Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 806: Foundations - How to Build a Season-Opener Plan to Kill a Good Buck

Transcript

Ep. 806: Foundations - How to Build a Season-Opener Plan to Kill a Good Buck · Wired To Hunt Podcast

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
0:05
Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,
0:09
Speaker 1: creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.
0:14
Speaker 1: First Light, Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host
0:19
Speaker 1: Tony Peterson.
0:20
Speaker 2: Hey everyone, welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundation's podcast,
0:22
Speaker 2: which is brought to you by first Light. I'm your host,
0:24
Speaker 2: Tony Peterson, and today's episode is all about building a
0:27
Speaker 2: plan to fill your buck tag in the first few
0:29
Speaker 2: days of your season. Maybe I'm just a little biased here,
0:37
Speaker 2: but it feels like so much of the white tail
0:40
Speaker 2: content out there these days is just centered around rut hunting.
0:43
Speaker 2: I feel like I just don't see or hear as
0:45
Speaker 2: much about early season hunting as I used to. But
0:47
Speaker 2: maybe I'm wrong. I don't think I am, But honestly,
0:51
Speaker 2: it doesn't matter. It probably has a lot to do
0:54
Speaker 2: with how many more products there are to sell around
0:56
Speaker 2: rut hunts than hot September hunts. I don't know. What
0:59
Speaker 2: I do know is that there are a few days
1:02
Speaker 2: of any given season right at the beginning that are
1:06
Speaker 2: my best bet for killing a big one, and they
1:08
Speaker 2: could be yours. Too, So buckle up, because that's what
1:10
Speaker 2: I'm going to talk about right now. In a past life,
1:16
Speaker 2: I worked for a fellow who worked for a fellow
1:19
Speaker 2: who was the biggest raging narcissist I've ever met in
1:21
Speaker 2: my life. If you've ever heard of the dark triad,
1:25
Speaker 2: which is a psychological theory about personality types that are well,
1:30
Speaker 2: not a whole lot of fun to be around, this
1:32
Speaker 2: guy fit neatly into all three categories. While my interaction
1:36
Speaker 2: with him was pretty limited, it never surprised me when
1:39
Speaker 2: an email or a text would show up, often at
1:41
Speaker 2: like midnight or one in the morning, when he just
1:44
Speaker 2: had something shitty to say. Since I was a contractor,
1:47
Speaker 2: it didn't bother me too much because I could more
1:50
Speaker 2: or less walk away at any given point and tell
1:51
Speaker 2: the whole organization to go kick rocks in the street.
1:54
Speaker 2: And that's eventually what I did, And that was in
1:57
Speaker 2: no small part due to the fact that I didn't
1:58
Speaker 2: want to help that guy make money or be associated
2:01
Speaker 2: with him in any real way or watch how he
2:04
Speaker 2: treated the coworkers I actually really liked and respected. One
2:08
Speaker 2: of the things that I'll never forget he liked to say,
2:11
Speaker 2: since we were in the hunting industry and creating content
2:13
Speaker 2: based around different categories. In the bow world was that
2:17
Speaker 2: we had a first amongst equals policy. What he meant
2:20
Speaker 2: by that was, for example, if we were covering new bows,
2:25
Speaker 2: the biggest advertisers got the top spots, and whoever spent
2:28
Speaker 2: the most was going to get the lead image as well.
2:31
Speaker 2: Over the years that I worked there, it became pretty
2:34
Speaker 2: clear that first amongst equals was some well grade a bullshit,
2:38
Speaker 2: And I don't know why we even had to pretend
2:40
Speaker 2: it was a thing. It was like we were gaslighting
2:42
Speaker 2: ourselves or something. The bow companies, they weren't equal because
2:46
Speaker 2: to get top billing you simply had to outspend everyone
2:48
Speaker 2: else in your category. And that was that. Now he'd
2:52
Speaker 2: label all companies equals, even the ones that spent far
2:55
Speaker 2: less than others and some that didn't spend at all.
