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

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Speaker 1: the White Tail Woods, presented by first Light, creating proven

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

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Speaker 1: Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on

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Speaker 2: the show, I'm going to be breaking down how I

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Speaker 2: just killed my mid October Michigan buck and the tactics

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Speaker 2: I use that can help you now and through the

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Speaker 2: rest of the season to tag your own deer. All right,

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Speaker 2: welcome back to the Wire to Hunt podcast. We are

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Speaker 2: here with a special, emergency, impromptu, unexpected just you and

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Speaker 2: me show because this isn't something I usually do, but

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Speaker 2: when the time is right, when the iron is hot,

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Speaker 2: when things are happening, I want to jump in and

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Speaker 2: give you the latest information, the most recent updates and

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Speaker 2: stories that are fresh off the presses. And this one

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Speaker 2: is very hot because I just killed a buck mid October.

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Speaker 2: October to lol, as they say, was not so slow

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Speaker 2: for me this year. And what I want to do

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Speaker 2: for you here today is to walk you through exactly

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Speaker 2: how I killed this deer, the things I did in

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Speaker 2: the off season, the plan I put together the conditions

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Speaker 2: that I waited for to make my strike, and the

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Speaker 2: very specific set of circumstances that led to one of

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Speaker 2: the most intense deer hunts of my entire life. This was,

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Speaker 2: I guess, without giving too much weight right now, this

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Speaker 2: was one of those very rare times when you put

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Speaker 2: a specific hunting plant together, like a very detailed I'm

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Speaker 2: going to do it here, I'm going to do it

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Speaker 2: at this point. This is what the deer is gonna do,

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Speaker 2: this is where I'm gonna be, this is how it's

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Speaker 2: all gonna work out. And then have it actually worked

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Speaker 2: that way. I mean, I oftentimes have plans like that,

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Speaker 2: but you know, nine point nine times out of ten

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Speaker 2: doesn't work out well. This time it worked almost exactly

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Speaker 2: to a t. So I want to share with you

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Speaker 2: exactly how that happened and then kind of take a

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Speaker 2: step back and try to make this relatable and useful

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Speaker 2: for all of you and talking through a couple of

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Speaker 2: the takeaways, a couple of the things that I did

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Speaker 2: here and that I think we're reinforced for me as

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Speaker 2: lessons that can help you. In mid October, in late October,

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Speaker 2: all the way through November. I want to give you

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Speaker 2: some specific ideas that can help you have more success

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Speaker 2: this hunting season, no matter when you're listening. So that

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Speaker 2: is the game plan. That's what we're doing here. And

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Speaker 2: it's just like I said, gonna be pretty casual. I'm

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Speaker 2: going to walk you through. This stuff is fresh on

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Speaker 2: my mind because this all just happened last night and

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Speaker 2: I'm I'm excited. I'm feeling very thankful. Maybe haven't had

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Speaker 2: quite enough time to process it, but that's what I'm

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Speaker 2: gonna be doing here today. I'm gonna be processing live

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Speaker 2: on the air with you guys, and we'll see, we'll

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Speaker 2: see what comes out of this. So this story is

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Speaker 2: a shorter story in some ways than others you've heard

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Speaker 2: because this is not a three or four year hunt.

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Speaker 2: This isn't like the Wide nine hunt that was four

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Speaker 2: years of history with one specific deer, which, by the way,

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Speaker 2: if you haven't watched that film yet, it's on the

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Speaker 2: Mediator YouTube channel. Doing a shameless plug here, but check

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Speaker 2: out the four year Hunt for the Wide nine at

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Speaker 2: the Mediator YouTube channel. I really think you guys will

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Speaker 2: enjoy that. It's like a forty minute film dives deep

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Speaker 2: into that story, lots ups and downs, This was not

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Speaker 2: that kind of hunt, because this is a location that

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Speaker 2: I just started hunting this year, and this deer was

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Speaker 2: killed on my very first time hunting this spot, so

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Speaker 2: very different than the Wide nine story. But I will

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Speaker 2: rewind the clock a little bit because this hunt started

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Speaker 2: this past summer. Some of this stuff I mentioned earlier

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Speaker 2: in the year kind of prepping you guys, and when

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Speaker 2: we talked through our goals, hopes and hit lists podcasts

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Speaker 2: in the summer, I shared some of this, but I'm

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Speaker 2: going to give you the full recap now, just in

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Speaker 2: case you didn't hear that. So earlier this year, I

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Speaker 2: lost access to a property that I hunted last year.

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Speaker 2: That property got sold. It was a nice farm, a

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Speaker 2: pretty good size. I you know, had kind of depended

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Speaker 2: on that one as a really great kind of plan

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Speaker 2: B type spot to spend some time. And so coming

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Speaker 2: into this summer, I knew I again had to find

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Speaker 2: more access, and so I just kind of came into

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Speaker 2: this year going back, I guess to my roots. I

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Speaker 2: kind of wanted to get back to what I did

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Speaker 2: ten fifteen years ago when I just remember, you know,

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Speaker 2: I was I don't know, like twenties, mid twenties, and

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Speaker 2: anytime I ran into someone who maybe had some land,

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Speaker 2: I would, you know, bring up deer hunting and just

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Speaker 2: happen to see if there might be an opportunity there.

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Speaker 2: I was knocking on doors, I was asking around, I

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Speaker 2: was talking to family and friends, and I just want

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Speaker 2: to get a little bit more of that happening. So

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Speaker 2: this year, talk to a number of different people, just

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Speaker 2: asking around, seeing if there was anyone who maybe I

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Speaker 2: hadn't known of in the past that had a little

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Speaker 2: bit of land they might be willing to share access to.

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Speaker 2: And to make a long story short, I did pick

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Speaker 2: up some new spots. I picked up some stuff in

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Speaker 2: Illinois as we talked about, and then picked up several

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Speaker 2: spots in Michigan as well. And I think the main

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Speaker 2: takeaway here with the access thing is to never turn

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Speaker 2: your nose up on a spot, to never judge a

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Speaker 2: book by its cover. Because one of the parcels that

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Speaker 2: I got access to didn't have a whole lot going

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Speaker 2: for it. It was mostly just a big farm field.

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Speaker 2: And I remember when I got permission on this piece,

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Speaker 2: I pulled up the maps and I looked at everything,

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Speaker 2: and some of these spots just feels, you know, not

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Speaker 2: a great chance to kill a mature buck in that

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Speaker 2: kind of spot. So I thought, Okay, you know, I'll

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Speaker 2: shoot some dos there, help out this farmer, do you

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Speaker 2: know my management duties. But I don't know if this

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Speaker 2: will be a spot I'm gonna, you know, get a

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Speaker 2: crack at an older deer. But one of these spots,

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Speaker 2: when I looked at that aerial, you could see that

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Speaker 2: it butted up to a really impressive looking swamp, a

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Speaker 2: good swamp system, a place that I'd kind of driven

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Speaker 2: around in the past, was aware of, had always wanted

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Speaker 2: to get access somewhere around this swamp, and this property

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Speaker 2: butted up to it and had a little bit of

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Speaker 2: cover on the backside of it. Something like four acres

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Speaker 2: is what I kind of was able to measure. The

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Speaker 2: area of actual color. This is grass brushy stuff, some

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Speaker 2: autumn olive, some scrubby willows that kind of stuff, some buckthorn,

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Speaker 2: so good cover, but a very small amount of it,

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Speaker 2: and then cornfield for ninety seven percent of the property.

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Speaker 2: What it had going for it again was it butts

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Speaker 2: up into this great big swamp, which is you know

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Speaker 2: in places like Michigan where there's a lot of hunting pressure.

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Speaker 2: It's always going to be different depending on where you're at.

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Speaker 2: But for me in southern Michigan, the sanctuaries oftentimes are swamps, wet,

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Speaker 2: big nasty, thick stuff that other hunters typically don't want

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Speaker 2: to go into. That's where deer can get a little

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Speaker 2: bit of age on them in my area. You know,

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Speaker 2: in Wisconsin it might be big, hilly, nasty topography. In Iowa,

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Speaker 2: maybe it's a big open crp field. There's no trees

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Speaker 2: around and so hunters can't hunt traditionally there. Whatever it is,

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Speaker 2: finding those sanctuaries is huge, and so I knew even

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Speaker 2: though this is a very small huntable area, it was

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Speaker 2: next to a really good looking sanctuary. So I kind

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Speaker 2: of flagged that as hey, this is still worth a

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Speaker 2: checkout even though it's pretty small. So late in the

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Speaker 2: summer I went out there. I did a speed scout.

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Speaker 2: I walked the outside edge of the field. I walked

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Speaker 2: that back section to cover. I marked and the scrapes

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Speaker 2: that I found or spots looked like they would be

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Speaker 2: historically scrapes where you can still kind of see the

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Speaker 2: remnant opening underneath these overhanging branches. I marked the major

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Speaker 2: trails leaving the swamp heading into my section and heading

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Speaker 2: into the cornfield, and I did notice a couple things

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Speaker 2: that I really liked. Two spots in particular stood out.

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Speaker 2: One of them was this little cluster of oaks on

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Speaker 2: this transition between the swamp and the corn and so

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Speaker 2: in this cluster of oaks, it's maybe an acre, but big,

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Speaker 2: healthy looking white oak trees. And one of these awesome

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Speaker 2: scrapes right at the hell convergence of two or three

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Speaker 2: different trails. So I marked that. I found a tree

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Speaker 2: that would be downwind of the typical winds. I thought

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Speaker 2: about how I would access it, and I put a

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Speaker 2: camera on this scrape in that spot, set that up,

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Speaker 2: moved on, continuing on to a different part of this

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Speaker 2: little four acre piece. I found another spot that was

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Speaker 2: very interesting, And here was a ditch that came out

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Speaker 2: of the swamp and stopped right before it got to

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Speaker 2: the cornfield. And I thought to myself, when I looked

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Speaker 2: at that, where that ditch and is like a full,

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Speaker 2: you know, a water filled ditch. And I saw that,

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Speaker 2: and it was pretty wide, and it did not look

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Speaker 2: like something that deer would want to jump over if

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Speaker 2: they didn't have to. I immediately thought, this is a

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Speaker 2: travel pinch. This is a spot where deer going to

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Speaker 2: funnel around the ditch and be pressed up alongside this cornfield.

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Speaker 2: I then saw buck, thorn, tree, bush orrub whatever you

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Speaker 2: technically want to call it. It was leaning right out

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Speaker 2: next to that ditch that had a big old opening

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Speaker 2: underneath it where you could just tell for years deer

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Speaker 2: had been making scrapes underneath that. And then as I

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Speaker 2: had approached that, I had also bumped a buck that

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Speaker 2: was bedded out on these little two fingers of timber

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Speaker 2: that extended that timber. It's more like brushy shrubs and

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Speaker 2: very small scruby trees, but there was two fingers that

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Speaker 2: extended alongside either side of the ditch, going in towards

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Speaker 2: that swampy section. And as I walked past that, I

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Speaker 2: bumped what looked like a decent buck off the end

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Speaker 2: of one of those points. So all of that is

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Speaker 2: telling me, all right, there's some bedding here, there's this

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Speaker 2: pinch here, there's a standing corn behind, there's an obviously

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Speaker 2: well used annual scrape right here. All of it made

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Speaker 2: my spidery senses tingled big time. So again I thought, okay,

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Speaker 2: this is an absolute great hunting location. I like what

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Speaker 2: I see here. You could see deer using this in October,

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Speaker 2: coming out to feed from that swamp, heading out into

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Speaker 2: the corn. I thought, you know, also during the rut,

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Speaker 2: there's gonna be does coming out and feeding here. This

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Speaker 2: ditch might pinch a little bit of that movement in

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Speaker 2: front of me. Problem was, as I searched around, as

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Speaker 2: I looked around this whole area, there was no tree

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Speaker 2: as you'd get up into. There was no options whatsoever

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Speaker 2: within shooting range, even really outside of shooting range unless

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Speaker 2: you got like sixty seventy yards away to get a

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Speaker 2: saddle or a tree stand somewhere. So I remember standing

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Speaker 2: there this summer thinking, what the heck do you do?

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Speaker 2: How would I make this work? And maybe in the

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Speaker 2: past I would have just moved on. I would have said, Eh,

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Speaker 2: can't hunt it, No tree, can't do it. But I

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Speaker 2: remember thinking, like, this is a spot you have to

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Speaker 2: be and there's got to be a way to make

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Speaker 2: it work. So I first thought maybe I could hide

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Speaker 2: in the ditch, like maybe I can get down and

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Speaker 2: stand in the water, or stand on the bank and

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Speaker 2: hide underneath those underneath the weeds and wait for deer

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Speaker 2: to come by. Maybe I could shoot from that position.

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Speaker 2: But then I got to thinking, the only way to

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Speaker 2: hunt this area would be with a wind pushing from

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Speaker 2: that ditch out into the field. Otherwise, if you have

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Speaker 2: a wind blowing somewhere else, it's blowing into where all

217
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Speaker 2: this deer coming from. Just wouldn't work. So I then

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Speaker 2: thought I could probably hide in the corn. And this

219
00:11:37,679 --> 00:11:40,080
Speaker 2: was a really key thing for me, was realizing that

220
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Speaker 2: I can use that standing corn basically as a blind. Right,

221
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Speaker 2: you see a lot of people who own land putting

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Speaker 2: pop up blinds or haybal blinds or even tower blinds

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Speaker 2: in or right behind standing corn. Like some people will

224
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Speaker 2: even have a cornfield, they'll mow some of it down

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Speaker 2: and then they'll have their pop up blind right inside

226
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Speaker 2: the standing corn. Well, I can't do that, but I

227
00:12:01,360 --> 00:12:04,640
Speaker 2: could basically use the standing corn like a blind. I

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Speaker 2: could hide in it, just stand in it, or crouch

229
00:12:06,640 --> 00:12:09,760
Speaker 2: down in it. So I walked out there about twenty

230
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Speaker 2: five thirty yards from where I wanted to be able

231
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Speaker 2: to shoot to, and I started looking around and fortunately,

232
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Speaker 2: maybe not for the farmer, but for me as a hunter,

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Speaker 2: a lot of that corn had been eaten by deer,

234
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Speaker 2: so there was a lot of it knocked down, so

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Speaker 2: there was it almost was like someone came in and

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Speaker 2: mowed some of this stuff down, because it was pretty

237
00:12:26,480 --> 00:12:28,840
Speaker 2: good openings. So I found a spot where I was

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Speaker 2: back far enough that I was right on the edge

239
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Speaker 2: of the standing corn and then had this kind of

240
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Speaker 2: knockdown corn in front of me, and I just marked

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00:12:35,920 --> 00:12:37,960
Speaker 2: a waypoint on Onyx and said, all right, this is

242
00:12:38,000 --> 00:12:40,600
Speaker 2: the spot that has the most lanes to different places

243
00:12:40,600 --> 00:12:43,400
Speaker 2: that I think deer might come through. It has me

244
00:12:43,480 --> 00:12:47,439
Speaker 2: within shooting range of that ditch funnel and I can

245
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Speaker 2: see that scrape. So I marked it and said, all right,

246
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Speaker 2: I'm gonna come back at some point, and this is

247
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Speaker 2: gonna be the spot to hunt if I want to

248
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Speaker 2: hunt the ditch. So that's where I left things. I

249
00:12:57,640 --> 00:13:00,520
Speaker 2: had a camera on that scrape. I marked the way point,

250
00:13:00,920 --> 00:13:03,920
Speaker 2: finished my little quick spout scouting, walk through there, and

251
00:13:04,200 --> 00:13:08,480
Speaker 2: pieced out. I was done. That takes me to I

252
00:13:08,480 --> 00:13:13,040
Speaker 2: don't know, sometime in August, late August, and pictures started

253
00:13:13,080 --> 00:13:16,040
Speaker 2: rolling in on those two cameras that I had and

254
00:13:17,320 --> 00:13:20,319
Speaker 2: ended up being pretty promising. There was a handful of

255
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Speaker 2: nice deer, nothing giant but some bucks that or maybe two,

256
00:13:24,360 --> 00:13:29,800
Speaker 2: maybe three, maybe four, and then finally this crazy big

257
00:13:30,080 --> 00:13:34,000
Speaker 2: browtime buck just like crazy big brow times, like eye

258
00:13:34,080 --> 00:13:37,120
Speaker 2: popping ten eleven I don't know at the time, maybe

259
00:13:37,160 --> 00:13:39,480
Speaker 2: twelve inch long brow times is what it looked like

260
00:13:39,520 --> 00:13:42,280
Speaker 2: to me when looking at those first velvet photos. So

261
00:13:42,480 --> 00:13:45,080
Speaker 2: super exciting. I've never had a buck like that anywhere

262
00:13:45,080 --> 00:13:48,200
Speaker 2: I could hunt, and showed my kids the pictures. An Ever,

263
00:13:48,440 --> 00:13:52,760
Speaker 2: my oldest wanted to call them tall brows. So this

264
00:13:52,840 --> 00:13:56,640
Speaker 2: dear right away stood out. And fortunately, over the rest

265
00:13:56,679 --> 00:14:01,000
Speaker 2: of the summer, late August and September, that deer showed

266
00:14:01,080 --> 00:14:04,640
Speaker 2: up somewhat consistently, not over and over and over again,

267
00:14:04,679 --> 00:14:06,800
Speaker 2: but enough to know he was in the area. He

268
00:14:06,920 --> 00:14:10,840
Speaker 2: was using this cornfield, and he called this zone home

269
00:14:10,960 --> 00:14:16,480
Speaker 2: at least. So fast forward, as the season is approaching,

270
00:14:16,760 --> 00:14:20,680
Speaker 2: I'm continuing to monitor these cameras. I'm monitoring different properties

271
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Speaker 2: I have to hunt. I do some drives around these

272
00:14:23,400 --> 00:14:26,000
Speaker 2: various neighborhoods, just trying to see if there's any deer

273
00:14:26,040 --> 00:14:28,160
Speaker 2: in the field, just trying to get a sense of

274
00:14:28,160 --> 00:14:32,880
Speaker 2: what else is out there, and slowly start putting together

275
00:14:33,000 --> 00:14:37,520
Speaker 2: a game plan. The approach that I am taking this

276
00:14:37,640 --> 00:14:40,720
Speaker 2: year is to be a little bit more spread out,

277
00:14:41,120 --> 00:14:43,520
Speaker 2: to try to keep tabs and what deer are around

278
00:14:43,720 --> 00:14:48,240
Speaker 2: to collect collect collect information through cameras, through long distance glassing,

279
00:14:48,640 --> 00:14:54,040
Speaker 2: through the occasional observation stand type hunt, and sometimes doing

280
00:14:54,040 --> 00:14:56,720
Speaker 2: a quick drive through or walk through, and trying to

281
00:14:56,760 --> 00:15:02,040
Speaker 2: scout a little bit on foot and hunt the properties

282
00:15:02,080 --> 00:15:05,720
Speaker 2: that have a potentially active deer. So I'm not going

283
00:15:05,760 --> 00:15:09,200
Speaker 2: to overhunt any one particular property after one particular deer.

