Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 398: Late Season Tactics and the Helium Balloon Theory

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Ep. 398: Late Season Tactics and the Helium Balloon Theory · Wired To Hunt Podcast

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your home for
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host,
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: your host, Mark Kenyan, and this is episode number three
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: and today the show, I'm joined by Tony Peterson to
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: answer listener questions on topics ranging from killing those to
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: finding late season bucks in warm weather, to whether or
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: not helium balloons can lead you to big bucks. All right,
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: by Onyx. Today we're doing some much needed listener Q
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: and A. I get tons of emails and Facebook and
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: Instagram messages UM from from you guys, which I love
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: getting with specific hunting related questions, and I hate myself
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  Speaker 1: for this fact, but I'm not able to respond to
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: all of them. And I'm sorry that I can't do that, um.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: But that's why I try to make sure we get
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: some of these episodes in, because I want to answer
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: as many of those as we possibly can and help
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: you folks out. And to do that, I've got my
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: buddy and a leading meat either contributor and one of
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: the very best deer hunters I know, and that person
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  Speaker 1: is Tony Peterson. So, Tony, thanks for being on here
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: to help me answer some questions. Well, thanks for having
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: me buddy. You uh, you said that we were talking
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: a little earlier day and you said that your experience
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: on the back forty forced you to take a full
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: month off of hunting. Is that true? Have you? Have
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: you been doing any white tail hunting since we talked
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: last time in early November? That that was partially a
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: joke about Michigan hunting and partially more of my response
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: from getting after it for a couple of months in
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: a row and just coming home after that drive and going,
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: I don't want to I don't want to see the
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: view from a tree stand for a while. So I did.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: I took some time off and hunted some peasants and
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: hung out with my little girls, and lately I got
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: the itch bad. You know how it is when the
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: when the season is about to end, and you start going, man,
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  Speaker 1: it's gonna be nine months before I can do this again.
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  Speaker 1: So I've actually been hunting really hard lately, just to
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: try to kill an antler list deer here close to
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  Speaker 1: my house. And it's it's been a lot of fun
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: and very humbling yeah, I hear you're there. That's that's
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: exactly how I felt. After after all that back forty
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: stuff finished up, I went and I did, as you know,
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: I killed the buck I was after on my other
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: Michigan spots, and then after that I took my big breaks.
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: I think I took two weeks off. But now I'm
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: right back in the same boat as you, trying to
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: kill trying to kill some does. And that's that's It's
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: a lot of fun. I love this part of the
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: season when I'm not worried about filling a buck tag
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: and instead I can just get out there and hunt
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: for analyst deer and and like you said, that can
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: be a challenge sometimes, but it's also slightly less stressful
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: or something something about it is just a little bit
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  Speaker 1: more um. It feels like I'm just going out there
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: to have a good time hunting, and not as much
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  Speaker 1: as Okay, I gotta do this, I gotta do this.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: This has got to go right, and I can't. I
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: can't make this mistake. And if it goes all just
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: right and then it's then it'll go the way I want.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: So maybe that's just because of my manic personality, but
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: something about this is nice, That's what I'm trying to say.
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: Oh it is man. You take away that pressure of
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: the of the buck tag situation, and you you find
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: yourself just hunting to hunt, and it's just a different
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: experience out there, and they're they're both fun. But this
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: time of year, when you kind of got the burnout
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: factor going real high and you're just trying to you know,
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: ring as much as you can out of the season
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: before it's gone, it is just nice to go sit
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: and if if you get a good shot, try to
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: take it. And if not, who cares? Yeah? Exactly, exactly, Um.
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  Speaker 1: And you know this is this perfectly segues into a
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: bunch of questions that I got. Um. I got a
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: bunch of different listener questions, and a lot of them
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  Speaker 1: actually revolved around this very topic, which was, you know,
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  Speaker 1: nobody ever talks about trying to kill a dough No
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: one ever talks about the tactics for filling an antlerst tag.
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: It's always how do you kill mature buck? How do
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: you kill a big buck? How do you kill you know,
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: such and such a buck? In early September, how do
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: you kill a running buck with a grunt called blah
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: blah blah blah blah. There are not many articles or
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: podcast dedicated to, Hey, how do you kill a dough
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: in December or January or something like that. Um, I
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: haven't read that one, Tony. I don't know about you,
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: but um, i'll we will summarize a bunch of people's questions,
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: which is, hey, talk us through some of the things
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: you're thinking about right now when you're trying to fill
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: an analyst tag. Um, well, let's let's just answer that
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: generic question raf the bat and check off on about
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: thirty of the submissions I've gotten. What are what are
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: your some of your thoughts there? Um, you know, I
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: think that I think a lot of those questions probably
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: come from people who don't have maybe a tradition, an
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: old destination food source to set up on, because it's
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: not if you're talking typical white tail strategy right now,
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: it's not there's no secrets. I mean, it's go set
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: up on the calories and wait them out. But a
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: lot of people don't have that option, and you know,
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  Speaker 1: That's what I'm dealing with right now, and so I'm
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: I'm trying to uh, I'm trying to kill them, pass
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: them through and staging, and it's been it's been really
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: interesting because I'm having as good a hunts in the
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: evening as i am in the morning because I'm not
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: on a food source. And so it's really been about, uh,
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: you know, what do you have to work with? And
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: if you don't have that awesome pickcorn field or that
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: food plot, you got to figure out what they're doing.
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: And you might have a situation where you have dear
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: betting on a little property. Might you might have the
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: right betting cover, but you don't have the right food,
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  Speaker 1: And so a morning hunt might be a better deal
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: if you can get in. And it's it's kind of
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: about starting over right now, and you know, scouting in
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: the moment and figuring out where they're going to go.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: And if you see if you see something happening, they're
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: pretty patternable right now, you can move in on them.
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: So there's it's it's a fun time to hunt. Plus
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: you just don't have nearly as much competition out there. Yeah.
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: Now on the flip side, though, you don't have as
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: much competition right now because there was a ship ton
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: of competition two weeks ago or a month ago. So
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: these deer have been heavily pressured just about anywhere you've been.
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: You could be in even an aisle or somewhere at
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: least for any part of the season. This is the
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: most pressure they've been relative to the norm. So they
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: are edgy, they are on pins and needles. They're gonna
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: be more sensitive to mistakes probably than they were three
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: months ago. Um. Do you find yourself being more conservative
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: at this time of the year because of that? Or
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: do you have to get more aggressive because of the
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: flip side that you have to get aggressive to get
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: to some of these spots. Um. I find myself kind
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: of walking an interesting line with us, because sometimes you
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: can just get away with what you said, which is
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: just hunt by where the calories are and wait them
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: out and does will show up And if you have that,
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: it works. Um. But then sometimes, like in the situation
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: I'm in right now, some of my my main Michigan
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  Speaker 1: spot that I spent a lot of time on, Um,
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  Speaker 1: all the food has been plowed under. I've never had
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  Speaker 1: this situation on this set of properties, but all the
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  Speaker 1: food's gone, just a bunch of dirt fields, and so
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: I have zero late season food now compared to every
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: other year when there's always good stuff. So now I'm
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: in that situation you just described where I've got betting,
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: I've got transition stuff, I have no food. So I
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: went last night and hunted a little spot yet last night. Yeah,
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: last night, I hunted a little tiny food source that
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: I do kind of have, but it's kind of eaten
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: down to a pulp. And I thought, there's a chance
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: that you might get one dough family group that will
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  Speaker 1: hit this on their way to the other places, and
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: and I did have that happen, but they were at
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: a bow range. But what I'm finding is that if
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: I want to kill one of these doughes, now I
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: have to actually get aggressive, almost as aggressive as I
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: might hunt, you know, on November eight in a certain way.
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  Speaker 1: But I'm thinking about this unique thing that we don't
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: very often, which is a lot of times I think
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: about how aggressive or how much pressure I can put
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  Speaker 1: on a buck and like what they will, what they'll
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: be okay with, what I can get away with. But
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  Speaker 1: very rarely do you think about, okay, how many mistakes
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  Speaker 1: can I risk making to kill a dough and what
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  Speaker 1: will a Doe family group tolerate? You know what I mean?