2:58
Speaker 2: But that's not how it shook out, and we all
3:00
Speaker 2: knew it. This is a side note here, but I
3:03
Speaker 2: think the reason people get so crabby and generally disgusted
3:06
Speaker 2: with the world as they settle firmly into middle age
3:08
Speaker 2: is because because you see so much of this stuff
3:10
Speaker 2: in society. There's so many ways to lie without lying,
3:14
Speaker 2: yet everyone knows it's happening, and after a while, you're
3:16
Speaker 2: tolerance for that kind of thing wears pretty thin. Anyway,
3:21
Speaker 2: First amongst equals isn't a real thing, because it's not true.
3:25
Speaker 2: Being considered first in a review is just a matter
3:27
Speaker 2: of playing the game with a marketing budget that's bigger
3:29
Speaker 2: than your competitors, and being first matters a lot. You
3:33
Speaker 2: want that lead image because you get the brand recognition.
3:37
Speaker 2: You want your product shown in use in a way
3:40
Speaker 2: that stirs something in the audience. It makes them subconsciously
3:43
Speaker 2: connect your product to something they hold near and dear
3:45
Speaker 2: to their hearts. You want the best write up, too,
3:49
Speaker 2: because the people who actually read those things are somewhat
3:51
Speaker 2: influenced by the words that come from some place of
3:54
Speaker 2: perceived authority. And while I'm kind of being totally negative here,
3:59
Speaker 2: I will say there were chances to provide a good
4:01
Speaker 2: service to the readers in that role. It wasn't all
4:03
Speaker 2: just smoke and mirrors, and it felt good to build
4:06
Speaker 2: and test a new bow that you generally believe was
4:08
Speaker 2: a good product. Things are, you know, often not so
4:11
Speaker 2: black and white. What is, though, is that being first
4:14
Speaker 2: is often a very good thing. This is something I
4:18
Speaker 2: used to believe about white tails, but really started to
4:21
Speaker 2: figure out when I headed out west to hunt river
4:23
Speaker 2: bottom deer in public land. What that taught me was
4:26
Speaker 2: that if I can get eyes on a book or
4:28
Speaker 2: a bachelor group at least for a day or two
4:30
Speaker 2: of their travels, and if no one goes in and
4:32
Speaker 2: messes with those deer, I could kill them with a
4:35
Speaker 2: frequency that doesn't exist in any other part of the season.
4:39
Speaker 2: Of course, that's just me. There might be people listening
4:42
Speaker 2: to this who have an unbelievable rot spot or a
4:44
Speaker 2: late season food source that's just banging, you know, where
4:47
Speaker 2: every other opportunity outshines the opening few days of the season.
4:51
Speaker 2: There are a lot of variables involved in white tail hunting.
4:54
Speaker 2: But here's the thing, though, no matter where you hunt,
4:57
Speaker 2: you probably still have a really good chance of patterning
4:59
Speaker 2: it a big deer and shooting him in the first
5:02
Speaker 2: few days of the season. If you haven't been paying
5:05
Speaker 2: attention to this podcast, let me let you in on
5:08
Speaker 2: a little secret that I truly believe. And it's that
5:11
Speaker 2: way way way too many hunters think they can phone
5:15
Speaker 2: it in until the rut and then they'll be just fine.
5:18
Speaker 2: I think if there is a hint of self doubt
5:21
Speaker 2: in that idea, or if you just flat out no
5:25
Speaker 2: from enough experience that the rut is far from a
5:27
Speaker 2: sure thing when it comes to a taxidermy bill, you
5:30
Speaker 2: should probably think about early season hunting. Now, there's something
5:34
Speaker 2: worth breaking down here before I get into how I
5:36
Speaker 2: develop a good pattern. It's opener timing. If you're in
5:41
Speaker 2: a state with an early September opener, your odds of
5:43
Speaker 2: identifying a pattern and capitalizing on it are just better
5:47
Speaker 2: than states with a mid September opener. And those folks
5:50
Speaker 2: have it better than anyone waiting until October one or
5:53
Speaker 2: later for their opener. What everyone has in common, regardless
5:58
Speaker 2: of opening day specific, is that the first few days
6:01
Speaker 2: of the season are when you can catch a big
6:03
Speaker 2: one slippin'. Even though they might catch on to the
6:06
Speaker 2: program pretty quickly when the truck starts showing up in
6:09
Speaker 2: the dark before first light, it seems like it takes
6:12
Speaker 2: them a couple of days to start layering back into
6:15
Speaker 2: the cover and avoiding hunters in a way that they
6:17
Speaker 2: are really good at. It's also true that individual hunting
6:21
Speaker 2: spots will lend themselves to better opening weekend hunting than others.
