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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide

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Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,

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Speaker 1: creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.

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Speaker 1: First Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host

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Speaker 1: Tony Peterson.

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Speaker 2: Everyone, welcome to the Wire to Hunt Foundation's podcast, which

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Speaker 2: is brought to you by first Light. I'm your host,

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Speaker 2: Tony Peterson, and today's episode is all about how to

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Speaker 2: kill deer in areas with high hunting pressure. Now, this

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Speaker 2: might seem kind of like an odd time of year

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Speaker 2: for a podcast about hunting around lots of other hunters,

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Speaker 2: but honestly, this might be the most important thing to

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Speaker 2: learn for an awful lot of us. And it starts

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Speaker 2: with our mindsets and how we view our hunting situation.

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Speaker 2: And you know, there is no bad time of year

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Speaker 2: to address that kind of thing. But that's not all

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Speaker 2: I'm going to talk about here. I'm going to explain

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Speaker 2: how I approach my hunts on public land and just

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Speaker 2: generally pressured at spots, and go pretty deep on why

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Speaker 2: I think this is sort of the easiest and the

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Speaker 2: hardest thing to do in the white tail space. My

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Speaker 2: paid writing career started in two thousand and three with

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Speaker 2: a trout fishing article, and let me tell you something,

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Speaker 2: when I saw my byline and an actual outdoor publication,

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Speaker 2: I about lost my mind. I thought wrongly, I might

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Speaker 2: add that my place in the outdoor industry was solidified

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Speaker 2: at that point. After all, they don't just let any

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Speaker 2: rando write a trout fishing article for a newspaper and

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Speaker 2: then pay him a whole thirty five bucks for it.

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Speaker 2: I knew I was breathing some rarefied air there, but man,

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Speaker 2: was I super wrong. It took me years of begging

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Speaker 2: for work to get anywhere at all, and those few

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Speaker 2: years that I really had to go hard they were

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Speaker 2: awful lean. I had to learn not only how to

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Speaker 2: write for individual editors and their audiences, but also how

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Speaker 2: to pitch assignments that I could actually tackle. No. Over time,

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Speaker 2: this gets easier, but you never really have things mastered.

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Speaker 2: I was reminded of this when an editor of a

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Speaker 2: now defunct magazine asked me to write a simple article

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Speaker 2: on walleye fishing. Do you guys know how I feel

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Speaker 2: about walleyes, and while I will occasionally target them, especially

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Speaker 2: when I have a landowner who is willing to trade

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Speaker 2: out hunting access for fresh filets. I'm just more of

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Speaker 2: a bass guy. I can't eat fish. I hate trolling,

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Speaker 2: and although I did catch two walleyes on top waters

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Speaker 2: last year, I generally gravitate toward fish that when they hit,

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Speaker 2: will make your heart race. You know, another way to

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Speaker 2: look at it is I really like the kind of

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Speaker 2: fish that will definitely eat a frog if it hops

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Speaker 2: on by overhead through some lily pads. Anyway, I took

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Speaker 2: that walleye assignment because when you're a freelancer, you get

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Speaker 2: into the habit of saying yes, because when you do,

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Speaker 2: you can buy Eggo waffles for your kids, and if

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Speaker 2: you say no, you generally can't. But as soon as

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Speaker 2: I started writing that piece, I realize I wasn't qualified.

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Speaker 2: I don't remember the exact gist of the article, but

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Speaker 2: I knew that my info would be a mile wide

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Speaker 2: and an inch deep, and that just doesn't cut it

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Speaker 2: when you're supposed to be a quote unquote expert. It

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Speaker 2: was one of the few times in my life that

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Speaker 2: I just flat out admitted to an editor that I

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Speaker 2: didn't have the chops for an assignment. I thought I did,

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Speaker 2: but what I thought about myself was wrong. That shit

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Speaker 2: always stings a little, and it always reminds me of

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Speaker 2: how hunters view the key to their success in the field.

