Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 376: Mastering October with Jeff Sturgis, Adam Hays, Dan Infalt, and more

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Ep. 376: Mastering October with Jeff Sturgis, Adam Hays, Dan Infalt, and more · Wired To Hunt Podcast

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wire to Hunt podcast, your home for
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host,
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: your host, Mark Kenyan. In this is episode number three
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: seventy and today we're hearing from six different white tail
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: experts on the ins and outs of hunting deer during
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: the month of October. All right, welcome to the Wired
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: to Hunt podcast, brought to you by on X. Today
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: we're celebrating the month of October. It's here, and let
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: me tell you what. I am really really excited about it. Uh,
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: that's no surprise, I suppose anyone listening. I'm sure you're
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: pretty excited as well. This is an amazing time of year.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: I just wrote an article actually over at the Meat
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: Eater website in which I made the claim that October
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: is the most interesting month of the entire hunting season.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: And I say this because it's this month full of
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: tension and anticipation. It's it's it's just like the analogy
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: I used is a roller coaster that you know, that
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: first hill of a roller coaster when you're just slowly
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: going up and there's that click click click click click
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: as you get closer and closer and closer and closer
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: to the top, and then you get to the very
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: top and it's, oh my god, it's about to just
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: drop off from underneath me. That feeling, that rise, that's
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: what October is like for me. That month just slowly
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: builds towards the rut, and you know, any second now
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: things could just go crazy. But you don't know when
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: that's gonna be. It could be it might not be
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: till the very end of the month, but it could
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: also be October three when a big cold front comes
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: pushing through and the woods just lights up, or that
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: first early dough comes in the heat on October fift
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, it's it's nuts. That can
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: happen at any point, and even if that doesn't happen,
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: it's just the slow, steady rise of testosterone in the
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: bucks and excitement for all of us, and each day
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: it's going to be different. Speaking of that difference, there's
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: just this incredible diversity to the month, where you know,
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: what's going on in October one is very different from
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: what's going on and from how you should hunt on
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: October fift, which then again is even more different from
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: what you're doing on October thirty one. There's there's almost
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: three different hunting seasons just within the month of October.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: So for all of those reasons, I wanted to take
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: a step back today and and kind of try to
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: get a big picture strategy session going on for all
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: things October. And to do that, I wanted to to
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: use a diverse set of voices and a bunch of
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: different ideas here and and I'm lucky we have that
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: kind of resource right at our fingertips here on the
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: wire Hunt podcast, because we've been doing these things, having
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: these conversations with the best of the best in the
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: white tailed world for seven years now. Myself and Dan
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: Johnson we got this thing cracking in the spring of
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: two thousand four, teens. We've been doing this for what
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: seems like a lifetime. And what I've realized though, is
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: that we're recently here. A lot of you who have
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: just joined us in the past couple of years, you've
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: missed out on a lot of really good stuff from
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: those early podcasts, some really foundational conversations back in Chosen
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: fourteen fifteen sixteen, and it really hasn't seen the light
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: of day compared to our recent things. So here's my
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: game plan for this one. I've gone back through our
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: archives and selected six different white tail experts from those
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: early episodes who covered various aspects of hunting in October.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: I went back and listened to those and I hand
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: picked a selection of excerpts from those conversations. And sometimes
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: those are five minutes, sometimes it's twenty minutes. But on
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: piece together, between these six different people, you get this
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: very interesting, very varied, very varied what I'm trying to
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: say is very diverse set of ideas for hunting throughout
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: the upcoming month. Now, keep in mind, when you're listening
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: to this set of experts and these different people, you're
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: going to hear some conflicting ideas. One person is going
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: to say one thing, the next person might say something
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: completely the opposite. And I don't think that's a bad thing.
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: I think that's an interesting and good thing. And if
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: you've listened to this podcast over the years, I've I've
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: said this time and time again. I'm gonna say it again.
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: There are a million different ways to skin this cat,
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: that being hunting and killing deer. There's a lot of
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: different ways to do it, and You can have totally
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: different ideas from one person to the next, and they
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: can both be very successful. So I love comparing and
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: contrasting these different sets of strategies and circumstances when you're
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: when you listen to this, listen to these people, think
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: about the circumstances that they're in, the types of place
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: is they're hunting, the way that they hunt, and then
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: compare and contrast that to what you have in what
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: your situation is. Do you hunt public your private? Do
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: you hunt big farms or small farms? Do you hunt
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: you know, do you have a lot of time to hunt,
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: just a few days to hunt? Think about those things
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: as you listen to these people, and I think that's
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: going to help you figure out what's the best set
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: of ideas to pull from this to apply to your
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: own hunts. Now here's who's up to bat today. We're
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: gonna hear from Gordon Whittington, Dan Infult, Bernie Beranger, Jeff Sturgis,
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: Adam Hayes, and Mark Drewy in that order. Now, keep
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: in mind, these are just little polls from much larger conversations.
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: So if you're intrigued with, you know, with any one
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: of these experts, I'd really encourage you to go back
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: search for the full episode with each person and give
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: those a listen. Um, when we get to the beginning
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: of each different person, I'm gonna mention who it is
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: and then what number of that episode is, so you
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: can easily go back into your podcast app and and
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: find that one these are. These are way back there,
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: so you have to do a little searching. But every
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: one of these is really good in their own way,
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: so it would definitely recommend to do that. Before that, though,
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: I guess one last thing I want to do. I
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: want to give you a few things to think about
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: from from my perspective as someone who sat here for
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: seven years now hearing from all of these folks and more,
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: and trying to synthesize all of this down into a
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: few guiding principles. Um. I I don't claim to be
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: in the same level as any of these guys, but
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: I think if any of you have followed along since
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: excuse me, since the beginning, it's I've had. I've had
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: a cool opportunity to to take all these different tips
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: and tactics and ways of hunting, take it all in
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: and guinea pigs. Some of these things myself. So for
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: whatever it's worth, here's a few of my high level
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: October hunting one oh one pointer. I guess a few
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: of the of the big if I were writing an
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: article or if I were writing a book even on
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: hunting October, these might be four really important chapters of
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: that book. So I'm gonna give you the high level
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: on that. That'll be a good starting point, and then
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: from they're gonna send you in to these in depth,
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: much more detailed conversations with these six people. So here's
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: my starting points for October number one. If you have
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: an October one opener, like we do in Michigan, you've
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: got a really unique opportunity coming up. Right. If you're
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: listening to this on the day of this podcast drops,
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: it is October one, and those first couple of days
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: of the month represent one of your very best chances
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: of the entire season. And you know, if you had
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: a September fifteenth opener, you had that special opportunity on
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: September fifteenth, if you've had a September one opener, etcetera, etcetera.
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: But but for those of us listening today in Michigan
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: or elsewhere, Illinois was a whole bunch of states opening
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: right now. Those first couple of days of the month
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: represent this special chance because these deer have not been
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: heavily pressured up to this point. So I love taking
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: a big swing on one of those first couple of days.
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: These they are still acting relatively normal, They're still much
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: more daylight active than they might be a week or
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: two from now, and they're on those patterns to a degree,
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: they're still on a bedding to feeding pattern. So what
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: you want to do is have as much information at
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: your fingertips as possible. Maybe that's trail camera images, Maybe
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: that is actual long distance observations that you're doing in
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: the knights leading up to the opener. Maybe this is
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: historical data sightings and pictures from last year and the
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: year before. But take whatever information you have to put
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: together the very best guess at where you think that
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: Buck or Bucks in general would be feeding right now.
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: Because it's really a food game in early October, you
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: need to know what that top food sources and then
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  Speaker 1: take an aggressive swing into the very best spot you
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: can think of given that. So again you need to
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: identify what the number one food sources right now and
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: get as close to that food source and to wherever
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  Speaker 1: the best betting is, where you've come to find box
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: or betting, try to get in between that and aggressively
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: put yourself in the best position. Again, I like to
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: go for that top, top option right now, because again
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: you've got a little window here October one, October two,
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: maybe the third, and then if there's a lot of
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: pressure around you, you know, by the tenth eleven, it
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: could be a totally different ball game. So take that
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: aggressive swing at the top food source right now. Now,
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: as I mentioned, things can quickly change, and as you're
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: gonna hear from a bunch of people coming up, and
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: as I'm sure many of you've heard in the past,
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: there is this thing that a lot of people refer
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: to as the October lull. Right, people say, well, once
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: you get into October, you know, the second week, third week,
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: even you know, once you get into the first past
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: the first couple of days of October, you're gonna get
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: this October lull, which a lot of people see as
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: this this decrease in daylight dear activity. Because of that,
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: a lot people don't like to hunt during mid October,
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: or we'll just hunt does in mid October or whatever.
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: Here's my perspective on this is that it's not so
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: much a lull as it is a shift. You have
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: studies have shown a steady increase in dear activity and
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: buck activity throughout the month, but that's not necessarily what
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: a lot of people see. And that's because after the
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: first week of October, so a bunch of things are
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: changing in the woods. Number one, a lot more deer hunters.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: Number two, a lot of changing food sources. Right, if
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: you hunt an egg land, you know, farm country, your
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: beans are drying down and not as attractive anymore. Corn
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: is drying down and becoming more attractive. You probably have
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: a lot of acorns possibly dropping. You're gonna have other
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: soft massed trees like apple tree starting to drop apples
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: in certain parts of the country. Not only that, but
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: you've got leaf cover dropping across the country as it
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: gets colder. So you have changing food sources and changing cover,
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: also coding siding with more hunting pressure. All that just
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: means a lot of change in dear activity. They're going
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: to react to those changes. They're gonna just where the
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: hunting pressure is. So this just means there's a lot
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: of movement not that you're gonna see, but movement in patterns.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: So these bucks might still be daylight active, they might
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: still be on your property, but because of some of
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: these changes, because of hunting pressure, whatever it is, they
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: might just be doing this closer to their bedding areas.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: Or maybe they're not hitting that big old bean field
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: that you saw them on a month ago, but they're
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: hitting acorns in the timber. You've got one of two
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: options in my mind for the middle of October, this
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: October shift time frame. I'm gonna say this is October
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: seven through October twenty one, maybe give or take um.
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: I think if you don't know your area, or if
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: you are relatively inexperienced, or if you just don't have
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: a strong handle on how dear react to those changes
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: I just described, this might be a time to play
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: a little more safe hunt the edges, observe um. Maybe
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: target does. Maybe if you've got like one small property
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: that's your best stuff. Maybe you don't hunt your best
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: stuff right now. Maybe you go and hunt some nearby
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: public land and experiment, try different things, get aggressive there,
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: but without blowing out your honey hole quite yet. That's
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: if you don't have a strong handle on your spots.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: But if you do have a strong handle, or if
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: you are really experienced, you know your property as well,
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: you've scouted, you know where these bucks are betting. If
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: you have that kind of intelligence not I'm not saying
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: like i Q, I'm saying like intel, like uh, scouting information.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: If you have that kind of stuff, it can be
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: a good time to get aggressive because these bucks are
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: still on a pattern. They are still tight to their
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: core areas. So if you know that stuff, they're they're killable.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: You'll hear from people like Dan Infult who this is
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: a great time for them because they know where those
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: buck bedrooms are and they go in tight and they
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: hit those things hard and they can have success. So
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: you either play it safe or you have to be
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: very aggressive to get into these spots where these bucks
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: are still daylight active. It's just high risk, high reward.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: So think about that number three. October really is a
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: month of playing the weather game. Uh. You can have
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: a situation that just happened here a few days ago,
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: so there's a little bit pre October. But just you know,
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: the very last couple of days of September, we had
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: a big cold front past through here in Michigan, and
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: it just lit up the woods. I mean, I was
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: glass in an area last night and I saw eight
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: or nine different bucks on their feet two hours before dark,
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: a full hour plus earlier than I've seen any of
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: these bucks moving until this front hit and then bam,
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: here they are, including a mature buck. There was sparring,
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: they were scraping, and it was directly linked in my
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: mind to this big twenty degree temperature drops. So when
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: you get those big temperature drops, you gotta jump on them.
