Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,
Speaker 1: creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.
Speaker 1: First Light, Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host
Speaker 1: Tony Peterson.
Speaker 2: Hey everyone, welcome to the Wire to Hunt Foundation's podcast,
Speaker 2: which is brought to you by First Light. I'm your host,
Speaker 2: Tony Peterson, and this episode is all about deer densities.
Speaker 2: Something occurred to me recently while recording an episode of
Speaker 2: Wired to Hunt with the trout bum himself. As Mark
Speaker 2: told the story of hitting his target buck this year,
Speaker 2: I realized that he sees more dear on one Michigan
Speaker 2: sit than I see in an entire season in northern Wisconsin.
Speaker 2: His stories go something like, at first I saw a buck,
Speaker 2: and then four doughs, and then a buck in another buck,
Speaker 2: and then six more bucks plus some doze, while my
Speaker 2: stories go well, I saw one squirrel and then probably
Speaker 2: the same squirrel, and then two sits later, the loneliest
Speaker 2: dough in all the land briefly emerged from the swamp
Speaker 2: Shrek style to take a look around Mark's very easy,
Speaker 2: privileged hunting, when contrasted with my extremely difficult workingman's hunting,
Speaker 2: made me realize we don't talk about deer densities enough,
Speaker 2: but they are so important to strategy, and this is
Speaker 2: what I'm going to talk about right now and next week.
Speaker 2: So buckle up. Did you know that your vision runs
Speaker 2: one hundred milliseconds behind what's actually happening in the world.
Speaker 2: It doesn't take much time for light to bounce off
Speaker 2: an object so you can see it, and then your
Speaker 2: eye has to send a signal to your brain so
Speaker 2: it can decide what it's looking at. But it does
Speaker 2: take a little bit of time. Do you remember that
Speaker 2: short lived fad about the dress that was either gold
Speaker 2: or blue? On the internet, like in twenty fifteen. Randomly
Speaker 2: something like that pops up and it divides people because
Speaker 2: some see one color, some see a different color. But
Speaker 2: how can that be? How can address that is blue
Speaker 2: appear gold to us or vice versa, or let's take
Speaker 2: it a step further. Neuroscientists have studied how much our
Speaker 2: brains fill in the blanks with what we perceive to
Speaker 2: be reality, and they've studied how we as individuals have
Speaker 2: unconscious bias, which means we are totally unaware of it.
Speaker 2: They've done studies with people who were tasked with watching
Speaker 2: videos of civilians interacting with law enforcement, where they were
Speaker 2: instructed to either focus on the civilian or the police
Speaker 2: officer depending on their backgrounds and interactions with law enforcement.
Speaker 2: The perceptions of the interactions on video varied wildly, yet
Speaker 2: they all watched the same video. Our brains work hard
Speaker 2: to mold and shape reality to fit our prior experiences.
Speaker 2: We make up our minds to fit the reality that
Speaker 2: we are most comfortable with. Take chronic wasting disease CWD
Speaker 2: for example. If you want something that hits close to
Speaker 2: home with a lot of us anyway, this is a
Speaker 2: good topic. There are a lot of people who have
Speaker 2: their minds made up with CWD, but most of the
Speaker 2: staunch opinions aren't really rooted in reality because there's a
Speaker 2: lot we don't know, a lot that just isn't backed
Speaker 2: up by data on both sides. So we draw our
Speaker 2: own lines in the sand, fill in the blanks. I'd
Speaker 2: bet you'd be more willing to take the thread of
Speaker 2: CWD more seriously if you had had positive interactions with
Speaker 2: Game and Fish employees, or had a generally positive view
Speaker 2: of the agency. Now, if you have a negative view
Speaker 2: for whatever reason, I bet there's generally more of a
Speaker 2: chance that you think that it's just bullshit built in
Speaker 2: around CWD. There are two different perceptions of reality around
Speaker 2: this issue, and we really don't know yet which one
Speaker 2: is right. What is far more likely is that the
Speaker 2: truth is going to be some type of hybrid reality
Speaker 2: between the two. Or take another hot topic, wolves. I
Speaker 2: had a conversation with a fellow at the gym earlier
Speaker 2: this year who couldn't blame our Minnesota DNR enough for
Speaker 2: the prevalence of wolves and how disastrous they have been
Speaker 2: to the Northern Minnesota deer heerd. He also didn't understand
Speaker 2: anything about the Endangered Species Act, or federal activist judges
Speaker 2: working out at Washington, DC, or the sheer complexity of
Speaker 2: the legal system as it transcends federal and state levels
Speaker 2: and involves a species like wolves. His thought was that
Speaker 2: the DNR wanted wolves to replace hunters, and that was that. Now.