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  Speaker 1: What I'm getting out here, so I'm actually I'm gonna
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: be okay with doing something knowing that, yeah, I might
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: go in there and these deer might figure me out,
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: but I might be able to get away with it
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  Speaker 1: a few more times in general than I could if
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: I was trying to kill just one five and a
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: half year old buck. Um. And so that's a different
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: mindset to have at this time of year when you're
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: thinking about that. Um, I don't know, is that is
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: that something you're doing to big time man? I? You know,
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: if you want to become a better hunter, hunting does
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: right now in a place that did get pounded during
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: the gun season is a great way to do it, because,
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: like you said, it's a weird time because they're pretty
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: visible when they're moving or if you have that place
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: they're feeding, you can see them. But when they get
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: bow range close, they just don't tolerate anything. And that's
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: what I've been dealing with. I've had I think I've
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: probably sat five times in the last week between mornings
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: and evenings, and I've had deer with thin shooting range
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: every time, and i haven't gotten to full drop without
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: blowing everything out. I'm just and I'm telling you like
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: I'm getting busted by fons. It's just it's almost comical,
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: and it's really focused. It It's forced me to focus
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: on how do I get in there? How early do
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: I have to go in there? What route do I
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: take to go in because the place I'm hunting, I
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: have a couple different ways to get in there, and
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: the amount of deer I see varies a lot by
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: how where I park and you know how long it
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: takes me to walk in there. And it's sort of
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: this weird master class that I'm I'm getting on hunting
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: all deer. And I'm telling you, I've got this this
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: group of three dough funds in there, and they all
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: looked a issues and I've had those year around me
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: so many times, and they are like, they are so
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: good at surviving right now, it's crazy. Let alone. Let
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: alone when the does and funds come in and I
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: try to I try to shoot one of the older does,
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: or there's a few loaners in there. Everybody is on
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: their A game this time of year, and so it
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: really it just it just forces you to think about
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: every move you make and if the wind is you know,
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: not perfect, or if it's a little crunchy going in,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: or you wait till they're a little too close and
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: you start to draw. It's it's rough. I mean, it's
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: really humbling. Yeah. So so one of some things that
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: are unique to hunting dose this time of year that
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: would be different than the things that we would tell people,
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: you know, to do when you're chasing the mature buck
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: during the rut. I mean, I'm thinking like, for example,
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: if I was thinking of how I might set up
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: for an evening hunt, and that was chasing a buck
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: during the rut, I might be thinking about, you know,
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: being downwind of a parallel trail that a luck might
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: be running down to scent check the food source, or
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: lots of times, there might be this big cow path
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: that leads into a food source that I wouldn't hunt
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: because that's where all the other deer are gonna come on.
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: But the buck might be on this much less noticeable
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: path that's thirty yards down there. Like little things like that,
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: I'm not I might be paying attention to sign rubs
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: and scrapes and stuff when I'm trying to kill a buck.
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: When I'm trying to kill the dough it's actually the
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: obvious sign, the obvious thing. That is the right way
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: to do. I'd rather hunt the obvious trail and be
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: very safe from a wind perspective than try to do
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: some kind of cutting the corner wind to try to
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: hunt a food source and make the deer think that
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: they've got the wind in their favor. Um. I'm not
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: worried about that, at least for me. I'm not worried
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: about that kind of thing. I'm not worried about it
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: trying to set up so that a bunch of doughs
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: have the wind in their favorite to come to a
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: food source. I am going to try to be in
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: between wherever they're going or where they're coming from, which
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: is whatever they're betting in right now, to that best
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: food possible, And if I can't hunt really close to it,
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: I simply want to be safely downwind so that you
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: don't have the chance of one of those does picking
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: you off as you described, um, and then hunt the
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: obvious thing, like if there's a bunch of tracks telling
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: me that a bunch of deer coming through here. The
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: nice thing about when you're trying to kill does is
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: that I don't care what those tracks are. I don't
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: care if one of them is four inches wide and splayed. Um.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: If there's some tracks, there's probably a deer that I
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: shoot in that group, and um, and so you you
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: don't need to overthink it in certain ways, but you
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: still have to execute well on the simple plan, if
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: that makes sense. Um. So, like you said, you gotta
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: be able to go through that whole getting drawn back process.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: You've got to make sure that you're paying attention early
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: on in the hunt. When the does show up before
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: you were in expecting them and you don't, you don't
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: have them pick you off. When you're in that tree
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: that's wide open right now, you don't have as much cover.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: Your things are louder. Seems like every sound echoes more
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: this time of year. These deer are on edge already,
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: so any little thing will set them off. UM. So
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: it's a different tension to detail. UM. But it's slightly
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: more forgiving in some aspects. I guess I think it's
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: I think it's more forgiving and that you have more options.
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: I mean, you have more targets right if you're if
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: you're open to any antler list, dear, you've got way
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: more options than if you're if you're, you know, limiting
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: yourself to a five and a half year old buck.
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: And I honestly think we don't give you know, we
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: we talked about bucks all the time, is how cag
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: they are, and you know what a buck has to
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: go through to be five and a half years old.
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: We don't think about the age of does or the
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: job they have, and I honestly think that does a
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: lot of times are way better at picking you off
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: than bucks. When you see when you see bucks moved
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: through the woods, even on public land, a lot of
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: times they're so confident that they're not you know, they
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: don't seem to be on their a game as much
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: as sometimes you see those doughes coming through with fawns
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: and they don't miss a thing. And so it's not,
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: you know, it's not so cut and dry that this
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: kind of deer is is really good at it. In
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: this kind of deer is, you can be dismissive of it,
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: and this this time of year, you can't. You can't
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: write any of those deer off. They all have the
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: potential to teach you a lesson about what you did wrong.
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: And that's that's what's so fun about it. And you know,
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: the thing that levels it off is that is the
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: quantity thing. You usually have just a way bigger hit list. Now,
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: if if anybody who walks in that doesn't have antlers
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: on its head is on the menu, then you've got
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: some options, but they're not easy, and that's what's awesome
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: about it. Yeah, okay, So what about this scenario. Let's
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: say you are set up and you have some does
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: come through, but that big old mama dobe you know,
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: picks you off and she either sees you move in
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: or hears you draw back or something and boogers out
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: of there. Um, when it comes to does, you're just
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: trying to kill some does. Now, would you can't if
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: you found a spotlight that that works and that there's
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: does coming through like that, would just sit out there again?
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: Would you go back the next day? Would you expect
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: some level of forgiveness or are you thinking, man, she
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: blew me out, I'm going to have to do something
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: different to mark She's gonna come right back and look
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: in this tree and see me and then out of
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: here she goes. Or on the flip side, you know,
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: well that one deer picked me off, but there could
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: be another tendo as it could come through here still
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: because I'm on the right food or I'm on the
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: corridor that leads to the right food, and you know,
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: I don't care about that one, because there's gonna be
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: seven more I care. I I just had a really
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: a really good example of this happened to me. Um.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: I had a dope come in the very first night
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: I hunted since I got back from the back forty
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: and she she fed in, had a couple of funds
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: behind her, got to twenty yards broadside. I was like,
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: this is over, and as soon as I started drawing,
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: she was gone. And she never looked up. She just
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: heard it and she bolted. And so it was kind
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: of like a weird bust because she just she knew
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: something wasn't right within her guard, but she didn't know
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: what happened. And I hunted there I think two days
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: after that, and that who came back in and she
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: pegged me so hard up there. It was just like
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: she remembered, like the last time I got here something
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: that I just wasn't comfortable with. And so they it
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: kind of depends, you know, if if you have enough
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: deer coming in where you can you can you know,
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: let a couple of them go, or if they if
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: they bust you and snort away, it's not that big
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: of a deal. Then you can keep kind of volume
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: hunting a spot. But if you get one of those
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: doughs like that and she happens to be the one,
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: the first one who moves in the evening or the
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: first one back, she can make your life really really
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: tough if she blows up every time she gets in
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: the area, or if she's going to look up into
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: that tree to the point where I'm actually thinking about
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: hunting this dough specifically from the ground and carving a
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: little spot in a cedar tree just to see if
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: I can trigger, and she come in and think that
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: maybe that tree is empty, so I'm not there. I
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: don't know, but it's it's interesting to see when you
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: get out there and you have those experiences, what some
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: of them tolerate and what some of them seemed learn from.
