Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 604: Foundations - For the Love of Does, Part 1
Transcript
- 0:01Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
- 0:05Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better dearer hunting, and now your
- 0:10Speaker 1: host Tony Peterson. Hey, everyone, welcome to the Wire to
- 0:14Speaker 1: Hunt Foundations podcast, which is brought to you by First Light.
- 0:17Speaker 1: I'm your host, Tony Peterson, and today's episode is all
- 0:20Speaker 1: about the ladies and why it's a mistake to look
- 0:23Speaker 1: right past them and focus totally on the bus. They
- 0:36Speaker 1: don't get any credit and it's a shame. You know,
- 0:39Speaker 1: does make up a big part of the deer herd
- 0:42Speaker 1: and they are directly responsible for raising future generations of
- 0:45Speaker 1: white tails. And they're delicious and often just as challenging
- 0:50Speaker 1: to kill as their male counterparts. But they don't have antlers. Well,
- 0:55Speaker 1: I guess like one and eight thousand of them do.
- 0:57Speaker 1: But for the most part, of dough is a dough
- 0:58Speaker 1: is a dough is a dope, But that's not really true,
- 1:02Speaker 1: and it varies quite a bit from hunter to hunter,
- 1:05Speaker 1: and how easy it is to not only get around
- 1:07Speaker 1: them but kill them. I personally loved him. I love
- 1:11Speaker 1: them so much. I'm going to talk about them for
- 1:14Speaker 1: the next two weeks. And even if you're the biggest
- 1:17Speaker 1: antler fetish hunter out there who cares only about big
- 1:21Speaker 1: racks on the wall, you should give a listen, because
- 1:23Speaker 1: learning about how to hunt does and help you hunt
- 1:25Speaker 1: the bucks better. A couple of weeks ago, we took
- 1:39Speaker 1: my daughters to a local high school. By the time
- 1:42Speaker 1: we got there, the parking lot was full of cars.
- 1:46Speaker 1: Kids of all ages could be seen walking through the
- 1:49Speaker 1: cold Minnesota morning to the front doors. Most of them
- 1:52Speaker 1: were wearing jerseys. Inside, the activity increased. There were players
- 1:58Speaker 1: and coaches and parents and parents all over in the hallways,
- 2:02Speaker 1: and the distant sound of cheering and ref whistles filled
- 2:05Speaker 1: the air. Our girls had three games on the schedule
- 2:09Speaker 1: in a matter of just four hours. To top it off,
- 2:13Speaker 1: this nasty flu that is going around, or COVID two
- 2:16Speaker 1: or whatever the hell it is had knocked their team
- 2:18Speaker 1: back from nine players to seven, and one of those
- 2:22Speaker 1: remaining girls she was fading pretty fast, so we could
- 2:25Speaker 1: safely call it about six and a half players. The
- 2:29Speaker 1: first game was a decent one, with my girls team
- 2:33Speaker 1: taking an early lead and keeping it throughout both periods.
- 2:36Speaker 1: Day one with twenty four points, which is about average
- 2:40Speaker 1: for fifth grade girls. Now, of those twenty four, one
- 2:44Speaker 1: of my daughters scored twenty. She was pretty proud of herself,
- 2:49Speaker 1: and so were we. Now. The second game looked to
- 2:53Speaker 1: be a little bit more of a challenge, but our
- 2:55Speaker 1: girls started out strong and they pulled out to a
- 2:57Speaker 1: ten to zero lead, over coming a five bucket deficit.