Speaker 2: I don't know if the agency that relies heavily on
Speaker 2: the license sales from deer hunters would cut its own
Speaker 2: throat by conspiring to proliferate an apex predator across the land,
Speaker 2: a predator I'm pretty confident has never bought a hunting
Speaker 2: license ever. A part of the reason these issues suck
Speaker 2: to think about and deal with is because even though
Speaker 2: our tendency is to see them in black and white
Speaker 2: because that's easy, they are far from simple issues. Society
Speaker 2: is plagued by complex issues. If you talk to young
Speaker 2: folks these days, wealth inequality is a big one. Their
Speaker 2: take on it is quite a bit different from how
Speaker 2: many in my parents' boomer generation feel about it. Things
Speaker 2: get even weirder when we see a couple of the biggest,
Speaker 2: most outspoken billionaires working on my favorite subject, which is
Speaker 2: going into space, or they see Bill Gates on TV
Speaker 2: trying to guess the price of some simple grocery and
Speaker 2: home goods item. Did you know that Bill Gates did
Speaker 2: this one time on I think it was The Ellen
Speaker 2: DeGeneres Show, and he thought a bag of Totino's pizza
Speaker 2: rolls cost twenty two dollars. Let that sink in and
Speaker 2: tell me if he isn't experiencing a different reality from you.
Speaker 2: Where the perception of reality gets real weird. We let
Speaker 2: what others believe about life bleed into our world and
Speaker 2: sometimes shape how we proceed with our actions. This happens
Speaker 2: in hunting all the time. Trust me, if you think
Speaker 2: there isn't a difference and the opportunities presented to you
Speaker 2: versus I don't know some of the hunting industry people,
Speaker 2: you're off your rocker there, Betty Crocker from media hunts
Speaker 2: and outfitters, trading hunts for exposure to people who just
Speaker 2: have badass places to hunt that want to associate with
Speaker 2: big names. The world is kind of like Candyland for
Speaker 2: a lot of hunting industry folks. Now, naturally, some of
Speaker 2: them do things the hard way. Some of them also
Speaker 2: built their own empires and they hunt their own ground,
Speaker 2: which is pretty cool, But the reality there is still
Speaker 2: not something you're going to experience. Let me try to
Speaker 2: explain this in a way that's something like we should
Speaker 2: all be able to relate to. We are all aware
Speaker 2: of the concept of deer density. In some places, the
Speaker 2: general deer density might be forty or sixty or more
Speaker 2: dear per square mile. In other places that might be
Speaker 2: closer to ten or fewer deer. You might hunt the
Speaker 2: up of Michigan and see a handful of deer all
Speaker 2: season in southern Michigan, you might average a dozen or
Speaker 2: more sightings per sit. You might watch the big names
Speaker 2: on the outdoor channel passing up one forties left and
Speaker 2: right to wait for a giant. They can do this
Speaker 2: because not only do they have an extremely high deer
Speaker 2: density to work with, that deer density is flush with
Speaker 2: prime age bucks. There are properties in Iowa that might
Speaker 2: have more mature bucks on them than some counties have
Speaker 2: in other parts of the country. Okay, that might be
