Speaker 1: All right, we're back with another episode of Cutting the
Speaker 1: Distance podcast. This week, my guest is Tom Schneider. You
Speaker 1: probably remember Tom from our Wolf episode earlier on, and
Speaker 1: then we did a couple of episodes of rifle hunting
Speaker 1: tactics which were wildly popular and much appreciated from our listeners.
Speaker 2: Tom.
Speaker 1: If you don't know, if you haven't listened to those Tom,
Speaker 1: And if you don't know who Tom is, he's probably
Speaker 1: one of the best all around hunters that I know.
Speaker 1: You put this guy in the woods chasing elk with
Speaker 1: a bow. You put him in the woods chasing elk
Speaker 1: with a rifle, mule the air with a rifle, white
Speaker 1: tails with a rifle, a bow.
Speaker 2: You name it.
Speaker 1: Tom and his family can They're very accomplished hunters. So
Speaker 1: welcome again to the show. I'm glad to have you on.
Speaker 3: Thanks again for having me.
Speaker 1: I appreciate it absolutely. So how was your fall this year?
Speaker 1: We haven't talked. I know, I feel like you've been busy.
Speaker 2: I kind of fall.
Speaker 1: We I watch on social and you're like, you go
Speaker 1: from working like a madman to being hunting like a madman,
Speaker 1: and it's like, I don't know, you probably haven't hardly
Speaker 1: had a breath to breathe. How's your fall been?
Speaker 3: Oh, just like you pretty much summed it up and
Speaker 3: that one sentence, working and hunting. And I took on
Speaker 3: more work than I should have this hunting season. So
Speaker 3: so anytime I am home, it's like, oh, should it
Speaker 3: be time spend with the wife and kids or going
Speaker 3: back to full on, you know, long days working in
Speaker 3: the woods. So but no, it's it's it's always trying
Speaker 3: to find that balance. It was. It's been a good fall. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I started in Alaska. I did a moose on Alaska.
Speaker 3: It's been a long time since I hunted moose, and man,
Speaker 3: I stayed way longer than I should have.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I was like, I was seeing pictures in Alaska,
Speaker 1: and then I seen more.
Speaker 2: I'm like, is he still up there hunting? Like, what
Speaker 2: the heck? RD, He's gone a long time up there.
Speaker 3: That's a lot what a lot of people were saying too.
Speaker 3: And I had some friends at home we were talking
Speaker 3: about wolf hunting, Like, I got some friends at home, like, hey,
Speaker 3: I got a good lead on a wolfpack. I'm like,
Speaker 3: I can't go, but I'm like I'll be home soon
Speaker 3: a week or two goes by and they're like, hey,
Speaker 3: are you back yet. I'm like, no, I'm still in Alaska.
Speaker 3: You're like, you're still in Alaska. Oh man, Yeah, it
Speaker 3: was interesting, but yeah, I'd say so. I left to
Speaker 3: Alaska September fifth, and I got back the twenty eight.
Speaker 1: Holy cow, Wow, that's a that's a long time. That's
Speaker 1: an amazing trip.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah. Well, the moose just whipped our butt, you know.
Speaker 3: And I felt like, so the hunts I've done in
Speaker 3: the past with moose, and this was before my brother
Speaker 3: in law's sister Ever moved to Alaska, you know, Chavis
Speaker 3: Sny used to just do DIY hunts, and you know,
Speaker 3: I felt like finding the moose was never the problem,
Speaker 3: Like it was just the hardest part was packing them out.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah.
Speaker 3: And this was one of those hunts where I'm like,
Speaker 3: it really humbled me on moose hunting because I felt
Speaker 3: like it was always more of work than it was hunting.
Speaker 3: And we did a lot of hunting and trying to
Speaker 3: find a moose to kill, and it was just I
Speaker 3: think a lot of hunters, you know, have this experience
Speaker 3: of being just in the wrong spot at the wrong time,
Speaker 3: over and over and over and over again, and we
Speaker 3: just it was just yeah and so, but I try
Speaker 3: to shorten my story up the last day of moose season,
Speaker 3: I wanted to moose with the boat, but I said,
Speaker 3: screw the boat at staying at camp. I'm sorry, hoyit,
Speaker 3: but yeah, I left the boy at camp and and
Speaker 3: some like the rifles in the hand, you know, and
Speaker 3: we could even get we were even having a hard
Speaker 3: time getting a moose in in lot, you know, within
Speaker 3: six hundred yards. I was like, how do respects expect
Speaker 3: to get one with a bow if we can't even
Speaker 3: get them that close, you know. And I say the
Speaker 3: biggest struggle we were fighting the area we were hunting.
