Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 333: DIY Gear and Bowhunting with Garrett Prahl

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Ep. 333: DIY Gear and Bowhunting with Garrett Prahl · Wired To Hunt Podcast

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your home for
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host,
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: your host, Mark Kenyan, and this is episode number three
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: thirty three and than the show, I'm joined by the
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: d I Y Sportsman himself, Garrett Prawl, to examine his
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: ultra light mobile hunting style and the fascinating approach he
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: takes to testing and modifying his gear to perfectly fit
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: his hunts. All right, welcome to the Wired Hunt podcast,
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: brought to you by on x TAN. The show, like
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: I just mentioned, we've got Garrett Prawl and if you
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: know of Garrett, it's likely because of his popular YouTube
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: channel or podcast, both under the name of d I
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: Y Sportsman. And what I think makes Garrett's approach and
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: his content so unique is this the seemingly endless tinkering
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: and modifying and fine tuning that's applied to almost every
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: aspect of his hunting gear and his hunting process. You
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: can just see this engineering background shine through everything is doing,
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: whether it's talking about climbing stick modifications or choosing the
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: right place to hunt on any given day. And I
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: just love this, this analytical and and experimental approach to things,
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: even though at times, maybe especially with gear, I'm not
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: very good at that, but I'm I'm always wanting to
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: try and get better at those kinds of things. So
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: that's what we're talking about today. First, it's a thorough
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: examination of Garrett's mobile hunting style and how he approaches
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: scouting and hunting on the fly, and how he adjust
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: to change the conditions or hot deer sign, how he
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: knows when to hunt somewhere and when he knows to
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: keep searching for something better, and a whole lot more
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: on that from very interesting stuff. And then secondly, we
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: spend a lot of time talking about the gear that
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: help helps him with this ultra light mobile hunting style.
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: So we're getting into the nitty gritty details on his
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: climbing system, you know, climbing sticks, his saddle hunting gear,
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: how he modifies sticks and tree stands and lineman's belts
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: and all sorts of really in the weeds gear tricks
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: and tips that have made him a more stealthy, speedy,
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: and efficient hunter, which, at least from my perspective, I
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: think is really helpful stuff. I gotta believe you guys
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: are gonna enjoy it too. So it's a chat I
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: really enjoyed. I think you will enjoy it as well.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: And I'm excited for that one. But before we get
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: into the main event, UM, I do not have my
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: buddy Dan Johnson with me here today, so it's just me.
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: But I do want to tell you a story because
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: I've got an exciting update. If you follow me over
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: on Instagram or Facebook or Twitter, you likely know about this,
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: but I thought he'd shared the story anyways. Um, yesterday,
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: my wife was feeling very, very very pregnant. Right, she's
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: almost well, she is pretty much ready to have baby.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: Let's just put that out there. She's thirty nine and
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: a half weeks very uh eager for this thing to happen,
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: as am I, and so yester, she's let's go for
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: a walk. She's been pacing around the house all more thing,
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: just walking circles because that's the only thing that makes
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: her feel half decent. So she said, let's go for
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: a walk. And I think it was me, might have
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: been her um who said, well, let's just go walk
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: in that cornfield up by the road at this property.
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: Hunt It's it's nearby, it's easy to get to and um,
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: just we could just roam around wherever we could take
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: the dogs. So my wife, who's very pregnant, my two dogs,
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: and my two year old son and I head outside,
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: head out to this spot and just start walking. And
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: we just get into the corn field, and my son
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: doesn't want to walk in the snow. He's for whatever reason,
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: just the texture of the snow or the depth or something,
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: he wasn't comfortable. Um So he's just standing there, refusing
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: to walk, refusing to walk. So I go walking like
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: ten yards up and turn around and tell him to
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: come follow me, and he won't do it. So I
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: go back to him, I pick him up, and I
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: start walking again. And and because of where I had
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: to go to pick him up, I'm now a couple
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: of rows down in the corn then I would have
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: started otherwise. And I just barely start walking. I mean
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: I'm ten yards in fifteen yards and something like that.
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: And in my mind I kind of thought, oh, man,
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: I better just keep an eye out just in case
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: he happened to seeing antler out here. But I'm right
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: off the road, right by a house, and lo and behold,
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: there's an antler, like right there, and I look five
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: yards further on and there's another antler right there. There's
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: a match that right in front of me, just as
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: we start walking with my whole dang family right there.
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: I mean, it was crazy. I'm you know, I can't
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: believe that I'm yelling at my wife. Oh my god,
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: there's antlers right there. Get every We gotta show him
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: the antlers. And we go up to him, and Kylie
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: sets ever down in front of the antlers and she
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: picks one up, and then I get to see the angler.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: I let them pick it up first, and as she
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: picks it up, I see the G two's on it.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: And it was one of those holy crap moments. That's
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: trans antler. That is the antler from the buck that
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: I watched all two thousand eighteen, passing on him because
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: I wanted to see him in two thousand nineteen and
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: then two nineteen is you guys probably know if you
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: listen to this podcast, you know that I was hunting
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: him obsessively all two thousand nineteen. Had these close calls,
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: you know, almost had a shot and basically had a
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: shot but passed on it because I didn't feel comfortable
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: with um, the angle he was at and the possibility
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: of limbs getting the way, So I had all these
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: close calls. I saw him on the very last day
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: of the season. He's the one and his antlers both
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: sides are right here, right off the road in front
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: of me on this walk with my family. I mean,
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: it was nuts. I freaked out, very very excited. These
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: are the antlers I was dying to get my hands
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: on this year. I was gonna spend a ton of
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: time shed hunting trying to find him. And loan, behold,
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: we stumble on him, and the most unlikely fashion of
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: all time. I mean, the luckiest thing maybe that's ever
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: happened to me as far as deer hunting related things.
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: I just couldn't believe it. Shocking, very exciting. Um, But
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: what's interesting is what happened the rest of the day.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: So we we get the antlers and then we go
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: home a little bit later. And at first, when my
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: son got the antler and we saw the antlers outside
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: in the corn field, he just wasn't feeling He was
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: kind of sour. He just wasn't happy about the whole
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: walking in the deep snow. So we go back to
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: the house, get inside. I give him the antlers then
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: and then he freaks out. He's really excited about the antlers.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: He's trying to say the word antler. It kind of
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: comes to ira, but he's running around with the antlers.
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: He's put him on his head like he's a deer.
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: He's pointing at the deer mounts up on the wall,
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: pointing at the antler's pointing at his antler's pointing. The
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: antler's pointing his handlers. He's rattling him. He goes to
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: our shed pile and makes me grab some other sheds
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: and I have to rattle while he rattles. I mean,
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: he was having just a blast. Fast forward a little
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: bit and later in the day. Now it's in the
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: evening and he looks out the window. It's about dinner time,
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: and he starts yelling Dad, Dad, da, and I look
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: out there and he sees deer out in the field,
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: and with the snow over the fields, the deer really pop.
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: And that's something he's never done before. He's never actually
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: spotted deer before me. So he spots the deer, starts
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: yelling at this dead, dead deer, and I have to
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: go over there and watch the deer with him. And
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: then we go look at the front out the front
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: of the house and there's deer in the front field
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: across the road. So we're running from window to window.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: He's yelling about the deer. We've got a grab binoculars.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: He makes me grab mine. He's got his little toy binoculars.
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: We're watching him. Then we got to go to his
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: room and look out his window and see if there's
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: deer out there. That was a blast. And then he
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: goes and grabs the grunt tube and his rattling bag.
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: He gives me the rattling bag, he takes the grunt
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: of he starts grunting bra He looks at me and
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: then makes me rattle. Um. Just hilarious. So that was great.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: And then maybe I know, we eat dinner, We get
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: done with dinner, and then he starts bugling. He loves
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: watching ELK videos, so he's got this really high pitched
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: kind of mouth bugle whistle he can kind of do.
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: He he'll do that. When he does that, it means
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: he wants to watch some el cutting videos. So you know,
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: I'm thoroughly enjoying all of his excitement today. So I
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: decided to throw on a YouTube video that just shows
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: bugling bulls, just to kind of a reel of all
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: these different bulls somewhere the song record all this different
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: video footage out in the Rockies are somewhere. So we
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: pull that on and then I go grab my bugle tube.
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: I've never done this before, but I just for some reason,
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: I got the idea that I bet you he could
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: have a good time with the bugle tubes. So I
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: give him the bugle tube. He watches the Elk on
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: the YouTube and then he starts mimicking it with the
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: bugle And I'm not shipping you, guys, he is good
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: like he now he's not using the read he's just
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: making the sound of his voice and amplifying it with
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: the tube. But I mean, he was nailing it. He
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: was even getting some growl in the front and the
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: back end. He's got the rising tone and then then
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: drop off at the end. You know, he would listen
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: to one and then try to mimic it. He listened
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: to one and try to mimic it, and it was
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: just the coolest thing seeing him there doing it. And
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: he would even you know, when guys bugle and he's
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: probably seeing this in the hunting video, that's what he's
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: duplicating it. But they often start with a bugle tube
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: pointed low and then rise, rise, or lift the tube
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: up high. Towards the end of the note, he was
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: even doing that. It was crazy. Um. So we just
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: had a ball, just an absolute ball. And I'm laying
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: in bed last night, getting ready to, you know, shut
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: it down, and I'm thinking back on the day. You know,
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: I found these antlers from the deer that I've obsessed
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: over for the last two years. It was my number
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: one goal for the next couple of months, and there
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: they were, and I got the match set. Um, that's incredible.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: And then I'm thinking about all the other things that happened,
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: like the fact that I did that with my son
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: and with my wife, and then playing with the antlers afterwards,
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: and then grunting at the bucks outside and watching them
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: with our binoculars and then bugling like an elk, and
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: all these things, and I realized, Man, the best things
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: about that whole day didn't have to do with finding
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: those antlers at all, and it was just It's a
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: small thing, but it was just one of those moments
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: where I was reminded of what's really important. And it's
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: easy with how much we love this stuff, how much
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: we love deer and hunting and whatever outdoor pursuits were into,
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: it's easy to get wrapped up in that. It's easy
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: to get obsessed with the goal, with the thing, with
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: the pursuit. And I am as guilty as anyone you
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: guys know it. I really get after the stuff. Um,
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: But days like yesterday just remind you to take a
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: step back and make sure your perspectives right, especially man,
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: after everything they happened this Sunday with the passing of
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: of Kobe, you know, just an iconic figure like that
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: that I know some so many people were influenced by
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: and grew up with. Um, him being with his daughter,
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: that just breaks your heart and it makes you think,
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: as a dad, um, just to kiss your kids, hug
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: your wife or your husband or your family members, and
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: just remember what's really most important. So with that said,
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: we do need to talk to deer hunting, So let's
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: get right into it and talk to Garrett Prawl Before that, though,
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: quick break here and the we're not going to thank
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: a partner here this week. I'm actually going to just
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: thank you, guys. I want to give a thank you
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: to the entire wire to Hunt audience for your support
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: with my book, That Wild Country. The support, the just
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: the uprising of folks talking about the book, sharing the book,
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: buying the book. It's been incredible. I can't tell you
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: how much I appreciate it. It's been a huge success
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: because of you guys, So thank you for that. If
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: you haven't yet picked up a copy, certainly would encourage
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: you to do so. Um check out the reviews on
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: Amazon to see what the real people think about the book.
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: I've just been so pleasantly surprised and honored and humbled
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: to hear the people are really enjoying it, finding it
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: really informational but also a lot of fun. Man. That
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: is the coolest thing to see people enjoying that. So
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: thanks in advance, and if you did pick up a copy,
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: I thank you for that. But also if you haven't
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: left a review on Amazon, it would be amazing if
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: you could do that. There's a couple of folks in
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: there that I don't like the fact that Hunt or
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: leave a couple of nasty comments like that, so we
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: gotta make sure there's some other good reviews out there too, um,
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: which fortunately of them are which super appreciative, So head
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: on over leave a review and thank you in advance
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: for all of your support there. All right with me
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: now on the line is Garrett Praul. Welcome to the show. Garrett,
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: thanks for having me on. Mark. Yeah, I'm glad we're
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: getting the chat. As we just mentioned before I started recording,
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: I saw you at the bar at a t A.
