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Wired To Hunt Podcast #231: My 2018 Montana Public Land Deer Hunt & More · 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,
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: your host, Mark Kenyan. This episode number two hundred and
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: thirty one, and today in the show, myself, Spencer and
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Further are recapping our early September hunts and I am
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: excited to be able to share with you the story
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: of the successful conclusion to my Montana public land hunt.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: All right, before we get to all that, though, big
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: things to our partners at Lacrosse Boots for their support
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: of this podcast episode. And I actually have a great
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Lacrosse Boots story to share with you from this Montana hunt.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: I've been on about my regular knee high rubber boots
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: for the hunt. Um, but I knew I was going
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: to be crossing a river a handful of times, quite
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: a few times, actually, so I made the mistake of
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: being a cheapskate and buying some fifteen dollar packable waiters
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: from Amazon. These things were trash and the first time
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: using them, they ripped, so I had to go. I
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: to drive over an hour to the nearest city where
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: I could get some better kind of waiters or boots,
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: and they're at the local kind of farm supply store.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: I was able to get some across hip boots. These
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: things were exactly what I needed. I brought them back
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: to the property I was hunting, and they were able
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: to get me across the river, down the river, through
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: the river many many times of the course of the
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: four days I was hunting there. So I should have
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: just gotten something high quality that in the first place.
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: But none of this is say my across boosts. Both
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: the rubber boots and the hip boots worked great for
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: this hunt. And uh now I'm glad I've got a
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: great pair for these to do some creek crossings and
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: traversing in miss Chegain as well in other places. So
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: if you're interested in learning more about the cross boots
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: for yourself, you can visit Lacrosse Footwear dot com. All right,
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: by Onyx and today we're coming to you live from Montana,
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: North Dakota, and South Dakota. It's me further and Spencer
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: and I thought the plan for today could be for
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: us just to recap how our first week of hunts
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: have gone, because all three of us have been hunting
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: out in these different states. Um, early September hunts. Dan
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: couldn't be with us because he's still in the mountains
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: chasing elk, but I've heard they've been having some close calls.
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: I'm sure next week we'll have some interesting updates from him.
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: But really quick, let's do a quick roll call. Um,
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: I want to hear who has filled their tag so
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: far off the three of us. Uh, Spencer, if you've
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: killed the bucks, say I nay? Okay further now, this
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: seems like the shame most plug here for you. Man,
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: I don't have a tag till yet. Okay, I'll say
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: mark yea buck tag filled? Um. Do you guys wanna
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: hear about my story first? Or you want to tell
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: me your stories? I think Josh and I have pretty
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: short updates, so maybe we should get hours out of
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: the way. All right, Well, Spencer, what's the story on
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: Lieutenant Dan. Uh? The story is he's still out there
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: and he is safe. Um. I got to haunt the
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: first and the third. I had the winds that I
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: wanted to get a chance at him. Um, I was there,
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: but he was not, So I don't know at this
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: point I think he has kind of changed his pattern,
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: and where I have an opportunity to hunt him at
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: is now like a secondary pattern. I guess I am
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: just trying to catch him deviating from what he normally does.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: And when he shows up in this property that I
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: can haunt like once every five days or whatever it is.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: And so my hope has been that if I'm there,
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: like nine out of the first ten days or something,
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: I'm going to get a chance at him. So I
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: was there on the first and the third, he did
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: not show up. Um on the fourth, we got about
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: a half inch of rain that day, and uh, the
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: property that it haunted at the end of like three
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: miles of dirt road, minimal maintenance, and so I literally
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: couldn't even get back there. And so the fourth and
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: the fifth I had to haunt, like my plan C
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: setups um, you know, miles away from where Lieutenant Dan
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: is and I did not have any very good action then.
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: And so as at this point, my season has been
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: very very slow. Deer movement for me has been like
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: a three out of ten if we go by the
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: radio standards. Now, I don't think that's indicative of what's
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: actually going on. The weather. It's been uh, pretty solid
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: if if you wanted to kill a mature buck right now.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: The mosquitoes, though, those have been a ten out of ten.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: They they have showed up to every hunt for me,
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: So it has been slow so far. I don't think
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: the velvet buck thing is going to happen, but this
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: has all been gravy for me getting to hunt in
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: early September. Um, you know, I didn't I think that
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: was gonna get to happen this year. So even though
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: it didn't work out, this is not like a finality
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: ending for me. Um. I'll get to keep hunting with
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: this tag. Um you know it's it's from my home county,
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: so I'll be out there a lot. And like if
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: my season was a round of golf, I haven't even
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: got the whole one yet. I'm just at the driving range,
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: so there's a lot to go and I'm still feeling
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: pretty positive. Um well, as further knows, I'm very good
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: at golf. So UM, I love these analogies, and that
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: was like, thank you, thank you. I always like to
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: I like to imagine Steve Ornella is listening and make
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: a bunch of sport ball references. Is that he is
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: not going to get sport ball and you're right he would.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: They would all go right over his head, Um Spencer.
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: I was what I was curious about, was, um, this
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: setup where you were hoping to get a shot at
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: at your buck there? What was that like? Can you
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: describe what that setup was and why you thought you
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: would have a chance at him there? So it's a
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: large property, um, like hundreds of acres, but about we're
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: probably it is beans and there's just a small amount
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: of timber. Um. So there's a very fine line between
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: me being aggressive and me being passive when it comes
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: to hunting this buck, because um, there's a lack of
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: betting that I have access to, and that betting isn't
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: too far off of this field edge. So I have
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: just been playing it safe for now and I have
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: been hunting um the edge of a bean field hoping
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: to catch him out, hoping to catch him coming out
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: beating at night. And so you haven't seen him obviously,
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: like you said, Now, you did tell me off the
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: air a couple of days ago that you were trying
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: to figure him out a little more and you had
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: something happened. Is that something you can explain? What happened.
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: How you thought, maybe that hazard has an impacted things. Yes,
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: So that was back on August twenty three. I believe
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: it was. UM. I had checked the trail camera that
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: he had been kind of a regular on, and all
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: of a sudden, UM, he was showing up less and less,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: and so I was losing confidence about where this deer
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: was betting. I kind of had in my mind, um
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: once I started keeping tabs at him back in June. Um. Yeah,
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: it was pretty confident where he was at in June, July,
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: early August. And we get to the end of August, UM,
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: and he was showing up less. So I thought maybe
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: I wasn't accurate with where he was betting at. UM.
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: So I tried to get in a little bit deeper
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: into the property. Uh. Like I said, this was August,
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: to get a camera up there with hopes um of
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: me maybe catching him uh earlier, well, me catching him
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: between the bean field and where I thought he was betting.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: The problem was, I got the camera up, turned around
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: to leave, and I busted him out of some plump
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: thickets and he was bedded in the general area that
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: I thought, but closer to the field edge than I
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: was expecting when he busted though, Uh, he he ran
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: out of the plump thickets and got into a thick
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: part of the creek bottom and never turned around the
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: whole time. Um. He was in a thick area where
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: he would not have been able to see me. He
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: just heard me up there. The wind was also in
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: my face, strong wind like twenty um. So he was
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: just busting based off of my sound. And so it
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: was a bad deal. You never want to bust a
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: deer um, you know, especially that close to the season,
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: one that was open and get a chance in. But
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: everything was positive about it, I guess as positive as
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: it could be. Um. He didn't smell me, he didn't
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: see me, um, and so I felt okay about it.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: That area has a lot of coyotes. Um. You know,
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: he could have thought it was a coyote or or
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: anything else. Um. So when I got back up to
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: the field edge, hoping uh that I could maybe confuse him,
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: I lit the area up with mock scrapes uh and
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: and put fresh year and and all of them, thinking
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: that maybe if he were to come back to that
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: field edge and he would uh find it a coincidence
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: that while there's all these mock scrapes here and I
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: just got busted by something that was hanging out near
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: the plump thicket where I bed. Maybe there's another mature
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: buck around here, just hoping to to confuse him, maybe
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: pique his interest to to show up there a little
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: bit more often. Um. And it was only like three
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: days later, August twenty six, I believe, and he was
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: on camera again, right around shooting light. So although I
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: busted him, um, I don't think it was the end
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: of the world. And I don't think that's affected any
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: of my hunts quite yet. It's an interesting idea you
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: had there about your little mock scrape surprise for him. Um.
