Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 620: Foundations - Tough Bucks

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Ep. 620: Foundations - Tough Bucks · Wired To Hunt Podcast

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
0:05
Speaker 1: to the fundamentals better dear hunting, presented by First Like
0:08
Speaker 1: creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.
0:13
Speaker 1: First Light, Go further, stay longer, and now your host
0:17
Speaker 1: Tony Peterson. Hey, everyone, welcome to the Wire to Hunt
0:21
Speaker 1: Foundations podcast, which brought to you by First Light. I'm
0:23
Speaker 1: your host, Tony Peterson, and this episode is all about
0:26
Speaker 1: how tough white tails really are. Take a look outside
0:43
Speaker 1: right now. Maybe you live in a place like I
0:45
Speaker 1: live in and it's miserable and stupid outside, and you
0:48
Speaker 1: realize people probably shouldn't live here. Maybe you think, like
0:52
Speaker 1: for some reason a lot of Wyoming residents do, that
0:55
Speaker 1: the place you live makes you tough. The winter is
0:58
Speaker 1: hard in you, and you know you and your people
1:00
Speaker 1: and well you know the badass or he comes oozing
1:03
Speaker 1: out and everything you do from flossing with a chainsaw
1:06
Speaker 1: to cattle roping bull moose in your spare time. Sure
1:09
Speaker 1: you're kind of tough, but not as tough as your
1:11
Speaker 1: average one and a half year old six pointer. Thems
1:14
Speaker 1: the breaks, my friends, and that's what this episode is
1:16
Speaker 1: actually really all about. If you head on down to
1:29
Speaker 1: the local watering hole where Garth Brooks is still playing
1:32
Speaker 1: on the jukebox, and the crowd leans heavily toward long
1:36
Speaker 1: necks and not necessarily drinks like cosmos or chocolate martinis.
1:40
Speaker 1: You probably don't have to look too hard to find
1:42
Speaker 1: some dude who thinks he's pretty tough. There's one in
1:45
Speaker 1: every bar, I guess, and I'll bet that hypothetical but
1:49
Speaker 1: also very real archetype of a person. If you were
1:52
Speaker 1: to switch the dusty TV on and turn it to
1:54
Speaker 1: some random UFC event, I bet you'd hear from them
1:57
Speaker 1: stories about how the competitors weren't really that tough, and
2:01
Speaker 1: your new bar friend could probably take them in a
2:03
Speaker 1: no rules, bare knuckle brawl in the back alley amongst
2:06
Speaker 1: the dumpsters and the cigarette butts. I'm sure the tough
2:09
Speaker 1: guy would tell you, you you know, over the drone of
2:11
Speaker 1: manicured cowboy hat wearing fellows singing I don't know, dirt
2:15
Speaker 1: road songs and short shorts in a life they probably
2:17
Speaker 1: never have seen. And Shirley can't see from their beachfront
2:20
Speaker 1: place in Malibu that toughness doesn't come from earning no
2:24
Speaker 1: stupid belt or having a bunch of rules so that
2:27
Speaker 1: no one really gets hurt. It comes from the heart,
2:30
Speaker 1: he'd say, Or I don't know, growing up with twelve
2:34
Speaker 1: older brothers and a drunk for a dad or whatever.