6:25
Speaker 2: When I'm an egg country, for example, or out west,
6:27
Speaker 2: like I mentioned earlier, I feel like finding good dear
6:30
Speaker 2: and at least starting to tease out their patterns is
6:33
Speaker 2: as easy as it gets out there. I'm sure it's
6:36
Speaker 2: easier on premier properties with food plots, but I'm not
6:39
Speaker 2: talking to very many of those folks. And whether you're
6:42
Speaker 2: on private or public, if you have an opportunity to
6:45
Speaker 2: glass food sources, you should do that. It's the easiest
6:49
Speaker 2: way to kill a big buck. But it's still not
6:51
Speaker 2: that easy. Now. I know you wanted something a little
6:54
Speaker 2: sturdier to stand on here, but I can't give you that.
6:57
Speaker 2: What I can give you is how I develop an
6:59
Speaker 2: early season plan to try to fill tags right away.
7:02
Speaker 2: So let me start with a simple one. You may
7:05
Speaker 2: have heard me mention that my daughters take after their
7:07
Speaker 2: old man and that they really like just shooting deer.
7:11
Speaker 2: They aren't trophy hunters yet. They want to get into
7:13
Speaker 2: a blind or a stand in September and have something
7:16
Speaker 2: walk by within twenty yards and that's about it. So
7:19
Speaker 2: for them, I don't need to glass a whole lot.
7:23
Speaker 2: I'm not developing a pattern for a specific buck, well
7:26
Speaker 2: sort of. When it comes to the consistency of the
7:28
Speaker 2: kind of bucks they want to shoot, some trail cameras
7:31
Speaker 2: can pretty much tell me what I need to know.
7:34
Speaker 2: Young bucks are pretty dumb, and they often move early,
7:37
Speaker 2: and when they get on a soybean field or a
7:39
Speaker 2: kill plot or a little pond pattern, they tend to
7:42
Speaker 2: stay on that pattern. Now, while that sounds easy enough,
7:45
Speaker 2: it's just a start. I still need a setup for
7:48
Speaker 2: them that will put my daughters within like twenty yards
7:52
Speaker 2: of that deer or those deer. And this has to
7:54
Speaker 2: have good access, and it has to take into account
7:57
Speaker 2: the likely south or west winds we will deal with.
8:00
Speaker 2: The Way to get around all of that is to
8:02
Speaker 2: find those spots now and set them up without worrying
8:05
Speaker 2: too much about gathering mountains of data. I know this
8:09
Speaker 2: sounds easy because it kind of is in a lot
8:11
Speaker 2: of places. It's also something that often doesn't require cameras,
8:14
Speaker 2: although they make it a hell of a lot more enjoyable.
8:17
Speaker 2: You know, just tracks alone, or even a concentration of
8:20
Speaker 2: droppings can put you in a spot like that for
8:23
Speaker 2: opening weekend, as long as the weather doesn't go to haywire.
8:27
Speaker 2: This is a pretty good way to go about things.
8:35
Speaker 2: It's also how I find a hell of a lot
8:37
Speaker 2: of deer on public land, which is not a coincidence,
8:40
Speaker 2: because before I can find big ones, I just need
8:42
Speaker 2: to find deer. With my daughters, we are pretty much
8:45
Speaker 2: just hunting deer. And if that's your mo o, the
8:48
Speaker 2: first few days of the season are your best bet
8:51
Speaker 2: for success if you put in the requisite groundwork now.