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: Just just ye, just how I busted him. You know,
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: he didn't lay eyes on me, and I'm sure he
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: didn't smell me. I never got down wind of him,
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: and the wind was so strong it never swirled and
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: gave him an advantage. Um. So I just thought it
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: wasn't gonna hurt anything, certainly, and I just hope that,
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: you know, maybe that would pique his interest and get
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: him showing up to that being field again. Okay, So
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: that didn't work out, though, at least as far as
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: getting you out there getting a shot out there. Now
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: you're out of it because of the muddy road. What's
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: your game plan for the next couple of weeks? Now,
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: the next couple of weeks, I'll be hunting, um, like
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: my sea property and my d property, um, which don't
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: set up well for early season. Now if this were
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: in November, Like my c property is actually my A
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: property and it's kind of confusing, um. But I'll give
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: it a few more days here, hoping that I can
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: catch a random velvet buck that I didn't know existed
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: on one of these other um pieces of ground, that
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: I can haunt it. And I'll do some public land
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: setups as well, um, just just to keep me out
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: there and with hopes that I can find a summer
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: pattern book. But I don't think it's going to happen
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: um at this point, bumber. Well, like you said, though,
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: there's still lots of golf that we played, and if
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: there's a Tiger Woods in the hunting world, they gotta
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: believe it's U Spencer. Um. We just we won't tell
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: your wife about the infidelity part. But otherwise, UM, see,
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: I got I got sport ball jokes too, like that.
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: That's right, that one wasn't as good though, Yeah, probably not.
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: But what can you do? Um? Further, are you curious
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: about anything with Spencer or do you just want to
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: dive right into your story? What? Yes? Not to what like?
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: Um like time of movement? Like when have you kind
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: of started seeing some deer moving? Like I know you
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: said that moving was like three out of ten, but
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: hasn't been late like real late or what have you
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: been sitting there? So my hunts have been so poor.
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: I have not even spotted a buck to this point.
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: Everything I've seen have been dough was. I think on
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: each hunt I've seen um, three to four doughs with
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: their fonds, and much of that movement has been early, like, um,
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: I would say one hour to ninety minutes prior to
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: the sun going down. What kind of time frame have
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: you seen? Further? Mine's all been like real late, Um,
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: you know, like half hour before dark. Um. I did
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: see some a few doughs kind of filtering through, um
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: like five o'clock ish, but then it just kind of
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: shuts down until at last little last little bit of light.
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: But yeah, everything's been been pretty late. So so let's
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: back up. Though, I guess you're you're out in North Dakota.
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: You're at this spot that we did some scouting this
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: spring at Um, how did you I know, like last
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: time you're on the podcast, you talked a little bit
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: about how you've been looking at some maps to figure
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: out kind of what your game plan was going to be.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: But how did you actually execute on that? Because what
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: you're in day three now? So how what have you
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: done so far? Yeah, so I'll give a sport ball
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: uh analogy here real quick. So I'm I'm maybe like
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: I'm maybe like a beer or two into my like
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: golf round, and that's really when I get going, like
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: get a little bit of swing. Loop gone. You're not
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: much swing and uh hopefully hopefully I'm making the turn
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: here after nine holes and I'm coming in the home
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: stretch strong. Let's be honest, though, you're way past two
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: beers after nine holes. Job, I don't know, because I
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: get to that point where just feeling good enough where
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: I just walk up to the ball and hit it.
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: I don't think about it too much. Um. But yeah,
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: so I kind of had picked out a couple of
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: spots that I wanted to try to to sit the
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: first couple of nights and more or less just observation stands, um,
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: but also putting myself in this situation where it could
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: be a a good spot. Um, you know if if
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: something did come come through, and um, the first night
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: was better than the second night. And uh, basically I
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: picked some spots on this on this in this river
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: bottom um where there are some heavy, heavy trail crossings
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: across the river and I was able to access them
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: via the river pretty easily. Um, other than the fact
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: that they've been really long hikes to get in there. Um.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: But I was I stayed away from the cover um
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: where I think they're all betted up, and then I
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: was trying to get in between where I think they're
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: going to be headed out at night to to to
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: to feed. UM. I think what I figured out is
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: I need to get in closer to them. UM. I
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: think I've just too far away from I think that's
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: part of the reason I'm seeing the late movement is
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: that I just need to bust in on him a
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: little bit more. What what then is going to be
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: the plane tonight? What are what's the setup? And look
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: like I'm so tonight the spot I'm I'm looking at,
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: I gotta double check the wind and everything here, um
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: before I head back out, and don't have any service
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: that I'm gonna go across the river from where I
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: was at the first night. Um, I did see one
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: decent buck, just got a quick glimpse of them before
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: I lost him and all the all the brush, and
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: he was kind of working around that the point of
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: this this river bend, and uh, there's a couple of
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: spots over there that can kicking that. I think I
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: can get set up um and hopefully then see back
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: into some of that thicker cover, um better than what
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: I could the first night. So I'm gonna cross the river.
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to be more than a hundred hundred
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: and fifty yards where I was from the first night,
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: but it seems to be that's where more the action
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: was was taking place that night. And the tree I've
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: got picked out, I could see from my other stand,
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: I would have he would have been a chip shot. Um.
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: If it was like I said, it was a decent buck.
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't know exactly what he was.
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: He was hard horned already, UM, but it looked like
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: he did have some potential. So that's kind of the
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: plan for a night, going to make a move across
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: the river kind of where all the actions happened in
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: the first night. Can you get across the river by
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: waiting it or do you have to drive to the
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: other side. Uh, it's super low right now, so I
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: think I'll be able to I got some hip waiters
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: that I brought with me that are like packable. Hopefully
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: they don't rip on me like they did for you. Um.
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: Because I've been so I should be able to get
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: across it pretty easily. I think. Okay, cool, that's all
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: good for me to know. Uh, if I'm going to
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: be meeting you out there to night. So UM, you
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: had said in the past that you were holding out
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: for a three and a half year old buck um
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: and basically to the last day, Like, even if a
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: two and a half year old comes by in the
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: last day, you're not going to shoot him. Um. Here's
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: something I didn't know prior to just talking to you
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: right before we hopped on air, was that there's a
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: chance for a mule deer there as well. Would you
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: drop your standards, um for a mule deer to walk by?
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: Um as a you know, a michigander you probably don't
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: have many opportunities that a mule deer. So would you
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: shoot like a spike buck if if one wandered in
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: archery range? Uh? No, because my tag is for white
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: tail only. Oh yeah, I don't don't do that then, yeah,
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: non residents is a white tail only. So unfortunately, no,
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: I will not be doing that. Regardless of what I
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: would like to do. That's uh, I wouldn't be able to.
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: So white tails are bust for me. And yeah, I
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: mean like the goals for and a half year old. Um,
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: we'll see, we'll see how I'm feeling on like Saturday
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: evening and there's a nice two and a half old
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: standing in front of me. That'd be hard not to
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: pull the trigger on that, I think, but we'll see. Well,
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: it's tough, man, It's it's it's hard word getting around
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: down there. There's there's a lot of ground to cover
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: on foot and with the true standing on your back,
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: and she's last last night I went like a mile
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: and a half and and it was like straight down
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: a cliff. I had to like switch back down a
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: cliff down to this river bottom and it was a
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: brutal hike in and out. Yeah, imagine I have to
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: take a deer out of there. Yeah, I know, I know.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: That's That's what I'm starting to think about more and more.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: I've got my little buck burrito to mark, but I
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: might end up quartering one out. I don't know. I'll
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: tell you what after after my adventures yesterday, I'm done
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: with the buck barrito. I'm gonna start quartering these suckers off. Josh,
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: I'm I'm all for you shooting a two and a
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: half year old like on that last day. I hate
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: when somebody says, like, don't shoot something on the last day.
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: You wouldn't shoot on the first. But like those people
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: have not been in real world hunting situations, like they
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: can go pound rocks if they think that you're not
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: allowed to like change your standards or change your goals
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: when you're on like a public land hunt twenty hours
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: from home or whatever it is. I know, the more
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: I've been thinking about it, like if there's anything that
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: would make me happy, I'm just gonna do it. And
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: like like you said, I'm like twenty hours from home,
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: you know, busting my tail out here basically you know,
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: on my own and uh man, it would be it
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: would be awesome to to fill that tag. You do
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: whatever makes you happy, Josh, Yep, and that's what I'm
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: planting on. Well, I hope it happens tonight. I'll be
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: I'll be there, I'll be ready to help you. And
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: I guess the reason why I'm going to be there
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: and ready to help you is because, like I said,
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: I finally filled my tag. So, um, do you guys
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: want to hear the story of my hunt? It's been
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: quite the four or five days out there. Yeah, walk
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: us through all five days, like from day one up
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: until when you took the shot. Before we get to
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: my story, though, let's take a quick break to think.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: Our partners at Onyx and Onyx are the makers of
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: the Onyx Hunt app, which is a mobile mapping application
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: which has just been a tremendous tool for me over
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: the past week here in Montana. This mapping app allows
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: me to see aerial views and topographic views, shows me
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: all the public land parcels and borders, shows me who
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: the private property landowners are next door. I've used it
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: almost I have used every day actually mapping out how
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna get to my stand locations. Uh, thinking through
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: where deer might be bet at, etcetera, etcetera, mapping out
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: how long of a walk I had um And also,
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: in particular, you're gonna hear in the podcast in a
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: second about how I did get a shot at this
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: buck and when trying to recover him, it took a
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: lot of tracking to find him. And there's a tool
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: within the Onyx Hunt app called the tracker feature, which
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: central to drops a line everywhere you've walked. And so
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: what I did is they had that track return around
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: while I was tracking my deer, and then I could
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: look at the map afterwards and see what ground had
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: covered and what ground I haven't covered yet. And that
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: little feature ended up helping me find my dear. So
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: the Hunt app has been very helpful. If you would
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: like to try it out for yourself, you can visit
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: onyx maps dot com or search for Onyx Hunt on
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: your mobile app store of choice. And if you want
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: off your order, you can use the promo code wired.
