Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,
Speaker 1: creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.
Speaker 1: First Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host
Speaker 1: Tony Peterson.
Speaker 2: Hey everyone, welcome to the Wire to Hunt Foundation's podcast,
Speaker 2: which has brought to you by first Light. I'm your host,
Speaker 2: Tony Peterson, and today's episode is all about how to
Speaker 2: actually make good shots on white tails and not just
Speaker 2: how to be more accurate with your bow, because there's
Speaker 2: a difference. The reason that there are so many folks
Speaker 2: out there making YouTube tutorials on how to be a
Speaker 2: better archer is because they are like definitive answers to
Speaker 2: many of our common problems. Addressing shooting form, using the
Speaker 2: right accessories, tuning your bow, you know, on and on.
Speaker 2: It's good stuff, not knocking it. After all, if you
Speaker 2: can't shoot well on the range, you sure as hell
Speaker 2: won't be able to consistently shoot well on deer. This,
Speaker 2: as you probably know, is pretty important and it just
Speaker 2: so happens to be the topic of this episode. If
Speaker 2: you train retrievers or really any kind of dog, you
Speaker 2: start to understand false positives. Some people think a false
Speaker 2: positive is a dog that looks real birdie only to
Speaker 2: flush I don't know, a rabbit or a skunk or something.
Speaker 2: Pointing dogs are prone to false positives too. Inexperienced pointers
Speaker 2: will lock up in a beautiful tripod point where a
Speaker 2: rooster was I don't know, ten minutes ago, or with
Speaker 2: some other critter in the grass that's definitely not a pheasant,
Speaker 2: a grouse, or whatever you're after. False positives in the
Speaker 2: dog world they come in many forms, and they are
Speaker 2: the enemy of the amateur trainer. They convince us that
Speaker 2: we have gotten our dogs to a point where they
Speaker 2: are real good and well. Most of the work's done.
Speaker 2: You can pat yourself on the back, break up your
Speaker 2: hound at the local touny bar, and get ready to
Speaker 2: kill a limit of ring necks or green heads or whatever.
Speaker 2: Putting the cart before the old horse is a no
Speaker 2: bueno situation, though, and it often happens with people who
Speaker 2: train in the same environment over and over. The dog
Speaker 2: that will heal perfectly and sit perfectly still until he
Speaker 2: send him while you're working in the neighborhood soccer field.
Speaker 2: That's great, but will you get that same behavior while
Speaker 2: you're hunting. It's kind of like, I don't know, working
Speaker 2: out or walking with a pack on your back when
Speaker 2: you live at eight hundred feet above sea level and
Speaker 2: assuming that's going to be good enough to get you
Speaker 2: into the mountains and hunt an elk like a rock
Speaker 2: star doesn't work very well. Sometimes it's better than nothing. Anyway,
Speaker 2: back to dogs, how about if you're working on a
Speaker 2: hunt dead scenario or a fine the bone antler scenario
Speaker 2: in the knee high grass. If you've been there and
Speaker 2: you've trained dozens of times, it's probably pretty consistent that
Speaker 2: if you point one way or the other, your dog
Speaker 2: will read your hand signals and switch directions till he
Speaker 2: finds the price. Now, take these same dogs in an
Speaker 2: actual hunt, and the wheels will fall off pretty quickly,
Speaker 2: at least a lot of times they do. This is
Speaker 2: why so many folks, mostly men, lose their ever loving
Speaker 2: minds on the first couple of hunts of the season,
Speaker 2: especially if you have a few smirking buddies hunting with them.
Speaker 2: It's embarrassing to break up a dog only to watch
Speaker 2: them totally delaminate in the field. It's also extremely common
Speaker 2: I honestly don't know if there has ever been a
Speaker 2: single bird dog that advanced to a high level of
Speaker 2: training in low key environments that also brought that same
Speaker 2: level of excellence right to the field during a hunt.
Speaker 2: I think it's possible, honestly, at least not right away.
Speaker 2: You know, older seasoned dogs can you know, they can
Speaker 2: get pretty damn close. But the seasoned part is the
Speaker 2: one that's important there. And while plenty of retrievers and
Speaker 2: pointers are likely to get older, not all of them
Speaker 2: get seasoned real well. Takes time in the field hunting
Speaker 2: for a dog to learn what you want out of him.