2:37
Speaker 1: But the truth is that's sitting on a bar stool
2:39
Speaker 1: in a place like Newell, South Dakota telling people how
2:42
Speaker 1: tough you are is a far cry from stepping into
2:45
Speaker 1: that octagon improving it against someone who has trained for
2:48
Speaker 1: a decade or two on how to fold people into
2:51
Speaker 1: neat little packages of pain and sadness, or strike them
2:54
Speaker 1: from their calves to their skull with a wild repertoire
2:58
Speaker 1: of practice elbows, ches and kicks. It's not the same thing,
3:03
Speaker 1: and everybody knows it, kind of like how when you
3:06
Speaker 1: occasionally get a living wild animal in your hands that
3:10
Speaker 1: doesn't want to be there, and you can just feel
3:12
Speaker 1: the raw power in them. Many folks have taken a
3:16
Speaker 1: beating from turkey wings after they've dumped them with a
3:19
Speaker 1: load of fours in the spring, or a few people
3:22
Speaker 1: have taken spurs to the hands or the neck or
3:24
Speaker 1: the face. Animals are strong, generally, but some animals are
3:28
Speaker 1: just tough, real tough. Not sit at the bar and
3:32
Speaker 1: not prove it tough, but tough. Anybody who's hunted squirrels
3:36
Speaker 1: knows they're tough. The cling to life aspect of squirrels
3:40
Speaker 1: is real and will show itself if you hunt them enough. Rabbits,
3:44
Speaker 1: on the other hand, not that tough. They're like the
3:47
Speaker 1: clueless city dweller who instantly gets bit by the first
3:50
Speaker 1: zombies in an outbreak. Just not smart enough for a
3:53
Speaker 1: long life and just not tough. Rough grouser like that too.
3:58
Speaker 1: They catch a single baby from your shatka pattern. They're
4:01
Speaker 1: coming down. Not a rooster, though. Pheasants are tough. You
4:05
Speaker 1: knocked them down, they just run and hide. Their will
4:08
Speaker 1: to live is impressive. Take antelope not so much, not
4:14
Speaker 1: so tough. I actually kind of don't think elk are
4:17
Speaker 1: that tough either, but I don't have enough experience to
4:19
Speaker 1: make that call, so I could be way off based
4:22
Speaker 1: on that one. And of course, those white tails we
4:26
Speaker 1: love so much. They are as Mark would probably put
4:29
Speaker 1: it tough some bitches, and they are. The second year
4:34
Speaker 1: I ever shot was a button buck on a late
4:36
Speaker 1: September morning. I actually got shot him twice and had
4:40
Speaker 1: to cut his throat when we blood trailed him to
4:42
Speaker 1: his bed where he was very much alive. Now, I
4:46
Speaker 1: don't know if you know much about button bucks in September,
4:49
Speaker 1: but they aren't very big. And I also don't know
4:53
Speaker 1: if you know anything about the old style broadheads, like
4:55
Speaker 1: bare razor heads or wikies, but they were big and
4:58
Speaker 1: covered in a lot of utting surface. And the fact
5:02
Speaker 1: that he took one through himself broadside at one down
5:05
Speaker 1: through his back and still had the grit to go
5:08
Speaker 1: and bed down and be alive when we got there
5:10
Speaker 1: tells you something. And it was ugly. That was an
5:14
Speaker 1: ugly encounter that stuck with me as a hunter. I
5:18
Speaker 1: did a terrible job and that left a mark, but
5:21
Speaker 1: so did that Dear's toughness. Since then, I've seen so
5:25
Speaker 1: many examples of the great deer really have and it
5:28
Speaker 1: comes in many forms, but one of the most obvious
5:31
Speaker 1: is how often they have significant but healed over wounds
5:34
Speaker 1: on them. A good buddy of mine shot a buck
5:37
Speaker 1: in southern Minnesota with his muzzleloader in December. That buck,
5:42
Speaker 1: it was nice, dear had a normal four point side
5:45
Speaker 1: on one side, but also kind of a smaller, droopier
5:48
Speaker 1: looking messed upside, and Ben said it looked like someone
5:52
Speaker 1: had shot the buck with a shotgun slug the year before,
5:55
Speaker 1: because although it was healed up, he said the scar
5:57
Speaker 1: tissue and the damage to the shoulder was in intent now.