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: And I think I was standing next to Dan Johnson,
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: and you know how he is. He's big and loud
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: and you won't get to get past him, so I
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: couldn't reach over and grabbing and chat with you. So
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: I'm glad we're finally getting able to chat tonight because
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: I've been following your work from AFAR and enjoying what
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: you're putting out there to the world. So glad you
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: can be here to night. Man. Absolutely appreciate it. So
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: tell me this. I kind of want to just jump
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: right into it. I want to know, how did you
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: become the d I y sportsman? Why is that how
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: you define yourself? You know, I think it just kind
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: of it morphed into that over time. I've always been
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: the kind of guy who tinkers around with a lot
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: of stuff, um, you know, build stuff in the garage,
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: never really um did anything in terms of like guided
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: hunts or anything like that. Everything that we did growing
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: up was always, you know, for the most part of
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: public land kind of you know, figure stuff out as
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: you go. So when I started to make content, eventually
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: it kind of morphed into you know that everything kind
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: of fitting that d I Y category in some way
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: or another, whether it was from that hunting aspect or
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: if it was actually building my own gear. Um, and
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: it just kind of kept on going from there. What
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: was when did that facet of its start the whole
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: gear side. Were you doing that even as a as
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: a kid. Were you the kid that was obsessed with
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: legos and connects and all that stuff, or or when
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: did that kind of click for you? Oh yeah, I've
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: always been that way. I was the kid who was,
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: you know, a second grader whittling little Ropolo lures pocket knife.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: That was that was totally me. That's amazing. What what
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: was your first piece of hunting gear that you modified
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: or created? Do you remember that? Oh? Boy, Uh, that's
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: a good question. I'm not even percent sure what the
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: first thing was maybe eight ors for stix. Nice. Okay,
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: so that's probably within the last decade then, yeah, yeah,
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: So what about your hunting style itself? When you know,
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: if I were to look at when my hunting, when
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: my own style of hunting kind of came into its owner.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: When I came into my own as a hunter, Um,
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: it was it was a little over a decade ago,
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: probably my very early twenties. That's when it kind of
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: when it clicked for me and I went from just
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: hunting to hunting in a in a informed way that
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: was like no on my way. Um, when did that
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: happen for you? When did you shift from just being
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: like a kid out there hunting to oh, I'm now
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: I'm hunting, do you know what I mean? Yeah, for me,
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: it was probably when I was about fifteen. For the
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: first couple of years, my dad and I we'd go
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: out in the woods and we kind of try to
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: figure it out, but we never quite you know, I
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: knew exactly what we were doing. Wanted to get better
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: for sure, And about that same time, I stumbled on
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: some articles from guys like Dan Infall Madre de Quisto
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: talking about marsh hunting techniques, which was you know, kind
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: of the terrain that we most often hunted, and that
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: really opened up my eyes and also allowed me to
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: to kind of dig a little bit deeper and figure
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: out on my own what methods and strategies I could
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: use to help, you know, get a little bit more
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: familiar with the scouting aspect, get a little bit more
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: familiar with the note taking, and kind of plugging in
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: all that together to make it work. Actually in the fall,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: so that's kind of when I really went off the
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: deep end, so to speak, and really started to put
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: a lot of time and effort into really refining the
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: way that we we hunted. Yea, So how would you
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: describe that the way that you hunt if if you
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: had to? You know, let's say that the classic elevator
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: pitch are on an elevator going from the first floor
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: to the fourth floor and a guy says, tell me
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: what you're hunting style is? How do you describe that
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: to him in the sixty seconds you've got before you
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: get to that fifth floor? Oh boy, you might you
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: might want to turn into a forty floor elevator. Well, okay, skyscraper.
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: So in a nutshell, for me, it really between off
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: season and in season. The off season stuff really revolves
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: around a combination of aerial scouting and boots on the
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: ground scouting, and in season it's the same thing. It's
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: just that it really just revolves between aerial scouting and
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: looking for fresh sign with that in season scouting. And
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: really for me, it's very cyclical. I go right for
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: one to the other. They're always really meshed closely with
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: one another. The better job I do with boots on
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: the ground and the off season, that allows me to
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: look back at the maps and better piece together the
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: big picture, and then I find new things in the map,
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: go back into the woods, dig it a little bit deeper.
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: And then same thing in the season. The better job
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: I did looking at the maps, the better job I
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: did actually you know, picking it apart in the postseason.
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: I find that in season, when I find the sign
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: that I'm looking for that indicates them in a hot area,
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: that other stuff really helps me look at exactly how
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: I want to pinpoint that set up on that specific
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: day and be a little bit more precise and and
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: how I do that set up. Whereas if I just
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: you know, focus on one or the other, if I
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: focus all on postseason, if I focus all on just
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: in season, I feel like I'm really limiting myself, or
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: if I don't look at the maps, I feel like
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: I'm really going and blind. Yeah, I want, I want
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: to dive deeper into those quite dramatically. But before I
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: do that, you mentioned on the front end that folks
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: like Dan Infalt were really influential on you, and and
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: and me too, and a lot of people out there.
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: There's there's a lot of folks that have this kind
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: of style of hunting. Um, how would you say, if
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: at all your own spin on it is different if
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: you and Dan were to go out, if you're on
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: the public Land Challenge or whatever it is, and Dan's
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: going off and doing his thing, You're going off doing
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: your thing. How would you describe what you're doing that
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: would be different than him. I think you could probably
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: summarize and say, Dan at this point is a little
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: bit better woodsman than I am. He can look at
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: things and have a little bit better feel for what
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: exactly is going on than I can, whereas I have
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: to rely a little bit more on being able to
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: piece together certain you know, theories and strategies and whatnot
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: by looking at kind of the bigger picture and trying
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: to piece together, you know, what the maps say at
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: one location, how that compares to what I've seen in
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: a different location, and then piecing it together with what
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: I'm actually seeing on the ground and kind of learning
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: that way. I think I maybe do a little bit
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: more on the UM I would say, the technical, but
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: the UM online portion of that scouting than he does. Okay, Yeah,
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: you know it's funny what you said there resonates with
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: me because I think I'm probably similar to you and
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: that for us at our stage, you know, versus having
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: done this for forty five years or however long he's
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: been doing it at this level, um, when we've done
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: it ten, fifteen years whatever. At this level, I still
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: have to really focus on analyzing all these pieces of
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: data coming in. Right I'm thinking about all this fresh sign,
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: all of my all the sign from previous scouting efforts,
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: and I'm sitting there and act to literally think it
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: through and kind of compute Okay, this is telling me
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: this and this is saying this other thing. Now I'm
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: going to weigh the odds of these two things and
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: make a decision. While some like in Faults might just
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: have that intuitively click, He's just gonna He's not gonna
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: sit there for five minutes and debate between A and B.
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: He's gonna know, yeah, I've seen this a thousand times before.
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: This is gonna be the best option. He steps in
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: the woods and these things pop out like bright shining lights. Um.
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: And I think every year the bright shining lights start
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: to flash a little bit more for me. But I
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: still have to sit and think for a second. Um,
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: does that sound right? Is that kind of where you
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: feel like you're a lot to that that takes yet
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: to think it through? Still it's not that snap. Yeah,
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: I think that's a really good way of describing it.
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: I'm the type of guy who I'll sit there in
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: the truck before I leave, and I'll sit there for
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: half an hour trying to debate between two or three
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: different spots that all could be equally good based on
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: the wind direction and what I've noticed scouting. So I
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: definitely I think about it a lot more than I
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: probably should, probably to the point where at certain times
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: I get paralysis by analysis. But eventually, you know, I
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: just kind of kind of go with the flow on
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: a particular day and and make something work and and
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: then you know, take out, take what I learned that
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: day and modify it for the next day. How do
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: you deal with that situation? So me and Dan talked
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: about this a lot, dealing with paralysis by analysis, because
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: we're both guilty of it. We both are so we
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: geek out about the details and about trying to think
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: through all these things. But like you just said, sometimes
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: it can get to be so much you're stuck. How
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: do you push through that and make that final decision?
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: It's you know, it's the rut. It's November four, Ye're
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: about to head out on this hunt, and it's two
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: thirty or three thirty, four thirty morning. You've got to
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: make that decision of where you're going. How do you
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: how do you break the tie riker? So I think
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: for me, it is number one having a plan, not
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: being afraid to stick with the plan, but then also
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: not being so stuck into the plan that you're not
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: willing to deviate from it when you see something that
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: tells you you should. So, for example, you know, when
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: we went down to Missouri this year, I had a
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: plan that first day for all the types of spots
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: that I wanted to to look at. You know, walk
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: nine miles that first day, just looking for pinch points
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: between various betting areas I thought I saw on the map.
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: And then my plan was, you know, basically just systematically
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: work through a bunch of these different areas. But what
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: we found on the first day told me that that
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: first strategy wasn't gonna work, so that all planned B.
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: So I just you know, basically I had to plan
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: B already in mind, So I just went from A
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: to B, and then just started doing some of the
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: additional scouting, um, getting some feedback from other guys in
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: the group they were in that same area. And then
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: based on some of my historical you know, experiences and
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: looking at research in terms of weather patterns and whatnot,
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: I had planned on basically setting up in a certain
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: area based on what the weather was going to be
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: the next day. Um. And that was basically the plan
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: for that and it allowed me to really easily kind
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: of stick to that plan and get into that area,
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: hang our sets for that next morning when we're supposed
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: to get that nice you know, high pressure, cold air,
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: nice calm day. Um. But then at the same time
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: that particular day when we went and set our stuff
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: up there. Um, we found that even though the weather
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: wasn't maybe ideal for what you'd expect a lot of
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: deer movement to be. The deer were just on their
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: feet running um. And we saw we work worked through
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: an area that we saw a lot of deer moving around,
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: and you know what, we we can't go back and
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: do what we were planning on doing. We got to
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: just sit right here. And that's how I ended up
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: shooting that buck that I got in Missouri. Um. But
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: had I had I basically either number one got two
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: stuck in that plan, and I probably wouldn't have ended
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: up sitting where I ended up shooting my dear and
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: number two. If I didn't have the ability to just
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: you know, so easily make that plan in the first place,
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: I would have been, you know, stuck at the truck
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: trying to figure out, you know where in the thousands
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: of acres I was going to go, and it would
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: have been you know, much tougher decision. Yeah, that's really
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: hard to do what you described there, especially that first
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: part where you've got a plan A and you go
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: in on day one and and I've experienced this, it
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: is really hard to shift from a to b especially
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: if you're in a new spot where there's you know,
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: thousands of acres to choose from, and your day one
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: would be a tough thing to do for a lot
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: of people. Where you correct me if I'm wrong, but
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: you went in thinking you were in to focus on
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: tops and finding these terrain funnels of sorts, and you
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: didn't find sign and you ended up in a totally
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: different area like river Bottom area, and then you did
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: find something there. That's that's right, correct, Yeah, that's absolutely
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: what happened. We covered tons and tons of miles on
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: that of those walk ons Bridge tops looking for sign.
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: Last year in Missouri, we're on that same time, that's
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: where the hot sign was. Different area but similar terrain,
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: and so I thought it was just gonna be like
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: we did last year, and it was ended up being
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: totally different. But I will say what what has helped
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: me probably this past year that I really started focusing
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: on a little bit more, especially in areas where I
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: haven't done the priest scouting, even around home in Minnesota.
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: Hunted a new marsh this year, and I didn't have
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: any postseason experience other than a couple of quick trips
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: in June and July, which is awful in the swamps.
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: But effectively, what I tried to do, since there's so
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: many there's so much acreage, there's so many spots that
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: look like they could be great, is I would specifically
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: pick on a particular day to go on a route
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: that could take me through an A, B and a C.
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: And so I would go in there on whatever day
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: I was going to hunt and look at the sign
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: an area A, and if it wasn't that great, I
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: would just keep on going to be and then I
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: would keep on going to see and by the time
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: I got to see, if see also wasn't that great,
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: that I would just continue scouting my way back to
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: the truck, and you know, it didn't feel as much
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: like it was a wasted day, whereas in the past
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: what I may have done is said, Okay, it looks
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: like the best potential spot based on the map, and
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: I would go in there. I'd hunt it regardless of
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: what the sign looked like. And I think I definitely
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: got on more deer this year by having that ABC
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: strategy in mind rather than trying to pick spots where
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: it was you know, really you know, no plan B option. Now,
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: how do you do that at the scale you did
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: on that first day where you walked nine miles without
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: finally seeing the thing you wanted to see. I don't
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: know if I could do that. I thought, you know,
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: I went on up in Minnesota's pasture and I walked
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: something like three miles, and I thought to myself, all right,
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: you covered a bunch of ground and finally you got
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: to sit down somewhere. Um, you cover nine miles before
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: you finally found the thing you wanted to find. Um,
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: tell me, tell me about what you saw over the
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: course of that day. You know, there must have been
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: something that made you think, oh, this might be okay.
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: I'm curious what made you keep going and going going,
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: or was it just simply like a complete lack of zero,
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: devoid of deer sign. I mean, it wasn't just a desert.
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: Or did you have such a strong sense of confidence
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: in the fact there had to be somewhere with tons
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: and tons and tons of fresh sign that you were
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: gonna keep pushing until you got there. What was your
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: whole thought process throughout that day? Yeah, so it definitely
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: looked like a desert for a lot of the area
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: that I was in places where I would expect to
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: see for sure, sign, rubs, scrapes, whatnot. There just wasn't
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: much of anything. Might see some old tracks on the
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: logging roads or something like that, but basically I wasn't
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: going to stop walking until I found something that gave
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: me at least some amount of confidence that would be
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: good too to set up in. So we just kept
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: walking that first day. And really that first day, the
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: only thing that we ended up finding that looked remotely
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: good is when we finally did get down to a
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: river bottom type area, we found a few sets of
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: fresh tracks. Let me started to find a couple of
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: rubs that we found a scrape, and then we saw
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: three doughs that we kicked up and and h bounced
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: out of that area. And then from that point it
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: was okay, well, if we walked through this many miles
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: of hills up in the ridge tops and just haven't
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: seen much of any sign, Yeah, we know that there's
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: deer down in this river bottom. Let's go back look
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: at the maps again, talk to some of the people
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: back at camp, and then see what other places on
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: the maps are going to be similar to this. And
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: then that kind of fueled how we looked at going
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: about the next day. You know, it's kind of shifting
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: focus from not necessarily the exact spots, but the type
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: of habitat that we were in and saying, this type
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: of stuff that we've already walked through, we've walked through
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: enough of it to say we don't have confidence with
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: this type of stuff, but this other type of stuff
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: that we walked through, we did, you know, have confidence in.
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: And maybe that's not the exact spot, but there's gotta
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: be more spots just like this. So that's kind of,
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: you know, what we did for the next day. Yeah,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: this last summer, me and Dan were talking about his
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: UM trail camera scouting strategy that he put together and
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: we called it Dan Johnson's dots on a map connect
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: them with lines strategy. And I think that you've now
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: created what I'm going to call the type of stuff strategy,
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: and I think I think it's going to be a
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: good one because it's it's a great point that you make,
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: which is especially when you're hunting public land, especially when
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: it's larger swaths of land, you need to somehow compartmentalize it.