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: That's w I R E D. I believe you need
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: to access that from the desktop version, is what I've heard.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: So promo code is wired w I R E D.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: All right, so I will give you the spiel and
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: you guys just jump in and stop me whenever you've
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: got questions or when I'm getting really boring or something
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: like that. Um. So basically got out there off Saturday afternoon,
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: early afternoon. This is the same spot where me and
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: Josh had scouted and shed hunted earlier this year, so
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: I knew it, I had walked, I knew kind of
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: where I wanted to go. And the big hang up
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: though for me was that, Um, to get to this
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: piece of public land, you have to Um, it's land locked,
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: so you haven't either need to pass through private land. Well, basically,
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: anyway you go about it, you have to pass through
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: private land. Um I have been hearing. Well, basically there's
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: a river you can take to get in there. The
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: right way to do it technically is to get permission
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: by the private landowner who owns the land around that river.
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: So I had gotten that permission earlier this year, and
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: I just kind of just assumed that I still had
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: that permission coming in a hunting season. UM. But I
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: decided to give that guy a call the week before
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: my hunt just to double check, And after having that
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: phone call, found out that he kind of rescinded that permission.
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: Now he thought he's gonna have a family that was
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: gonna be hunting, he'd rather not go back there. So
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: I was all kind of in a panic then, because
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: I had all these spots picked out, I thought we're
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: gonna be great. But now if I couldn't go down
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: that river, I couldn't get to him. Well that's said
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: he did mention, well, stopping when you get here, we'll
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: chat and we'll see. So I get there on Saturday,
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: I stopping and chat. After like two hours hanging out
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: there chip chatting with him, him, his wife, really really
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: nice people, great people. UM. And the the end result
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: was that they decided that it would be okay for
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: me to go back there now. So that was great.
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: It was a huge relief, UM, and I all of
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: a sudden had this all this new confidence back again.
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: So that first day I packed up my gear and
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: hiked in and kind of like what Josh mentioned with
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: those long walks, it's about a mile, just under a
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: mile and a half hiked to get in there, Um,
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: across all this public land and then down all on
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: this river and then back into this public land. So
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: it's a long time getting in there. But um, I
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: gotta tell you about my new mobile setup. UM. I
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: switched to the tree saddle. I think a lot of
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: people have heard about that. So it's the first time
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: using the tree saddle, and I loved it, like, I
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: really really liked it. Um. One of the nicest things
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: being the fact that I didn't have to carry in
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: a tree stand, so I had thirteen pounds less on
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: my back, which is really nice. And I also took
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: in my like elk hunting backpack for this trip too.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: I just started thinking, you know what, I'm not gonna
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: carry these heavy loads with a smaller backpack and be uncomfortable.
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: I'd rather have the big backpack, so I had a
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: bigger backpack. Plus I didn't take a tree stand. Now,
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: I I brought climbing sticks, and I was wearing my saddle,
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: and then I've got you know, camera gear, and I
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: was on AX and I'll switch other crap. Um. But
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: I was able to get in there and get set up.
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: This is one of the well, this was the first
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: hunt ever in the saddle, so it took me a
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: little while to get up in the tree and get
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: comfortable and settled. And actually, while I was up there
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: fiddling in my saddle trying to get situated. I had
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: two bucks come walking right by twenty five yards to
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: young bucks at like four forty five in the afternoon,
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: so that seemed to be a good sign um. But
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: over the course of the night, I saw a bunch
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: of deer, had at least two different mature bucks that
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: I saw, but both of them were on different sides
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: of me, about ninety yards away, out of the side
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: of range obviously, So that night was great, had some
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: good encounters, but I knew I needed to make a
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: move the next day. The issue was that the next
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: day I had a totally different wind direction that just
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: seemed I think, it's just the risk of blowing this
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: area up with that wind was too high. So I
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: knew of one other piece of public that I could
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: access that I thought would be pretty good that would
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: work for that wind. I just had never been down
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: in there before. And the issue with this one was
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: kind of like Josh, your situation. To get down to
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: the river bottom ground, you had to come up off
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: these really high bluffs and then basically go canyoneering down
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: into this thick coollye um to get down at the
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: bottom some pretty steep stuff um. And that was a
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: mile and a half hike to get to that spot,
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: so I was able to get down there, though I
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: I went into like a pre hike. I hugged it
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: without my gear to see if I could even get
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: in there. I could. Then I had to hug all
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: the way back, get all my gear, then hike all
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: the way back down and then get to a tree
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: get set up. Um my set up with the saddle,
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: and day two is easier. So I was getting more
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: comf for a ball, and I did see a good
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: number of deer too. Um. It was a little later
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: movement that first night. I was seeing those bucks at
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: like six six fifteen and didn't get dark till eight
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: or eight oh five or something like that. Um. Night
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: number two, I was closer out towards the food, so
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: that movement was a little later. I did see two
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: mature bucks. One was on the private land. One was
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: on the public land, but he was out of my
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: range and the opposite side of this piece, so it
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: wasn't in the game, wasn't in the wasn't in the
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: chips on that one. But that was still encouraging. I
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: found it two nights in a row. I've seen mature
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: bucks two nights in a row. I've got two different
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: good options now. Um, So I was excited about that market.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: Where you're at in this river bottom like river bottom
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: that I'm familiar with is typically nasty, like overgrown Vietnam
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: jungle looking stuff. But like from the pictures I've seen,
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: the grass looks like it's very thin and like ankle high.
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: Were their cattle on this ground that you were hunting?
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: So on the first place that I hunted Day one property,
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: they have sheep in there sometimes, um, and cattle sometimes too.
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: I think they aren't there right now, but there were
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: sheep there right now. Um. On the day to property,
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure I didn't see any stock out there,
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: but um, possible. But the terrain itself, it's kind of
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: there's three different habitat types or three different types of
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: stuff that I'm seeing on this property. There's there's like
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: the really thick like Russian olives, so just you know,
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: really thick, bushy stuff that's like great betting cover, and
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: then it usually transitions into like a grassy slash cottonwood
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: savannah type terrain and then eventually hits to crop fields
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: on the private land. So both of these public places.
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: It was that kind of deal. There was the Russian
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: olive betting, there was the kind of transition cottonwood groves,
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: and then there's the crop fields in the private So
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: I was positioning myself kind of in between that bedding
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: and the food. A night number one I was, well,
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: I guess both nights I was kind of in that
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: cotton woody um transition area. But on night number one
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: it was much tighter to the bedding, like there was
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: there was the russianale of betting within fifty yards of me,
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: thirty yards and on one side um. On night number two,
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: I was farther away from it, but because of the
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: wind direction I had, I had to had to move
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: far in one direction so my wind would skirt the
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: edge of that bedding and not cut right into it. Um.
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: So that's kind of the the situation. And I think
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: why both of these spots was you know, so great
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: as far as deer sightings and seeing mature boxes. That
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: both of them required, like I said, about a mile
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: and a half hike. One of them. You had to
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: take a river in which a lot of people won't do.
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: So I had to, you know, I had to first,
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: I had these disposable these like fifteen dollar packable waiters
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: that are trash um, and I ripped them within the
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: first wade. The first time across the river, I got
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: caught on a piece of wood and ripped him. So
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: was junk and there. So I tried to use the
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: rest of the night kept filling up. I got muddled.
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: I mean, it was just a nightmare that first day.