Speaker 2: While you're out in the field hunting. There's no shortcuts there,
Speaker 2: and you can train and train and even overtrain, but
Speaker 2: there's on the job experience, and that's just that. You
Speaker 2: know what else is like this pickleball? Just kidding, it's golf,
Speaker 2: just kidding, it's bow hunting white tails. You can shoot
Speaker 2: foam until you're an Olympic level shooter, but that's only
Speaker 2: going to take you so far in the field. You
Speaker 2: know a lot of the conventional advice here and have
Speaker 2: probably heard me go on and on about some of it.
Speaker 2: I think you should practice in some ways that will
Speaker 2: help you be a better shot, like using three D targets,
Speaker 2: you know, shooting from your deck or a tree stand
Speaker 2: set up just for that purpose. I think you should
Speaker 2: practice in low light, and that you should shoot at
Speaker 2: odd yardages with limited arrows. You should make every shot
Speaker 2: count and treat every shot like you don't get a mulligan,
Speaker 2: because in the wild you probably won't. And that's a
Speaker 2: good start, But there's more to be done now. I've
Speaker 2: told you guys a few stories about some of my
Speaker 2: most embarrassing misses and the years I struggled with real
Speaker 2: buck fever, But I don't think you can quite understand
Speaker 2: how bad I used to fall apart. It was like
Speaker 2: having a disease that caused me to black out, lose
Speaker 2: my mind, and always or nearly always shoot over the
Speaker 2: back of the deer that I so desperately wanted. It
Speaker 2: got so bad I felt like quitting many many times.
Speaker 2: I didn't know a way out, and I didn't really
Speaker 2: understand the process of getting over my buck fever and
Speaker 2: learning to be a good shot on animals. In fact,
Speaker 2: I still don't know for sure how to do it completely.
Speaker 2: I kind of think you can't, but you can be
Speaker 2: better than a quivering mass of total dipshit who couldn't
Speaker 2: hit a buck in the lungs with twelve quivers full
Speaker 2: of arrows and unlimited time. Now, I think this is
Speaker 2: going to sound kind of dumb, but I want you
Speaker 2: to hear me out. The first step is visualization. I know,
Speaker 2: I know it sounds like some you know, Kenyon's hippie
Speaker 2: dippy mustache laiden bs, but the truth is it works,
Speaker 2: or it can work, and for me it works this way.
Speaker 2: I think about shooting deer a lot. And if you
Speaker 2: don't believe that, talk to my wife when I'm driving
Speaker 2: and she's telling me something that I absolutely am not
Speaker 2: really taking in and definitely won't retain, or you know,
Speaker 2: when strangers talk to me. A lot of times I
Speaker 2: get to daydreaming. You know, maybe it's a touch of
Speaker 2: ADHD or whatever, but I start thinking about shooting deer,
Speaker 2: and I start thinking about shooting them out of very
Speaker 2: specific setups, like when I get into my stand. I
Speaker 2: also always, always always draw my bow a few times
Speaker 2: and aim at stuff. Now, not deer. You know this
Speaker 2: is going to be leaves or whatever, But it's the
Speaker 2: process of thinking through and visualizing your shot. You don't
Speaker 2: have to do this just when your wife's talking to you.
Speaker 2: You should do it in your stands as well. I
Speaker 2: do it when I'm in a groundb line or a
Speaker 2: tree stand or hanging in a saddle. I draw an
Speaker 2: aim at random, I am at whatever, and I think
Speaker 2: about how easy it would be to make a shot
Speaker 2: on a deer if a deer was standing there. If
Speaker 2: you don't do this, start, I'm totally serious. If you
Speaker 2: get into a ground blind and you don't draw your
Speaker 2: bow and aim out the window a few times, you're
Speaker 2: far more likely to screw up a shot. If you
Speaker 2: get saddled up and you don't practice drawing and aiming
Speaker 2: around both sides of the tree or behind you, you're
Speaker 2: setting yourself up to make a mistake. You do not
Speaker 2: want the first time you draw at a weird angle
Speaker 2: to be the time there's one hundred and thirty five
Speaker 2: inch ten pointers standing there. Imagine the buck on that
Speaker 2: trail and watch how your pin floats across that yellow
Speaker 2: leaf you're aiming at, or that bare patch dirt or whatever.