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: You have to break it down somehow. And one way
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: to do it is what you did, which is breaking
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: it by the type of terrain or the type of stuff,
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: and in finding where the act of it is focused,
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: because very often what you described is happening in other
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: places to where they're They're in a spot for a reason,
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: right there in a river bottom for a reason, just
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: why they're not on top of those ridges. So once
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: you can isolate it, drill it down somehow, then you
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: can focus on finding something similar. And that's man that's
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: applicable during the rut, that's applicable in the early season,
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: the late season, any kind of time of year. When
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: you find what that type of stuff is, it can
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: help you. Yeah, absolutely, And I've even seen it in
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: terms of you know, say like Marsh Islands, where there
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: might be islands and a particular piece of land, but
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: maybe you find that you were hunting on an island
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: that was surrounded by redbrush and all of a sudden
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: you found more dear activity on that particular island. Well,
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: then you can go back in the map and look at, Okay,
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: how do these fifty islands, maybe you know eight or
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: ten or twelve of them also have that same kind
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: of brush surrounding those islands, So then that would be
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: kind of where I would focus on next rather than China,
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: look at that whole sea of fifty of them and
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: trying to figure out which one would be the best. Yeah,
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: it comes back to to look at those details, like
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: why is this So that's here's the type of stuff. Now,
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: why is this the type of stuff? So you found
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: that that the red brush was the unique feature. That's uh,
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: that's interesting. Now the next day, so you're on the
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: Missouri hunt. The first day you walked and walked and walked,
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: never really found what you wanted until the end. The
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: next day you went back to a different place but
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: the same kind of stuff, and this hunt you actually
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: had the opposite I think, if I remember the story
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: right from watching your videos and stuff, you had a
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: game plan looking for that kind of stuff, and then
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: before you could even get to where you eventually thought
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: you'd go, you decide you had to stop right then
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: there because of the deer activities. Saw right, Um, how
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: do you go about making that decision? So day one
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: it was I'm not stopping until I see something that
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: makes me have to stop, and you never did, so
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: you kept going and going going, So we just talked
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: about how you know when not to stop. Now, day two,
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: you're going in and the opposite happens, that something stops
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: you before you get to where you thought you were
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: going to go, and you said, oh, this means I
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: have to stop. Describe that thought process. Sure, well, I'll
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: interject before I answered that question specifically to say that
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: there was a day in between there where we didn't
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: we didn't see much at all, but it was a
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: very hot, like sixty degree afternoon. But we took our
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: learnings from day one, got in another low river bottom
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: type area that again had this like I don't know
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: what kind of plant was, but it's this green stuff
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: that was growing in this river bottom area. And we
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: only saw a couple of deer that entire day. But
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: when we were walking out at night, we must have
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: kicked out twenty different year. On the way back to
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: the truck in that same river bottom area, we saw
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: a really nice buck in a private field right again
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: in that same kind of area after dark. So it
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: was like, Okay, now we've kind of affirmed that the
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: river bottom is where they're at, and we think that
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: it might just be a factor of the weather that
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: they weren't moving during daylight. Um in that particular habitat.
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: So based on based on day one, I'm not seeing
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: anything the ridge tops saying hey, you know, it might
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: be good in the river bottoms. And then day two
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: kind of that confirmation of hey, the deer down here,
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: they just gotta move during daylight. And then we jump
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: into day three. So day three, how do you know
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: when to stop? While we we basically walked into again
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: an area that was kind of like a thermal hob
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: that we had planned on sitting the following morning because
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: this day three started jumping. But just in case people
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: don't know, can you explain what you mean by thermal hub? Sure?
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: So in this hilly Ozark, Missouri habitat, there's a lot
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: of these little, you know, fingered ridges, and you have these,
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: um basically these bottom type areas where it's the almost
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: like the bottom of a creek drainage where you might
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: have all of these little tiny creeks that flow and
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: they eventually into you know, bigger and bigger creeks, and
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: you get into some of these areas where it's just
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: kind of a flat, open area, but you might have
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: three or four different ridges that all drop off into
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: this one little bottom area. And the way that the
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: deer can use that, of course is with the scent,
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: especially the dropping thermals in the early morning and late
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: evenings when that scent dropped into that area kind of
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: pools and it collects the scent from a lot of
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: different area and the surrounding hills. So the thought process
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: with that is, hey, early morning, it's gonna be nice,
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: you know, calm cool. If we get any dropping thermals um,
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: then that could be a good area for potentially a
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: buck to hit that area, as he sent check in
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: for dose first thing in the morning. So that was
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: kind of the thought strategy and kind of the description
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: of the area that we were looking at specifically where
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: we you know, hung our stuff for that following day. Yeah,
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: so continue on, yep. So the weather is the other
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: kind of important thing here, And that morning of the
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: third day, we didn't even hunt because it was about
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: you know, thirty five degrees driving wind and rain um,
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: and of course we had camera gear and this, that
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: and the other thing, so we just we knew it
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: was going to get colder with this cold front moving in,
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: so we decided to wait until the rain turned into
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: something solid eventually turned into sleet, and that sleet eventually
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: turned into snow, and that was when we hit the woods.
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: So we got out there thinking that the deer might
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: be hunkered down during that, you know, that major front,
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: and then the next morning was gonna be the hot spot.
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: So we weren't even really thinking at that time that
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: we were planning on giving a high percentage hunt that afternoon.
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: We just wanted to get ourselves into a good area,
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: picked the trees, get set up so the following morning
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: we'd be able to have the ideal set up. But
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: then after we got into that thermal hub, we found
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: the trees, we found the ideal set up, we hung
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: our platforms, we hung our sticks. As we were coming
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: back the direction of the truck, we got into this
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: river bottom area that you know with the probably the
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: half inch of snow that was on the ground. By
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: that time, we were seeing sets of tracks running through,
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: so that already indicated us that in the last couple
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: of hours there's been deer running through here. Then we
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: kicked up a dough she had a buck on her,
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: and then we saw another dough on a buck going
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: through the same area, and at that point it was like, okay,
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: we'd be idiots to keep walking past this, So we
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: just we obviously didn't have our stuff with us. We
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: just looked for an ideal spot to be able to
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: sit at least somewhat secluded on the ground. And the
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: challenge of that particular area was that it was open
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: river bottom and you could see you know, two yards
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: in most directions, so it's like, well, how do you
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: know exactly where to set up? And we really didn't,
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: but we knew we had to be there somewhere, and
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: that being next to any particular tree was better than
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: you know, not being in that area at all. So
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: we ended up just kind of trying to pick the
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: best spot that we could that was next to some
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: tracks and it was kind of next to convert of
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: like a crp field and a little bit of thicket.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: There was also kind of in that river bottom. But
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: to be totally honest, I mean, the the deer really
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: there was nothing that was defining enough of a terrain
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: feature to force the deer through any particular spot. So
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: we just kind of picked the best spot that we
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: we thought we could and you know, hunkered into a
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: deadfall and then describe what happened next. So we saw
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: a faun moving through, got within twenty yards of us,
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: never knew we were there. It was kind of fun
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: for my wife because she got to film it and
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: see it. And then we saw a buck chasing the
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: dough about i'd say eighty yards away from us, and
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: then from a totally different direction, about an hour before light,
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: I could see another dough coming from that CRP field direction,
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: so totally different direction than the last dough and r
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: bucking doll that we saw running through again, indicating that
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: it was just kind of luck if you're in the
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: right spot at the right time down there. But we
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: saw a doe coming in. She was headed nearly straight
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: toward us, and then I could see a buck right
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: behind her, and she slowly moved, you know, getting a
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: little bit closer and closer. She was probably about twenty
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: yards away from getting directly down wind, and I was
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: thinking that she was going to bust us. But then
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: the last minute she turned and came out of bee
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: line straight toward me, and then of course about it's
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: hard to tell in the video, but she's about ten
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: or twelve yards away. She looks up and sees me
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: holding my bow and and sees my wife standing there
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: in the dead fall, and she takes off. But the
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: buck doesn't really know at this point what has happened.
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: He's standing about twenty five yards away, quartering too well.
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: Then he finally turns us had to go look at
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: the dough and I got back to full draw, um,
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: and then settled the site on him and shot and
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: then you know, the rest is his history. So it
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: was a little bit of a you know, luck, But
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: I'll take that during the road any day, you know. Heck. Yeah, Well,
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: it kind of seems like this is something that is
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: not completely out of the ordinary for you though. Um.
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: That being it sounds like on occasion you do find yourself.
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: Um decided to sit on the ground, and I think
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: just having the confidence to do that allowed you to,
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: you know, pull off this hunt because some guys would
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: maybe have been walking through there and they saw this
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: sign and the deer go running through, and they're thinking, crap,
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: I don't have a stand with me. Um, I can't
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: hunt here, So I'm gonna go back to the truck,
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: or I'm gonna go back wherever you did hang your
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: sticks and go grab your stuff out of the tree
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: and walk back and by the time they came back
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: and two hours later or whatever, the sign or the
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: the action that you guys actually enjoyed would have been passed. Um,
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: tell me about that. Tell me how often do you
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: find yourself bow honey on the ground and that kind
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: of you know, impromptu kind of way. Is that something
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: you're you're adding to your repertoire more and more and why? Yeah,
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: I think this year definitely more than in years past,
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: probably about i'd say a goodt of my hunts this
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: year I sat on the ground and a lot of
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: times it was just kind of going back to the
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: plane ABC. Sometimes you get to Plan beror Plan C
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: and you just don't feel like you have that much
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: time to be able to set up, or maybe the
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: area that you're in is not really ideal for a
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: tree stand set up or a saddle set up, but
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: you can you have great groundcover, whether it's grass or
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: whether it's deadfall, and I feel like sometimes you can
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: be more factive on the ground. You definitely do get
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: picked off, in my experience, a lot more on the
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: ground that you do when you're up in the tree.
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: But again, it's it's kind of a balance between do
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: you think you got a better shot at trying to
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: get up into a tree and maybe busting a deer
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: all because they're getting ready to move um or do
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: you think you're gonna be able to get a shot
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: off on the ground. It really just comes down to
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: a situation specific type thing. And if I'm hunting on
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: the grounds, it's usually because I have the competence that
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: I'll be able to at least, you know, get drawn
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: back and be able to get a shot opportunity in
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: a particular area without getting winded. Yeah, anything you've picked
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: up haven't done that? More and more this year, Any
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: little best practices or tricks you've learned to whether it
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: be getting drawn or picking the right spot on the ground,
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: or anything you've found that's helping you do that. Yeah.
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: A tree size definitely has been a big thing. Every
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: time I've tried to sit on a tree that's narrower
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: than my torso, I always get busted, it seems like,
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: and I like so I like the bigger trees. Also,
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: where the sun is coming from definitely makes a difference
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: in how I'll set up. If the sun is from
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: behind me, I like to get on the front side
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: of a tree or a brush or deadfall and kind
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: of sit in the shade and be on the front
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: side of the tree as if I was turkey hunting
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: with a track gun. And if the sun is in
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: my face, then I'd much rather be on the back
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: side of that tree and be kind of sitting in
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: the shade there, so now the sun glaring off me
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: and magnifying all of my movements. So if the sun's
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: in my face, a lot of times I'll take the
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: tether for my saddle and I'll just hang on the
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: back side of the tree to stay comfortable. And if
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: it gets down a prime time, it might even just
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: unhook and just stand vertical behind the tree. I do
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: that in one hunt this year and had a buck
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: walk by within it's had no idea I was there
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: because I was able to sit behind that big red
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: oak in the shade and he never even looked my direction. Um.
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: But then if the sun, of course is from behind me,
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: that I'd like to stay on the front side, um
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: and be a little bit have a little bit easier
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: time trying to get to full draw. Picking when to
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: draw definitely is is huge. I always, even if it's
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: a year I'm not gonna attempt to shoot. I like
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: to practice getting to full draw just because it's you know,
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: it teaches you so much thinking, like learning what you
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: can and what you can't get away with and when
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: you need to be able to move and of course
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: and of course filming makes that infinitely harder. UM. A
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: lot of times when I do get busted's from a
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: combination of moving the cameras and trying to get my
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: bow into position. So if I didn't have that, that
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: would make it much easier. What I like to do
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: with the compound is definitely get drawn back at the
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: first opportunity that I have and stay at full draw,
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: you know, until I get a shot opportunity. With a
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: traditional bow if I'm hunting with one of those, that
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: I can't really do that necessarily, so I just kind
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: of geta until I get the first good chot opportunity
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: that I would have. UM. But yeah, all those little
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: things definitely UM make a difference when too. I mean,
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: you can have the wind doing one thing up in
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: a tree on the ground, it might can do in
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: something a little bit different, So it's almost it's really
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: a case by case thing. And every time I do
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: it I learned something a little bit more. Probably in
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: a couple more years, if I continue to hunt off
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: the ground a lot, I'm sure i'll know even a
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: lot more than I do know. Yeah, it seems like
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: you're getting into those kinds of situations because you have
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: this very mobile hunting style, which we kind of talked
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: about in Fault even Heart Whoever. A lot of these
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: folks that have kind of, um preached this for a
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: long time now, there's a lot of folks like us
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: who are trying to adapt it to our own styles
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: and put that into action. UM. So when you're not
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: on the ground, it means you are in a tree.
