Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 993: An Outdoor Year in Review with Janis and Mark

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Ep. 993: An Outdoor Year in Review with Janis and Mark · 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 1: Welcome to the.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Wired to Hunt Podcast. This week on the show, we're
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: doing a little fireside chat of sorts with myself and
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: Giannis pitel Us, reviewing our year in the outdoors, the
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: highs and the lows and the lessons learned. I'm looking
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: forward to twenty twenty six. All right, welcome back to
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: the Wired to Hunt podcast, and Merry Christmas. You are
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: listening to this on the day it airs. I guess
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: I don't know what to say. It's Christmas Day. I
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: hope you're spending most of the day with your friends
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: and family, but if you're spending a little bit of
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: time here with me, I certainly appreciate. And today we're
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: going to be sitting down, me and Giannis here in
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: a minute to reflect on twenty twenty five, to look
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: back on our year and all of our experiences outdoors,
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: the adventures, the hunts, the fishing trips, the other exploits
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: of so many different types and really talk about what
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: we did, why it was special, why it sticks with us,
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: maybe a little bit of how our criteria has changed
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: over the years as far as what's important to us
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: and what's not. And then we spend some time looking
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: forward into the new year and talking through some of
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: our plans and adventures and hopes for twenty twenty six.
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: And I share all this, and I'm sharing all of this,
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: this whole conversation with you today because I hope that
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: it can be a little bit of a thought trigger
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: for you, something that helps you do something like this yourself.
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: I've found that taking a little bit of time, especially
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: at this time of year, to look back on the
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: last twelve months is so help well.
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: It's so.
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: Rejuvenating and satisfying to just take a moment to appreciate
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: what we just experienced. It's so much of life is go, go, go,
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: go go. At least I'm guilty of rarely taking time
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: to enjoy the present, of rarely taking time to enjoy,
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: you know, all of the weeks and months and incredible
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: experiences and fun moments and laughs and trials and tribulations
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: even too all on the way. So what I try
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: to make time for during this Christmas break of sorts?
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: Is is some of that quiet some of that maybe
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: just on your own or maybe with your spouse or
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: a friend or a buddy or whatever might be. Just
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: talk about some of the stuff, or think about some
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: of the stuff, or write it down and talk through
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: what were the things that really went well? What were
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: some of the things that didn't go so well? How
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: do I wish I could have changed things? Or maybe
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: you know, what do I want to do different this
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: coming year? That is a useful and like I said,
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: it can be a really therapeutic exercise sometimes too. So
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: that's what me and Yanni did today. I kind of
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: have framed it in my mind like a fireside chat,
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: like I've imagined wishing that me and Giannis were hanging
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: out at my house, sitting by the fire, drinking a
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: coffee or a cold beer or something and reminiscing. And
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: so what we're gonna do is, actually, using the magic
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: of post production, we're going to add the sound of
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: a crackling fire, which let's cueue that fireplace right now.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: That sounds pretty nice. So from here on, how we're
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: gonna chat with that soothing sound of the cracking and
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: popping fireplace, and I hope you enjoy this relaxed conversation
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: with myself and my good pal Giannis Boutellus, as we
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: reflect on this past year in the outdoors, as we
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: look forward, and as we hopefully can be a part
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: of a really nice Christmas Day or Christmas break with
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: you and yours. I'm wishing you well. I appreciate you
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: being a part of this community, and here's to a
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: very happy holiday. Enjoy the chat, all right, Yannie. I
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: want you to imagine that you and I are sitting
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: in a nice cozy living room or I don't know,
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: den family room area of sorts with a fireplace, all right,
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: and imagine it's Christmas season, could be Christmas Day or
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: around that, and you and I have just gotten to
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: sit down. We've got a cup of coffee or tea
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: or eggnog or whatever, and finally have some quiet time
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: to catch up and look back on the year that
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: we just had. That is the stage that I'm setting
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: for our conversation today. And even right now you can't
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: hear it, Yanni, but there is actually a crackling fireplace
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: playing in the background. Right now, our listeners can hear
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: the beautiful fire popping and crackling as we as we chat.
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: Are you wearing an ELF outfit?
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: I should be wearing an Elf outfit. My kids are
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: wearing literal Santa themed clothing right now. Today was their
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: last day of school when we were recording this, so
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: so there's a lot of Christmas Eve stuff going on
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: around me. But I know you are too. You were
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: dressed up just recently, weren't you.
• 5:30
  Speaker 3: I was actually in an ELF outfit two evenings ago.
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: It didn't we're on the live tour right now when
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: we're recording this, and two nights ago, I think we
• 5:40
  Speaker 3: were in Birmingham, Alabama, and yeah, the joke just didn't
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: really hit. You know, no one even commented that there's
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: like a grown man in an ELF suit. You know.
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: Brent got the easy job of being Santa Claus, so
• 5:54
  Speaker 3: it didn't take a lot of imagination. But for me,
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: you know, I had to really go into character there,
• 5:59
  Speaker 3: and yeah, it didn't really hit. So steve veto the
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: outfits for last night. I think we're not going to
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: dress up tonight, but I just like to say, if
• 6:08
  Speaker 3: we're in this room, you know, I was joking about
• 6:11
  Speaker 3: the LF outfit. But I'm imagining you might have like
• 6:14
  Speaker 3: a white turtleneck with like a nice Christmas sweater on
• 6:18
  Speaker 3: with your eggnog.
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: I follow, I follow what you're getting at here. Speaking
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: of that, the white turtle neck makes me think of
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: Christmas Vacation, the movie, right. I just went to a
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: bar the other night that was completely themed on National
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: Lampoons Christmas Vacation. So everything was decked out in you know,
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: nineteen nineties Christmas decorations. All the TVs were playing the
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: Christmas Vacation movie. There was Wally's World mugs that you
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: could get with eggnog and other Christmas Vacation themed drinks.
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: It's highly recommend it. It was an an arbor Michigan.
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: It was a great Christmas spot to hang out. So
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: random aside, but we should go get a drink there
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: someday when you're in Michigan next time in Christmas time.
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we were at a bar actually with the Southern
• 7:10
  Speaker 3: Outdoorsman Boys when we were in Birmingham after the show
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: and they were playing a Scrooge or a what's the
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: actual story? A Christmas story I guess which it must
• 7:22
  Speaker 3: have been a funny version. There was no volume but
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: I was kind of like, man, there's so many other better,
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: funnier Christmas movies that people know, you know, the lines,
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: and it would be better. It just didn't seem fitting
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: for a bar atmosphere.
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: But how are you guys feeling about the live tour?
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: Otherwise it's going well, man. The crowds have been super energetic.
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: Everybody is telling some great stories I got telling you
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: before we started. You know, bus life it takes a
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: few hopefully not more than a few nights. But the
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: sleep on the bus, you know, it's not sleeping at home, right,
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: and so even though you're sleeping through the night, it's
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: kind of like sleeping in a tent where you sleep
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: all night, but at the same time you're sort of
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: aware of the night passing and so obviously you're not
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: in that just deep, deep sleep that really gets you.
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: Just refreshed the next day. So yeah, there's a little bit,
• 8:21
  Speaker 3: you know, a little bit of weight in the in
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: the eyelids, but otherwise, yeah, it's great. It's you know,
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: getting to meet the VIPs. They come through. So before
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: the main show, we have seventy five VIPs they come
• 8:35
  Speaker 3: through and we basically just do a meet and greet,
• 8:37
  Speaker 3: shake some hands, take pictures, and sign some stuff, and
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: just getting that feedback loop from them, you know, what
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: they're like in how we've affected whatever they're doing, and
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: just getting chat with them. It feels good, you know,
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: and it gives value to what we do.
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: So yeah, I've always felt like those those types of
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: events can be really exhausting, right, shaking hands and saying
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: hi to one hundred people or a thousand people or
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: whatever it ends up being, but it is also like
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: very energizing because to your point, it's it's good to
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: just see the people that are listening and watching our
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: stuff and hear how, like you said, here, what I
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: think and how it's impacting them, and that is nice.
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: So you've got an event tonight or tomorrow or when's
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: the next one?
• 9:28
  Speaker 3: Every night we're in Memphis, Tennessee tonight, then we are
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: in Ville, Arkansas, then Dallas, and we finish in Austin
• 9:42
  Speaker 3: and then we fly home on the twenty third, hopefully
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: with smooth you know, smooth skies and uh, you know,
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: no crazy Christmas travelers, no crazy weather.
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: That's a grind, that is a Whoever put that schedule
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: together right before Christmas is a little bit cruel, but
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: I'm glad you're doing it, not me.
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: Listen, I make sure I Yanni gets plenty of time
• 10:13
  Speaker 3: to hunt. So when we're done with this, you know,
• 10:15
  Speaker 3: we're gonna enjoy the holidays and then Mingus and I
• 10:17
  Speaker 3: are going to go on a roll and just be
• 10:20
  Speaker 3: pounding the mountains around Bozeman trying to catch some cats.