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: You gotta go and take advantage of them. Most of
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: month of October is predicated on when this good weather
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: comes through. When it's swarm and creddy, I might still hunt,
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: but I'm not gonna hunt my good stuff. But when
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: the good fronts push through, I'm gonna take my swings.
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: That's when I'm going to strike. Okay. And finally, speaking
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: of strikes, this last portion of the month that last
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: ten days or so, really the last six or seven
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: days of the month. If I'm drilling down even further,
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: this is one of your very best chances the of
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: the year. In my mind, You've got this moment and
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: you're gonna here. Mark jury talks talk about this where
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: you have two things coming together in a special way.
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: You've got bucks that are still hanging tight to their
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: core areas and they're still on a little bit of
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: a pattern. So if you know a buck, or if
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: you know where a couple of bucks are spending a
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: lot of time, and you've got history with his deer
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: and you know your property, well, you can still have
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: confidence that they're gonna do that thing. They're still going
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: to be in that area, you know, but that pattern
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: is overlapping. Think of like a ven diagram where this
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: overlap is. This is overlapping also with the beginning of
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: the rut. So you've got the super high testosterone. You've
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: got bucks that are looking for the first dough. Maybe
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: the first dough does come into heat. That's all happening
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: while these bucks are still hanging out in that area
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: that you know. So you can kill these bucks in spots,
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: you know, while they're still hanging on the spots, you
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: can hunt and they're getting a little frisky. Early ten
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: days later November seven, this this pattern can be blown up.
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: Now they're doing crazy things. Now they're running all over
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: the place. These bucks are roaming a mile down the
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: road instead of writing your forty acres. So take advantage
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: of that last window in October. Take a surgical strike
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: into these spots where you know these bucks are living.
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: But now you've got the chance they're gonna move an
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: hour early. And if somehow you can get that cold
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: front that hits in late October, holy smokes. Get in there.
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Canceled work, canceled dinner plans, uh, whatever you gotta do.
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: That is that's the good stuff right there. So those
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: are four high level October ideas to think about over
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: the next thirty one days. There's a lot more we're
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: gonna get into with these next six people, though, a
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: lot of good ideas. We're gonna kind of bounce around
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: a lot. You're gonna hear about, you know, should you
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: hunt mornings or not. You're gonna hear what do you
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: think about the October law. You're gonna hear about different
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: stands that you different stand ideas you should think about.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: You're gonna hear about different weather conditions and how these
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: guys think about them during October. A lot of different stuff.
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: But keep in mind these four high level ideas. Keep
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: in mind when it's in the very beginning, try to
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: cherry pick what you can use from all these different things.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: And finally, as we get through this, these are interviews
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: I described as I mentioned from two thousand, fourteen fifteen sixteen.
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: This is a long time ago. So you're gonna hear
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: myself and Dan Johnson, who helped me out with a
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: lot of these early episodes. You're gonna hear us asking
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: some questions or even sharing some of our perspectives that
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: might be different than and what I think right now.
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: So anything I say during these old school interviews take
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: with a grain of salt. This is this is young Mark,
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: this is old Mark. This is old Dan. And you'll
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: hear me called Dan Dallas too, that was his old nickname.
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: We're gonna get a little old school here. But when
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: you're hearing from our guests, it's some good stuff. It's
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: some varied stuff. And I guess you know, as I'm
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: building all this stuff, you don't want to hear from
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: me anymore. Let's let's stop with the Mark Kenyan rambling.
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: Let's get into our six expert opinions are October Masterclass,
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: and we're gonna kick this off with Gordon Whittington of
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: North American White Tail Magazine for the fifteen minutes actually
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: before you came onto the show with us, me and Dan,
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: we're just talking about our October hunting woes, all of
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: things have gone wrong for us, and how we have
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: not killed a deer yet. Um. And that's kind of
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: what I wanted to start our conversation with Gordon was
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: just about some of the challenges of hunting this time
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: of year we're entering and we've all heard a thousand
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: times were entering this period of the season that many
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: people referred to as the October Law. Um, I guess
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: maybe what do you think about that, Gordon? Is there
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: such a thing? Do you believe that the October law is?
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: Is that factor fiction? Well, I think there is no
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: question that at various times of the fall, and really
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: year round obviously, but during the time of year when
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: hunting is legal. We all know there are times a
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: year when your probability of seeing a mature buck on
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: his feet in legal shooting light are better than others.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: It depends on habitat, weather, moon phase, but mostly hunting
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: pressure to some extent, habitat type. There's all these different
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: factors involved, dear densities, so many things, but I would
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: say that in general, if you if you talk to
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: the guys who have let's say, like in Michigan, October
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: one bow opener of the illinor it that way, you know,
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: right around October one, at least you've got you know,
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: the deer have been out of velvet for three weeks
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: to a month. The bucks are you know, of course,
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: somewhat reclusive and solitary. Really when they come out of velvet,
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: they come other bachelor groups. They really go into a
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: short travel pattern. They don't move much in daylight. Even
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: if they're not spook or being hunted, they're not moving
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: a long way to food. And you know, maybe out
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: in the prairie of Wyoming you've got deer walking two
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: miles when alfalfa fielding back, you know, even in early season.
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: But for the most part, in most habitats you have
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: deer on a very short travel pattern. And that's you know,
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: compounded by the fact that then suddenly we get the
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: acorns and the other fall masts that starts to come
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: into play. And that's so that's mostly back in the
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: woods and we're trying to kill these deer on the
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: edges because we don't want to penetrate their sanctuaries, and
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: yet their sanctuaries might literally have acorns dropping into their
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: bedding areas. As those deer lying there waiting for dark, Well,
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: that deer has got very little and sent him. Unless
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: he's really thirsty, he's got very little incentive to get
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: up and move much in daylight. And I think if
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: you look at Reggio telemetry and you look at all
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: the different GPS studies that have been done on while deer,
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: you'll see that mature bucks just have a very short
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: travel pattern at this time of year. So there aren't
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: if you have the terminus, let's say is a food plot,
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: and it may be the best food plot in the county,
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: and you may have the best bedding area two yards
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: away from there in a swamp or something. If that
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: buck is in that swamp and he's going to that
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: food plot at night, he's got very little ground to
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: cover to get there, and he can get on his
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: feet right at dark, you know, stretch a little bit,
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: rubbed his rack a couple of times, and then prance
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: right out to the food plot, and he's already too
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: late for you to kill him. Now, that's just the
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: fact a lie that you know, hunting pressure didn't necessarily
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: cause that. It might have accentuated that pattern, but it
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: didn't really cause it. He's just got no incentive to
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: get there early. He's also got no incentive to stay
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: there after daylight in the morning. By the time you
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: got daylight coming over with a food plot, he's normally
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: back in a place where you can't get him killed.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: So these are just realities, and he's not very responsive
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: to rattling or calling. Generally speaking, you don't want a
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: good deer drive. There's all sorts of things that you're
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: not going to do an early season that otherwise might
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: compensate for that lack of mobility on his partner's a
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: lack of a daytime pattern. You put all that together,
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: and that's a really long winded way of saying, Uh,
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: they're hard to kill now, but but we understand why
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: they're hard to kill. They're just not on their feet
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: much in daylight. And and I don't know what you
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: can ultimately do to change that pattern very much. Trail
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: cameras clearly have made it easier for us to pinpoint
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: those locations where they're spending time, but you have to
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: be very careful not to blow the deer out, either
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: checking cameras or going in to hunt that spot, and
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: a lot of guys just get so impatient, and early
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: season there's like, oh, man, Paul's finally here. I've been
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: waiting all all year to get in the tree. I'm going, well,
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: when is not quite right, I'm going anywhere, you know,
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: I gotta go with Saturday. I'm going, well, you can
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: go and blow him out and not see him a
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: game for three months and have your neighbor killing three
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: weeks later. And that's a lot of times. It's just
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: the reality of what happens is that we just don't
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: have the discipline to wait for better conditions. So would
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: you typically recommend Let's say we've got someone who's hunting
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: in that type of scenario you just listed there where
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: he's not getting daily troal camera pictures of a buck.
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: He's not seeing daily activity from a buck yet because
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: of that situation, right, he's this buck doesn't need to
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: travel very far. Maybe he hasn't been overly pressured yet,
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: but he just doesn't have that incentive to move during
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: daily So that's our scenario. Would you tell this person
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: all right, I guess would you typically think this hope
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: of person should wait until the rut, or are there
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: some things that they should do now to try to
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: still make it happen. I would. I would go to
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: a separate area and try to get my dose shot.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: That's the first thing I would focus on. If I
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: can't get him in the in the setup that I
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: feel is most likely to produce an opportunity in the
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: first time or two or three, that I sit there
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: during the earliest days of season and catch him unaware
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: and possibly get him shot before he knows the season
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: it's even open. If I can't do that, I'm gonna
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: pull out. I'm gonna go somewhere else. I'm gonna try
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: to get my doze shot, Or to be honest with you,
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: for many of us, it's I'm gonna try to get
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: all my jobs done around the house so that when
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: prime time gets here, I can spend more time in
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: the woods. And I do think that's some of It's
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: a function of time allocation. We all have limited time,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: even those of us who hunt quote for a living,
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: we all still have other things in our life we
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: have to do, and the worst thing in the world
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: is to put all those off hunt hard in October,
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: mess up your spot didn't come the fifth and November,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: and realize you're behind on your honey dues, and then
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: have to spend three days in prime time catching up
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: so you can then go and chase deer again. I mean,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: I think sometimes we just don't have a really good
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: game plan. And because of that. It's not to say
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: people don't kill big ones in October lad in mid October.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: They certainly do. I mean there's been some big ones
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: kill the last you know, a couple of weeks all
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: over North America. But the number of people hunting relative
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: the number of big deer opportunities is with a pretty
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: skewed ratio. Yeah, definitely. I mean, I think it's hard
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: to argue with that that it's definitely possible, but at
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: the same time as challenging, at least from everything I've
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: ever learned and from all the different people we've talked
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: to on this podcast, I think, you know, one of
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: the big things that comes down to is, you know,
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: there's certain types of conditions, or certain little weak spots
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: in a big box armor of sorts that you can
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: take advantage of if you have that perfect scenario for it.
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: But eight times out ten, you know, either you don't
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: have that scenario or you don't have all the intel
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: that you need to make a smart move, or whatever
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: it might be. Eight times out of ten, usually smarter
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: bet is to wait until those right conditions, because to
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: your point, when you start pushing in there and doing
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: things before at the times, right before the scenario was right,
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: you're just gonna muck things up before you ever even
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: had a chance. And then when you might have had
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: that better chance, maybe in late October or November, whatever
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: it is, or when the cold front comes through, you know,
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: now you can't take advantage of that because you've already
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: educated that buck. And that's a tough lesson to learn. Yeah,
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: it's difficult, and I could never blame anybody for saying, Look,
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: I just flat enjoyed being in the deerwoods, and even
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: if it messes up my chances of killing the big one,
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: I want to go. Well, how on earth could you
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: tell a guy that you shouldn't go? I mean, I
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: you know, a deer. Deer hunting is supposed to be
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: to be fun, and if that's fun to him and
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: he's legal and safe and ethical, then good for him.
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: I mean, I hope he shoots one, but if he
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: doesn't shoot one, I at least know that he was
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: out there, you know, exercising his right and the privilege
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: to go hunting and be part of the American hunting
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: force that we're all so proud of. So I don't
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: really and it's hard me to bash that guy and say, oh,
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: you're crazy or you're not being smart. I mean, I
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: would like for him to see the payoff for doing
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: things a little different way. But I'm never going to
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: bash him because he made a quote poor decision and
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: and educated the buck that he might have otherwise shot.