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: You know. I think one thing that's a little bit
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: different between buck and doe here is that if I
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: had that kind of situation with a mature buck, I
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: you know, if they pegged me there, I would be
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: much less expectant of them to return to that exact
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: place the next day or two days after that. I'd
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: expect that they're probably gonna avoid it by a wider
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: margin for some amount of time. But with a Doe
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: or Doe family group, I feel like there's a pretty
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: decent chance they'll come back the next day. There's a
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: pretty good chance they'll be back if I'm in the
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: right spot, you know, if I'm on that right food source,
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: or if I'm on the trail that leads to the
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: food source or out of their betting area. Um, but
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: I do believe that that Mama Doe is gonna be
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: looking right at that tree. She's gonna she's gonna come
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: that general direction, and she will be looking to see
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: if you're there again. And I think that if you,
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: I think you can get away with going back to
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: the same general area, but you better be in a
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: different tree. I can't tell you how many times I've
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: had this kind of thing where I get pegged and
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: the next day I'll hunt a different tree but in
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: the same general spot, and you can watch her coming
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: from a mile away, and she's just pegged on that tree,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: looking at it, looking at it, expecting to see someone
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: there doing the head Bob already. But if you're not there,
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: and if you're somewhere that is enough out of the
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: way that she doesn't pick you up again, they'll eventually
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: let her. She'll eventually let her guard down and come
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: in once she's confirmed that the danger isn't there tonight.
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: Um So, what I've found his work pretty well for
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: me is that if I do find myself in that situation,
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: I'll reposition within that zone and um, you can get
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: away with it the next day or two days later
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: or something. Um when you you just might not have
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: that same opportunity if it was a buck here after.
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: So I think you've got a little bit more wiggle
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: room there when you're when you're doing this, And then
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: again it comes back to the target environment too. If
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: not that doll, then it's the other group that comes through. Um. So,
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: so that's what I'm doing right now, is I'm I'm
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: bouncing around these transition areas to the food the foods
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: on places I can't hunt, but I can still hunt
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: the transition corridors, and um I'm camping in the best
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: places that I can hunt on those transitions until I
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: get pegged or make a mistake or kill one, and
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: then I'm making a small adjustment, um, and I'm trying
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: to fill as many dough TEGs as I can because
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: I think a really important point about dough hunting is
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: that this is the absolute best thing you can do
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: to help yourself come next year when you do have
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: a buck tag. I think it's a really important point
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: to make that there's and we talked about this in
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: the podcast we did earlier this year, Tony, Right. I mean,
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: the moment of truth. Dealing with that moment of truth
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: is is a tough thing, no matter how experienced you are.
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: But the only way to get better at it is
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: to have gone through a bunch. And the more times
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: you go through that moment truth, the better you can
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: handle it. And if all you ever do is kill
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: you know, or try to kill one mature buck every year,
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: or whatever it is for you, But if you limit
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: yourself to that kind of thing, you're just not going
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: to get that experience that a whole lot. If instead
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: you can go and fill five dough tags in December
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: or throughout the year or whatever it might be, whatever
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: that number is for you, UM, it does nothing but
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: help you. It absolutely makes you a better more UM.
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: You know, more effective once you have to go through
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: those moments again. And and it's it's it's a high pressure,
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: intense situation, whether it's a dough or a big buck um,
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: but simply having more targets to work with when you're
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: dough hunting gives you that opportunity to push through it.
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: At least that's what I phone. I totally agree. I
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: think I think it's a it's just an awesome way
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: to get better and and and learn from the things
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: that you shouldn't do or you know, maybe get some
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: positive reinforcement if you get it right. And it's just
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: there's a lot to it. It's it's a lot of fun,
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: and it's it's worth the effort. Yeah, it is a
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: lot of fun. That's the other thing is it's just
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: it's just fun. It's just fun and you fill the
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: freezer and you get great food, and it's it's great practice.
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: I love my late season dough hunts and you've got
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: a bunch of deer to butcher and you get to
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: do it and it's kind of like a fun thing
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: with a family. For for me at least I get
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: my wife involved and now my boys, and uh, it's
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: just a good way to wrap up the season. If
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: it's ties a really nice boat, you top off the
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: freezer to the max wherever you need it. Maybe you
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: share a deer with a family member or something. Um,
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: and I just love that is the way to end
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: my season. It just it leaves me with a good
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: taste in my mouth, both um figuratively and literally, I guess.
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: And then sets you up well for the new year.
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: So your wife will actually help you butcher and process
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: of deer. Yeah, yeah, that's that's awesome. I love it.
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: But she she she participates, and you're just happy that
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: she did it. Yeah, well, that's that's better than what
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: I have going on. My wife has offered a few
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: times and I had her just be kind of the
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: rapper and the you know, the label writer, right like, okay,
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: this one's backstraps from this date and this deer, and
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: I don't know what she was doing. My my wife's
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: a smart lady. She has a doctorate, like she's she's
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: no dummy. But when we started opening up those packages
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: throughout the year, when we would eat him, it was
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: like mystery meat. It was like she had no connection
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: between what she wrote and what was actually in the package.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: I was like, what do you what are you doing? Like?
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: How distracted were you? And so she's she's she's not much.
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: She doesn't help very much of that process that mostly
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: falls on me these days. Yeah, that's uh, that's important.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: You don't want to be surprised when you open up
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: the package and you're thinking you're cooking up backstrap for
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: the family. Instead you got a pound of burger. Y Ah. Yeah,
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: that's uh. That's my next ten to twelve days, I
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: think is hopefully doing a bunch of that. So, um,
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: let's let's keep rolling through some of these. Um here's
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: an interesting one. And I've read a few people like
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: post theories about this. I've never given it much thought,
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: but Jonathan asks do helium balloons have any connection to
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: buck betting? He'll continue, I'll read the rest of you
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: kind of a long thing here, but he says, do
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: helium balloons play any have any connection to buck betting?
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: This has been posted more and more on social media
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: about thermal's bringing balloons down and where those balloons land
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: are an indication of good buck betting areas. People have
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: both laughed at this theory, but others have picture posted
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: pictures of buck shot in these areas too. I was
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: a skeptic about it until my son and I were
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: out on the last day gun season in Wisconsin. We
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: set up on the ground between some dead falls, and
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: it wasn't until we got set up that we saw
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: a helium balloon laying on the forest floor. I didn't
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: pay much attention to it, but other than we're found landed,
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: but I was just sitting there. Then I started seeing
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: all these fresh rubs and sign and we sat for
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: a couple more hours and this I had to pack
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: it out. But as we were walking out, we jumped
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: a buck about seventy yards away from this location, bedded
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: right in that area. I'm still skeptic, but I'm curious
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: if this is coincidence or if there's something to the
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: balloon and thermal buck betting theory. Um. So, I've read
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: in some other places on forums and stuff about the
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: same thing, so I'll kind of generalize it a little more.
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: The basic theory here is that there are certain like
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: there's balloons all over the place. People put these balloons
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: up in the air for birthday parts or whatever, and
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: unfortunately end up as litter spread across the woods. I'm
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: sure people have seen that out there. And where are
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: these balloons get taken to though? Is supposedly, you know,
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: an indication of where the natural wind and thermals and
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: wind tunnels and stuff eventually direct anything that might be
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: floating in the air. And so some people have said, Man,
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: if you see a balloon land somewhere, it is you know,
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: or or a number of balloons laying so where it
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: might be indicative of one of these kind of spots
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: like a bathtub where a lot of air currents kind
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: of funneled down into and dear light to keen on
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: that kind of thing. Have you ever heard of that?
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: Do you think there's any possibility of truth to it
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: or do you think it's someone online trying to sound
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: smarter than they really are. Well, I think that that's what.
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: I love that he asked that question, and that he's
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: entertaining that, Um I had never heard that theory. I have,
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: I actually remember but wait, wait, wait wa Way back
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: when I was an associate editor at Peterson's Bow Hunting,
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: somebody wrote an article and referenced, you know, seeing uh
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: helium balloon waving around in the woods, and I remember
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: the other editors like bringing that up, like, have you
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: ever seen this? And I've actually seen that a few
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: times out there, where they come down and they get caught.
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: I've never in my life connected those random balloon encounters
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: to any kind of deer hunting strategy. I think that
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: that's a I think that's maybe really grasping a straws there.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: I think if you found, if you really paid attention
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: to the location of every balloon you found in your
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: life in the woods, you know, any kind of remains
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: of a balloon, you would find maybe a little more
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: randomness to it than them getting sucked down into places
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: where the thermals are awesome and they provide a good
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: betting advantage for deer. But I could be wrong on there.