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: That'll be good. So that's a perfect segue the main
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: thing I want to talk about, which is, you know,
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: looking back on our outside years. So I don't know
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: if this is something that you can relate to it all,
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: but sometimes all I do is look forward. It's always
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: the next trip you've got to get ready for the
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: next project you're working on, or the next thing you've
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: got to do at home, and you never end up
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: actually looking back and really like appreciating and thinking about
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: all the cool stuff that happen, and at this time
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: of year especially, I try to make space to do that.
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: But it's the only way it happens if is if
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: I like actually set aside time to I don't know,
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: take Kylie out to dinner or something and tell her like, hey,
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: let's just reminisce. Let's talk about the year. What were
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: your favorite things? What did you think one? Well, what didn't?
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: So I kind of was curious about your take on that,
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: Like when you look back on the year, when you
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: think back on twenty twenty five in the context of
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: like your outdoor related activities, hunting and fishing and all
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: the other things you're doing out there, did it did
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: it live up to your expectations?
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: Oh? Yeah, Yeah, I had a great year.
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: How Like, what when you when I ask you that
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: question and you think that, they're like, why do you say?
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah? Why was that so such a fair answer?
• 11:46
  Speaker 3: We we had big plans, and I had big plans
• 11:49
  Speaker 3: kind of both personally. Uh And they actually were kind
• 11:53
  Speaker 3: of the personal hunting plans that I'll tell you about.
• 11:57
  Speaker 3: They came about sort of in a in just like
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: a happenstance manner, you know, kind of rushed like I
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: wasn't really planning him, and then sort of they just
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: came together. And what I'm talking about is my trip
• 12:11
  Speaker 3: to Manitoba for a spring bear hunt, which was very
• 12:14
  Speaker 3: last minute and the Alfre just was able to secure
• 12:18
  Speaker 3: another tag and get me in there and get me
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: in there late and was a great guy. Is a
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: great guy Craig McCarthy and his wife Melanie and North
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: Mountain Adventures and through that he at that time was
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: looking to expand his operation to northern Manitoba for some
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: caribou hunting, and he hadn't been up there yet and
• 12:41
  Speaker 3: he sort of was like thinking about an exploratory trip
• 12:44
  Speaker 3: for the fall. As soon as I heard that, I
• 12:47
  Speaker 3: was like, oh, sign me up, you know, like we
• 12:50
  Speaker 3: can maybe make this work. And so like, the more
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: I do this stuff. As much as I love my
• 12:59
  Speaker 3: wife Tael deer Hunt, I love turkey hunting, and I
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: love my Elkhunt, like I feel like I need some
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: level of like legit adventure, Like that's what really fuels me.
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: And it's like I love everything else I really do,
• 13:15
  Speaker 3: but that the adventure, the unknown part of the adventure.
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: I think unknown it's synonymous with adventure because I feel like, yeah,
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: if you know what's gonna happen, it's hard to really
• 13:26
  Speaker 3: have a good adventure. But when you have a thing
• 13:28
  Speaker 3: you're gonna go do it, there's a lot of unknowns.
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: You don't know how it's gonna happen, how what's gonna happen,
• 13:34
  Speaker 3: Like you're guaranteed a good adventure, and I feel like
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: the bear hunt it kind of went as expected, not
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: to adventure some but to then come back to Manitoba,
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: where I didn't even know they had caribou until I
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: was up there in May. And then come September, you know,
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: we fly up there and take whatever four or five
• 13:53
  Speaker 3: planes to get the northern Manitoba and had a very
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: Alaskan adventure in Manitoba, and uh, you know, landing on
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: a lake with tons of lake trout, tons of pike.
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: I mean, probably some of the best lake trout and
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: pike fishing I've ever experienced, you know, like every time
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: you put on a glassy evening, every time you pulled
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: into a new cove, like the first six casts were
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: guaranteed to have a top water bite from a pike.
• 14:24
  Speaker 3: I mean, just you know, it's pretty special, you know.
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: And then we as a family decided this was gonna
• 14:35
  Speaker 3: be the year that we were gonna go h take
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: the Renella's up on their invitation to their fish shack
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: in Alaska, and so we joined the Rannella family, the
• 14:44
  Speaker 3: Henderson family. Andy rad Julowski was there. Who am I missing?
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: Seth and his wife Kelsey. They have a cabin up
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: there too. Now they were there, I feel like there's oh,
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: Jammy Romero was in our group. Anyways, we did that
• 15:05
  Speaker 3: and you know, that might have not been such a
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: huge adventure for me, but for me to get to
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: to be able to share that place and those activities
• 15:15
  Speaker 3: with my family was awesome, you know, super stoked to
• 15:20
  Speaker 3: get them there. See how they dealt with the conditions.
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: You know, even on the best day. Alaska it's like
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: not that nice, right, Like it's always kind of wet,
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: kind of rainy, kind of cold. But we had a
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: great time. They thrived. They that water's like fifty five
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: degrees or something, maybe come pushing sixty. They swam every
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: single day in that water. Like yeah, they're just they're
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: like little otters. You know, there's water around, they're getting
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: in there. So that's how I can answer that so quickly,
• 15:55
  Speaker 3: is that just like right off the top of the head.
• 15:58
  Speaker 3: I can just like you know, come up with, like,
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: you know, a couple of three trips that were big
• 16:06
  Speaker 3: time fun and adventures, stuff I hadn't done and and
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: if I had done it, like it was, I got to,
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: like I said, with a fishing trip, got to share
• 16:15
  Speaker 3: that with my family and uh hi, oh, Stephen, Ranela, everybody,
• 16:22
  Speaker 3: Mark Canyon. We're doing a wire to Hunt podcast. Figure out. Okay, Yeah,
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: there's three of these rooms. You're welcome a shower in
• 16:31
  Speaker 3: there if you want. He must have been napping getting
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: situated for the day. Yeah, but he's got a good plan.
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: He stays on the bus. Everybody else comes into the
• 16:44
  Speaker 3: venue and starts sort of occupying the greening room and
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: all these you know rooms in the basement of a venue,
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: and then Steve ends up having the whole bus to himself.
• 16:53
  Speaker 3: It's quiet, it's comfortable, and he stays in there and works.
• 16:56
  Speaker 3: So it's a good plan.
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: Smart. Uh So what are the girls other than loving
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: to swim? What do the girls think about their first
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: That was their first Alaska experience, right.
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I know my oldest was there when
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: she was one year old, but yes, that was their
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: first real Alaska experience. Man, I wish they were here
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: to answer that question. They had a great time. I
• 17:22
  Speaker 3: think a lot of time for kids. It's like they
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: were there with their friends, right, and so that can
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: kind of make it or break it, right, Like who
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: you're with, you know what they're doing because they're not
• 17:37
  Speaker 3: necessarily remembering how great the fishing was or which a
• 17:44
  Speaker 3: lot of fishing, how great, you know, the one hike
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: that we did was how great the whale watching was.
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: Like they remember that interstitial stuff when they're just running
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: around on the beach with their friends, you know, finding
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: crazy stuff the rocks or going swimming or whatever, and
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: it's a it's a good group of kids and they
• 18:06
  Speaker 3: have a great time. So yeah, they never got down
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: like they thrived in that environment, which was great to see.
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: Like it wasn't hard for my kids to go, oh,
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: we just got to sleep on pads and like on
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: a wood floor in a damp cabin, and our clothes
• 18:24
  Speaker 3: are gonna be damp for a week, and we're gonna
• 18:27
  Speaker 3: be sort of like in a space a lot of
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: a small space and a lot of other people. You know,
• 18:33
  Speaker 3: showers are kind of limited, like you can get a
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: shower in, but it's really like every other, every third
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: day kind of thing. But they they thrived, you know,
• 18:42
  Speaker 3: and they I know. My oldest was actually awarded the
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: Coveted Cock of the cove Award, which is basically given
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: to the person that is just constantly Steve gives us
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: out this award, but it's given to the person that
• 18:59
  Speaker 3: when Steve at like pm, it's like, hey, there's a
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: little bit of daylight left. Let's go dig some holes
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: and bury some rocks to anchor down this new part
• 19:07
  Speaker 3: of the dog. And everybody else is like, oh my god,
• 19:11
  Speaker 3: I'm tired. I just want to drink another beer and
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: go to sleep. And I was like, oh go, And
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: then you know, she's like, well, then after that we
• 19:19
  Speaker 3: got to go shrimping, and I was like, oh yo.
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: And then anytime there was you know, we basically all
• 19:26
  Speaker 3: the kids had to do the dishes, and there was
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: fifteen people there, so there's a fair amount of dish
• 19:30
  Speaker 3: dishwashing to do, and d stepped up, washed a lot
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: of dishes and just really was a was a helping hand.
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: And so yeah, like I said, they thrived, you know,
• 19:45
  Speaker 3: and just yeah, just just had a great time. So yeah,
• 19:48
  Speaker 3: other than I don't know if I can give you
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: any more details, we would have to ask them, like
• 19:53
  Speaker 3: now that it's been you know, six months, asked them
• 19:56
  Speaker 3: what they thought about that trip.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, are your criteria different these days when you think about,
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: you know, what makes a trip great or a year great?