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's that's his call, not mine. Yeah. Now,
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: given your position, you know, with North American Whitetail magazine,
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: you get to hear a live different perspectives from other
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: writers and hunters who do sometimes push a little bit
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: more in October and have success. Are there any I
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: don't know, any standout tactics that you have seen from
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: some of these other guys who do like to focus
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: on October that either intrigue you the most or that
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: you think have the most merit. Well, I think if you,
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: I thank you, You've got control of your land and
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: have a tactic where you can have number one, a
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: very relaxed deer herd, you know, and and and go
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: out of your way to minimize the pressure on those
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: deers so that you can wait for that little cool
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: front that really gets the buck a little bit more active,
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: you know, a little earlier in the evening, coming out
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: to the plot, and you've got a plot set up
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: so that you've got places between bedding and feeding where
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: you can get him shot. I do feel like if
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: you can, if you can almost landscape your proper or
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: your hunting area that way, or or put the scouting
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: in to find those situations that clearly that's going to
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: give you an advantage over the guy who's just randomly
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: going to go say, well there's acorns falling here, and
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: there's some deer pellets. I think i'll set here. Um yeah,
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: he might kill the many world record, but the chances
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: are better for the guy who's actually got a plan,
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: as we all know. So so I look at it
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: and say, yeah, if you can find that, you know
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: a place where deer or pushed a little bit more
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: into a travel pattern because the topography changing crops possibly, um,
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: you know, you've got isolated food sources as opposed to
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: widespread food sources. If you can find those little honey hooles,
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: if you will and really be super careful with the wind,
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: be being very disciplined about how you go in there
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: and get out of them, and hunt them lightly, but
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: give yourself a chance on the periphery of that dear's
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: travel pattern to get a crack at him if he
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: makes a little bit of a slip up one afternoon
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: or one morning. But you know, day and day out,
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: you're just going to have to be very disciplined and
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: how you approach it, because again it's it only takes
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: one slip up on our part and the buck is
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: totally educated to at least that particular hunting set up. Now,
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: he might continue to roam widely across the area and
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: get shot by somebody else, but but his knowledge of
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: that one particular ambush site that you've set up. We
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: want to minimize that. And we and you know, whether
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: it's you know, because we've hunted it sloppily. You know,
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: we went in there wrong wind, or we threw trash
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: on the ground, or we didn't you know, we didn't
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: we went into bad conditions and we've basically left a
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: lot of of of tell tale knowledge for him to
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: pick up by our presence. Even if he didn't come
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: by the stand when we were in it, he still
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: knows we were there. And what we got to just
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: continue to go back to is minimizing the possibility of that.
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: But I do think that the guys that are most successful,
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: most often or really just crowding in as far as
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: they dare on the downwind side of a travel pattern
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: that they have reason to know is there either because
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: of sightings you know, sign or more often anymore, it's
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: just simply trail camera images that tell them that they're
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: on the right pattern. Just don't have to be careful
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: about how you hunt it. Yeah, And speaking of that
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: whole topic of you know, just being particularly careful about
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: everything related to hunting pressure, UM, you might remember I
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: actually wrote an article for North American Whitetail a few
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: years ago about how I personally have decided to minimize
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: almost completely the number of mornings that I hunt during
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: early to mid October UM. And it's a long running
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: discussion that me and Dan here have with between ourselves
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: and other guests and stuff. Guess I'm just curious about
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: your take on that. What's your perspective on morning hunts
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: in early to mid October. Well, I have shot some
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: some books in the morning in let's say the third
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: week of October somewhere and there where, of course, but
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: later you get an October the generally speaking to better
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: things we're going to get. Um. I have had a
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: little bit of luck on some bucks, some early bucks,
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: starting to cruise small isolated food plots and sometimes even
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: coming into a to a buck decoy, and I've had
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: I've had pretty good luck doing that. I do feel
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: like that kind of minimizes my disturbance of any real
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: security cover because I'm out there on the edge of
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: an opening, and uh, I can hunt that way. And
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: if he if he comes out and he sees a
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: decoy and he's responsive to it, then he comes around,
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: gives me a shot, he's the right buck, then then
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: I'm golden. If it doesn't happen, I've not at least
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: not disturbed any significant security cover in the process. I
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: can back out, take my decoin, go home. So I
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: have seen. You know, sometimes you tend to think I've
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: got to be back in the deepest, darkest swamp to
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: kill one, you know, during this low period. Maybe not,
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: but you do need a little bit of weather or
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: something to get that buck a little bit more interested
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: in what's about to come in November. And if you
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: get that set of conditions, I do think that's a
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: great time to get to get a shot at. You know,
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: it's some relatively mature buck. Okay, Next, we're gonna get
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: a very different set of ideas from Dan in Falts.
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: You know him from The Hunting Beast, you know him
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: as an aggressive public land in d I, y bow hunter.
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: Here's some ideas from Dan. I want to take a
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: step back here real quick to get started because you
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: know this time frame, this middle portion of October. Lots
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: of people refer to that as the October lull. So
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: me and Dallas were just talking about this are different
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: opinions on this, but I want to hear from you, Dan,
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: is the October law Is that fact or fiction? You know? Um?
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: I would say it's it's it's somewhat fact um somewhere
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: in the middle there. I mean, you do get less
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: moving in daylight, um during this time frame. I think
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: it's starting to pick up now, but during that early
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: October frame, I think that you do get less movement,
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: but I don't see a law because I'm pushing those
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: dead and areas. I'm still getting them, you know, in
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: daylight seeing them, but I'm definitely seeing them closer to
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: the edge of darkness. And a lot of the bucks
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: I am seeing that are good bucks. Um, during that
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: time frame, only gettings from those beds. So I think
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: where most people are seeing a low as they're sitting
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: over food plots or food sources, you know, or acorn
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: patches or stuff like that, and they're seeing less moving
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: in daylight. Um, I'm still seeing the same amount of
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: moving at that time frame. I'm just seeing it later
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: in the day. Okay. And what do you think is
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: causing that decline and dear activity? Most people are saying
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: you said that these deer staying closer to the bedding
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: areas later. Um, I've got some different ideas, and there's
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: been a number of different hypotheses you know, thrown around
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: there about what caused that later movement or less um
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: decreased movement. But what do you think it's causing that day?
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: For me, it would have to be a guess. Um.
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: I think some of it has to do with the
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: heat and the fact that they're changing their coats to
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: winters winter coats, because it almost seems like when that
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: cold hits, you know, that that period of time and
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: that evening when it gets cold and so when they
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: get up and move. But that's pure speculation on my part, okay.
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: And maybe I imagine maybe some hunting pressure might cause
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: that too from a lot of people. Yeah, yeah, I
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: think so. But you know, I have on some spots
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: that don't get much pressure, and I still see it
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: places with pressure and I see it, so okay. Interesting.
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: So then that being the case, you know this time frame,
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: you said that you're still seeing that activity because you're
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: pushing it close to beds and close to bedding areas, um.
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: And I think you know that is I'm sure something
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: I want to talk about here. And are there any
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: other major tactics other than that the year employing this
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: time of year to get close to those dear or
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: does your entire strategy revolve around those betting areas at
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: this time? I would never see my entire strategy revolves
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: around any one thing. Um. But there's one tip I'd
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: I'd love to give your listeners that they probably haven't
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: heard before. And this is gonna sound a little weird
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: to you, but I guarantee it's true. Um, right around
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: the first week of October to the second week maple
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: leaves when they first started turning orange and dropping, when
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: they just first started dropping. They have a bigger draw
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: than acorns. Um. But you have to have isolated maple
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: leaves them things hit them like you wouldn't believe. I
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: think they get a sweetness or something when they first die,
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: when they start dropping. Um, but they're a huge draw.
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: I first learned that from Andre Dia cuistal Um. He
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: told me that when we were on a hunt one
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: time and I we paid attention after that and he
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: was dead on. I observed it many times and moving
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: to these uh little maple patches. Wow, that's definitely something
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: I never thought about. Got a I got a maple
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: tree in my backyard, Maybe I should hunt in my backyard.
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: How close is the betting probably a couple of miles.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: So so that said, then let's let's cycle back to
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: the betting area topic, because I think there's a whole
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: lot we could talk about in this and we talked
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: a little bit about it back in March or April
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: whenever we chatted with you the first time, dan Um.
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: But I guess let's start at the highest level and
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: then just keep on diving deeper. Can you give us
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: a high level overview of of what you're doing when
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: it comes to hunting these betting areas. When you're heading
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: in for a hunt, what are you thinking about, why
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: are you doing it, and how are you setting up? Well,
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: there's two different ways I go in on these betting areas,
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: and in the best way is if I prech scout
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: of it, and I've gone in and say January February
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: and really taking a good look at this betting area
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: and looked at how that's your stage, and look from
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: their perspective at how to set up. That's the best
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: scenario because then when I go back and I go
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: in for the first time in hunt, I've got a
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: really good shot to kill him. The second scenario is
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: I haven't hunted the area, and like this last book,
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: I'm going in and I'm guessing on the betting. I
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: think I do a little better than other people on
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: that aspect because I've been looking at these bets for
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: so many years that I have a good, good knack
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: of reading them, if you know, if you know what
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: I mean, But those are like two mean scenarios. Is
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: guessing the betting or knowing it from previous scouting. Okay,
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: and so how about we go let's talk about that
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: first scenario, and then I really wanted to have in
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: that second scenario too, because that might apply to people
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: at this point who who maybe are just trying to
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: figure this out as they go. But for someone who
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: already has this betting area scouted out, let's say, like you,
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: you're already have a whole lot of different betting areas
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: across numerous properties that you plan hunting. You know, how
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: do you have those prepared? Do you have stands hung up?
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: Or I think from what I remember, lots of times
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: you're setting up on the on the go. But can
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: you talk to us about how you are choosing which
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: ones you're gonna hunt on a given day and then
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: you know when you're heading in and what do those
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: setups look like? Okay, Well, you know some of the
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: bet in areas are based on like acorns, you know,
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: or corn or or some food source. And if you
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: know that food source and knowing that food source is available,
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: you know when the hunted. Um some you know, I
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: don't have any idea why they're betting there except for
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: that it's a good bet in area, and I got
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: to kind of, you know, go in and check it out.
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: Maybe you got a hunt in September, maybe a hunt
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: later in October, maybe a rut hunt, and try and
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: figure out when they're there. Are you using wind direction
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: at all to help make that decision? Is that from
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: absolutely um? But but there's there's one thing about wind,
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: is it's more important on the hill country directionalize then
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: it isn't swamps. A lot of times it swamps. They've
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: been on these points and and fingers and a little patches, um,
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: not based on the wind at all. So you can
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: have the wind in your face and and really do well.
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: But in like hill country, Um, they've been on that
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: leeward side on the points and such. So you gotta
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: play that one a little bit. You gotta play it
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: off wind, um if you're gonna get him on the
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: hill side, which is a lot better than hunting downhill
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: because then you get the thermals busting you. So yeah,
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: when the wind plays a huge direction, I mean a
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: huge wind plays a huge factor in um, in choosing
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: where you're gonna hunt and why, and more more so
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: than just keeping your wing from getting to the book.
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: In a lot of cases, they've been in a certain
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: position because of the wind. Can you tell us a
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: little more about that last part there? You know why
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: they've been in a certain area. Um. There's a lot
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: of different different opinions on this. You bucks wall enter
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: a bedding air with the wind in the face, or
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: the bed for the window over their backs, or they'll
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: only leave with the wind in their face. You know what.
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: What's your take on that? On how deer use the
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: wind when choosing wear to bed and how to leave
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: their bed and approach the bed in the first place.
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: That's a good question, and whant to hear a lot
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: And as you can imagine, I've observed a lot of
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: deer going in and out of beds, and the overall
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: majority of them come into a bed by circling around
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: and jay hooking and smelling from town wind. It just
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: don't feel comfortable going in there for some reason without
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: the wind interface. UM. So it makes it kind of
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: difficult to hunt those betting areas in the morning because
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: you kind of get the kind of come in from
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: a different direction each time. So the trails you see
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: um at the bettering areas they used to dear leading
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: the beds, not going into them because they come in
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: it kind of weird. Um. But when they when they
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: leave those beds, I don't see any relation to the
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: wind whatsoever. What I do see is if the wind
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: is not in their favors to their back, they come
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: out a little more cautiously, a little slower, but they
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: still go the direction they want to go. M So
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: then when you're choosing where to set up, you're not
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: thinking about where will a buck want to go in
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: the evening. You know, you're hunting in the evening, so
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: you're not thinking about where is he gonna want to
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: go based on the wind. You're just thinking about this morning,
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: what was the wind direction that would cause him to
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: move into this betting or? Is that right? Uh? Yeah,
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: that's true to a degree. I mean, like I've said,
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: a lot of swamp that is regardless of the wind.
