46:12
  Speaker 3: live there, he lives in Oklahoma. But I could not
• 46:14
  Speaker 3: bring up a place where he wasn't like yeah I've
• 46:16
  Speaker 3: been in there, or I killed a deer here or whatever.
• 46:19
  Speaker 3: But he told me, and this was several years ago.
• 46:21
  Speaker 3: But he's like, believe me when I say this, you
• 46:25
  Speaker 3: will lose the drive eventually, Like figure out a way
• 46:30
  Speaker 3: to keep yourself motivated to get out there, to keep
• 46:33
  Speaker 3: doing it, because as you get older and you do
• 46:35
  Speaker 3: more stuff, and you know, family wears on you and
• 46:38
  Speaker 3: you get tired and you know, the usual stuff. He's like,
• 46:41
  Speaker 3: you don't think it'll happen, but it will. And I've
• 46:44
  Speaker 3: thought about that, you know, hundreds of times in my
• 46:48
  Speaker 3: life because there's a guy who was like, live in it,
• 46:52
  Speaker 3: and he's telling you, like he's in the future and
• 46:54
  Speaker 3: he's like, hey, trust me on this. You won't be
• 46:56
  Speaker 3: as motivated to do this when you get to my age.
• 46:59
  Speaker 3: And I just look at it and I go, how
• 47:01
  Speaker 3: can I stay Like, how can you like push that
• 47:04
  Speaker 3: away or keep that at bay for a while.
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I don't know the answer to that, other than
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: continuing to walk that careful line between chasing it now
• 47:15
  Speaker 2: but also not doing the opposite of that, which is
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: the ten years from now or fifteen years from now
• 47:22
  Speaker 2: we say, oh man, we did a lot of epic hunts,
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: but I missed my kids this thing, and I missed
• 47:28
  Speaker 2: my kids that thing, and I didn't get to do
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: this stuff with my son or my daughter's or whatever.
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: It's like, how do you balance that drive to do
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: it all with knowing that we don't get our kids
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: childhoods back either, or our marriage back or whatever. Like
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: that's the constant balance, right.
• 47:43
  Speaker 3: Well, and you don't get your own time back either,
• 47:45
  Speaker 3: you know, like you don't get your old health back.
• 47:47
  Speaker 3: Like I really think that this is going to sound stupid,
• 47:50
  Speaker 3: but I just as I get older, and my patience
• 47:53
  Speaker 3: and discipline sure seemed to serve me well for a
• 47:57
  Speaker 3: lot of stuff. And so I I look at that
• 48:00
  Speaker 3: and I go, you don't have to lose your family
• 48:04
  Speaker 3: over a deer, you know, Like, but you also don't
• 48:06
  Speaker 3: have to try to get into a situation where it's
• 48:08
  Speaker 3: so easy that the challenge is gone and you don't
• 48:11
  Speaker 3: appreciate it anymore. Because when you see that, and I
• 48:14
  Speaker 3: know people don't believe it, but when you see that,
• 48:16
  Speaker 3: it's it's like a tangible thing that happens to people
• 48:19
  Speaker 3: when they get a really, really good spot. It's very
• 48:22
  Speaker 3: easy to just go, well, I don't have to work extra?
• 48:26
  Speaker 3: Why would I? But that when you put yourself in
• 48:30
  Speaker 3: a position to be challenged and work extra it's It
• 48:33
  Speaker 3: usually makes you feel pretty good and it keeps you
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: kind of going. Man, it didn't happen this year, but
• 48:37
  Speaker 3: next year, I'm going back to do that trip again.
• 48:39
  Speaker 3: Or keep buying those over the counter elk takes till
• 48:42
  Speaker 3: they're gone, you know, like because they're going to be gone.
• 48:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I've got a buddy who I think he'd be
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: okay with me saying this. A couple of friends that
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: now have a situation kind of like that, and they
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: now call themselves box blind bastards.
• 48:58
  Speaker 3: Are these here the Iowa Buddies?
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And you know, you get a sweet spot and
• 49:06
  Speaker 2: it gets comfortable and there's nothing wrong with that, Like
• 49:09
  Speaker 2: that's all some people want, which is great. Like if
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: you were happy with that, heck, yeah you got a mate.
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: But you know that might not be what.
• 49:19
  Speaker 3: Dude, you got to be real honest with yourself, I mean,
• 49:22
  Speaker 3: because because right it could be your thing, and that
• 49:24
  Speaker 3: could be exactly what you want out of your hunting,
• 49:26
  Speaker 3: and that would be a perfect scenario. But you have
• 49:28
  Speaker 3: to be really honest about it, like are you enjoying it? Like,
• 49:32
  Speaker 3: are you enjoying going to the same view and opening
• 49:35
  Speaker 3: the same window when you want to shoot a deer
• 49:37
  Speaker 3: every time, or do you need something else? Like it's
• 49:39
  Speaker 3: so personal.