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: You know, I don't know what would your answer have
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: been different if I'd ask you this ten years ago
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: or fifteen years ago.
• 20:19
  Speaker 3: I'm sure it would have been. I'm sure that my
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: criteria different. I feel that like now I'm able to
• 20:29
  Speaker 3: just articulate it or I just know, you know what's
• 20:34
  Speaker 3: going to make a good trip for me, and I
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: know what I like to do, which is pretty much
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: hang out outside. You know, It's not like it's that complicated, right,
• 20:45
  Speaker 3: And I like to have that adventure sprinkled in. But
• 20:48
  Speaker 3: I also love my you know, fifteen days hanging out
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: in a tree saddle in Wisconsin and just sort of
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: meditating for that period of time, right, And again, we're
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: extremely lucky that it's not like we get one of
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: these adventures a year, right, Like I got to go
• 21:09
  Speaker 3: hunt and mountain mule deer on a backpack and hunt.
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: I got to go el cunting for I don't know,
• 21:16
  Speaker 3: I didn't hunt that many days because I killed a
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: bull early on in the season. But you know, I
• 21:25
  Speaker 3: think more and more, like I know it's planning twenty
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: twenty six. Like I'm very much taking the approach of
• 21:33
  Speaker 3: like asking my girls, like, Okay, what hunts do you
• 21:36
  Speaker 3: guys want to do what hunts are we definitely going
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: to do, and then making sure there's time set aside
• 21:42
  Speaker 3: for that and then all plan everything else around it.
• 21:46
  Speaker 3: As much as they want to hunt and do stuff,
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: I'll make it happen. They're probably good for like three
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: to four haunts a year, right. We have like a
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: big Turkey camp in the spring. That and then in
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: the fall we have the Montana Youth Hunt. There's a
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: Wisconsin deer camp, and then something else kind of sprinkled
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: in there. My girls are not like some of my
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: peers kids that are just ready to go shoot stuff
• 22:20
  Speaker 3: every day of the week, you know, no matter the season.
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: So yeah, as long as I have them taken care
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: of and like we're doing stuff together. I was telling
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: another we did a little short interview after the show
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: last night, and she asked me about I can't remember
• 22:37
  Speaker 3: how it came up, but anyways, it got me to
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: think about how without this hunting and fishing thing with
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: my kids, since I have two girls, I would spend
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: like a huge percentage less time with them, especially less
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: quality time with them than I do, like if they
• 22:56
  Speaker 3: were not into it. And it's something that I'm always
• 22:58
  Speaker 3: worried about. It's like my girls at any moment just
• 23:01
  Speaker 3: be like, you know, it's been fun, but like I'm
• 23:04
  Speaker 3: going in a different direction, right if there's a higher likelihood,
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: I feel like with two girls doing that than two boys.
• 23:13
  Speaker 3: And so yeah, I'm very I'm very grateful that we
• 23:17
  Speaker 3: do have those three or four trips every year where
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: we're spending that quality time. And no, it's even though
• 23:23
  Speaker 3: it's like doing things I like to do, it's still
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: that quality time that you get from being out the
• 23:30
  Speaker 3: outdoors because you know, you don't have the phones and
• 23:33
  Speaker 3: the screens and just the craziness of life around and
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: you know there's just time to talk and hang out
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: and get to know each other.
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel like if I didn't have hunting and
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: fishing with my dad, I don't know what our relationship
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: would be like. That's that's the main core thing we
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: have in common. That we can have shared time together
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: and something to to just just like a core thing
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: in common is so important. Yeah, it's huge, and I
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: do feel like for me now, my criteria has definitely
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: been shifting, right. I Mean for a lot of years
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: it was just how do I kill the most big
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: bucks and and now it's definitely shifting more to I'm
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: feeling that adventure bug again. I really I feel like
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: that need for something bigger and new and wild and
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: outside of the outside of the ordinary and different. But
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: then on the other hand, I also have the desire
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: to priority so prioritizing kind of two things on either
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: side of the spectrum. One is like the unique adventure,
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: something different outside the element, my usual element. And then
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: number two is is the core foundational family stuff like
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: more time with family and friends on those types of things,
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: you know, taking advantage of as much time as I
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: can with my dad at our family deer camp for
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: my kids and that kind of stuff. So I feel
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: like I'm trending towards you know what you described, which
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: is first, figure out how do we block in those
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: family trips, make sure those have got a spot on
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: the calendar, and then budget in the other stuff on
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: the on the on the gaps, I guess, because that's
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: I don't think. When I'm on my deathbed someday, I'm
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: gonna sit back and wonder, well, did I kill fifty
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: four big Bucks or fifty one or twenty eight or whatever.
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: It's gonna be. Well, the memories with the people you
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: care about, or some like really unique, special, outside of
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: the norm experiences. So trying to start prioritizing a little
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: bit of that personally, which it started pretty well this year.
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: Not just this year, but had some of those experiences
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: this year, which is pretty cool.
• 26:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think you did. I would say, Mond time
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: with your kids.
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: I'm lucky in that they are, you know, like your
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: daughters are. They're into it, they love it, they want
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: to be out there, you know. Like we went to
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: the Keys, the Floria Keys this spring, so this is
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: like one of my main highlights. We did a family
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: trip to the Keys and we had a little rental
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: place on the water. So we had a dock that
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: went out I don't know, fifty feet or a hundred
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: feet or something, and so every day, you know, my
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: oldest Everet, he would just want to go out there
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: to the end of the dock and just fish the
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: whole day. And then my youngest Colt, who's not as
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: into it as ever, but but some you know, he'd
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: kind of come back and forth. You go play in
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: the pool for a while, and then he go out
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: to the dock and fish for all then he go
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: playing the pool for a while and then back to
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: the dock. But they just want to be outside the
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: whole time. They want to be looking for fish, looking
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: for crabs, catching barracudahs and grunts and snappers. And there
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: was even tarpin out there, so I caught a tarpin
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: off the with the kids and everyone. So getting to
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: see all that, share all that with them was was
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: really cool. So so many of my favorite stories from
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: this past year are with them. We did our first
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: four night backpacking trip with the whole crew this summer
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: that was awesome. Did their highest elevation three day backpacking
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: up in the saw tooths that was really awesome. And
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: then a lot of hunts so I don't know if
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: I told you, I probably did, but Everett killed his
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: first turkey of this spring, so m hmm, yeah, that's
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: that stuff really really stands out. But then also, you know,
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: I went and got to do that trip with Kal
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: to the Arctic Refuge, which was like one of those
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: big adventures way outside of the norm, So that one
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: stands out too. Is just unbelievable just to see somewhere
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: like that finally, so and I'm finally it's like a
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: Barbell is kind of how I'm seeing my world now.
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: I want some on that far side of the spectrum
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: and some on the far other side at this phase
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: of life, for whatever that's worth. Do you do you
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: feel like any of this has shifted your white tail
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: kind of growing? I don't know if it's growing love
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: or if it's returning to that love. I mean, the
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: last like five years or so, you've been on this
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: expanding whitetail kick. How does all this fit into to
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: where you are there? On that?
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: Well? I had a it was fun. It was good.
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: I say that now that I'm removed by a month
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: but very humbling white tail season. Spent counting the days
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: with my daughter in a tree rifle hunting. I think
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: fifteen days, and certainly i'd say at fifteen, probably at
• 28:54
  Speaker 3: least ten, maybe eleven days were dawned to dusky switched tree,
• 29:00
  Speaker 3: so I was out of the tree for an hour midday,
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: but like put in some mega hours and came up
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: empty handed. And you know, I had I think I
• 29:14
  Speaker 3: sort of had in my mind like, oh, just like
• 29:17
  Speaker 3: persistence can be enough, you know, if I just like
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: go in and just pound, like I'm in a good
• 29:24
  Speaker 3: enough spot like I can sit on the funnels. It's
• 29:27
  Speaker 3: the rut, like something's gonna walk by me. They didn't,
• 29:32
  Speaker 3: and so it's sort of it's sort of like reset me,
• 29:34
  Speaker 3: and it's kind of reset my. I don't know it's
• 29:38
  Speaker 3: in the end. It's great because I love a challenge
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: and I'm still even though I've been doing it my
• 29:44
  Speaker 3: whole life, i still am, you know, at the more
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: of a beginner stage as a white tail hunter, and
• 29:51
  Speaker 3: uh that is great because it makes it fun. Like
• 29:55
  Speaker 3: I'm learning and I'm like, I'm sure at one point,
• 29:59
  Speaker 3: I think I've told you this before too. Like I
• 30:01
  Speaker 3: always feel like once I feel comfortable enough to like
• 30:04
  Speaker 3: take someone else out and be like, yeah, come with
• 30:07
  Speaker 3: me and I'll show you how to do this, and
• 30:08
  Speaker 3: we can probably get something done and sort of guide somebody.