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: But if it is a wind specific bed, yeah, I'm
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: certainly thinking about, you know, if he's better there in
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: the morning. However, Um, I've seen bucks get up and
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: move when the wind changes during the day, so that
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: can have a buring on it too, So you might
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: want to be set up on where the wind is
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: now or where it's going to be in the evening. Okay,
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: I gotta question for you. You mentioned earlier that you're
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: not hunting mornings this time of time of year. Can
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: you can you elaborate on that a little bit while
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: you're not spending time in the stand in the mornings? Well, Um,
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: as you can imagine, I've been hunting these beds like
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: this for many, many, many years. Um. You know what
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: I've found is when I go into these bed in
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: areas in the morning, um, kicking the bucks out of
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: the bed in areas before daylight, they're already petted. Um.
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: What I see during daylight in the mornings at this
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: time of the year, it's usually immature box or dollars.
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: The mature ones are alreadybetted. Okay, all right now? Is
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: that the same for your marsh and your hill country? Oh? Yeah, yeah, okay.
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: See Now, me, on the other hand, I love hunting
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: mornings and um, but like unlike you, I'm not a
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: I'm not a huge bed hunter, right. I like hunting
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: transitions between food and bedding. In the mornings, and that's
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: where I that's where I had my success this this weekend. Anyway,
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: although I didn't kill, I still had an encounter with
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: a pretty good deer. And you know, we've talked about
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: this a lot, uh Dallas UM, and I think maybe
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: again I prior already mentioned us on previous episodes, but
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: I continue to wonder if this is again because of
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: the differences in pressure between you know, what Dan might
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: be hunting and why I might be hunting in Michigan
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: or Wisconsin versus you know, the properties that you're there
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: on Iowa. UM, I don't know. I just I gotta
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: comment on this. Um. You know, a friend of mine
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: under the Crystal has shotten a lot of a lot
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: of big books. A matter of fact, he's if he
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: put him in the books, he has more blooming Crocketts
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: with the bow than anybody in the world. And I
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: noticed that he's killing a lot of those big books. Um,
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: in the mornings, you love on the mornings. And I
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: was interviewing him for something I was doing, and uh,
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: I said, you know, I gotta ask you, how do
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: you keep killing these books in the morning? And I
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: told them the problem I had that I'm kicking them
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: out of their beds and stuff. And he said to me,
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: he says, Dan, I got the same issue. But look
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: at the dates when I killed those deer, he says.
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: I'm waiting for the moon to be overhead before i
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: go in there, he says. And when I when I
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: haven't moon overhead in the morning, uh, within the first
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: hour of daylight, he says, those books get back to
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: those beds of great light, and I'm able to shoot
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: him in daylight. I'm really glad you brought this up, Dan,
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: So they're coming back to the beds later than they
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: normally would with the moon overhead, yeah or underfoot? Okay,
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: So can you it seems to think that the overhead
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: moon has a little more influenced than the underfoot one. Um,
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: but I'm not so sure. Can you Can you go
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: into this a little more for people that maybe might
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: not be as familiar with underfoot, overhead or all these
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: different moon um time frames. I know you you published
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: something on your website these moon dates that tend to
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: lead to earlier movement in the thing or later movement
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: movement in the morning. Um, could you just explain that
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: in detail for us, because The whole moon thing is
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: something that so many people have questions about and so
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: many people don't really understand. So can you give us
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: your whole kind of one on one on that piece. Okay,
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: you know, I don't understand why they do it, but
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: I have seen plenty of evidence that I know that
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: it goes on and there's more movement when the when
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: the moon is straight up or straight down, there's more
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: movement with buck movement. And when that happens UM in
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: the last couple hours of daylight or the first couple
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: of hours of daylight, you get more buck movement or
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: more dear movement. Overall, it's hard to notice UM on
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: the public lands and hunt but the few times I
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: was over by like Andre's hunting managed land, UM, you
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: can set your watch to what time the food plots
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: would fill up based on the moon shart and it
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: was amazing, UH to just sit back and watch that.
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: UM the way where I got my information for Ms
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: Jeff Murray UM. He passed away a few years ago,
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: but his his UH family still puts out a chart.
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: I think the charts like five or ten bucks. They
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: sew it on UM his website, which we just search
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: Jeff Murray moon guy, he'll find it. Um. I don't
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: believe all his principles about where to hunt and stuff
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: like that. Obviously I'm pushing dead in areas. And he's
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: talking about when daring food sources and stuff based on
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: the moon. My thing is the movement based on the
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: moon overhead or underfoot. And so this chart, what is
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: this what is this chart showing? Is it showing you?
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: Is just telling you the time, the time frames that
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: the moon is overhead and underfoot, the dates and uh,
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: and it gives you he has like a hot thing
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: on her for time frame. But I think you can
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: get that information free to you can just search it
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: online and and there's different charts different people have out there.
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: But but some other people have different ideas on moon
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: charts and the moon position and stuff too. So you
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: can get kind of confused if you start searching it
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: um in other sources and you've you've put some of
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: that on the Hunting Beasts, right if I if I
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: found that because I link to that, Yeah, yeah, absolutely,
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: it's it's stickied up on the top of the Deer
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: Hunting forum. UM. I put down the dates and times
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: that I feel are the best for for daylight movement. Okay,
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: I also put down based on the moon when the
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: um what cruise time should be. Okay, interesting, and so
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: again based on these charts and the rising and setting
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: of the moon. This is if you see one of
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: these charts or one of these time periods falling within
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: that same time period of first light or last light,
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: those are times when you might get that earlier or
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: later movement. And so that might be a time, even
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: in the middle of October to push into one of
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: these pushing closer to a betting area or one of
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: these hotter spots, because you might just get a couple
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: of extrements of movement, right correct, And and really, I
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: mean if you can get ten extra minutes of movement,
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: they can get a long ways in ten minutes. Yeah,
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: for sure, definitely. So now how about our our second
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: scenario that you mentioned a while back, Dan, which was
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: if you haven't pre scouted an area. Um, let's say
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: there's a guy listening to the show right now and
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: he's thinking to himself, Okay, I'm I'm having horrible success
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: right now. I've been hunting field edges and I'm not
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: seeing any bucks. But I hear Dan is telling me
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: to try to push closer, closer some of these betting areas.
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: For that guy that hasn't done the preseason scouting, all
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: he has is, you know what he knows about property
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: and some maps? How can he go about finding these
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: betting areas? And then you know, making those moves? How
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: are you doing that? And what should he know? This
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: other guy? Okay, you know that's real rain specific, but um,
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: you see it's uh a marsh. You can't tell marsh.
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: That's to me, that's the easiest thing to read, um
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: because you can see it visually, so easy. If you
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: look at the can until marching and you look at
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: the timber edge where it meets the cattails, you know
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: you've got the straight edge of trees meeting cant tails,
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: and somewhere along that line you're gonna see like a
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: finger of trees go out or a point right at
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: that the point the tip of that finger. I guarantee
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: there's gonna be a good book that you see these
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: little islands, like a little brushy points that come off,
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: and guarantee at the tip of that will be a
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: buck bit. And when you look at a swap and
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: you start filling the whole thing with timber. You're gonna
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: see the same stuff. It's just harder to visualize because
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: you can be able to see the different colors and
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: the different types of trees. The hard woods look different
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: than the tamaracks in such right, and it's gonna be
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: the same thing. You're looking at those island tips, You're
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: looking at those those changes in the contour that's straight
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: line along hard transition of thick meats, you know, open.
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: And when you start out in the public land, you've
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: got to start looking for the remoter transitions, UM so
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: that you're not and they're hunting where everybody else is
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: talking because people will follow those transitions to like a trail.
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: So you gotta try to find the remote ones that
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: people don't go to. UM. Now, if you get into
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: hilling screen, then you're looking for points and fingers and
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: stuff like that, and you're the top. So I've got
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: my TAPO and I've found a finger coming off a
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: ridge or maybe if I'm in the marshy area, i
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: found that finger of timber of high ground that pushes
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: into the swamp. Um am, I just am, I just
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: gonna find that spot in the map decide. Okay, I
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: know that there's a cot food source on the other
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: side of this, so there's a decent chance he might
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: be betting out in that finger. I'm going to try
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: to get as close as I can and set up
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: on any random day or maybe on one of those
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: moon days. Or is there anything else that he needs
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: to be thinking of about before moving in to try
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: to hunt that bed he thinks is there. Well, what
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: I do is if I'm pretty sure there's gonna be
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: a bed there, or I think there's gonna be bed
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: I just hunted. If I can get within a hundred yards,
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: I'm sure you can get a chance at that ball
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: in daylight. If there's a spot where I can't get
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: that close to that buck, can't get close enough to
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: that bed, I gotta hang back like two yards. So
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: that's the spot I saved for that moon day or
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: that cold front that comes in it gets to move
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: a little earlier. Um, those are the days I saved
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: for that. Otherwise, UM, I'm hunting those spots one after another,
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: pushing as close as I can. Because you're you don't
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: hunting this way, You're not gonna see bucks every time.
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: They've got different bet Nerrens are all over the place,
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: And what I'm doing is I'm trying each bed nery
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: and once you're sent in the y're just stay out
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: of there for a while. So it makes the other
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: Betton area is better. So you just keep, you know,
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: hopping around and hitting these things, and you're gonna have
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: a few that don't pay off. And in the more
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: of an amateur yard at it, the more you're gonna
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: have something that don't pay off, and you know, and
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: you just gotta keep hitting it until it works. And
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: the hardest part for a guy who doesn't hunt like
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: this is keeping up this confidence level because, like I said,
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: even I, you know, I'll go five six months without
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: seeing a deer, you know, but I guarantee in the
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: long run, I'm seeing more big books than most guys.
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: All right now, we're gonna bounce over to Bernie Barringer.
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: He's the author of The Freelance bow Hunter, written from
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: many different magazines, and he's got some different ideas on October.
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: Can you share this what your progression looks like throughout
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: the month of October, um, and how you're hunting strategy
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: is typically changing as we progress. Yeah, Um, it's It's
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: interesting how so many people really think the the month
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: of October is just a time to just wait, you know,
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: forget it, let's just wait for November. And um, you know,
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: the first week in October can be a really tough
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: time because the um, the bachelor groups are broken up,
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: and um, you know, the patterns. We're having a hard
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: time figuring out where the deer are because, uh, you know,
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: throughout the month of September, these deer a sort of
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: just changing in their food sources and their patterns, and um,
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: you know, you'll be watching on your cameras and you'll
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: see these deer in the fields and the evenings and
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: stuff like that starting late August and right through the
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: middle of September, and all of a sudden they're gone,
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: you know. And then you know, the end of September,
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: first of October, and all of a sudden, you've got
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: a buck on your camera and you go, I haven't
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: seen where did this come from? Well, he came from
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: somebody else. You know, they're wonder where he is. And
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: uh so the first week in October, it's pretty much
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: all about the food. M If you can find um, acorns, hazelnuts,
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: stuff like that, in my area. That's kind of what
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: they're eating on. If there's still some dry some corn
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: in the field, um, you know they're they're still in
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: somewhat of a pattern. It's just that you'll have to
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: find these deer again and you have to move quickly
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: because the patterns are changing. UM. I like hunting October
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: because the first week in October, especially, the weather is
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: nice and usually here we've had a frost, so we
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: don't have much about mosquitoes and stuff like that. But then, um,
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: as the second week of October wears on, then the
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: it's getting colder, so the deer seeking out the high
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: card foods like corn and stuff like that. When the
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: if they're standing corns left that there, that's a real
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: magnet for them. Um. Sometimes they're picking up corn that's
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: been harvested and so forth, and um. So that you know,
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: second week is not a bad time to hunt either.