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Speaker 2: There's sort of a ubiquitous reasoning in the white tail space,

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Speaker 2: at least for folks who aren't consistently successful, that what

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Speaker 2: they lack in skills they can make up for by

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Speaker 2: buying something. Look, that's an easy thing to understand, at

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Speaker 2: least for us, you know, men and our egos. But

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Speaker 2: in reality, we just don't have what it takes. We

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Speaker 2: don't acknowledge that we don't want to, so it must

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Speaker 2: be something we don't own, like a specific deer call,

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Speaker 2: or the right knee high boots, or the most realistic

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Speaker 2: decoy or whatever. Now, Look, I work for meat Eater,

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Speaker 2: and I want you guys to buy all kinds of

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Speaker 2: hunting stuff because my kids still eat eggo waffles for breakfast.

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Speaker 2: But the truth is, if you're hunting where other hunters hunt,

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Speaker 2: your best bet is going to be to buy something

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Speaker 2: your competition won't buy. It'll be to understand what it

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Speaker 2: means to hunt around pressure. So let's look at it

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Speaker 2: this way. First, Why does everyone want a hunting spot

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Speaker 2: to themselves. Why does everyone dream of having control over

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Speaker 2: deer ground. Why do most of the people who are

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Speaker 2: killing giant deer also happen to be the same people

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Speaker 2: who have access to ground that no one else has

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Speaker 2: access to Because unpressured deer are dumb and they are easy.

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Speaker 2: Now there are degrees to this stuff. Of course, unpressured

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Speaker 2: deer on a two thousand acre lease in Iowa are

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Speaker 2: a different thing from unpressured deer on a hundred acre

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Speaker 2: lease in Georgia, South Carolina. But the thing about whitetails

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Speaker 2: is that if we give them a safe space away

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Speaker 2: from our influence, they just tend to be less cagey.

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Speaker 2: They tend to grow more comfortable moving during daylight hours

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Speaker 2: and just doing deer stuff when deer are supposed to

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Speaker 2: do their stuff. This is like the secret that no

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Speaker 2: one really talks about in the hunting industry because most

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Speaker 2: of the hunting industry is dominated by this type of hunting.

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Speaker 2: But most hunters are dealing with with the challenge of

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Speaker 2: killing big deer, where other people are trying to kill

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Speaker 2: big deer. The thought process here is generally that the

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Speaker 2: hunting pressure sucks, but I still have to outsmart the deer,

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Speaker 2: and the way we've been promised to do that is

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Speaker 2: by grunting at a certain point in the season, or

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Speaker 2: using an ozone generator, or buying whatever and using it correctly.

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Speaker 2: That will allow us to fool the deer. And to

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Speaker 2: some extent, all of that is true. If you buy

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Speaker 2: good products and use them correctly, you're not going to

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Speaker 2: be a worse hunter for it. But we are also

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Speaker 2: not going to kill booners on public land in Kentucky

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Speaker 2: because of it either. The thing about this is that

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Speaker 2: if you want to fool the deer where they get

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Speaker 2: hunted a lot, you have to understand how they survive.

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Speaker 2: What do they do that allows them to live on

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Speaker 2: parcels that have lots of hunters, Because when you think

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Speaker 2: about it that way, you have at least some type

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Speaker 2: of roadmap to follow to find the actual deer. Let's

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Speaker 2: start with something that I hear so often but just

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Speaker 2: drives me nuts. I hear hunters make blanket statements all

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Speaker 2: the time about deer in their state, or the deer

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Speaker 2: in their county, or on a specific chunk of public land.

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Speaker 2: I remember reading a thread on bow Site quite a

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Speaker 2: few years ago about public land hunting in Nebraska, several

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Speaker 2: of the locals weighed in and said there were no

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Speaker 2: bucks older than two and a half or three and

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Speaker 2: a half due to the timing of the gun season

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Speaker 2: and the onslaught of hunting pressure from non residents not

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Speaker 2: that time. I hunted Nebraska public land every year, and

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Speaker 2: I never had an easier time finding mature bucks than

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Speaker 2: I did there. At home in Minnesota, I could find them,

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Speaker 2: but not as easily and not as frequently, and I

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Speaker 2: might add not even on public land but private I thought,

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Speaker 2: if you believe that to be true, you will absolutely

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Speaker 2: live that truth. As the kids like to say, you're

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Speaker 2: never going to overcome that mindset because you've given yourself

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Speaker 2: an excuse not to. It's an open and shut case,

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Speaker 2: but it's also mostly bullshit. There are good bucks in

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Speaker 2: every state that has white tails, and plenty of them

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Speaker 2: live on public land. You have to operate under that assumption,

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Speaker 2: but you also have to keep your standards within reason.