284
00:15:09,240 --> 00:15:11,680
Speaker 2: I'm a little bit more open to what I'm targeting

285
00:15:11,680 --> 00:15:14,280
Speaker 2: this year. Last year is very much wide nine. This

286
00:15:14,400 --> 00:15:17,080
Speaker 2: year there's a handful of different deer, some spots here

287
00:15:17,080 --> 00:15:19,960
Speaker 2: in southern Michigan, some spots up in northern Michigan, and

288
00:15:20,000 --> 00:15:21,800
Speaker 2: I'm going to go where the iron seems hot and

289
00:15:21,800 --> 00:15:25,480
Speaker 2: where the conditions seem right. So in this case, there's

290
00:15:25,480 --> 00:15:28,200
Speaker 2: a few things that had to be lined up for

291
00:15:28,280 --> 00:15:33,120
Speaker 2: me to want to hunt this particular small property. I

292
00:15:33,200 --> 00:15:35,600
Speaker 2: knew I would not be ill hunted a lot, because

293
00:15:35,640 --> 00:15:39,400
Speaker 2: again it's small and you could burn it out pretty quickly.

294
00:15:39,480 --> 00:15:42,080
Speaker 2: There's one or two spots. There really was nowhere else

295
00:15:42,080 --> 00:15:44,440
Speaker 2: you could hunt on this piece, and so I was

296
00:15:44,480 --> 00:15:47,880
Speaker 2: looking to make very targeted strikes, so waiting for the

297
00:15:47,960 --> 00:15:51,400
Speaker 2: right moment and then give it a shot and then

298
00:15:51,720 --> 00:15:53,320
Speaker 2: back out for a while and maybe give it one

299
00:15:53,320 --> 00:15:55,000
Speaker 2: more shot. But this wasn't a place that I could

300
00:15:55,040 --> 00:15:57,360
Speaker 2: hunt over and over and over and bump around here

301
00:15:57,400 --> 00:15:59,160
Speaker 2: and try this spot and try this spot and try

302
00:15:59,160 --> 00:16:02,160
Speaker 2: that spot, to wait until I felt pretty darn confident.

303
00:16:02,240 --> 00:16:06,400
Speaker 2: So I was number one infrequent hunting in this particular location.

304
00:16:06,760 --> 00:16:08,520
Speaker 2: That doesn't mean I'm not going to hunt other places,

305
00:16:08,560 --> 00:16:10,800
Speaker 2: but for this spot, it's got to be the right time,

306
00:16:11,000 --> 00:16:13,760
Speaker 2: the right moment for a deer that I actually want

307
00:16:13,800 --> 00:16:16,560
Speaker 2: to take a crack at. The one main deer that

308
00:16:16,560 --> 00:16:18,200
Speaker 2: I want to take a crack aut on this property

309
00:16:18,320 --> 00:16:21,320
Speaker 2: was for sure, that tall browtime buck. There was another

310
00:16:21,360 --> 00:16:25,000
Speaker 2: eight pointer who looked like maybe he was four, with

311
00:16:25,080 --> 00:16:27,640
Speaker 2: short brow times that I thought, if that deer hangs

312
00:16:27,640 --> 00:16:30,160
Speaker 2: out here a lot, I might be interested in that one.

313
00:16:31,320 --> 00:16:35,680
Speaker 2: But the tall browbuck was there the most, probably maybe

314
00:16:35,720 --> 00:16:37,720
Speaker 2: of any of the other deer I was seeing across

315
00:16:37,800 --> 00:16:42,800
Speaker 2: those two different camera locations. He was showing up somewhat frequently. Now,

316
00:16:43,240 --> 00:16:45,440
Speaker 2: in order to hunt him, I mentioned any of those

317
00:16:45,520 --> 00:16:48,640
Speaker 2: right conditions. A couple things. I needed some kind of

318
00:16:48,680 --> 00:16:52,480
Speaker 2: wind that was not blowing into the swamp. I could

319
00:16:52,560 --> 00:16:54,880
Speaker 2: get away with maybe a straight north or a straight south,

320
00:16:54,880 --> 00:16:57,800
Speaker 2: a parallel it, or I could get something that's blowing

321
00:16:57,880 --> 00:17:01,120
Speaker 2: like northwest or southwest coming out of the swamp, but

322
00:17:01,200 --> 00:17:03,800
Speaker 2: I couldn't have anything going into the swamp. So that

323
00:17:03,840 --> 00:17:08,200
Speaker 2: was a key thing. Secondly, as I started seeing pictures

324
00:17:08,280 --> 00:17:12,040
Speaker 2: rolling of this deer, I was getting a basic sense

325
00:17:12,240 --> 00:17:14,960
Speaker 2: of the fact that he spent a decent amount of

326
00:17:14,960 --> 00:17:17,800
Speaker 2: time in this zone, and he was showing up on

327
00:17:17,840 --> 00:17:20,399
Speaker 2: the edges of daylight. In a few times in daylight,

328
00:17:20,840 --> 00:17:24,480
Speaker 2: I had mooring pictures of him coming into bed before

329
00:17:24,520 --> 00:17:27,280
Speaker 2: the sum was up, and then I had a couple

330
00:17:27,800 --> 00:17:30,520
Speaker 2: days where he came out before dark in the evening,

331
00:17:31,400 --> 00:17:33,919
Speaker 2: so he's bedded somewhere on this side of the swamp.

332
00:17:34,720 --> 00:17:36,439
Speaker 2: I knew that my cameras would just telling me a

333
00:17:36,480 --> 00:17:38,640
Speaker 2: slice of the story. So if I got two pictures

334
00:17:38,640 --> 00:17:41,720
Speaker 2: of him around daylight or close to daylight, he was

335
00:17:41,800 --> 00:17:44,520
Speaker 2: probably coming out more often than not, just different spots

336
00:17:44,560 --> 00:17:48,119
Speaker 2: that I can't monitor. So what I knew I wanted

337
00:17:48,119 --> 00:17:50,280
Speaker 2: to do was was wait until I had that right

338
00:17:50,359 --> 00:17:54,720
Speaker 2: set of winds and then a trigger, which for me

339
00:17:55,080 --> 00:17:57,199
Speaker 2: usually is a cold from some kind. I want some

340
00:17:57,320 --> 00:18:00,840
Speaker 2: cooler weather coming in. I want a weather change, ideally,

341
00:18:01,160 --> 00:18:04,320
Speaker 2: you know, ten plus degrees, fifteen plus degrees of a

342
00:18:04,359 --> 00:18:07,880
Speaker 2: temperature drop. That's something I really want to see. If

343
00:18:07,880 --> 00:18:11,320
Speaker 2: I see that in October, I'm I'm interested in taking

344
00:18:11,520 --> 00:18:14,159
Speaker 2: a more aggressive swing on one of my spots. So

345
00:18:15,000 --> 00:18:19,439
Speaker 2: I needed that. Another key thing with this particular spot

346
00:18:19,680 --> 00:18:22,280
Speaker 2: is that I had to walk through a standing cornfield

347
00:18:22,359 --> 00:18:24,560
Speaker 2: all the way to get to this location. And then

348
00:18:24,600 --> 00:18:28,400
Speaker 2: I needed, you know, sneak in standing corn and set

349
00:18:28,480 --> 00:18:30,359
Speaker 2: up close to where these deer or some of these

350
00:18:30,359 --> 00:18:34,159
Speaker 2: deer are probably betted right So I remember thinking to myself, like,

351
00:18:34,280 --> 00:18:36,040
Speaker 2: this is gonna be very hard to pull off if

352
00:18:36,040 --> 00:18:39,720
Speaker 2: it's a very dry and very still. I need some

353
00:18:39,760 --> 00:18:42,320
Speaker 2: wind cover or I need rain cover to be able

354
00:18:42,320 --> 00:18:44,600
Speaker 2: to move through all this standing corn and get set

355
00:18:44,680 --> 00:18:48,000
Speaker 2: up in the corn without alerting deer that maybe are

356
00:18:48,040 --> 00:18:50,520
Speaker 2: better right off those little points that wouldn't be that

357
00:18:50,600 --> 00:18:54,760
Speaker 2: far away. These bucks could have been bedded sixty yards away,

358
00:18:54,760 --> 00:18:57,359
Speaker 2: maybe from where I'd be trying to set up. So

359
00:18:57,960 --> 00:19:00,600
Speaker 2: as I was watching the forecast, I need wind direction.

360
00:19:01,040 --> 00:19:04,640
Speaker 2: I wanted the cold front. I wanted wind or rain,

361
00:19:04,880 --> 00:19:07,800
Speaker 2: so I could stealthily move in there. And then finally,

362
00:19:07,880 --> 00:19:10,080
Speaker 2: like I mentioned, I would love it if I had

363
00:19:10,160 --> 00:19:13,679
Speaker 2: photos that told me again he's you know, give me

364
00:19:13,720 --> 00:19:16,000
Speaker 2: some confidence that he's still in the zone. And so

365
00:19:16,160 --> 00:19:18,560
Speaker 2: that's what I ended up getting. All of these things,

366
00:19:18,640 --> 00:19:22,159
Speaker 2: these stars all aligned here. Just recently, the evening of

367
00:19:22,200 --> 00:19:27,840
Speaker 2: October thirteenth, I had the cold front moved through. Temperatures

368
00:19:27,880 --> 00:19:32,840
Speaker 2: dropped from I think the seventies on Friday all the

369
00:19:32,840 --> 00:19:39,320
Speaker 2: way down to fifties and high forties by Sunday. I

370
00:19:39,400 --> 00:19:43,760
Speaker 2: had a west northwest wind, so this wind was blowing

371
00:19:43,800 --> 00:19:47,760
Speaker 2: away from the cover and down, allowing me to basically

372
00:19:47,840 --> 00:19:50,159
Speaker 2: walk with the wind in my face, just kind of

373
00:19:50,240 --> 00:19:53,680
Speaker 2: quartering across my face and into my face, straight from

374
00:19:53,680 --> 00:19:55,879
Speaker 2: the road all the way through the standing corn. And

375
00:19:55,920 --> 00:19:57,880
Speaker 2: then it had been raining for the last day and half,

376
00:19:58,080 --> 00:20:01,040
Speaker 2: so everything was wet, everything was quiet, and there was

377
00:20:01,040 --> 00:20:03,320
Speaker 2: a little bit of a breeze, so I could sneak

378
00:20:03,320 --> 00:20:06,560
Speaker 2: in there completely silent, nothing would hear me. I could

379
00:20:06,560 --> 00:20:08,760
Speaker 2: head in there with a wind blowing across my face

380
00:20:08,800 --> 00:20:11,960
Speaker 2: and down, so deer might still feel comfortable coming out

381
00:20:12,000 --> 00:20:14,399
Speaker 2: to this field. If a buck wanted some degree of

382
00:20:14,440 --> 00:20:17,239
Speaker 2: wind across his face. He could still smell something as

383
00:20:17,280 --> 00:20:19,800
Speaker 2: he came out to feed, but he certainly wouldn't smell me.

384
00:20:20,800 --> 00:20:23,360
Speaker 2: This cold weather, I thought, would give me a trigger

385
00:20:23,440 --> 00:20:25,679
Speaker 2: to get him moving a little bit earlier than usual.

386
00:20:26,160 --> 00:20:28,680
Speaker 2: And I had two pictures of him moving in daylight

387
00:20:28,800 --> 00:20:31,879
Speaker 2: in the prior ten days, and then I had some

388
00:20:31,960 --> 00:20:34,480
Speaker 2: other shots of him coming into bed in that general

389
00:20:34,560 --> 00:20:39,240
Speaker 2: zone that ten day window two right around daylight. So

390
00:20:39,440 --> 00:20:43,000
Speaker 2: again it's just telling me, I'm I'm probably close to

391
00:20:43,040 --> 00:20:45,840
Speaker 2: his bedroom, and now I have this cold front that

392
00:20:45,880 --> 00:20:48,320
Speaker 2: I think will get him out here to this food source,

393
00:20:49,119 --> 00:20:51,240
Speaker 2: likely a little bit earlier in the day than maybe

394
00:20:51,280 --> 00:20:53,880
Speaker 2: he would on others. I've got one of the best

395
00:20:53,920 --> 00:20:55,919
Speaker 2: food sources on the edge of this big swamp, so

396
00:20:55,960 --> 00:20:58,520
Speaker 2: I believe that there's probably a lot of deer. They're

397
00:20:58,520 --> 00:21:01,399
Speaker 2: in a head towards this standing corner field. There's bean

398
00:21:01,440 --> 00:21:03,720
Speaker 2: fields in the other area, but those are mostly harvested.

399
00:21:04,200 --> 00:21:07,560
Speaker 2: There had not been a freshly cut corn field. That

400
00:21:07,720 --> 00:21:10,000
Speaker 2: sometimes is the kind of thing that gets deer flocking

401
00:21:10,040 --> 00:21:13,160
Speaker 2: to it, So you know there's a good chance these

402
00:21:13,160 --> 00:21:15,560
Speaker 2: deer were feeding the corn. Saw a lot of deer

403
00:21:15,600 --> 00:21:18,080
Speaker 2: on cameras doing that. This would be the trigger I

404
00:21:18,119 --> 00:21:21,280
Speaker 2: thought that could make it all happen. So based on

405
00:21:21,320 --> 00:21:25,800
Speaker 2: all that, the ditch standing corn spot was where it

406
00:21:25,800 --> 00:21:28,040
Speaker 2: was going to be. Those were the conditions I was

407
00:21:28,080 --> 00:21:39,760
Speaker 2: waiting for, and that's why I was so ideal. I

408
00:21:40,040 --> 00:21:43,600
Speaker 2: rushed home from visiting with my family in western Michigan,

409
00:21:43,880 --> 00:21:48,040
Speaker 2: got home Sunday afternoon, grabbed my gear, took a cent

410
00:21:48,080 --> 00:21:52,240
Speaker 2: freeze shower, slipped out there, walked straight down the rows

411
00:21:52,240 --> 00:21:55,280
Speaker 2: of the standing corn right to my pre marked location

412
00:21:55,480 --> 00:22:00,520
Speaker 2: on my map, and tried to just hum grew down

413
00:22:00,520 --> 00:22:02,720
Speaker 2: in the corn, and I remember getting situated in there.