Speaker 3: Without giving too much detail, there just wasn't really good
Speaker 3: elevation where you can sit up in glass these moose.
Speaker 3: You're kind of hunting these bottoms. You got a lot
Speaker 3: of alders, and so your visibility is very slim. And
Speaker 3: I don't feel there like there wasn't one time, right say,
Speaker 3: like we were in a good spot where we could glass.
Speaker 3: There was a lot of moose activity, they just you
Speaker 3: couldn't glass them up. And then when when the sun
Speaker 3: rise and everything would bed down and just everything went quiet,
Speaker 3: you know, and you'd sit there and you know, hike
Speaker 3: the mountain and grunt, and you know, Adam is a
Speaker 3: really good hunter. I'm a really good hunter. But I
Speaker 3: also feel like, you know, you get two guys that
Speaker 3: have different opinions on how to hunt, and you know,
Speaker 3: I left a lot of it to Adam, but there
Speaker 3: was times where I'm like, you see me, I'm kind
Speaker 3: of the skinny guy that always wants to hike. And
Speaker 3: I know glassing is important too, but I'm like, especially
Speaker 3: when there's not a lot of visibility, I'm like, Adam,
Speaker 3: I think we should just hike, you know, right, And
Speaker 3: he's like, if we just sit here, because it is
Speaker 3: the rut, He's like, well, if we just sit here,
Speaker 3: we'll see moose passing through. And I'm like, okay, you know.
Speaker 3: And after a couple of days of that, I'm just like,
Speaker 3: I think we should start doing more moving around, hiking
Speaker 3: a lot more and stuff. And it seemed like either
Speaker 3: way nothing was working.
Speaker 2: It's frustrated.
Speaker 3: So we're just like, hiking's not working, and trying to
Speaker 3: locatable not hikings not and it was just right. But
Speaker 3: the last day last it was the last day of season,
Speaker 3: you know, we saw a meadow and it was just
Speaker 3: moose right activity, like crazy, but we were I'd say
Speaker 3: we were probably at thirteen hundred yards. But as soon
Speaker 3: as you start closing the distance, cutting that distance to
Speaker 3: about you know, to even just long range rifle range
Speaker 3: between eight hundred and six hundred yards, you couldn't see
Speaker 3: them anymore. And so you couldn't tell where they'd even
Speaker 3: bet down, you know, because there was a lot of metal.
Speaker 3: There was small small amount of meadows, but a lot
Speaker 3: of alders, and so when they bet down, you're like,
Speaker 3: I have no clue where they betted, and so because
Speaker 3: they can move another one hundred to two hundred yards
Speaker 3: into this to the alders and disappear. But anyways, kind
Speaker 3: of the plan was, because you know, sun Rose, it
Speaker 3: was a warmer day, they all bet it down. I
Speaker 3: was like, I know, Adam, this sounds like a crazy idea,
Speaker 3: but I think we need to do is just do it.
Speaker 3: It's a huge loop around, walking through bog, walking through
Speaker 3: a lot of masts, but to keep our wind in
Speaker 3: our favor, and I think just waiting that meadow about
Speaker 3: right in the evening, when all the moose had come
Speaker 3: back to feed and do there's you know, the cow
Speaker 3: mooster feeding, but the bulls are rutting like crazy. But
Speaker 3: just wait for that last last hour before dark. It's
Speaker 3: a long ways out from our camp, but I think
Speaker 3: if we wait there, then I think that last hour
Speaker 3: before dark, I think we should just grunt the heck
Speaker 3: out of that, you know. And that's what we did,
Speaker 3: you know, like I said, Morning wrote the sun rose
Speaker 3: moose all betted down, pretty much everything was shot for
Speaker 3: the day there, and so we're like, well, let's just
Speaker 3: well take naps, trike lasting do what we can. And
Speaker 3: I kid you, nod. It was so on the last
Speaker 3: it was the last two hours before dark. We got up.