Speaker 2: a slight exaggeration, but I bet it's somewhat true. Pretty close. Now,
Speaker 2: imagine if every TV host had to tell you how
Speaker 2: many deer they saw on every set they showed, or
Speaker 2: you know, every Instagram post about a day buck. Would
Speaker 2: you still believe some of those folks were the best
Speaker 2: hunters alive? If you heard them say once again that
Speaker 2: they saw seventy six deer in their food plot on
Speaker 2: some random night in October, how hard would you think
Speaker 2: it would be to hold out for one hundred and
Speaker 2: eighty inch deer If you knew that you could at
Speaker 2: any given point in the season kill one hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty or one hundred and sixty inch or in a
Speaker 2: few days time. Their reality is different from yours, which
Speaker 2: I know is obvious, but I don't think some people
Speaker 2: understand the gap. Part of this is because we are
Speaker 2: hardwired to make things sound more difficult, and I do
Speaker 2: this too. Take the buck I shot a couple weeks
Speaker 2: ago in Wisconsin. The hunting there is tougher for me
Speaker 2: than anywhere else I hunt. That's just due to the
Speaker 2: deer density being really low. Now you know, the predator
Speaker 2: one hundred density is high too, which doesn't help, but
Speaker 2: that just contributes to the deer density. It's just a
Speaker 2: different beast than a lot of places, but it's also
Speaker 2: very similar to a lot of places, such as the
Speaker 2: nature the big Woods. Now, on that hunt, I hunted
Speaker 2: all day for three days, and I saw a do
Speaker 2: Then a buck that looked like someone took the body
Speaker 2: of a horse and married it to the rack of
Speaker 2: a coups deer came running in and stiffed my decoy.
Speaker 2: I killed him, and it was wonderful. I also want
Speaker 2: you and everyone else who listens to know how hard
Speaker 2: it is to hunt over there, because that makes me
Speaker 2: look better. The truth is it's it is a difficult
Speaker 2: place to hunt, but I also love it. I don't
Speaker 2: not enjoy hunting over there, even if I know I'm
Speaker 2: only going to see very few deer and am very
Speaker 2: unlikely to see a big one. It just is what
Speaker 2: it is. There really isn't a reason to try to
Speaker 2: make it sound worse than it is besides ego, and
Speaker 2: we have our biases and that colors our perception of reality.
Speaker 2: But reality isn't really up for negotiation. It just is
Speaker 2: what it is. This is the case with deer densities,
Speaker 2: and I don't think we fully understand how much this
Speaker 2: affects our season. Just think about the com confidence you'd
Speaker 2: have if you knew when you went hunting that you'd
Speaker 2: always see deer, and a lot of them. And when
Speaker 2: you see a lot of deer, there are almost always
Speaker 2: a few good bucks mixed in at some point. Would
Speaker 2: that change your view on getting up at o dark
Speaker 2: thirty again? I know it does for me. It's a
Speaker 2: hell of a lot easier to go hunting and stay
Speaker 2: in the game when you know it's going to be
Speaker 2: a freaking blast. Or look at it this way. Over
Speaker 2: in Wisconsin, my daughters and eye hunted parts of twenty
Speaker 2: days before we saw a single dough Literally we saw
Speaker 2: a few bucks, but we averaged one deer sighting per weekend.