414
00:22:02,760 --> 00:22:04,879
Speaker 2: I brought a little matt to kneel on to keep

415
00:22:04,960 --> 00:22:08,399
Speaker 2: my knees from getting soaking wet. The whole time. I

416
00:22:08,400 --> 00:22:11,119
Speaker 2: remember really trying to be careful about setting up in

417
00:22:11,160 --> 00:22:13,440
Speaker 2: the right position, because when you're hunting on the ground,

418
00:22:14,480 --> 00:22:18,399
Speaker 2: it's harder to move. It's harder to adjust sometimes than

419
00:22:18,440 --> 00:22:21,560
Speaker 2: when you're in a tree right because you just might

420
00:22:21,600 --> 00:22:22,919
Speaker 2: not be able to move as much because you're at

421
00:22:23,000 --> 00:22:25,800
Speaker 2: ground level with deer. You are at the mercy of

422
00:22:25,840 --> 00:22:28,320
Speaker 2: where the deers show up, so you know when you're

423
00:22:28,359 --> 00:22:30,240
Speaker 2: up in a tree, they're usually not going to see

424
00:22:30,240 --> 00:22:33,960
Speaker 2: you hopefully not at first. So you can move around,

425
00:22:34,000 --> 00:22:36,000
Speaker 2: you can readjust you can fix things in the moment,

426
00:22:36,920 --> 00:22:38,879
Speaker 2: but you kind of need to have everything fixed just

427
00:22:39,040 --> 00:22:41,399
Speaker 2: right on the ground, or at least I want to

428
00:22:41,440 --> 00:22:42,919
Speaker 2: try to set it up that way. And I remember

429
00:22:43,400 --> 00:22:45,560
Speaker 2: last year I had to hunt on the ground again

430
00:22:45,600 --> 00:22:49,080
Speaker 2: without a blind, just hiding in grass. Last year in Nebraska,

431
00:22:49,200 --> 00:22:51,600
Speaker 2: it was a similar situation where I knew this is

432
00:22:51,600 --> 00:22:53,359
Speaker 2: the spot I had to be to intercept the deer,

433
00:22:53,800 --> 00:22:57,480
Speaker 2: but there was no trees, and so when I got there,

434
00:22:58,080 --> 00:23:00,520
Speaker 2: just like I did last night, I spent a lot

435
00:23:00,560 --> 00:23:02,760
Speaker 2: of time thinking through, Okay, where exactly do I think

436
00:23:02,760 --> 00:23:05,439
Speaker 2: these deer might come through? How exactly do I need

437
00:23:05,480 --> 00:23:08,119
Speaker 2: to be positioned with my body to be able to

438
00:23:08,119 --> 00:23:09,720
Speaker 2: be abd drawback and shoot. I don't want to have

439
00:23:09,720 --> 00:23:12,320
Speaker 2: to reposition my body if I don't have to. How

440
00:23:12,320 --> 00:23:14,480
Speaker 2: do I best take advantage of cover here on the

441
00:23:14,520 --> 00:23:17,439
Speaker 2: ground so that I can hopefully hide down here but

442
00:23:17,560 --> 00:23:20,159
Speaker 2: still have some shooting lanes. So all that stuff was

443
00:23:20,200 --> 00:23:23,560
Speaker 2: going through my mind last night too. I was using

444
00:23:23,600 --> 00:23:25,480
Speaker 2: standing corn right behind me, but I didn't want to

445
00:23:25,480 --> 00:23:27,879
Speaker 2: be deep into the standing corn because I wanted to

446
00:23:27,880 --> 00:23:29,200
Speaker 2: be able to shoot in front of me and to

447
00:23:29,280 --> 00:23:31,480
Speaker 2: the side of me. So I got to the spot

448
00:23:31,520 --> 00:23:34,280
Speaker 2: as I mentioned, where there was this push down corn

449
00:23:34,320 --> 00:23:36,960
Speaker 2: from the deer feeding already, but there's still some patches

450
00:23:37,000 --> 00:23:39,439
Speaker 2: of standing corn here and there. So I kind of

451
00:23:39,600 --> 00:23:42,080
Speaker 2: adjusted my location just a little bit to where things

452
00:23:42,080 --> 00:23:45,960
Speaker 2: have been changed since the summer. And what I had

453
00:23:46,200 --> 00:23:50,520
Speaker 2: was some open push down corn to my right where

454
00:23:50,600 --> 00:23:52,879
Speaker 2: it was almost like a quarter acre or a half acre,

455
00:23:53,000 --> 00:23:55,760
Speaker 2: almost like food plot looking thing because of the corn

456
00:23:55,800 --> 00:23:58,440
Speaker 2: being pushed down. So I knew if any deer came

457
00:23:58,440 --> 00:24:02,840
Speaker 2: from the north of me, I could turn and make

458
00:24:02,880 --> 00:24:04,879
Speaker 2: an adjustment and take a crack at the deer over there.

459
00:24:04,880 --> 00:24:06,520
Speaker 2: If he came north of me from a spot I

460
00:24:06,560 --> 00:24:10,440
Speaker 2: wasn't expecting, I would have options. If he came right

461
00:24:10,440 --> 00:24:11,800
Speaker 2: out in front of me off one of those two

462
00:24:11,840 --> 00:24:16,200
Speaker 2: little brushy fingers and got pinched by the ditch, I

463
00:24:16,200 --> 00:24:18,639
Speaker 2: would have a perfect twenty five yard shot right in

464
00:24:18,680 --> 00:24:21,399
Speaker 2: front of me, and then I could see the buckthorn

465
00:24:21,600 --> 00:24:24,520
Speaker 2: shrub where that big scrape was. Now, I didn't have

466
00:24:24,600 --> 00:24:28,800
Speaker 2: a perfect shot to it, but I could likely get

467
00:24:28,840 --> 00:24:31,760
Speaker 2: a shot at him as he approached it, or maybe

468
00:24:31,760 --> 00:24:33,360
Speaker 2: if I had to make a slight move I could

469
00:24:33,359 --> 00:24:35,200
Speaker 2: get a shot, but I didn't want to get any

470
00:24:35,240 --> 00:24:38,600
Speaker 2: farther up, any closer to that, which would have given

471
00:24:38,640 --> 00:24:40,800
Speaker 2: me a more clear shot to there, but would have

472
00:24:40,960 --> 00:24:44,560
Speaker 2: exposed me even more. And that was like the challenge

473
00:24:44,640 --> 00:24:47,720
Speaker 2: was trying to get that balance of being able to

474
00:24:47,760 --> 00:24:52,760
Speaker 2: stay hidden while also having shot opportunities. So I spent

475
00:24:54,600 --> 00:24:58,640
Speaker 2: I don't know, ten fifteen minutes thinking this through and

476
00:24:58,680 --> 00:25:01,560
Speaker 2: making tiny adjustments like let's move one yard over here. Okay,

477
00:25:01,600 --> 00:25:04,200
Speaker 2: is this right now? I'm gonna move two yards over here. No,

478
00:25:04,320 --> 00:25:07,640
Speaker 2: I gotta take advantage of these three cornstalks here. So

479
00:25:08,119 --> 00:25:12,160
Speaker 2: really was trying to get that just right, got myself situated,

480
00:25:12,240 --> 00:25:15,600
Speaker 2: tried to map out exactly where the best place to

481
00:25:15,600 --> 00:25:18,359
Speaker 2: put all my different things where it would be. Again,

482
00:25:19,880 --> 00:25:23,640
Speaker 2: it's these little tiny things that many times don't matter,

483
00:25:23,680 --> 00:25:27,000
Speaker 2: but sometimes they make all the difference. So I try

484
00:25:27,040 --> 00:25:31,520
Speaker 2: to be very thoughtful about all the possibilities. This is

485
00:25:31,520 --> 00:25:33,879
Speaker 2: a really key thing that I've talked about a lot.

486
00:25:34,680 --> 00:25:37,520
Speaker 2: So I'm beating the dead horse maybe, But every time

487
00:25:37,560 --> 00:25:40,360
Speaker 2: I get set up in a location, I try to

488
00:25:40,520 --> 00:25:45,359
Speaker 2: walk through every possible scenario and think through can I

489
00:25:45,440 --> 00:25:48,399
Speaker 2: draw if a deer comes here? Can I move in

490
00:25:48,440 --> 00:25:51,360
Speaker 2: a position if a deer is over there? What will

491
00:25:51,400 --> 00:25:54,159
Speaker 2: I do if a deer comes out from behind me? Where?

492
00:25:54,440 --> 00:25:56,040
Speaker 2: You know? What? If I miss and I need to

493
00:25:56,040 --> 00:25:59,000
Speaker 2: grab another arrow, where's my quiver position? Can I reach

494
00:25:59,000 --> 00:26:01,040
Speaker 2: the quiver easily? Can I do it quietly without a

495
00:26:01,080 --> 00:26:03,760
Speaker 2: deer noticing? If I need my grunt to Where's that

496
00:26:03,800 --> 00:26:06,520
Speaker 2: going to be? If I need to reposition and shoot

497
00:26:06,640 --> 00:26:08,560
Speaker 2: up into this open area to the north, what will

498
00:26:08,560 --> 00:26:10,560
Speaker 2: I do? Do I have anything in my way that's

499
00:26:10,560 --> 00:26:12,280
Speaker 2: going to keep me from being able to make that move?

500
00:26:12,800 --> 00:26:14,520
Speaker 2: Is my backpack in the spot that's going to get

501
00:26:14,560 --> 00:26:16,760
Speaker 2: in my way? If I have to move to shoot

502
00:26:16,800 --> 00:26:21,720
Speaker 2: over by the scrape, etc. Etc. All of those scenarios

503
00:26:21,760 --> 00:26:24,800
Speaker 2: went through my mind in that first fifteen minutes as

504
00:26:24,800 --> 00:26:27,840
Speaker 2: I sat through and thought through how I want to

505
00:26:27,880 --> 00:26:32,640
Speaker 2: position myself here. I get all that done. I'm on

506
00:26:32,680 --> 00:26:36,359
Speaker 2: my knees, kind of hunkered down with some scattered standing

507
00:26:36,359 --> 00:26:38,320
Speaker 2: corn and then broken down corn in front of me,

508
00:26:39,359 --> 00:26:43,440
Speaker 2: effectively giving me a natural ground blowe as best as possible.

509
00:26:44,040 --> 00:26:46,040
Speaker 2: And as soon as I get kind of settled, I

510
00:26:46,119 --> 00:26:49,919
Speaker 2: hear a deer sneeze, like that kind of sneeze cough sound,

511
00:26:49,960 --> 00:26:51,720
Speaker 2: that if you've been out there in the woods long enough,

512
00:26:51,720 --> 00:26:54,320
Speaker 2: you've heard that plenty. You can identify it right away.

513
00:26:54,560 --> 00:26:58,080
Speaker 2: That's a deer. And it sounded really close. So I'm

514
00:26:58,960 --> 00:27:01,440
Speaker 2: laying down almost just hunkered down as low as I could,

515
00:27:01,480 --> 00:27:04,280
Speaker 2: because this deer was close. And that was kind of

516
00:27:04,280 --> 00:27:05,639
Speaker 2: the name of the game of this hunt is that

517
00:27:05,680 --> 00:27:09,920
Speaker 2: stuff would just appear very close. You know, there would

518
00:27:09,920 --> 00:27:11,520
Speaker 2: be no deer, and then there would be a deer

519
00:27:11,680 --> 00:27:14,399
Speaker 2: thirty five yards away. There would be nothing, and then

520
00:27:14,440 --> 00:27:17,080
Speaker 2: there'd be a deer twenty five yards away. Again, it's

521
00:27:17,200 --> 00:27:19,760
Speaker 2: it's a breeze and it's rainy, so you can't hear

522
00:27:19,800 --> 00:27:24,119
Speaker 2: almost anything or at least very minimal walking sounds. So

523
00:27:25,040 --> 00:27:29,520
Speaker 2: the hunt begins with a little buck coming out of

524
00:27:29,560 --> 00:27:32,240
Speaker 2: one of these little brushy fingers, walks alongside that dish,

525
00:27:32,359 --> 00:27:37,760
Speaker 2: comes right at me and walks within ten yards seven yards,

526
00:27:38,200 --> 00:27:42,120
Speaker 2: and I remember just trying to melt into the ground

527
00:27:42,240 --> 00:27:45,439
Speaker 2: so he wouldn't see me. And he gets right up

528
00:27:45,480 --> 00:27:48,400
Speaker 2: on top of me and then gets into the row

529
00:27:48,440 --> 00:27:51,040
Speaker 2: of corn that I'm in and looks straight down the

530
00:27:51,119 --> 00:27:52,640
Speaker 2: row and I'm right in the middle of the row,

531
00:27:53,080 --> 00:27:56,160
Speaker 2: and he kind of like jolts notices there's a lump

532
00:27:56,160 --> 00:27:59,280
Speaker 2: on the ground and bounds away. He doesn't blow, but

533
00:27:59,320 --> 00:28:02,919
Speaker 2: he kind of bounds off and then walks away. So

534
00:28:03,000 --> 00:28:05,320
Speaker 2: I consider myself lucky that he didn't totally freak out.

535
00:28:05,359 --> 00:28:08,080
Speaker 2: But I knew that's like a chink in my armor.

536
00:28:08,880 --> 00:28:13,200
Speaker 2: So I then readjusted my location again and again micro adjustment.

537
00:28:13,280 --> 00:28:16,199
Speaker 2: I just realized, I need to set myself up so

538
00:28:16,240 --> 00:28:19,080
Speaker 2: if any deer comes into a row, I'm not right

539
00:28:19,119 --> 00:28:20,960
Speaker 2: in the middle of that row. I need to use

540
00:28:21,560 --> 00:28:25,000
Speaker 2: the row of corn to be to break up my outline.

541
00:28:25,880 --> 00:28:27,720
Speaker 2: So there were some dead corn stocks that were kind

542
00:28:27,720 --> 00:28:30,120
Speaker 2: of pushed in different places, and I just leaned one

543
00:28:30,160 --> 00:28:32,000
Speaker 2: of those in along the side of me, so it

544
00:28:32,000 --> 00:28:34,000
Speaker 2: breaks up my outline a little bit more. And then

545
00:28:34,040 --> 00:28:37,399
Speaker 2: I slid up twelve inches so that the row of

546
00:28:37,520 --> 00:28:39,680
Speaker 2: corn is on either side of me, or at least

547
00:28:39,720 --> 00:28:42,400
Speaker 2: on my right side. So instead of my body being

548
00:28:42,480 --> 00:28:44,320
Speaker 2: right in the middle of a row, I now have

549
00:28:44,440 --> 00:28:46,400
Speaker 2: like half my body in one row half my body

550
00:28:46,400 --> 00:28:48,800
Speaker 2: in the other row. And if a deer were to

551
00:28:48,880 --> 00:28:52,200
Speaker 2: walk through that looking down the rows, now they're just

552
00:28:52,240 --> 00:28:53,880
Speaker 2: seeing a little bit of a clump sticking out from

553
00:28:53,880 --> 00:28:55,680
Speaker 2: one row of corn and a little clump sticking out

554
00:28:55,680 --> 00:29:00,000
Speaker 2: the other but not one big ball that ends up

555
00:29:00,080 --> 00:29:04,000
Speaker 2: hang off when I don't know. Ten minutes later, another

556
00:29:04,080 --> 00:29:06,720
Speaker 2: buck comes out, does the same thing. Another young deer,

557
00:29:07,440 --> 00:29:10,520
Speaker 2: and he comes through right a five yards five to

558
00:29:10,560 --> 00:29:14,600
Speaker 2: ten yards again very close, and this time he kind

559
00:29:14,600 --> 00:29:18,760
Speaker 2: of walks through eyeballs my area, but doesn't freak and

560
00:29:18,800 --> 00:29:22,080
Speaker 2: just walks past into the main standing corn behind me.

561
00:29:22,560 --> 00:29:29,960
Speaker 2: Disappears feeding fast forward another our ish and another deer

562
00:29:30,000 --> 00:29:33,240
Speaker 2: comes out. This one's a doe. She comes out from

563
00:29:33,320 --> 00:29:36,400
Speaker 2: the left side of the ditch and near that scrape.

564
00:29:36,400 --> 00:29:38,800
Speaker 2: She actually was standing in the scrape, and then she

565
00:29:38,840 --> 00:29:42,160
Speaker 2: comes walking right towards me and walks again to five

566
00:29:42,280 --> 00:29:45,040
Speaker 2: yards right into my face, and she's like on top

567
00:29:45,080 --> 00:29:50,280
Speaker 2: of me, notices me at five yards and same deal.

568
00:29:50,560 --> 00:29:53,920
Speaker 2: She kind of like boogers like, sees me, gets a

569
00:29:53,920 --> 00:29:57,240
Speaker 2: little weird, bounds off, stops, turns, stares at me for

570
00:29:57,240 --> 00:30:01,560
Speaker 2: a while, stares at me, stares at me, stares at me,

571
00:30:02,040 --> 00:30:06,520
Speaker 2: and then couldn't figure it out, turns around slowly walks away.