- 3:01Speaker 1: In that age group, it's not very easy, but the
- 3:04Speaker 1: opposing team managed to do it now. They even got
- 3:07Speaker 1: a little help from my non twenty point scoring daughter, who,
- 3:11Speaker 1: in a moment of not so great basketball awareness, shot
- 3:15Speaker 1: into the wrong hoop. It was the first basket she
- 3:18Speaker 1: made all day, and it ended up counting for the
- 3:20Speaker 1: opposing team. It also tied the whole game up and
- 3:24Speaker 1: sent us into overtime, so not ideal. We won thanks
- 3:30Speaker 1: to a free throw from my daughter, who did not
- 3:32Speaker 1: graciously provide opponents with an extra two points, so that
- 3:36Speaker 1: was good. The third game, I was a train wreck,
- 3:41Speaker 1: but they came in second place. For the tournament, it
- 3:44Speaker 1: was full of ups and downs, and while it was
- 3:46Speaker 1: embarrassing when my daughter made a basket in the wrong hoop,
- 3:49Speaker 1: it also helped that I was sitting by a woman
- 3:51Speaker 1: whose daughter went zero for ten on free throws, and
- 3:54Speaker 1: of those she airballed nine. Of them. Anyway, Even though
- 3:59Speaker 1: my twin daughters were both playing on the same team
- 4:03Speaker 1: in the same games, it was clear that one of
- 4:06Speaker 1: them is really, really good. I'm not ashamed to say
- 4:09Speaker 1: the best on the team. The other she needs some work.
- 4:14Speaker 1: I don't know, or maybe some golf clubs are volleyball
- 4:16Speaker 1: or something. What does this have to do with deer hunting. Well,
- 4:21Speaker 1: we are all deer hunters, right, We are all chasing
- 4:24Speaker 1: the same species, yet we don't have the same skill sets. Sure,
- 4:29Speaker 1: we wear the same jerseys, maybe looked up to the
- 4:32Speaker 1: same coaches. But some of us are starters and some
- 4:36Speaker 1: of us are bench warmers. For now, some of us
- 4:41Speaker 1: should focus on mature bucks, and some of us should
- 4:44Speaker 1: be really happy to make a good shot on any deer,
- 4:47Speaker 1: even if that deer doesn't have antlers and never would.
- 4:52Speaker 1: That's right. Some of us should just be deer hunters
- 4:55Speaker 1: with an emphasis on Does that might seem crazy or
- 4:59Speaker 1: that I'm shooting on newbies or low experience hunters. That's
- 5:03Speaker 1: not my intention at all. I'm a firm believer in
- 5:06Speaker 1: working your way up the ladder in life, and I
- 5:09Speaker 1: think there is a progression to whitetail hunting that can
- 5:13Speaker 1: be circumvented, but shouldn't be. How do you circumvent it?
- 5:18Speaker 1: That's pretty easy. You just have to have a parent
- 5:21Speaker 1: who I don't know, invested in an apple and kept
- 5:24Speaker 1: all their shares until recently, and now that they've gifted you,
- 5:27Speaker 1: I don't know, tens of millions of dollars. Just go
- 5:29Speaker 1: out and buy a section or two of land in
- 5:31Speaker 1: Iowa or Kansas. Done and done. See it's pretty easy
- 5:35Speaker 1: right now. There are other ways to circumvent the process too,
- 5:39Speaker 1: but if you had those, you wouldn't be listening to me.
- 5:42Speaker 1: So let's assume you don't, and let's ask another question,
- 5:47Speaker 1: how easy is it for you to kill those? If
- 5:50Speaker 1: you answer it's pretty dang easy, bro, i'd counter with, okay,
- 5:54Speaker 1: when and where? Now? If you answered, well, it's kind
- 6:00Speaker 1: of easy for me to kill dose, I'll just fill
- 6:02Speaker 1: in the blanks here and assume that that's actually kind
- 6:05Speaker 1: of a nun. I learned that trick from a doctor
- 6:07Speaker 1: one time, who asked me how much I drank. When
- 6:10Speaker 1: I told him, he said, well, that's a lot, and
- 6:13Speaker 1: I said, I don't know, man, I think that seems
- 6:15Speaker 1: pretty reasonable, and he said, well, we double the amount
- 6:19Speaker 1: you tell us because everyone lies to us, And I
- 6:21Speaker 1: was like, how dare you call out the exact behavior
- 6:25Speaker 1: I literally just did and make me sound like your
- 6:27Speaker 1: run of the mill, lying idiot, which I just was.