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And I mean that's one of the great things
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: about what we do, right, It's like, this can be
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: whatever it is you want to be. You know, it's
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: it's and I suppose that's the case with a lot
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: of different activities. I guess if you want to be
• 49:52
  Speaker 2: a climber, a runner or whatever, you can make your
• 49:56
  Speaker 2: own goals and your own experience. But that is particularly
• 50:01
  Speaker 2: true with hunting, as long as you don't fall prey
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: to the pressures of like what everybody else thinks, right
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: and so and so I guess to that point, like, man,
• 50:08
  Speaker 2: if you want to be a box blind guy or girl, man,
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: more power to you. That's awesome if that's the thing
• 50:14
  Speaker 2: that gets you stoked and you are excited to go
• 50:16
  Speaker 2: do do it, and you should not be at all
• 50:19
  Speaker 2: worried about what Tony or I think. But on the
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: flip side, you know the same at the same time,
• 50:25
  Speaker 2: like if that's not going to do it for you,
• 50:27
  Speaker 2: but you're falling into the trap of like, oh man,
• 50:29
  Speaker 2: this feels easy, and then you just keep doing it
• 50:31
  Speaker 2: because it's the easy thing. Well, then maybe you want
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: to reconsider it too. So it comes down to like
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: knowing yourself, knowing what's going to keep you energized and
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: excited about this, and then chasing that well.
• 50:41
  Speaker 3: And I think one of the things that we see
• 50:43
  Speaker 3: with hunters a lot, you know, like the general hunting
• 50:46
  Speaker 3: population is terrified a change. Like you see this if
• 50:48
  Speaker 3: there's a proposal to move a gun season or a
• 50:50
  Speaker 3: bo season or something for some reason. I mean, you
• 50:53
  Speaker 3: name it, We've seen it a million times. But you
• 50:57
  Speaker 3: also have to recognize that you're going to change over
• 51:01
  Speaker 3: the next two years and five years and ten years.
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: And so that goal of having that thing, you know,
• 51:07
  Speaker 3: maybe when you have kids and having you know, buying
• 51:10
  Speaker 3: that forty acres and putting those box lines up and
• 51:12
  Speaker 3: giving them that experience is like, you know, closest thing
• 51:15
  Speaker 3: to dying and going to heaven. But you know, when
• 51:18
  Speaker 3: those kids hit teenage years and maybe they're not hunting
• 51:20
  Speaker 3: with you or something like, you might be in a
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: totally different place, you know, or you might do it.
• 51:25
  Speaker 3: You know, you might do the public land thing and
• 51:27
  Speaker 3: be like, that's that's only my thing and burn yourself
• 51:29
  Speaker 3: right to the ground for five seasons or ten seasons
• 51:32
  Speaker 3: in a row and go. Man, I'm not I'm not
• 51:35
  Speaker 3: looking forward to it anymore. I'm not scouting the way
• 51:37
  Speaker 3: I want to. And like, if you're honest about that,
• 51:40
  Speaker 3: maybe you're going the other way, you know, and and
• 51:43
  Speaker 3: who knows where you'll end up. But if you're open
• 51:45
  Speaker 3: to that stuff, it's it's important to just be honest
• 51:48
  Speaker 3: about it. Yeah.
• 51:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think there's a lot of truth to that
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: and sampling and testing and seeing where you where that
• 51:56
  Speaker 2: right places for you. So hard pivot here before we
• 52:01
  Speaker 2: wrap up, There's one thing I wanted to ask you
• 52:03
  Speaker 2: about about last year and something I thought it'd be
• 52:07
  Speaker 2: kind of fun to talk about here for a few minutes,
• 52:09
  Speaker 2: which is one of our guilty pleasures Tony, which is reading.
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: We both do a lot of reading, and I never
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: get to do podcasts where I get to talk about books,
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: and you're the only person I could talk about books with.
• 52:22
  Speaker 2: So do you have a favorite book or two or
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: recommended book or two, or something that stands out? It
• 52:30
  Speaker 2: doesn't have to be a book. It could also be
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: like a film, a documentary, a podcast series or anything
• 52:34
  Speaker 2: like that. But I've got books. Do you have any recommendations? Coming?
• 52:38
  Speaker 2: On twenty three?
• 52:39
  Speaker 3: I do so, even just what we talked about about changing.