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: And one of the things about you that has made
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: you interesting to me, particularly interesting over the years is
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: the way you've focused on really fine tuning your mobile
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: hunting set up, maybe more than other people, definitely more
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: than most people. UM that's been really interesting to me
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: because I am not naturally good at gear. I'm not
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: naturally good at messing and modifying and improving and fine
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: tuning and testing a gear set up, whether that be
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: my boat or my tree stand, or my saddle or
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: my truck. Uh, that's just not what I'm just not
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: naturally good at stuff. So when I see someone like
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: you who's really good at that stuff, I'm very jealous
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: and I kind of dislike you a little bit for it.
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: So let's just get that out of the way. Um.
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: But that said, I want to dive deep into kind
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: of the evolution of your mobile hunting setup because I
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: know that you've you've used climbing sticks, you've used mobile
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: tree stands, You've you've saddles, you've used all sorts of
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: interesting modified climbing methods. Um, let's talk about where you're
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: at right now. What is the best mobile hunting setup
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: for Garrett today? If ready go on with with one
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: one setup for your public land hunt you're going on
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: or whatever kind of hunt, what's that going to be
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: of all the things you've tested? So, I would say
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: probably my bread and butter system is a saddle with
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: a platform like the Predator, three climbing sticks with double steps,
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: a single loopator and if the leaves are already down,
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: then I would take that. I would take four sticks
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: instead of three, and then a lightweight lineman's about like
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: an eight millimeter aplex rope. Same thing for the tether
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: and basically just but just go with that. That would
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: allow me to climb up in a tree. It allows
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: me to use one stick up I need to, two
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: sticks if I need to, allows me to hunt off
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: the ground if I want to. It really gives me
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: a lot of options. Um, And that's it's really It's
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: something I can bring in on any given hunt in
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: hill country and marsh country, big woods country and be
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: able to adapt and be able to pick a spot
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: and hunt it the way I think it should be hunted. Yeah,
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: And I think that's been one of the biggest things
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: for me. Especially why I love making the switch to
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: a saddle is that when you head in and you've
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: got your saddle and you've got your sticks, you don't
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: feel the same obligation to go sit in a tree
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: up high as you do if you carry it in
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: a twelve or fifteen pound tree stand. You know, it
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: just seems so much easier, you know what, I'm just
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: gonna sit in the ground because you're not hauling in
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: this big thing. But at least for me, when I
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: used to have that stand with me, i'd get in there,
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: I'm like, well, damn it, I just hiked this thing
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: in here. I better use it. So yeah, that the
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: lightweight approach, the ultra light approach um is more and
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: more and more appealing to me. Let's start at the ground, though,
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: Let's start at what you're doing at base level before
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: you get up in the tree. You've got to climb
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: up there. Um, You've tested and tried a whole bunch
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: of different ways to get up in there. Um, some
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: of it I think it's crazy. I've seen some of
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: the things you've tried and the things you've manufactured, and
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: it's nuts, but it's pretty cool. I couldn't do it.
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: Tell me about what your current climbing method of choices.
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: You said two steps sticks? Um, what's your favorite brand?
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: Are you modifying them at all? Um? What do you
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: think is the best option right now for you? Well, so,
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: the ones that I typically use are ones that I
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: made a couple of years ago. They are twenty four
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: inches long, and like I said, the double steps, really
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: the closest thing in terms of design, if people want
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: to get a visual, would be like the Beast gear sticks.
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: In terms of the weight, in terms of the length,
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: in terms of the design, they're very very similar to those. Um,
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: So that's kind of what I prefer because I feel
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: like I'm able to maximize the amount of height that
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: I am able to get per stick. They're lightweight at
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: you know, roughly a pound and a half per stick,
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: and the eiters don't really add much of any weight
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: at all to them, and they're just they're not as pacable.
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: Right If I need to crawl under deadfall, that's that's
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: really the only time when it becomes a pain, because
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: those steps will will hang up on the deadfall as
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: you're trying to climb underneath or crawl underneath. But apart
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: from that, it's usually not not too big of a deal. Um,
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: And it's there's really no tree I can't get in
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: with that particular system. And the other thing that it
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: allows me to do with the steps being that far
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: apart from one another, is on certain trees, I can
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: kind of you know, lean forward and hook my knees
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: around those top steps, and that gives me a little
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: extra stability on top of the lineman's belt to be
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: able to you know, trim a limb if I'm able
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: to trim limbs or set my next stick if it's
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: a really goofy, odd leaning tree. So it just gives
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: me a lot of flexibility. Yeah, so if people people
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: most people out there probably can't build their own sticks
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: or modify sticks maybe, but if they were out there
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: looking to buy something, you know that's that's commercially available
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: right now, what would the you know, key things you
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: kind of just described it, But if you're looking at
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: what's available out there, what would be some of the
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: key features you would say that people should definitely try
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: to get when they're choosing from the four or five
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: six different stick options out there. Sure, you know, one
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: thing is one thing is weight. If you're using one
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: or two sticks, it's really doesn't matter all that much.
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: But if you're using three, four, if you're using five,
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: and that really starts to add up pretty quickly. So wait,
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: it's definitely something I would look at. I personally like
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: the double steps, like I mentioned, but there's a lot
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: of guys that also like the single steps, and it
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: really that comes down to personal preference. I think more
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: than anything, single steps sticks will usually pack a little
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: bit better than the double So if you're just crawled,
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: just to make sure that folks understand when you say
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: single versus double, you're I think I'm understand what you're saying,
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: as I understand it would be when you get to
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: your first step, like on a lone wolf, there'll be
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: one step that slides out to the right and then
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: you have to kick out one to the left for
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: the next step up. But then on a different type
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: like the muddy sticks or something, they've got left and
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: right steps on the first step left and right, on
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: the second step left and right, you know, as you
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: go up and up and up. That's what you mean, right, yeah, yeah,
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: And it's good to clarify that because there's the double
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: steps like you just described, and then there's also sometimes
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: I'll use double steps to describe the fact that there's
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: two steps on that stick. There's two of those double steps,
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: one on the top and one on the bottom, plus
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: the eight or versus having three like a like a
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: set of hawk or muddy might have. Yes, okay, so
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: continue with what you're saying. Then started jumping. Yeah, so
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: so definitely wait and if you're a single or double
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: step guy, that'll determine, you know, if you want to
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: go more packable. If that's more important to you, then
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: rotating single steps like the lone wolves might be a
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: better option for you. But if you like just all
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: around best climb ability. I think double steps, you know,
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: each step having to on the same level is definitely
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: the way to go. I personally like standoffs that are
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: a little bit further from the tree as opposed to
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: steps that are the standoffs that are really close to
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: the tree. Just from the standpoint that it allows me
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: to get more of the balls of my feet on
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: the step, and then I don't get cafetigue nearly as bad. Um,
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: So it allows me to wrap my wrap my knees
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: around the top steps a little bit easier if I
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: do happen to be on a tree where I want
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: to want to be able to do that. So those
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: are things I would look for. Um. Really within the
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: mobile community, there's you know, there's the b sticks, there's
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: the lone walls, lone Wolf, Coustom gears, the you know,
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: the hawks. Hag actually came out with a new two
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: step stick this year based on the fact that a
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: lot of guys used to take their three step ones
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: and cut them down to make the you know, just
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: the top and the bottom one. Um, which brings me
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: to another you know point of distinction is just the
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: overall length of the stick. Me being six ft tall,
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: I like twenty four in aluminum portion of that that stick.
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: I don't feel like that's really stretching it out too
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: far for me at all. If I was six four,
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: I could probably go with a little bit longer to um.
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: And then obviously late season it gets a little bit
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: more tight. But I still found that for me is
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: still doable. And the step spacing on that's probably closer
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: to two Manu factor in the loss, you know, having
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: the step not at the bottom of the tube. Um,
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: whereas you see a lot of stack, a lot of
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: sticks out there might have a fifteen or seventeen inch
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: step spacing. So again, the shorter ones are going to
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: be more compact, a little more pacable. But I feel
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: like the climbability you can usually get by with a
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: little bit longer step spacing than you might think. Yeah,
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: what about um, the attachment to the tree. I know
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: that I've on the sticks I use, I've replaced the
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: usual belt I'm blanking on brain farting on the right
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: way to describe this, But the the webbing that you
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: throw around the tree and since on reverse the button
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: or whatever I've I've taken that out and replace that
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: with with something different than the one was mainly what
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: came with the sticks on the box. I know you've
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: tested a whole bunch of different things. I saw a
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: video of yours once with like six different rope systems
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: attachment methods. Where what do he thinks the best option?
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: What do you use? What do you recommend for the
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: folks there just use it on the box, or do
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: you think we should all be switching out? Well, there's
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: nothing wrong with using the the off the shelf method
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: with that cam buckle strap. But if you do ditch
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: that strap, you save like six to eight ounces per stick,
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: and you illuminate that potential for noise. Right. You can
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: you know, put style strips or rubber or felt or
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: anything on those buckles to quiet them down, or you
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: can just be really careful. But if you switch to
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: a buckle list system, then you're able to be you know,
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: obviously a little bit lighter, a little bit quieter in general.
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: But I like, personally the best after trying, like you said,
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: just about everything that's out there, I still keep going
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: back to a quarter inch piece of am steel that's
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: spliced into a loop on one end that you flip,
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: that you slide over the versa button and then you
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: just throw that thing around the tree and then you
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: just you know, it's gonna be tough to describe it
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: on a podcast, but the rope mod basically where you
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: just take that free end of the rope and and
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: hitch it underneath itself and lock it and hold it
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: in place with a half hitch is it allows me
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: to use it on basically any tree because you can
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: make that that am steel rope as long as you want.
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: You can make it eight foot, you can make a
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: ten foot, you can make it six ft right, you
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: can do whatever length you want there. So tree size
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: isn't as big of a concern. That am steel is
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: very very low stretch. It's dynama. So when you actually
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: do the rope mod and you wait, you put your
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: weight on the stick, it doesn't sag as much as
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: you would get with some other climbing ropes or just
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: like accessory cord or something like that. And in comparison
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: to you know, some of the daisy chain style of methods,
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: you don't have to worry about nailing a specific loop
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: perfectly right. It doesn't matter what exact diameter of that
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: tree is. You can take that am steel, hook it
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: in place, and just pull it tight and cinch it,
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: and then you're gonna get a minimal amount of uh,
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: you know, movement down the tree once you actually do
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: put your weight on it. So I'd say that's probably
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: my my go to for sure. Yeah. Yeah, it's pretty
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: slick um. And and for anyone who's not familiar, am
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: steel is just a really low, small diameter, super super
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: strong rope, right basically, That's that's what it is. And
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: then you you splice essentially a loop in the end.
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: And then with those knots who described that, you're able
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: to do that all without any daisy chains, without any buckles,
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: without anything else. That's pretty that's a pretty cool way
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: to do it. Yeah, And I like it a lot.
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: It's you know, personal preference. Also, I know a lot
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: of guys that have tried the am steel rope and
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: they like a daisy chain system better, right, And there's
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: some guys that like the buckle system just from the
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: standpoint that you can get a little bit more momentum
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: on a bigger tree to swing that thing around than
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: you can with a little bit lighter rope. Yeah, So
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: I switched to a daisy chain this year, and I
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: like it a lot. I like it a lot more
• 54:57
  Speaker 1: than my buckles, um, because like you described, it gets
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: sort of that whole risk of noise. But you're right,
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: it does have you. You do have a little bit
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: less you know, ability to get just the right tension
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: as you would with a rope system like you have. UM.
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: I like it for me just because I you know,
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: it's just dummy proof, and I'm a dummy, so it
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: works pretty good for me. Um. Continue with ropes, though,
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: what about linesman's belts or that lineman's belts? Um? Again,
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: I'm using, you know, something I can buy from someone,
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: because I don't like to customize things because I don't
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: have confidence myself to do that. But you're it seems
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: like many times making your own going as lightweight as
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: you possibly can. Um. Any recommendations, whether it be for
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: making your own or d I ying it, or if
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: someone doesn't feel confident with that and you want to
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: point them to something they can just buy off the
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: shelf for a couple of pieces they can buy. What
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: would you recommend as far as improving that? Because I
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: can tell you back in the day when I used
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: to hunt a tree stand and I used a full
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: tree harness. The lines with belts they brought with the
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: get in the box of those are so god awful
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: and I use them for way too many years that
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: finally switching to something good has been just a paradigm
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: shift for me. Um help correct some other people before
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: they spend years and years and years like I did
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: with a piece of crab. Sure, So a couple of
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: options Number one, if you're going to make your own,
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: and I'll just I'll start with this because it's what
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: I'm more familiar with rather than what all the particular
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: options you can buy. Would be a really good option
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: for Alignment's rope is the Samson Predator eleven millimeter paired
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: with a Ropeman one ascender. It's really easy to use.
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: You can adjust it both to add tention and remove
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: tension with one hand. It's a nice, you know, a
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: little bit easier to handle size. The big a little
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: bigger eleven you know millimeter rope that's very similar to
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: what you would already see in a lot of tree
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: climbing industry applications, and it doesn't take up a whole
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: ton of weight. It's gonna be again similar to maybe
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: something that's off the shelf from like tethered or muddy
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: or something like that. But it's a pretty good reasonable
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: option and I use that for uh several years and
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: didn't really have that many complaints with it. Another option
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: that I've used and used more recently would be a
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: smaller rope eight millimeter in size called the Sterling Poplex rope.