8:55
Speaker 2: But what if you don't want to end your season
8:57
Speaker 2: on a four ky when it's day one and you
9:00
Speaker 2: need to consider all of the ways you can find
9:02
Speaker 2: and keep tabs on a buck of the caliber that
9:05
Speaker 2: you're looking for. Trail cameras are pretty great for this,
9:09
Speaker 2: but honestly, I think the best bet for cameras in
9:11
Speaker 2: late summer patterning is to use them to figure out
9:14
Speaker 2: travel roads. It's not that hard to figure out where
9:17
Speaker 2: they are usually going, although it can be if you
9:20
Speaker 2: spend a lot of time in the big woods. Then
9:22
Speaker 2: cameras are your primary option if you can use them.
9:26
Speaker 2: But cameras are just a reinforcement tool and a tool
9:29
Speaker 2: to get you to go hmm, that's interesting. Why is
9:33
Speaker 2: that buck on this trail at this time and suddenly
9:35
Speaker 2: on this trail at this time. Since there isn't a
9:39
Speaker 2: lot of randomness involved in deer movement, trail cameras in
9:42
Speaker 2: the mediate weeks leading to the opener can help you
9:44
Speaker 2: make much better decisions on where to sit. They can
9:47
Speaker 2: also help you put together some options for hunting mornings,
9:51
Speaker 2: which is something that almost no one does in the
9:53
Speaker 2: early season anymore. I do because the advantage I have
9:57
Speaker 2: on deer that haven't been hunted for nine months is
10:00
Speaker 2: definitely going to die in the first week of the season,
10:03
Speaker 2: whether I hunt only evenings or I hunt every morning
10:06
Speaker 2: as well, and I'd rather get out there with a
10:09
Speaker 2: chance to hunt mornings than not, even though I mostly
10:12
Speaker 2: kill September bucks in the evening. A better bet for
10:15
Speaker 2: building an early season pattern than just running trail cameras
10:19
Speaker 2: is to glass every chance you can as well. Now
10:22
Speaker 2: I know I've talked about this a lot, but I
10:24
Speaker 2: firmly believe this is the best way to learn deer.
10:27
Speaker 2: Instead of a trail camera image of a buck and
10:29
Speaker 2: that beans. A few nights a week, maybe during day
10:33
Speaker 2: to light hours, maybe at midnight you're actually watching that
10:36
Speaker 2: book or multiple books, enter the field and start feeding.
10:40
Speaker 2: Since you're there, you can understand the conditions in which
10:43
Speaker 2: the deer did what they did. Bright sunshine, super windy, whatever.
10:48
Speaker 2: That information is so valuable. I can't even really describe
10:52
Speaker 2: how valuable I think that is. And what makes things
10:55
Speaker 2: even more valuable is when you think you're onto consistent
10:58
Speaker 2: bachelor group and suddenly they pull a no show. You
11:02
Speaker 2: have to figure out what changed and why that mattered
11:05
Speaker 2: to them. If it's a big time weather shift, that's
11:09
Speaker 2: enough to work with, it's pretty easy. But what if
11:12
Speaker 2: the conditions are very similar to the other days when
11:14
Speaker 2: the bucks showed up and suddenly they don't. Then maybe
11:17
Speaker 2: it's a food source thing, or they got messed up
11:19
Speaker 2: by someone going into their bedding areas or something. You
11:23
Speaker 2: will never know. The best way to figure this out
11:26
Speaker 2: is to keep looking, keep glassing. Maybe wait until there
11:29
Speaker 2: are some afternoon storms forecasted, so you can go out
11:32
Speaker 2: there before the thunder starts and you can just poke
11:34
Speaker 2: around on the field edges or off of the fields
11:37
Speaker 2: a little bit where the deer come from. You know,
11:40
Speaker 2: maybe there's a soft mass thing going on, or something
11:43
Speaker 2: like a tree falling across their most consistent trail. The
11:47
Speaker 2: environment in which white tails live is subject to a
11:51
Speaker 2: hell of a lot of micro changes throughout the year,
11:54
Speaker 2: and one thing you never expect that could alter the
11:57
Speaker 2: habits of a bachelor group just enough to seemingly kill
12:01
Speaker 2: your pattern can happen in an instant. You might not
12:03
Speaker 2: even know about it. Now. If you have other places
12:06
Speaker 2: to watch, go watch them. Figure out where those deer went.