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: I've never I've never entertained the balloon pattern as a
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: possibility for finding deer. Yeah, I'm right there with you.
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: I've I've never paid enough attention to it to lend
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: any kind of true anecdotal observation at least to it.
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: But my gut tells me that while maybe this does
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: pan out that way, there's gotta be a whole lot
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: of other random circumstances where they end up elsewhere. And
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: it's just too too, too small a sample size of
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: draw any kind of strong conclusions from. There's enough other
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: things you can ken on to try to figure out
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: where box bed or we're dear bed that are much
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: more surefire. So let's start there. I like that. Yeah, um,
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: but fun to think about. And I'll tell you what.
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: Next time I see one of those balloons out there,
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna sit and think, well, here, here's what scares me.
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: We have to be we have an environmental responsibility with
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: the answer to this question, because I don't want people
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: going out there letting balloons go. That's a strategy to scout.
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: Please don't do that. Do not do that. And if
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: you see these balloons, pick him up, put him in
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: your backpack and put him, you know, bring him back home,
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: take him out of the woods. Uh. If for no
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: other reason, then then so that some other hunter doesn't
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: come along and think that's a good betting here, Well, yeah,
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: here's another strategy. Now there's gonna be somebody out in
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: public land time balloons to random places that he doesn't want.
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: He like that. He wants the concentration of pressure to
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: go to so you can hide the hide the better
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: spots for himself. Oh gosh, that's some funny stuff right there.
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: I've got a friend who does something similar the oposite
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: a way where he'll I'm not condoning this, I'm not
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: saying you should do this, um, but he will set
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: up dummy tree stands in places where he, you know,
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: if he's trying to if he's got a little secret
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: spot that he doesn't want people to start hunting, he'll
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: put like three tree stands in a half circle around
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: it between the access point and where he wants to
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: go hunt, just to make other hunters that are passing
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: through like, oh gosh, this one is getting hit super hard,
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: and then they go somewhere else. Uh So people are
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: getting people are getting very creative with their public land hunting. Tony.
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: I I do not condone or endorse that. I simply
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: state it as a as something you got to contend with. Yeah,
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: that's uh, I don't I don't want people doing that either.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: So so here's a different ethical question if we're examining
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: the ethics of of something like that. Josh asks I
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: have permission to hunt a three acre property, but he
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: knows that one of the neighbors is an anti hunter
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: and would not let him recover a deer if it
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: expired on their land. Is it ethical to hunt this
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: three acres knowing that there's a neighbor that would not
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: let him recover it or cross if that deer ran
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: that direction after shooting it? Man, I I personally wouldn't
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: hunt it because of that. That's just bad juju. But
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: I suppose it could probably be set up in a
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: way where you were as far away from that property
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: as possible, and if you were really really careful about
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: the shot selection, you could probably be okay. But that's
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: a that's a rough one. I think. I think at
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: the very least I'd be looking for a plan B there. Yeah,
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: that's a doozy. I think it would depend, like you said,
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: on some of the specifics, like if it's a long,
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: narrow property and the neighboring property only borders on one
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: side of the narrow part of the rectangle that kind
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: of thing, and you're hunting of the direction with good
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: spots all around you, than maybe. But if it's just
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: a tiny little three acre quarter and you can't get
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: away from that neighbor, I just there's nothing worse than
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: having that situation where you shoot a deer that you
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: know it's gonna die, and then you have a go
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: or there and you can't do anything about it. I
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: I've always been terrified of that. I've never had to happen,
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: but I've always, you know, worried what if I shoot
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: one and it goes to a neighbor and they don't
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: give me that permission. Um. So I've always tried to
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: avoid any kind of uncertainty like that by either talking
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: to the neighbors ahead of time if you can, or
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: just steering clear of edges, you know, to avoid that
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: possibility as much as possible. Um, this is one I would,
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: like you said, I would, I would much rather pursue
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: a plan B if you can then be in a
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: tough situation. But I know people do it, especial people hunt,
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: like in urban areas. Um, That's that's the reality of
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: some situations. Yeah, I mean you'd really you know, it's
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: so situational, like you at how far away can you get?
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: And I mean that would be that would be the
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: kind of situation where I'd be looking for like a
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: perfect fifteen yard broadside where I thought I wasn't going
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: to hit the off side shoulder or anything like that
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: and get to get the best, least panicky reaction out
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: of the deer as possible, you know, I mean you
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: just you see little differences if you slip it right
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: through the ribs on both sides and they don't really
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: know what's going on, a lot of times they don't,
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: they don't go very far. But if you catch that
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: off side shoulder and they panic, I mean, it's it's
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: really granular stuff there, but there's there's a lot of
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: responsibility with a setup like that. It's just it's that's
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: a tough one. Yeah, yeah, it is. I just go
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: back to I think if I were I would waffle
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: on this myself and I'd be like wow this or
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: well that maybe maybe, But I think the thing that
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: would tip me over the edge would be examine the
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: best case scenario and examine the worst case scenario. And
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: so the best case scenario is a kill a deer
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: and I bringing home and I've got a great meal. Um.
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: But I could also maybe get that same best case
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: scenario one and hunted a piece of public land or whatever.
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: But the worst case scenario is so worst case is
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: so horrible in my in my view, I just I don't.
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: I couldn't stomach that, um, so I would probably probably
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: avoid it. Yeah, that would be I think it would
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: be a very hard situation to enjoy to hunt that. Yeah,
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: all right, Moving on, Brian asks, how do you plan
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: for wind when a stand is in an area where
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: deer can come from any direction? Just play the odds, buddy,
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's a what he's talking about. There is
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: so common in in so many different situations that you
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: just have to go where where are they most likely
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: to come from? And how does that work for me?
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: And it's this is the kind of thing I learned.
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: You know, I grew up hunting the bluffs in southeastern Minnesota,
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: where you a lot of ridges, and you know, you
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: could play the wind pretty well. And when I relocated
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: to where I live now, it was a lot flatter
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: and there was just that situation where the travel wasn't
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: really dictated by terrain as much, and I just learned
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: to live with it and go, Okay, well, they don't
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: seem to come from this direction as much, so when
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: the wind's going that way, that's my best option. But
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: it's just, uh, it's it's tough because you will probably
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: screw up I mean, you're gonna you're gonna blow some
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: deer out, But what are you gonna do? I mean,
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: at the same time, you're really lucky to be in
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: a place where the deer can come from any direction
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: and you've got a chance to hunt. You know, yeah, yeah,
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: you always have to give something up. Every time I
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: go said, I always know that you've got to give something.
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: There's always, no matter what, you're always going to be
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: giving something. So you need to make that judgment call.
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: And you know, look at the probabilities of each and
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: and something that can sometimes be helpful, um is rather
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: than just saying, well, I think it's most likely they'll
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: come from this direction, and at least likely they're But
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: then you're sitting there thinking and spit balling, like where
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: is the safe spout, where's a danger spot? If you
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: were to look at the if you were to stand
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: in a tree and then look at the compass directions
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: north southeast west, and if you're sitting there trying to
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: think this all through, assigned an actual probability like a
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: number to each side to just kind of help you
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: think stuff through. And and and this is just like
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: some little trick I've read about that helps people with
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: some decision making, not not not hunting, but can be
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: applied to hunting. Is when you apply a number to
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: your different options, it just makes it easier for you
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: to make decisions. So if you say, okay, well, I
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: think that there's a fifty percent chance that that's the
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: spot of buck could come from. I think that this
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: direction it's it's like a ten percent place, and this
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: one over here is probably more like than you gotta
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: think about for a second about this and think about this, well,
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: given I know that, and that's maybe like a it's there,
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: and then this is it's about I know there's gonna
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: be there's always there to come from that way. And
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: just forcing yourself to think through each direction and give
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: it a number, that little exercise can help. So that's
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: something to think about as you're trying to make decisions
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: around your trees. UM, just a little mind exercise with that. UM.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: I will say one other thing, which is that sometimes
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: that's just a spot you can't hunt sometimes or sometimes
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: or some parts of the year. UM, you just might
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: need to say, okay, you know what if there's a
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: tree like that, even if it seems to be in
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: an awesome place. If I know I'm gonna get winded
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: and there's gonna be a dobe blowing here, that's going
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: to ruin the whole hunt. Um you know, let's say
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: it's like October or something like that, October one, and
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: you know that you're basing the whole success of your
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: hunt is going to be based on whether or not
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: that buck will get up and walk past you heading
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: to the food source. But if there's so many does
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: in the area, and if you know that there's no
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: way to get away with out a dobe blowing, and
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: you also know that if a dobe blows, that big
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: buck just is not going to come through in daylight
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: because he's two d yards away and he's if he
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: hears a doe blow and he's just not going to
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: come through, Well, then that's just not the spot to
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: get it done. And you either need to find some
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: other spot where you can have a little more more
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: in your favor, or maybe you just have to wait
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: and wait till it's it's a different type of behavior
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: that you're operating on. Um. So, so sometimes there's a
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: tough decisions you gotta make. Like there's some spots that
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: I hunt where I would love to get in and
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: hunt a tree. Like there's a tree I know that
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: that if there's a good buck in this general area,
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: he's gonna pass by that tree more than almost any
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: other tree I can think of, Like I've just seen,
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: if there's a big buck in here, they always come
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: through this little area. But it's right in the middle
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: of everything. And if you were to go in there,
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: there's gonna be deer winning you all the time. And
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: so I've I like this year, I had one opportunity.