Speaker 2: Do this. If you're hunting an evening, do this as
Speaker 2: soon as you settle in and then maybe once or
Speaker 2: twice more before primetime. If you're hunting mornings, wait until
Speaker 2: first light, do a good perimeter check to make sure
Speaker 2: you don't have any deer closing in. Then do this.
Speaker 2: Do it later in the morning too, when you start
Speaker 2: to get sleepy and you start to think about packing
Speaker 2: the whole thing up. Do this in hot weather and
Speaker 2: cold weather, and even if you've made seventeen perfect double
Speaker 2: lung shots in a row, it's just a good exercise,
Speaker 2: but it serves another purpose. It tells you how shooting
Speaker 2: out of your specific setup is kind of gonna go.
Speaker 2: This is something a lot of us don't appreciate until
Speaker 2: it's too late and we're smack dab in the middle
Speaker 2: of an encounter. Take a groundb line, for example. You
Speaker 2: set up a pop up on the edge of an
Speaker 2: alfalfa field. You arrange the far woodline, and it's forty yards.
Speaker 2: You know there are several trails that lead into the field,
Speaker 2: and you could draw your bow, aim a little and
Speaker 2: you're just gonna be good to go. You start to
Speaker 2: daydream about a big one coming in and you think
Speaker 2: he's going to walk right into the middle of the
Speaker 2: field and pose up at twenty yards, but he doesn't.
Speaker 2: He stays on the far wood edge, at the boundary
Speaker 2: between where you can shoot where you can't because of
Speaker 2: how your chair is positioned and how the shooting port
Speaker 2: is situated. This is the kind of thing that causes
Speaker 2: real panic, and real panic is the kind of thing
Speaker 2: that causes us to make bad shots. Knowing how far
Speaker 2: you can swing your bow one way or the other
Speaker 2: to really shoot and what you'll do if he doesn't
Speaker 2: follow the script is important. It's something you should think
Speaker 2: about when you have the luxury of thinking about it
Speaker 2: on your own time, and not when it's suddenly very
Speaker 2: important because he's walking through the same goes for tree
Speaker 2: stands and saddles. Do you know where you can draw
Speaker 2: and aim and take a shot from the ladder stand
Speaker 2: your dad's set up for you seven years ago, when
Speaker 2: you're hanging and hunting out of a saddle and thinking
Speaker 2: about where you can shoot and what trail he's likely
Speaker 2: to come down? Do you know where your real shooting
Speaker 2: windows are and how easy it'll be for you to
Speaker 2: aim through them. The more you think about this stuff
Speaker 2: without a deer there, the easier it is to make
Speaker 2: a shot work. When a deer is there. I know
Speaker 2: this sounds like overkill, but it's not. You want to
Speaker 2: know how things are going to go before they get going.
Speaker 2: A little dress rehearsal if you will. The same goes
Speaker 2: for shot distance. When you get on stand. Do you
Speaker 2: range several markers so you know how many yards he
Speaker 2: will be if he stops at the yellow patch of
Speaker 2: beans in the field. What if he takes the farther
Speaker 2: trail around your pinch point? Stan? Are you going to
Speaker 2: wait until he's there to range him and then suffer
Speaker 2: the possibility that the extra movement and that extra time
Speaker 2: will cause you to miss out on a shot opportunity.
Speaker 2: If you can do something beneficial before he gets there,
Speaker 2: you should do it. I'd also recommend drawing metaphorical lines
Speaker 2: in the sand when you get into your setup. As
Speaker 2: far as shot distances go. If I'm on a bean field,
Speaker 2: for example, I'll range the rose until I know what's
Speaker 2: forty yards out. That for me is the farthest I'm
Speaker 2: going to shoot at a white tail in perfect conditions.