12:10
Speaker 2: But if you don't, just keep watching your best spot
12:13
Speaker 2: or your only spot. But remember the reason they might
12:16
Speaker 2: have stopped coming there could be you tread lately. Stay
12:20
Speaker 2: as far away as you can. The goal is to
12:23
Speaker 2: find a spot where bucks are consistent enough in like August,
12:29
Speaker 2: where you have a decent chance to keep tabs on
12:31
Speaker 2: them until the first few days of the season. That's
12:35
Speaker 2: so simple, I know. But here's where a lot of
12:38
Speaker 2: people screw this up. They see their target bucks coming
12:42
Speaker 2: into a field, they go, well done and done, I
12:45
Speaker 2: got it, got to figure it out. Those big boys
12:47
Speaker 2: they enter the corner there and they feed out there
12:49
Speaker 2: in the grassy swale for a while. So I'm just
12:51
Speaker 2: going to go in there and hang a stand in
12:52
Speaker 2: that corner. But when they carry that stand in there,
12:56
Speaker 2: they realize that corner that looks small from six hundred
12:58
Speaker 2: yards away is much bigger. When they're standing in it,
13:02
Speaker 2: they realize that the train folds a little differently than
13:05
Speaker 2: it looks from far away. They realize that there are
13:08
Speaker 2: several trails to choose from and not too many good trees.
13:13
Speaker 2: But they hang a stand call it good then, no
13:16
Speaker 2: matter what they hunt it on opening night. This is
13:20
Speaker 2: something I've done enough to know how much you shouldn't
13:23
Speaker 2: do it. It's not enough to see some deer in
13:26
Speaker 2: a field or a fresh clearcut or whatever. You want
13:30
Speaker 2: to know what trails they're likely to use, and you
13:33
Speaker 2: need to acknowledge the old shot clock that's ticking away,
13:37
Speaker 2: because if you don't get in there quick, that pattern
13:39
Speaker 2: could very easily die. But if you go in there
13:42
Speaker 2: and hunt it wrong, you'll kill it prematurely. What I
13:45
Speaker 2: like to do in this situation is to track check
13:48
Speaker 2: trails if I can, run cameras if I have to,
13:52
Speaker 2: but also figure out a couple of options. Sometimes the
13:55
Speaker 2: best way to do this is just to acknowledge that
13:57
Speaker 2: you can't figure it out completely with observing from a stand,
14:02
Speaker 2: So I'll hang a stand to hunt from. That allows
14:04
Speaker 2: me to get in and out pretty safely, but also
14:07
Speaker 2: allows me to watch the best spot on opening night.
14:11
Speaker 2: I often see something that allows me to go in
14:13
Speaker 2: the next day and either hang a new set or
14:16
Speaker 2: sit on the ground somehow, which is actually a really
14:19
Speaker 2: good early season option because you have so much cover
14:23
Speaker 2: and there's so many more ways you can work a spot.