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: And that rope, again, it's a a static rope. It's
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: got a nice camouflage color to it. It has a
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: nice firm sheath, so it's you're able to use it
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: like a Lemon's rope very easily. For that one, I
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: wouldn't use the Ropeman one just from a sizing perspective,
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: but you can use other ascenders like the Ropeman two. Uh,
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: there's a con duct, there's a CT rolling lock. Those
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: are all mechanical ascender options. And if a guy doesn't
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: want to use the mechanical as center, maybe it doesn't
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: feel comfortable with it or whatnot, you can also use
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: a small cord like a a bill jammie, and it's
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: a little small cord that's very high tensile strength that
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: is used for basically making hitches on smaller diameter ropes
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: like that, and then you can use either like a
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: prusi knot or there's other types of knots that you
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: could use in that particular setting to slide your carabeaner
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: back and forth. And then there's little pieces that you
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: can add to that system that are called tenders that
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: basically would take the place of your second hand. You know, normally,
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: even have a prusing knot on a lineman's rope, you
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: would have to grab the knot with one hand and
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: pull the tag out of the rope with the other right.
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: So what the tender basically does is a little a
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: little mechanism that just basically when you pull on the
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: tag into the rope, it grabs the back end of
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: the knot for you and allows you to slide that
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: with just one hand. So that's an option for guys
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: who I want to go with maybe a smaller rope,
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: but don't necessarily want to go with a mechanical a center,
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: they have that option too, but I typically do for
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: the linman's rope. Is I used that sterling oplex rope
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: with a ropeman two ascender Um, you've got to be
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: a little bit careful of the ropeman two, because the
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: teeth do tend to to chew away at the sheath
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: if you're not careful, but if you're careful, I haven't
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: found it to be that much of an issue, but
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: I've heard reasonably good things about the conduct and the
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: CT rolling lock two for that particular application. And then
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: for a tether, same same thing. You can use the
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: Samson Predator rope. You can use a sterling oplex rope
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: for that. I've used both of them. Um, if I
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: were going to make a tree stand tether, I would
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: probably go with the a little bit larger diameter Samson
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: Predator rope and use a friction hitch, whereas for the saddle,
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: I usually use that oplex and I usually just use
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: a again, a mechanical ascender because it's just really nice
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: and easy and fast to be able to adjust on
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: the fly. So when you're talking about these different types
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: of ropes, why are you why are you choosing one
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: or the other? Um? Like, what is this simply trying
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: to cut ounces, trying to be as as lightweight as
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: possible for a lot of this UM versus just you know,
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: taking a rope that I get when I buy the
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: whole kit with my saddle or something like that. Yeah,
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: So basically it's trying to reduce, reduce weight, reduce bulk,
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: make it easier to use all without making too big
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: of a compromise on safety. Right. So if it was
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: if I was going to do something where I could
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: get down to a two ounce lineman's rope, but it
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: put me at a large risk safety wise, it wouldn't
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: be worth it. Right. And if there's nothing wrong with
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: the off the shelf stuff other than the fact that
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: you know, it's just bigger rope. Even that Sampson preddtor
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: is a little bit bigger rope. So when you bunch
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: that thing up and put it in your you know,
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: little ciss holer type bag, it's just gonna take up
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: more space, and that's less space for other type things. Um,
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: the weight, if you have a pretty minimal system, isn't
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: a huge concern. But again, if you can make it
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: lighter without compromising safety, and you can make it more pacable,
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: then why not. I hear you're there, so speaking of
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: um trying to find lightweight, non bulky ways to improve
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: your system, we were talking sticks. I forgot to ask
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: you about your aiders. Um, I know that's another thing
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: that you've tried a whole bunch of different routes. I've
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: been trying a couple of things here over the last year,
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: tried to add that to my system. Um, walk me
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: through some of the different options, I guess, first off,
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: explain to folks what an aider is, and then walk
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: us through some of the different options you've tried and
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: what you've ultimately landed on for you. Sure, So, in
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: a nutshell, an aider is an additional step that's flexible
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: that you can attach to your stick so that when
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: you pack your sticks up it's not taking up any
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: extra length. But yeah, when you hang the stick on
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: the tree, you have that extra foothold that just kind
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: of dangles underneath your step so that you can have
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: one additional foothold to get you a little bit higher
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: per stick up the tree and typically don't add much
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: weight at all depending on how you how you build them.
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: So there's either options that are d I y or
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: there's options that are store bought. In the rock climbing industry,
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: especially for like big wall type climbing, they'll have these
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: eights that guys will use to help them get up
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: the up the walls, and a lot of times those
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: eights will be three, four or five or even six steps.
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: I've tried eighters like that. A lot of guys like them.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: For me, I find that when you get that many
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: steps and you get eights that are that long, they
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: tend to be a little bit more challenging for me
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: to use, especially if I'm entrees that are maybe not
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: straight um or maybe I'm going from one trunk to
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: another on the way up, and balance becomes an issue.
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: I personally like just a single step that's pretty close
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: to the same length as my normal step spacing. So
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: for my sticks, if I have a twenty two inch
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: step spacing, I would have one eight or loop that
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: is about right thereabouts for my additional loop. I find
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: that early season, or if I'm practicing in the summer,
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: I can add two loops that big and I can
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: use it just fine. But get into November December, you
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: got extra clothes on. I really feel a lot more
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: secure with just having the single loop, and that's again
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: a comfort level for you know, some guys are gonna
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: like being able to get higher and they're you know,
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: maybe a warmer climate there a little bit more athletic,
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: and they don't have any issues at all with a
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: multi step you know, long aid, whereas you might have
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 1: another guy who just feels a little bit safer with
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: kind of minimizing the amount of eight that he has
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: on each stick, or maybe just having an eight on
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: the ground level stick and then as normal as other
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: sticks are eight or free as normal. That's that's the
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: route I took as as kind of a beginner's step
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: into using an eight. As I bought one of those
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: five step eighters from the rock Climbing World and I
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: attached that to my bottom stick. But now instead of
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: having my bottom stick, you know, way low in the tree,
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: I can stick that bottom stick at head level almost
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: and then I can climb up to it with the aider.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: But God forbid if I, you know, got a little
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: uncomfortable using the aid. I'm only three four ft off
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: the grounds. There's no big deal, right, That was a
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: nice way to try it out this year. But what
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: what kind of aid are you described using that single
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: loop eight er? Um? You're making that yourself, right? How
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: do you do that? Yeah? I took a piece of
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: three sixteen am steel and remember the steps of my
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: sticker double step, and it's a fixed double step, so
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: I basically spliced it into the loop on one side
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 1: of my step, and then I spliced it into the
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: other side, so I was able to use a locked
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: Brummel splice on the first side, and then you can't
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: do the lock Brumbel's place on the other side, which
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: is just one of the two methods making a splice,
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: So on the second splice I had to do basically
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: just a lock stitch to hold that in place. So
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: if people aren't familiar with splicing, that's probably going to
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: be really hard to follow. But it basically looks like
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 1: just a big you hanging off the bottom of the stick,
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: and it's just an am steel you. So the advantage
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: of that is since one side of the aid is
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: attached to one side of the step and the others
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: at the other side of the step, that loop is
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: always open. It doesn't twist. It makes a really nice,
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: big open catching point for me to be able to
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: fit my boot. In some of the ads I've made
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: in the past, there were multi step and sometimes I
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 1: would just attach them to the tube of the stick
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: in the center. They would tend to spin around on
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: me and be a little bit more challenging to get
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: my boot in, especially on the way down in the dark.
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: So having having an eight or loop that stays open
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: and a dozen't twist makes it a lot easier to use.
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: I think, is there any fix you've found for dealing
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: with that twist um without creating the you know always
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: in splice like you described there, because because yes, that
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: spin is something I've experienced with mine. Um, any tips
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 1: for making that a little bit better or just figure
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: out a better system. Yeah, if if you're if you're
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: stuck with a type of aid system that only attaches
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 1: on a center point of the stick, it can be challenging.
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: What usually just ends up working the best for me
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: in those type of scenarios, just especially if your way
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: down you just take your first foot in that loop
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 1: and just you know, you get your foot centered in
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: a nice and and well and then you just bite
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: your toe into the tree, and you know, the more
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: firm you can make that first step, the better the
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 1: rest of the steps beneath it will kind of follow
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: that same that same line or stay in that same plane.
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: Whereas if you just kind of haphazardly fit your boot
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: in and kind of let your foot, you know, just
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: spin and and angle up against the tree. Then the
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: rest of the steps you're just gonna kind of do whatever.
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 1: I've I've seen, well, I've heard people talk about and
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 1: I've seen you experiment with climbing methods involving only one
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: stick or no sticks. Um, can you describe is that
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 1: even tenable for the average person or is that pretty crazy?
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: It seems pretty crazy? Um, But what's your experien has
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: been with kind of experimenting with that? So, yes, and no,
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: I experimented a bit a couple of years ago with
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: both the what they call the one stick method or
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: single sticking as well as you know what you alluded
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: to with like, hey, if you can use a single stick,
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: why not just take an aid or and move it
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: up the tree as you go. Basically, what both of
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 1: those systems and tail is you basically hang from a
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: tether and you take one stick and you move it
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: up and attached to the tree. Then you climb into
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: that stick or climb up onto it. You slide your
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: tether up and then you hang again, and then you
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: detach the stick, move it up, and you just repeat
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: that process until you're up at hunting height and when
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: you would want to go back down, you would repeat
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: that same process in reverse. So even if it wasn't
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: that big of a pain in the butt to get
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: up into the tree, it took forever to get down.
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: That was one of the reasons why I didn't really
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: use it all that much. Uh. But there is another
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: option that you can do for getting down the tree
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 1: should be to repel. So if you if you have
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: a forty ft, if you have a forty piece of rope,
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: and you have your repelling equipment, which you know, this
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: is all pretty standard stuff within other industries, you know,
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: like candy neering and rescuing and things like that, you
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: can basically do whatever method you want to get up
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: the tree. And even if that method is a pain
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: in the pot to get down, it doesn't matter because
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: you can just drop it right out of the tree,
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 1: and you can you know, lean back and just repel
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: right down and then retrieve your fort rope, throw it
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: back in your harness pouch, and be on your way
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: back to the truck. So that's actually a method that
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: I've been playing around with a lot more recently because
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: of repelling to me, is something new I haven't really
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 1: played around with it until the last couple of months,
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: but I actually I really like it, so I'll probably
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: for at least most of my sets are at least
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: a large majority of them. I'll try and play around
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: a lot more with that single stick and repel. You know,
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: there really the only advantage that I get is, you know,
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: packing weight and bulk, right, If I have three sticks,
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: I'm usually packing those things onto the back of my
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: pack and then I'm carrying my bow. But with a
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: single stick, I can throw that thing on the bottom
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: of the pack, put my bow on the outside, and
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 1: then I have two free hands to help with balance
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 1: and whatnot as I'm going through like a march or something.
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: So there's some advantages. They're just like with multiple sticks,
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 1: I can get into basically any tree with that method.
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 1: And then if I need to get down quick Let's
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: say I spying a deer and it's rolling around in
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 1: the grass and you know I need to be able
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: to get onto the ground to get a second arrow
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 1: in them, or if I need to basically get down
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 1: and move to a different tree based on movement, being
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: able to repel down is a lot quicker, and it
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: makes you feel safe because you're always attached to the tree. UM.
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: So there's there's definitely some advantages there. It takes a
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: little bit of getting used to. I've learned that with
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 1: the single stick, there's some things about it that make
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 1: it a little bit easier to use. One would be
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 1: the specific type of eight or that you would use
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: with it. The other would just be specifics about the stick. Right,
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 1: A stick that is very solid, doesn't have a lot
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: of flex, bites into the bark really well, tends to
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: work better than some other sticks. So like anything, there's
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: there's fine tuning and tweaking. UM. But for a guy
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: who figures it out and makes it a part of
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: a system and gets used to it, I think there's
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: definitely some advantages with that type of a system for sure. Yeah.
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 1: So so tell me about how you think about safety
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: with all of this, because as we talk about all
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: these different clouding methods and all these different elevated hunting
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: styles UM and modifying things, safety is a big issue.
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: I'm sure it's on your mind as you're making these decisions.
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: I know that for anyone that's listening or for myself,
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: we obviously have to be very very very careful about
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 1: everything we do. Um, because you are taking your life
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 1: into your own hands and you go into an elevated position. Um,
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 1: you everybody should know that. It's it's one of those
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: things that you are tackling a innately risky type of
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: scenario that you just had to be incredibly careful with. Um.
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: Especially since I became a father, I have just kind
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 1: of worrywarded more and more every time I get up
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 1: into a tree, just trying to make sure I'm doing
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: everything exactly right, taking my time, being very thoughtful about
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: every step I take, every time I'm getting on and off,
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: for every time I'm shifting my handholds or anything, always
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 1: making sure I'm attached. Um, just I can't afford to
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: make a mistake. How do you go about thinking about
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 1: that yourself? And I'm sure you get a million questions
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: from people, people watching your videos, people hearing about how
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 1: you're modifying things, are trying these things. How do you
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: handle the safety topic with those that are listening to
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 1: the things you're doing. Yeah, and it's especially important for
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: me too, because if I make a video on something
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: and somebody tries to replicate, and maybe they do something
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: a little bit different right, or maybe they're a much
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 1: bigger guy than I am. But they can all have
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 1: implications for sure. So typically what I what I look
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: at it as I look through the ends of number one.
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 1: Are there similar industries that are already using these type
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 1: of items? How are they using them? What are the regulations,
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: what are the standard operating procedures, and why are those
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: the way they are. If there's already something within the
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 1: you know, the candoneering industry or rock climbing industry or
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 1: the arborist industry that standard, there's probably a good reason
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: for it. If I am going to deviate from something
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 1: like that, I better have a good reason or understand
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: why it is the way it is in that industry
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 1: and why it might be different for what I'm trying
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 1: to do. UM. The other thing is I will always
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: look at things like the specifications of whatever materials I'm
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: gonna potentially be using. I'll look at test data UM.