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: I decided that one day I was going to try
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: to hunt that spot, and I wait until all the
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: conditions would be as best as I thought they could
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: possibly be, and I thought it was worth it, like
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: swinging for the fences that one time. And I did it,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: and and that buck did come through, but before stooding light. Um.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: If I were to go in there and hunt that
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: tree over and over again, um, because it's the best tree,
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: it would not be the best tree for long. So
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: you gotta know when to when to go for it.
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: And you've got to know when it's it's not worth
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: the risk. Even though it might be a dynamite spot,
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: it's only a dynamite spot with you can get away
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: with it. Yeah. Well, and I would add to that too,
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: is you know if you if you go in and
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: you know you're giving up something like you said, pay
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: attention to what happens and and how could you tweak
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: it a little bit? Like I I had an experienced
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: earlier this year in Minnesota where I had I had
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: hung a stand over this pond and it was pretty good,
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: but there were a lot of winds I couldn't I
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: couldn't hunt it on and I ended up building a
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: little natural ground blind probably about fifty yards away. That
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: opened up everything for me. And it wasn't nearly as
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: I couldn't see hardly anything. It wasn't nearly as comfortable,
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: but that spot became so much more hontable by me
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: just going, well, I can't hunt it the way I
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: really want to, Like I wanted to sit there in
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: that tree and see them coming and have that nice
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: shot angle and everything. But it was just a matter
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: of a little tweak and kind of going Okay, well,
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: I gotta take a step back and figure out if
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: I can make this work another way. And it worked
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: really well. And so sometimes you have that option to
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: where you want to force something because it's how you
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: want to hunt or where you want to hunt. But
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: there might be a little tweak somewhere, some little concession
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: you can make that opens up more possibilities. It's a
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: very good point. Hard to do, hard to sometimes avoid
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: the temptation. I certainly found myself there big time, all right.
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: T J says, uh quote, you often give hypothetical scenarios
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: in your podcast to the people you interview. So here's
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: one for you. I'm going to be employed for the
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: entirety of deer season next year. So if you couldn't
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: hunt next deer season and you didn't have access to
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: a bow of practice, what would you do during that
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: time period to still make yourself a better hunter for
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: the season after Who Yeah, that's a good one, you know.
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: I would say consuming content is the obvious one. You know,
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: there's still there's still ways to learn vicariously through other people.
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: But I think I think this is and I don't
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: know what what this guy has access to as far
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: as uh, just daily life routine type of stuff, but
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: I think that I think that becoming a better white
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: tail hunter is just about embracing the challenge, and that's
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: just all of life, right, like learning how to play
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: guitar has nothing to do with learning how to kill
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: six and a half year old bucks. But at the
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: same time, giving yourself that motivation and going Okay, I'm
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: gonna I'm gonna tackle this challenge because I can't do
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: this other challenge. I think that lifts you up. And
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: so it's it's maybe like a weird woo woo answer
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: to this, but anything you can do that just keeps
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: challenging yourself and giving you these little winds through through
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: the struggle is huge. And that's just so so inherent
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: to white tail hunting. I think, yeah, yeah, So what
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: are you suggesting though, Are you suggesting finding some other
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: way he can push himself while he's out there, or
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: that inherently what he's doing is going to be something
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: he's going to grow as a person, which will then
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: lead to better deer hunting. All of the above. I mean,
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: I don't I don't know if the dude can bring
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: a guitar over there and keep him in the keep
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: it in the barracks, or if it's just a matter
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: of just reading as much as possible, or you know,
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: stand super physically fit. You know, I don't know, there's
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: not enough details there. It's uh, you know, it's it's
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: kind of all up to his situation, what he's what
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: he's going to have available to him. But anything like
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: that that you can do to just keep the mind
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: going beyond the day lead job. But what he's gonna do,
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: which is super important, is just just to keep it
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: going in the right direction and keep keep the mindset
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: up of learning and challenges and and moving towards you know,
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: new accomplishments. Yeah, yeah, and I like that. I think
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: that's great idea. I would my other two ideas would
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: be what you first mentioned, which is can learn as
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: much as you possibly can. You know, I had a
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: situation like this about a little over a decade ago
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: when I took a new job where I had to
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: live in California during hunting season, so I couldn't hunt,
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: and I was just like working all day on the
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: regular day job. And then I came home and I
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: didn't socialize. I didn't go out and do stuff with people.
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: I didn't do anything except for work on wired hunt
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: and like study every single piece of white tail hunting
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: content I could in the world. I mean, I read
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: and watched and just like went in crazy over drive
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: learning mode um and and I do think it helped
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: me a lot. UM. I would say the thing that
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: I wish I would have done then, and what I
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: would suggest to t J is take your scouting to
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: like level two thousand UM. So that's one thing that
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: you can very tangibly set yourself up for the next
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: year season by you know, either studying the property that
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: you have permission on or find find fifty dynamite public
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: land hunting spots. If you've got time to do it.
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: Go and look at every dream state you ever consider hunting,
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: or whatever the state is that you live in, and
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: find every little nook and cranny it looks like there
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: might be some potential and then zero in on not
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: just like, Okay, this looks a good parcel. This is
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: a good parcel, but go and hand pick like six
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: spots that look really good on the map for you
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: to go scout when you get back home and find
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: another piece of property and pick the best six spots
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: there or whatever, and you can muster up as far
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: as time. I mean, if you can't be in the tree,
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: you might as well be picking trees to hunt next
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: year and picking spots just to scout next year and
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: and no them like the back of your hand. So
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: when you get out there, you know, Okay, this is
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: where that saddle is gonna be. I really want to
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: check that out. Here's where that creek crossing is, or
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: at least what I think the creek crossing. Let's go
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: and double check it. Let's see if there's big tracks,
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: Let's see if there's rubs down here in this bottom,
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: and and have that stuff lined up so when you
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: get back home you can you've got a list of
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: all the places you want to check out. And you're
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: not wasting time on just randomly exploring things. You're scouting
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: with a purpose, or if you're arriving to hunt, you're
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: starting that hunt with a really really solid game plan. Um.
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: I think that's one super tangible thing that could help anyone.
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: Oh man, I agree. I think that's a great point.
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: Is and and it's fun. I mean, you learned what
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: the you know, the most successful deer hunters out there
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: learned to love East scouting. And yeah, it's not it's
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: not a total replacement for the real thing, you know.
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: I mean, he's gonna be missing out on some stuff,
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: but it's a it's at least in the neighborhood, and
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: it's you know, it's fun to plan hunts. It's fun
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: to find those spots and and and put in the
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: work when you can't be out there, So that that's
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: a great point. Yeah. Um, here's a couple of quick
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: just equipment questions that we can knock out real fast.
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: Someone asked about phone adapters for spotting scopes. Um, Tony,
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: do you use anything like that. I use the phone
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: scope Lollipop adapter, which is a universal adapter, so you
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: can fit it to any size phone and put that
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: against your spotting scope and then uh, you know, film
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: through it or view through it. And for like long
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: distance scouting with a scope, you know, whether that be
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: early season from a bluff, you know, like we do
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: sometimes on September hunts, or even in the Midwest. I've
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: got some hilltops that can sit on and see down
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: into fields and that helped me scout a lot. Um.