572
00:30:08,120 --> 00:30:11,680
Speaker 2: At this point I thought, hey, you're getting away with it.

573
00:30:11,720 --> 00:30:13,920
Speaker 2: This is good news. You haven't had a deer blow

574
00:30:13,960 --> 00:30:18,120
Speaker 2: the whole thing up. That's the good news. Bad news

575
00:30:18,200 --> 00:30:23,280
Speaker 2: is you're like you're playing with fire, having this many

576
00:30:23,360 --> 00:30:26,920
Speaker 2: deer come this close to you. It's bound to blow

577
00:30:27,000 --> 00:30:28,720
Speaker 2: up in your face, is I remember I was having

578
00:30:28,720 --> 00:30:31,600
Speaker 2: this conversation with myself in my head, like, yikes, this

579
00:30:31,680 --> 00:30:33,600
Speaker 2: might not work out because there's too many deer that

580
00:30:33,640 --> 00:30:37,600
Speaker 2: are coming right to you. It just seemed like it

581
00:30:37,640 --> 00:30:40,640
Speaker 2: was a matter of time until something was gonna just

582
00:30:40,680 --> 00:30:42,680
Speaker 2: start blowing and blowing and blowing. Or if a bunch

583
00:30:42,720 --> 00:30:44,920
Speaker 2: of deer came out and started feeding and then one

584
00:30:44,920 --> 00:30:47,040
Speaker 2: of them gets close. If you know, if you get

585
00:30:47,040 --> 00:30:49,400
Speaker 2: a dozen deer all of a sudden running away, that's

586
00:30:49,400 --> 00:30:51,920
Speaker 2: going to make a commotion. You can only get away

587
00:30:51,960 --> 00:30:54,240
Speaker 2: with so much of that before I'm mature. Buck is

588
00:30:54,240 --> 00:30:57,480
Speaker 2: going to know something's going on. But as I was

589
00:30:57,520 --> 00:31:00,200
Speaker 2: thinking that, and I remember thinking like, gosh, I don't

590
00:31:00,200 --> 00:31:02,440
Speaker 2: know if this is gonna work. I glanced to my

591
00:31:02,520 --> 00:31:06,600
Speaker 2: left and I saw antlers in that scrape, and I

592
00:31:06,600 --> 00:31:10,080
Speaker 2: pull up my binoculars and can get a better look

593
00:31:10,120 --> 00:31:12,760
Speaker 2: through like the brush and the stalks that are there,

594
00:31:13,120 --> 00:31:19,120
Speaker 2: and I realize it's him. Tall Brows is right there,

595
00:31:19,560 --> 00:31:24,400
Speaker 2: twenty five thirty yards in the scrape there in shooting range,

596
00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:27,480
Speaker 2: but behind stuff, I can't get a clear shot. So

597
00:31:27,600 --> 00:31:31,240
Speaker 2: that's a holy crap kind of moment. It's not even

598
00:31:31,280 --> 00:31:34,240
Speaker 2: six o'clock yet and he's already out there. It had

599
00:31:34,320 --> 00:31:36,600
Speaker 2: rained earlier in the day. It actually had been sprinkling

600
00:31:36,640 --> 00:31:38,240
Speaker 2: a little bit while I was out there. Now it'd

601
00:31:38,320 --> 00:31:42,800
Speaker 2: cleared up, barometric pressure is rising, it's twenty degrees cooler

602
00:31:42,800 --> 00:31:46,400
Speaker 2: than it was a day and a half ago. Picture

603
00:31:46,440 --> 00:31:50,880
Speaker 2: perfect conditions as far as I'm concerned, and bam, there

604
00:31:50,880 --> 00:31:54,600
Speaker 2: he is. But I'm on the ground, hiding in half

605
00:31:54,600 --> 00:31:58,360
Speaker 2: stalks of corn, twenty five to thirty yards away from him,

606
00:31:59,200 --> 00:32:01,760
Speaker 2: and he's just right there. I never heard him coming.

607
00:32:02,200 --> 00:32:04,479
Speaker 2: I didn't see him coming. I have no ability to

608
00:32:04,680 --> 00:32:07,280
Speaker 2: move into position to do anything different. He's just there.

609
00:32:08,600 --> 00:32:12,240
Speaker 2: So I just remember at this moment thinking to myself, Okay,

610
00:32:13,640 --> 00:32:17,959
Speaker 2: don't panic, just wait, wait it out. And so as

611
00:32:18,000 --> 00:32:20,000
Speaker 2: soon as he kind of turned his head, I waited

612
00:32:20,000 --> 00:32:21,400
Speaker 2: there for a while. At this point I could see

613
00:32:21,440 --> 00:32:23,280
Speaker 2: his eye like kind of right in my direction, so

614
00:32:23,280 --> 00:32:25,560
Speaker 2: I couldn't move. As soon as he turned his head,

615
00:32:25,600 --> 00:32:29,400
Speaker 2: I slowly reached over and grab my bow, and I fortunately,

616
00:32:29,520 --> 00:32:32,120
Speaker 2: as I described, I had it everything positioned in the

617
00:32:32,200 --> 00:32:34,040
Speaker 2: right kind of spot that I should be able to

618
00:32:35,000 --> 00:32:37,840
Speaker 2: make something happen without a lot of moving. So I'm

619
00:32:37,880 --> 00:32:40,600
Speaker 2: able to reach over the bow, grab the bow, slowly

620
00:32:40,680 --> 00:32:43,560
Speaker 2: pull the bow up. I'm low on my knees because

621
00:32:43,560 --> 00:32:45,720
Speaker 2: I've been hunkered down because that dough had just passed

622
00:32:45,720 --> 00:32:47,640
Speaker 2: through not very long ago. So I was like crouch,

623
00:32:47,760 --> 00:32:49,600
Speaker 2: really low. I wasn't like a pie on my knees.

624
00:32:49,640 --> 00:32:54,640
Speaker 2: I was down low on my knees, and I can't

625
00:32:54,800 --> 00:32:57,520
Speaker 2: shoot from this position like where he is, can't see

626
00:32:57,520 --> 00:32:59,160
Speaker 2: his vitals. All I can see is the top of

627
00:32:59,240 --> 00:33:02,720
Speaker 2: his head. So as soon as he turns around or

628
00:33:02,760 --> 00:33:06,120
Speaker 2: turns away his head a little bit again, I rise

629
00:33:06,160 --> 00:33:07,959
Speaker 2: up higher onto my knees. So I go from like

630
00:33:08,000 --> 00:33:11,080
Speaker 2: down on my knees, like my butt on the back

631
00:33:11,120 --> 00:33:13,400
Speaker 2: of my legs, to now all the way up my knees,

632
00:33:14,120 --> 00:33:15,719
Speaker 2: and I can see him better. But I can now

633
00:33:15,760 --> 00:33:17,960
Speaker 2: see that there's still too much corn and brush in

634
00:33:17,960 --> 00:33:19,520
Speaker 2: front of his vitals. Now I can see like his

635
00:33:20,520 --> 00:33:24,560
Speaker 2: chest up to his head and neck can't move. I'm there,

636
00:33:24,720 --> 00:33:27,520
Speaker 2: I have the bow ready. I'm thinking, Okay, how do

637
00:33:27,640 --> 00:33:31,360
Speaker 2: I maneuver into a shot, And then he spins and

638
00:33:31,400 --> 00:33:33,400
Speaker 2: looks at me, like his head just kind of turns

639
00:33:34,440 --> 00:33:36,560
Speaker 2: and just staring at like right in my general direction.

640
00:33:37,680 --> 00:33:40,760
Speaker 2: It wasn't like, uh oh, I nailed you, but it

641
00:33:40,800 --> 00:33:45,479
Speaker 2: was something got his attention, and in my head, I'm worried,

642
00:33:45,520 --> 00:33:49,080
Speaker 2: did he just nail me? Did he bust me? Now?

643
00:33:50,840 --> 00:33:57,000
Speaker 2: What follows is a collection of different variations of the

644
00:33:57,040 --> 00:34:00,479
Speaker 2: same thing, happening again and again over the course of

645
00:34:00,560 --> 00:34:03,720
Speaker 2: thirty minutes. And it's honestly all of a blur in

646
00:34:03,720 --> 00:34:05,760
Speaker 2: my head. So I can't remember which one of these

647
00:34:05,800 --> 00:34:08,360
Speaker 2: things happen in which order, but I'll give you the

648
00:34:08,400 --> 00:34:10,960
Speaker 2: basic gist of what happens over the next thirty minutes.

649
00:34:13,320 --> 00:34:16,000
Speaker 2: He's twenty five to thirty yards away. He's staring at me.

650
00:34:16,440 --> 00:34:19,719
Speaker 2: I'm holding my bow up, you know, clipped on, but

651
00:34:19,840 --> 00:34:23,640
Speaker 2: not drawn back. I'm thinking he's seeing me. I freeze

652
00:34:23,640 --> 00:34:29,200
Speaker 2: in that position for three to five minutes. He finally relaxes,

653
00:34:29,760 --> 00:34:34,200
Speaker 2: turns back, looks away, begins if I recall right. He

654
00:34:34,239 --> 00:34:37,000
Speaker 2: begins to work the licking branch in the scrape. As

655
00:34:37,000 --> 00:34:38,400
Speaker 2: soon as he does that, and I can see that

656
00:34:38,440 --> 00:34:41,600
Speaker 2: his left eye is not looking at me. I try

657
00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:44,120
Speaker 2: to make a move to get into another lane where

658
00:34:44,120 --> 00:34:45,880
Speaker 2: I might people get a shot, and then I realize

659
00:34:46,560 --> 00:34:50,560
Speaker 2: I'm gonna have to stand to actually pull this off here.

660
00:34:50,920 --> 00:34:53,680
Speaker 2: So as soon as he's up in those branches really

661
00:34:53,800 --> 00:34:57,360
Speaker 2: well distracted, I stand up and start to move into

662
00:34:57,400 --> 00:34:59,880
Speaker 2: a position to get a shot. And then he spins

663
00:35:00,080 --> 00:35:04,040
Speaker 2: head around and looks right at me again, and then

664
00:35:04,080 --> 00:35:10,400
Speaker 2: thinking for sure I'm busted. Game over, and I just

665
00:35:10,400 --> 00:35:13,880
Speaker 2: stand there and I remember thinking like, don't breathe don't

666
00:35:13,880 --> 00:35:16,960
Speaker 2: look him in the eyes, had closed my eyes. I

667
00:35:17,160 --> 00:35:20,719
Speaker 2: just try to do anything to stay calm, cool and collected.

668
00:35:21,880 --> 00:35:26,080
Speaker 2: And that lasted another like three four minutes, just frozen,

669
00:35:26,880 --> 00:35:29,719
Speaker 2: just waiting any second out he's gonna bust. And then

670
00:35:29,760 --> 00:35:32,000
Speaker 2: he puts his head down and I'm just about to

671
00:35:32,000 --> 00:35:34,880
Speaker 2: start moving again, trying to take another half step again.

672
00:35:34,920 --> 00:35:38,800
Speaker 2: I'm standing up twenty five issu yards twenty five to

673
00:35:38,880 --> 00:35:41,279
Speaker 2: thirty yards away from when I think it's a four

674
00:35:41,360 --> 00:35:45,879
Speaker 2: year old, big old Michigan buck in this scrape. There's

675
00:35:46,000 --> 00:35:48,400
Speaker 2: just like one row of corn that was not knocked

676
00:35:48,440 --> 00:35:50,960
Speaker 2: down on the edge there that's blocking him, and then

677
00:35:51,000 --> 00:35:54,239
Speaker 2: some brush. I just need to kind of move to

678
00:35:54,320 --> 00:35:56,560
Speaker 2: the side a couple steps to get where I thought

679
00:35:56,600 --> 00:35:58,800
Speaker 2: i'd be alc he puts his head down. I start

680
00:35:58,800 --> 00:36:01,560
Speaker 2: to move again, and then I hear clock clock, and

681
00:36:01,600 --> 00:36:03,839
Speaker 2: then I realized what I couldn't see behind that one

682
00:36:03,920 --> 00:36:05,719
Speaker 2: rowf standing corn and brush is that there was a

683
00:36:05,760 --> 00:36:08,279
Speaker 2: second buck there with him. So they start to spar.

684
00:36:09,480 --> 00:36:12,880
Speaker 2: I start to take steps towards him into the side.

685
00:36:13,239 --> 00:36:15,000
Speaker 2: I get to a spot where I think of an opening,

686
00:36:15,080 --> 00:36:17,239
Speaker 2: but now he's spun in that other bucks in front

687
00:36:17,239 --> 00:36:20,040
Speaker 2: of me. I can't shoot. I think I'm gonna have

688
00:36:20,040 --> 00:36:23,560
Speaker 2: an open if he spins around. They release, He looks up,

689
00:36:23,760 --> 00:36:28,839
Speaker 2: looks right at me. I'm frozen again for one, two,

690
00:36:28,920 --> 00:36:31,960
Speaker 2: three minutes. I'm not exactly sure for how long. Frozen

691
00:36:31,960 --> 00:36:34,440
Speaker 2: there for a while, he stands in that position forever.

692
00:36:35,480 --> 00:36:40,239
Speaker 2: I'm just waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting thinkingly. Anytime now he's

693
00:36:40,280 --> 00:36:43,680
Speaker 2: gonna bust, but he doesn't. He turns. The other deer

694
00:36:43,760 --> 00:36:47,080
Speaker 2: kind of turns back, moves off. Then this buck turns

695
00:36:47,080 --> 00:36:49,960
Speaker 2: and starts heading back to the ditch. This is when

696
00:36:50,000 --> 00:36:52,279
Speaker 2: I think, Okay, he's gonna walk towards the ditch. I'm

697
00:36:52,280 --> 00:36:55,880
Speaker 2: gonna have a shot opportunity. He's behind brush. I remember

698
00:36:55,920 --> 00:36:59,120
Speaker 2: two times there was two different times in this encounter

699
00:36:59,600 --> 00:37:03,160
Speaker 2: where I think thought like, you probably could get a shot.

700
00:37:04,120 --> 00:37:05,680
Speaker 2: One of them was when there was that corn in

701
00:37:05,719 --> 00:37:09,799
Speaker 2: the way. There was some like corn leaves that were

702
00:37:10,000 --> 00:37:12,319
Speaker 2: only thing blocking the vitals, and I remember thinking like,

703
00:37:14,640 --> 00:37:17,080
Speaker 2: if you you could get an arrow through there, probably,

704
00:37:17,520 --> 00:37:18,680
Speaker 2: but I didn't want to do it, like I did

705
00:37:18,760 --> 00:37:22,359
Speaker 2: not want to didn't want to push it, didn't want

706
00:37:22,360 --> 00:37:24,000
Speaker 2: to have something go wrong. But I remember having a

707
00:37:24,040 --> 00:37:27,120
Speaker 2: moment where I thought that might be a shot, but no.

708
00:37:27,800 --> 00:37:30,080
Speaker 2: And then the second opportunity was when he starts walking

709
00:37:30,120 --> 00:37:34,279
Speaker 2: away and the brush was just too tall, but it

710
00:37:34,360 --> 00:37:37,719
Speaker 2: was barely too tall. It was like, you know, two

711
00:37:37,760 --> 00:37:40,359
Speaker 2: inches above where I two to three inches two inches

712
00:37:40,400 --> 00:37:42,279
Speaker 2: something like that above where I would have wanted to

713
00:37:42,280 --> 00:37:43,879
Speaker 2: be shooting. So I thought, gosh, if you just aim

714
00:37:43,960 --> 00:37:46,719
Speaker 2: a couple inches beneath that through that grass, you know

715
00:37:46,760 --> 00:37:49,840
Speaker 2: your arrow could punch right through that just fine. Maybe.

716
00:37:50,440 --> 00:37:51,920
Speaker 2: But then I said, no, you're not going to take

717
00:37:51,960 --> 00:37:54,800
Speaker 2: a maybe shot like that. So he keeps he's walking

718
00:37:54,840 --> 00:37:57,320
Speaker 2: now with that, he's about to get to the ditch

719
00:37:57,360 --> 00:37:59,520
Speaker 2: and right there it looks like the brush goes down

720
00:37:59,560 --> 00:38:01,160
Speaker 2: and it looks like I can see like his head.

721
00:38:01,160 --> 00:38:03,840
Speaker 2: Then his neck gets more open. I begin to draw.