14:26
Speaker 2: If you're willing to sit on the ground. The key
14:29
Speaker 2: is to strike the very first time you can, but
14:32
Speaker 2: in a way where you're not totally like overly reckless. Now,
14:36
Speaker 2: I say that I also lean more into controlled recklessness
14:40
Speaker 2: than a lot of folks. If I have an early
14:43
Speaker 2: season pattern that I believe is dialed, I will go
14:46
Speaker 2: after it if the cit is a high odds deal,
14:49
Speaker 2: even if that means I'm going to blow the whole
14:51
Speaker 2: field out when I leave. There's a very common theme
14:54
Speaker 2: in deer hunting now where you have to try to
14:56
Speaker 2: be as cautious as possible, but cautious keep a lot
15:00
Speaker 2: of people from killing deer, especially on pressured ground when
15:04
Speaker 2: someone's gonna mess with them eventually. In that situation, I'd
15:08
Speaker 2: rather try to take a controlled risk and go into
15:10
Speaker 2: a situation that I feel I have figured out. Just
15:13
Speaker 2: roll the dice. Sometimes it works, actually, like quite often
15:18
Speaker 2: it does. But it's also heavily dependent on the amount
15:21
Speaker 2: of scouting I do. So think about it this way.
15:25
Speaker 2: The more you put into getting out there, the more
15:28
Speaker 2: you'll be tuned into the subtle changes and the deer behavior,
15:31
Speaker 2: or the conditions, or the neighbor's field getting cut for
15:33
Speaker 2: silace or whatever. You're keeping tabs on the deer in person,
15:38
Speaker 2: and that is something you just can't do any other way.
15:41
Speaker 2: It's a lesson in how to be a good hunter
15:43
Speaker 2: that you just can't buy except through calculated sweat equity. Now,
15:50
Speaker 2: I know what a lot of people will say, and
15:53
Speaker 2: that's that they don't want to hunt when it's hot
15:55
Speaker 2: or buggy, or when all the small game hunters might
15:58
Speaker 2: be out if that season opens the same week as
16:01
Speaker 2: your deer season. To that, I say, good, stay home.
16:05
Speaker 2: I like it when the opening weekend is hot and
16:08
Speaker 2: not full of awesome deer weather because the deer don't care.
16:12
Speaker 2: They're just coming out of the hottest part of the
16:13
Speaker 2: year and they're pretty used to it. The people care,
16:17
Speaker 2: and the fewer people that are out there, the better.
16:19
Speaker 2: Plus I said this before and I'll say it again.
16:22
Speaker 2: To wrap this whole thing up, you probably won't have
16:26
Speaker 2: a better chance to kill a big one. You really won't,
16:29
Speaker 2: not even during the rut, not during any other time
16:31
Speaker 2: of the season, although that is predicated on your willingness
16:35
Speaker 2: to set yourself up for success. And the first week
16:38
Speaker 2: of the season isn't the rut. It won't magically deliver
16:41
Speaker 2: a buck to your feet. It can, through calculated scouting,
16:46
Speaker 2: absolutely allow you the chance to truly understand a situation
16:49
Speaker 2: where the odds are, you know, maybe as good as
16:52
Speaker 2: they're ever going to be for you to get close
16:54
Speaker 2: to a big one, so that I absolutely believe. So.
16:58
Speaker 2: If you're sitting here now thinking about November days and
17:01
Speaker 2: the toads that should be out looking for ladies, consider
17:03
Speaker 2: that those same deer are probably out there right now
17:06
Speaker 2: doing pretty much the same thing every day, and they'll
17:10
Speaker 2: keep doing mostly that right through onto the bow opener,
17:15
Speaker 2: and then suddenly that opportunity will be gone. So do
17:19
Speaker 2: yourself a favor if it's an option, and don't let
17:21
Speaker 2: that opportunity slip away. Go try to find them now
17:25
Speaker 2: and they'll learn about them as much as you can.
17:28
Speaker 2: And come back next week because I'm going to talk
17:30
Speaker 2: about how you should dare to be different in the
17:32
Speaker 2: white tail woods because it's often the key to killing
17:35
Speaker 2: big bucks. That's for this week, Tony Peterson has been
17:40
Speaker 2: the Wire to Hunt Foundations podcast, which is brought to
17:42
Speaker 2: you by First Light. I know you've heard this, but
17:44
Speaker 2: I'm gonna say it again. First Light has three new
17:47
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17:51
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17:55
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17:58
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18:02
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18:04
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18:06
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18:09
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18:11
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18:13
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18:16
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18:21
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18:24
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