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: It's so much easier and more comfortable to view through
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: a phone than with your face right up to the
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: little spotting scope eyepiece. Um. So I highly recommend it
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: for anyone who does that kind of thing. So I
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: use the phone scope lollipop. What about you, Tony? I
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: I second that as well, and it you know, one
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: one super good benefit of that too is if you
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: take little kids out scouting, it's so much easier for them,
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: you know, you you can make it so much more
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: fun and it's so much simpler to get them to
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: see what you're looking at and you're you're dialed into
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: it's and yeah, it's just it makes the whole experience better. Sure,
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: highly recommended, definitely. All right, Lane asks about a place
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: that you and I got to know well, Tony, question
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: about the wall tent we're using on the back forty? Um,
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: So there are a lot of questions about what that
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: tent was. So it's a tent from a company called
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: Montana Canvas and the model was the spike tent was
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: what that was? Um? Any thoughts on the tent, Tony?
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: Any review? Um? After we after we got out of
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: our own way and actually figured out how to put
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: it up, it was pretty sweet. When we when we
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: were first looking at the pile of poles and canvas,
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: we were like, Uh, this thing sucks. And then we
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: figured it out and we realized the problem was our
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: on our end, and it was. It was a pretty
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: solid tent man. Yeah, it did pretty darn well. And
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: after you left, we had a mega storm come through
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: with forty five to sixty five mile in our winds,
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: and after were leading up to that, we tightened everything down,
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: we added the rain fly, and after those updates it
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: it handle everything Mother nature through Atta. So it did
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: darn well. Yeah, that's that's a really understated important thing
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: about tent camping. But you know, for anything, but if
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: you if you head on a white tail trip, a
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: good tent, a really good tent is such an asset
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: and it's often overlooked by people who, you know, don't
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: don't see that storm coming, or don't think it's going
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: to be that big of a deal, or don't understand
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: what it's like to not be able to stand up
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: when you wake up in the morning. Like having a
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: good tent is is huge. Yeah, big time. Here's a
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: question from another guy named Mark and um to send
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: control question. He says, curious, do you still use ozonics
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: on every hunt? I do, but I can't really tell
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: how effective is once you get to fifty plus yards
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: down wind. I'm sure it helps, but I can see
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: dear getting my scent sometimes even with the ozonics on
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: fresh shower, in sent lot, clothes, etcetera, etcetera. UM. So
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: my quick take on this is that, yes, I do
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: still use nosonics, and I do think it helps. Sometimes
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: I don't think it's sure thing. One. I don't think
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: that anything I do from a send control perspective is
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: is gonna get me through all time. Um. If I
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: can get away with a deer not winding me two
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: times out of every ten encounters, I look at that
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: as a win, because ten out of ten is worse
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: than eight out of ten. Um. And I do think
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: that if I do more things right than wrong when
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: it comes to send control, it could help me a
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: little bit. And if I do, if I get a
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: one percent improvement because I'm using clean clothes, and I
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: get a one percent improvement in my odds because I
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: kept my clothes outside, and if I get a one
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: percent chance improvement because I ran my ozonics machine, that
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: adds up to you know, three or five percent, or
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: if I do ten things right ten whatever it is.
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: My point being is that every little bit can help you.
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: And my perspective has always been that there's so many
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: things that are outside of your control when you're deer hunting,
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: especially for a mature buck. That if there's something I
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: can do that I can have some control over, I'm
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: gonna do my best to do that. So unfortunate I can.
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: I was able to get nosonics, and I know some
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: people can't afford that, and so it's a luxury. It's
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: a luxury that I do think helps me sometimes. UM,
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: but I don't ever depend on it. I'm always going
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: to play the win first and foremost. I'm always going
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: to do all those other things right that I can.
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: That's there's no guarantees, but but sometimes I do think
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: it helps, and um, for that reason, I use one
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: tony thoughts. I'm in the same boat. I gotta you know,
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: when ozonics originally came out, I thought no way, and
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: so I started messing around on some public land here
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: in the Twin Cities and realizing, like, I think this
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: has given me an advantage I didn't see coming. And
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: so I started messing around with bird dogs because I
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: play a lot in that space, and it was the
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: best way for me to beat a bird dogs nose.
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: And it really got me curious. And now you know,
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: after you know, however, many years we've been using them,
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: I really find that the biggest benefit to me when
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: I'm I'm using an osonics machine is when there's that
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: kind of lightened variable five to seven mile prour wind.
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: You know, if it's if it's twenty miles an hour
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: and it's blown pretty consistently, I can play that really well.
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: But there's a lot of times you get out there
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: where everything settles down in the evening and that winds
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: kind of coming and going, and it's not that big
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: of a deal for a year that's a hundred and
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: fifty yards away, but when they get close to bow range,
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: you're you're in trouble. And that's that's where I felt
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: like I get a real tangible benefit from an osonics unit. Yeah. Yeah,
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: it's uh, it's it's it's one more tool you can
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: have in your toolbox. If if if you're fortunate to
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: have something like that, you know, use it, but you
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: certainly don't need to. I don't think anyone listening needs
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: to think that, oh, I'm not gonna be able to
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: kill a deer because I can't get one of these
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: little thing with bober has put up at a sure
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: you can certainly do it plenty of other ways, um,
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: but it's helpful too. Um. How about this one a
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: little bit general question, but it might give us some
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: interesting ways to go. Eric asks if we have any
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: late season archery tips. Um. The one thing I would
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: jump on here. It's very simple, uh, not revolutionary at all,
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: but practicing still in the late season I think is
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: the biggest thing for me. I know in past some
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: years I did not do a good job of that.
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: I was great about my practice in the spring and
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: summer and into the fall and into octoe Ober. But
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: as soon as it gets really cold and it's not
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: pleasant to be outside or it's a dark out in
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: the evening when you get home from work, um, and
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: it's not convenient to do it, it's really easy to
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: fall off on that archery practice. And I can tell you,
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: at least from personal experience, that if I'm not shooting
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: my bow often my form and my accuracy drops off
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: pretty quick. To like I needed to keep going. I
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: need to keep my body like tuned in to be
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: on my game. UM. So I'm constantly trying to do
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: a better job of staying up on that, and the
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: best way I've found to do that is to make
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: it easy, like have it routine and make it easy.
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: So if that means, you know, keeping a target out
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: in a specific spot and keeping your bow hanging up
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: near your back door, so when you walk out to
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: go to the mudroom, you see your bow hanging up there, like,
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: oh yeah, I gotta get my shots, and then you
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: step outside and you shoot it right out your back door.
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: If if there's some way you can make it less
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: inconvenient at this time of year, that might help. Um,
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: I would just say keep the reps coming, do it
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: as much as you can. With clothing that's sim learned
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: to what you're gonna be wearing out there in the
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: field too, because it is different when you've got big
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: puffy layers on versus a T shirt in the summer. Yeah,
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: I would totally agree with that. And I think, you know,
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: most people aren't going to shoot as much in December
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: as they did in August. I mean that's just a given.
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: But the peace of mind that comes from, you know,
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: one three shot round before you go out and sit
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: through the evening knowing nothing change, you know, knowing your
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: bow is still dialed in, and you you get a
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: little confidence boost. It's it's a big deal. You see,
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: you can see what you're capable of. You're not sitting
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: there going, jeez, I haven't drawn this thing back in
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: a month and a half. I hope I didn't bump
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: it around or have something change, but it is, you know,
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: you you gotta you gotta make a little bit of
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: an effort to do that. But it's a big deal.
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: And it's also you know, when you when you consider
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: if you haven't drawn that bow in a month or
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: six weeks or whatever, you know, can you draw it
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: really smoothly back to your face, nice and slow, and
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: or do you have to sky it a little bit
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: and throw some weight in do it? You know, if
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: it if it's not, If that's not an issue, then
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: it's not an issue. But if you're if you're pulling
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: some weight that's at your upper end and you're you're
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: out of practice for a few weeks or more, you
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: might have to do more movement when you draw than
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: you want to and that might cost you a deer. Yeah,
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: And that brings up another good point, which is sometimes
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: when you're really cold or you've been sitting out for
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: a long period of time, it can make it harder
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: to make those movements again too. So what I'll do
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: oftentimes almost all the time whenever I get up into
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: a tree all season long, but especially important this time
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: of year, is practice drawing back in the tree at
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: different angles. Um. So this is like a simple little
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: exercise I try to go through every time I get
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: set up in a new tree. I will try to
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: visualize each different place I think a shot might happen,
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: and then draw back and kind of play through that
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: scenario so that I'm making sure, like, Okay, can my
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: elbow extend all the way back without hitting something behind me? Well,
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: my arrow clear some branches in front of me? If
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: I turn this way, can I do that without my
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: foot slipping off the platform? Different stuff like that. And
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: if you do that, it prepares you for the shot.