722
00:38:04,000 --> 00:38:09,400
Speaker 2: I'm just beginning, and he drops like the ditch. The

723
00:38:09,440 --> 00:38:11,680
Speaker 2: bank of the ditch lowered sooner than I realized, and

724
00:38:11,719 --> 00:38:14,560
Speaker 2: so now he gets down low and I can't see

725
00:38:14,600 --> 00:38:16,800
Speaker 2: the vitals at all now, but he stops and stares

726
00:38:16,800 --> 00:38:20,680
Speaker 2: at me. He's right there, pinned on me, and I

727
00:38:20,719 --> 00:38:23,080
Speaker 2: just remember at this point again, I'm holding the ball,

728
00:38:23,080 --> 00:38:25,440
Speaker 2: I'm clipped on. I had been in the process of

729
00:38:25,440 --> 00:38:31,239
Speaker 2: almost starting to draw, and again frozen looking at me,

730
00:38:31,360 --> 00:38:33,600
Speaker 2: and I remember thinking, and it's such a stupid thing,

731
00:38:33,719 --> 00:38:36,440
Speaker 2: but I was almost like trying to line up the

732
00:38:36,560 --> 00:38:39,160
Speaker 2: riser of my bow in front of my face, thinking

733
00:38:39,239 --> 00:38:41,840
Speaker 2: somehow that the riser the bow in front of my

734
00:38:41,920 --> 00:38:45,799
Speaker 2: face would somehow hide me. And at this point I

735
00:38:45,800 --> 00:38:47,480
Speaker 2: started to kind of shake. You can just tell, like

736
00:38:47,520 --> 00:38:50,440
Speaker 2: the adrenaline the whole thing. I remember seeing my arrow

737
00:38:50,560 --> 00:38:53,360
Speaker 2: shaking on the end and this big silver fixed blade

738
00:38:53,360 --> 00:38:57,640
Speaker 2: broadhead just kind of bouncing, and in my head, I'm like,

739
00:38:57,680 --> 00:39:00,879
Speaker 2: you need to calm down, you need to just get

740
00:39:00,920 --> 00:39:03,000
Speaker 2: control of that thing. You don't want this shaking silver

741
00:39:03,080 --> 00:39:06,400
Speaker 2: thing to be the deal that ends this whole encounter.

742
00:39:07,200 --> 00:39:09,160
Speaker 2: But I also had another thought at this moment. Was

743
00:39:09,200 --> 00:39:12,680
Speaker 2: at this moment or somewhere within this final piece, I

744
00:39:12,760 --> 00:39:17,360
Speaker 2: remember thinking, this is it, Like you're busted. There's no

745
00:39:17,440 --> 00:39:19,200
Speaker 2: way this deer is not going to get out of here.

746
00:39:20,200 --> 00:39:22,759
Speaker 2: Just enjoy it. And that was an interesting thing. I

747
00:39:22,760 --> 00:39:25,000
Speaker 2: don't think I've ever had a moment when I was

748
00:39:25,880 --> 00:39:28,960
Speaker 2: in a moment of truth encounter with a deer where

749
00:39:29,000 --> 00:39:31,480
Speaker 2: I thought to myself, Ah, this isn't gonna happen, But

750
00:39:31,920 --> 00:39:34,279
Speaker 2: just enjoy the fact that you're this close to this deer,

751
00:39:35,080 --> 00:39:37,080
Speaker 2: and I should bring I should, I should take note

752
00:39:37,120 --> 00:39:40,600
Speaker 2: of this because this was a not this is not

753
00:39:40,640 --> 00:39:42,920
Speaker 2: a film hunt. This is the first hunt I've had

754
00:39:42,960 --> 00:39:44,800
Speaker 2: this year that was not filmed for me to or

755
00:39:44,840 --> 00:39:46,560
Speaker 2: this is just a me hunt. This is just for

756
00:39:46,680 --> 00:39:51,279
Speaker 2: fun hunt. And you know, something I tried to think

757
00:39:51,320 --> 00:39:53,839
Speaker 2: about as I drove out there that day and walked

758
00:39:53,880 --> 00:39:57,279
Speaker 2: in that day was to just try to really like

759
00:39:58,560 --> 00:40:02,560
Speaker 2: wallow in the experience, like really soak it in. Don't

760
00:40:02,640 --> 00:40:06,160
Speaker 2: let anything stress you out, don't worry if you know,

761
00:40:06,280 --> 00:40:09,200
Speaker 2: you get buggered, if deer figure you out, if it's

762
00:40:09,200 --> 00:40:12,080
Speaker 2: a if it doesn't work out, that's fine. Just enjoy

763
00:40:12,200 --> 00:40:15,560
Speaker 2: like you're out there. Just soaking in the scenery, enjoying

764
00:40:15,600 --> 00:40:18,880
Speaker 2: watching deer, just have fun. I remember thinking that the

765
00:40:18,920 --> 00:40:21,879
Speaker 2: whole time, and it was happening. It was an intense hunt,

766
00:40:21,920 --> 00:40:24,439
Speaker 2: like even before this buck showed up, all these close

767
00:40:24,520 --> 00:40:27,359
Speaker 2: encounters with deer, it was just there wasn't a whole

768
00:40:27,360 --> 00:40:29,400
Speaker 2: lot of time to sit around and think or to

769
00:40:29,440 --> 00:40:31,359
Speaker 2: sit around and relax. I was kind of in action

770
00:40:31,480 --> 00:40:35,480
Speaker 2: from the beginning, but I did remember thinking several times like, man,

771
00:40:35,520 --> 00:40:37,640
Speaker 2: that's pretty great, Like this is why you do this.

772
00:40:38,080 --> 00:40:42,799
Speaker 2: You're in a beautiful place, You're you're super excited. That's

773
00:40:42,840 --> 00:40:45,839
Speaker 2: another thing that I should point out. This is the

774
00:40:45,880 --> 00:40:49,160
Speaker 2: first hunt of this year where I had like full blown,

775
00:40:51,200 --> 00:40:54,920
Speaker 2: you know, buck killing day vibes. And if you've hunted

776
00:40:54,920 --> 00:40:57,200
Speaker 2: deer long enough, you know what I'm talking about here.

777
00:40:57,200 --> 00:41:01,920
Speaker 2: When you have the conditions, the circumstances, the time of year,

778
00:41:01,960 --> 00:41:05,439
Speaker 2: the intel, the something that makes you think, like when

779
00:41:05,440 --> 00:41:07,680
Speaker 2: you're going into the woods on that day, like it

780
00:41:07,719 --> 00:41:11,560
Speaker 2: should happen. It can absolutely happen. Those are my very

781
00:41:11,560 --> 00:41:14,520
Speaker 2: favorite days to hunt. When it is like a targeted

782
00:41:14,600 --> 00:41:17,839
Speaker 2: hunt where you really have a really strong intuition in

783
00:41:17,880 --> 00:41:21,040
Speaker 2: set of reasons that this should work. That's how I

784
00:41:21,080 --> 00:41:25,719
Speaker 2: felt yesterday, and that just colors everything different, like you've

785
00:41:25,760 --> 00:41:29,040
Speaker 2: got extra nerves. I'm allgittery when I'm getting ready at

786
00:41:29,040 --> 00:41:33,239
Speaker 2: the house, texting my hunting buddies, like, oh man, first

787
00:41:33,320 --> 00:41:35,600
Speaker 2: day where I'm really feeling the vibes. I'm really feeling it,

788
00:41:36,040 --> 00:41:37,960
Speaker 2: and that's just that's a great thing. I love that

789
00:41:38,000 --> 00:41:39,840
Speaker 2: about the fall. You get a handful of days like

790
00:41:39,880 --> 00:41:42,439
Speaker 2: that where you're just amped, and this is one of those.

791
00:41:43,400 --> 00:41:45,680
Speaker 2: So I've got that going on while also trying to

792
00:41:45,719 --> 00:41:49,280
Speaker 2: just enjoy it for what it is. And the hunt

793
00:41:49,560 --> 00:41:53,200
Speaker 2: kind of checked all the boxes because it was in

794
00:41:53,239 --> 00:41:55,879
Speaker 2: the action, and then the buck I'm after shows up.

795
00:41:56,160 --> 00:42:02,240
Speaker 2: I had this crazy encounter and now I've tried multiple

796
00:42:02,239 --> 00:42:04,040
Speaker 2: times to try to get a shot at him. Every

797
00:42:04,040 --> 00:42:06,279
Speaker 2: time I move, he moves. Every time he moves, I

798
00:42:06,320 --> 00:42:09,560
Speaker 2: adjust whenever he's not looking, and I just can't line

799
00:42:09,560 --> 00:42:11,960
Speaker 2: it up quite right. Now. He's staring at me. I'm

800
00:42:12,000 --> 00:42:14,719
Speaker 2: hiding behind my bow riser. My silver broad head is

801
00:42:14,719 --> 00:42:17,360
Speaker 2: shaking in the wind. They're shaking, you know, on the rest,

802
00:42:17,520 --> 00:42:21,120
Speaker 2: and I'm just thinking he's gonna blow out of here.

803
00:42:21,800 --> 00:42:24,920
Speaker 2: There's no way that you're not busted. What a cool encounter,

804
00:42:25,760 --> 00:42:29,560
Speaker 2: and then this stinking buck turns instead of running away,

805
00:42:30,160 --> 00:42:34,440
Speaker 2: walks back to the scrape. He gets back to that scrape,

806
00:42:34,719 --> 00:42:39,200
Speaker 2: and I'm thinking, geez again. As he's doing that, I'm

807
00:42:39,280 --> 00:42:41,840
Speaker 2: having to be frozen because he's in the open and

808
00:42:41,960 --> 00:42:44,480
Speaker 2: his face is like his eye is looking at me.

809
00:42:44,560 --> 00:42:48,280
Speaker 2: And now I'm like exposed. I'm not hiding behind corn anymore.

810
00:42:48,320 --> 00:42:52,520
Speaker 2: I'm standing because I had walked right. I walked on

811
00:42:52,600 --> 00:42:55,440
Speaker 2: the edge of that corn to try to get a

812
00:42:55,440 --> 00:42:57,880
Speaker 2: better shot. But then he'd moved again. So now my

813
00:42:58,239 --> 00:43:00,520
Speaker 2: window of cover or my wall of that I was

814
00:43:00,560 --> 00:43:02,200
Speaker 2: using to get closer to him and try to find

815
00:43:02,280 --> 00:43:04,680
Speaker 2: lane through, now that's gone because he walked to the

816
00:43:04,719 --> 00:43:07,680
Speaker 2: other side, so he's coming across. Now I'm feeling even

817
00:43:07,719 --> 00:43:10,360
Speaker 2: more exposed, so I can't move to get a better shot.

818
00:43:11,160 --> 00:43:14,280
Speaker 2: Goes back to the scrape. I'm blocked from a shot again.

819
00:43:14,880 --> 00:43:17,319
Speaker 2: Now that second buck comes back out, he kind of

820
00:43:17,360 --> 00:43:20,719
Speaker 2: circled behind this tall browtime buck. He's walking towards me

821
00:43:21,719 --> 00:43:23,719
Speaker 2: for the ninth time. I'm thinking this whole thing's not

822
00:43:23,760 --> 00:43:26,040
Speaker 2: going to fall apart, but that buck doesn't see me.

823
00:43:26,080 --> 00:43:30,200
Speaker 2: He moves off to the side. To make a long

824
00:43:30,239 --> 00:43:34,120
Speaker 2: story short. The tall brow buck stands underneath the scrape.

825
00:43:34,960 --> 00:43:37,960
Speaker 2: I make another step to get this last bit of

826
00:43:38,000 --> 00:43:40,880
Speaker 2: brush out of the way, about to draw. He turns

827
00:43:41,400 --> 00:43:45,880
Speaker 2: walks back to the ditch, and this is my window,

828
00:43:45,920 --> 00:43:48,560
Speaker 2: Like I now know, okay, if he crosses here, if

829
00:43:48,600 --> 00:43:51,279
Speaker 2: he gets to the ditch, I have one window, which

830
00:43:51,280 --> 00:43:53,960
Speaker 2: is just before he starts dropping down that bank. There

831
00:43:54,040 --> 00:43:56,240
Speaker 2: was a little bit of an opening right before he dropped.

832
00:43:56,719 --> 00:44:00,399
Speaker 2: As he starts approaching that he is angle just enough

833
00:44:00,440 --> 00:44:02,400
Speaker 2: that I don't think he can see me draw. I

834
00:44:02,560 --> 00:44:08,880
Speaker 2: draw back. He gets right there, I stop him. Shoot.

835
00:44:09,320 --> 00:44:13,840
Speaker 2: He's perfectly broadside. I am standing on the edge of

836
00:44:13,880 --> 00:44:17,760
Speaker 2: the cornfield twenty five yards away from him. Ish something

837
00:44:17,800 --> 00:44:24,000
Speaker 2: like that, and I hit him back. In my mind's

838
00:44:24,000 --> 00:44:26,759
Speaker 2: I it looked like I hit him back of the ribs,

839
00:44:27,160 --> 00:44:30,959
Speaker 2: mid body ish perfect up and down, but back and

840
00:44:31,239 --> 00:44:36,920
Speaker 2: on the shot. I remember two things. I remember, you know,

841
00:44:37,280 --> 00:44:41,400
Speaker 2: it was a situation where he walked right to the

842
00:44:41,480 --> 00:44:43,120
Speaker 2: edge of where I bill shoot him. If he took

843
00:44:43,120 --> 00:44:45,200
Speaker 2: another step, he dropped down the ditch. And then it's

844
00:44:45,239 --> 00:44:47,480
Speaker 2: just thick brush. I'd never get another shot. So the

845
00:44:47,520 --> 00:44:53,680
Speaker 2: whole thing was crazy and fast paced at that point,

846
00:44:53,840 --> 00:44:57,800
Speaker 2: and I just remember two things. I remember avoiding the shoulder,

847
00:44:58,440 --> 00:45:00,680
Speaker 2: and I had this situation last year where I hit

848
00:45:00,719 --> 00:45:03,320
Speaker 2: the wide nine and the shoulder, And I've been thinking

849
00:45:03,320 --> 00:45:07,240
Speaker 2: to myself about trying to get back off the shoulder

850
00:45:07,239 --> 00:45:10,480
Speaker 2: more than I used to. And it's funny, you know,

851
00:45:11,920 --> 00:45:14,879
Speaker 2: I am constantly trying to get better at this. I'm

852
00:45:14,920 --> 00:45:17,640
Speaker 2: constantly working to find ways to improve my shooting, to

853
00:45:17,719 --> 00:45:22,839
Speaker 2: improve my shot opportunities, to remove error. And you think

854
00:45:22,840 --> 00:45:24,640
Speaker 2: you've got to figure it out, and then something happens,

855
00:45:24,680 --> 00:45:26,000
Speaker 2: and the next year you're thinking, well, how do I

856
00:45:26,040 --> 00:45:28,080
Speaker 2: count for that error? And then you go out there

857
00:45:28,120 --> 00:45:30,279
Speaker 2: the next year and then you have some other thing

858
00:45:30,360 --> 00:45:32,080
Speaker 2: go wrong or something go right, and're like, Okay, I've

859
00:45:32,080 --> 00:45:34,200
Speaker 2: got it. And then the next year something goes wrong.

860
00:45:34,360 --> 00:45:35,880
Speaker 2: Oh well, how do I do with that challenge or

861
00:45:35,880 --> 00:45:38,399
Speaker 2: how do I fix that thing? And so as many

862
00:45:38,400 --> 00:45:40,840
Speaker 2: of you know, if you've been listening for a while,

863
00:45:41,160 --> 00:45:43,360
Speaker 2: you know that after last year, I wanted to switch

864
00:45:43,400 --> 00:45:46,160
Speaker 2: stuff up again, went to acquire the bow. I've reduced

865
00:45:46,160 --> 00:45:48,680
Speaker 2: my max range from forty yards to thirty yards because

866
00:45:48,719 --> 00:45:50,719
Speaker 2: I don't want to have bad shots happen. I don't

867
00:45:50,719 --> 00:45:52,719
Speaker 2: want to wound deer I don't want to miss deer.

868
00:45:53,120 --> 00:45:58,000
Speaker 2: I'd rather have fewer opportunities, but fewer shots go bad.

869
00:45:59,239 --> 00:46:03,080
Speaker 2: Switch to a single pin sight to reduce any possible

870
00:46:03,120 --> 00:46:06,520
Speaker 2: site picture issues. Switched to a fixed play broadhead so

871
00:46:06,560 --> 00:46:08,759
Speaker 2: that if I do click the shoulder again, I've got

872
00:46:08,800 --> 00:46:10,920
Speaker 2: a better chance of punching through. So I made all

873
00:46:10,920 --> 00:46:14,920
Speaker 2: these adjustments in part because of this bad shoulder situation

874
00:46:15,000 --> 00:46:17,319
Speaker 2: I had last year, which really hit me hard. And

875
00:46:17,360 --> 00:46:23,080
Speaker 2: then of course I overcompensate. I am paranoid about the shoulder.