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Speaker 2: If you want five and a half year old bucks

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Speaker 2: and only on a few weekends on public land in Oklahoma,

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Speaker 2: good luck, buddy. You're just not living in reality. And

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Speaker 2: it's not because the bucks aren't there. It's because you're

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Speaker 2: not gonna be able to do what it takes to

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Speaker 2: kill them. You have to scout enough and hunt enough

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Speaker 2: to believe the truth about the deer that are out there.

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Speaker 2: Because they are out there, then you have to take

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Speaker 2: a long look at your competition just the way the

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Speaker 2: deer will. So let's think about this from the perspective

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Speaker 2: of something that is said, all of the time, deer

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Speaker 2: pattern us better than we pattern them. It's cliched. I

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Speaker 2: also believe it to be absolutely true. I really do.

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Speaker 2: I think when you're a prey animal and your number

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Speaker 2: one predator shows you what it does, you pay attention

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Speaker 2: and you play the odds that what that predator usually does,

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Speaker 2: it will keep doing. If an animal with a brain

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Speaker 2: about one third the size of ours can predict our activities,

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Speaker 2: why can't we. We want to be able to run

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Speaker 2: a pattern on the deer so we can predict them

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Speaker 2: you know when and where to hunt them, But first

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Speaker 2: we have to run a pattern on ourselves in our competition.

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Speaker 2: So what does that mean? Well, where do you usually

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Speaker 2: start at the parking area other access points? Where is

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Speaker 2: the average hunter going to walk into the ground that

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Speaker 2: you're hunting. This is usually pretty easy to predict and

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Speaker 2: it's a hell of a starting point. But where does

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Speaker 2: it go from there? On pressured ground, there are often

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Speaker 2: well worn hunter trails into various parts of the property.

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Speaker 2: How far do you think the average hunter is going

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Speaker 2: to go? Is he likely to climb a bluff, cross

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Speaker 2: a river, wade into a thorny mess or is he

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Speaker 2: going to mostly stay on the level and not cross

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Speaker 2: the water and avoid the thick stuff just to stay

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Speaker 2: in the easier habitat what you looking at there is

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Speaker 2: probably what eighty percent of your competition will default to.

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Speaker 2: The deer know this well and they bet their lives

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Speaker 2: on it. So now what you just go where others don't?

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Speaker 2: Sort of, That's a huge part of it, if I'm

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Speaker 2: being honest, And a huge part of knowing where those

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Speaker 2: areas are is by scouting right now when everyone else

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Speaker 2: isn't scouting bucks on public land leave sign too, and

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Speaker 2: it's out there waiting for you to find it. Now.

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Speaker 2: On this task alone, we make the mistake of thinking

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Speaker 2: that if we find the spots on the places we

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Speaker 2: currently hunt, then our job is over. It's not. You're

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Speaker 2: not just looking for the location you can arrow a

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Speaker 2: buck this fall, but you're trying to learn how to

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Speaker 2: find the spot's pressure deer most likely to use. Because

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Speaker 2: that great spot that you find tucked into a river

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Speaker 2: bottom flat this spring might be the ticket of this fall.

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Speaker 2: Or you might have a couple of young dudes who

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Speaker 2: like jump shooting ducks show up and change your whole game.

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Speaker 2: It's not enough to just find a few good spots,

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Speaker 2: although that's a hell of a start. I want to

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Speaker 2: understand the process of how you go about finding the

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Speaker 2: locations you need to find, no matter when it is

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Speaker 2: and what's going on around you with the other people. Now,

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Speaker 2: this makes it sound too simple, because you might find

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Speaker 2: the absolute best mature buck spot on the thousand acres

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Speaker 2: of public land in your neck of the woods. Hey,

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Speaker 2: that's great, it's freaking great. But does that mean it's

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Speaker 2: the kind of spot you can arrow a one P

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Speaker 2: fifty in during the September opener or do you need

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Speaker 2: to go in there and hang and bang in late October?