• 30:12
  Speaker 3: Like I can do that with Elk, I can do
• 30:14
  Speaker 3: that with Turkey's white out deer. I did tell a
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: couple of guys where to sit this year in our
• 30:20
  Speaker 3: camp for rifles season, and they did kill, you know,
• 30:23
  Speaker 3: two nights to the nice cups that we killed, so
• 30:29
  Speaker 3: like that was validation. These are two spots that I've
• 30:32
  Speaker 3: sort of pioneered on the property sort of figured out.
• 30:36
  Speaker 3: We've sort of made them into permanent spots. You know,
• 30:39
  Speaker 3: one as this treat as a ladder stand. One just
• 30:42
  Speaker 3: has a kind of a natural log slash brush blind
• 30:47
  Speaker 3: and uh they both produced, right, So that was that
• 30:50
  Speaker 3: was super cool. But uh yeah, I mean I did
• 30:54
  Speaker 3: come away from it, even though I mean I did
• 30:56
  Speaker 3: get to spend I don't know, I think my daughter
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: hunted with me. I have a tree three four days.
• 31:01
  Speaker 3: I did come away with it.
• 31:03
  Speaker 4: Kind of thinking, like, man, fifteen days, and you know,
• 31:08
  Speaker 4: are all those days worth it to not be doing
• 31:11
  Speaker 4: something else, not be you know, hanging with my kids
• 31:14
  Speaker 4: or whatever.
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: And again I'm lucky that I'm doing it for work,
• 31:17
  Speaker 3: But I did come away with those thoughts. But I
• 31:22
  Speaker 3: don't know, like' like I said, I'm still new to it.
• 31:26
  Speaker 3: I'm having such a good time now, especially owning a
• 31:29
  Speaker 3: little bit of land doing all the you know, property management,
• 31:34
  Speaker 3: to see that already kind of come into fruition. I mean,
• 31:37
  Speaker 3: we had some bucks hanging there this past summer. They
• 31:42
  Speaker 3: hung out there really through hunting season. I mean, like
• 31:45
  Speaker 3: like they all do. They sort of disappeared here and
• 31:47
  Speaker 3: there for a week or two. But now the hunting
• 31:50
  Speaker 3: season's over. Two of them have come back and are like,
• 31:53
  Speaker 3: you know, regularly regularly on camera, and honestly, we haven't.
• 32:00
  Speaker 3: The fruits of the labor are like maybe ten percent
• 32:04
  Speaker 3: of what's gonna be there, and so that it's great
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: to see and gets me super excited for the future,
• 32:11
  Speaker 3: knowing like what we're planning and hopefully what's gonna happen.
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: Did you feel like you were able to get the
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: sense that, oh yeah, like stuff made a difference this year,
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: or is it? Or is it oh yeah, so yeah.
• 32:23
  Speaker 3: Oh yeah, no, like where we thinned. I mean, for
• 32:28
  Speaker 3: those of you that didn't listen to me talk about
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: our property in Wisconsin, I mean it's just square. It's
• 32:33
  Speaker 3: a forty acres square. The northern half is mostly a
• 32:38
  Speaker 3: oak dominated habitat and it was like the classic you know,
• 32:43
  Speaker 3: clost canopy. Southern half was white pine dominated. It had
• 32:48
  Speaker 3: been cut about thirty thirty five years ago and it
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: had never been thinned. So it's just this kind of
• 32:54
  Speaker 3: scraggly thick. I mean I went, like the deer moved
• 32:58
  Speaker 3: through it, but they never really hung out, like it
• 33:00
  Speaker 3: was kind of a desert, and we basically took out
• 33:04
  Speaker 3: every single pine out of the southern twenty and left
• 33:09
  Speaker 3: what was remaining for of these like you know, they're
• 33:11
  Speaker 3: only eight inches, Like there's two big oaks in there
• 33:14
  Speaker 3: that might be a foot at you know, breast height.
• 33:20
  Speaker 3: But just doing that cutting that and then letting you know,
• 33:25
  Speaker 3: letting sunlight hit the ground and then what came up
• 33:28
  Speaker 3: that has really made this like thick, you know, a
• 33:32
  Speaker 3: lot of cover, a lot of blowdowns. Like there's just
• 33:35
  Speaker 3: a ton of food in there. There's a ton of
• 33:37
  Speaker 3: bedding covers, so that the deer are definitely spending time there.
• 33:41
  Speaker 3: The northern half because we're doing this three year project
• 33:46
  Speaker 3: with the US Fish and Wildlife Service sort of creating
• 33:49
  Speaker 3: an oak savannah, So we cut ninety some percent of
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: the trees but left some really nice big oaks and
• 33:56
  Speaker 3: it's gonna be left that way now. And the oaks
• 33:58
  Speaker 3: are spread out basically where if one falls, it's not
• 34:01
  Speaker 3: gonna hit another oak. That kind of gives it paints
• 34:04
  Speaker 3: a picture of how you know, spotty these oak trees are.
• 34:08
  Speaker 3: You can definitely see across it now. Now there's because
• 34:11
  Speaker 3: we've been spraying herbicide. There was like nothing growing, so
• 34:14
  Speaker 3: the deer aren't using it. Like, again, they're passing through,
• 34:17
  Speaker 3: but they're not using it. But in three years when
• 34:20
  Speaker 3: there's four to six foot tall grasses and forbes all
• 34:23
  Speaker 3: through there, I mean, it's just gonna be great, great
• 34:27
  Speaker 3: habitat for all kinds of stuff. Right, So I would
• 34:30
  Speaker 3: say this year, yeah, we saw great results in kind
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: of twenty acres of it, but there's another twenty acres
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: that really the deer were just kind of like, yeah, whatever,
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: and that's gonna change and it's gonna be sweet.
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's gonna be exciting. I Uh, I feel like
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: that has been my favorite part of my habitat work
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: in the past, has just been the seeing the cause
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: and effect stuff. It's like doing a thing and then
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: that first time you see something that is that is
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: really truly because of the work you did, that is
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: super rewarding. Something you said a second ago made me
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: really curious about your perspective on a debate that sometimes
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: happens that you uniquely could give an answer to, which
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: is white tails versus mule deer mule deer hunters. I
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: feel like your typical mountain guy, uh might sometimes want
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: to put their you know, turn their nose up on
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: white tails and sale, white tails are easy, nothing compared
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: to hunt mule deer's mule deer. What's what's your take
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: which is more challenging mule deer hunting or whitetail hunting,
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: or how would you compare and contrast the tue given
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: the fact you've done both pretty seriously now.
• 35:47
  Speaker 3: It's it's apples and oranges. Sure, they're both deer, but
• 35:54
  Speaker 3: like man, and I'm sure there's some places, you know,
• 35:58
  Speaker 3: maybe eastern car Auto, Western Kansas, where they're kind of
• 36:03
  Speaker 3: doing the same thing, right, because they're both there. But
• 36:07
  Speaker 3: like where I hunt mule deer in the mountains, and
• 36:09
  Speaker 3: then compared to where I hunt white tail deer in
• 36:12
  Speaker 3: the deciduous forest of central Wisconsin, they're just so different,
• 36:18
  Speaker 3: and the habitats so different, the tactics are so different.
• 36:24
  Speaker 3: And I would say that right now it's way harder
• 36:27
  Speaker 3: for me to kill a mature buck in Wisconsin. But
• 36:31
  Speaker 3: I think that's more because the lack of experience. You know,
• 36:36
  Speaker 3: I know plenty of people, we both know plenty of
• 36:38
  Speaker 3: people that are very successful year after year with mature
• 36:42
  Speaker 3: whitetail bucks. And you know, I went on a five
• 36:48
  Speaker 3: or six day hunt this year in the mountains out
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: west and killed a nice mule deer buck. You know,
• 36:55
  Speaker 3: I haven't scored them yet, but it's a buck. I
• 36:57
  Speaker 3: think that, you know, most people would have a real
• 36:59
  Speaker 3: hard time pass right, but they're just so different. I
• 37:04
  Speaker 3: mean I feel like that mulier hunt required uh just
• 37:09
  Speaker 3: physical uh, you know, stamina and just being in shape.
• 37:14
  Speaker 3: I mean we really we carried you know, heavy backpacks,
• 37:18
  Speaker 3: you know, a couple thousand, three thousand feet up a mountain,
• 37:22
  Speaker 3: and we have to have the skills to be up
• 37:24
  Speaker 3: there camping and surviving and living and then hunting at
• 37:28
  Speaker 3: the same time. And it's great, but like I kind
• 37:33
  Speaker 3: of know what to do right, and it didn't happen
• 37:36
  Speaker 3: at the first spot we went to. We adjusted. It
• 37:39
  Speaker 3: was challenging. We were seeing too many people, you know,
• 37:42
  Speaker 3: spent a bunch of time looking at on X. I
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: had done some scouting in the summer, so I kind
• 37:47
  Speaker 3: of had some plan b's, but you know, went to
• 37:50
  Speaker 3: a plan B and it happened right with the white tails.