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: So the next day I went and drove to a
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: city where I could buy real hip boots hit waiters,
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: and those work much better. Um, But I digress. The
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: first thing that that property head going for it was
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: the river, and the distance made it hard to get
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: into it. And the second day property I had the
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: distance and then this cliff and this canyon, so you
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: had to really work to get down in there. So
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: I just don't think many people are willing to do that,
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: And especially where I'm at, there's not a whole ton
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: of white tail hunters. Most guys right now are focused
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: on mule deer and elk um. So the few guys
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: maybe that are chasing white tails are are looking for
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: the easy, low hanging fruit. These were definitely not low
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: hanging fruit spots um, And how how long did it
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: take you to get from like when you get out
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: of your pickup two when you get to the tree
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: when you were going to set up. Yeah, I think
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: it's about an hour, give or take. I think it
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: was yeah, if I'm remembering right, give or take that
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: hour mark um. And then the other thing that both
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: of these things had going for them was that the
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: public land was this cover betting and transition, but both
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: of them were next to private land the head crop
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: fields on them. So I specifically picked these places because
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: it looked like there was neighboring fields that would hopefully
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: have food in them, and I confirmed they both had
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: alfalfa growing on the private property, So that really holds
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: a deer in this area. So if there's good green
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: alfalfa and there's covering nearby, you're almost guaranteed there's gonna
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: be deer um. And so that's what I looked for.
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: It looked for the food. I looked for hard to
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: get to public that was adjacent to it, and I
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: found these two spots. I had that and both of
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: them ended up being producers. So day number three rolls
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: around now and I have a good wind direction to
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: go back into the night number one spot. So I
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: go in there, but this time I'm going to move
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: my stand to take into account what I saw on
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: the first night. So I'd seen seven bucks come by
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: along the north side of this little opening I was
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: in this little transition area. One of them was a
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: definitely mature buck. One of them was a maybe. So
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: I thought based off that if i'd move my stand
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: to be just down wind of that edge, I could
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: catch him moving again. And you know, I got in
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: there and got settled, and right away, like within I
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: don't know, twenty minutes of being in there, here comes
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: like a two or three year old buck and a
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: younger like a year and a half old buck, and
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: a bunch of doughs coming right at me. I was like,
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: oh man, this is great. I'm in the right spot.
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: But then at about fifty yards fifty sixty yards, they
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: cut into the Russian olive thicket before they got to me,
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: and then they could see them traveling inside the brush
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: past me, and I wouldn't be able to get a
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: shot at them. And I'm thinking, oh my gosh, did
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: I somehow like misremember the spot? Am I? Like? Thirty
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: forty yards too far over? And now every deer that's
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: gonna come by is gonna cut into the thicket before
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: they get to me. Um. So I was sitting there
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: for five minutes like kicking myself, like you are an idiot,
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: you screwed up. You're gonna have to make move your
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: stand again tomorrow. Um. And I couldn't get down a
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: move because there was more deer coming through, like the
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: deer parade had begun. Um. Fortunately a couple of doughs
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: did come by within range, and I gave me a
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: little bit of hope, and I was saying, Okay, maybe
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: some of these deer cut in, some of these dear don't.
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: And I still was holding true to my memory that
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: told me these bucks came by there. So I'm sitting
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: there watching lots of different doughs coming through, and now
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: there's deer behind me too. So every once in a while,
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: I'm looking behind me, and this situation, I'm looking to
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: the left behind me, and I turned my right to
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: look back in front, right on that edge, and there's
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: a great big bucket fifteen yards right in front of me,
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: right in my shooting lane, walking right at me. So
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: I'm like, holy crap, Like instantly knew that's a big
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: mature buck. And what time was this, man, I think
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: this was like six thirty or sixty five or something
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: that so at least an hour and fifteen minutes before dark. Um,
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: he's right there. And what I did is I thought
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: I would have time to grab my camera, spin the
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: camera around, spin me around, because again I'm I'm in
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: the saddle. And the way I was set up in
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: this tree is it had had a bunch of branches
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: on the back side of it, and I set up
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: my saddle kind of right next to these branches so
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: that when I leaned straight back, I was essentially tucked
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: into the branches and you couldn't see me at all.
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: Nothing saw me. Not a single deer looked up there
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: and saw me in the tree. But what I could do,
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: because I'm in the saddle, you can maneuver very easily,
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: so I could be tucked into the branches when their
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: deer coming by that I didn't want to see me.
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: But if I needed to get into shop position, I
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: could just slowly kind of swing to my left and
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: be able to get a great shop. And so that's
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: what I did here. I I was swinging into position
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: while moving my camera all the while this bucks in
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: my in my shooting lane and walking through it. And
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: what in a happening is that by the time I
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: got drawn back on him, he had got behind a
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: couple of branches I couldn't shoot through, and then had turned. Um,
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: I think he turned directly towards me, if I remember right.
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: And there were two other bucks with him. I never
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: even really looked at them too much because I was
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: so focused on him. I remember seeing them and being like, oh,
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: that looks like a couple of younger bucks, and then
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: focused on the first one. So he goes almost directly
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: beneath me. The other two are directly beneath me. I'm
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: drawn back on this buck, hoping he's gonna turn. If
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: he turns and gets into one of these gaps in
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: the branches, I could get a shot at him. Drawn back, waiting, waiting,
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: he turned, starts walking directly away from me now and
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: now I'm thinking, okay, just give me a little bit
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: of an angle on a quarter way shot. And that
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: doesn't happen. Then he stops, and then there's this buck
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: underneath me. I think the youngest buck was like right
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: underneath me, smelling around where my tree steps had been
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: or where my backpack had been laid, and I spread
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: a bunch of nose jammer down there when I got done.
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: But after I don't know seconds anything like that. Eventually
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: he was like I don't like this, and that buck bolted.
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: And when that buck bolted, didn't snort, didn't like freak
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: out completely, just was like, you know, if you ever
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: see that where a buck like just gets a little
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: surprised and like, I don't like this, and they run
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: off like ten fifteen yards, That's what he did. He
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: ran off ten fifteen yards, and then the other two
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: bucks then followed him because he kind of freaked out.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: So now the big bucks out of range, they're all
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: out of range. They stopped, there's kind of looking around
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: and there's no way I can get a shot, and
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: then they slowly walk away. Um, so I was just
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: pretty piste off of myself. I had this great big
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: I mean I don't know I have, and the invelvet
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: they always look a lot bigger than maybe they are.
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: But I was thinking probably one forties, definitely a four
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: year old still in velvet. Um really nice buck had
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: him right there, I mean literally that spot where he
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: was was what I set the saddle up for. Like
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: I was, Okay, I want these deter come right through here.
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: If he's there, off this perfect beautiful broadsaide shot. This
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: is where think they're gonna be. And he did it exactly.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: I just wasn't ready in time. I just he surprised me.
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: He was right in it before I noticed him. And
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: and I think in retrospect, if I hadn't messed with
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: the camera, I probably could have just grabbed the bone,
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: got drawn and got a shot. Um. But that's what
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: I did. I tried to get on camera. So has
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: has that cost you before? Trying to get the cameras
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: set up while self filming and miss an opportunity. And
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: the only other time that this happened, um, And it was.
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: It was a situation where I told myself I wouldn't
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: do it again, and now I just did it again.
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: But it was back in two thousand fourteen on I
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: was hunting this buck I called Jawbreaker in Ohio, and
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: it was it was very very similar situation. It was
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: almost the exact same scenario where I was looking in
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: one direction, I turned around all of a sudden the
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: buck I'm after was right in my shooting lane at
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: like twenty yards and same deal. I rushed to try
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: to get the camera turned on him and and grabbed
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: the bone and get drawn all the same time. And
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: because of that, he used just about outside of my
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: shooting lane by the time I stopped him and got
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: a shot. And I think because of that, it just
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: forced me to rush and I got a bad shot
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: on him, and UM hit back and didn't end up
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: recovering until the next spring. So ever after that, you know,
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: that really frazzled me. And I don't at least for
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: the next few years after that, I've been telling myself,
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: I'm not gonna let the camera interfere with a shot
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: like that. UM. But apparently I did again because I
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: still try to get on a camera this time, and
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: it cost me. At least this time. I didn't rush
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: the shot. I just didn't take the shot. So I'm
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: glad about that. And there was there was a time,
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: there was a second there I was like I could
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: probably I could force it, and I stopped myself, so
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: I guess I did. There was some personal growth there.