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Speaker 2: Is there enough pressure on your spot to make you

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Speaker 2: consider not trying to get in there on a Saturday

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Speaker 2: afternoon instead of waiting until a Wednesday. What factors are

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Speaker 2: at play here? Are you going to state where crossbows

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Speaker 2: are legal, and a lot of the weekend warriors might

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Speaker 2: be sneaking around trying to shoot one in a way

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Speaker 2: that almost certainly won't work. How we think about this

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Speaker 2: stuff is as important as putting in the miles and

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Speaker 2: the sweat equity, and it all needs to be filtered

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Speaker 2: through the reality of what the hunting pressure is probably

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Speaker 2: going to be like, because hunting pressure is your number

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Speaker 2: one enemy. It puts deer down, It disrupts the rhythm

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Speaker 2: of nature, and at some points you just can't really

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Speaker 2: overcome it. You have to work around it. So to

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Speaker 2: dive deeper here, think about it this way. What's your

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Speaker 2: dream date to hunt? November seventh, Halloween? I bet it's

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Speaker 2: somewhere around there, maybe a little later if you'd live

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Speaker 2: in the Deep South. Now ask yourself, who else would

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Speaker 2: answer those exact same dates? Is it most hunters? Because well,

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Speaker 2: it's pretty simple shit really Okay. So if you were

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Speaker 2: a prey animal that even though you really want to

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Speaker 2: spread your genes around, but also realize that day to

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Speaker 2: day the amount of nasty predators in your world is increasing,

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Speaker 2: how would you respond? You would probably tamp down that

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Speaker 2: breeding urge sum because if you don't, you will die.

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Speaker 2: You also know that the predators you're most worried about

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Speaker 2: generally leave the woods alone all night long, so you

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Speaker 2: don't move much during daylight when the predator saturation is high.

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Speaker 2: But there are times when the predators sature is low,

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Speaker 2: and you know it because you can see them, and

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Speaker 2: you can hear them, and you can most definitely smell

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Speaker 2: them when they're there and long after they've left, when

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Speaker 2: they aren't around nearly as much, you know it. But

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Speaker 2: we think about seasonal timing and it will just override

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Speaker 2: their survival instincts. Sometimes it does, but not nearly as

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Speaker 2: much as most of us need it to. A hot

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Speaker 2: dough can make magic happen on heavily hunted ground, it

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Speaker 2: just most likely won't happen to you on any given season.

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Speaker 2: I think a lot of people who complain about hunting

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Speaker 2: pressure want to hunt when they think it's supposed to

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Speaker 2: be the best. But that's the dominant line of thinking

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Speaker 2: in the hunting community at large. You have to be

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Speaker 2: a contrariant here if you want to get around all

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Speaker 2: of that hunting pressure and its negative effects. I know

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Speaker 2: no one wants to take their rautation in earlier mid October,

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Speaker 2: but if you hunt where the pressure is high, you

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Speaker 2: probably should. I keep seeing this in my travels to

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Speaker 2: hunt public life in many different states, and it's to

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Speaker 2: the point now where I don't think a whole lot

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Speaker 2: about the peak rut when I'm on public land. I

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Speaker 2: like the weeks before that, when everyone else is waiting

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Speaker 2: for it to get good, because the deer I want

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Speaker 2: to kill will be more relaxed then than they will

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Speaker 2: be when all the trucks roll in during the rut.

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Speaker 2: It's so simple, but kind of not. To understand this

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Speaker 2: and believe it, you have to go against lifelong beliefs

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Speaker 2: that the best in the business have told us all about.

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Speaker 2: You have to figure out why the general standard deer

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Speaker 2: hunting advice doesn't actually apply to someone who is hunting

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Speaker 2: a place where there are lots of other hunters. It

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Speaker 2: would be like the difference between hunting elk and a

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Speaker 2: unit in Wyoming where there are grizzlies versus a unit

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Speaker 2: where there aren't. Both hunts can be a typical bugle

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Speaker 2: until you get one working type of deal, or you know,

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Speaker 2: maybe post up on water until you get one that's

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Speaker 2: thirsty enough to come in, or he just wants to

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Speaker 2: roll around in the mud, but there will be a

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Speaker 2: dominant concern that just changes the game. The grizzly hunt,

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Speaker 2: or you know, the hunt in an area with grizzlies,

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Speaker 2: it is an elk hunt, but it's one with an

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Speaker 2: added challenge. A pressured ground white tail hunt is a

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Speaker 2: white tail hunt, sure, but it's one with an added challenge.