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: And by the third week in October, now you're starting
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: to see a lot of scrapes and rubs. They are
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: pretty active rather than you know, there's there's you start
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: seeing scrapes and rubs. You know, at the end of
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: August and even as the velvet comes off, but by
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: the third week in October, the bucks are really paying
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: attention to them, and so that's when I start paying
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: attention to them too. And also that's when the effectiveness
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: of calling and rattling is starting to work. UM. And
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: then by the fourth week in October, then you know,
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: calling and rattling is at its peak. That's it's it's
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: the best last week in October, first week in November.
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: I would even give the edge to the last week
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: in October for for calling and rattling. Um. You know,
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: that's the best time of the year. Also to haunt
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: scrapes and rubs because the bucks are visiting them consistently.
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: And UM. You know something another issue with um with
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: scrapes that a lot of people don't think about and um,
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: the you know, it's kind of complicated, but you know,
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: there's been several studies done that bucks, um don't visit
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: scrapes in the daylight. You've probably read the signists. What
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: they do is they put camera at the scrape and
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: they and then they say, well, we got eighty percent
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: of the pictures of mature bucks that we got were
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: at night. And well, one thing that they that they're
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: not noticing about this is the fact that they're only
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: putting a camera right at the scrape. And so bucks
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: are checking scrapes during the day at this time, but
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: they're just not walking right into them because most of
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: your scrapes, if you think about it, they're on a
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: power line cut or a road to track on the
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: edge of the field or something like that. Needs but
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: your bucks don't like to expose themselves to open areas
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: during the daylight. So they'll whenever can they can, they'll
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: stay thirty or forty yards down the wind of the
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: scrape in cover, and they'll just check the scrape without
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: walking right up to it. Now, if there's something good
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: in the scrape, if there's fresh dope, or if you
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: use a good lure or something like that, um you can,
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: you know, you can hunt right over these scrapes and
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: bring these bucks right in. But um so, don't completely
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: discount hunting scrapes during the daylight because there's that last
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: week in October. Fact, Halloween is kind of famous for,
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: you know, for killing bucks over signed. So so at
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: that time period is do you prioritize scrapes so much
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: that during that as we get October. That's that's one
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: of the main areas that you're actually hunting over is
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: specifically in the spot because of a scrape. Yeah, I'm
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: looking for areas that are all torn up and uh
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: I'm you know, by the last week in October. I'm
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: not spending a lot of time worrying about beds and
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: food and stuff like that. You know, I'm looking for
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: a sign that that those bucks, you know, the testosterones rising,
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: they're gonna be checking those scrapes and and uh, Terry,
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: if you find an area that's got six or eight
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: scrapes and a bunch of rubs and stuff like that,
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: it's it's definitely worth spending the afternoon there during that
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: last week in October. So one of the things that
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: I feel like a lot of people do talk about
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: when when we're on this topic of scrapes is that
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: the places that you will see that daytime activity are
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: usually going to be the scrapes some people refer to
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: like primary scrape ariers or something like that, being these
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: places back in the cover. So the scrapes are on
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: the field edge, don't focus on those, try to find
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: these areas of that are all for but the ones
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: that are back secluded somewhat. Is that the way you're
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: looking at things too, or are you even taking advantage
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: of field that scrapes because you still think that they're
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: they're coming down wind of at thirty or forty yards
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: into the cover checking on those field that scrape somewhere. Yeah,
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: if the wind is right that you can get down
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: wind of one of those scrapes that's on a field edge. Um,
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: they're good places hunt, you know, if you can have
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: the wind blowing from you or from the scrape to
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: you and getting a tree up there. The bucks will
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: they'll check them and then they'll make a hook. They'll
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: kind of circle around in a half circle. If if
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: they smell something they like, then they'll kind of circle
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: around and try to quarter into the wind with the
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: you know, kind of the wind on the flat of
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: their face so it's in one nostril basically, and they'll
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: approach the scrapes that way. So to keep that in mind.
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: But I would say if I had to choose between
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: the two, I'd take an area back in the cover
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: more that's closer to the betting area that's all torn up,
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: because you're more likely to encounter them in the daylight.
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: If you're closer to the bedding area. But these these
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: areas where they're all tore up on the edge of
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: the fields, they shouldn't be completely overlooked. Fair enough, have
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: you seen have you seen, you know, for from all
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: your years of being in a tree stand and and
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: just watching deer movement in general, is there a time where,
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: you know, we're talking about hunting scrapes right now, where
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: these dear really start to get up on their feet
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: in daylight, whether that's getting up early or coming to
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: back to bed late. Um, yeah, I would say the
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: last week in October here in the Upper Midwest is
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: when you start seeing that. And then by you know,
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: the first week in November, and then you start seeing
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: more of the chasing more so, you know, and so
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: then the scrapes will work. But there, you know, you
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: can concentrate more on the dough betting areas and where
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: the doughs are feeding in the evening, because the bucks
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: are going to be they're starting dose, are starting to
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: smell pretty good, you know, around the first of November,
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: so those bucks are going to be sniffing them out.
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: Because yeah, if you can answer your question, then last
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: week in October absolutely, Dan where you were you asking about,
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: like time of year or where you were asking where
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: the factors that change it, well, not necessarily factors, I
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: mean in regards to hunting the actual scrapes, right, that's
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: something that I don't do a lot of. So just
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: because I don't for me, I'm not seeing a lot
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: of enough movement during the daylight, you know, I'm not
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: necessarily going right into the bedroom in late October. Maybe
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: if there is a um, maybe if there is a
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: I guess a cold front coming for for an evening hunt,
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: I guess, But I do like hunting u late October,
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: the morning hunt back in the bedroom where the deer
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: might be coming later back to that bedroom or maybe
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: scent checking. So I guess my question was, um, there
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: you know what time of year, whether it's like twenty nine,
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: are are used typically seeing these deer not chasing yet,
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: but getting up on their feet a little earlier, because
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: you know, there's that smell and that there's that smell
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: in the air, like hey, we gotta we gotta start
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: getting ready. And I think, and I think, Bernie, you
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: you would go ahead and sorry, I was gonna say,
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: I think your previous answer then answers that right that
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: last week in October. Yeah, yeah, And I would like
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: to mention the mornings too though that's a UM. I
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: would say the closer you get to November, the better
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 1: it gets. But as far as the morning goes, when
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: they're primarily on a feeding t betting pattern, then they'll
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: trickle back in UM and it's hard to it's hard
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: to hunt mornings on feeding to betting patterns without bumping deer.
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: For particular, if they're hunting in open fields and you know,
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: they'll start trickling back in well before daylight sometimes and
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: and uh, you know, you might not encounter the deer
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: and you can it's it's hard not to uh spook
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: him or you know, intrude. But the closer you get
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: to November one, the more the bucks stay out a
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: little later. So that's kind of an answer to your
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: question that the effective us of morning hunting UM gets
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: better as you approach the first November. All right, moving on,
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: here is a few bits from Jeff Sturgis. He's the
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: founder of Whitetail Habitat Solutions, the author of a number
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: of great books. He's got the White Tail Habitat Solutions
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: YouTube channel and a lot of interesting ideas, in particular
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: about how he looks at weather during the month of October.
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: And we're gonna drop into a section here where Jeff
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: and I were talking. It was right around October first,
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: somewhere in that ballpark, and I asked him to walk
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: through the upcoming forecast. This is back into some fifteen
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: I think I want him to walk through the upcoming
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: forecast and how that would impact how he hunts. So
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: keep this in mind. He's talking through a hypothetical set
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: of weather factors for the last ten days or so
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: of October and how that would influence the strategy. So
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: here we go, so definitely. So so then here's the
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: next thing I'm curious about, because right I think we
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: hear about this type of thing, pay attention to cold fronts,
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: looking for those changes in wind speed like you, So
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: it seems like you like when it calms down a
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: little bit and the high pressure days. We hear about
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: a lot of these things, but sometimes it's hard to
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: understand how to actually take that and put it into play.
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: So something I've seen you do the last couple of
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: weeks is you're putting out this weekly forecast where you
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: talk about what the weather is going to look like
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: in the coming week or two weeks, and then which
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: of those days coming up are high value sits and
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: what that means for you as a hunter. Could you
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: possibly walk us through, as best as you can remember
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: right now, what that looks like for the coming days
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: here UM is kind of an example, UM, and this
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: and for for context, this podcast will be going live
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: on this Thursday. So maybe if you, if you remember
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 1: what the forecast looks, can you talk to us about
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 1: what you're looking at this upcoming weather and how you
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: implement some of the things that we've just talked about. Yes, yeah,
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: and I have that that weather forecast burned in my
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: head pretty well. But and I this time when I
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: pulled up for Lacrosse, Wisconsin, last time I pulled up Chicago,
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: I was actually thinking about flipping over to the Detroit
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: area lands and Grant Arbor next week regardless. So it'll
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: be coming your way anyway. But the big thing with
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: UM this week is Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. We had three
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: days in the low seventies to mid seventies at least
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: around here in this area. It really across the same
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: general line moving east and last, there's not that much difference.
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: It's gonna be a lag time a lot of day,
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: I would say, from here in lower Michigan and then
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: another day over to northern Pennsylvania neal orkum. But really,
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: you know, things happening for the most part, the weathers
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: moving west east or west northeast. So that being said,
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: this week we had those three warmer days and then
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: here we have about a ten degree drop on Thursday.
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: And so those three warm days to me, really helped
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: set up on that Thursday drop. And you could say,
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: now if it was four or five days of poor
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 1: weather or warm weather, Um, if it was a you know,
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: if you had a monster storm moving through on Wednesday,
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: that might make a really big difference. But it's still
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: a pretty quality a high quality day. And especially that's
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: gonna be uh the of October, and that happens to
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: be the days that have shot a couple of really
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: nice box five in secure old box, had a really
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 1: nice opportunity on another, a nice book, another five fix
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: year old. So we're starting to get into that time
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 1: where I'm really getting pumped. And I talked to you
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: about that this week to market. You had the box
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: on camp and uh on the cameras and it's it's
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 1: getting exciting. Um. Then on Friday, what's really cool is UM,
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: so Thursday showing a let's say a low of thirty
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: nine and a high of sixty. Let's say on Wednesday
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: it was the highest seventy one. So there's a leven
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: degree temperature drop. UM. I believe the morning temperature. Now
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 1: when you look at the weather forecast, and you know,
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: maybe some of the listeners don't realize this, but when
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: you see the low for Thursday, that's actually Friday mornings temperature.
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: And so it's a little deceiving because if you look
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 1: at Wednesday the low is forty nine, that's actually Thursday morning.
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: So Friday morning has a forecast at low of actually
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: thirty nine, and so tend to gree temperature drop from
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: morning to morning. I'm looking for that from the evening
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: daytime highs to daytime high and in some areas they're
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: actually calling for a little bit of rain or precipitation,
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: maybe some higher winds on wednesdy day to Thursday. UM.
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: Even looking at the Chicago I think that the high
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: quality days of Friday or whether that will help to
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: actually enhance the value that day and going forward, I
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: think the there's a little bit of moisture on that
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: Friday Saturday time, and another little bit of drop on
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: on Sunday. And so I'm looking at like, if I
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: was planning out this week, you know, I really want
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: to make a priority of hunting this Thursday Friday because
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 1: of the first couple of days after the front, there's
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: good quality temperature, draw a little bit of weather to
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: serve to set that up, and then there's a little
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: bit of a bump where you have some a little
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: bit of a warmer day, um, some inclement weather, rain,
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 1: and then clearing and high pressure on Sunday. So if
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: I'm planning my sets, I might spend Saturday with family. Um,
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: it looks like Friday night is going to be pretty wet.
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: Not to say that you couldn't shoot a mature buck
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: in the rain, certainly, But if I'm planning my sets
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 1: and I have four or five, then I really want
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: to get out. I'm gonna I'm actually planning Friday or
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 1: Thursday morning, Thursday night, Friday morning, and I'll sit on
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: Sunday as well. So and then looking ahead, and this
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: is you know, looking at a week and a half. Um,
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: the there's a really nice drop, and I think it's
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: next Saturday or Sunday where you have pretty steady weather.