• 38:00
  Speaker 3: I don't know so much to talk about mark, uh,
• 38:03
  Speaker 3: Like I said earlier, like this just straight persistence, Like
• 38:09
  Speaker 3: I know how to apply that persistence on a mule
• 38:11
  Speaker 3: deer hunt of just like, Okay, you're just gonna have
• 38:14
  Speaker 3: to get up to glassing points and just pound the glass.
• 38:18
  Speaker 3: If you keep doing that, you're gonna turn up a buck.
• 38:20
  Speaker 3: And like that's what we did. And I sort of
• 38:23
  Speaker 3: thought I had that formula for white tail deer hunting
• 38:27
  Speaker 3: in the first half of November. Is like, you know
• 38:30
  Speaker 3: where the funnels are, the pinch points, like you just
• 38:33
  Speaker 3: put in the time and your three year older plus
• 38:37
  Speaker 3: is gonna eventually walk by. And I don't know what
• 38:40
  Speaker 3: it is. I mean, is it just coincidence that there
• 38:43
  Speaker 3: can be years where you just keep picking the wrong
• 38:46
  Speaker 3: spot and like they go by the the other pinch
• 38:49
  Speaker 3: point one hundred yards the other direction or whatever. Yeah,
• 38:54
  Speaker 3: it happens, you know, And we know you've interviewed guys
• 38:59
  Speaker 3: that you know, the seat equity guy, right, he's just
• 39:02
  Speaker 3: like kills big bucks up north. But he sits there
• 39:05
  Speaker 3: for days on end. I can't remember his name right now,
• 39:08
  Speaker 3: but days on end without seeing deer, and that's hard
• 39:12
  Speaker 3: to do, extremely hard to do. But he knows, right,
• 39:16
  Speaker 3: that's the formula, that's his tactic. He knows that eventually,
• 39:20
  Speaker 3: you know, the mature buck walks through there. So I
• 39:23
  Speaker 3: don't know. I sit squarely on the fence on this one.
• 39:30
  Speaker 3: I think there are lots of Western hunters, but there's
• 39:34
  Speaker 3: no way they can let alone do a full day,
• 39:37
  Speaker 3: ten to eleven hours sit in one tree. They could
• 39:41
  Speaker 3: do it for four hours until they're just like I
• 39:44
  Speaker 3: gotta go, I gotta move, you know, Like having that
• 39:47
  Speaker 3: patience and that mental discipline to sit there and just
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: put your time in. Is it sounds easy when you
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: just say it, everybody knows, like two days, three days
• 40:01
  Speaker 3: into it, all of a sudden the grind sets in.
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: You know.
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it is an underappreciated challenge by those who've never
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: done it, that's for sure. So was your big takeaway
• 40:14
  Speaker 2: from your white tail season the thing you led with,
• 40:18
  Speaker 2: which was that persistence isn't always enough?
• 40:20
  Speaker 3: Is that the big takeaway this year? Or did something
• 40:22
  Speaker 3: else as you look back?
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: Yet? Was there something else that you'll carry forward more
• 40:27
  Speaker 2: than anything else?
• 40:31
  Speaker 3: Man? I mean, honestly, I'm still digesting it, you know,
• 40:36
  Speaker 3: because it just it really was humbling to put in
• 40:38
  Speaker 3: that much effort and not be able to come away
• 40:42
  Speaker 3: with you like just like a better encounter of like, oh,
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: you know, I had him at thirty and he just
• 40:48
  Speaker 3: went behind the wrong tree or you know, you heard
• 40:51
  Speaker 3: me draw on my bow or something, but like I
• 40:53
  Speaker 3: didn't even get that close. Yeah, I don't know. Just
• 40:59
  Speaker 3: and again it's the rut right, Like there's just there's
• 41:02
  Speaker 3: nothing guaranteed of of the movement, and stuff's erratic. And
• 41:07
  Speaker 3: so it's got me thinking about, like, well, maybe I
• 41:10
  Speaker 3: need to try a different approach as as opposed because
• 41:12
  Speaker 3: the last five years it's just been like, well, I'm
• 41:14
  Speaker 3: gonna show up sometime between November one and November seven,
• 41:18
  Speaker 3: and I'm gonna stay for a week and that's gonna
• 41:21
  Speaker 3: that's like my program. And maybe it's time to you know,
• 41:25
  Speaker 3: sort of get out of my comfort zone of that.
• 41:27
  Speaker 3: Instead of relying on the rut, I rely more on
• 41:32
  Speaker 3: some scouting and and and patterning them and come and
• 41:36
  Speaker 3: hunt in September or early October and uh, you know,
• 41:41
  Speaker 3: try to find some feed locate or whatever it might be.
• 41:43
  Speaker 3: But so yeah, I don't know, I think. Yeah, the
• 41:47
  Speaker 3: other takeaway is, yeah, yeah, you're not as good of
• 41:49
  Speaker 3: a white tailed deer hunter as you thought you were,
• 41:52
  Speaker 3: and you got to put more effort in and understand
• 41:54
  Speaker 3: these deer better and uh and and figure it out.
• 41:59
  Speaker 2: I think something you said a minute or two ago, though,
• 42:03
  Speaker 2: is something that you should keep close to your close
• 42:06
  Speaker 2: to your heart in the coming eight, nine, ten months
• 42:09
  Speaker 2: to your next whitetail hunt, which is that sometimes you really,
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: truly can do everything right and it still just doesn't
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: happen because of the randomness of these critters and the
• 42:22
  Speaker 2: fact that if you're bouncing around, they could always be
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: at the other spot. So sometimes it's just not in
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: the cards, no matter how much time you put in.
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: So don't beat yourself up too much. Now, Yeah, what
• 42:35
  Speaker 2: about this? What was more mentally taxing your fifteen days
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: of close to all day sits in a tree stand
• 42:45
  Speaker 2: in Wisconsin or running your Hunter mile race?
• 42:53
  Speaker 3: Oh? Man, I mean fifteen days obviously a lot longer
• 42:59
  Speaker 3: than the thirty three hours it took me to run
• 43:02
  Speaker 3: one hundred miles. I think it was at times more
• 43:08
  Speaker 3: intense running one hundred miles where where you're just you
• 43:14
  Speaker 3: get to points where you know you just sort of
• 43:17
  Speaker 3: your brain's having a hard time wrapping around why it
• 43:19
  Speaker 3: can't make your legs actually run anymore. But yeah, even then,
• 43:28
  Speaker 3: it's like, I feel like it's easier because you're still
• 43:31
  Speaker 3: you're moving there's like a thing you can do to
• 43:35
  Speaker 3: have an immediate impact on the outcome, which is put
• 43:38
  Speaker 3: one foot in front of the other. And on a
• 43:41
  Speaker 3: white tail deer hunt, you don't have that at least
• 43:45
  Speaker 3: the way I hunt, right, Like, there is that there
• 43:48
  Speaker 3: is this other version that we you know, you've interviewed people.
• 43:52
  Speaker 3: I mean I think that you know Zach from the
• 43:54
  Speaker 3: Hunt in public is best known for it's like, well,
• 43:56
  Speaker 3: just go find the deer, don't sit in a tree
• 43:59
  Speaker 3: waiting for the walk by, Like, go find where that
• 44:01
  Speaker 3: buck is and try to kill him that way. And
• 44:05
  Speaker 3: maybe I need to take that approach. So I would.
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: As hard as that hunter miler was, I think it was,
• 44:13
  Speaker 3: it's still because I was. I was legit burned out
• 44:16
  Speaker 3: by the end of it, and I have a hard
• 44:19
  Speaker 3: time saying no, like even when. So what we do now,
• 44:22
  Speaker 3: it's a great tradition is we have Wisconsin Deer Camp
• 44:26
  Speaker 3: for the opener and on Tuesday we kind of have
• 44:29
  Speaker 3: a changeover the camp where like the deer hunting crew,
• 44:34
  Speaker 3: the camp leaves and my brother, my daughter, my dad
• 44:39
  Speaker 3: we stay and then my sister's family shows up, my
• 44:42
  Speaker 3: family shows up, my brother's wife shows up, my mom
• 44:46
  Speaker 3: shows up and then we do Thanksgiving there, and like
• 44:50
  Speaker 3: I basically get to continue to hunt. I'm not hunting
• 44:53
  Speaker 3: as much, but I'm still making I'm making like at
• 44:56
  Speaker 3: least a nice morning or nice evening hunt every day.
• 44:59
  Speaker 3: And I'm I have a kid with me, or you know,
• 45:02
  Speaker 3: my wife comes with me or whatever. But like I
• 45:06
  Speaker 3: have a hard time you know, having two Well yeah too,
• 45:11
  Speaker 3: I say, because I had an archy tag unfilled, but
• 45:14
  Speaker 3: you know, buck tag unfilled in my pocket and not
• 45:17
  Speaker 3: going out. It gets very hard for me to do.
• 45:20
  Speaker 3: Even though it's you know, you're whatever, twelve days in
• 45:23
  Speaker 3: and the family's there. I'm like, well, I'm getting up
• 45:26
  Speaker 3: tomorrow morning again at five, and I'm gonna go into
• 45:28
  Speaker 3: the woods because I just have to. I have to go. See.