876
00:46:23,120 --> 00:46:26,160
Speaker 2: I remember thinking off the shoulder, and I think what

877
00:46:26,200 --> 00:46:29,040
Speaker 2: I did is I went off the shoulder, and I

878
00:46:29,080 --> 00:46:32,200
Speaker 2: think I just pulled when I was moving back off

879
00:46:32,239 --> 00:46:35,759
Speaker 2: that shoulder, or I rushed it, or just made a

880
00:46:35,800 --> 00:46:40,120
Speaker 2: human error, and that happens, and maybe he took a

881
00:46:40,160 --> 00:46:42,799
Speaker 2: step forward. I'm not sure. I don't have film of it.

882
00:46:42,840 --> 00:46:44,839
Speaker 2: I can't look to see exactly what the deer did.

883
00:46:46,239 --> 00:46:49,000
Speaker 2: But no excuses. It was not a perfect shot. The

884
00:46:49,040 --> 00:46:55,160
Speaker 2: shot was back and he bounded off, ran maybe fifty yards,

885
00:46:55,440 --> 00:46:58,680
Speaker 2: stopped behind some bushes. I pulled up my bi nose

886
00:46:58,880 --> 00:47:02,600
Speaker 2: found him there, and then he took a handful of steps,

887
00:47:02,960 --> 00:47:05,040
Speaker 2: disappeared in a brush just before he got into the brush.

888
00:47:05,040 --> 00:47:09,319
Speaker 2: I remember thinking kind of a wildly walk, but it

889
00:47:09,360 --> 00:47:12,279
Speaker 2: was a walk, you know. And when you hit a

890
00:47:12,320 --> 00:47:15,080
Speaker 2: deer and you think the shot was back and then

891
00:47:15,120 --> 00:47:18,360
Speaker 2: you see him bound off stop and then walk away,

892
00:47:19,440 --> 00:47:21,239
Speaker 2: you know that is a telltale sign that you hit

893
00:47:21,280 --> 00:47:24,160
Speaker 2: that deer further back than you wanted, you know, liver

894
00:47:24,800 --> 00:47:28,799
Speaker 2: or stomach or intestines or something like that. So I

895
00:47:28,840 --> 00:47:32,920
Speaker 2: went from this thirty minute incredibly intense, like one of

896
00:47:32,960 --> 00:47:35,560
Speaker 2: the most intense face offs I've ever had with a deer,

897
00:47:35,719 --> 00:47:39,880
Speaker 2: very exciting situation. I get the one deer I'm in

898
00:47:39,880 --> 00:47:42,360
Speaker 2: there after like I had the targeted strike go exactly

899
00:47:42,400 --> 00:47:45,200
Speaker 2: the way I wanted it to, and then you know,

900
00:47:45,320 --> 00:47:47,399
Speaker 2: you have that super super high and then you see

901
00:47:47,400 --> 00:47:49,239
Speaker 2: that arrow hit and you know it's not quite right,

902
00:47:49,760 --> 00:47:52,000
Speaker 2: and then immediately you come back down to earth and

903
00:47:52,120 --> 00:47:57,319
Speaker 2: kind of crash down beneath earth, and you know, we've

904
00:47:57,360 --> 00:47:59,480
Speaker 2: all been there. I've been there my share times over

905
00:47:59,520 --> 00:48:01,440
Speaker 2: the years. I've had lots of great ones, I've had

906
00:48:01,480 --> 00:48:04,319
Speaker 2: lots of less than great ones, and this was one

907
00:48:04,360 --> 00:48:07,600
Speaker 2: of those where I thought, well, that's going to be

908
00:48:07,600 --> 00:48:11,280
Speaker 2: a dead deer, but it's not necessarily going to happen

909
00:48:11,360 --> 00:48:13,719
Speaker 2: right away. And so the smart thing to do, the

910
00:48:13,760 --> 00:48:16,040
Speaker 2: thing you know you have to do but it's not

911
00:48:16,120 --> 00:48:18,200
Speaker 2: fun to do, is you got to give that deer time.

912
00:48:18,440 --> 00:48:21,640
Speaker 2: So I waited there for a while and just watched

913
00:48:21,640 --> 00:48:23,640
Speaker 2: this little pocket to cover with my by notes for

914
00:48:23,680 --> 00:48:27,080
Speaker 2: a while, just in case, just in case, he walked

915
00:48:27,080 --> 00:48:28,399
Speaker 2: out of there, and I could see where it went,

916
00:48:29,120 --> 00:48:31,200
Speaker 2: but he didn't. And then I had one more dough

917
00:48:31,239 --> 00:48:34,000
Speaker 2: come out, and she saw me because I was still

918
00:48:34,040 --> 00:48:36,680
Speaker 2: just standing out there in the open now watching, and

919
00:48:36,760 --> 00:48:38,920
Speaker 2: she saw me, and she did start to blow, and

920
00:48:38,960 --> 00:48:41,040
Speaker 2: I remember thinking, all right, I probably just need to

921
00:48:41,040 --> 00:48:43,160
Speaker 2: get out of here before a lot of deer come out,

922
00:48:43,320 --> 00:48:46,400
Speaker 2: because one deer blowing is a thing, But if I

923
00:48:46,440 --> 00:48:48,440
Speaker 2: have a dozen deer that eventually come out here at

924
00:48:48,440 --> 00:48:51,440
Speaker 2: some point, and all these deer are alarming, and I

925
00:48:51,520 --> 00:48:54,400
Speaker 2: just didn't want to spook that buck any more than necessary,

926
00:48:54,520 --> 00:48:58,520
Speaker 2: So grab my stuff, slips straight out the cornfield. I

927
00:48:58,600 --> 00:49:00,279
Speaker 2: don't go to look for my arrow, I don't check

928
00:49:00,280 --> 00:49:02,799
Speaker 2: out the shot site, none of that stuff, because I

929
00:49:02,880 --> 00:49:04,959
Speaker 2: just knew the hit was back of where I wanted

930
00:49:04,960 --> 00:49:10,120
Speaker 2: to be. This deer needs to go overnight. The calculus

931
00:49:10,160 --> 00:49:12,880
Speaker 2: here is that a deer that has hit somewhere back there,

932
00:49:12,920 --> 00:49:15,400
Speaker 2: whether it's liver or stomach or intestine, whatever it is,

933
00:49:16,040 --> 00:49:22,240
Speaker 2: that deer usually needs eight to twelve hours to be safe.

934
00:49:22,400 --> 00:49:26,720
Speaker 2: And the problem is that if you let that deer,

935
00:49:26,880 --> 00:49:28,880
Speaker 2: if you leave that deer a long, what they're probably

936
00:49:28,920 --> 00:49:31,439
Speaker 2: gonna do is get to the first good cover, lay down.

937
00:49:31,520 --> 00:49:34,240
Speaker 2: They don't feel well, they lay down. If they're not pushed,

938
00:49:34,280 --> 00:49:36,640
Speaker 2: they'll stay there and they will die in their bed,

939
00:49:36,760 --> 00:49:40,000
Speaker 2: and you'll find them relatively close. If you push in

940
00:49:40,040 --> 00:49:43,000
Speaker 2: there too soon, what typically happens is that deer still

941
00:49:43,000 --> 00:49:44,879
Speaker 2: has enough energy to get out of their first bed

942
00:49:44,960 --> 00:49:47,120
Speaker 2: and then run off and they might cover a lot

943
00:49:47,160 --> 00:49:49,320
Speaker 2: of distance. And oftentimes a deer that's hit back a

944
00:49:49,320 --> 00:49:51,719
Speaker 2: little bit will not bleed very well, so you're not

945
00:49:51,760 --> 00:49:54,759
Speaker 2: gonna have much of a blood trail. YadA, YadA, YadA.

946
00:49:54,840 --> 00:49:57,560
Speaker 2: Long story short, I'm going to make sure that I

947
00:49:57,600 --> 00:50:00,439
Speaker 2: have a chance of finding that deer and not put

948
00:50:00,719 --> 00:50:04,680
Speaker 2: and let them go overnight, even though that's super stressful.

949
00:50:05,040 --> 00:50:10,680
Speaker 2: And to make a very long story short, you know, overnight,

950
00:50:11,080 --> 00:50:14,120
Speaker 2: stress about it, worry about it, think through all the scenarios,

951
00:50:14,160 --> 00:50:17,920
Speaker 2: think through everything as you do. And I'm very fortunate

952
00:50:18,040 --> 00:50:20,439
Speaker 2: that the next morning a friend and I were able

953
00:50:20,480 --> 00:50:23,720
Speaker 2: to go out there and maybe I don't know, between

954
00:50:23,760 --> 00:50:27,960
Speaker 2: seventy one hundred yards away found that buck and the

955
00:50:28,000 --> 00:50:43,280
Speaker 2: tall brow buck story is concluded. I scouted this property

956
00:50:43,280 --> 00:50:46,239
Speaker 2: one day, and I hunted it one day, and I

957
00:50:46,280 --> 00:50:49,120
Speaker 2: was able to kill the deer. It doesn't go that

958
00:50:49,120 --> 00:50:51,600
Speaker 2: way very often. It was like a very targeted strike

959
00:50:51,719 --> 00:50:54,799
Speaker 2: plan and it actually panned out that way. So I

960
00:50:54,800 --> 00:50:57,919
Speaker 2: count myself very fortunate that this time, the careful plan

961
00:50:58,160 --> 00:51:01,000
Speaker 2: actually the deer actually word or you know, follow the

962
00:51:01,000 --> 00:51:05,040
Speaker 2: script this time, So that doesn't happen all that often.

963
00:51:05,080 --> 00:51:06,920
Speaker 2: So I've wanted to try to think through, Okay, what

964
00:51:07,320 --> 00:51:09,800
Speaker 2: worked right here? What did I do right? And anytime

965
00:51:09,800 --> 00:51:11,640
Speaker 2: you kill a deer there's a certain element of luck,

966
00:51:11,800 --> 00:51:15,800
Speaker 2: so that's got to be admitted, Like anytime the deer

967
00:51:15,880 --> 00:51:18,000
Speaker 2: do the thing you need them to do, count yourself

968
00:51:18,080 --> 00:51:22,160
Speaker 2: lucky and just appreciate that. So that's number one. But

969
00:51:22,280 --> 00:51:25,279
Speaker 2: number two, let's talk through like the key things that

970
00:51:25,400 --> 00:51:28,440
Speaker 2: led to this actually panning out. A big thing was access.

971
00:51:28,760 --> 00:51:32,040
Speaker 2: A big thing was that I constantly am trying to

972
00:51:32,080 --> 00:51:35,600
Speaker 2: find new spots to hunt, and this year, after losing

973
00:51:35,640 --> 00:51:38,040
Speaker 2: a good spot. Try to make an extra effort to

974
00:51:38,080 --> 00:51:40,520
Speaker 2: do so, and picked up two three new spots in

975
00:51:40,560 --> 00:51:44,160
Speaker 2: southern Michigan, and that ended up leading to a great

976
00:51:44,239 --> 00:51:47,080
Speaker 2: deer down here. That wouldn't have happened if I had

977
00:51:47,120 --> 00:51:49,399
Speaker 2: not made the extra effort to just ask around, talk

978
00:51:49,400 --> 00:51:51,960
Speaker 2: to more people about this stuff. And I think an

979
00:51:52,000 --> 00:51:55,279
Speaker 2: important thing with this particular property is to remember that

980
00:51:55,719 --> 00:51:58,319
Speaker 2: you can't judge a book by its cover. Like we

981
00:51:58,400 --> 00:52:02,040
Speaker 2: all want the two hundred acre farm with mixed egg

982
00:52:02,200 --> 00:52:05,600
Speaker 2: and timber and swamps and topography and the whole nine yards.

983
00:52:05,600 --> 00:52:08,600
Speaker 2: That'd be great, but for most of us, that's just

984
00:52:08,640 --> 00:52:12,239
Speaker 2: not gonna happen. I mean, almost all the stuff I

985
00:52:12,280 --> 00:52:15,560
Speaker 2: hunt in Michigan is less than one hundred acres and

986
00:52:15,760 --> 00:52:19,560
Speaker 2: mostly fields, and none of it is ideal. Like almost

987
00:52:19,600 --> 00:52:21,680
Speaker 2: none of the properties that I have permission to hunt

988
00:52:22,000 --> 00:52:24,000
Speaker 2: would be spots i'd pick as like, oh that's a

989
00:52:24,040 --> 00:52:27,239
Speaker 2: slam dunk spot. It's usually well, this little zone looks

990
00:52:27,280 --> 00:52:29,839
Speaker 2: like it's Scott Promise, and this property maybe butts up

991
00:52:29,840 --> 00:52:32,239
Speaker 2: into something good. And this spot doesn't have a lot

992
00:52:32,280 --> 00:52:34,480
Speaker 2: going for but maybe it will slide under the radar.

993
00:52:35,760 --> 00:52:39,160
Speaker 2: You got to take what you can get, and you know,

994
00:52:39,239 --> 00:52:40,919
Speaker 2: don't judge it before you go out there and see

995
00:52:40,920 --> 00:52:44,600
Speaker 2: what's going on. And in this case, mostly just a

996
00:52:44,680 --> 00:52:48,200
Speaker 2: huge field, just a little area in the back where

997
00:52:48,239 --> 00:52:53,200
Speaker 2: there was grass brush, some scrubby trees. But it made

998
00:52:53,200 --> 00:52:56,319
Speaker 2: this really great little transition zone along the edge of

999
00:52:56,320 --> 00:52:59,839
Speaker 2: that swamp. And I'm just very glad that, you know too,

1000
00:52:59,840 --> 00:53:02,080
Speaker 2: things happened. Number One, I looked at the aerial of

1001
00:53:02,080 --> 00:53:03,919
Speaker 2: this property, I thought, that's not a lot to hunt,

1002
00:53:04,320 --> 00:53:06,680
Speaker 2: but it butts up into a great piece. And then

1003
00:53:06,719 --> 00:53:09,759
Speaker 2: number two, when I went out there, just saw what

1004
00:53:09,840 --> 00:53:15,520
Speaker 2: a tremendous transition that this was. So that was Number one,

1005
00:53:16,120 --> 00:53:18,120
Speaker 2: taking advantage of a small property, or at least a

1006
00:53:18,160 --> 00:53:21,279
Speaker 2: small part of a property that some people maybe would say,

1007
00:53:21,280 --> 00:53:24,160
Speaker 2: I'm not worth hunting, there's like one good tree to hunt,

1008
00:53:24,640 --> 00:53:30,600
Speaker 2: But I recognized an opportunity there. Number two being creative

1009
00:53:30,680 --> 00:53:35,520
Speaker 2: with setups. As I mentioned earlier, you know, fifteen years ago,

1010
00:53:35,600 --> 00:53:37,480
Speaker 2: I think I would have walked past this spot, and

1011
00:53:37,760 --> 00:53:39,680
Speaker 2: maybe if I identified it as a good area, as

1012
00:53:39,719 --> 00:53:42,239
Speaker 2: a good ambush location, with this ditch coming out and

1013
00:53:42,280 --> 00:53:44,840
Speaker 2: the two fingers of brush going into the swamp, maybe

1014
00:53:44,840 --> 00:53:46,600
Speaker 2: I would have seen, oh hey, this looks like a

1015
00:53:46,600 --> 00:53:48,759
Speaker 2: great transition. Oh hey, this looks like there might be

1016
00:53:48,800 --> 00:53:51,280
Speaker 2: bucks bedded off of those points, maybe in the swamp.

1017
00:53:52,080 --> 00:53:54,400
Speaker 2: And oh hey, this ditch. I wonder maybe that ditch

1018
00:53:54,600 --> 00:53:56,719
Speaker 2: would funnel deer moving up through along the edge of

1019
00:53:56,719 --> 00:53:58,360
Speaker 2: the field. Maybe I would have picked out all of

1020
00:53:58,360 --> 00:54:01,000
Speaker 2: those things that made this look good. I hopefully would

1021
00:54:01,000 --> 00:54:04,680
Speaker 2: have identified that scrape, that overhanging branch where there'd be

1022
00:54:04,719 --> 00:54:07,840
Speaker 2: a scrape in the fall. But I think fifteen or

1023
00:54:07,840 --> 00:54:10,440
Speaker 2: twenty years ago, I might have looked at this and

1024
00:54:10,480 --> 00:54:13,200
Speaker 2: then looked for trees and not found a good tree

1025
00:54:13,200 --> 00:54:15,440
Speaker 2: for a tree stand, or not found a tree for

1026
00:54:15,480 --> 00:54:19,160
Speaker 2: a saddle and then said, well, can't do it. Or

1027
00:54:19,200 --> 00:54:21,200
Speaker 2: I would have looked for the next closest tree, and

1028
00:54:21,200 --> 00:54:23,640
Speaker 2: I would have ended up seventy or eighty yards away

1029
00:54:24,120 --> 00:54:27,719
Speaker 2: in a good tree, but not in the spot. But

1030
00:54:27,920 --> 00:54:32,239
Speaker 2: what I've learned is that you don't need to have

1031
00:54:32,280 --> 00:54:34,359
Speaker 2: the perfect tree. You don't need to have a tree

1032
00:54:34,400 --> 00:54:36,799
Speaker 2: at all. You don't need a perfect blind, you don't

1033
00:54:36,840 --> 00:54:40,359
Speaker 2: need to have some big, fancy, elaborate spot. If this

1034
00:54:40,440 --> 00:54:44,000
Speaker 2: is the spot where you have the X, like the

1035
00:54:44,719 --> 00:54:47,640
Speaker 2: X the spot in the spot, you gotta do whatever

1036
00:54:47,640 --> 00:54:50,640
Speaker 2: it takes to be there because with a bow we're talking.