- 6:31Speaker 1: The audacity of some folks. Killing dose seems easy because
- 6:37Speaker 1: you know what, but what I said earlier, they don't
- 6:40Speaker 1: have antlers. So a dough is a dough is a dough.
- 6:44Speaker 1: The year and a half old dough. She gets lumped
- 6:46Speaker 1: in with the old horsehead dough that is gray in
- 6:48Speaker 1: the face, snorts at you when you even think about hunting,
- 6:51Speaker 1: and has put two fawns on the ground and guided
- 6:53Speaker 1: them to young adulthood every spring for a decade. Would
- 6:57Speaker 1: we do the same thing with bucks? I mean, would
- 7:00Speaker 1: you say a forky is the same as a hundred
- 7:02Speaker 1: and fifty in no, because that would be dumb as
- 7:06Speaker 1: dumb as lying to your doctor, but a really unhealthy
- 7:09Speaker 1: addiction that you have. We would say, well, oh no,
- 7:13Speaker 1: those two deer have nothing in common. That forky. He's
- 7:17Speaker 1: just young and dumb, and he has maybe his whole
- 7:20Speaker 1: life ahead of him if somebody doesn't shoot him. He's
- 7:23Speaker 1: no real challenge for a quote unquote real hunter. But
- 7:28Speaker 1: the one fifty. Let me tell you something. That dear
- 7:31Speaker 1: isn't even really a dear. He's a wizard of the
- 7:34Speaker 1: animal world that can wave his little magic wand and
- 7:36Speaker 1: disappear in a whisper smoke. He can sense your presence
- 7:40Speaker 1: through his sixth sense and feel the vibration of your
- 7:43Speaker 1: heart beating through your first light vest from a half
- 7:45Speaker 1: a mile away. He's so nocturnal he doesn't even remember
- 7:50Speaker 1: what it's like to move in the daylight hours. If
- 7:53Speaker 1: you spook him, well son, you best target another buck,
- 7:57Speaker 1: because that deer has done unpacked his bags and moved
- 7:59Speaker 1: to a whole old new property, and now he's so
- 8:02Speaker 1: cagy he actually digs a hole and hides in it
- 8:04Speaker 1: after covering himself up with leaves another debris. All you'll
- 8:08Speaker 1: see is an antler tip poking on the leaf litter
- 8:10Speaker 1: if you see him at all, which you won't because
- 8:13Speaker 1: he's practically invisible. Of course, this is all great a
- 8:17Speaker 1: level horseshit. A five and a half year old dough
- 8:21Speaker 1: is probably pretty damn similar to a five and a
- 8:23Speaker 1: half year old buck, at least when it comes to survival.
- 8:26Speaker 1: The downside she has is that she's usually got little
- 8:30Speaker 1: miles to feed, and that might put her in a
- 8:32Speaker 1: position to take more risks the buck he can and
- 8:36Speaker 1: does just look after himself. So where am I going
- 8:40Speaker 1: with this? If you want to be a better deer hunter,
- 8:44Speaker 1: you have to get better at hunting deer, all of them.
- 8:49Speaker 1: You will never be a great big buck hunter if
- 8:52Speaker 1: you can't kill does on the same properties you're hunting
- 8:54Speaker 1: those bucks. You will never be a really successful over
- 8:58Speaker 1: the road buck hunter if you can't travel and shoot
- 9:01Speaker 1: some adult does. Now, I know a lot of people
- 9:04Speaker 1: might not believe this because we focus so hard on bucks,
- 9:08Speaker 1: But let me share a couple of stories of my
- 9:09Speaker 1: life about does to kind of frame this up for you. Now,
- 9:13Speaker 1: I mentioned this one particular old gal a few times,
- 9:16Speaker 1: so I'll just keep it short. But I once co
- 9:18Speaker 1: owned a little property in the suburbs here. We put
- 9:21Speaker 1: in a kill plot on that place, and an old
- 9:24Speaker 1: long nose dough claimed it. She would rear up and
- 9:27Speaker 1: swat at the other deer that came in, both bucks
- 9:30Speaker 1: and does, and was generally a great, a dear version
- 9:34Speaker 1: of a biz natcho. So I said, well, I think
- 9:38Speaker 1: it's time to put her in the freezer. But she
- 9:41Speaker 1: was on to that stand that we had over the plot.