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: But then it also prepares your muscles just to be
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: you know, going through that motion and do that, you know,
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: do it in a way that's not going to happen
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: when there's deer around you. But if you sit for
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: three hours and cold, and you've been just frozen to
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: the bone, and you've been maybe it's a morning hunt
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: and it's nine am, and you're gonna stick it out
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: for another forty five minutes or something, um, but you're frozen, Like,
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: that's a good time to draw that ball back again
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: and make sure you can do it so that when
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: that deer does show up half an hour later, you
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: don't get in that situation like you just described Tony,
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: where you start to draw back and I can't get
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: it back. I can't get a pull up high or
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: do something crazy or get stuck. Like how many people
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: have you heard about who have talked about some cold
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: day onstand and they haven't moved for five hours or
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: three hours and then a deer shows up and they
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: can't get their ball back that in August it was
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: a piece of cake and right now they're struggling. You
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: don't want that moment, no, And you don't want any
• 54:57
  Speaker 1: surprises when you draw, Like you said, so if you
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: visualize where they're going to come in, where your shots
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: are going to be, and you know you can draw,
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: your elbow is not gonna hit anything behind you, or
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: you're not going to run out of real estate, or
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: the extra seven layers of clothes you have on are
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: going to interfere. That's all stuff you want to know
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: before before you know that deer walks into twenty yards
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: because if you if you have anything come into the
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: equation like that, even if you do get drawn, it's
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: all of a sudden taking away your attention a little
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: bit and adding another element that makes it harder to
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: do your job. And you really want to keep it
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: as simple as possible. So I don't I don't like
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: any surprises when I draw my bowl. I want to
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: I want everything to go exactly as I expected to. Yeah, definitely.
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: Uh question here from Colin. Colin mentions that during the
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: late season time, all you hear from people is focused
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: on food, focus on food, focus on food. But this
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: year where he's at, it's been unseasonably mild, temperatures in
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: the thirties or fourties, there's no snow, and his assumptions
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: that deer aren't feeling as much pressure to put the
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: feedback on um. He says, have noticed that deer in
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: my area are still very nocturnal despite the waning moon
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: and decreasing gun pressure. So where should bow hunter's focus
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: at this time of year when the weather doesn't necessitate
• 56:10
  Speaker 1: the urgency to feed in the cover? Man, I mean,
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: there's those deer are still going to browse their way through.
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: They're still gonna go bed somewhere thick, They're they're still
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: going to give you an option. And you know what
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: what he mentions with the nocturnal aspect, I mean, that's
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: that's just one of the most common things to deal
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: with right now. I mean, especially if you're if you're
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: gonna be a food hunter this time of year. When
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: you look at it, you've got like nine hours of
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: daylight and the rest is dark. It's it's easier for
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: them to be nocturnal now than any time of year.
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: And then you think about all the pressure that pushed
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: them there, and so it's it's really a matter of
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: getting in where they're going to move in daylight. And
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: that kind of goes back to what we talked about
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: at the beginning of this is get into the cover
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: and figure it out, because there's there's options there beyond
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: just on a on a field edge for a lot
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: of people. Yeah, And I think it's it's it's tricky
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: when you have to go and try to find that
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: kind of thing. And I would give one other idea
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: to think about, which is you can sometimes that cold
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: weather and the great food source connect as a crutch
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: a little bit, or or it's that thing that will
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: get the deer moving when otherwise they might not. But
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: you can also sometimes find places where the deer are
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: going to move, regardless which which you alluded to. One
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: of those could be like that good cover. Um. The
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: other scenario that you might be able to seek out
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: and find is like the sanctuary. And sometimes the sanctuary
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: could be the best cover, but it also might be
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: something different. It might be a neighboring property where no
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: one is allowed to hunt, and if that's something you
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: can find, or a little city park where no one
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: is allowed to hunt or something. Those are the types
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: of places where late season bucks will flock to after
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: all that pressure, and if they find that little safe pocket,
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: they might be much more comfortable moving in daylight once
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: they find that safe area. So you might be able
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: to find some non nocturnal movement, or you might be
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: able to find that one buck that's still moving around
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: if you can find where these little sanctuary spots are. Um,
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: you know that that ten degree day with a foot
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: of fresh snow is the type of thing that might
• 58:18
  Speaker 1: pull a buck out of somewhere where he has been
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: pressured and get him on his feet. But when you
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: don't have that, you've got to find the spots where
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: they already are. And um, it's probably one of those
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: two things we discussed. Yeah, I think that it's really
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: easy to assume there's a big time nocturnal thing going on.
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: But also if you're it's entirely dependent on where you're
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: sitting and what you're watching, or if you know, if
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: you're running trail cameras this time of year, you could
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: very easily buy into that, but it might not be
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: the case. You know. I think that nice weather this
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: time of year is actually more fun to hunt, and
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: I find myself sitting longer, and I see dear doing
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: things that I wouldn't expect them to do, and it's
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: almost all movement in the cover. But I don't see
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: even even really heavily pressured deer. I see them get
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: up and move around, and sometimes you see like a
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: nine thirty little little kind of blitz of activity where
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: they must get up and go brows around in the cover.
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: And there's a lot going on out there that you
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: you really don't know about. To you go spend a
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: lot of time in the woods, yea, Yeah, that's the truth.
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: Now here's a flip side, Tony. If you've got the
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: time left in the season and you haven't been able
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: to find a buck yet, and you're sitting here thinking
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: to yourself, Okay, I know where this good cover is,
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: and I know there could be you know, some activity
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: going on in there, but at the same time, the
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: weather is lousy, the deer aren't moving a lot there
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: in that cover right now, and I could push in there,
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: but that's an aggressive move. And maybe there's you know,
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: maybe there is a mature buck there. But if I
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: push in there the wrong way, you know, I might
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: really book your stuff up. Um, would you recommend waiting
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: for some period of time if there is good weather coming.
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: Let's say you've got two weekends or you've got three
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: days of vacation. Would you burn it right away? Or
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: would you look at the fifteen day forecast and then
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: that does look like we're finally going to get it.
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: It's the last two days of the season, but we're
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: going to get it. Would you still do what you
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: just alluded to or would you save your time and
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: wait till you do you have those ideal conditions this
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: time of year, I would I would check that forecast out,
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: just just because you're probably really only working against the
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: deer here. You're not probably considering a ton of extra
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: hunting pressure, and so you're you're just playing the game
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: against the deer. And if if your situation has some food,
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: and you know it's forty degrees for the next five days,
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: but it's going to drop down to ten on the
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: sixth day, you know, then you can make that move.
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: Then you can play that, you know, because you're not
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: worried about other people going in and probably messing around
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: with them. You know, if you're if you're hunt in
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: public land and you think a bunch of squirrel hunters
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: are going to go in there or something, it might
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: be a different scenario. But if you if you have
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: the option to wait and play the conditions and you
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: don't think people are gonna screw that up, then yeah,
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: that's that's definitely the road I'd go. Yeah, Yeah, I agreed.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: If you've got the flexibility, it certainly helps. It's certainly
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: weather definitely can help a lot this time. If you
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: can get on your side. It's it's not something to
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: take for granted, Um, okay, we have to wrap it
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: up here, but a couple quick ones. Um, let's see
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: maybe one last quick one here, here's something that maybe
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: would be interesting. Um. Nate asks, I've been saving a
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: spot all year that has a wind turbine on it,
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: a new wind turbine, and I've been waiting for them
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: to get the equipment out of there. Do you think
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: that that will disturb the deer too much having this
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: new construction equipment there, um? Or should I have just
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: been getting after regardless? Um. He says that he hasn't
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: even gone out there to put up cameras, so he
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: doesn't know what's going on, but he's been just kind
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: of waiting for the disturbance to be gone. So I
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: guess to generalize the question, would like a construction project
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: of sorts, like a wind turbine, or like someone building
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: the house or someone putting up some kind of pipeline
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: through a property, will that mess up the deer movement
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: or not? Uh? You know, again, it's a little bit situational,
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: but my gut says no. I mean, I've just spent
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: a lot of time hunting around wind turbines and construction
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: here in the cities, and it's it really doesn't factor
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 1: And I don't think a whole lot, you know. I mean,
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: if it was right next to the only betting cover
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: or something, sure, there's you know, there's a chance it
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: could really screw you up. But I wouldn't I wouldn't
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: be super conservative in that situation. I think that those
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: deer are going to look at that just like they
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 1: look at farming activity and and probably not see it
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: as much of a threat. And I'd get after them. Yeah. Yeah,
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: I think dear pretty quickly determine, you know, what's normal
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: in a given situation what's not. And you know, that
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: first day when the construction began, in the first couple
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: of days, I'm like, whoa, this is not normal and
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: I'm not into it, and they're gonna steer clear of it.