• 52:42
  Speaker 3: And you know, I spent a lot of my life
• 52:44
  Speaker 3: reading a lot of fiction and writing that way. And
• 52:48
  Speaker 3: then you know, probably the last five or seven years,
• 52:51
  Speaker 3: I've mostly been reading nonfiction stuff mostly Like I just
• 52:55
  Speaker 3: I wasn't drawn to just made up stories anymore, but
• 52:59
  Speaker 3: ID up reading. And I think you've read some of
• 53:01
  Speaker 3: his stuff, Andy Weiers books. You know, he wrote The Martian,
• 53:06
  Speaker 3: Artemis Hail Mary. Have you read those?
• 53:09
  Speaker 2: I've no, I've I've I've read part of The Martian,
• 53:13
  Speaker 2: so I haven't finished Martian, and I own Project Hail Mary,
• 53:16
  Speaker 2: and it's like on my to read list this year,
• 53:19
  Speaker 2: but I haven't got to it yet. But I've read
• 53:20
  Speaker 2: like the first chapter and like, I got to read this,
• 53:22
  Speaker 2: so I was intrigued when he brought that up.
• 53:25
  Speaker 3: That was probably one of my favorite books the last year.
• 53:29
  Speaker 3: And I'll tell you what if I if I read
• 53:32
  Speaker 3: the synopsis of it, I probably wouldn't have read it.
• 53:36
  Speaker 3: Like I kept I kept getting into it. He has
• 53:38
  Speaker 3: like a very he's a weird style because it's very
• 53:41
  Speaker 3: almost informal writing, Like there's a lot of like this
• 53:45
  Speaker 3: is going to make me sound like a prick. But
• 53:46
  Speaker 3: if if I see something and it has a lot
• 53:48
  Speaker 3: of exclamation points, I'm like, uh, I don't want to
• 53:50
  Speaker 3: read this, probably just yeah whatever. But that book, I
• 53:55
  Speaker 3: kept reading it and getting into it, and I'm like,
• 53:58
  Speaker 3: I was just like so surprise at how much I
• 54:00
  Speaker 3: just enjoyed, you know, being entertained by it, and it
• 54:04
  Speaker 3: gets you to think about a lot of stuff because
• 54:05
  Speaker 3: he's real science based. But it was like a it
• 54:09
  Speaker 3: was a good lesson for me because I was kind
• 54:11
  Speaker 3: of like, I'm not you know, Cormack McCarthy died, I'm
• 54:14
  Speaker 3: kind of done reading fiction right for the most part.
• 54:18
  Speaker 3: And then I read that and I was like, I
• 54:21
  Speaker 3: just enjoyed it so much. And I liked all of
• 54:23
  Speaker 3: his books. I read them all last year, but that one,
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: I was like that one actually kind of just like
• 54:28
  Speaker 3: partially because I was like, there's no way this is
• 54:30
  Speaker 3: going to do it for me, so that one and
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: I ended up going through I'm reading a lot of
• 54:37
  Speaker 3: space books, which would not surprise you, and I've been
• 54:43
  Speaker 3: reading a lot of Carl Sagan stuff and man Cosmos.
• 54:50
  Speaker 3: It was just I don't know, I didn't read it
• 54:52
  Speaker 3: for whatever reason, and then I read it last year,
• 54:55
  Speaker 3: and I was like, it's just so interesting, Like anybody
• 54:59
  Speaker 3: who can take the concepts of astrophysics and all of
• 55:02
  Speaker 3: the math involved in all of the ways in which
• 55:05
  Speaker 3: we know what's happening and explain it to somebody like me,
• 55:09
  Speaker 3: Like you heard me try to do math when you
• 55:10
  Speaker 3: were asking me about how many miles I run at
• 55:12
  Speaker 3: the beginning of the episode, I was off by like
• 55:14
  Speaker 3: twelve hundred miles. I anybody who can take those concepts
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: because all of that stuff is math and and just
• 55:22
  Speaker 3: make it so digestible and interesting.
• 55:25
  Speaker 2: He's he was, and he wrote that back in like
• 55:28
  Speaker 2: the eighties or nineties, right, yes, and so like this
• 55:31
  Speaker 2: this holds up still, it's.
• 55:33
  Speaker 3: In fact later it's probably it does. It's wild to
• 55:38
  Speaker 3: hear some of his predictions and know what we've kind
• 55:41
  Speaker 3: of proven to be true since then. But also he
• 55:45
  Speaker 3: wasn't just like obsessed with space, right, Like it was
• 55:48
  Speaker 3: all about like our place in the universe and how
• 55:50
  Speaker 3: we treat each other. And it was his way of
• 55:53
  Speaker 3: looking at things was so fascinating as far as like
• 55:57
  Speaker 3: what what does society need? Like where are we going?