• 45:35
  Speaker 3: So what was the actual question? I feel like I
• 45:37
  Speaker 3: rambled when you were.
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: Riffing on the challenge of all those days compared to
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: you know, yeah, the hunter miler.
• 45:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah. So at the end of it all, like as
• 45:50
  Speaker 3: Thanksgiving went came and went, and I was still you know,
• 45:54
  Speaker 3: getting out there, it was I definitely got to a
• 45:58
  Speaker 3: point where it was losing a little. It's luster big time,
• 46:03
  Speaker 3: you know, the grind had set in. I don't want
• 46:06
  Speaker 3: to say I was grumpy, but I was definitely just
• 46:09
  Speaker 3: kind of like, ah, what can I do? I need
• 46:13
  Speaker 3: to change something, you know. But again I'm like, well,
• 46:15
  Speaker 3: I'm just gonna be persistent and it'll happen, you know.
• 46:18
  Speaker 3: So it's tough till to swallow when you know it
• 46:20
  Speaker 3: gets dark on your last haunt, you know, and you
• 46:23
  Speaker 3: got to go home the next day. But it is
• 46:27
  Speaker 3: what it is, you know. It's not like you have
• 46:28
  Speaker 3: a bad time. It's like a you just gotta, you know,
• 46:31
  Speaker 3: eat your piece of humble pie and then go, oh. Right,
• 46:34
  Speaker 3: But I still got to hang out in the woods
• 46:36
  Speaker 3: for you know, fifteen days in Wisconsin. It was beautiful.
• 46:40
  Speaker 3: You know, it's great.
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: You're training for your Hunter mile race. Yeah, days and
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: days and days and days and days and days over
• 46:59
  Speaker 2: the course of a year, probably even more than that really,
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: but for a long time leading up to the big race,
• 47:05
  Speaker 2: you were training doing a hard thing for a long
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: period of time. For days on end right, you were
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: consistently having to get up early and go do the
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: thing you didn't maybe always want to do. Sometimes it's
• 47:17
  Speaker 2: freezing cold, sometimes it was raining. Sometimes you were just
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: really tired or sore or whatever, but you train yourself
• 47:24
  Speaker 2: to be able to do that. Then you did the
• 47:26
  Speaker 2: thing the one hundred miles, and you had to go
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: through that kind of in a microcosm all over again.
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: But instead it was over thirty three hours, non stop,
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: having to force yourself take one more step, go up
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: one more hill, et cetera.
• 47:41
  Speaker 3: Did that.
• 47:43
  Speaker 2: Mental grind over the months in any way help you
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: handle the fifteen day mental grind of white tail hunting? Like,
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: did you build a mental capacity through that physical challenge
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: and training for that physical challenge that translated to your
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: deer hunt or anything else?
• 48:04
  Speaker 3: I can't. I can't say that the two are really related.
• 48:06
  Speaker 3: I'd say more than anything, my capacity now for these
• 48:10
  Speaker 3: longer sits comes just from age. Like, I'm just much
• 48:15
  Speaker 3: more comfortable being happy because I think what is hard
• 48:21
  Speaker 3: about sitting for ten or eleven hours in one tree,
• 48:26
  Speaker 3: for especially people these days, with as fast as stuff
• 48:30
  Speaker 3: is happening, you know, and sort of the media that
• 48:32
  Speaker 3: we intake and just life in general, is that it's
• 48:36
  Speaker 3: the slowness of it, and it's it's literal boredom, and
• 48:39
  Speaker 3: are like, we're not used to being bored. It's not actually,
• 48:44
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's like a bad way to describe it,
• 48:45
  Speaker 3: but it is what it is. Yeah right, yeah, Like
• 48:48
  Speaker 3: there's it's boredom, and like I think, now it's easy
• 48:54
  Speaker 3: for me to go, oh, but it's not. And you
• 48:57
  Speaker 3: should appreciate the fact that you can enjoy this long
• 49:01
  Speaker 3: chunk of time that goes by so slow, and like,
• 49:06
  Speaker 3: I feel like I'm aging slower because when when I'm
• 49:10
  Speaker 3: at home with doing the kids and everything, it's just
• 49:12
  Speaker 3: like six months just go by and clips and just
• 49:16
  Speaker 3: fast and right, and you look and you're like, oh,
• 49:18
  Speaker 3: my kids oldest one is fourteen. That's insane. And then
• 49:22
  Speaker 3: you go, oh, right, I aged fourteen years too in
• 49:24
  Speaker 3: that time that is taken to get hurt, you know here,
• 49:28
  Speaker 3: And so like, I really appreciate how slow time moves
• 49:33
  Speaker 3: when you're sitting in a tree stand because I feel
• 49:36
  Speaker 3: like there's I don't know, I think the only other
• 49:39
  Speaker 3: thing you could do is like legit meditate or I
• 49:42
  Speaker 3: feel like when I'm doing a hard workout, like you're like, oh,
• 49:44
  Speaker 3: it's only an hour, but like when you're in the
• 49:46
  Speaker 3: grind of a hard workout of an hour, time seems
• 49:49
  Speaker 3: to slow down to But yeah, I just think that
• 49:56
  Speaker 3: it's just has come with age that I appreciate stuff
• 49:59
  Speaker 3: where it moves, what time's going slow.
• 50:05
  Speaker 2: So what do you think that means for next year?
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: Do you see yourself doing I mean, I guess you
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: said possibly some different time periods. Do you envision more
• 50:16
  Speaker 2: just in general time, like more white tail time next year,
• 50:19
  Speaker 2: less white tail time next year.
• 50:23
  Speaker 3: I think it'll be similar, And a lot of that
• 50:28
  Speaker 3: just comes with where with this geography, right, it just
• 50:32
  Speaker 3: doesn't make sense. Not that I couldn't hunt deer Montana,
• 50:36
  Speaker 3: but I really like hunting deer again in the deciduous
• 50:39
  Speaker 3: forest of the Midwest, and uh, but I like hunting
• 50:45
  Speaker 3: everything else, and so to put more time to it,
• 50:48
  Speaker 3: I just don't see that happening. Like, I'm just fine.
• 50:52
  Speaker 3: It's obviously gonna take me longer to get better only hunting,
• 50:55
  Speaker 3: you know, one to two weeks of white tails every season.
• 50:58
  Speaker 3: If I lived in Wiscon said full time, that would
• 51:01
  Speaker 3: be more of my like major thing, and the elk
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: hunting would only be a week out of the year, right,
• 51:08
  Speaker 3: But I live in elk country where we can go
• 51:10
  Speaker 3: after work, you know, we can go on the weekends
• 51:12
  Speaker 3: on a short on a short stint, but I do
• 51:16
  Speaker 3: have a for me. What's out of state true out
• 51:20
  Speaker 3: of state hunt planned. Brent Reeves and I are gonna
• 51:23
  Speaker 3: go hunt Kansas together. He's got a spot and hopefully
• 51:29
  Speaker 3: he's also. I have a bunch of points i'll draw,
• 51:31
  Speaker 3: hopefully he'll draw it too, and we are going to
• 51:34
  Speaker 3: uh co film each other. So Brent's gonna film me,
• 51:40
  Speaker 3: I'm gonna film him. The cameraman will be characters in
• 51:44
  Speaker 3: the episode. And I think we're gonna have a great
• 51:46
  Speaker 3: time and I'm looking forward to it. I've spent some
• 51:49
  Speaker 3: time with Brent, wonderful human. We're gonna laugh a lot.
• 51:54
  Speaker 3: At some point we're gonna disagree about how we're gonna hunt,
• 51:57
  Speaker 3: and uh that's gonna be fun too, So I'm looking
• 52:01
  Speaker 3: forward to that. You know, I've never hunted Kansas. It's
• 52:03
  Speaker 3: uh it's right up there with Iowa and the other
• 52:07
  Speaker 3: great white tail states. I'm looking forward to, you know,
• 52:10
  Speaker 3: seeing some new country that'll probably just like hunting elk
• 52:14
  Speaker 3: at different locations, or just like hunting anything other than
• 52:18
  Speaker 3: what your like primary species is like it makes you
• 52:21
  Speaker 3: a better hunter in some way. You know, it's not
• 52:25
  Speaker 3: always a parent, right, but I think going to hunt
• 52:28
  Speaker 3: Kansas will probably give me insight to how to hunt
• 52:32
  Speaker 3: my place in Wisconsin better, you know, and that'll be cool.
• 52:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's so true.
• 52:37
  Speaker 3: But yeah, if I if I had to guess, it'll
• 52:41
  Speaker 3: be roughly the same. I'm sure I'll do a week
• 52:43
  Speaker 3: in Wisconsin bow hunting, and I'll probably be there for
• 52:46
  Speaker 3: roughly a week for the rifle opener and Thanksgiving, and
• 52:50
  Speaker 3: then I'll have this Kansas home with Brent, So you know,
• 52:53
  Speaker 3: maybe maybe it will be a few extra days, but
• 52:56
  Speaker 3: pretty similar to this year. But yeah, nice, definitely looking
• 53:00
  Speaker 3: forward to it.