6:01
Speaker 1: That same buck also had several time wounds in his
6:04
Speaker 1: rear quarter that were full of puss. I don't know
6:08
Speaker 1: which injury I'd pick, the shotgun blast of the shoulder
6:11
Speaker 1: or some blunt tines digging into your glutes. That neither
6:14
Speaker 1: is all that appealing. If you're hunting a high pressure area,
6:19
Speaker 1: you have probably shot a few deer with bullets or
6:21
Speaker 1: broadheads in them. I have. I've shot deer with muzzle
6:24
Speaker 1: loader bullets in their legs and in their backstraps. I've
6:27
Speaker 1: shot a buck one time in Minnesota that had an
6:30
Speaker 1: enormous but old wound on his back. I don't know
6:33
Speaker 1: if he got hit by a grain truck or what,
6:36
Speaker 1: but a whole section of his back dipped down lower
6:38
Speaker 1: than the rest. Can you imagine the amount of deer
6:43
Speaker 1: out there making a go of it on three legs.
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Speaker 1: It's pretty incredible too. If some random blaze orange clad
6:51
Speaker 1: asshole and his buddies walked through my living room in
6:53
Speaker 1: a line and shot off one of my legs when
6:54
Speaker 1: I tried to get away, I think I'd lay right
6:57
Speaker 1: there in my yard and beg for a merciful second shot. Dear,
7:01
Speaker 1: are just tough. I already told his story, so I
7:05
Speaker 1: won't give it full details here. But I shot a
7:08
Speaker 1: buck through the ribs in Texas one time. When that
7:10
Speaker 1: buck came back to the feet or two days later,
7:12
Speaker 1: I shot him again, thankfully better that time. And what
7:16
Speaker 1: was crazy is I got to see how much that
7:18
Speaker 1: original wound had healed up in two days. It was incredible.
7:23
Speaker 1: The skin had fused back together, and while it would
7:27
Speaker 1: bleed a little bit when I pushed on the wound,
7:29
Speaker 1: it wasn't like the kind of wound you'd expect from
7:33
Speaker 1: fixed blade broadhead going right through your chest. Imagine that.
7:39
Speaker 1: Imagine what it would be like to have an arrow
7:41
Speaker 1: go through your ribs, magically miss all the good stuff
7:44
Speaker 1: that keeps you out there in the mesquite, and then
7:46
Speaker 1: being damned near fully healed a few days later. They
7:51
Speaker 1: are truly incredible, and I think it's probably a little
7:54
Speaker 1: bit of genetic hardwaring and a little bit that they
7:57
Speaker 1: don't have pity parties like we do. I've interviewed quite
8:00
Speaker 1: a few veterinarians in my life. Over the years, they
8:03
Speaker 1: used to produce and host a podcast all about sporting dogs,
8:07
Speaker 1: and for like a decade I wrote the retriever health
8:09
Speaker 1: column for Wildfall magazine. And while I got a crash
8:13
Speaker 1: course and dog health through those years, one thing that's
8:16
Speaker 1: stuck with me was all of the injuries to dogs
8:19
Speaker 1: that have heard about from veterinarians. One fellow who's a
8:22
Speaker 1: friend of mine named Ira Macaulay has his own clinic
8:25
Speaker 1: down in Missouri. I asked him what the most gnarly
8:29
Speaker 1: dog injuries are that he sees, thinking he'd talk about
8:32
Speaker 1: dogs getting shot or busting their legs up or something,
8:36
Speaker 1: but he said they all involved catfishing. And as most
8:40
Speaker 1: of you know, dogs don't discriminate a whole lot on
8:44
Speaker 1: what they'll put in their mouths, just like toddlers now
8:47
Speaker 1: think about using cut up hot dogs or a glob
8:51
Speaker 1: of chicken liver or a bunch of stink bait for catfish.
8:55
Speaker 1: If you think a laborator retriever is gonna gobble that
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Speaker 1: ship up the way you would have you bumbled into
9:00
Speaker 1: an edible in an hour later, someone set down some
9:02
Speaker 1: Reese's peanut butter cups in front of you. You're wrong.