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Speaker 2: And if you don't think about that challenge and understand

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Speaker 2: how it affects the deer, you'll think that you're dealing

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Speaker 2: with an insurmountable problem. You're not, but it will be

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Speaker 2: if you approach it the same way as any average

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Speaker 2: whitetail hunter would. Maybe that last point is the most important. Honestly,

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Speaker 2: the people I hear from who say that their spot

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Speaker 2: is just too busy, they kind of seem to have

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Speaker 2: their minds made up. But I never hear them say

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Speaker 2: that they scout it all winter long, or tried anything

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Speaker 2: to overcome the issue of a lot of people in

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Speaker 2: the woods. So I don't know what to make of it.

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Speaker 2: I do know that pressured white tails are the hardest

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Speaker 2: white tails to hunt. I believe that, and it only

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Speaker 2: gets worse in a low density situation, And that only

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Speaker 2: gets worse in a big woods type of situation. But

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Speaker 2: even then the problem is solvable. It takes a due,

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Speaker 2: realistic approach of putting in the work to figure out

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Speaker 2: the spots of the deer are likely to use so

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Speaker 2: that they don't bump into you, but also understanding that

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Speaker 2: if you don't try to deviate from the strategies that

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Speaker 2: most hunters rely on, you're going to have average results.

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Speaker 2: And I tell you this because I think it's important

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Speaker 2: if hunting pressure ground is too tough for you, lower

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Speaker 2: your standards. I say that a lot, but I think

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Speaker 2: a lot of people get frustrated not being able to

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Speaker 2: kill mature bucks where they hunt. But what about two

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Speaker 2: and a half year olds? What about does actually hunting

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Speaker 2: for something you might be able to shoot is really important?

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Speaker 2: Hunting for something that isn't going to happen is a

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Speaker 2: great way to lose interest and to kill your drive

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Speaker 2: and to give yourself an excuse to not go. And

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Speaker 2: when that happens, you'll definitely believe the pressure has taken

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Speaker 2: your opportunities away. So maybe you need to look at

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Speaker 2: it a little differently and try to target something more

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Speaker 2: doable to figure out how to make that happen, and

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Speaker 2: then actually succeed out there. You know, that's something you

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Speaker 2: know most folks won't do on pressure ground, but you can.

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Speaker 2: And when you can do that, you can at least

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Speaker 2: see the way in which you might turn it into

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Speaker 2: something bigger. But it all starts with our mindset and

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Speaker 2: our willingness to examine what it would take for a

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Speaker 2: white tail to live through a couple of seasons where

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Speaker 2: there are a lot of people trying to ensure that

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Speaker 2: doesn't happen. That kind of thing can start now, and

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Speaker 2: it should, especially if you pair it up with some

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Speaker 2: scouting before the ticks are too thick and the greenery

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Speaker 2: drowns out last year's sign. So do that and come

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Speaker 2: back next week because I'm going to talk about procrastination

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Speaker 2: and how it can kill the best white tail plans,

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Speaker 2: especially when it comes to our gear. That's it for

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Speaker 2: this week. I'm Tony Peterson. This has been the Wired

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Speaker 2: to Hunt Foundation's podcast, which is brought to you by

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Speaker 2: First Light. Thank you so much for your support. We

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Speaker 2: truly appreciate it. You guys are showing up for our

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Speaker 2: Turkey Week this week in big numbers, and just generally,

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Speaker 2: you guys listening to these podcasts, you know, Clay's, Brent's,

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Speaker 2: Whoever's uh, watching our films, reading the articles, whatever you're doing,

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Speaker 2: you know, checking in on socialb We truly appreciate it.

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Speaker 2: Without you, guys, we are nothing, So thank you for that.

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Speaker 2: If you need to check out Turkey Week, or you

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Speaker 2: just want to check out some deer hunting content, whatever

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Speaker 2: the mediator dot com has you covered, go there, take

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Speaker 2: a look.