• 53:05
  Speaker 2: So you had a long couple weeks of white tail hunting.
• 53:08
  Speaker 2: You had an epic adventure in the Manitoba for caribou.
• 53:12
  Speaker 2: You showed everybody up in the Elk Woods by killing
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: a big bowl in like three hours or whatever it was.
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: You killed a mule there in five days. You went
• 53:21
  Speaker 2: to Alaska, you ran one hundred miles, You went on
• 53:27
  Speaker 2: I don't know how many days of mountain lion hunts,
• 53:29
  Speaker 2: but I'm sure you had a lot of fun doing
• 53:30
  Speaker 2: all that. Like you said, amazing year. But do you
• 53:35
  Speaker 2: have any regrets? Is there anything that you wish you
• 53:39
  Speaker 2: had had done in twenty five that you didn't or
• 53:42
  Speaker 2: that you wish you did differently, or anything like that.
• 53:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I should have put I should have put more
• 53:47
  Speaker 3: time into the construction of the apartment above my garage.
• 53:56
  Speaker 3: Is that is that your wife whispering that in your ear? No,
• 54:02
  Speaker 3: because the plan is to rent that thing, and you
• 54:07
  Speaker 3: can't rent it until it's done right. And so yes,
• 54:11
  Speaker 3: my my sort of like absurd passion for hanging out
• 54:17
  Speaker 3: in the woods gets in the way of construction projects
• 54:22
  Speaker 3: for sure. You know, I don't know if I have
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: any true regrets. I try to be living without them,
• 54:30
  Speaker 3: but there's always If there's anything I'm working on these days,
• 54:33
  Speaker 3: it's probably personal relationships. You know. You and I have
• 54:39
  Speaker 3: these conversations about having relationships with our dads, and obviously
• 54:43
  Speaker 3: now we have it with our kids. But just trying
• 54:47
  Speaker 3: to you know, do better at that, even do better,
• 54:50
  Speaker 3: you know, having the best relationship possible with my wife.
• 54:55
  Speaker 3: And I'm not regretting, you know, how the year went,
• 54:58
  Speaker 3: but I think that always like looking forward to being like,
• 55:02
  Speaker 3: oh I could do that a little bit better, you know,
• 55:04
  Speaker 3: spend more time with them, you know, be more open
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: whatever it is, try to have more real conversations, you
• 55:14
  Speaker 3: know with those people. Yeah, but yeah, I think hunting
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: and adventure wise, no real regrets. You You don't seem
• 55:29
  Speaker 3: like a guy that regrets more.
• 55:32
  Speaker 2: I mean, like you said, I try not to. I
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: feel like every year gets away from me, though I
• 55:40
  Speaker 2: always feel like it. You have these grand plans or
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: or even small plans, but important ones, and then they
• 55:49
  Speaker 2: tend to slip by. I always struggle with something you
• 55:52
  Speaker 2: mentioned there, which is like balance and personal relationships. Every year,
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: I think I'm gonna do better, and maybe I do
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: a little bit better, but I probably still miss the
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: mark on those on those things sometimes. So it's like
• 56:05
  Speaker 2: trying to balance these grand ambitions, these big plans, these adventures,
• 56:10
  Speaker 2: satiating all that, and then balancing that with you know,
• 56:14
  Speaker 2: the family stuff, the relationship stuff. I think I'm guilty
• 56:19
  Speaker 2: sometimes of saying, oh, I'll do that someday. I want
• 56:22
  Speaker 2: to do that someday. I want to take so and
• 56:24
  Speaker 2: so on that trip. Someday, We're going to do that someday.
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: But I don't want that someday to never get here.
• 56:32
  Speaker 2: That's something that I probably need to just make happen
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: sooner than later. You know, those types of things, But
• 56:43
  Speaker 2: but yeah, I guess I don't. I wouldn't say I
• 56:45
  Speaker 2: have major regrets either, just I am glad. You know,
• 56:48
  Speaker 2: this year I did not film as many things, which
• 56:52
  Speaker 2: opened my calendar up for more family hunts which were
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: really important, like family time, which was really good. So
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: I was glad I was able to do that.
• 57:00
  Speaker 3: So that was it.
• 57:01
  Speaker 2: Would have been a regret if I hadn't had that.
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: I'm glad that I did get that. And then this
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: coming year, I think I'm going to be filming more
• 57:10
  Speaker 2: this coming year with like a bunch of new things.
• 57:12
  Speaker 2: So I'm very excited about that because there's a bunch
• 57:14
  Speaker 2: of adventure and new stuff coming down the line for me.
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: But it's going to be how do you how do
• 57:19
  Speaker 2: you balance? That will be my challenge this year.
• 57:24
  Speaker 3: So I do feel like the more the more effort
• 57:28
  Speaker 3: I put into the home stuff and make sure that
• 57:31
  Speaker 3: everybody's happy there and you got those good relationships at home,
• 57:35
  Speaker 3: it's not only easier, but it just seems like the
• 57:39
  Speaker 3: universe sort of make sure you. It's like you're having
• 57:42
  Speaker 3: a better time on your adventures away when you know
• 57:46
  Speaker 3: that everybody at home is pretty stoked, you know.
• 57:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, very true. Well, being stoked is important, and I
• 57:54
  Speaker 2: want to make sure that you are stoked tonight on
• 57:56
  Speaker 2: your live show, Yanni. I want to make sure you've
• 57:58
  Speaker 2: got the energy necessary to perform on stage, so I
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: should let you get to the rest of your day.
• 58:05
  Speaker 2: I do appreciate you taking some pre uh live podcast
• 58:10
  Speaker 2: time to do a virtual podcast and catching up with
• 58:14
  Speaker 2: me on so O and stuff, so thank you.
• 58:15
  Speaker 3: You can't you can't call it a live podcast anymore though,
• 58:18
  Speaker 3: because we don't record them, we don't air them, so
• 58:20
  Speaker 3: it's really just a live show. Yeah, it was forebody
• 58:26
  Speaker 3: at home. It was. When we used to do that,
• 58:29
  Speaker 3: it was very difficult because every night you needed to
• 58:33
  Speaker 3: have one hundred percent new content because if you're just
• 58:37
  Speaker 3: listening from whatever city that we didn't go to, you're
• 58:42
  Speaker 3: gonna you don't want to listen to the same episode
• 58:44
  Speaker 3: six times in a row, even though we moved six cities.
• 58:47
  Speaker 3: So you'd have to make new content, new jokes, new
• 58:49
  Speaker 3: stories for every single night. And it, uh, it's a lot.
• 58:54
  Speaker 3: It's a lot. You know. That's why comedians have like
• 58:56
  Speaker 3: their their set and they repeat that set, you know,
• 59:00
  Speaker 3: and they refine that set, and it's kind of weird
• 59:05
  Speaker 3: that we're like in that space now, right, we're such
• 59:09
  Speaker 3: like amateurs. You know. Randall was making some hilarious jokes
• 59:12
  Speaker 3: last night about like, oh, you expect these guys that
• 59:15
  Speaker 3: like mostly hunt and fish, but now all of a sudden,
• 59:19
  Speaker 3: like you're gonna have them going a tour and they
• 59:21
  Speaker 3: got to get up on stage and like understand how
• 59:24
  Speaker 3: like you know, stage production works and do all that,
• 59:28
  Speaker 3: and yeah, we're just like like we're not professional you know,
• 59:35
  Speaker 3: actors or theater people or speakers or whatever. Right, but so.
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: Set properly low expectations if you're going to the shows.
• 59:44
  Speaker 2: Low expectations.
• 59:45
  Speaker 3: Please, No, Like I said, man, everybody's been having a
• 59:50
  Speaker 3: great time. We've been getting lots of laughs, and as
• 59:57
  Speaker 3: the week goes on, we're we're finding the shows. We're
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 3: finding the sequences and the stories and the jokes and
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 3: you know, dropping some things. But no, it's been good.
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 3: Everybody's been having a great time. Been giving out a
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 3: bunch of killer prizes and just you know, a bunch
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 3: of swagged everybody and everybody's you know, having a great time.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 3: So is there not? Is there not one? Unless you
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 3: really have to go. We've got a few minutes. We
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 3: didn't even make it an hour.
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 2: We can keep talking if you want as much, as
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 2: much as you like.
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 3: You forced me to reflect on twenty twenty five, but
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 3: it's so much more fun talk about what we're going
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 3: to do in twenty twenty six, right, true, true? So
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 3: what's your big adventure? What's the big adventure for me
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 3: twenty twenty six. Yeah, I've got.
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 2: A bunch of them, Nie, I've got some wild ones coming.
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 3: So you're trying to move out west. That's a pretty
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 3: big adventure.
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 2: Well that's possibility, ye know, Yep, that's a big one.