9:05
Speaker 1: The problem with eating catfish bait is that it's often
9:09
Speaker 1: stuck to a treble hook, which is tied to some
9:12
Speaker 1: pretty stout line. Iras said that he sees dogs more
9:15
Speaker 1: often than you'd imagine with a trouble hook lodged in
9:18
Speaker 1: their esophagus or deeper into their stomach, depending on where.
9:23
Speaker 1: They either have to go in through the throat or
9:25
Speaker 1: cut a new hole into the side of the dog
9:27
Speaker 1: to work on that hook. He then went on to
9:31
Speaker 1: say that you wouldn't believe how fast they heal from that,
9:35
Speaker 1: and he's right, I wouldn't. But dogs don't feel sorry
9:39
Speaker 1: for themselves. They have emotions just like I'm sure, dear dude,
9:44
Speaker 1: but they don't have the luxury or hell probably the
9:47
Speaker 1: burden of being able to think of themselves in main
9:49
Speaker 1: character mode like we do. Your average lab isn't thinking
9:52
Speaker 1: about how sad it is he's missing out on a
9:54
Speaker 1: play date with another dog, or how he has a
9:57
Speaker 1: big week at work and now he's hobbling around on crutches,
10:01
Speaker 1: or about how his stupid boss is always making him
10:04
Speaker 1: work late and never appreciates him and only really cares
10:06
Speaker 1: about the other white toil guys on the team. We
10:08
Speaker 1: have better mustaches, but questionable hunting skills. Dogs don't have
10:12
Speaker 1: that problem, and neither do Dear. They live in the moment,
10:17
Speaker 1: and they heed that call, that deep in the bones
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Speaker 1: call that says you will see another sunrise, you will
10:24
Speaker 1: do what it takes to live, period and stop. Done
10:28
Speaker 1: and done, my friends. That's one of the many, many
10:32
Speaker 1: things that makes dogs so damn cool and deer so
10:36
Speaker 1: damn special. It's also something you can use to be
10:38
Speaker 1: a better hunter on a couple of different fronts. The
10:42
Speaker 1: first is the pure survival instinct. As I mentioned, if
10:48
Speaker 1: you butcher your own deer and you hunt where other
10:50
Speaker 1: people hunt, you're gonna start to see some old wounds
10:54
Speaker 1: on your deer. Imagine how many encounters a deer probably
10:57
Speaker 1: goes through in its life to suffer bullet or arrow
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Speaker 1: wounds and survive. That is a deer that isn't going
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Speaker 1: to risk its life unnecessarily. Think about it from this perspective.
11:10
Speaker 1: Let's say you had someone from some quaint little town
11:13
Speaker 1: in Iowa where everybody knows everyone in the last murder
11:15
Speaker 1: happened in nine when the postman got caught delivering more
11:19
Speaker 1: than the mail to some dude's wife, and the old
11:21
Speaker 1: rabbit shotgun came out, and for a while the mail
11:24
Speaker 1: was a little late, and it was the talk of
11:26
Speaker 1: the county. Take that person and put them in like
11:30
Speaker 1: the south side of Chicago on the fourth of July,
11:32
Speaker 1: one's a hundred degrees out, maybe the sun setting. That
11:36
Speaker 1: world's going to be different for them. They'll be like
11:39
Speaker 1: a year and a half old buck out there wandering
11:41
Speaker 1: around at noon during the public land. There's gonna be
11:44
Speaker 1: different survival instincts, and maybe not that sharp might get
11:48
Speaker 1: into some trouble. Now, take someone who has grown up
11:51
Speaker 1: in that city environment. Imagine how different they would travel,
11:54
Speaker 1: how they look at the world from a different view.
11:58
Speaker 1: Imagine the difference in decision make Now imagine that in
12:02
Speaker 1: the dear world, if you'd be lucky to live for
12:05
Speaker 1: five years, and during three months of those five years,
12:08
Speaker 1: every year someone tried to kill you every day, and
12:11
Speaker 1: worse yet, got close enough to wound you a time
12:14
Speaker 1: or two, how risky do you think you'd be after that?