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: But after it's been there for a month, um or
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: whatever however long the time it's been, they're gonna eventually realize, okay,
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: and this zone there's this kind of stuff going on,
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: and they're gonna have to learn how to live around it,
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: and they'll start moving again, and we'll start there'll be
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: some kind of safety zone where they feel comfortable. But
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: as soon as people go beyond where they usually are,
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: then they'll become uncomfortable again. So I think that I
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: think there probably is, you know, as you alluded to, Tony,
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: there's gonna be a certain a certain degree of normalcy
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: that that that starts again and that you can just
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: start taking advantage of, and you actually might be able
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: to use it to your advantage because all of a sudden,
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: like they're okay with a certain amount of human scent
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: blowing in there, and they're okay with a certain amount
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: of ruckets going on because it's there every day and
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: they've got to continue on with their lives. So they
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: might not travel right into that betting air like they
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: always used to because it's too close to something. But
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: figure out how they adjusted and then adapt to that.
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: Um I think, you know, you know, all of a sudden,
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: now you might have a great place for your wind
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: to blow into, or you might have a really good
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: access route now that you didn't have beforehand. Um So,
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: so just trying to figure out how they adapt and
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: then and then roll with that would be my suggestion. Yeah,
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: I agree, And I think the only way to find
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: out is to hunt them and see exactly. Okay, Tony,
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: let's do one last question here from Dominic and this
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: is one. UM that's more just for me, but you
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: can weigh in with any thoughts given your experience. Um.
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: Dominic asked, when is the back forty being given away?
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: And how are you going to deal with the emotions
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 1: of lee losing a piece of land like that that
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: you put so much work into. So I'll answer that
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: the second part first, um, which is it is? It
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: is bittersw in that definitely put a ton of work
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: into it over the last two years and have seen
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: it change and kind of begin to show so much potential.
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: So part of me is like, man, I would just
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: absolutely love to see what this place is going to
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 1: be like in five years or ten years. And so
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: many of the things we made or the changes we
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: made are just just scratching the surface, Like I just
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 1: barely get to get our fingers into it before you know, uh,
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: And really with just that little bit of work, not
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 1: a little, it's a lot of work, but with a
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 1: short amount of time, UM, we've seen like really exciting
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: first initial results. Um. So part of me would love
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: to have another ten years and be able to keep
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: grinding on it and see what it could really become.
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: But another part of me is excited to you know,
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: kind of let my baby go out into the world
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: and spread their wings. And um, and and mostly that
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: excited because I know it's going to spread its wings
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 1: in a really cool way. Because we are giving the
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: property away at the end of this year, and we
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: just recently announced how we're doing that. UM. I don't
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: know if I told you about this tone or not. UM,
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 1: but what we decided we always said from the beginning,
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: we're gonna give it away. UM. We you know, hadn't
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: shared specifically how we're going to give it away, but
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 1: we knew like we're not gonna hold onto this thing
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: and have this be the mediator private hunting mecca. UM.
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: We're going to you know, by this place, learn about it,
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: share the experience, improve it, and then pass it on
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: to someone or something. And what we decided to do
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 1: was we wanted this to continue to be a a
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: place and a resource for other people to learn about
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: hunting and learn about wildlife and you know, learn about
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: the natural world. And we've been able to use it
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 1: for that the last couple of years by building content
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: around it and by taking out all sorts of guest
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: hunters and bringing new hunters out there and giving them
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: those experiences, and we want that to keep happening. So
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: we have decided to donate to give away the back
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 1: forty to the National Deer Associate. So this is the
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: organization that used to be known as the Equality Deer
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: Management Association. It's now the National Deer Association. Um. They're
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: the guys that came out with the Field of Fork program,
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: one of the best programs out there for recruiting new
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: hunters and bringing them through a mentorship program. UM. I
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: got to be a mentor and be a part of
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: that last year and see what they're doing. It's it's
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: a really good stuff. They've got a really strong system
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: in place for teaching folks how to be new hunters
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: and pair them with mentors and give them the support
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: they need. And so we're giving them the back forward
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: so they have a place to run those programs, so
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: they have a really high quality place to bring new
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: people out to show them what's going on in a
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: piece of lant like this, to take them out hunting
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: and they can see a bunch of deer and get
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: a chance at the first dear and learn how to
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: get a deer and learn how to butcher a deer
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: and all that stuff. UM. Talking to some other people
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: I know, like Dan Jejo, who was the new hunter
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: we brought out this year and he's been hunting public
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: land and he's at a hell of a time seeing
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: any deer at all. As a new hunter, that can
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: be a really tough thing. And so he saw like
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: one doll the entire season this year. And then he
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: came out and was hunting the Back forty and you know,
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: the first day he said, you know, I saw more
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: deer in the last couple hours and I saw all
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: season leading up to this, and he was so excited
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: about that. Um. You know, having a place like that
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: to give to be kind of fast track some of
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: those experiences is is a pretty neat thing. And so
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: that's what we want to happen on the back Ford
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: and that's what we're gonna do. We're passing it on
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: to them and UH, we're gonna continue to keep tabs
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: on it and help out with some things out there.
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: I'm excited about some other things will be announcing later
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: this year early next UM, but we are going to
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: continue sharing some of the stories from the Back forty
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: and uh and helping it along over the future years.
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: But that's what's happening, and you can learn more about
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: that on the Mediator website where we describe in some
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 1: more detail what we're doing with the Back forty and
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: the last episode of the Back forty series just dropped
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: this past weekend as well, so you can you can
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: learn some there as well. Um, that's the plan, Tony.
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: What do you think about that? I love it, man,
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: I think it's I think it's awesome, and I think
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 1: that I think that they don't understand how delicious those
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 1: deer are that they're getting there. That's even an added
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: bonus too. That's a good point, yea, you and I
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: can both attest to. That's high quality venison. It's great. No,
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 1: I think it's I think it's an awesome, awesome thing.
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 1: You guys are doing well. Uh, it's It's been a
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 1: lot of fun, and I'm glad that you could be
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 1: out there too to both enjoy it and to really
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 1: help us set the foundation with allow those those tree
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: stands and box blinds we put up, Tony are are
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: going to help a lot of new hunters of the
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: coming year. So kudos to you man, thanks again for
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 1: your help. Well, no problem, but it was a blast,
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: all right. Well, any final thoughts were wrap this one up,
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 1: just just get out there and enjoy it. It's gonna
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: end soon and we're gonna have to wait a long time.
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 1: And so just if you if you have the chance
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 1: to hunt now, even if you think it's not gonna
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: be very good, it's still it's still worth it to
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 1: get out there. That's very true, highly recommended. And I
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 1: always I love those last few huns when especially the
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: last night, that last hour. You know, if it's if
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 1: it's not action packed, I'm actually okay with that because
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: I like to just sit and really just soaking everything
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: around me and taking every every squirrel chirping on a
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: branch next to me, or every every animal that does
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: pass by, or looking at the moon rising or the
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 1: sun setting or I know it's taking all those little
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 1: things and just try to savor it. Just try to
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: just soak every little last bid in and then then
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: also reflect on the season um that led up to that.
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: It's just those last hunts or something to just enjoy
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: for what they are. So so do that, do that,
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 1: and uh, until next time, Thank you for tuning in,
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 1: Thanks for being here, and stay wired to hunt,