• 56:00
  Speaker 3: But what do we actually need? And that I think
• 56:02
  Speaker 3: that was why he was so popular, you know, and
• 56:05
  Speaker 3: I think that's why it holds true to this day.
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: See, I've got a similar fascination with those kinds of questions,
• 56:12
  Speaker 2: but not with space. I'm interested in right now just
• 56:16
  Speaker 2: like the impacts of AI and where that's going right now.
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: That seems like we are on the precipice of this
• 56:22
  Speaker 2: massive shift in so many different things. So that's been
• 56:25
  Speaker 2: an area of like curiosity for me this year. I've
• 56:27
  Speaker 2: read a bunch. I've got a book on that called
• 56:29
  Speaker 2: The Coming Wave that I can't recommend yet because I'm
• 56:33
  Speaker 2: just working through it still, but very interesting to this point.
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: It's written by one of the founders of DeepMind, which
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: is one of the AI companies at Google bought you know,
• 56:42
  Speaker 2: seven eight years ago or whatever, so they're the ones
• 56:44
  Speaker 2: behind Google's big AI push. So interesting, interesting stuff.
• 56:52
  Speaker 3: Have you had a chance to talk to Steve Ranella
• 56:54
  Speaker 3: about AI yet?
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: I have not. You guys get into that.
• 56:58
  Speaker 3: In Oklahoma, we had an interest conversation about it. In
• 57:02
  Speaker 3: typical Ranella fashion. He's like, Ah, it's not gonna be
• 57:06
  Speaker 3: anything kind of thing. Yeah, it's not gonna not gonna
• 57:09
  Speaker 3: ruin society. It's not gonna enslave humans. It's just this
• 57:14
  Speaker 3: total dismissive.
• 57:18
  Speaker 2: Uh well, I'll be sure to bring it up. What
• 57:22
  Speaker 2: I see him next and see, uh see where his
• 57:25
  Speaker 2: head's at on that one.
• 57:26
  Speaker 3: So what was what was your favorite then? Because you
• 57:29
  Speaker 3: just started that one? So books, Yeah, if you looked
• 57:31
  Speaker 3: at last year, what was the one where you were like,
• 57:33
  Speaker 3: oh my god, I can't recommend this enough.
• 57:38
  Speaker 2: Probably it would be two books, the two books that
• 57:43
  Speaker 2: I and the Trick is like one of them I
• 57:45
  Speaker 2: think could be for anyone who listens to this podcast.
• 57:47
  Speaker 2: One of them. You'd have to be like, very committed
• 57:50
  Speaker 2: to learning about this kind of stuff. So the easy
• 57:52
  Speaker 2: recommendation and and folks in our world have seen this
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: recommended a bunch but wild New World by Dan f
• 58:01
  Speaker 2: Have you read that one.
• 58:02
  Speaker 3: I haven't read that one, but I've read his other books.
• 58:05
  Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, so you know he's great. He's one of
• 58:07
  Speaker 2: Steve's longtime friends. He's been on Steve's podcast. So his
• 58:11
  Speaker 2: latest book takes a look at the history of wildlife
• 58:15
  Speaker 2: and people in North America since people came to North America.
• 58:20
  Speaker 2: So it basically starts like Pleistocene type animals, everything that
• 58:24
  Speaker 2: happened there the near I think it's fair to say
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: a catasgraphic extinction event that occurred in North America relatively
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: soon after folks showed up here. And then it follows
• 58:38
  Speaker 2: from that all the way through you know, Europeans showing
• 58:41
  Speaker 2: up and everything that happened there, and then kind of
• 58:44
  Speaker 2: wraps up almost to where we are now, just kind
• 58:48
  Speaker 2: of following that constant push and pull and tension and
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: dependency but also destructive relationship we have with wildlife here.
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: So really interesting and I think super relevant to anyone
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: who hunts or fishes, you know, kind of coming to
• 59:05
  Speaker 2: terms of that. It's sometimes very ugly history, but it's
• 59:09
  Speaker 2: other times inspiring history. So that's great book. I can't
• 59:13
  Speaker 2: recommend that one enough.
• 59:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, he's pretty good, Yeah.