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: I didn't force the shot, so I'm glad I didn't
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: do that. UM. But That's always been my biggest fear,
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: Like if I were to ever start filming that it
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: could cost me a deer or it cost me an opportunity,
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: and like I feel like that could take the fun
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: out of it real quick. And like there there's just
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: so many little things that have to go right for
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: you to kill a white tail with a bow. Um
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: that it just adds an extra element to those people
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: who can sell film um and consistently kill big deer,
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: like so much respect for him because that it's hard
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: to do. Yeah, I know, it definitely is. It definitely
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: is a whole another layer of challenge. But and after
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: that job breaker incident, I did consider like do I
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: want to stop filming? Um, But what it came back
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: down to me is as long as you're not going
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: to force a shot down, as long as you don't
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: make the mistake I made that first time, which is
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: forced a rush shot because of it, um, it adds
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: so much fun to the hunt because you can go
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: back and look at that video. Like I just love
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: getting video of deer I see. I love being able
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: to look back at them. I love being able to
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: share the pictures or videos of other people. UM. Like
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: that's become almost just as much of the hunt with
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: me now as like I'm hunting with a camera in
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: a lot of cases. So just seeing a good buckwheat
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: in the distance is still awesome because I can capture
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: video of him and I can relive that. UM. So,
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: even if I wasn't going to be like posting my
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: videos on YouTube or sharing them with you know, for
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: wired hunt, I think I would still video just because
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: I love that aspect um. But it does, it does
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: make things tougher. So I was pretty frustrated. Before we
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: move on from this, how has it been How has
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: it been filming from the saddle as opposed to a
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: tree stand. Any differences or anything like that you've noticed. Yeah,
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: good question, because that was really one of the biggest
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: things that kept me from trying to saddle in past years.
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: It is because I was worried about that. Um So
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: I was worried still now that I have a saddle,
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: But it ended up being fine, you know, end up
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: not being an issue at all. I think, I just
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: you know, positioning, it is a little bit different, um
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: but it's not bad, just because with the saddle you
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: can move around in the tree so much. Um. You
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: can maneuver and position yourself for different shots. You can
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: maneuver around the camera almost easier than you can with
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: a tree stand, because you know, in the tree stand
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: you're standing straight up tight to the tree. In this
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: you can be leaning out, you can be sitting down,
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: you can be just you can There's a lot of
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: flexibility with it. Um So filming was fine, It was
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: really easy. I think the biggest difference was that, at
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: least for me, when I get into a tree stand,
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: first thing it was getting the tree stand. I clip in, um,
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: you know, off a lifeline or whatever onto your safety
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: harness tree strap, and then I get my backpack, set
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: my backpack on the seat, and I start unpacking and
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: I start setting up my camera gear and all that
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: kind of stuff. You don't have a seat now when
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: you're in saddle. So what I just end up doing
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: was the first thing I would do when I got
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: into the tree is that I would, um, you know,
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: figure out where I'm gonna hang my stuff, and like
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: on my camera arm. There's a little hanger on my
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: on my strap on camera arm, so you can use
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: that to hang a backpack on. So I just essentially
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: had a place to hang my backpack in easy reachable
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: distance so that while I'm in the saddle, I can
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: still reach my backpack with all my camera gear and everything.
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: And it kind of like it's sitting on a seat, um,
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: but still accessible, so I can take care of things
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: one at a time, um, in that kind of fashion.
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: So that worked out really well. Um. Yeah, So I
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: got all settled in there, and and that the whole
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: situation happened. I was bumming about that buck had another
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: group of four bucks come walking in right underneath me,
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: passed on a on a pretty nice looking three year old. Um.
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: And then the salt in the wound that night? Was
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: that the original mature buck that I saw from night
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: number one that I moved to this tree for this
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: big wide a pointer. He goes walking right by the
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: tree I hunted on night number one. UM, so you know,
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's like the age old question I always
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: like have is like when do you move? Do you
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: move after seeing one siding or do you stick it
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: out in case they change what they do? And in
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: this case, he went by where I was the day before.
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: And you know, it is what it is. But now
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: you you hunted four evenings, correct, correct, And how many
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: of those haunts did you see the same deer that
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: you had seen in the past? Um? On night number
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: one and nine number three, I saw that wide a pointer.
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: That was the only buck that I could set tell
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: you for sure was the same deer from past nights
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: because night number two was a different location and night
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: number four was just a quick hunt. I only saw
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: one deer at night number four, But I won't spoil
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: that quite yet. Um, but I'm sure that you've seen.
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: Were there any bucks that you thought we might have
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: pulled sheds from? You know? I did wonder about that,
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: and there were none that like stood out to me
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: as obvious, like, oh yeah, that's this buck. I'm gonna
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: go back and look at some of our sheds and
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: like try to think through that and try to picture
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: the bucks I saw and the sheds we have. But
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: nothing that stands out to me as like a no brainer.
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: This is half, you know, Like we didn't find the
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: triple brown time buck. I didn't see him, um, but
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: I was hoping we might. I might see one of
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: those deer, but I can't say for sure that I did. Well,
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: let me know when you're gonna do that and I'll
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: bring all my sheds over and we can. That'd be
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: fun to look through footage and play with our sheds.
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: Um So, yeah, I think our wives with having even
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: more questions about us. Yeah, they would. Um So, night
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: number three ended basically was seeing that wide one but
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: at my first stand location. Um snuck out of there.
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: And then day four I decided I'm going to go
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: back to the same stand because you know, the wide
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: eight could just as likely come back past me, not
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: like he did a number one. And I also had
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: that group of three batcheler bucks come through, including the
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: one I tried to get a shot at and couldn't.
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: And I didn't think they spooked so bad that they
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: wouldn't come by again. Possibly, Um, if that had happened
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: in Michigan, I don't think I would have hund in
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: the same stand because these Michigan deer are just they
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: don't give you second chances. But I have noticed in
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: spots like this where there's just not as much pressure,
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: these deer they just behave differently. Um, you can get
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: away with a lot more, you know, Like I said,
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: not a single there, not one. The entire time I've
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: been out here has looked up into the tree. I
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: can't tell you how many times in Michigan, even hunting
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: trees for the first time, deer just looking up lots
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: of times, lots of times they won't they'll see something
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: and they're like when they keep going, but I mean
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: nothing looked up at all, It's amazing. And so I'm
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: sitting there. I'm so used to like being frozen, assuming
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: that deer're going to look up at me and look
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: at me for a second and then keep going and
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: look at me and they keep going. Never had to
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: deal with that, So it is. You know, I'm not
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: ever going to try to equate public land hunting, you know,
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: like a western state to public land hunting back in Michigan,
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: or even private land back in Michigan. Um, it's just
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: a different it's a different animal. Um. So that's what
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: I thought, you know, I could probably get away with
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: another hunt there. Um. But we had this cold front hit.
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: You know that you talked a little bit, well, I
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: guess we talked about that on rut ray Deo uh Spencer,
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: how this cold front came through the country and it
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: was like ninety something degrees on Monday and on Tuesday, Um,
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: it was twenty degrees cooler, So now the highers are
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: gonna be in like the sixties. I've already been seeing
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: early deer movement, so I'm thinking about to myself, all right,
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: I've been seeing mature bucks moving at six. I've been
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: seeing deer moving by like five thirty five thirty. Um,
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna have to get in there really early, just
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: in case these deers start doing something crazy. So I
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: got all settled and snuck in there to be in
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: the tree stand. I was shooting to be in the
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: tree stand by about three thirty, and I got there
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: about three thirty. I was up in the tree and
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: settled by about three thirty five, and I'm in that
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: same stand. I was happy with how I got in there,
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: nice and quiet. Um, it's nice and cool and comfortable.
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: Three thirty five, I'm all set. I'd got in my
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: camera gear set up, everything was settled. At three thirty five,
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: I grabbed a bottle of water out of my backpack
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: and I lost my plastic water all summer. So I
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: had like one of those great, big, huge YETI tumblers,
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: like the big heavy silver ones. But it's the only
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: bottle I had. Um, So I've got this huge silver
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: thing in the tree with me. I'm taking a swig
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: of that. As I'm taking a swig of this water,
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: I see moving on the left corm. I turned my
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: head and I just see this big framed buck. And
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: the first thing in my head is it's that buck
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: from last night, but he's shed velvet. But the frame
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: looked just like this deer from the night before, kind
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: of curling in big brow times. So, my holy crap,
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: this deer's right here. He's coming in. He's like at
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: sixty yards. And the first thing I thought in my
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: head is, do not miss this opportunity now because you're
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: drinking out of water bottle. So I quickly try to
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: tighten the top on my water bottle, get that in
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: my backpack, grab my bow, start to spin, and I
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: grabbed the camera again. I guess I figured in my
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: in my mind subconsciously, I thought I had time, and
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: I did have time this time. Um got the camera
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: turn just kind of spun on the general dur action,
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: hit play or hit record, got the ball ready, he
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: went behind some branches, And now I'm saying, okay, he's
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: it's not even like he's gonna angle out of range.
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: Like so many times, you know, something like this happens.