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: And this I think helps a little bit. I come
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: from an engineering background, so I'm always looking at tensile strengths. UM.
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 1: I'm looking at how different things made together, am I
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: you know, introducing any risk by using something in conjunction
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: with something else. And the other thing that we have,
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: like even in our industry at work, you know, one
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 1: thing we'll have is we'll call we'll have something called
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 1: the failure Modes and Effects analysis that we'll do when
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: we're designing something in product development, and it basically is
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 1: a list of every single possible thing that could go wrong,
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 1: and then tie it into that is what is the
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 1: severity of you know, this thing happening, and then also
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 1: what is the likelihood or the you know, the occurrence
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: of this potentially happening. So if there's something that is
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: really likely to happen, even if it's you know, something
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: that is maybe not that big of a deal, right
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 1: Like let's say, for example, you using your aid or
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 1: just on your first on your first stick, right, you
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: falling from five ft might not be that big of
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: a deal. You might roll your ankle or you might
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: do something like that, but right that's that's something that
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: is a decision you can make. Conversely, if there's something
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 1: that's very unlikely to happen, but there's severity of it,
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: you know, if it does happen is really really severe,
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 1: you know, like death, then that's also something where you
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: gotta take a step back and say, maybe this isn't
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: you know, worth it. So you've got to look at
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: it from the lens of number one, have we reduced
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: the likelihood of any bad thing happening? And also number
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: two is the severity of it, you know, under control. Um.
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 1: And that's not the decision that anybody can take lightly,
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 1: And it's not a decision that you should just you know,
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 1: look on YouTube or a forum or something and just
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 1: assume that whatever somebody says is right. Um. And ultimately,
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: if you don't feel comfortable, if you have questions about something,
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: you shouldn't do it and just do what's you know
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 1: kind of already been established for sure. Yeah, um, yeah,
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 1: that's that's that's important stuff. And then obviously keeping the
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: common sense things in minds, such as just making sure
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: you're attached to the tree at all times, making sure
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 1: that you are, Yeah, you just used common sense and
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: take your time, don't rush things. It's one of the
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 1: things that I'm that I purs only battle with because
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: I love the idea of being able to get up
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: in the tree fast and having a great system in
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 1: place and being quiet and efficient and bam them up
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: there and I'm hunting. That's kind of like the dream scenario.
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 1: You want to be that quiet, efficient predator. But if
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: you find yourself rushing and you're just I just want
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 1: to get up fast. I want to get it fast.
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 1: Um that's when I think I find myself making a
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: little sloppy mistake or foot slips or you know, you
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: introduce this possibility of of added risk. So I try
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 1: to remind myself that smooth isn't I think it's smooth
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 1: as fast or slow as fast and fast no smooth.
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: I always get this wrong when I try to say
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: it smooth is no slow as smooth and smooth as fast?
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: Is that right, Garett? You know what I know? Yeah,
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: I know the saying that you're going for, and if
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 1: I try to remember it all screw it up. It's
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: basically it's trying to be smooth and take it slow,
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 1: and when you do that, you end up going faster
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 1: than like trying to rush it and getting all hurkey
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 1: jerky and stumbling on what you're trying to do. Um.
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 1: So that's what I tried to keep reminding myself when
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 1: I'm trying to get up in the tree, is just
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: take one step of time and as as you go
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: smoothly through it, it happens in a much more efficient manner.
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 1: And I think one way to do that though, is
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 1: to practice it and to have like a plan in place.
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 1: So when I first started trying to be a mobile hunter, like,
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: I got my sticks, I got my horrible tree stand,
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 1: and then I just went out hunting one day with it,
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 1: and I never practiced with it before, and it must
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 1: have taken me like forty five minutes get up in
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: the tree. I rattled and I clanked buckles, and you know,
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 1: I got up in there, and then I realized, how crap,
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 1: I gotta go down there and get my backpack and
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 1: get my bow. I'd forgotten entire things and just a mess.
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: And year after year after year after year after year,
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 1: I've gotten a little bit better every year and fine
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: tuned my system a little bit to the point where
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 1: now I've got a much better system in place and out.
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: I'm just continuing to modify and trying to make it quieter,
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 1: trying to make it smoother. Um, but telling about what
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: your process is, how do you or what things do
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 1: you try to do to make that process as smooth
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 1: or as efficient or as quiet as possible, Because I'm
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: sure those things are important to you too. Yeah, So
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 1: I have a couple of trees in my backyard, and
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 1: they're not necessarily the easiest trees to climb either, you know,
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 1: aspins with lots of limbs and things like that. And
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 1: when I'm trying all these different climbing methods, or even
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 1: if it's something that I'm familiar with, I always tinker
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 1: and I go on in the backyard and I try
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: climbing with it. And just from a consequence of how
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 1: often I'm back there trying one thing or another, I
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 1: become really comfortable with my equipment and to become much
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 1: more efficient. Being able to use them all becomes kind
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 1: of second nature, And so I think that's definitely something
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 1: that's helpful versus a guy that you know, breaks the
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 1: stuff out a week before the season and just throws
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 1: in the truck and gets ready to hit the woods.
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 1: The other thing that I'll do fairly often, especially this
• 1:17:59
  Speaker 1: time here, because the leaves are down then I don't
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: want to get that awkward feeling of the neighbors watching
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: is I'll just go out and climb the trees in
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 1: the dark, and usually there's enough moonlight or a street light,
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 1: you know, ambiance that I can see what I'm doing
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 1: even without a headlamp, and just having that a little
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 1: bit lower level of visibility helps me get again much
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 1: more familiar with my equipment. That's smart. I like that
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 1: because that's a scenario that at least I find myself
• 1:18:25
  Speaker 1: in more and more often, wanting to go and do
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 1: a running gun set in the morning and you're doing
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: it an hour and a half or two hours before
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 1: daylight or whatever it is. And when I first started
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: trying to do that, that was just kind of a
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: disastrous scenario. I didn't feel comfortable doing it. But I've
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 1: done it so many times that you just you can
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 1: do it with a head lamp, But practicing it the
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: way you're talking about is it's smart, especially if you're
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: just getting started. Um let's okay, let's take the next step.
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 1: Then we we start on the ground. We've talked about
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 1: our ropes, We've talked about our climbing method, We've talked
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 1: about the process of getting out there, and I guess
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 1: one other thing, Um yeah, let's keep on climbing the tree.
• 1:19:05
  Speaker 1: Your process of you know, getting your pack or your
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 1: bow or anything like that, do you do you have
• 1:19:12
  Speaker 1: everything on your back when you climb up into the tree,
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 1: or do you have your bow and your pack on
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 1: the ground and you pull them up with ropes? Or
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 1: what about your sticks when you're going up with Do
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 1: you have all your sticks in your backpack and then
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 1: you pull them off as you start going? Or how
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 1: do you connect all these things to you as you send? Yeah,
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 1: so if I were using the one stick method, I
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 1: probably would have my bow on my pack. But typically
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 1: what I would do, and I'll explain this for you know,
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 1: the three slash four sticks set up, because that's most
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 1: often what I would do and probably what is more
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 1: common for a lot of the listeners. So I get
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 1: to the tree, I take the sticks off the pack,
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 1: lay them all on the ground, same thing on my
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 1: saddle platform, and I lay the bow down and then
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 1: on my pack. I have a retractable pull up rope
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 1: a Doyle's gear hoist that will often use, and I'll
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 1: just connect that to the boat and I'll put the
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 1: pack back on my back. Then I'll take the saddle platform.
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 1: I'll hang it on a loop on the back of
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 1: my saddle so it's right in the middle of by
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: my behind, and then I'll take the sticks I'll take
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 1: one of them, stick it right on the tree. Then
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 1: I'll take sticks two and three and I'll hang them
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 1: on the sides of my harness at my hips. And
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 1: then i'll take that last stick, if it's a fourth stick,
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 1: hunt and I'll climb up onto the first stick, attach
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 1: the lineman's rope, and put that second stick on. So
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 1: then at that point I have two sticks on the tree,
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: I have my pack, my saddle platform, and sticks three
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: and four all ready to go, So I just continue
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 1: climbing with that lyman's rope. I'll take one of the
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 1: sticks off one hip, stick it on the tree, keep climbing,
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 1: take that fourth stick off, attach it, keep climbing, and
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 1: then once I get up to hunting height, essentially, I'll
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 1: take the saddle platform off the back of the saddle
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 1: and I'll stick it onto the tree, climb up onto it,
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 1: hanging the tether first, then climb up onto the platform
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 1: and take out a little utility strap from one of
• 1:21:04
  Speaker 1: my saddle pouches. That utility strap has two hooks on it,
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 1: one for the bow, one for the pack. So once
• 1:21:10
  Speaker 1: that's on the tree, I'll take the pack off my back,
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: hanging on one of those hooks. Then I'll go and
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 1: pull the bow right up and hanging on the other hook,
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 1: and assuming I wasn't filming, that would be it. From
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 1: that point I would be essentially ready to hunt, and
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 1: getting back down to the ground would be the same
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 1: thing in reverse. How do you attach sticks three and
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 1: four to your saddle? What are you using to connect it?
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 1: So there's little plastic clips that you can that you
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 1: can buy um Eastern Woods Outdoors sells these little kiatax things.
• 1:21:42
  Speaker 1: I've also taken like the little the little like snaps,
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 1: little plastic snaps that you can have for like key
• 1:21:49
  Speaker 1: chain holders and things like that, and I just kind
• 1:21:51
  Speaker 1: of break them in half and kind of use zip
• 1:21:53
  Speaker 1: ties to hold them onto the saddle mesh and basically
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 1: just give me a little bit of a hook on
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: that saddle. And then what I can do on my
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 1: sticks and my saddle platforms that take a little piece
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 1: of pair of cord or uh tent guideline or something
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 1: like that, and I will just tie a loop maybe
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 1: two inches in diameter, so two three inches in diameter
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 1: onto the top of the sticks in the platform. So
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 1: I'm able to just basically take those and hang them
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 1: on those little hooks on the saddle. Nice. So your
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 1: your your platform? Um, now that you use the saddle,
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 1: that's kind of replaced a tree stand platform of course
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 1: in most cases. Um, but I know you used to
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: do some different modifications to tree stands and a lot
• 1:22:39
  Speaker 1: of people still do that. UM. I'm curious do you
• 1:22:42
  Speaker 1: do you make any mods to your platform similar to
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 1: what you do with the tree stand? Um? Or you're
• 1:22:47
  Speaker 1: using a platform or have you ever tinkered with making
• 1:22:50
  Speaker 1: your own? I know some guys have made their own platforms.
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 1: I know that Tethered makes one the one I use
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 1: that I like a lot, um, But what are you
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 1: doing with the platform these days? Yeah? So I started
• 1:23:00
  Speaker 1: off with the d I y ones right before before
• 1:23:04
  Speaker 1: you know there was a commercial option. Everybody was anybody
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 1: who was making a setup platform. It was basically d
• 1:23:09
  Speaker 1: I Y at that point in time, and mine was
• 1:23:12
  Speaker 1: no different. And I've graduated to now using the one
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 1: that Tethered hasn't actually helped design that one. Um. But
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 1: I don't really make too many modifications to it myself.
• 1:23:22
  Speaker 1: The only thing that I do is I spray painted
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 1: it and then I added on, you know, the little
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 1: loop so I can hang it from my saddle, and
• 1:23:30
  Speaker 1: I use the mini Versus trap, and then I also
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: you know the UM the verse a button that's cast
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 1: into that post. I ground the diameter of that down
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: a little bit so it's a little bit easier for
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 1: me to put on the loop of the versus trap,
• 1:23:45
  Speaker 1: the mini Versus trap. And that's really all that I've
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 1: done to it. At one point I wrapped it with
• 1:23:51
  Speaker 1: para cord, but then I felt like I wasn't able
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 1: to use the traction on the side quite as well,
• 1:23:55
  Speaker 1: so I'd ended up taking it off. I put I
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 1: got stell strips on the on the post, but apart
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 1: from that, I really haven't modified it too much. Okay,
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 1: so you alluded to a few things that I know
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 1: you do a tree stands to or have, UM, But
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 1: for people that don't use the saddle and they're still
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 1: using a tree stands some kind of lone wolf for
• 1:24:13
  Speaker 1: an XLP or whatever it is, but they want to
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 1: hunt in a mobile fashion. UM, can you describe some
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 1: of these modifications that you recommend for tree stands so
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 1: that you've tried in the past that someone could try. Yeah,
• 1:24:25
  Speaker 1: so for any of like the posts, and I did
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 1: that on the saddle platform. I've done it on my
• 1:24:31
  Speaker 1: lone Wolf stands in the past. I like putting cell
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 1: strips on there because number one adds camo. It makes
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 1: it a soft touch, warmer to the touch. You're not
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 1: holding cold aluminum on your bare hands when you're trying
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 1: to hang the stand. And then of course it makes
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 1: contact much much quieter. So if you were to bang
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 1: the buckle on the post or any part of the platform,
• 1:24:51
  Speaker 1: it would make a whole ton of noise, typically right
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 1: out of the box. But once you add that stell
• 1:24:55
  Speaker 1: strip material, which is you know, that nice kind of
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 1: micro fleece, and you do same thing with the buckle.
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 1: If you're going to be using a buck hole, then
• 1:25:02
  Speaker 1: it really does make a huge difference if you do
• 1:25:04
  Speaker 1: have that accidental contact um. And apart from that, you
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 1: just have to be really careful to make sure that
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 1: you don't make that metal to metal claying. But my experience,
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 1: as careful as you are, usually still mess up at
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: some point, and that could be that it could be
• 1:25:18
  Speaker 1: the end of a hunt, depending on where you're set up.