1037
00:54:51,320 --> 00:54:54,120
Speaker 2: Two feet can be the difference, five yards can be

1038
00:54:54,160 --> 00:54:57,640
Speaker 2: the difference. One little gap in the brush can be

1039
00:54:57,719 --> 00:55:01,799
Speaker 2: all the difference you need. In so so, just having

1040
00:55:01,880 --> 00:55:05,400
Speaker 2: the confidence to get creative with where you hunt and

1041
00:55:05,600 --> 00:55:07,560
Speaker 2: be willing to hunt on the ground, or be willing

1042
00:55:07,560 --> 00:55:09,799
Speaker 2: to hunt low in a scrubby tree, or be willing

1043
00:55:09,800 --> 00:55:12,719
Speaker 2: to hunt really high in a bean pole tree, or

1044
00:55:12,760 --> 00:55:18,000
Speaker 2: be just don't get hung up on the ideal. You know,

1045
00:55:18,040 --> 00:55:20,200
Speaker 2: you hear all these different people on these podcasts. My

1046
00:55:20,280 --> 00:55:22,719
Speaker 2: podcasts included who say, well, you want to have a

1047
00:55:22,800 --> 00:55:25,520
Speaker 2: great you know, a great tree with cover all over,

1048
00:55:25,560 --> 00:55:27,279
Speaker 2: and you want to be twenty feet up and lots

1049
00:55:27,280 --> 00:55:31,400
Speaker 2: of branches around you, et cetera. And sure that'd be great,

1050
00:55:31,960 --> 00:55:34,080
Speaker 2: but sometimes that's not going to be in the right spot.

1051
00:55:34,600 --> 00:55:36,759
Speaker 2: And I've just seen now time and time again so

1052
00:55:36,840 --> 00:55:40,120
Speaker 2: many times in the last decade or so, where if

1053
00:55:40,160 --> 00:55:43,880
Speaker 2: I hadn't gotten creative and been willing to just risk it,

1054
00:55:44,680 --> 00:55:47,200
Speaker 2: willing to be on the ground and hid in grass

1055
00:55:47,280 --> 00:55:49,880
Speaker 2: or hide in brush or belly crawl across the field,

1056
00:55:51,280 --> 00:55:53,959
Speaker 2: I would have never killed deer. I killed the deer

1057
00:55:54,040 --> 00:55:56,799
Speaker 2: on the ground without a blind in Nebraska a few

1058
00:55:56,840 --> 00:55:59,120
Speaker 2: years ago, like ten years ago. I did it again

1059
00:55:59,280 --> 00:56:03,040
Speaker 2: last year in the grass, snuck into a spot where

1060
00:56:03,080 --> 00:56:05,640
Speaker 2: there's no trees, ambushed them as if I was hunting

1061
00:56:05,640 --> 00:56:07,720
Speaker 2: from a tree, but instead in a patch of grass,

1062
00:56:08,440 --> 00:56:10,359
Speaker 2: had a belly crawl on the wide nine last year,

1063
00:56:10,360 --> 00:56:12,400
Speaker 2: had a belly crawl across the field and sneak up

1064
00:56:12,440 --> 00:56:15,080
Speaker 2: to a bucket called Junior a few years before that.

1065
00:56:16,800 --> 00:56:21,480
Speaker 2: It just keeps on reinforcing the notion to me that

1066
00:56:22,440 --> 00:56:25,919
Speaker 2: you have to learn when to go for it and

1067
00:56:25,960 --> 00:56:28,719
Speaker 2: when you know. Sometimes it's when you see a buck

1068
00:56:28,800 --> 00:56:31,720
Speaker 2: do something and you see it with your own eyes

1069
00:56:31,840 --> 00:56:33,480
Speaker 2: and you think to yourself, well, there's a reason he

1070
00:56:33,520 --> 00:56:35,799
Speaker 2: did that. That's the spot I needed to be. Well,

1071
00:56:35,840 --> 00:56:37,360
Speaker 2: you need to do whatever it's going to take to

1072
00:56:37,360 --> 00:56:39,960
Speaker 2: be able to hide your tail there and hunt that spot.

1073
00:56:40,200 --> 00:56:42,600
Speaker 2: If it means laying on your belly, if it means

1074
00:56:42,719 --> 00:56:45,680
Speaker 2: hiding in a ditch, if it means hiding in a

1075
00:56:45,680 --> 00:56:47,960
Speaker 2: bush or being three feet up in a tree, whatever

1076
00:56:47,960 --> 00:56:49,440
Speaker 2: you got to do, you got to be there. So

1077
00:56:49,560 --> 00:56:51,440
Speaker 2: sometimes it's when you see a deer do a thing.

1078
00:56:51,640 --> 00:56:55,000
Speaker 2: Sometimes you just know based on sign that's the spot.

1079
00:56:55,320 --> 00:56:58,080
Speaker 2: Sometimes you actually see a deer bedded, and you gotta

1080
00:56:58,200 --> 00:57:03,640
Speaker 2: go for when you have an opportunity lined up like this.

1081
00:57:04,120 --> 00:57:08,040
Speaker 2: Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Right,

1082
00:57:08,560 --> 00:57:10,799
Speaker 2: we only have so many chances, we only get so

1083
00:57:10,880 --> 00:57:14,719
Speaker 2: many hunts, and for too many years, fifteen twenty years ago,

1084
00:57:14,800 --> 00:57:17,760
Speaker 2: I was so conservative. I was so worried about scaring deer.

1085
00:57:17,920 --> 00:57:20,320
Speaker 2: I thought, man, if I screw up once, that mature

1086
00:57:20,320 --> 00:57:22,440
Speaker 2: buck's gonna catch on to me and I'll never never

1087
00:57:22,480 --> 00:57:26,440
Speaker 2: have another chance. But it's just not true most of

1088
00:57:26,480 --> 00:57:30,640
Speaker 2: the time, even in heavily pressured areas. You know, I

1089
00:57:30,640 --> 00:57:33,320
Speaker 2: talked about this a week or two ago with with

1090
00:57:33,560 --> 00:57:36,840
Speaker 2: Jacob at Exodus. You know, these bucks that get to

1091
00:57:36,920 --> 00:57:39,680
Speaker 2: four or five years old, they are in an area

1092
00:57:39,760 --> 00:57:42,160
Speaker 2: for a reason. They made it to that age because

1093
00:57:42,200 --> 00:57:45,800
Speaker 2: they believe this spot that they live is safe. So

1094
00:57:45,960 --> 00:57:47,760
Speaker 2: if you take a swing and do one of these

1095
00:57:47,760 --> 00:57:49,640
Speaker 2: aggressive things to be in the right spot at the

1096
00:57:49,720 --> 00:57:53,120
Speaker 2: right moment, because everything's telling you to do that. Even

1097
00:57:53,120 --> 00:57:55,760
Speaker 2: if you mess it up, you're probably gonna have another

1098
00:57:55,840 --> 00:57:59,640
Speaker 2: chance somewhere maybe, but you would never have had that

1099
00:57:59,760 --> 00:58:02,160
Speaker 2: chance if you didn't go for it. So there's a

1100
00:58:02,160 --> 00:58:06,720
Speaker 2: big difference between being a deer watcher and a deer killer,

1101
00:58:07,200 --> 00:58:08,600
Speaker 2: and if you want to get to the point where

1102
00:58:08,600 --> 00:58:11,640
Speaker 2: you were actually closing the deal on some of these deer,

1103
00:58:12,040 --> 00:58:14,440
Speaker 2: you just have to take the big swing. You have

1104
00:58:14,520 --> 00:58:16,840
Speaker 2: to do the creative sit You have to take the

1105
00:58:17,640 --> 00:58:20,040
Speaker 2: belly crawl or the hide in the corn or the

1106
00:58:20,080 --> 00:58:21,960
Speaker 2: hide in the grass, or sneak up on the deer

1107
00:58:21,960 --> 00:58:24,600
Speaker 2: that you saw betted, even though it's high risk, even

1108
00:58:24,640 --> 00:58:27,480
Speaker 2: though probably seven times out of ten it's not going

1109
00:58:27,560 --> 00:58:31,840
Speaker 2: to go well, three times out of ten, maybe it does,

1110
00:58:32,640 --> 00:58:35,360
Speaker 2: and it's worth it. So many of the deer that

1111
00:58:35,400 --> 00:58:37,720
Speaker 2: I've killed in recent years have been because I was

1112
00:58:37,720 --> 00:58:39,520
Speaker 2: willing to say, damn it, I'm going to give it

1113
00:58:39,560 --> 00:58:43,680
Speaker 2: a try. Probably not going to go well, but it might.

1114
00:58:43,840 --> 00:58:45,600
Speaker 2: It's definitely not going to go well. If I sit

1115
00:58:45,680 --> 00:58:47,959
Speaker 2: back here seventy yards away and just watch the whole time.

1116
00:58:49,560 --> 00:58:52,480
Speaker 2: If you go for it, yeah, maybe you screwed up.

1117
00:58:53,120 --> 00:58:55,080
Speaker 2: But if you do screw it up, you learn something

1118
00:58:55,200 --> 00:58:57,720
Speaker 2: because you were actively trying to change the situation. You

1119
00:58:57,720 --> 00:59:00,800
Speaker 2: were actively trying something new, and then maybe not, maybe

1120
00:59:00,840 --> 00:59:02,880
Speaker 2: you do actually pull it off and you get to

1121
00:59:02,960 --> 00:59:05,560
Speaker 2: enjoy that situation. So that's that was a huge takeaway

1122
00:59:05,560 --> 00:59:08,480
Speaker 2: from this hunt for me being creative with my setup,

1123
00:59:08,560 --> 00:59:11,320
Speaker 2: being willing to plan ahead and say, hey, there's not

1124
00:59:11,360 --> 00:59:13,120
Speaker 2: a tree here, how can I make up for that?

1125
00:59:13,240 --> 00:59:15,680
Speaker 2: How can I make this work? Still thinking about the

1126
00:59:15,680 --> 00:59:18,680
Speaker 2: standing corn, finding a place I can hide in the corn.

1127
00:59:18,680 --> 00:59:22,120
Speaker 2: That gave me some excuse me, gave me some lanes.

1128
00:59:23,040 --> 00:59:26,360
Speaker 2: And then finally when I got in there and the

1129
00:59:26,400 --> 00:59:30,680
Speaker 2: buck shows up, well, I don't have a shot. And

1130
00:59:30,760 --> 00:59:32,720
Speaker 2: looking back at old mark, I think I would have

1131
00:59:32,720 --> 00:59:35,600
Speaker 2: been afraid to move. At one point as a hunter,

1132
00:59:35,760 --> 00:59:38,240
Speaker 2: I would have thought, Okay, I'm hidden here in the corn.

1133
00:59:38,320 --> 00:59:40,880
Speaker 2: I need to just wait until he walks my way, hopefully,

1134
00:59:41,080 --> 00:59:45,160
Speaker 2: and then I'll get a shot. And instead I knew, Hey,

1135
00:59:45,200 --> 00:59:47,600
Speaker 2: you can get away with movement, even when you're close

1136
00:59:47,680 --> 00:59:50,520
Speaker 2: to deer if you time it at the right moments.

1137
00:59:51,040 --> 00:59:52,760
Speaker 2: And so I waited till he was looking the other way,

1138
00:59:52,840 --> 00:59:54,240
Speaker 2: or he put his head down, or he put his

1139
00:59:54,280 --> 00:59:57,360
Speaker 2: head up in the scrape, or he sparred with that deer,

1140
00:59:57,480 --> 00:59:59,640
Speaker 2: or he moved and walked behind bushes. But every time

1141
00:59:59,720 --> 01:00:03,480
Speaker 2: he gave me a one second window, I was standing up.

1142
01:00:03,760 --> 01:00:05,800
Speaker 2: I was taking a step to the left. At one

1143
01:00:05,800 --> 01:00:07,720
Speaker 2: point took like three or four steps with my bull

1144
01:00:07,760 --> 01:00:12,240
Speaker 2: about to be drawn, like, you know, very aggressive right

1145
01:00:12,280 --> 01:00:15,120
Speaker 2: in his wheelhouse movements. And yes, I was lucky that

1146
01:00:15,160 --> 01:00:17,320
Speaker 2: there was some wind and that had been rained earlier

1147
01:00:17,360 --> 01:00:19,200
Speaker 2: in the day so I could do that without him

1148
01:00:19,240 --> 01:00:22,600
Speaker 2: hearing me. But if I hadn't done that, I don't

1149
01:00:22,640 --> 01:00:24,440
Speaker 2: think I ever would have been able to get the

1150
01:00:24,480 --> 01:00:26,919
Speaker 2: shot that I did. So I think that goes back

1151
01:00:26,920 --> 01:00:29,600
Speaker 2: to knowing that, you know, when you have these windows,

1152
01:00:29,640 --> 01:00:32,480
Speaker 2: when things are lined up, you do have to get aggressive,

1153
01:00:33,000 --> 01:00:37,080
Speaker 2: be creative, you know, make your own stars. Like, don't

1154
01:00:37,120 --> 01:00:39,600
Speaker 2: just wait for the stars to align. Make them align.

1155
01:00:40,600 --> 01:00:44,760
Speaker 2: That's a big thing. That's a really key thing. Make

1156
01:00:45,200 --> 01:00:49,160
Speaker 2: the stars align for you. Don't wait for some happenstance,

1157
01:00:50,440 --> 01:00:54,240
Speaker 2: make it happen. Finally, I think an important thing here

1158
01:00:54,280 --> 01:00:58,960
Speaker 2: on this front was that it's October thirteenth. There's a

1159
01:00:59,000 --> 01:01:00,880
Speaker 2: lot of people say you shouldn't be kill deer for

1160
01:01:01,080 --> 01:01:05,920
Speaker 2: mature deer in mid October. It's the October lull. A

1161
01:01:05,960 --> 01:01:07,560
Speaker 2: lot of folks that say, don't go out there and

1162
01:01:08,000 --> 01:01:10,920
Speaker 2: mess spots up when there's no chance of good things happening.

1163
01:01:10,920 --> 01:01:13,080
Speaker 2: But the truth of the matter is, and we've talked

1164
01:01:13,080 --> 01:01:14,760
Speaker 2: about this a lot too but truth of the matter

1165
01:01:14,800 --> 01:01:17,600
Speaker 2: is that buck activity, deer activity ramps up throughout the

1166
01:01:17,600 --> 01:01:21,360
Speaker 2: month of October towards the rut. They just shift right,

1167
01:01:21,400 --> 01:01:24,120
Speaker 2: So what they're doing in September and early October changes

1168
01:01:24,600 --> 01:01:27,480
Speaker 2: as hunting pressure ramps up. Deer just to hunting pressure,

1169
01:01:27,880 --> 01:01:30,760
Speaker 2: Deer just to changing food sources, right, You've got crops

1170
01:01:30,800 --> 01:01:33,880
Speaker 2: coming out, they just to cover changing, you've got leaves

1171
01:01:33,880 --> 01:01:37,200
Speaker 2: falling down. They are making all these changes. There's changes

1172
01:01:37,200 --> 01:01:40,520
Speaker 2: in their habitat, there's changes to pressure, there's changes in

1173
01:01:40,560 --> 01:01:43,680
Speaker 2: their physiology as they're getting ready to rut. So all

1174
01:01:43,720 --> 01:01:47,160
Speaker 2: of that just means that deer are changing, So hunters

1175
01:01:47,200 --> 01:01:51,320
Speaker 2: need to change with them. And if you can do that,

1176
01:01:52,560 --> 01:01:55,320
Speaker 2: you can get on deer. I think if you plan

1177
01:01:55,440 --> 01:01:58,120
Speaker 2: your hunts to account for that, or if you've got

1178
01:01:58,120 --> 01:02:01,440
Speaker 2: a deer dialed in, or if you have an unpressured spot,

1179
01:02:01,840 --> 01:02:05,320
Speaker 2: you can absolutely till still have success, especially when you

1180
01:02:05,400 --> 01:02:07,600
Speaker 2: have these right conditions lined up. And so a big

1181
01:02:07,640 --> 01:02:10,040
Speaker 2: thing for me over recent years has been if I

1182
01:02:10,080 --> 01:02:12,960
Speaker 2: see that front come through, that gives a deer a

1183
01:02:12,960 --> 01:02:15,320
Speaker 2: little bit extra incentive to get on his feet earlier,

1184
01:02:15,720 --> 01:02:17,680
Speaker 2: I'm going to take a swing. Whether it's October eighth

1185
01:02:17,720 --> 01:02:21,520
Speaker 2: or October thirteenth, or October nineteenth or twenty second, that

1186
01:02:21,560 --> 01:02:24,640
Speaker 2: window can still be really good. So in this case,

1187
01:02:24,680 --> 01:02:28,120
Speaker 2: our front came through like the thirteenth through the fifteenth,

1188
01:02:28,440 --> 01:02:31,160
Speaker 2: and I when I saw the forecast, I said, all right,

1189
01:02:31,560 --> 01:02:34,240
Speaker 2: that's going to be one of these swings. Now. I'll

1190
01:02:34,240 --> 01:02:36,480
Speaker 2: also say that it's great to have a lot of

1191
01:02:36,520 --> 01:02:39,400
Speaker 2: different options so that you don't only have one farm

1192
01:02:39,520 --> 01:02:42,320
Speaker 2: or one spot you're hunting over and over. Right, So I,

1193
01:02:42,640 --> 01:02:44,880
Speaker 2: because I had picked up new access, because I had

1194
01:02:44,920 --> 01:02:48,640
Speaker 2: additional properties that I've slowly accumulated over the years, I

1195
01:02:48,640 --> 01:02:52,200
Speaker 2: could hunt early October and then wait and hunt a

1196
01:02:52,200 --> 01:02:55,600
Speaker 2: different spot mid October, and then I can come back

1197
01:02:55,600 --> 01:02:57,840
Speaker 2: and hunt a different spot a little bit later October.