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: A good deer comes in, but he just angles just
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: out of range or something. It's just he followed the
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: script perfect. He walks right into like fifteen yards and
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: he's walking through a wide open spot. I give him
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: a little maratte. He stopped, pulled through, released good shot.
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: Double lung. Look, it looked like a double lung, maybe
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: a little bit back um in my mind's eye, I
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: saw it, you know, perfect up and down and maybe
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: just like a few inches farther back from where I
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: wanted to be, But I assumed back of lungs um.
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: He mule kicks and just takes off like crazy, just
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: runs like a madman. And I've seen him kind of
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: do a wide arching loop out through the cotton woods
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: and through a little opening and then into those Russian
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: olive thicket stuff. And that was at three thirty seven,
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: So I've been in the tree settled for two minutes
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: and I had already shot a deer. Ah um. And
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: And what was what was the temperature that day? Like
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: when you were hunting? You know, I was like high
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: sixties probably, I think until had had it been like
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: low eighties would have you been there four and a
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: half hours before dark, I would not have been there
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: so early. No, Um, the nights before I had been
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: getting to the tree at like I would be. I've
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: been wishing I was there even earlier. But the first
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: two or three nights, I remember getting there around like
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: four thirty or five. Um. Like I remember looking at
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: my watch when I had those two bucks walking by
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: me on the first night, and it was like five
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: o three or something. Um. So yeah, so I was
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: in there much earlier than I had been the previous nights,
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: specifically because of that cold front. So the cold front
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: like got you to kill the deer, whether or not
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: it actually changed that deer's pattern or that deer's movement,
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: like it got you there earlier and gave you the
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: chance to to kill that buck. Yeah for sure. And
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: if if that, if I hadn't in that temperature drop
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: coming in, I would have not been there at three
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: thirty five. And do you remember, uh what I had
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: brought up on an episode of radio last year how like, Uh,
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: I'm not convinced that cold fronts actually increased dear movement,
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: but it helps with hunter's confidence, Like it gets you
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: there you're more focused, you're probably not messing around with
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: your phone, You're hunting a better stand than you normally would. Uh,
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: and you're you're like in the zone and you are
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: more confident or more ready that a dear is going
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: to come by. Um, and this is like another good indication.
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: Now you could also point at like, yeah, that the
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: cold front got that deer moving four hours sooner. But um,
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: you know, regardless, that cold front got you there sooner
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: and got you to kill that buck. Yeah, I think
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: you're I think your theory holds water. I think that's true.
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: I think it definitely does get you out there in
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: your better spots, more confident, more ready. I'll argue though,
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: that the cold fronts do actually impact dear movements still
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: too um. But either way, yeah, it worked. Um, I
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: got that buck, got a shot, and I was really excited. Um.
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: I assumed that he would be toppled over right inside
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: that thicket. I just as he wasn't running away. I
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: was just waiting for him to go toppling over. But
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: he didn't, So I waited, you know, I don't know,
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: I think forty five minutes. I was thinking, I'll wait
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: like forty five minutes to an hour because I thought
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: was a double long shot and I'll go get him.
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: But by the time five minutes so passed, then I
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: started thinking, you know, this is gonna be a nightmare
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: getting out of here with him. Plus I want to
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: get my other camera press, I want to drop off
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: all this other gear. Um. Plus it wouldn't be bad
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: to give more time. So I decided to pack up everything,
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: take down my saddle and my steps and everything, and
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: go back to camp, drop everything off, get some food
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: and some water, and then come back. So I end
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: up doing that, so that didn't lead me to I
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: didn't get back to start tracking until six o'clock then,
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: so he'd had about two and a half hours now,
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: uh um. And so I went to the site where
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: the arrow was found. The arrow arrowhead, great red blood
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: all over. It looks good, um, But just a little
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: splash of blood right by where the arrow was and
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: then nothing. So I walked around and walked around and
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: walked around. Couldn't find any blood. Now I have to
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: preface this, and I think I've mentioned this on the
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: podcast before, so people probably know this. Um. But I've
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: got some red green color blindness. So I see red
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: and green just fine. But in a situation like that
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: where you've got little flecks of blood against like a
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: brown dirt and dust and all that kind of stuff,
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: it doesn't pop out to me as well. So when
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: I'm standing up, like I'll be walking with Josh and
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: he'll be like blood blood, blood, blood, and I have
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: to get down, hunched over and focus in them, like,
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: oh yeah, there it is. There it is. So this
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: kind of situation just it's harder for me. So I'm
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: not finding blood around the kill site other than right
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: at the shot, but after that, I couldn't find it.
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: So I'm thinking myself, well, I saw right where he
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: ran in. I'll just go and try and pick up
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: blood there. So I do that. I try to skip
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: to the finish line, got over excited and went up there,
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: started walking around nothing, nothing, nothing, long story short, couldn't
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: find any blood anywhere. Now it's a half hour hour
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: before dark and I'm thinking, okay, I'm not gonna be
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: able to see any blood. It's already starting to get darker.
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: He's got to be just in here somewhere. I know
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: it was a good shot. I know he's down. So
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: I just started body searching, just grid searching the edge
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: and walking and walking and basically without saying the same
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: thing over again. I walked all night till it was
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: dark and I couldn't see anymore, hadn't found him. Decided
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: to go back to camp come back out the next morning.
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: That night, looked at footage again. I could see that
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: the shot, you know, was basically what I thought a
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: touch back, but still that should be a dead deer um.
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: So I went back in the next morning and went
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: back to the last place I saw him running, looked
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: for blood again, was able to find blood. This time.
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: I followed a blood trail for maybe eight yards to
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: hundred yards, and that gave me like a line of travel,
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: so I knew, Okay, now I know where how he
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: was heading in here for sure, better than just what
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: I thought I remembered, but then again lost it. So
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: then I just started gritting again, and I gotta give
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: um a big plug to a tool. I was using
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: the Onyx Hunt app, and I was using the track feature,
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: so it tracks your everywhere you walked, and so I
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: used that to identify, you know, to keep track of
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: everything I had grid searched already. So I was basically
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: just walking back and forth, back and forth, and then
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: looking at the map to see what I hadn't covered yet.
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: And so I started walking I don't know, six thirty
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: or seven or something like that in the morning. Uh,
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: I guess this is Wednesday morning. And by eleven o'clock
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: I still hadn't found him. I maybe it was like
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: ten th fact something like that. I remember texting you, Josh,
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: telling you that I hadn't I lost blood. It was
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: grid searching again, and I was I was pretty down
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: by then because I had walked this whole area that
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: I thought he should have been in. Um, I couldn't
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: find him. And it's just the these rush and I'll
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: think it's it's just so thick. I was most of
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: the time on my hands and knees, crawling around in
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: all fours um, and I just thought to myself, it's
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: it's like a needle in a haystack, like if you
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: find him or actually trip over him, because it's so
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: thick and a lot of this stuff. But I figured, well,
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: I've got, you know, four days out here until I
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: have to fly home, so I might as well just
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: keep on walking until I find him. Because I really
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: did believe he was somewhere. So I remember looking at
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: the map and seeing that there was this gap that
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: I hadn't hit yet that was close to the edge
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: of the river, and so I started walking that line,
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: and I just remember being in my head just having
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: the thought like I'm never gonna find him. I'm never
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: gonna find this deer. And I was so upset with myself.
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: And right as I'm having that thought, I spotted like
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: an orange color and I kind of put my head
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: around the corner and this like tall grass and there's
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: the body of a deer. And I'm like, no way,
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: and that there's gotta be some other dead deer. And
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: I keep Then I come around the corner, I'm seeing more.
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: I'm seeing more, and then I see antlers and like
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: no where, no where, and I keep gonna get up
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: to him, like, oh my god. I flipped out. I
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: couldn't believe it. There he was. Um. I recovered, you know,
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: after I don't know, maybe six hours of walking around
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: or something like that. I guess if you take the
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: night before and then that morning, Um, but there he was.
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: I mapped the distance from the shot. I mapped kind
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: of the whole arc of where he ran to where
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: I saw blood, and then from the last blood to
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: where I found him. And it was about three yards
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: that he covered. Um, so he put some some ground
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: underneath his put some ground in the boots there. But
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: so what what would you contribute the lack of blood
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: to you? I think it was more of a liver
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: hit than it was a lung hit. I think it
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: was back of lungs and liver and on the exit wound.
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: Actually it blew out um a bunch of tissue and
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: tested not in test out. I should have looked more
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: at it. I was just such a rush yesterday morning
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: when I was recovering because I was worried about the
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: meat because it was getting warm and he'd been out
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: there since the day before. So I didn't do a
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: really good autopsy. I just rushed to get it done. Um.