Speaker 2: The last time I drew in Iowa Tag, I hunted
Speaker 2: public land and saw twenty six deer on my first
Speaker 2: full day of hunting. In the beginning of October, I
Speaker 2: saw fourteen deer on my first morning hunt there, including
Speaker 2: six bucks ranging from one hundred to one hundred and
Speaker 2: seventy inches. In which situation would you be able to
Speaker 2: rally and keep getting up and ready to go When
Speaker 2: we believe we are going to have fun. It's so
Speaker 2: much easier to go than when we believe you're not
Speaker 2: going to see anything. This is reflected in the harvest
Speaker 2: data that is coming out from some of the general
Speaker 2: firearm seasons that just wrapped up in Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Speaker 2: The numbers are low compared to last season. The obvious
Speaker 2: culprit is the warmer than average weather we had, but
Speaker 2: the less obvious culprit is that the perception of hunting
Speaker 2: in warm weather does bad things to hunters. It convinces
Speaker 2: them to put in less effort, which is the exact
Speaker 2: opposite way to approach a difficult hunt. Hunters believe the
Speaker 2: reality of their hunt will be low deer movement because
Speaker 2: of the weather. They then hunt with less enthusiasm, and
Speaker 2: suddenly we're in like a manifest destiny situation. All right,
Speaker 2: So where am I going with this? Well? A lot
Speaker 2: of directions actually, But for right now, I want you
Speaker 2: to be honest about the deer density and the properties
Speaker 2: you hunt. I don't care if you live in Michigan
Speaker 2: or Louisiana wherever, and you think you have the hardest
Speaker 2: hunting ever, I want you to think about the properties
Speaker 2: you hunt. Don't break it down by stay or region
Speaker 2: or something else that can color your bias. Go to
Speaker 2: the individual properties. How many deer live there or use
Speaker 2: them somewhat consistently. This is the basis for a lot
Speaker 2: of the decisions you'll make throughout the season, so it's
Speaker 2: important to be honest. Trail cameras and in person observations
Speaker 2: are huge for this because they show us two things,
Speaker 2: the deer we can confidently say live on or around
Speaker 2: our properties, and the deer that might use them somewhat
Speaker 2: but aren't regulars. Of course, this doesn't take into account
Speaker 2: shifting home ranges or what factors can change deer densities.
Speaker 2: But I'm not going to get into that this week.
Speaker 2: That's topic for a podcast that's coming up. For now,
Speaker 2: just try to be honest about how many deer you
Speaker 2: really have access to. If you're in a low deer
Speaker 2: density world, then you have to be very careful with
Speaker 2: all of the deer you might encounter. If you hunt
Speaker 2: where the deer are thickest thieves, your concerns are different.
Speaker 2: Both circumstances come with unique challenge, but you can't get
Speaker 2: into those until you think about what you have to
Speaker 2: work with overall, and you have to be willing to
Speaker 2: be wrong. This past winter looked like it was a
Speaker 2: really rough one on the deer in my world, at
Speaker 2: least some of the places I hunt. We had wet,
Speaker 2: heavy snow at some really inopportune times, and I thought
Speaker 2: going into spring that the northern deer herds were going
Speaker 2: to be decimated. A random conversation with a forester convinced
Speaker 2: me that I was probably wrong. He said that the
Speaker 2: amount of treetops that suddenly became accessible to the deer
Speaker 2: helped the herd out a lot, which makes sense, and
Speaker 2: my springtime observation seems to show that I had overestimated
Speaker 2: the severity of the winter kill. But By August, I
Speaker 2: was less sure I won property I own. I had
Speaker 2: a handful of little bucks, two dos, and one decent
Speaker 2: deer on camera. I saw several of those deer in
Speaker 2: person as well. When I was scouting. I never got
Speaker 2: a picture of a dough with a fawn all summer
Speaker 2: or fall, nor did I see I didn't have a
Speaker 2: bunch of new deer show up. And the more I
Speaker 2: scouted other public properties in that area and ran cameras
Speaker 2: on a few of the private areas I hunt, I
Speaker 2: realized that I couldn't find a fawn to save my life,
Speaker 2: and I could barely find a dough. My reality there
Speaker 2: shifted multiple times, and it ended up forcing me to
Speaker 2: hunt my highest odd spots for all days sins while
Speaker 2: lowering my standards to whatever buck might come in. I
Speaker 2: also left my dough tags at home because there was
Speaker 2: no reason for me to kill a few baby makers
Speaker 2: when there just weren't that many around. So I started
Speaker 2: out in the preseason with a plan based around a
Speaker 2: certain deer density that I expected to have to work with,
Speaker 2: but by opening day I had to alter that strategy,
Speaker 2: and by the rut, my entire perception of the hunt
Speaker 2: and how I had to go about. It had changed
Speaker 2: completely and this was all tied to the amount of
Speaker 2: deer that were available to me, which wasn't very many.
Speaker 2: So what does this have to do with your hunting everything?