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: It looks like next week, and then a major dropper
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: around Halloween. So it's still a little ways out the
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: window of there, probably you know, really high probably uh
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 1: you know, accuracy rating. But at the same time, I'm
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: really looking forward to that next drop right around Halloween,
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: which is prime time in the northern part of the Midwest. Absolutely,
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: that's going to be a great time to be in
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: the tree now looking though at this most for this
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: most kind of upcoming weekend. So you talked about that
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: cold front hitting today that the air the day that
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: this podcast is going live is Thursday, so that cold
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: fronts hitting Thursday, said, Thursday Friday could be good sits
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: and then maybe against Sunday. Um, this time of year,
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: the twenty six give or take, around this part of
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: the year in October, how are you approaching those hunts
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: at this time to take advantage of this good condition
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: that's good conditions. Where are you hunting? What are you
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: thinking about when choosing those stand sites? Yeah, that's a
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: great question. Um, I'm looking at total pre rout hunting.
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: And what I mean by that is really the box
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: to me, are not moved in that far. And I
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: have to excuse me if this is a poor example
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: or a crash example. But um, you know, bi guy,
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: there's thirty girls in a nightclub, bar or whatever, and
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 1: there's ten guys going in and and that's the time
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: where it's uh, you know, pretty easy to meet a girl. Um.
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: And that's to me unless you're unless you're danaus the
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: same analogy a while ago. That's funny. Yeah, I use
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: that with a client. He said, I don't see anything
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: wrong with that example. But any anyways, Um that uh,
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: it's it's kind of like that for the pre rot.
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: You know, these big boys already have the fall ring
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 1: ranges to published. They have where they want to eat,
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: where they want to stay there in the day, their
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: betting areas, and they have some doughs nearby. And it's
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: not that they have to have those doughs, just the
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 1: way it works. They the doughs are right next to
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: the high quality food, good covering. Then those bucks are
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: aren't far behind them, and so they're already established. And
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: when one of those dose starts to get a little
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 1: a little ruddy. Then uh, it's those bucks they you know,
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 1: you can pick up on that. There's a lot of
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: dolls will start coming in the heat, and those first
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: few doughs are pretty easy for them to find and
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: they don't really need to move around too much. And
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 1: so um, at the same time, right before that happens,
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 1: they're going to become more active. And I know, just
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 1: in the last three days, I've had a lot of
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 1: scrapes pop up and then around the properties right hunt
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 1: and that's not even going in the woods much. That's
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 1: just just on the exterior edges. So what I'm looking
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 1: at is for one of those bucks are going to
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 1: move along ways. So I'm not really I'm not going
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: to sit all day. Um. I just don't think there's
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 1: a lot of value and sitting there in the middle
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: of the day unless you have to get into an
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 1: area that you can't get out until after dark. Um.
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: So I'm placing a high priority in the morning near
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: bedding areas. So I'm trying to get within a hundred
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: fifty yards of them sure box betting area, knowing that
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: his range might expand from an acre to ten to
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: fifteen acres during the morning, especially when there's cooler temperatures
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: at the same time in the evening, if I sit
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: in that bedding area, then it's going to be a
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: pretty poor hunt. The closer it gets too dark, because
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: that box is then turning his attention towards the evening
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: food sources of social areas where all the dos and
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: the dope fani the groups are moving in the other box,
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: and he wants to leave that bedding area and go
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: to that food source. So if I'm still in that
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: betting area, then the closer it gets start to last dance.
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: I haven't seen a box. So I find the best
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: to prioritize my sits and increase that value by sitting
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: in a morning area that relates to a betting area
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: and then an evening area that relates to a food source.
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: Doesn't necessarily mean I'm sitting in the bedding area or
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 1: in the food source, but I'm pretty close. So that's
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 1: that's more the pre rod. So how are you choosing?
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: You know? Okay, again we're talking about how we're prioritizing,
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: you know, different days. We've prioritized days, But then how
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 1: do you prioritize a certain betting area or a certain
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: food source, because I'm sure you know you're looking at
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 1: your farm and you have done something to know. Okay,
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: I think there's betting here, I think there's food here.
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: But then the next question that naturally people are thinking
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: through is Okay, I know I want to be by
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 1: betting area in the morning, or I know I want
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: to be by good food source. Then they start saying, okay,
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: which one? And so I think we've talked about trail cameras,
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 1: we talked about scouting, we talked about sightings. What of
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 1: all those, if any or anything else are you using
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: to then choose the the specific food source you're hunting
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: in the evening? Well, I I do love my trail cameras.
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 1: And for one that shows me if there's a sure
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 1: box in the property or not. It showed me when
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: they come on the property, when they don't, showed me
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: if they're coming to in the day or at night. Um,
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: But at the same time, the direction they're coming from,
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 1: you should give me some clue as to what betting
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 1: area they're choosing to stay at during the day. And
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 1: so if I knew that a monster bok was hanging
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: back out in this corner in a betting area, then
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 1: that would be my priority stand location and where I'd
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: want to go back into the edge of that betting area,
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 1: walk in the opposite direction from the food. So in
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: the morning, when I'm walking in the dark, I'm not
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 1: going through the food stars, I'm coming in from the
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: exact opposite way, thinking that that box is somewhere between
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 1: that food and his betting. He might already be in
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 1: his betting. But this time of year there's a lot
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 1: of social activity taking place in the morning. They're making
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 1: rub scrapes from chasing does, and so I have a
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 1: lot more of a likelihood of sneaking into the backside
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: of a betting area waiting for a buck to come
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 1: back to me at this time of the year than
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 1: I do October tenth, for example, or maybe even October.
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 1: And so what I'm also doing is there's some pretty
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: good value sit in the evening too, And so I'm
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 1: looking at if I'm gonna if I'm gonna sit three times,
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: and I'm gonna say, hunt two mornings in one evening.
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 1: Where can I sit in the morning that I'm not
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: potentially ruining that evening set if I happen to bump
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: a deer and vice for so I'm really thinking about
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 1: my next two to three sets out and making sure
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 1: that you're moving from point A to point B and
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: then they're also moving from point feed and point B,
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: and I'm not getting into both those lines or one
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: of those lines and destroying for that evening hunt. I'm
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 1: saving another line and movement for you know, the next morning,
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 1: in the next evening. I'm trying to prior to prioritize
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: my sets that way so that I can maintain a
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: high value and a freshening with each set. I also
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: in each area most of my really high quality areas
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 1: that I love to really focus on, I'll usually have
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: two to three complimentary stands, and so one area can
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: think of particularized I can't wait to hunt this weekend.
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: It will be the first set. It's a triangle of
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: stands um the one I can hunt with sutherly winds
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: in the evening, the other one I can hit with
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 1: hunt with northerly winds all day, either morning or evening,
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 1: and the other one has to be southwesterly winds to
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: westerly winds in the morning. And so it gives me
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: a great compliment of stands I can hunt just about
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: any wind condition morning, evening, midday doesn't really matter. If
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 1: I know there's a big buck up there, which there
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: there always is that I can go into one of
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: those stands and and get a high quality set. But
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 1: after I sit in there that one time, I'll probably
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: skip over and hunt another set, um, you know, for
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: for the next set or you know, the following morning.
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 1: So are you ever looking at an area, uh, in
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 1: particular stand and in setting a morning in an evening
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 1: or an evening in a morning to try to catch
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 1: movement coming back and forth if in fact the wind
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: is the same. Yeah, And there's a lot of times where,
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 1: you know, when when we're out in the whole country,
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: you can cheat the wind a lot, which is different
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 1: than the flat land. I mean, I live in Michigan
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: forty two years, so it's pretty flat. They're compared to
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 1: you know out here. But that being said, if you
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 1: can get away with hunting both those mornings, there's times where, um,
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 1: let's say the total movement from where I think a
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 1: buck betting is to where I think he's really generally
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: spending his evening and nighttime hours. Um, let's say it's
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: four hundred yards along that movement or three hundred yards,
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: why might come in the opposite direction, get a good
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 1: morning hunt, and then leave that same way, and then
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 1: I'll flip around in the afternoon for a nice three
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 1: or four hour sit. Actually walk in through the food
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 1: source and get into my stand location and let my
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: wind blow into a safe way. And so in that way,
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 1: I'm hunting both ends of the movement. And if I
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 1: feel that I got in non invasively in the morning,
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: I didn't. I didn't hear any spooks, I didn't hear
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 1: anything blown at me while I was on the stand,
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 1: and I thought I got away with a good clean sit. Um.
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 1: I will certainly try that at times too. Are all
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 1: your stands pre hung then, or do you do? Do
• 1:15:47
  Speaker 1: you set up a lot of stands throughout the year? Yeah,
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 1: most of my stands are pretty hung. Um. Now, when
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: we go down to Ohio and hunt on public land,
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 1: we have a few that we set a couple of
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 1: weeks ago. But at the same time we have a
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: lot of trees that we've marked for climbers and so,
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: and I do use climbers occasionally around here. Um. I
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: like actually the comfort of a climber. I like the portability.
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 1: I do not like the noise I'm walking in with it. Um,
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: you know, I period already takes me fifty minutes to
• 1:16:16
  Speaker 1: get to some of my stands walking up four hundred
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: feet in elevation, so to put a climber on my
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 1: back along with the extra way to have on my front,
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 1: and then it gets me pretty tired out by the
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 1: time I'm up there. So, UM, I try to have
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 1: those pre hung stands um cleaned out and ready to go,
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 1: and then I'll use a climber when I need that flexibility.
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: You mentioned that when you're sitting up for those mornings,
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 1: since at this time of year you like to be
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 1: I think you said like a hundred a hundred fifty
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: yards from where you think that betting area is trying
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: to be kind of close into there on the flip
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 1: side in the evening, are you relating more to I
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: know you mentioned that you're relating more to the food source,
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: but I'm just curious about the relativity of being near
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: to that food. So so are you right on the
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: food or do you like to still usually try to
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: stay pretty far off. I know from some of the
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: stuff I've read it from you, you've talked a lot
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 1: about the lines of movement and and placing yourself on that,
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: but I'd love to hear a little more about that
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 1: and um, you know, and if that factors into your
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: distance from food or distance from the prime food, things
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 1: like that. Well, one of the things I'm kind of
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 1: looking at absolutes too, and one of those things is
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: that absolute is where is the staging area. So staging
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 1: area to me is a is a really thick area,
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 1: brushy area, high stem count, density of regeneration, conifers, grasses, briers,
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 1: kind of that mix where that last step of safety
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 1: that a deer we'll go through from its secure bedding,
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 1: secure travel corridor, gets to that edge in that staging
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 1: area and when it pops out of there, it's really
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 1: heading towards food. And so a lot of times because
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 1: of the stem density and the proximity of food, those
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: areas also become dull family group betting areas. And so
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 1: what I'm trying to do is um really protect that.
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 1: So I'm thinking of a spot that I hunted into
• 1:17:59
  Speaker 1: the evening. It was in two thousand eleven, shot a
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: real nice five six year old buck, beautiful buck on
• 1:18:05
  Speaker 1: October two, and I was able to position myself. There
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 1: was betting areas on benches down below the flat that
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 1: I was on, and then there was a staging area
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: that was probably about seventy to eight yards from where
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 1: my stand location was. And so if you can kind
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 1: of imagine, I'm coming into this stand location to my
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 1: left and approximately within seventy fifty yards there's high quality betting.