12:19
Speaker 1: You probably wouldn't tolerate too many close encounters with humans
12:23
Speaker 1: unless you were positive you had as many advantages as possible.
12:28
Speaker 1: If you're better than a deadfall. And see you're here
12:30
Speaker 1: hunter walking below you. It's time for concern. But the
12:34
Speaker 1: advantage is yours and you know it now. If you
12:37
Speaker 1: get up to brows and head towards the nearest south
12:39
Speaker 1: alfa field and suddenly catch movement out of your peripheral vision,
12:43
Speaker 1: then you see some dude in a tree drawing his bow,
12:47
Speaker 1: you're going to realize quickly you gave up your advantage
12:50
Speaker 1: and now it's danger time. Those experiences are going to
12:54
Speaker 1: leave a mark. The second part of this ties into
12:58
Speaker 1: something I've said a billion times, but I'll say it again.
13:03
Speaker 1: We condition the deer to our danger. Just think about
13:08
Speaker 1: the average deer on an average hunting property that contains
13:11
Speaker 1: some agriculture. Where are those deer that live there most
13:15
Speaker 1: likely to encounter a hunter? Where are they most likely
13:19
Speaker 1: to get shot at? Where are they most likely to
13:22
Speaker 1: see a human or smell where a human has been.
13:26
Speaker 1: Where are they most likely to spot a brand new
13:28
Speaker 1: trail camera on a tree. Where are they most likely
13:33
Speaker 1: to bump into what they perceive as a concentration of danger?
13:38
Speaker 1: And then when is it most dangerous? Is it at
13:41
Speaker 1: midnight or twenty minutes before dark? What would most of
13:45
Speaker 1: the deer have to do to avoid that danger on
13:49
Speaker 1: any given day during the hunting season. Think about it,
13:53
Speaker 1: and now you know that, So what do you do
13:56
Speaker 1: like everyone else? Nope, nope, nope. It pays to hunt
14:02
Speaker 1: deer to get hunted for this very reason. You'll learn
14:06
Speaker 1: how tough they are and how they get to be
14:09
Speaker 1: so tough. Now, I'm not saying don't hunt in private
14:12
Speaker 1: land or don't go hunt where others don't or can't,
14:14
Speaker 1: because that would be stupid, and I don't want to
14:16
Speaker 1: sound any more stupid than I already do on any
14:18
Speaker 1: given day. I'm just saying it's a good idea to
14:22
Speaker 1: think about things from the dearest perspective and give credit
14:25
Speaker 1: where that credit is due, Just like I said a
14:28
Speaker 1: couple of weeks ago when I talked about how we
14:30
Speaker 1: almost always sell the act of shooting a dough so
14:33
Speaker 1: short because in some situations it can be incredibly easy.
14:37
Speaker 1: In others, though, it can be just as hard as
14:39
Speaker 1: killing them ature buck. That's because in some situations, those
14:44
Speaker 1: does in those bucks are subjected to real danger on
14:47
Speaker 1: a daily basis, or at least in a concentrated fashion,
14:52
Speaker 1: for like ninety days a year. That's a lot of
14:56
Speaker 1: looking out for yourself and enough close calls to really
15:01
Speaker 1: really leave a mark, and it's a great way to
15:03
Speaker 1: create the kind of deer that cannot only shrug off.
15:06
Speaker 1: I don't know, a non lethal hit from a rifle
15:08
Speaker 1: or a bow, but that will also structure the daylight
15:11
Speaker 1: hours of their life to stay away from those rifle
15:15
Speaker 1: toating and bow carrying threats. I honestly love that about them,
15:21
Speaker 1: well most of the time. I don't love it when
15:24
Speaker 1: I'm getting my ass kicked for weeks by the deer.