- 9:44Speaker 1: So out smarter, I put a ground blind in there
- 9:48Speaker 1: as well. I figured she would never see me in
- 9:52Speaker 1: the blind and never know for sure if I was
- 9:54Speaker 1: in there until it was too late. Except when I
- 9:58Speaker 1: did sit that blind and I did try to draw
- 10:01Speaker 1: on her, she busted me instantly. I tried to kill
- 10:05Speaker 1: that dough quite a few times, and I failed every
- 10:08Speaker 1: single time. For all I know, she's still out there
- 10:12Speaker 1: knocking the lesser dear senseless with her ancient hoofs Or
- 10:17Speaker 1: how about this I think it was. I had quite
- 10:21Speaker 1: a bit of time to hunt in northern Wisconsin. I
- 10:24Speaker 1: had a buck and a dough tag, and I thought,
- 10:27Speaker 1: I just want to shoot both on public land dairy
- 10:30Speaker 1: I hunt over. There has no shortage of big woods
- 10:33Speaker 1: that's opened anyone, so I figured killing a dough wouldn't
- 10:36Speaker 1: be much of a challenge. But I figured wrong. I
- 10:40Speaker 1: got two cocky. It took me three weeks, and while
- 10:44Speaker 1: I didn't hunt every day, I did hunt a lot.
- 10:47Speaker 1: I got busted by every single dough that came into
- 10:50Speaker 1: range until we finally got some snow and I changed
- 10:54Speaker 1: up my program to set a spot. I've been curious about.
- 10:57Speaker 1: I set my stand facing away from the trail I
- 11:00Speaker 1: expected them to use, and I waited in the frigid cold.
- 11:04Speaker 1: In about fifteen minutes before shooting light was up, I
- 11:07Speaker 1: heard the crunch, crunch, crunch of a deer coming up
- 11:10Speaker 1: the trail. Since I had a buck tag and a
- 11:13Speaker 1: dough tag and very low standards, and also quite a
- 11:16Speaker 1: bit of PTSD from getting busted so much, I drew early,
- 11:20Speaker 1: way early. And as soon as that dough stepped out
- 11:23Speaker 1: to where she could see me aiming around the trunk
- 11:25Speaker 1: of that tree, she had me pegged. I mean instantly.
- 11:28Speaker 1: It reminded me of one of the only bobcats I've
- 11:31Speaker 1: ever seen while hunting that walked out across the field,
- 11:33Speaker 1: looked up at me, sat down, and then spooted. That
- 11:37Speaker 1: kitty was two hundred yards away and saw me instantly
- 11:40Speaker 1: without even trying, And so did this dough. And the
- 11:44Speaker 1: only mistake that she made was that enough of her
- 11:47Speaker 1: chest was visible that I had a shot, and I
- 11:50Speaker 1: got it off, and I hit her well, but I'm
- 11:52Speaker 1: pretty confident she would have been gone in a few
- 11:55Speaker 1: seconds if I hadn't. It was a humbling three weeks
- 11:59Speaker 1: of hunting my friends. I've had other experiences with doze
- 12:03Speaker 1: that made me realize we should give them more credit
- 12:05Speaker 1: to A recent example is when I was sitting in
- 12:08Speaker 1: Wisconsin on a property I own with one of my
- 12:11Speaker 1: daughters back in October. Our blind, which I had said
- 12:15Speaker 1: on a little kill plot before the season even opened,
- 12:18Speaker 1: had been really kind of the hot spot, so we
- 12:21Speaker 1: had hunted it a few times already. I still felt
- 12:24Speaker 1: confident in a deer would come in, and as the
- 12:25Speaker 1: sun set, we saw a doe looking at us from
- 12:28Speaker 1: the edge of the woods. She was laser focused on
- 12:32Speaker 1: the blind, so we sat like statues. She took two
- 12:36Speaker 1: steps out, stopped, and then she took two steps back.