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: To my right, about seventy eight yards there's a staging
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: area with highly high likelihood that there was some doll
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 1: family groups bedding. And then about thirty yards out in
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 1: the grass from there was the start of one our
• 1:18:43
  Speaker 1: food plots. That was that food plight. The deer could
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 1: go in either direction for five and fifty yards one
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 1: way or four hundred yards in the other. And what
• 1:18:51
  Speaker 1: I like about not having a big circular food plot
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 1: at that point is once a deer entered that food
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 1: source in the evening, it really stretched him out, so
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 1: more deer and move more deer. Those deer pulled out
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 1: in the middle of the fields away from the field edge,
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 1: and uh, and that to me helps more deer cycle
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 1: through too. So in that case, UM, I actually shot
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 1: that buck with maybe forty five minutes to go before
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 1: dark as he was cruising between that staging area and
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 1: the bedding area, and uh, it was kind of a
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 1: dead area, almost a secure travel but more of a
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 1: travel corridor on benches and funnels than than actually coming
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: into its basically coming in between doll bedding and buck
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 1: betting on a more of an open flat um and
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 1: the doll betting be in the staging area. Okay, And
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 1: coming up here is Adam Hayes. He has been on
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 1: a number of TV shows, including Team two hundred, which
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 1: has been his latest. Uh. He's killed a whole lot
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 1: of impressive deer, including uniquely compared to a lot of people,
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 1: four different bucks over two inches, and he does us
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 1: in a very targeted, specific, strategic way, which makes his
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 1: input very interesting. Here's some quick ideas from Adam on
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 1: hunting October. You talked about the success that you have
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 1: towards the end of October, partly in that period of
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 1: time that people call the October lowell um. And from
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: some of the things I've read you, you've certainly killed
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 1: some of your giant bucks during that time. Firm and
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 1: I understand that you know what we've been talking about
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 1: the moon and understanding to be patient and waiting to
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 1: push in until those conditions are right. I know it's
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 1: a big part of your your kind of formula for success.
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: But what else are you doing at that time of year.
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 1: What are the other pieces of that puzzle in late
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: October that are helping you have success because people struggle
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 1: with that sometimes. Yeah, well it goes back to really
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: seeing the big picture and understanding what's going on that
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 1: time of the year. You know, if if you're after
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 1: a specific animal and you want your best opportunity to
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 1: kill that animal, you need to concentrate on when that
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 1: animal is going to be the most predictable and the
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: most patternable, and that's early season, before you've got into
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 1: into the rut when he's chasing all over the place.
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 1: Late season, they've been pressured for three or four months
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 1: and they're on edge every little thing they hear and
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 1: smell and see. Early season is I think it's your
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 1: best chance to kill a specific animal. And you know
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 1: a lot of people talk about the October law and
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 1: how tough it is to hunt. Yeah, it is in
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 1: a sense. But you know, I learned this from Andre
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 1: is that those animals are doing the exact same thing
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 1: pretty much every day. All they're doing is they're betting
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 1: and they're feeding, and they're going from A to B
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 1: and they're doing it in a very very small area.
• 1:21:42
  Speaker 1: They're not traveling very far at all. They're they're very
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 1: vulnerable because they're so predictable and powerable because they're doing
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: the same thing every day. But they're very tough to
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 1: kill because they're doing it in a very small area
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 1: and you're normally only going to get one chance to
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: invade need that little area before games over, and it
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 1: completely changes his pattern. He goes nocternal, he goes to
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 1: the next farm over. I don't believe they run out
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 1: of the county, but they will definitely change their patterns.
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 1: So you're only going to get one crack at him hurling.
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: So that's when the late season scouting comes into play.
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 1: That's when you know knowing what these animals are doing,
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 1: where they're at, you know where they're betting, where they're feeding,
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 1: how they're getting back and forth or made to be,
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 1: Knowing where the weak spot that where you need to
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 1: be to kill him, having things set up, knowing what
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: wins you need to get into that spot to kill him.
• 1:22:39
  Speaker 1: You know, maybe having some strategically placed trail cameras along
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 1: that pattern, so you know when that animal is moving
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 1: during daylight and um, like I said, it's a tough
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: time to hunt, but if you really understand what's going on,
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 1: it's your best chance to kill him the mature buck,
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: because he's doing the exact scene thing every day. It
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 1: just makes it very difficulty to get it done on
• 1:23:04
  Speaker 1: more than one occasion because, like I said, you you
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 1: walk into the that buck's bedroom in mid October and
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 1: you don't kill him in the game, is it either
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: got tougher or it's over because he's gonna be somewhere else.
• 1:23:16
  Speaker 1: He's gonna know you were in there. And it's just
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 1: that's why it's so tough for guys, like I said,
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 1: to not hunt a big gear everything's perfect, and then
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 1: once you get it perfect, you know how to get
• 1:23:30
  Speaker 1: into that area without disturbing atting animal and you kill
• 1:23:33
  Speaker 1: him the first time in when he's got the wind
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: in the moon in disavor, get in and get him out.
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 1: Andrey used to say it was he was surgically removing
• 1:23:42
  Speaker 1: a big buck from the face of the earth. And
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 1: that's really rich. How you got to look at it.
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: You're looking at it like a surgeon. Think about the
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 1: amount of after the surgeon puts them to you know,
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 1: not only you know, being able to practice medicine, but
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 1: knowing what he needs to do in that rating room
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 1: before he goes in there. And it's really it's that
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 1: black and white. I mean, you got to go in
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 1: there and surgically remove that animal. Yeah, I love that analogy.
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 1: That's that's one that I'm gonna I don't start using.
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 1: I like it. Um So, something you mentioned, and it's
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 1: something that you know, I've always have believed, I think
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 1: to degrees during that time of year, typically if you
• 1:24:20
  Speaker 1: have all these things in your favor, is it safe
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 1: to say that you are usually trying to get closer
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 1: to a betting area at that time of year, when
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 1: you have the right conditions, when you know where the
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 1: buck is. Most of those huns, those kill sets are
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 1: probably tight in the bedroom because of like you mentioned,
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 1: the fact that these bucks are using a really small area. Yeah.
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 1: I mean, for the most part, I think those deer
• 1:24:43
  Speaker 1: moving around, you know, in the area why hunt in
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 1: central Ohio, They're not moving very far between their bed
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 1: and where they're feeding. A hundred two hundred yards mac,
• 1:24:52
  Speaker 1: So wherever you're at, you're pretty darn close to where
• 1:24:55
  Speaker 1: he's betting. Yeah, can you have my best I've had
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 1: my best luck on those on those sets in evening hunts,
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 1: I very very rarely ever try a morning hut early
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 1: season on those animals. But if I'm going to, if
• 1:25:12
  Speaker 1: I've tried it once or twice in the evening and
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 1: haven't got it done, and I know right where that
• 1:25:18
  Speaker 1: animal is betting, and then maybe I have a stand
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 1: already hung in that bedding area, I will not go
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 1: into that bedding area on an early season hunt until
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 1: I have that red moon time one to three hours
• 1:25:31
  Speaker 1: after daylight. I've witnessed it on a handful of occasions,
• 1:25:36
  Speaker 1: seen a big, you know, two class animal coming back
• 1:25:40
  Speaker 1: to bed late on those overhead times late in the morning,
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 1: and that lives were the only times that animal came
• 1:25:46
  Speaker 1: back late. So so they're stay, they're feeding a little
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 1: later because the moon is telling them to not go
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 1: back to bed yet. Yeah, instead of know that that
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 1: that moontime hitting in the middle of the night and
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 1: they fed and they're laying down and starts cracking daylight
• 1:26:06
  Speaker 1: and they're heading back and get into their bed before
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 1: shooting light. They're actually feeding closer to daylight, and you
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 1: have a better chance to than seeding, you know, in
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 1: the daylight and coming back just a little bit late.
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 1: So how how much of a buffer are you giving
• 1:26:22
  Speaker 1: yourself when you go into those tree stands as far
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 1: as time is concerned, are you going in two hours early?
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 1: One hour early? You're talking about mornings or evings or
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 1: both mornings, Well, mornings, I'd like to get in super
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 1: early because I want everything to have a chance to
• 1:26:43
  Speaker 1: calm down. And I'm I mean, if I go into
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 1: trying to dive into a bedding area in the morning,
• 1:26:49
  Speaker 1: I'm taking my time. I mean, I don't want to
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 1: break a twig. I don't want to bang my bow
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 1: up against the stand. I mean, I don't want to
• 1:26:56
  Speaker 1: do anything. I'm I'm doing everything in slow motion because
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 1: you just can't make any mistakes in a betting area
• 1:27:02
  Speaker 1: in the morning. So I give myself twice as much
• 1:27:06
  Speaker 1: time as I think I need to get into my
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 1: spot undetected, you know, literally tiptoing into a spot, and
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 1: you know, given myself an hour before daylight for everything
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 1: to maybe calm down a little bit and just to
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 1: make sure that that animal is nowhere close to the
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 1: begging area if if it's at all possible when I
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 1: get in there. And to wrap us up, we've got
• 1:27:30
  Speaker 1: a couple of excerpts from my very first conversation on
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 1: the Wired Hunt podcast with Mark Jury. If you've listened
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 1: to any of our other more recent episodes of them,
• 1:27:39
  Speaker 1: you know he's a wealth of information. Here. He's going
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 1: to talk through some thoughts on morning hunts in October,
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 1: on the October lull, on some weather factors related to October,
• 1:27:51
  Speaker 1: and then some of his high level thoughts on different
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 1: phases of this month. So here we go. Now, I
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 1: want to go off on a brief tangent here um
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: because Dan and I, over the past weeks and really
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 1: the last year or two we've been doing this, we
• 1:28:06
  Speaker 1: have an ongoing debate about morning hunts, and we asked
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 1: this to our guest last week and now you just
• 1:28:11
  Speaker 1: briefly mentioned this and it made me think about So
• 1:28:13
  Speaker 1: I want to get your opinion real fast, um, hunting
• 1:28:16
  Speaker 1: mornings in October in general, is that something you would
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 1: be for or against. I will hunt every first morning
• 1:28:24
  Speaker 1: at the front and none of the others until the
• 1:28:27
  Speaker 1: latter part of October. Then I will hunt every morning
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 1: until about Thanksgiving. Okay, and can you so, can you
• 1:28:33
  Speaker 1: explain to us why you don't hunt all those other
• 1:28:36
  Speaker 1: mornings in October. I lack of movement and spoken deer
• 1:28:40
  Speaker 1: getting into their bedroom. They're not moving very far for
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 1: the most part. It's an afternoon game. I mean, their
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 1: afternoon is it's like our morning. You know that they've
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 1: been bed at all day. That's when they get up
• 1:28:50
  Speaker 1: and by early morning they're going back to bed. The
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 1: first morning the front is awesome. Regardless of what the
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: date is in October, it is amazing that first north
• 1:29:00
  Speaker 1: early morning. I don't care if it's October two or
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 1: fifty threat in the middle of the well, that morning
• 1:29:06
  Speaker 1: will be phenomenal. Guarantee. Yeah, that's good. That's good to know.
• 1:29:10
  Speaker 1: I think it continues to evolve me and Dan's thoughts
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 1: and opinions on this too, hearing the different perspectives, and
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 1: that makes a lot of sense. Waiting for the fronts.
• 1:29:19
  Speaker 1: I tend to do that a lot when it comes
• 1:29:20
  Speaker 1: to even the evening hunts, and it makes sense that
• 1:29:23
  Speaker 1: those morning hunts could really still be great even early
• 1:29:25
  Speaker 1: on with that right man, that firs morning is awesome.
• 1:29:29
  Speaker 1: It's just awesome, and they're they're in a good mood,
• 1:29:31
  Speaker 1: they're moving around, and that what happens to to stay
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 1: on the feed later, right, so they're late coming back
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 1: to bed. And now this is provided you're in the
• 1:29:39
  Speaker 1: right spot. You know, you can go goople any hunt
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 1: up by hunting the wrong place at the wrong time.
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 1: It's all about trying to get the right place at
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 1: the right time. But generally they're on the food later
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 1: and then they're going to be later coming back to bed,
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 1: So therefore you're going to see daylight activity, whereas most
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 1: mornings without that front, they're at bed are already betted
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: by the time and stay break. That's my experience. And
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 1: in October, yeah, so on on that particular instance, are
• 1:30:05
  Speaker 1: you gonna be hunting near the betting area where they're
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 1: coming back, or are you gonna be hunting some kind
• 1:30:10
  Speaker 1: of transition or pinch point to catch them coming back
• 1:30:13
  Speaker 1: to their bed. It depends on the mask cop that year.