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 1: So I like the style strips where applicable um on
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 1: the platform itself. For a tree stand, what I've done
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 1: is wrapped the edge, and what I like to do
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 1: on the outer rim of the platform is used even
• 1:25:35
  Speaker 1: something a little bit heavier than paracord, like a quarter
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 1: inch polyester camera rope or something like that, because number one,
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 1: it it really adds a lot of thickness and a
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 1: lot of noise deadening ability, especially when you let that
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: that post kind of swing down. If you get the
• 1:25:51
  Speaker 1: bolts a little bit loose and normally would make that
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 1: big slap um, it really deadens that down entirely. And
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 1: then also it gives you a little bit of a
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 1: tactile feel for where the edge of the platform is
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 1: without having looked down at it. So if I have
• 1:26:04
  Speaker 1: that quarter introop wrapping the outer room of my platform,
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 1: even though it adds a little bit of weight, it
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 1: makes it a little bit more user friendly from my perspective.
• 1:26:13
  Speaker 1: And then the seat I've experimented with a couple of
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 1: things on the seats um actually my loan if I
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 1: took the seat off at one point to put an
• 1:26:22
  Speaker 1: actual p s done with the little bit bigger size
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 1: and the much beefier pad um I've looked into way,
• 1:26:31
  Speaker 1: there's there's a way you can actually take a millennium
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 1: seat like off of their UM sixty s I think
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 1: it is, and modify that on to alone. If I
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 1: never did that one, is that the guys that style? No,
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 1: it's not a sling, it's like it's kind of like
• 1:26:44
  Speaker 1: a lawn chair. It's like a yeah, it's like a
• 1:26:48
  Speaker 1: really tightly held mesh type mesh. Yes, that's kind of
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 1: when I was thinking, yeah, yeah, yeah, So there's ways
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 1: to do that. I haven't done it myself, but those
• 1:26:56
  Speaker 1: are options. And now after after saddle hunting for a while,
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 1: I realized that, like if I go back to a
• 1:27:02
  Speaker 1: tree stand now, I've gotten so used to so many
• 1:27:05
  Speaker 1: different things that I feel like I don't even really
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 1: need the padded, you know, big seat as much I'm
• 1:27:10
  Speaker 1: able to. I'm more comfortable with the more minimal system
• 1:27:12
  Speaker 1: now than I ever used to be. Yeah. So where
• 1:27:13
  Speaker 1: do you stand on the saddle thing? UM? I started
• 1:27:16
  Speaker 1: using one two seasons ago now UM, and it's I've
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 1: just been floored by the by the things that allows
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 1: you to do. UM. So I've become a huge believer.
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 1: Where do you stand on that? Um? You plan just
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 1: using the saddle for most of the time moving forward
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 1: or do you see a need for you know, grabbing
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 1: your portal stand still at times? What's what's where's your
• 1:27:39
  Speaker 1: head at? Yeah, it's definitely my primary system, without a doubt.
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 1: What I usually tell people when they ask I get
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 1: this question quite a bit is I'll still I'm not
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 1: opposed to going back to a tree stand for when
• 1:27:52
  Speaker 1: the situation calls for it. And when the situation might
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 1: call for it would be let's say I got a
• 1:27:56
  Speaker 1: spot where I've pre scouted it. I know exactly the
• 1:27:59
  Speaker 1: tree I want to be in. That tree is maybe
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: a little bit of a slight backward lean. It's got
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 1: a bunch of branches and stuff hanging off the back side.
• 1:28:06
  Speaker 1: So ideally, in that setup, i'd be on the front
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 1: side of the tree with a little bit backward lean,
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 1: and that's where I would put my tree stand platform.
• 1:28:11
  Speaker 1: And that would be like one scenario. But if I'm
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 1: going and blind to a spot, or if it's you know,
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 1: anything else, then maybe that particular scenario that I just described.
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 1: I feel like there's a lot more versatility with the
• 1:28:24
  Speaker 1: saddle in terms of where I can you know, set
• 1:28:27
  Speaker 1: it up not only in the tree, but also on
• 1:28:28
  Speaker 1: the ground. Like some of those ground type setups that
• 1:28:30
  Speaker 1: I alluded to earlier. If I'm sitting on the front
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 1: side of a tree, a lot of times I'll do
• 1:28:34
  Speaker 1: is I'll just take that platform and I'll hang at
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 1: six inches off the ground, and that gives me a
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 1: little bit more clearance from my cam when I'm swinging
• 1:28:39
  Speaker 1: the bow around the ground level. Um. Same thing if
• 1:28:42
  Speaker 1: I'm on the back side of the tree, I can
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 1: hang the tether off the back side of a big tree,
• 1:28:46
  Speaker 1: hanging behind that tree in the shade, and basically be
• 1:28:50
  Speaker 1: more comfortable than if I was just sitting on the
• 1:28:52
  Speaker 1: ground or standing behind the tree. So it really I
• 1:28:54
  Speaker 1: feel like it gives me a lot of versatility in
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: addition to obviously being you know, quiet, safe, uh portable system. Yeah.
• 1:29:02
  Speaker 1: You know, big thing I've always liked about the saddle
• 1:29:05
  Speaker 1: setup is just how much more lightweight it is. You know,
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 1: if you've got a couple of mile hike in it
• 1:29:11
  Speaker 1: just it's it's a night and day difference between hiking
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 1: and with sticks in the stand versus just sticks um
• 1:29:18
  Speaker 1: in the bulk and everything. We've talked a ton about
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 1: your kind of hunt, your your elevated hunting gear. Um,
• 1:29:27
  Speaker 1: is there anything else from your you know, the whole
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 1: selection of gear that you have found helps you cut weight.
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 1: If we're talking about how to become more lightweight when
• 1:29:39
  Speaker 1: it comes to hunt, heading in to hunt anything we
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 1: haven't talked about traditional both saves you a few pounds. Yeah, sure,
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 1: that's obviously not practical for a lot of guys. Um
• 1:29:51
  Speaker 1: One thing that I played on a little bit this
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 1: year actually was both my boot system for late season
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 1: and my clothing system that both had significant impacts on
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: how much weight and carrying in once it colder. So
• 1:30:02
  Speaker 1: in the past, when it's gotten cold enough, have either
• 1:30:06
  Speaker 1: walked in with heavy boots or walked in with lighter
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 1: boots and carried heavier boots. But one of the things
• 1:30:13
  Speaker 1: I did this year, and I really ended up liking
• 1:30:15
  Speaker 1: it quite a bit, was I used uninsulated boots and
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 1: just like a lightweight pair of hiking socks for every
• 1:30:22
  Speaker 1: hunt this year. And what I would basically do is
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 1: I would pack in a pair of those insulated boot covers,
• 1:30:30
  Speaker 1: you know, like the Arctic Shield ones. There's a there's
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 1: a couple other brands out there now too. I think
• 1:30:34
  Speaker 1: Dan Johnson does the same thing now, and he said
• 1:30:36
  Speaker 1: he he likes that it's it's definitely less weight than
• 1:30:41
  Speaker 1: bringing in an extra pair of boots. You can supplement
• 1:30:43
  Speaker 1: it with handwarmers if need be, and your feet don't
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 1: sweat nearly as much. At least for me, my feet
• 1:30:49
  Speaker 1: sweat even when I'm sitting on the couch watching a
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 1: football game. Right. So, so what I like to do
• 1:30:54
  Speaker 1: now is I'll take a like a anti persprint footloation,
• 1:30:58
  Speaker 1: I'll rub it on my feet and I'll put on
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 1: the a liner sock, you know, thin polypropylene. Then I'll
• 1:31:02
  Speaker 1: put on a midweight wolfsock and then an uninsulated boot
• 1:31:06
  Speaker 1: and that'll take me without my feet sweating as far
• 1:31:09
  Speaker 1: as I want to go. And then once I get
• 1:31:10
  Speaker 1: set up, I'll put those boot covers on and add
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 1: the handwarmers if needby, and my feet have not gotten cold.
• 1:31:16
  Speaker 1: So that's definitely a big step up in terms of
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 1: just kind of usability and comfort in the woods. In
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 1: addition to not having to carry that extra weight that
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 1: I would used to. I used to bring impact boots
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: lash thows onto my stand just so that my feet
• 1:31:30
  Speaker 1: wouldn't get cold, And that's that's not going to be
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 1: an issue anymore. The other thing I played around with
• 1:31:36
  Speaker 1: was you know, Historically I would be the Bibbs and
• 1:31:39
  Speaker 1: Park a kind of guy, and I would walk in
• 1:31:43
  Speaker 1: with bass layers and some kind of windshell, and then
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 1: once I got to the tree, then I would put
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 1: on my insulating layers, so I would almost be kind
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 1: of like doubling up on the shell fabric. And what
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 1: I tried this year is basically I would take a
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 1: little bit oversized shell and I would walk in with
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 1: that over top of the bass layer. But then I
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 1: would just pack in puffy type garments, you know, whether
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 1: it was a synthetic puffy or a down puffy, and
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 1: then once I get to the tree and get set up,
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: I would take off that shell, put on the puffy jacket,
• 1:32:14
  Speaker 1: and put the shell back on over top. And that
• 1:32:17
  Speaker 1: saves me a significant amount of not only weight but
• 1:32:20
  Speaker 1: also bulk when you look at it from the perspective
• 1:32:23
  Speaker 1: of just how many layers of clothing I would typically
• 1:32:25
  Speaker 1: be wearing. Yeah, yeah, I like that a lot. I've
• 1:32:28
  Speaker 1: tried something similar. Um, just whatever way you go about it,
• 1:32:32
  Speaker 1: having a layering system like that in mind, and in
• 1:32:35
  Speaker 1: knowing when to use some and when to add some later.
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 1: Just having that figured out is a big shift for
• 1:32:41
  Speaker 1: a lot of people. That helps, So it's smart to
• 1:32:44
  Speaker 1: be thinking about that stuff. Um yeah, definitely anything else
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 1: on that front or otherwise. I'm curious about heavyweight hunting,
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 1: trying to think in terms of in terms of lightweight,
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 1: you know, lighthead lamp white, I knows. Um, I mean
• 1:33:04
  Speaker 1: your boat was gonna weigh, your boat was gonna weigh.
• 1:33:07
  Speaker 1: You know. That's kind of almost a separate discussion. Um. Well,
• 1:33:11
  Speaker 1: I can't really think of anything to too ultra specific.
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 1: I mean, like I mentioned, I don't really carry all
• 1:33:16
  Speaker 1: that much stuff. If I didn't wear my eventdn't packing
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 1: camera gear every hunt, then my setup would be, you know,
• 1:33:22
  Speaker 1: nearly as minimalist as just about any but I almost
• 1:33:24
  Speaker 1: wouldt even need to bring a pack on a lot
• 1:33:26
  Speaker 1: of hunts until it gets colder. Yeah, that's a good
• 1:33:28
  Speaker 1: point you bring up. You're you're filming your hunts, and
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 1: more and more people want to do that. Um. I've
• 1:33:34
  Speaker 1: self filmed a ton of hunts and I know it's
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 1: it's really cool, but it's also real pain in the butt. Um.
• 1:33:41
  Speaker 1: Any advice as far as how you fine tune yourself
• 1:33:43
  Speaker 1: filming system? Um? Any favorite pieces of gear? Anything worth
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 1: mentioning there. So I've come to learn that a head
• 1:33:52
  Speaker 1: mounted camera is in my in my experience and opinion,
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 1: I must have. I found that there's been so many
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 1: times with the head mounted cameras saved me when I
• 1:34:01
  Speaker 1: wasn't able to get great footage on the main camera
• 1:34:03
  Speaker 1: that it's absolutely always a part of my system now.
• 1:34:06
  Speaker 1: And with the saddle hunting, I like to run a
• 1:34:09
  Speaker 1: wide angle action camera on my tether looking back down
• 1:34:12
  Speaker 1: for a nice second angle that I can um that
• 1:34:14
  Speaker 1: I can throw in. And then in terms of kind
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 1: of the main camera set up, there's a couple of
• 1:34:19
  Speaker 1: decent systems for you know, mobile ultra light. If a
• 1:34:23
  Speaker 1: guy wants that kind of a camera, I'm set up.