Speaker 2: And if it's not perfect conditions because the light is
Speaker 2: fading or it's raining or whatever, that range is going
Speaker 2: to get reduced. I figure this out as soon as
Speaker 2: I can, so I don't have to hamm an awe
Speaker 2: during the moment of truth. This stuff helps you make
Speaker 2: better shots on deer, but so will something else. Watching deer,
Speaker 2: and I don't mean just seeing deer and taking a
Speaker 2: video of them walking by so you can post it
Speaker 2: on Instagram. I mean watching them and paying attention to
Speaker 2: what they do and when and how you'd shoot them
Speaker 2: at various times during your encounter. I do this on
Speaker 2: pretty much every deer that gets into range. I don't
Speaker 2: drawn aim at deer. I don't want to shoot, and
Speaker 2: I don't recommend that because if you have a big
Speaker 2: old brain fart trip that trigger, which is a possibility,
Speaker 2: you could have one hell of a oopsie on your hands.
Speaker 2: But watching deer and how they browse and how their
Speaker 2: body positioning can change, just from how they look back
Speaker 2: down the trail, or when they scratch their nose with
Speaker 2: a back hoof, or when they stretch their necks out
Speaker 2: to sniff a certain leaf. That's the stuff that will
Speaker 2: give you more confidence in choosing the right aiming point.
Speaker 2: You can damn near predict the future when you want enough.
Speaker 2: So even when we use three D targets to practice.
Speaker 2: We often think of real white tails kind of as
Speaker 2: a two D thing. We think of them from the broadside,
Speaker 2: and we know where the guts are, and we know
Speaker 2: where the liver is and the heart and the lungs,
Speaker 2: but we almost never shoot it here that's perfectly broadside
Speaker 2: while we were on the ground with them. We almost
Speaker 2: always have to deal with a couple of different angles,
Speaker 2: whether they are quartered to us or a little bit
Speaker 2: away from us, whether we are ten feet above them
Speaker 2: or thirty feet above them. A deer walking down a
Speaker 2: hill by your stand is probably not a shot that
Speaker 2: you ever ever practice at the range. A deer that's
Speaker 2: really close, say four yards in the base of your tree,
Speaker 2: is another shot you probably never practice, maybe shouldn't take.
Speaker 2: But it all depends on so many things. Can you
Speaker 2: get your arrow into both lungs? How likely is it?
Speaker 2: How likely is it that you'll get into both lungs
Speaker 2: on a giant buck like that? If you've never once
Speaker 2: thought about taking that shot, or visualized it, or watched
Speaker 2: a four key do this same thing and actually studied
Speaker 2: his movements and picked out the best aiming points every
Speaker 2: seconds he made his way through, I really think Watching
Speaker 2: deer and learning about their movements is an education that
Speaker 2: is worth so much to all of us hunters. This
Speaker 2: allows us to take better shots, partially because it allows us,
Speaker 2: you know, like I said, to predict the future. Just
Speaker 2: like in dog training, where there are certain behaviors that
Speaker 2: are just going to show at certain times, deer are
Speaker 2: very very likely to do certain things at certain times.
Speaker 2: I'll give you an easy example. If a buck walks
Speaker 2: in and he's totally relaxed, but then he stops to
Speaker 2: focus on something and he stares for like thirty seconds,
Speaker 2: you might think you're in trouble. Would you feel relief
Speaker 2: if you watched him shake his tail a couple times
Speaker 2: real fast? You should, because that means he's probably gonna
Speaker 2: drop his head and start walking, just like every other
Speaker 2: deer who has done the same thing. If you watch
Speaker 2: deer enough, you start to learn those types of behaviors
Speaker 2: and understand when your best shot opportunity is about to happen.
Speaker 2: That's so important to making good shots in the field
Speaker 2: when it counts the most. Think about it this way too.
Speaker 2: Most of the time, when deer come in and they're relaxed,
Speaker 2: they're moving pretty slow. They sniff here they step there,
Speaker 2: They almost forecast their movements, and that gives you a
Speaker 2: really good chance to draw when you need to and
Speaker 2: anticipate right where you should be aiming. All this stuff
Speaker 2: requires patients, and it actually helps you to become more patient,
Speaker 2: which is the antidote to rushing shots, which is the
Speaker 2: one thing that causes us to make bad shots more
Speaker 2: than anything else. Let me give you another example. You
Speaker 2: guys know I like to hunt rivers, I like to
Speaker 2: hunt water. Well. One river I like to hunt is
Speaker 2: in North Dakota and has steep banks. The deer almost
Speaker 2: always approach it at a walk and then they descend
Speaker 2: right down to the water and drink. This usually happens
Speaker 2: without a whole lot of stopping. Then they cross the
Speaker 2: river and they have to ascend the other bank. When
Speaker 2: they do, they almost always always stop to survey their surroundings.