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: If there's a mash crop, I'm gonna be somewhere on
• 1:30:18
  Speaker 1: an on an oak plat, or somewhere where there's acorns,
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 1: because they're phenomenal throughout October on the coal propts that
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 1: if there's not much of a mash crop, I'm probably
• 1:30:27
  Speaker 1: going to be not far off of a food plot
• 1:30:30
  Speaker 1: in a known betting area because they're just not moving
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 1: very far off where their their primary food sources. What
• 1:30:36
  Speaker 1: about specifically a morning hunt, That's what I was talking about. Okay,
• 1:30:41
  Speaker 1: I got you. That's that's exactly what in the morning,
• 1:30:44
  Speaker 1: that's where I go in October for those types of hunts,
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 1: how early are you gonna be getting into your stands
• 1:30:49
  Speaker 1: in the morning? Did I lose you? He? Can you hear? Mark? Oh?
• 1:30:55
  Speaker 1: There you are? Okay, yep. It was just curious for
• 1:30:57
  Speaker 1: those morning hunts in October, how earlier you trying to
• 1:31:00
  Speaker 1: get into your stand in the morning? Fairly early, it's
• 1:31:04
  Speaker 1: a thirty minutes before the first thought of like I
• 1:31:07
  Speaker 1: that's they're just not far and not moving very far,
• 1:31:10
  Speaker 1: So you better use the cover of darkness. And if you're,
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 1: if you're, you get away with so much more during
• 1:31:16
  Speaker 1: the cover of darkness than you do even at the
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 1: first hint of light. It's so much easier to blow
• 1:31:21
  Speaker 1: deer out at the first sin of light then when
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 1: it's black dark. Did you ever notice that, like if
• 1:31:25
  Speaker 1: you go in your stand, it's black dark, one might
• 1:31:27
  Speaker 1: bounce thirty or forty yards, but yet when it gets light,
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: you still see that deer, whereas if you're climbing up
• 1:31:32
  Speaker 1: and there's a little light, you're gonna blow and plumb
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 1: out of the country. I love black dark during October. Yeah,
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 1: definitely much safer approach that way. That's for sure, much safer,
• 1:31:41
  Speaker 1: and it's more important then than during the rut. Now,
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 1: I got a question for you. You just brought it up,
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 1: um in one of your last comments about the October law.
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 1: All right, So what we've talked about so far, you know,
• 1:31:55
  Speaker 1: the barometric pack pressure, the consistent winds, that the first
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 1: change in a wind direction, the cooler temperatures. Am I
• 1:32:04
  Speaker 1: to assume that your definition of the October law is
• 1:32:08
  Speaker 1: the opposite of all those? Well, October law. It's also
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 1: what I call the October swell. There's a defined period
• 1:32:18
  Speaker 1: or a defined phase in the middle part of October
• 1:32:20
  Speaker 1: where they come out of their feeding pattern that they're
• 1:32:22
  Speaker 1: into heavily from you know, from the time they dropped
• 1:32:25
  Speaker 1: the velvet until about October the chance through the fourteenth
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 1: that varies year to year. When they go into the law,
• 1:32:31
  Speaker 1: But from then untill about October, there is a definitely
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 1: subdued movement period there in October. Unless it's a major
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 1: could front. You have to have cold to have a
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 1: decent day, in my opinion. So in those situations where
• 1:32:47
  Speaker 1: you do get you know, I'm gonna continue to drill
• 1:32:49
  Speaker 1: on these examples. Let's say now we're in that dreaded
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 1: quote unquote October law. You do get that front. Is
• 1:32:57
  Speaker 1: that just a situation where you're going to move into
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 1: one of your Is that would you move into one
• 1:33:01
  Speaker 1: of your better stands at that point, or even though
• 1:33:03
  Speaker 1: you have a front, you're still gonna wait till a
• 1:33:05
  Speaker 1: better time period, maybe later in the year. No, I'll
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 1: go into it, and you have to recognize what's happening
• 1:33:11
  Speaker 1: during this well I said, they go into it looking
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 1: one way and they come out looking another way. I mean,
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 1: that is the build up, that's the testosterone going from
• 1:33:19
  Speaker 1: ground zero up to where it peaks to where all
• 1:33:22
  Speaker 1: the daylight activity happens there during seeking phase of the
• 1:33:25
  Speaker 1: pre route there in late October. That that period when
• 1:33:29
  Speaker 1: you do get a cold front, that's when you look
• 1:33:32
  Speaker 1: back historically at your pictures and you go where was
• 1:33:35
  Speaker 1: I getting daylight activity or where was it getting a
• 1:33:37
  Speaker 1: certain Bucks picture a lot during this date range. Chances
• 1:33:41
  Speaker 1: are it's in and around the scrape. We always transition
• 1:33:43
  Speaker 1: all of our cameras off of travel or food during
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 1: the greater pasture sphase. When we go into the October law,
• 1:33:50
  Speaker 1: that's the time we transition every camera we have the
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 1: scrapes because scrapes are gonna absolutely light up during that
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 1: phase and you you can go middle part of color.
• 1:34:00
  Speaker 1: In fact, it is the best time to hunt scrapes
• 1:34:02
  Speaker 1: is during the law, but you need a cold front
• 1:34:04
  Speaker 1: to actually get one on Steet movie. And the one
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 1: thing that we've kind of talked about interspersed throughout all
• 1:34:10
  Speaker 1: these different factors is the time of the year. And
• 1:34:13
  Speaker 1: you mentioned your show thirteen and the fact that you
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 1: guys broke down the year into thirteen different phases. Could you,
• 1:34:19
  Speaker 1: you know, briefly walk us through what those phases are.
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 1: We touched on a few of them, but could you
• 1:34:23
  Speaker 1: walk us through what those phases are that you guys
• 1:34:25
  Speaker 1: believe are you know, distinct, and maybe give us a
• 1:34:28
  Speaker 1: quick like you're one main thing to note about each
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: one of those phases. It's that possible you know I
• 1:34:36
  Speaker 1: can't do it off the top. I give you my
• 1:34:42
  Speaker 1: favorite hold on down there, let me get through this.
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: The moment the first days is September the fifteenth, and
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 1: let's just coincide with when the Missouri season helping September st.
• 1:35:01
  Speaker 1: And that's the phase we call the new Beginning. Uh.
• 1:35:04
  Speaker 1: It's if you're on one, there's a good chance you're
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 1: gonna kill him if you get a weather front. It's
• 1:35:08
  Speaker 1: all about food source that time, and it's all about
• 1:35:11
  Speaker 1: trail pictures and your summer observation, etcetera, etcetera. I love
• 1:35:14
  Speaker 1: that phase. I also love the phase that follows it,
• 1:35:16
  Speaker 1: which is greener Pastor September through October the twelve. To me,
• 1:35:21
  Speaker 1: greener Pastors is one of the best phases to kill
• 1:35:25
  Speaker 1: him the tur buck because there's a defoliation that goes
• 1:35:29
  Speaker 1: on during this phase throughout the Midwest. And I'm only
• 1:35:31
  Speaker 1: talking in terms of the hunting that I've observed here
• 1:35:34
  Speaker 1: in Missouri, Iowa, Illinois, and Kansas. Well, those beans that
• 1:35:38
  Speaker 1: we're planted back in May and Junior eventually turned from
• 1:35:42
  Speaker 1: green to brown and defoliate. There is a major switch
• 1:35:45
  Speaker 1: within the herd to go to the next green food source.
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 1: And if you've got that green food source close to
• 1:35:51
  Speaker 1: where you've seen the tur buck all summer, you're gonna
• 1:35:54
  Speaker 1: go through what I call greenw green transfer. There's a
• 1:35:56
  Speaker 1: good chance he's going to transfer from that green bean
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 1: field and you're green plot. The difference is the b
• 1:36:01
  Speaker 1: field might have been forty acres and your green field
• 1:36:03
  Speaker 1: might be one to three acres, a much smaller target
• 1:36:07
  Speaker 1: area to try and kill that dear. That phase, to
• 1:36:10
  Speaker 1: me is one of the best of the whole year.
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 1: Um October three, we'll talk about the October Law trus
• 1:36:17
  Speaker 1: days overall, and you gotta have a cold front and
• 1:36:20
  Speaker 1: mornings can be quite good. We key in on scrapes
• 1:36:23
  Speaker 1: with our cameras and with our hunting tactics. We're gonna
• 1:36:26
  Speaker 1: key in on scrapes in around that October Law with
• 1:36:28
  Speaker 1: gilt and get here during that period because they're still
• 1:36:31
  Speaker 1: on food source and they're not moving very fart. But
• 1:36:33
  Speaker 1: you gotta have a weather front in order to do
• 1:36:35
  Speaker 1: pre luck. October November the first. To me, this phase
• 1:36:39
  Speaker 1: is all about killing the oldest, biggest gear in the
• 1:36:42
  Speaker 1: herd if you can find him, especially with those historical
• 1:36:45
  Speaker 1: pictures like we were talking about you can get on
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 1: and kill that particular dear. This sphase, why because it's
• 1:36:52
  Speaker 1: one of the few phases where that really old hear
• 1:36:56
  Speaker 1: is actually on his feet. He's looking for the first
• 1:36:58
  Speaker 1: available dough to give the first hint of asterisk. And
• 1:37:02
  Speaker 1: I don't know that they're really ready to breathe yet
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 1: during this space, but he's certainly ready to start tending
• 1:37:07
  Speaker 1: her seven to ten days before he breathes her. But
• 1:37:11
  Speaker 1: she said that one thing that old was sucking her
• 1:37:13
  Speaker 1: is going to be the first one to find the
• 1:37:15
  Speaker 1: one that's felling the vest I love that face where
• 1:37:17
  Speaker 1: really mature deer. All right. So there you have it.
• 1:37:21
  Speaker 1: H a lot to take in there, I realize in
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 1: in a little bit all over the place. But I
• 1:37:27
  Speaker 1: think that if you take a little bit from each
• 1:37:31
  Speaker 1: of these different people, you can come into this next
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 1: month with a lot of different little tricks up your sleeve,
• 1:37:38
  Speaker 1: I think, and some things to think about the next
• 1:37:40
  Speaker 1: time you're thinking about should I hunt this day or not?
• 1:37:43
  Speaker 1: Or should I hunt this tree stand or not? Or
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 1: should I worry about the October law or not. I'm
• 1:37:48
  Speaker 1: hoping that this podcast is going to give you a
• 1:37:49
  Speaker 1: starting point and point you in the right direction. As
• 1:37:53
  Speaker 1: I mentioned at the top, these were just little bits
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 1: from much larger conversations, so go back and listen to these.
• 1:38:00
  Speaker 1: Gordon Whittington was episode number one, Dan Infalt was episode
• 1:38:05
  Speaker 1: number twenty seven, Bernie Barringer was episode number one. See
• 1:38:10
  Speaker 1: Jeff Sturgis was number seventy seven, Adam Hayes was number
• 1:38:14
  Speaker 1: sixty nine, and Mark Jury was number sixty three. Check
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 1: those out. Each one is jam packed with a lot
• 1:38:21
  Speaker 1: more information than we just heard here. So that's gonna
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 1: do it. I hope you guys enjoyed this one. Hopefully
• 1:38:28
  Speaker 1: this provided you something helpful to kick off the month
• 1:38:30
  Speaker 1: of October. It's a roller coaster, guys, and we are
• 1:38:33
  Speaker 1: just beginning to head up that first hill, and I'm pumped.
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 1: This is the best time of year. Enjoy it, soak
• 1:38:41
  Speaker 1: it in, hunt as much as you possibly can, um
• 1:38:44
  Speaker 1: because you know, don't don't neglect important obligations and responsibilities,
• 1:38:49
  Speaker 1: of course, but I can tell you from experience that
• 1:38:52
  Speaker 1: I look forward to this all year and then the
• 1:38:54
  Speaker 1: month goes by so fast, just a blank and it's gone.
• 1:38:57
  Speaker 1: So for whatever kind of time the energy you can
• 1:39:00
  Speaker 1: put into, at least enjoy soak it in and uh
• 1:39:03
  Speaker 1: just realize and remember these are special, special times, the
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 1: best of luck, shoot straight, have fun, be safe, and
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 1: stay wired to hunt.