• 59:17
  Speaker 2: Very good. Second recommendation is one that I pushed on
• 59:21
  Speaker 2: you years ago. We've talked about it since and then
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: I pushed it on you, and I had actually not
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: finished it when I had pushed on you, and then
• 59:29
  Speaker 2: I finally finished it this year, which is the Song
• 59:32
  Speaker 2: of the Dodo by David Klemen. And so you know,
• 59:37
  Speaker 2: as you know since you read it, but I'll mention
• 59:40
  Speaker 2: I think I even talked about this once earlier, back
• 59:42
  Speaker 2: in twenty three, I brought it up, but I'm going
• 59:44
  Speaker 2: to talk about it again because I just thought it
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: was such a profoundly interesting book and well written book.
• 59:50
  Speaker 2: You know, it basically looks at kind of how species,
• 59:57
  Speaker 2: like it examines evolution and extinction. If I had to
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 2: simplify it, it really dives into how species evolve and how
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 2: species go extinct. And it uses the example of islands,
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 2: and the study of islands, called island biogeography is basically
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: this this field of study. And what's interesting about this
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: is that you can see evolution and extinction happen much
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: more quickly and much more clearly on islands because of
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 2: the fact that these are isolated populations. And so it
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 2: uses all these different examples, and David travels around the
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 2: world exploring these kinds of things, meeting with people learning
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 2: about this kind of stuff, and he goes all the
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 2: way back into the history of like how we kind
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 2: of figure this out in the first place, So it
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: talks about Darwin and Wallace and the people who kind
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 2: of figured out the theory of evolution, and then goes
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 2: all the way through relatively currently, how we've also been
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 2: trying to figure like why are species going extinct? And
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 2: how is this happening? And what are the different forces
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 2: that you know, not not like the high level forces
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 2: like not habitat destruction, but like what happens to the
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: genetics of a population or what happens when you isolate
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 2: a population. I don't know, nerdy geeky in the in
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 2: the weeds kind of stuff, but he does it in
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: a way that's that's pretty darn compelling. And what's what's
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 2: really I think what makes us particularly relevant is right
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 2: this whole idea of like studying extinctions on islands. It
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 2: does not just apply to like physical islands like Maui
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 2: or something. We are also creating islands all over the
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 2: world on the mainland because we are continuing to create
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 2: these isolated pockets of wildlife habitat surrounded by people in development.
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 2: So like Central Park is an island, Yellowstone is an island.
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 2: The piece of woods behind my house is to a
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 2: degree an island surrounded by agriculture all around it. So
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 2: we're creating all these pseudo islands and now those island
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: effects that have real ramifications on wildlife populations. We're creating
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 2: those kinds of things all over the world, and species
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 2: are disappearing because of it. So if you care at
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 2: all about wildlife and having critters around and understanding why
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 2: we have fewer critters on average seventy percent fewer animals
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 2: on average, species across the country have gone down seventy percent,
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 2: not the country, world since nineteen seventy. So, like, there's
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 2: this biodiversity crisis, and this is something I'm spend a
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 2: lot of time diving deep into. This is one of
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 2: the best books on it and can't recommend it enough.
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 2: But it is big and it requires a commitment to
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 2: like dive into it, but I think it's worth the time.
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that book, That book is really good. It's just
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 3: a real heavy lift.
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Like there's there's a lot to unpack. I did
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 2: this thing where I don't know if you've ever done this,
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 2: but I have got the physical book and the audio
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 2: book and I bounce back and forth between the two.
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 2: You've ever done that. Yeah, it's been, like I don't know,
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: for like books that take a while to get through,
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 2: it's been a good way to like make time with them,
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 2: go for long drive, cover a bunch of ground with it,
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: and then like you're you're deep into it because you
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 2: listen to it, but it's easier to listen and then
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: you can, you know, pick it up here and there nights,
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 2: you know, in the week, and then jump in, do
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: a long drive over the weekend or something cover some ground.
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 2: I don't know, it's it's been something I've started to
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 2: do more often. It seems a little silly to pay
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 2: extra money for a second copy of the same book,
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 2: but I'm a fan of books, so I guess I
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: feel like it's a donation that I'm okay making to
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 2: the author's fine. Yeah, But but with that said, we've
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 2: got to wrap this one up because I've got to
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 2: run off through a snowstore and pick up my son
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 2: and can't be late for that. So thanks man for
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 2: talking books with me. We're talking goals. You know, it's
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 2: gonna be a good year. I'm excited about it.
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 3: Me too, buddy, me too.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 2: All right. Well, appreciate everyone tuning in for a bit
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 2: of a random show here today. But as we start
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: these every new year, I kind of feel like it's
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 2: nice to just kind of ease into the year, have
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 2: some fun talk about what we're thinking about and where
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 2: things are headed, and kind of get ourselves rejuvenated for
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: this next push. So that said, appreciate you being here,
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 2: and until next time, stay wired to hun