15:26
Speaker 1: And I know part of the reason they keep winning
15:28
Speaker 1: and I keep losing is because they've got a better
15:30
Speaker 1: plan to survive than I have a better plan to
15:33
Speaker 1: make them not survive. But that's good too. Those tough
15:37
Speaker 1: bucks and those doughs out there that are kicking my
15:39
Speaker 1: ass and maybe yours, they've earned it. They've dropped at
15:43
Speaker 1: the sound of a bow going off to only suffer
15:45
Speaker 1: a superficial wound to the backstraps versus a couple of
15:48
Speaker 1: deflated lungs. They've zigged and zagged at the right time
15:51
Speaker 1: as the orange clad drivers on the side of the
15:53
Speaker 1: bluff pushed their way through the brush and nearly sent
15:56
Speaker 1: them into the lapse of the posters who likely shot
15:59
Speaker 1: off hand with a spray and pray mentality that saved
16:02
Speaker 1: the deer and taught them some real important lessons. And
16:06
Speaker 1: I guess lastly I want to sign off with this.
16:09
Speaker 1: If you recognize how tough deer are, whether just by
16:12
Speaker 1: hunting and shooting enough of them or getting in on
16:14
Speaker 1: every butcher job you can, it really makes you appreciate
16:18
Speaker 1: shot selection and gear choice. I'm not going to get
16:22
Speaker 1: into that because I've covered it a lot, but when
16:24
Speaker 1: you respect an animal that doesn't die easy, it's a
16:28
Speaker 1: powerful motivator to do things right. Stack the odds in
16:31
Speaker 1: your favor, to practice the way you should tune your bow,
16:34
Speaker 1: choose the right arrows that don't have to be seven
16:37
Speaker 1: grains of bad cape buffalo medicine, but should fly real
16:41
Speaker 1: straight and deliver enough energy on target to take a
16:44
Speaker 1: questionable hit and make it lethal, or to go through
16:47
Speaker 1: the range and burn through an extra box of shells,
16:49
Speaker 1: even when those shells cost twice as much as they
16:52
Speaker 1: did I don't know two years ago, and you need
16:54
Speaker 1: nearly a master degree in navigating the dark web to
16:57
Speaker 1: find them. To do our part, I guess that is
17:02
Speaker 1: what I'm saying. It really drives that home when you
17:05
Speaker 1: start to understand how tough deer are and how hard
17:08
Speaker 1: they will fight to survive. Puts a little extra onus,
17:10
Speaker 1: on us to be better and to appreciate the times
17:13
Speaker 1: when it all comes together and we do our job
17:15
Speaker 1: and we watch those lights go out in five or
17:17
Speaker 1: ten seconds. The whole thing is pretty cool, and it's
17:21
Speaker 1: made possible by the white tails who are just made
17:23
Speaker 1: to live. That's it. Next week, I'm gonna have some
17:28
Speaker 1: fun on the show, and I'm gonna talk about always
17:31
Speaker 1: and never. I've touched on that topic a few times,
17:34
Speaker 1: but I've never done a deep dive into it. So
17:36
Speaker 1: that's what I'm gonna do, because always a net for
17:39
Speaker 1: beliefs really make us make some bad decisions out there
17:42
Speaker 1: in the field. That's it for this show, my white
17:48
Speaker 1: tail loving friends. I'm Tony Peterson and this has been
17:50
Speaker 1: the Wire to Hunt Foundations podcast, which has brought to
17:52
Speaker 1: you by First Light. As I always, thank you so
17:54
Speaker 1: much for your support. And if you think you need
17:56
Speaker 1: a little bit more of a white tail fix, feel
17:58
Speaker 1: free to check out my latest article on the medior
18:01
Speaker 1: dot Com slash Wire. If you read all those, don't
18:04
Speaker 1: fret because we dropped several new pieces each week from
18:06
Speaker 1: some of the best white tail hunters in the country.