Speaker 2: They've probably dealt with enough coyotes and lions there to
Speaker 2: know that the safe side of the river they just
Speaker 2: left is a memory, and it's time to figure out
Speaker 2: if there is danger waiting for them on the new side.
Speaker 2: It's pretty simple prey behavior. But if you're up in
Speaker 2: a tree there and they pop up, that bank. It
Speaker 2: often seems like they are onto something because they seem
Speaker 2: just a little bit edgy, like maybe they caught just
Speaker 2: a slight whiff of you and they're considering leaving. But
Speaker 2: they mostly didn't and they mostly aren't. But if you
Speaker 2: believe that you know that they might be on their
Speaker 2: way out, you're gonna rush a shot when you could
Speaker 2: have just waited a little bit until they convinced themselves
Speaker 2: that the new bank, the new side, is all good,
Speaker 2: and then they walk right by totally unaware that you're
Speaker 2: about to skewer them. Pay attention to all of the deer,
Speaker 2: study them. It's important. And lastly, I have one more
Speaker 2: thing for you. If you want to be a stone
Speaker 2: cold killer who consistently makes the kind of shots where
Speaker 2: you get to witness the light, it's going out, take
Speaker 2: shots that you know you can make. I know that
Speaker 2: seems dumb, because of course that's what should do, but
Speaker 2: a lot of people don't. Just think about it this way.
Speaker 2: If you put a deer out in front of you
Speaker 2: at fifteen yards a broadside and it's relaxed, how often
Speaker 2: are you going to tank that shot? Not very often,
Speaker 2: I hope. But now put that same deer quartering away
Speaker 2: in a little bit tense at let's say thirty three yards. Sure,
Speaker 2: you can make thirty three yard shots all day, but
Speaker 2: it's not nearly as much of a foregone conclusion as
Speaker 2: that first fifteen yard broadside shot. Knowing your limitations and
Speaker 2: being patient enough to wait for a no brainer shot
Speaker 2: or good things. It's also really tough to learn either
Speaker 2: of those things and implement them in the field. But
Speaker 2: we should all be working to be better at shooting deer.
Speaker 2: I deal with this every year, and it gives me
Speaker 2: so much pride to string together several good shots. You know,
Speaker 2: it doesn't always happen, and I doubt it ever will
Speaker 2: for me or you or you know someone like John Dudley,
Speaker 2: who could probably outshoot most of us if we were
Speaker 2: in broad daylight and he had to shoot in a
Speaker 2: pitch black cave. He probably still screws up some shots,
Speaker 2: you know. So the goal isn't to just become a
Speaker 2: badass paper puncher here. It's to become a reliable, consistently
Speaker 2: good shot on actual animals. That takes a few things
Speaker 2: that you can't just accomplish on the range. Think about
Speaker 2: this as your season opens up here. Think about coming
Speaker 2: back next week, because I'm going to talk about how
Speaker 2: to navigate the quote unquote October lull in real time,
Speaker 2: and I'm going to give you an example for that
Speaker 2: when I open that show that you're probably not going
Speaker 2: to expect. That's it for this week. I'm Tony Peterson.
Speaker 2: This has been the Wired to Hunt Foundation's podcast, which
Speaker 2: is brought to you by First Light. As I always,
Speaker 2: thank you so much for listening and for all your support.
Speaker 2: Truly appreciate it means the world to me and the
Speaker 2: rest of us here at meat Eater. If you want
Speaker 2: some more white tail content, or you want to see
Speaker 2: some videos with Steve or Clay or whoever, listen to
Speaker 2: some podcasts, go to the meaedeater dot com and you
Speaker 2: will find so much content that you will probably get
Speaker 2: fired from work because you'll spend too much time looking
Speaker 2: at it. But that's okay.