Speaker 2: Should you be rattling NonStop during the run if you
Speaker 2: have one mature buck per section to work with and
Speaker 2: totally horrible buck to dough ratio? Probably not, despite the
Speaker 2: fact that a lot of people who have better places
Speaker 2: to hunt will swear by that tactic. Or should you
Speaker 2: kam a cozi your way right into a prime betting
Speaker 2: area with questionable wind to shoot a big one when
Speaker 2: you know that you have a high deer density and
Speaker 2: you'll be spooking non target deer all day long with
Speaker 2: that move. Or think about in season scouting. If you
Speaker 2: hunt where the winners are mild and the ag is plentiful,
Speaker 2: you know there's deer everywhere. How much damage versus benefit
Speaker 2: will you get from in season scouting every acre to
Speaker 2: find the exact spot to kill a big one. Now
Speaker 2: take that same scenario and put it in a low
Speaker 2: density woods and it's kind of the only game in
Speaker 2: town to get around any deer. Pay attention because this
Speaker 2: is important. What is a good dial or strategy for
Speaker 2: someone else might be a total disaster for you. This
Speaker 2: will hinge on a lot of things like personal skill
Speaker 2: level and a real deep understanding of the strategy, But
Speaker 2: the risk reward ratio of these things is heavily dependent
Speaker 2: on the quantity and quality of deer you have to
Speaker 2: work with. I'll frame this up another way. Do you
Speaker 2: know who the most annoying elk hunter in the West is?
Speaker 2: It's the guy who hunts an over the counter unit
Speaker 2: on public land and thinks that the only thing he
Speaker 2: has to do is walk ridgelines of bugling his head
Speaker 2: off all day long. His idea is that the more
Speaker 2: ground he covers, the more likely he is to run
Speaker 2: across a bowl that will respond accordingly. The problem is
Speaker 2: that the bulls that live in those places have had
Speaker 2: so many negative interactions after checking out a strange bugle,
Speaker 2: the odds of a bull giving his location in response,
Speaker 2: or better yet, coming in while bugling are low. In
Speaker 2: a place where a high density and limited pressure this
Speaker 2: move will net you response is like crazy. It won't
Speaker 2: spook elk probably and will instead convince enough of them
Speaker 2: to come in or bugle back that it seems like
Speaker 2: the best strategy ever, and it is if you're on
Speaker 2: the Deseret Ranch in Utah and you have a twenty
Speaker 2: thousand dollars ELK tag in your pocket. But if you're
Speaker 2: in and over the counter unit in Colorado, it's almost
Speaker 2: guaranteed to fail every time, and worse work against you.
Speaker 2: You might be thinking that this has more to do
Speaker 2: with pressure than game density, and you're right, sort of.
Speaker 2: With fewer animals, the mistakes are compounded because the opportunities
Speaker 2: are lessened with each screw up. The margin for error
Speaker 2: just isn't in your favor. So think about the density
Speaker 2: you're working with on your home ground or the place
Speaker 2: you love to travel, to be honest about it, and
Speaker 2: think about how you'll take an even better census next year.
Speaker 2: And then come back next week because I'm going to
Speaker 2: talk about all all kinds of strategies for hunting low
Speaker 2: deer densities, and then the week after I'll probably touch
Speaker 2: on that high deer density thing. But should listen in
Speaker 2: because there's a lot to consider just when you're working
Speaker 2: around the amount of deer that might be available to you.
Speaker 2: That's it for this week. I'm Tony Peterson. This has
Speaker 2: been the wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, which is brought
Speaker 2: to you by first Light. As always, thank you so
Speaker 2: much for your support, for listening, for reading the articles.
Speaker 2: For whatever you're doing in this media world, we really
Speaker 2: really appreciate it. If you want more content, you know
Speaker 2: where to go, the medeater dot com. You can check
Speaker 2: out all kinds of stuff there. Maybe pick up the
Speaker 2: new board game of Meat Eater Trivia if you want
Speaker 2: to play that over the holidays or something. Lots of
Speaker 2: good stuff there at the medeater dot com.