1198
01:02:58,160 --> 01:03:00,000
Speaker 2: And I'm not burning out any one of those spots.

1199
01:03:00,480 --> 01:03:02,360
Speaker 2: So it's not like the October law is going to

1200
01:03:02,360 --> 01:03:04,720
Speaker 2: screw things up for me come the rut, because i

1201
01:03:04,760 --> 01:03:07,680
Speaker 2: haven't been hammering one spot the whole month of October.

1202
01:03:07,760 --> 01:03:10,240
Speaker 2: I've been spreading it out. Take a strike there, take

1203
01:03:10,280 --> 01:03:13,280
Speaker 2: a strike there, Take a strike there. When the rut arrives,

1204
01:03:14,280 --> 01:03:16,600
Speaker 2: no one of them is over pressured, no one of

1205
01:03:16,640 --> 01:03:19,120
Speaker 2: them is ruined. But I've still been able to hunt,

1206
01:03:19,160 --> 01:03:21,880
Speaker 2: and I've still been able to have opportunities all throughout

1207
01:03:21,880 --> 01:03:24,520
Speaker 2: the month. So that's an important thing to remember if

1208
01:03:24,560 --> 01:03:28,240
Speaker 2: you're listening to this on October seventeenth, you know, don't

1209
01:03:28,240 --> 01:03:31,640
Speaker 2: be afraid to get after it. Take advantage if you

1210
01:03:31,720 --> 01:03:35,040
Speaker 2: have a chance. But then also don't blindly hunt over

1211
01:03:35,080 --> 01:03:36,840
Speaker 2: and over and over. If you have just one spot

1212
01:03:36,880 --> 01:03:40,360
Speaker 2: to do it, Go hunt some public land, Go hunt

1213
01:03:40,440 --> 01:03:42,320
Speaker 2: that new permission that you got that maybe doesn't look

1214
01:03:42,320 --> 01:03:46,240
Speaker 2: that good, but who knows. And I think if you

1215
01:03:46,280 --> 01:03:49,720
Speaker 2: can do those things, you've got a better chance of

1216
01:03:49,800 --> 01:03:53,360
Speaker 2: just enjoying your hunting season, because that's so important to

1217
01:03:53,520 --> 01:03:58,600
Speaker 2: be careful to avoid. We talk a lot, you listen

1218
01:03:58,640 --> 01:04:00,800
Speaker 2: to a lot of really good hunters who oftentimes talk

1219
01:04:00,840 --> 01:04:03,040
Speaker 2: about needing to time your hunts, wait for the right

1220
01:04:03,080 --> 01:04:06,880
Speaker 2: moment to strike, don't overhunt, don't hammer these spots too much.

1221
01:04:07,440 --> 01:04:09,840
Speaker 2: You know you can kill them from the couch. Some

1222
01:04:09,840 --> 01:04:13,920
Speaker 2: people say, right, because if you're educating deer, you're not

1223
01:04:13,960 --> 01:04:17,240
Speaker 2: gonna be able to kill them. And all of this

1224
01:04:17,440 --> 01:04:19,680
Speaker 2: is true to a degree, and a lot of what

1225
01:04:19,720 --> 01:04:23,040
Speaker 2: I've talked about with this deer, this particular hunt, would

1226
01:04:23,160 --> 01:04:24,840
Speaker 2: you know point to me waiting and waiting and waiting.

1227
01:04:24,840 --> 01:04:27,400
Speaker 2: This is the first time out hunted this property. But

1228
01:04:28,760 --> 01:04:31,360
Speaker 2: make sure you still enjoy your season, have other places,

1229
01:04:31,640 --> 01:04:36,840
Speaker 2: get out there, enjoy yourself. So if you have a

1230
01:04:36,880 --> 01:04:39,680
Speaker 2: weekend in October, get out there. If you've got your

1231
01:04:39,760 --> 01:04:42,919
Speaker 2: vacation in November, but then a warm front rolls through

1232
01:04:42,960 --> 01:04:46,120
Speaker 2: and the conditions don't look good, don't worry about it.

1233
01:04:46,400 --> 01:04:50,680
Speaker 2: Hunt have fun. Maybe it's not perfect, but you never know.

1234
01:04:51,080 --> 01:04:55,320
Speaker 2: These are wild animals, these are wild places. The whole

1235
01:04:55,360 --> 01:04:58,720
Speaker 2: reason this is so exciting is that it's unsure. We

1236
01:04:58,840 --> 01:05:00,720
Speaker 2: do not know what's going to hap happen. There are

1237
01:05:00,720 --> 01:05:05,680
Speaker 2: no guarantees, and that uncertainty and the mystery that comes

1238
01:05:05,680 --> 01:05:08,640
Speaker 2: along with every single time we head into the woods.

1239
01:05:09,160 --> 01:05:12,439
Speaker 2: That is a beautiful thing. That's what keeps me coming

1240
01:05:12,440 --> 01:05:14,360
Speaker 2: back time and time again. And I'm betting that's the

1241
01:05:14,440 --> 01:05:20,240
Speaker 2: case with you too. So that is my hunt. That's

1242
01:05:20,280 --> 01:05:23,720
Speaker 2: how I killed this buck here in mid October in

1243
01:05:23,760 --> 01:05:27,040
Speaker 2: southern Michigan. I'm very thankful for it. It was a

1244
01:05:27,040 --> 01:05:29,840
Speaker 2: lot of fun. It was a very intense hunt. It

1245
01:05:29,920 --> 01:05:34,320
Speaker 2: was a crazy thirty minutes. I actually had that camera

1246
01:05:35,240 --> 01:05:40,760
Speaker 2: send pictures today all almost that entire encounter. So that

1247
01:05:40,800 --> 01:05:43,959
Speaker 2: buck showed up, the time between when he first showed

1248
01:05:44,040 --> 01:05:45,680
Speaker 2: up and when I got a shot at him was

1249
01:05:45,760 --> 01:05:48,080
Speaker 2: about thirty minutes. And I can tell you that not

1250
01:05:48,200 --> 01:05:50,200
Speaker 2: because I remember it happening in real time, but because

1251
01:05:50,240 --> 01:05:52,200
Speaker 2: the pictures. I've got the first picture there, and I've

1252
01:05:52,200 --> 01:05:54,000
Speaker 2: got pictures of him fighting with this other buck, and

1253
01:05:54,000 --> 01:05:56,680
Speaker 2: then I have pictures of him running away, which is

1254
01:05:56,720 --> 01:06:01,320
Speaker 2: pretty cool to see. So so yeah, just a really

1255
01:06:01,560 --> 01:06:06,800
Speaker 2: special one that is different but incredibly memorable all the same.

1256
01:06:07,160 --> 01:06:11,360
Speaker 2: And once again learning new lessons, having something's hammered home again,

1257
01:06:12,240 --> 01:06:17,680
Speaker 2: and just thankful worked out. So that is it for

1258
01:06:17,760 --> 01:06:20,640
Speaker 2: me here today. I'm hoping that you will take this

1259
01:06:21,360 --> 01:06:23,560
Speaker 2: and maybe this will inspire you a little bit. Maybe

1260
01:06:23,560 --> 01:06:26,440
Speaker 2: this will give you some new ideas. Maybe this will

1261
01:06:27,080 --> 01:06:29,800
Speaker 2: give you that extra kicking the butt to get out

1262
01:06:29,800 --> 01:06:32,640
Speaker 2: in the woods even if conditions aren't quite right or

1263
01:06:32,880 --> 01:06:36,000
Speaker 2: whatever it might be. If you're listening in mid October

1264
01:06:36,080 --> 01:06:38,840
Speaker 2: or late October, there are really good things available to

1265
01:06:38,880 --> 01:06:42,520
Speaker 2: you right now. I should point out scrapes are going

1266
01:06:42,600 --> 01:06:44,960
Speaker 2: to be ramping up over the coming week to ten days,

1267
01:06:45,480 --> 01:06:48,480
Speaker 2: So if you are listening October seventeenth through like the

1268
01:06:48,480 --> 01:06:51,240
Speaker 2: thirty first, and if you've got scrapes back in cover

1269
01:06:51,320 --> 01:06:55,000
Speaker 2: that you know deer have historically hit, that is absolutely

1270
01:06:55,000 --> 01:06:57,960
Speaker 2: a place where there will be bucks in the coming days.

1271
01:06:58,080 --> 01:07:01,760
Speaker 2: This buck came to a scrape, and that was one

1272
01:07:01,760 --> 01:07:04,080
Speaker 2: of the not the only reason I typically don't hunt

1273
01:07:04,120 --> 01:07:06,320
Speaker 2: spots just because of a scrape. But if you can

1274
01:07:06,360 --> 01:07:09,240
Speaker 2: have a scrape with a terrain or cover feature, with

1275
01:07:09,480 --> 01:07:12,520
Speaker 2: the food source to bed type pattern or whatever it is,

1276
01:07:13,040 --> 01:07:16,919
Speaker 2: you know, having that extra sweetener can be a key thing,

1277
01:07:17,120 --> 01:07:20,200
Speaker 2: especially this time of year, almost well not almost more

1278
01:07:20,240 --> 01:07:22,640
Speaker 2: than any other time of the year. This next seven

1279
01:07:22,680 --> 01:07:26,560
Speaker 2: to ten days is your best time for deer to

1280
01:07:26,560 --> 01:07:30,120
Speaker 2: be on those scrapes, so watch out for that. You know. Again,

1281
01:07:30,200 --> 01:07:32,720
Speaker 2: as we get into the last week of October, this

1282
01:07:32,800 --> 01:07:36,040
Speaker 2: is a great window because you have bucks that they're

1283
01:07:36,120 --> 01:07:40,400
Speaker 2: testosterone is just about maxed out, but most dos aren't

1284
01:07:40,680 --> 01:07:42,919
Speaker 2: in heat yet, So you've got bucks that are ready

1285
01:07:42,960 --> 01:07:45,640
Speaker 2: to go, but can't find any ladies that are. So

1286
01:07:45,680 --> 01:07:49,080
Speaker 2: they're amped up, they're frustrated. They're moving more in daylight

1287
01:07:49,160 --> 01:07:51,320
Speaker 2: right now, but they're still sticking to their home range.

1288
01:07:51,400 --> 01:07:54,400
Speaker 2: So if you have been studying a specific deer, if

1289
01:07:54,440 --> 01:07:56,760
Speaker 2: you've got a pattern on a couple deer, this might

1290
01:07:56,840 --> 01:07:59,120
Speaker 2: be your best window coming up because they'll still be

1291
01:07:59,200 --> 01:08:02,360
Speaker 2: in your area, not running crazy yet, they're not randomly

1292
01:08:03,760 --> 01:08:07,000
Speaker 2: cruising the landscape or chasing does across the landscape. They're

1293
01:08:07,040 --> 01:08:09,480
Speaker 2: still going to be to a degree following those patterns

1294
01:08:09,520 --> 01:08:11,880
Speaker 2: you've been learning about this past month or six weeks,

1295
01:08:12,200 --> 01:08:14,200
Speaker 2: but you've got a good chance of it happening in daylight.

1296
01:08:14,600 --> 01:08:17,519
Speaker 2: So I put a high priority on that last week

1297
01:08:17,560 --> 01:08:21,439
Speaker 2: of October, and then once November hits, then we're rolling

1298
01:08:21,439 --> 01:08:23,360
Speaker 2: into the rut. Assuming you don't live in the South

1299
01:08:23,400 --> 01:08:26,559
Speaker 2: where there's some of these different rut windows, but if

1300
01:08:26,560 --> 01:08:29,799
Speaker 2: you're in the northern half of the country, once November

1301
01:08:29,840 --> 01:08:33,599
Speaker 2: first hits, for me at least, I'm thinking betting areas

1302
01:08:33,640 --> 01:08:37,360
Speaker 2: and funnels and pinch points, anything that concentrates deer travel.

1303
01:08:37,400 --> 01:08:38,840
Speaker 2: There's gonna be a lot of bucks moving on their

1304
01:08:38,840 --> 01:08:41,679
Speaker 2: feet going from dough era dough betting ereic to dough

1305
01:08:41,680 --> 01:08:44,439
Speaker 2: betting era, to dove food source to dough food source,

1306
01:08:44,800 --> 01:08:47,679
Speaker 2: trying to find a dough ready to breed. You want

1307
01:08:47,680 --> 01:08:50,360
Speaker 2: to be anywhere that's downwind of one of those dough

1308
01:08:50,360 --> 01:08:54,360
Speaker 2: hot spots where movements funneled where movement is pinched down

1309
01:08:54,400 --> 01:08:58,400
Speaker 2: to locations. Find those kinds of spots. Put in the time,

1310
01:09:00,080 --> 01:09:03,720
Speaker 2: rind it out, yes, but also enjoy yourself. Do what

1311
01:09:03,760 --> 01:09:05,680
Speaker 2: you need to do to make sure this is fun.

1312
01:09:06,120 --> 01:09:12,479
Speaker 2: This should not feel like a grind, a job, misery entirely.

1313
01:09:12,520 --> 01:09:15,160
Speaker 2: Like you know, some of this stuff, it takes hard work,

1314
01:09:15,280 --> 01:09:19,679
Speaker 2: no doubt about it. But if you are not enjoying

1315
01:09:19,680 --> 01:09:24,080
Speaker 2: yourself along the way, you're getting it wrong. You're missing out.

1316
01:09:24,400 --> 01:09:26,120
Speaker 2: There's got to be a balance, There's got to be

1317
01:09:26,160 --> 01:09:28,680
Speaker 2: a sweet spot there between really giving it you're all,

1318
01:09:28,880 --> 01:09:33,080
Speaker 2: but then also making sure that you know you're enjoying

1319
01:09:33,080 --> 01:09:36,599
Speaker 2: this incredible experience for one's worth. So you probably heard

1320
01:09:36,600 --> 01:09:38,719
Speaker 2: me talk all about this. I won't belabor it anymore.

1321
01:09:39,200 --> 01:09:41,599
Speaker 2: I'll leave you with that. I'm wishing you guys all

1322
01:09:41,840 --> 01:09:44,360
Speaker 2: the absolute best from here on out. We're going to

1323
01:09:44,439 --> 01:09:46,960
Speaker 2: have some really great interviews coming up giving you some

1324
01:09:47,560 --> 01:09:52,479
Speaker 2: very you know, clear and actionable tips and tactics to

1325
01:09:52,560 --> 01:09:54,519
Speaker 2: make sure that the next four weeks of your hunting

1326
01:09:54,560 --> 01:09:58,080
Speaker 2: season are as jam packed and successful as they possibly can.

1327
01:09:58,920 --> 01:10:01,280
Speaker 2: I appreciate you tuning in. I hope you enjoyed this

1328
01:10:01,439 --> 01:10:05,880
Speaker 2: story and until next time, good luck out there, and

1329
01:10:06,200 --> 01:10:11,640
Speaker 2: stay wired to hunt h m m m