- 12:41Speaker 1: The wind was perfect. We hadn't moved, she hadn't seen us,
- 12:45Speaker 1: she hadn't smelled us, and we hadn't made a sound.
- 12:48Speaker 1: She just didn't like the vibes, I guess, and I
- 12:51Speaker 1: thought she was leaving. So I slowly eased my binos
- 12:55Speaker 1: up to my eyes and I realized that she was
- 12:58Speaker 1: standing in a patch of gray wooden aspens. She was
- 13:02Speaker 1: still staring. She just made sure to do it from
- 13:04Speaker 1: the cover. That's also when I saw two more doughs
- 13:08Speaker 1: doing the same thing. It took five minutes, but the
- 13:12Speaker 1: Leado finally walked into the plot, and when she did,
- 13:16Speaker 1: she sidestepped. She tried to get our wind, and she stopped,
- 13:19Speaker 1: and she looked, and she stared some more. She didn't
- 13:23Speaker 1: have any funds with her, Anita did the other two dos,
- 13:26Speaker 1: but that didn't seem to matter at all. Now the
- 13:30Speaker 1: Leado finally decided to feed in, which sent the all
- 13:33Speaker 1: clear to the other two. But I am confident we
- 13:36Speaker 1: wouldn't have gotten away with that in a tree stand
- 13:39Speaker 1: she had just seen us. I'm also confident that any
- 13:43Speaker 1: slight mistake on our part and the whole thing would
- 13:46Speaker 1: have been over. Now. I rarely see bucks, even public
- 13:51Speaker 1: land bucks act that way, but I see old does
- 13:55Speaker 1: act of that KG quite a bit. It's unfortunate, really,
- 14:01Speaker 1: that we focus so heavily on bucks when the doughs
- 14:03Speaker 1: can help us improve our games so much by teaching
- 14:06Speaker 1: us about dear. Now, this might seem like a weird
- 14:09Speaker 1: way to justify shooting more does, but it's not. I
- 14:12Speaker 1: really think the lessons you can learn from trying to
- 14:14Speaker 1: kill does are just as valuable as the lessons you
- 14:17Speaker 1: can learn from trying to kill bucks. Now, the big
- 14:21Speaker 1: difference here, and this is important, my friends, is you'll
- 14:24Speaker 1: just get more opportunities with does. This is something I've
- 14:28Speaker 1: harped on a lot, but most hunters just aren't closers.
- 14:32Speaker 1: It's not really their fault, and I'll explain why. But
- 14:35Speaker 1: let me give you something to chew on here. Think
- 14:38Speaker 1: about the biggest buck you have ever gotten a shot at.
- 14:41Speaker 1: Think about your hunting buddies, or your dad, or your uncles,
- 14:44Speaker 1: or whoever is in your like tight hunting circle. Think
- 14:48Speaker 1: about the biggest buck they've ever got a shot at.
- 14:50Speaker 1: Because I'm sure they've told you the story. How did
- 14:52Speaker 1: it go? Was it an easy double lung shot that
- 14:55Speaker 1: ended with a short blood trail and a trip to
- 14:57Speaker 1: the taxidermist? Maybe? Probably not. I hear a lot of
- 15:04Speaker 1: the biggest buck of my life stories, and almost all
- 15:08Speaker 1: of them involved the buck not riding in the back
- 15:11Speaker 1: of the hunter's truck. They almost always involve a miss
- 15:16Speaker 1: or a shot so poor that recovery never happened. Why. Well,
- 15:22Speaker 1: there's a lot of reasons. Buck fever is the biggest one.