• 1:34:25
  Speaker 1: UM out on a limb makes a good system. UM
• 1:34:29
  Speaker 1: fourth Arrow makes a decent system too. UM. I actually
• 1:34:32
  Speaker 1: modified mine pretty heavily from what it originally was, swapped
• 1:34:35
  Speaker 1: all the steel stuff with a luminum to make it
• 1:34:37
  Speaker 1: a little bit lighter. But apart from what type of
• 1:34:43
  Speaker 1: arm you're running and what type of camera you have,
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: it's it's pretty cotton dry in terms of that main camera,
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 1: and there's not really a whole lot that I do
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 1: that's really unique. Um. The hide camera is definitely something
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 1: that I feel like if a guy's having issues or
• 1:34:58
  Speaker 1: struggles with self domingus hunts as is, heading in a
• 1:35:02
  Speaker 1: head camera and running an external battery into that camera
• 1:35:05
  Speaker 1: and just letting it record the entire evening hunt makes
• 1:35:09
  Speaker 1: it a lot easier to get done what you need
• 1:35:11
  Speaker 1: to get down without worrying about hitting extra buttons and
• 1:35:14
  Speaker 1: making extra movements. Um, and then you can just add
• 1:35:16
  Speaker 1: it out whatever you need to after the hunt is over. Yeah,
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 1: it looks like you've got to I don't know, like
• 1:35:22
  Speaker 1: you're flying a jet plane or something. When you see
• 1:35:25
  Speaker 1: the setup you've got in your head, it's a it's
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 1: a quite a system you've got in place. At the
• 1:35:28
  Speaker 1: battery pack on the back and then this this camera
• 1:35:31
  Speaker 1: on the side. Describe what camera you're using, how you
• 1:35:34
  Speaker 1: connect all these things. I think you've got to external mic,
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 1: a little little tiny boom mic attached to at least
• 1:35:40
  Speaker 1: I've seen you you wear that at least once. Um,
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 1: what's that system? Yeah, So I've tried a few different
• 1:35:47
  Speaker 1: microphone things and not been all ultimately extremely happy with
• 1:35:51
  Speaker 1: a lot of them. Really, the easiest thing from if
• 1:35:56
  Speaker 1: you if you separate yourself from the main camera, which
• 1:35:58
  Speaker 1: might have a shotgun like in it. For capturing that
• 1:36:01
  Speaker 1: other audio, I like to have just a lavelier MIC
• 1:36:06
  Speaker 1: into a recording device that's tucked into a chuest pocket
• 1:36:09
  Speaker 1: and just have that run the entire hunt, and that's
• 1:36:11
  Speaker 1: capturing all my voice audio, and it's just capturing kind
• 1:36:14
  Speaker 1: of your your ambient noise and ambient audio that sometimes
• 1:36:17
  Speaker 1: mirror may not be better than what your action cameras
• 1:36:19
  Speaker 1: are able to capture. Um in. Generally your main camera
• 1:36:23
  Speaker 1: with your chotgun mic is going to be the best audio.
• 1:36:27
  Speaker 1: But then in terms of the other stuff that's on
• 1:36:28
  Speaker 1: my head. I've done a Sony X three thousand on
• 1:36:34
  Speaker 1: a Solvid head mount I've done an Osmo Pocket on
• 1:36:39
  Speaker 1: a d I y headstrap. Both of those basically with
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 1: external batteries plugged in. Either one works. I liked the
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 1: footage quality definitely the Osmo Pocket better, but it is
• 1:36:49
  Speaker 1: a significantly more hassle prone piece of equipment to use
• 1:36:53
  Speaker 1: than the Sony was. And I think even now there's
• 1:36:56
  Speaker 1: there's definitely better options than that Sony, like the Missouri
• 1:36:59
  Speaker 1: Hunt I filmed on the Sony for the head mountain
• 1:37:02
  Speaker 1: looking at like the go Pro eight and other cameras
• 1:37:05
  Speaker 1: that are on the market right now, like the Instant
• 1:37:07
  Speaker 1: three sixty one are they have a one inch sensor
• 1:37:10
  Speaker 1: action camera. Um, they're definitely better now than what I've
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: used on some of my videos in the past. So
• 1:37:16
  Speaker 1: it real simply is just if four K action camera.
• 1:37:20
  Speaker 1: I think four four K is huge for a head
• 1:37:21
  Speaker 1: mountain because you're gonna want to have to crop, you know,
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 1: you capture wide, capture everything, and then you crop in
• 1:37:26
  Speaker 1: editing to get something that's respectable. Um, so some guys
• 1:37:30
  Speaker 1: will film in ten eighty. I think it's absolutely on
• 1:37:32
  Speaker 1: an action camera in my opinion, worth at the film
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 1: in four K and just deal with the bigger file
• 1:37:37
  Speaker 1: sizes and deal with a little bit extra editing work
• 1:37:40
  Speaker 1: to crop in, and I think you tend to be
• 1:37:42
  Speaker 1: a little bit more happy with the end result. Yes,
• 1:37:46
  Speaker 1: that's uh, that's something that I have I wish I
• 1:37:51
  Speaker 1: did more often. I've always had a go Pro and
• 1:37:54
  Speaker 1: that I have never liked it on my head. I
• 1:37:57
  Speaker 1: just never got comfortable with it. So I would put
• 1:38:00
  Speaker 1: a tree mount or I would stick it on a
• 1:38:02
  Speaker 1: like a selfie stick or something and stick that in
• 1:38:05
  Speaker 1: my backpack and then I would tell myself, well, when
• 1:38:07
  Speaker 1: you when you've got a deer coming in, you'll just
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 1: you'll remember to turn it on and hit record and
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 1: eight times at a time. I don't. It's been great
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 1: a couple of times I used it. But your system
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 1: of always having it there and always having it on,
• 1:38:21
  Speaker 1: that that makes a lot of sense. But uh yeah,
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 1: because typically you're if your right hand, you're gonna have
• 1:38:28
  Speaker 1: the camera on the left side of your head, and
• 1:38:30
  Speaker 1: so if you don't have it turned on, that means
• 1:38:32
  Speaker 1: you got to If you've got your bow already held
• 1:38:34
  Speaker 1: in your left hand, it means you gotta take your
• 1:38:36
  Speaker 1: right hand, reach across your body and turn that camera on.
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 1: And I've gotten bust over that a little bit of
• 1:38:40
  Speaker 1: movement before trying to turn that camera on. So I
• 1:38:43
  Speaker 1: was like to leave him running. Yeah smart. Um, well,
• 1:38:47
  Speaker 1: I've been yapping your ear off for longer than I
• 1:38:50
  Speaker 1: thought I was going to. Um, so I want to
• 1:38:52
  Speaker 1: I want to wrap this up so your whole night's
• 1:38:54
  Speaker 1: not sunk. But but we spent a lot of time.
• 1:38:59
  Speaker 1: You know, we're talking about first your style of hunting
• 1:39:04
  Speaker 1: and then the gear you use to allow that style
• 1:39:08
  Speaker 1: of hunting. It's it's being mobile, it's being adaptable, it's
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 1: adjusting to what you're seeing, what's working, what's not the
• 1:39:17
  Speaker 1: the kind of stuff strategy or the sort of stuff strategy.
• 1:39:21
  Speaker 1: And if if that is the strategy that you plan
• 1:39:26
  Speaker 1: on moving forward with, and that's gonna be right, some
• 1:39:29
  Speaker 1: evolution of that will be how you're hunting five years
• 1:39:32
  Speaker 1: from now, ten years from now. You want to be
• 1:39:34
  Speaker 1: getting better and better every year. Tell me this, when
• 1:39:38
  Speaker 1: you sit down at night this year it's it's the winter.
• 1:39:43
  Speaker 1: I'm sure based off of what I do know from
• 1:39:46
  Speaker 1: you and what I can imagine about you, is that
• 1:39:48
  Speaker 1: you're probably like me, and that when you lay down
• 1:39:50
  Speaker 1: at night, a whole lot of nights are thinking about
• 1:39:51
  Speaker 1: what can I what can I be doing better? Or
• 1:39:53
  Speaker 1: what's the next thing, or how do I how do
• 1:39:56
  Speaker 1: I prep this? Even you know, even more perfectly for
• 1:39:59
  Speaker 1: the US next season. Um, for you, what's what's next,
• 1:40:04
  Speaker 1: what's the next step? What do you feel is that
• 1:40:07
  Speaker 1: next evolution you need to take or you want to
• 1:40:10
  Speaker 1: take to better fine tune how you go about hunting deer.
• 1:40:14
  Speaker 1: And maybe that's a gear thing, maybe it's a strategy thing,
• 1:40:16
  Speaker 1: Maybe it's some combination of the two. Um, I'm just
• 1:40:20
  Speaker 1: curious where your imagination is pointing you right now. So
• 1:40:24
  Speaker 1: one thing for sure is definitely even more boots on
• 1:40:27
  Speaker 1: the ground for some of the stuff that I hunted
• 1:40:29
  Speaker 1: last year. There was definitely areas that I hunted that
• 1:40:31
  Speaker 1: we're new and I was able to get on deer
• 1:40:33
  Speaker 1: and kind of figure it out in the moment. But
• 1:40:36
  Speaker 1: like I mentioned earlier in the podcast, if I can
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 1: go back in there knowing what I know now and
• 1:40:41
  Speaker 1: just pick those areas apart, then I don't know the
• 1:40:42
  Speaker 1: exact right treaty be in the first hunt rather than
• 1:40:45
  Speaker 1: picking it apart and figuring out after you know, two
• 1:40:47
  Speaker 1: or three different hunts. And I think one thing that
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 1: I could do better also is identify dear that I
• 1:40:56
  Speaker 1: might want to go after. I've never really done a
• 1:40:57
  Speaker 1: great job at that um in terms of, you know,
• 1:41:02
  Speaker 1: using trail cameras and figuring out, Okay, I know these
• 1:41:04
  Speaker 1: particular you know deer in these particular areas, and now
• 1:41:08
  Speaker 1: based on that, I'm gonna go back in there a
• 1:41:09
  Speaker 1: lot of times, but I usually end up falling into
• 1:41:12
  Speaker 1: the trap of is I'll just hunt in a place
• 1:41:14
  Speaker 1: that I want to hunt and hope that there's something
• 1:41:17
  Speaker 1: out there that I want to go after. Um. And
• 1:41:20
  Speaker 1: sometimes I'll you know, be totally happy filling doe tag
• 1:41:22
  Speaker 1: or from hunting with the traditional ball be hunt, you know,
• 1:41:24
  Speaker 1: happy with just about whatever. But I've never really said, like,
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 1: you know, hey, there's this deer here, I'm gonna going
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: after him. And maybe that's something I'm not quite ready
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 1: yet for. Um. But I think that as I continue
• 1:41:39
  Speaker 1: to get more and more years of doing this really
• 1:41:41
  Speaker 1: mobile type strategy and I see more and more things
• 1:41:44
  Speaker 1: in more and more different places, that eventually, if I
• 1:41:47
  Speaker 1: get to the point where I do want to say
• 1:41:49
  Speaker 1: I want to go after this deer or deer of
• 1:41:51
  Speaker 1: this particular caliber, I think the next step for me
• 1:41:55
  Speaker 1: is really getting a better handle on identifying and locating
• 1:41:58
  Speaker 1: exactly where those deer might be because they're just not
• 1:42:02
  Speaker 1: they're not there's not as many of them out there
• 1:42:04
  Speaker 1: as you know, we'd like to hope always. UM. So
• 1:42:07
  Speaker 1: that's that's definitely something where I could learn to improve on. Yeah, well,
• 1:42:11
  Speaker 1: I I like where your head's at. Um. That's definitely
• 1:42:15
  Speaker 1: something that I have experienced with. And I'll just give
• 1:42:18
  Speaker 1: you one word of warning is if you go down
• 1:42:20
  Speaker 1: that path, it is addicting, it is all consuming, and
• 1:42:24
  Speaker 1: it will keep you up at night. But it's a
• 1:42:27
  Speaker 1: lot of fun. It's a lot of fun to try
• 1:42:29
  Speaker 1: to figure a deer out. Frustrating at times, but a
• 1:42:33
  Speaker 1: ton of fun. So that's pretty awesome, man. I'm I'm
• 1:42:36
  Speaker 1: getting to kick out of things you're doing and the
• 1:42:37
  Speaker 1: stuff and the stories you're sharing, and the the way
• 1:42:40
  Speaker 1: you're approaching gear and and uh, I'm learning stuff. So
• 1:42:44
  Speaker 1: I appreciate that, and I'm sure everyone listening does too.
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 1: So if people want to follow what you're up to
• 1:42:51
  Speaker 1: learn more about the million different things you've got going on,
• 1:42:55
  Speaker 1: where can they find your content? Sure? So most of
• 1:43:00
  Speaker 1: my content is on my YouTube channel. That channel is
• 1:43:03
  Speaker 1: called d I Y Sportsman. You can just type that
• 1:43:05
  Speaker 1: into the search bar on YouTube and they'll pull right up.
• 1:43:09
  Speaker 1: I also have a Facebook page Instagram under the same
• 1:43:13
  Speaker 1: handles d I Y Underscore Sportsman for Instagram and d
• 1:43:15
  Speaker 1: I Y Sportsman for Facebook. I have a website, d
• 1:43:18
  Speaker 1: I Y dash Sportsman dot com. And then I also
• 1:43:22
  Speaker 1: have a podcast that's through the Sports and Nation podcast Network,
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 1: so the network the DAN runs I have the d
• 1:43:27
  Speaker 1: I Y Sportsman podcast, So those will be all places
• 1:43:30
  Speaker 1: where people can look up to the content that I offer. Awesome,
• 1:43:33
  Speaker 1: super cool stuff. Gerett, keep up the good work and
• 1:43:37
  Speaker 1: thanks so much for taking some time to chat tonight. Yeah,
• 1:43:40
  Speaker 1: absolutely had a great time. Let's uh, let's follow up
• 1:43:43
  Speaker 1: it again sometime soon. Sounds good and that's gonna do it.
• 1:43:48
  Speaker 1: Another episode in the books. Thank you all for listening.
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 1: I hope you guys found this one to be interesting.
• 1:43:53
  Speaker 1: I know I did. Again, I just want to reiterate
• 1:43:56
  Speaker 1: the whole safety thing with any of this stuff. Using
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 1: tree stands, you using saddles, using different climbing methods, place
• 1:44:03
  Speaker 1: safety first. Your life is in your own hands. Take
• 1:44:06
  Speaker 1: that seriously. Be safe, stay connected, use the proper safety
• 1:44:10
  Speaker 1: tools and methods, and don't risk your life trying to
• 1:44:13
  Speaker 1: get a deer. All that said, have a wonderful day,
• 1:44:18
  Speaker 1: have a great weekend, Enjoy the rest of your run
• 1:44:20
  Speaker 1: on the treadmill, your day of work, or your drive home,
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 1: whatever it is, and until next time, stay wired to hunt.