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: But he had a bunch of stuff coming out the
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: exit wound that I think plugged it all up. Like
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: it was a bunch of I don't know, like a
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: like a handful of junk coming out just starting to
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: come out that I that I'm guessing plugged up that
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: exit wound. Um. The entry wound was a great big
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: gaping hole, but that was higher, and then the X
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: wound was lower, um, and that was plugged. So I
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: think between that and the fact that it was maybe
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: more liver um, and then the fact that you know,
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: I can't see stuff quite as well, I think those
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: are the things that led to the blood trail being difficult,
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: and then that led to the blood trail drying up. Um.
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: But yeah, he was a really nice leven pointer. Actually
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: that's what we call it in Michigan as an eleven
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: point or spencer, you know that as a five by
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: six I think. But um, but really really nice public
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: land buck. I was really excited about it. I'm sure
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: now it's not the same buck from the night before. Um.
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: This buck is definitely younger than that deer was. Um,
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: I didn't you know. I think I saw that frame
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: of his antlers. I was like, oh, it's that buck,
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: and I never really gave him a second glance after that.
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: I just was making it happen. Um. But I don't
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: care about that. I'm just super excited about this deer.
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: And it was such a cool hunt. Um. There's a
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: lot of fun, there's a lot of work. It was
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: the most probably most physically demanding white tail hunt I've
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: ever been on, just so much hiking and climbing, and
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: then getting that deer out of there was a whole chore. Um,
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: it's a long process to get him back out. Um.
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: So I definitely worked for this one. So it it
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: was a sweet, sweet feeling of satisfaction when it was
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: all sudden down. Well, I was stoked for you. I
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: was super happy when you said you shot him. And
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: I thought initially that you were messing with me because
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: it was four hours before dark, Like why how would
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: you be killing a deer four hours before dark on
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: September fourth or whatever? But uh, kudos to you. And
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: if we go by like, uh, we'll talk about Rinella again.
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: His purity score. I think he calls it, you know,
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: like a public land with your bow in a state
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: that you don't live, um walking in a mile and
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: a half early September like this, like that is as
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: high as it gets. Uh, you're in that deal. So congrats,
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: thank you, and uh and you have now earned your
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: place on this podcast. In the future, you keep buttering
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: me up like that and you'll you'll keep getting some
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: play on the podcast. So thanks though, man, I appreciate
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: it was it was cool. I'm I'm a happy hunter
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: and and thankful that I was able to find him.
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: It's so funny though, you know, everything went the same.
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: But if I hadn't stumbled on him and found him,
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: I will be feeling the lowest of lows right now.
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: You know, I'd still be out there walking probably right now, miserable.
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: And I was thinking in my head, if I can't
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: find this buck, I'm definitely not hunting anymore, and I'm
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: definitely not gonna go North Dakota anymore. Um. I was
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: gonna just punch my Montana tag and say, all right,
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: that's it, and then probably wouldn't deer hunt again intil
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: October and just would have been so bummed. Um. And
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: then just by you know, chance of fate, um and
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: putting in the time, was able to find him. And
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: now it's, you know, completely opposite. I'm on cloud nine. Um.
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: So it's funny how that all kind of works out.
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: And I guess it. I guess you just gotta keep hope, right,
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: I mean, I was in the down the dumps right then,
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: but I just was gonna keep on going. And you know,
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: good thing I didn't give up. I think, you know,
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: I think there's some people that probably would have pulled
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: the plug after a few hours of not being able
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: to find blood and be able to find him and
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: to say, oh, he's he's probably fine. Um, but I'm
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: glad I didn't do that because he was there, and um,
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: I was able to wrap my tag around a great
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: public lamb buck. So so is that meat still good
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: you think or is that something that you'll donate to Josh? No,
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: the meat actually still good. Yeah, it was didn't smell
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: bad at all. And because of the travel, because I
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: was trying to head right to North Dakota and because
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: of the heat, I decided to drop it off at
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: a meat processor there in town. And um, so I
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: dropped it off with the cooler and they said, yeah,
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: it all looks good too. So I'm sure there will
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: be a little bit you know around um that, like
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: the wound and things like that. But um, but yeah,
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: I feel really good about recovering the meat and the animal.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: And I will say this, this is just another great
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: reminder we talked about all time, but this was in
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: public land. This was available to anyone, like anyone could
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: go out and have this hunting trip that I just did.
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: That was just as much fun and you know you
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: quantitatively successful. I got a great buck um, just as
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 1: much as you see, you know, someone having an outfitted
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: hunting aiola or something. UM. And I was able to
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: do it essentially for free, nothing but my taxpayer dollars
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: I've been paying over the course of my lifetime. Um
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: because this is this is open to us. So just
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: another little reminder for me to be so appreciative about
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: public land. And uh, it's just more motivation for why
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: I want to keep on making sure we have these
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: places and keep on standing up for him. So that
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: was good stuff. All right. We need to pause for
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: our last break of the day to thank our partners
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: at White Tail Properties, and today I just want to
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: give a quick plug for another one of their YouTube videos.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: This one's a little bit different. We've been talking in
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 1: the past about their land beat series, which is talking
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: through a lot of different habitat advice and tips and suggestions.
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: They've actually also just started posting some of their hunts
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 1: on their YouTube channel two. One of those is with
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: a guy who has been on the podcast before, Gabe A.
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: Dare And last year, if you listen to our podcast episode,
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: we did with him. We talked about this buck he
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: was hunting called the Hammer, and that buck is now
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: up on YouTube. It's a two hundred and twenty six
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: inch deer that he was able to harvest. Amazing buck.
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: Just a really unique, cool deer to take a look
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: at in an awesome hunt too. So you can check
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: that out on YouTube. You can just go to the
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: YouTube channel. You'll see it there very quickly. It's the
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: two giant boat kill, I think is what they call it.
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: And if you'd just like to learn more about white
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: Tail Properties in general or see some of the properties
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: there for sale, you can visit white Tail properties dot com.
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: And I gotta, I gotta echo what Spencer said because
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: I want to be around on the podcast a little
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: bit more too. But I'm just proud of you in
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: all the work that you put in, and you know,
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 1: I don't think there's anyone out there that you know
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: puts in the time and the energy that you do
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: and and being able to share that with everybody. Man,
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: it's awesome and I'm happy for you. Um, I gotta
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: I want to ask a couple of follow up questions,
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: if if I can just go back a little bit, Yeah,
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: do you do you think he had been dead for
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: a while. Do you think it was um, you know,
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 1: if you're talking liver hit, you know, he could have
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: been hanging on for a little bit. What were your
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: thoughts on that? You know, I don't know. I wondered
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: the same thing. Um, he wasn't super stiff when I
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: recovered him. So lots of times when a deer has
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: been dead a long time, you know, they kind of
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: stiffen up. But I wondered if maybe that wouldn't be
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 1: the case though in a situation like this where so warm. Um,
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: I don't know, I'm not sure. But did it did
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: it look like an area where he would bed down,
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: say he was you know, really hurting, or did it
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: look like he died like while running? It could have
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: been a bedded in location. It was way out at
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: the end of this point. Um, it wasn't in the
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: main bedding. It was like the the outside of the bedding. Um.
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: I just don't know. I couldn't tell. If I if
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: I had to guess though, if if you were gonna
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: force me to say what I guessed, I bet you
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: that deer ran out there and did bed down, and
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: maybe it was a little bit of time, UM, if
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: I had, if I had to put money on it.
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: But I walked by not too far from that the
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: night before, UM, and didn't bump him unless he'd bedded
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: down sooner than I bumped him, and then that was
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: his like outside location. Um. But if he was still
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: alive when I was out there two hours later, UM,
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: he didn't move if that's the case. So so I'm
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: not sure. But the shot, again, it was that deer
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: definitely couldn't have lived too long, that's for sure. Yeah,
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: it looked like a great shot. I mean from the
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: videos and stuff you said, I can't believe that, you know,
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: just so tough man. Oh, it's crazy, And I think
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: you know, I think the angle of the shot it
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: was a little more quartering to me, I guess, and
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: I realized not hard at all. I wasn't in danger
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: of getting the shoulder. But the entry wound was I believe.