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 2: Another one is I'm working on this, you know, I
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: don't know what we're calling them, but short a film
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 2: or an episode or something that is exploring the reality
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: and all the controversy around wolves in America. And so
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: I'm going to go And I spent about part of
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: a week in October searching for wolves, learning about wolves,
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: spending time out there around them, bound some watch some
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 2: from afar. We're going back in January for a full
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 2: week in the winter, camped out in the back country
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 2: with wolves, trying to follow them and observe everything they
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 2: do for a week. So that's going to be a
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 2: pretty cool adventure. Then sometime in the spring, I am
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 2: doing a excursion following buffalo in an undisclosed location and
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: it looks like a buffalo hunt as well. So studying
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 2: what buffalo do in the world wild, how they impact
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: the ecosystem, how they used to, what they're doing, where
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 2: they've come back, and then yeah, getting to to do
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 2: a buffalo hunt that's seemingly pretty close to for sure happening.
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 2: We're working on a Arctic caribou trip of sorts one
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 2: there's one possibility that might be a hunt in the fall.
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 2: There's another excursion for another show I'm working on that
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 2: might be seeking out and following one of these Cariboo
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 2: caribou herds during their calving event and observing what that's
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 2: like and documenting you know, when two hundred thousand caribou
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 2: all of a sudden give birth all in one place,
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 2: then the predators swarming in to try to take advantage
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 2: of that, and the whole ripple effect of all that.
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 2: So trying to find and document that that's something that
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 2: might be happening in June ish. So those are a couple.
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 2: There's a few others that are like on the table
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 2: I told you about my prong Horn idea, right, have
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 2: we talked about the prong Horn trip?
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 3: Oh? I don't think so.
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 2: So another one of these trips that that hopefully will
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 2: be approved for another project, will be following a pronghorn
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: migration on foot for more than one hundred miles and
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 2: following them and backpacking along the way and documenting everything
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: they have to go through to get from their summer
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 2: range to their winter range and all the challenges along
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 2: the way, and kind of explore wildlife migrations and and
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 2: what's going on with that these days. So one hundred
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 2: mile ish backpacking trip across some wild places would be
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 2: a pretty cool adventure in October next year. So yeah,
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 2: those are some that are up there.
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 3: So what about what about the what about the boys?
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 3: What's like the big hunt with the boys?
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 2: So the big stuff with the boys would be the standards.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 2: They're not the point where I can go on like
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 2: a out of state adventure thing with them, you know,
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 2: for a hunt. So we're gonna do spring turkey hunt again,
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 2: which the kids love. We do a lot of like
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 2: fake turkey hunts, so like before the season, we just
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 2: go out and try to call birds in just for
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 2: like experience, and the kids get love hearing Turkey's gobble
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 2: and just love being in the woods. And then once
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 2: the season begins, then they're coming along for a bunch
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 2: of hunts. And Everett, now, you know, like I said,
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 2: he got his first bird last spring, so he has
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 2: a tag and he'll be going after one again. And
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 2: then I'll have my dad out and he'll have a tag,
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 2: and then I'll have one too, So we'll do that
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 2: and then just come you know fall, just hopefully have
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 2: a lot of white tail season dedicated to just being
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 2: out there with them. Some of my best spots have
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 2: gone down in quality in the last couple of years.
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 2: There's been like a ton of increased hunting pressure around
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 2: some of my core places. The age class has just
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 2: been crushed and and so that's that's a bummer in
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 2: a lot of ways. But the upside is that because
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: there's no mature bucks to hunt, I don't feel the
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 2: pressure to like treat them with like white you know,
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 2: white slat satin gloves or whatever whatever the saying is.
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 2: So I don't feel so guilty about like taking the
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 2: kids out and shooting a bunch of dose or you know, shooting,
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 2: you know whatever, because there's not some big old buck
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 2: that I'm worried about messing up.
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 3: So that's what you won't feel so bad when you
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 3: take them out squirrel hunting, is they're not gonna mess
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 3: up the home range or kick out your big bucks.
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 3: But you need to be doing mark.
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 2: You're right, You're right. I need to do that. I
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 2: know my boys would love it. They they call it squirreling,
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 2: so like, hey, can we go squirreling? So like up
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 2: at our deer camp, they'll just walk around with a
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: baby gun, like, oh, we're gonna go squirreling.
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 3: We're on squirreling.
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 2: So those kind of roam search something out. But I
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 2: have not done what you telling me to do, which
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 2: is explicitly have a planned quality squirrel hunt. So I'll
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 2: put that on the itinerary. They do a ton in
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 2: the summer, not squirrel hunting, but back I just jumped
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 2: in my mind back to like the adventure thing with
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 2: the kids. As you know, you know, our summer ends
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 2: up being like a really good adventure time with the kids.
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 2: So we do want to kind of expand what we've
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 2: done on those like back country trips. We've every year
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: done a little bit more so this past year. Like
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 2: I said, we did a four day for the first time,
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 2: and they claim they're ready for a full week, so
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 2: we might we might try to do that.
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, we missed out on ba We missed out
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 3: on backpacking this year because of the other trips, which
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 3: is this is fine, but it's definitely on the dock
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 3: again for this summer. They're still both in the space
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 3: of like they're sort of like when we start, you know,
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 3: and planning up to it, but as soon as we're
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 3: you know, down the trail a couple of miles or
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 3: in camp the first night, everybody's pretty pumped to be there,
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 3: you know.
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, maybe I can convince you and your family
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 2: to take a couple six and eight year olds with
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 2: you guys and us, the whole crew. We should do
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 2: a shared backpacking trip one of these days.
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah, No, that'd be fun. That'd be fun. Oh, my girls,
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 3: your boys are young enough where they sort of like
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 3: I think they had that like almost like a motherly
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 3: or babysitter sort of like attitude towards your boys. If
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 3: they were any older and more peer like, they wouldn't
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 3: be interested, you know. But No, that would be fun.
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 2: They thoroughly have enjoyed their past visits, so maybe we
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 2: can do that.
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 3: Yeah, for sure. Anything else in your twenty six schedule, Man,
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 3: I don't have any great adventures planned. I've been trying
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 3: to draw a tat of an Elk archery Elk to
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 3: Ba and Wyoming for I think this will be the
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 3: third year. I guess point creep keeps getting me, but
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 3: I feel like I just, you know, judging by the numbers,
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 3: I really should have it this year. And there's actually
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 3: some running races in these same mountains, and so I
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 3: think if I think I'll know early enough that if
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 3: I draw the tag and I could also sign up
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 3: to run like a big race in the same mountain
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 3: range and maybe somehow work that into the story. It
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 3: could be pretty fun do a little scouting while I'm
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 3: doing a big, big race.
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 2: That's really cool.
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 3: But yeah, that's about the only uh like really big
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 3: hunt I've got like a three two to three year
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 3: plant going. I would like to do. A dream mind
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 3: would be to go on a Alaskan sheep hunt or
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 3: a Canadian sheep hunt for doll and I think that
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 3: to make it, to make it something just more valuable
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 3: to me, Like I want to go and I want
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 3: to go and hunt with someone that's just got an
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 3: immense amount of knowledge about the sheep right and that
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 3: has a lot of time on the mountain and they
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 3: can speak to you know why those animals just really
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 3: this captivate people so much. And I think I found
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 3: the guy and I'm hoping that he's gonna he's older,
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 3: as you'd imagine, because that's who you want to talk to,
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 3: an old guy that's got a lot of years in practice.
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 3: But as sometimes happens, you know, you can catch people
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 3: at the tail end and it can be too late, right,
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 3: like they're like, no, I'm I'm retired, Like I can't
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 3: do it anymore. But I think this guy's got got
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 3: it in him to both do that. So I'm not
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 3: even gonna mention his name, but I'm working on a
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 3: two to three year plan and it really would like
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 3: to do just like a solid bio piece, you know,
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 3: through the lends of a sheep hunt, but to really
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 3: do a biopiece on this person, but also on like
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 3: what makes this person you know, really want to dedicate
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 3: their life, you know, to be a being a sheep
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 3: hunting guide. And so if I can get all that
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 3: those like ducks in a row and make that happen
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 3: in a couple of three years, it'd be pretty sweet.
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 5: That sounds cool, make for some good looking forward to
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 5: that one. Yeah, great, great, great story, great adventure. All right, Johnnie,
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 5: I'm really gonna let you go this time. Good luck
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 5: tonight with this show, have fun.
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 3: Thanks for having me on.
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 2: I don't talk before Christmas. Officially, Merry Christmas.
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 3: Merry Christmas to you, Happy New Year, tell the boys
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 3: and Kylie, I said hello, and yeah, we'll do it again.
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 2: Right back at you, all right, and that's gonna do
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 2: it today. Merry Christmas, Happy holidays, have a wonderful kickoff
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 2: to your new year, which will be starting here any
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 2: day now. And as I mentioned at the top and
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 2: during me and Yansa's chat, I'd encourage you to do
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 2: a little bit of this yourself. Do some reflecting, do
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 2: some reminiscing, try to appreciate the good times, learn from
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 2: the tough times, and let's all move forward in twenty
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 2: twenty six with big dreams, high hopes, and lots of
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 2: good stuff on the to do list. So until then,
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 2: thank you, and stay wired to hunt,