- 15:25Speaker 1: Because we lose our minds on big bucks. We just do,
- 15:28Speaker 1: whether we admit it or not. And a lot of
- 15:30Speaker 1: us don't. Another factor, though, is that most of us
- 15:33Speaker 1: just haven't developed into closers. We might have developed into
- 15:37Speaker 1: pretty decent deer hunters over time, but that's just like
- 15:41Speaker 1: phase one or two. We still need years to get
- 15:45Speaker 1: good at sealing the deal. This is not something you
- 15:48Speaker 1: can shortcut. It takes close encounters that allow you the
- 15:52Speaker 1: opportunity to stand exactly when you have to or draw
- 15:56Speaker 1: at the perfect time. Then you have to pick a spy,
- 16:00Speaker 1: aim and execute. I know this sounds so simple in practice,
- 16:04Speaker 1: but it's so hard in real life. It gets much
- 16:09Speaker 1: much harder when you only get the chance to flex
- 16:12Speaker 1: your closer muscles once or twice a season, or maybe
- 16:15Speaker 1: once or twice every couple of seasons. This happens to
- 16:19Speaker 1: the most dedicated trophy hunters out there. If they don't
- 16:21Speaker 1: have easy places to hunt, they get into this space
- 16:24Speaker 1: where it's big bucks or nothing. But they aren't even
- 16:27Speaker 1: good at the things it takes to make a great
- 16:28Speaker 1: shot on a deer, and they won't get there at
- 16:31Speaker 1: least not for a long, long long time without more experience.
- 16:36Speaker 1: I'll think about it this way. If you make it
- 16:39Speaker 1: a goal to fill your freezer with mature doughs, and
- 16:41Speaker 1: you can get a buck tag or three dough tags
- 16:44Speaker 1: in your state. Now this is hypothetical, but bear with me.
- 16:48Speaker 1: You should have a lot more opportunities to fill those
- 16:51Speaker 1: dough tags. You still have a mature deer to fool
- 16:55Speaker 1: that is in your red zone and fully committed to
- 16:58Speaker 1: seeing another sunrise. You have to do everything right before
- 17:01Speaker 1: the shot and after. Not only do you level up
- 17:05Speaker 1: your preshot game, but your recovery game as well, and
- 17:08Speaker 1: those are not small things in the development of a
- 17:11Speaker 1: deer hunter. It's also a game changer to go out
- 17:15Speaker 1: with more than one type of animal on the hit list. Now,
- 17:18Speaker 1: I get that bucks and does are the same species,
- 17:21Speaker 1: but you'll put yourself in predator mode a hell of
- 17:24Speaker 1: a lot more if you're open to the possibility of
- 17:27Speaker 1: shooting whatever comes down the trail and not just something
- 17:29Speaker 1: that's worthy of the Graham. I think this is one
- 17:32Speaker 1: of the most important things about traveling to hunt, even
- 17:36Speaker 1: though it probably sounds dumb. I always buy a dough
- 17:39Speaker 1: teg if some state will sell me one, because sometimes
- 17:42Speaker 1: I just need to go find deer before I can
- 17:45Speaker 1: hunt bucks. I have way more fun knowing that I
- 17:48Speaker 1: can shoot a dough and it changes how I approach
- 17:51Speaker 1: my scouting and my hanging hunt strategy. I actually think
- 17:54Speaker 1: it makes me way better at home and way way
- 17:58Speaker 1: better when I'm on the road. And that's what I'm
- 18:01Speaker 1: gonna get into next week. Not why I think those
- 18:04Speaker 1: are worthy adversaries to us as hunters, but how to
- 18:06Speaker 1: kill them. I know that sounds crazy, but I promise
- 18:10Speaker 1: you at least twelve percent of it will make sense.
- 18:13Speaker 1: So tune in, keep after it, and look at that
- 18:16Speaker 1: empty space in your freezer as a personal challenge and
- 18:19Speaker 1: not a failure. That's it for this week. Thank you
- 18:24Speaker 1: so much for tuning in. I'm your host, Tony Peterson
- 18:27Speaker 1: and this has been the Wire to Hunt Foundations podcast,
- 18:30Speaker 1: which is brought to you by First Light. If you
- 18:33Speaker 1: want more white tail hunting no how, head on over
- 18:36Speaker 1: to them eat eater dot com slash wired to read
- 18:39Speaker 1: our latest articles, or visit the Wired to Hunt YouTube
- 18:42Speaker 1: channel to view our weekly how to videos.