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: I think it took back of the right well back
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: of the front lung liver and then the exit hit
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: the tip front tip of the stomach. Um is the
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: angle that the arrows hook. I believe because it looked
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 1: like there was a little bit of junk when I
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: opened them up in there, so so that you know
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: those one long hit bucks plus liver, I mean that
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: that's usually dead deer. But I mean people have always
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: heard about the infamous one long hit deer can just
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 1: go away further than you'd ever imagine. Um. So I'm
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: guessing it was some combination of all that. When when
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 1: you were searching for like that six hours, were you
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: kicking a bunch of deer up? Not really? Um, I
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: think if I remember right the night that that night
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 1: I shot him, I I spooked a few deer when
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: I walked in, but then once I got in there,
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: I think I must have just buggered it up enough
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: that they just had already bailed out of there, so
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: I didn't spook up anything. And then yesterday morning, when
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: I back went back in, when I walked by kind
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 1: of where my tree stand was, I actually spooked a
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: few doughs and another nice buck. Um I forgot, I
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: forgot all about that till just now. But yeah, another
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: nice buck hardhorn buck went running off. And then when
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: I got into that bedding, I did bump a few
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: deer out of their beds. I couldn't really see what
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: they were. Um. But but you could definitely see a
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: few deer running. So I think I've just been around
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: there so much that night before and then that next
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 1: day that pretty much everything scooted out for you give
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 1: any other fellow ups, No, I don't think so, man.
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: I think I'm good at my ends. All right, Well,
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: I appreciate, uh, I appreciate the kind words, gentlemen. It
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: was a fun hunt. And um, I gotta give a
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: plug here. If you are a podcast listener but you
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 1: are not a YouTube video watcher yet, you gotta check out,
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 1: um the videos I've been putting out from this hunt.
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 1: I put it out a video from every day of
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: the hunt, So if you go over to the wire
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: Hunt YouTube channel, you can see everything we've talked about
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: Day one, Day two, Day three. I don't have the
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: Day four and five video yet, but I'm gonna try
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 1: to get that out as app Um, I'm I thought
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: that was turned out pretty cool, So check that out,
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: subscribe to the YouTube channel. I'm gonna try to be
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: doing at all throughout the season as often as I can,
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: as close to daily real time. I'll be trying to
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 1: do that. So yeah, man, that's my story. I'm on
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: my way to North Dakota. Now, as soon as I
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 1: get done here, I'll finish the drive out and I
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: should be out there to meet up with you further
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: and hopefully one of us can fill another tag. Tell
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: us what's next if you have an elk hunt and
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: then you'll be in Michigan. Are you hunting Ohio all
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: this year or not? Yeah? So I come home for
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: a week and then back out for an elk hunt
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: and then home and then just focus in Michigan. I
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: don't think I'm in hunt in Ohio now. Um, you know,
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: we lost our spot, so I don't have anything else
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: planned for Ohio, so mostly just Michigan stuff until the
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: Minnesota trip and then maybe. You know, I've been talking
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: about doing this Nebraska hunt in the end of October.
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: I think that's still on. But yeah, I'm kind of
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: tired though. Between you know, it was gone for a
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: big chunk of time the summer, and then took another
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: week long trip out west, then came home for two weeks.
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: Now I've been out for this one, so I'm kind
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: of just ready to be home for a little bit
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: and hang out with my son. Um. But but yeah,
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: I can't complain the al kind I'm sure it will
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: be fun once I get out there and get going.
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: Um but I am looking forward to just sitting on
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: the couch for a day or two too. That's that's
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: the cool thing about hunting like early September. Like this,
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 1: I can burn myself out like two or three times
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: before November even gets here now because I can go
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: through these Whereas before, like hunting beginning of October, there'd
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: be problems where I would burn myself out, like right
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: when he was getting really good. So I'm I'm excited
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: for the early September stuff here. Yeah, you kind of
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 1: go on waves, right, you go, you hunt real hard,
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: and then you're kind of whooped and you needed a
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: little break and then you can get re energized and
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 1: go after it again. So yeah, I definitely ebbs and
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: flows like that as well. Um but I guess we
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: are lucky that we get to hunt enough that we
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: can that we can get burnt out, you know, So
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 1: I guess we should be we should be thankful for that. Um.
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: All right, Well, further, any last words before we let
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: you go. I know that you were already complaining before
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: we started recording about how we're holding you up. From hunting,
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: so they all, right, Okay, I gotta I gotta get
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 1: you guys to take on this. So so where I'm hunting,
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 1: where I'm camping, I don't have any service. So I'm looking.
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 1: I've got the weather pulled up here as as we're talking,
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: and I've got an interesting scenario for tonight that has
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: changed since the last time, um that I looked, and
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: the plan that I talked about earlier I think is
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: going to get uh messed up here. So I've got
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: an interesting scenario. I've got all four wind directions between
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 1: three pm and seven pm tonight, starting out starting out
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: with the south southwest to a southwest, to a west
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: to a north to a north northeast. So I don't
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: know what I'm gonna do now, I'm what what what
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: would you guys? That scenario? It's changing on the hour,
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: so like every hour is different. So it's assuming it's
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: like a light, very light and variable wind then like
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: two miles an hour or something, uh no, like nine
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: miles an hour, eight mile and then five four and
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 1: six so not super heavy, but um like enough for
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: its it would impact what I'm trying to do. A wow, Yeah,
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: that's a tough scenario. I mean, and this is one
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: of those scenarios. I thought it was at home, I
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: wouldn't go out, But that's not a yeah, yeah, I
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: was just gonna say, I feel like this is gonna
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: be the scenarios I wouldn't go diving into like a
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: great spot or anything because of that. But you don't
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: have much time, UM, So do you think that have
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: you noticed any kind of like thermal effect where you're at,
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: so like by the time when it starts cooling off,
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: have you noticed that wind dropping down off the bluffs
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 1: and sinking down into the river bottom? You know, I haven't, um,
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 1: because I've been where I've been at, I haven't been
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: too close to the cliffs. Um. It certainly could be
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: happening closer and by the thicker cover UM that I've
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: kind of stayed away from. But it has been super
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 1: like gusty winds here the last couple of days, like
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: like up in the twenty mile range. UM. So maybe
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: I'm just not noticing it because the winds have been
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: so strong. UM. But I'm almost wondering if I You know,
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: I was listening to your podcast that he did with
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 1: with Mark Drew the other day and he talked about
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: when you don't have those ideal wind conditions is get
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: on the ground. And I'm wondering if that's something where
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: I maybe try that tonight and just kind of move
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: around as the um as the wind changes. M it's
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: interesting idea. I mean it can't hurt. I mean you're
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 1: running gun. I mean might Heck, it might actually be
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 1: a cool way to be able to see a little
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 1: bit more, maneuver a little a couple of different Yeah,
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: and you're not worried about Booker and stuff up because
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: you're just there for a few days, right. I don't know, Spencer,
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 1: w you think interesting scenarrator? Uh, I would if you
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 1: think you've been seeing a lot of the movement that
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: last half hour or daylight whatever it looks like the
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 1: wind is going to be doing, then like you if
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: you said it to the northwest wind at that point,
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 1: I would try to set up for a hunt like that. Um.
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: But you know, you can be as aggressive as you
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: want with only a few days left and then hunt.
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 1: So if you go on the ground, I think that's
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: a good option too. Yeah. These last the last kind
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 1: of two or three hours. They've got a west and
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 1: north and the north northeast. Um, it's almost like if
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: you maybe maybe what you do is, if you're gonna
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: hunt in the ground, maybe you stalk your way in
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: towards so you start your day wherever you've got that
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: safe winds, so you're not at least you're not blown
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: out the bedding early, but by the time you slowly
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 1: work your way up to whatever you think your prim
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 1: area is, then hopefully you're there by the time the
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: wind shifts to that northwest whatever. Yep, yeah, I'll do
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 1: something and I gotta look at some stuff I'm not
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 1: I guess I'm not as a in a rush now
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: to get back. Yeah. So interesting. Well, hopefully let's not
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: do that. Um, but hopefully we'll have an update from
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: you guys here soon. Um. I think that's gonna do
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 1: it for us today. So good luck hunting to night
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: further and Spencer, are you hunting tonight? I'm gonna be hunting. Yes,
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 1: all right, Well, good luck to you too. And I
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 1: think that's a wrap. So that's it. I will just
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: echo what I usually do here at the end of
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: the podcast and give you a quick reminder to leave
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 1: a rating or review on iTunes to subscribe to the podcast,
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: to subscribe to the wire Done YouTube channel, and to
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: follow along with my hunts over on Instagram and Facebook.
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 1: And that will be that. And I guess the only
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 1: thing I need to say after that is thank you,
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: Thanks for your time, thanks for following along. Hope you
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: enjoyed these stories. I can't wait to share the rest
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: of the hunting season with you. I've got high hopes
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: for a lot more exciting adventures like this, and I'm
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 1: hoping for the same things for you. I hope that
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 1: what you've been learning here on the podcast this year
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: and over the previous years, I'm hoping that that can
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: all help you this season. Hope it pays off. And um,
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 1: whether it be with meeting the freezer antlers on the
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 1: wall or just some really great memories, it's all good.
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: So until next time, thank you, and stay Wired to Hunt.