Speaker 3: We're like, let's move. Let's just every single meadow we
Speaker 3: know of, let's go to it and grunt and see
Speaker 3: if we can get something to talk. And we got
Speaker 3: a bowl of talk, grunting hard. And so we worked
Speaker 3: and worked and worked him. Adam worked him at him
Speaker 3: has a lot of experience calling moose and he's great
Speaker 3: at it. And he called that moose in the sixty
Speaker 3: yards and I blasted with the rifle. Holy smokes, and
Speaker 3: I was like, and then when I walked up to
Speaker 3: the dead moose. I looked at the sun. It's the
Speaker 3: last day of moose season. The sun is touching the mountains. Oh,
Speaker 3: it is literally the last day, last out. And I
Speaker 3: just like, I said, I couldn't be more humbled in
Speaker 3: a situation like that, because I always looked at moose
Speaker 3: as a stupid, dumb animal U And I'm like, I
Speaker 3: had a lot of respect for them. They outsmarted us
Speaker 3: multiple different times, you know, and I was just like, man,
Speaker 3: I can't believe the moose are doing this to us.
Speaker 3: And Adam even said, he's like, this is the hardest
Speaker 3: I've ever had to work for a moose, like just
Speaker 3: to get a moose shot. And I'm like, I promise, Adam,
Speaker 3: I'm not a rookie. It seemed easier in the past.
Speaker 3: But but then yeah, then after that, then Tana, you know,
Speaker 3: because Adam when he was helping me, Tanna has to
Speaker 3: watch the kids, and Tanna wants to break from the kids,
Speaker 3: and she's like, I want a cariboo. So I'm like, well,
Speaker 3: I better stay for another week or so for and
Speaker 3: so I stayed with Tana just and so Adam watched
Speaker 3: the kids and a lot of bears over there and
Speaker 3: we helped her, but we did help her get a cariboo.
Speaker 3: And we kind of had a situation though where it
Speaker 3: was the So it was the days that she shot
Speaker 3: her cariboo, we saw him, we she wanted to get
Speaker 3: it with the bow. We belly crawled for several hours
Speaker 3: to get in Archie range, and we had a little
Speaker 3: like there's in this particular area where the caribou where
Speaker 3: it's just flat tundra, there's nowhere to hide. But this
Speaker 3: one group finally decided to bed right next to an
Speaker 3: older patch. We're like, let's belly crawl to that older patch,
Speaker 3: and as soon as we get to the older patch,
Speaker 3: we can get up, get up on our knees, get
Speaker 3: as close as you need to to the caribou, get
Speaker 3: your arrow, and shoot that bowl. And because Tana was
Speaker 3: really selective with cariboo, so there was a lot of
Speaker 3: that we could have killed. But she's like it doesn't
Speaker 3: have a bez on this side, or doesn't have a show.
Speaker 3: I'm like, ken, I'd be sticking that bowl all day
Speaker 3: with her.
Speaker 2: She's a bit of a caribou snob.
Speaker 3: She's a caribou snob, which is not a bad thing.
Speaker 3: I think I'm a meal there snob. She's a caribou snob.
Speaker 3: We all have, we all have our things. And well, anyways,
Speaker 3: she was. It was a big bull. And it was
Speaker 3: kind of cool because we're hunting the rut and you're
Speaker 3: just kind of seeing the rut take place with with caribou,
Speaker 3: which is really cool, you know. So we're seeing new
Speaker 3: bulls moving the herds, pushing new balls out. It's just
Speaker 3: like hunting elk. It was really cool to watch. And
Speaker 3: they have these beautiful white manes and well, anyway, so
Speaker 3: they were bedded and we were so we had to
Speaker 3: belly crawl on another thirty yards, you know, and every
Speaker 3: every yard do we move, it would take five minutes
Speaker 3: or so, you know, so it was moving really slow,
Speaker 3: but you're but those cows were they're on alert, and
Speaker 3: they were like on a little just on a little knoll,
Speaker 3: just enough to where they had some pretty good eyes,
Speaker 3: you know. And I'm like, and every time we'd move
Speaker 3: a couple of yards, they'd look our way. We'd stop
Speaker 3: and they'd look away, and I'm like, we will make
Speaker 3: this work. As soon as we get to the elders,
Speaker 3: we're in the clear. The caribou just all got up
Speaker 3: and just started to run. We're like what and right
Speaker 3: beside us, we had no clue. Was there a grizzly
Speaker 3: runs right past us as we were laying flat in
Speaker 3: the tundra and is chasing the caribou that we have
Speaker 3: that we have spent so many hours in belly crawling.
Speaker 3: And d was just like, give me the gun I
Speaker 3: want at this point, just give me a gun. I'll
Speaker 3: shoot the caribou with the gun. And that I said,
Speaker 3: are you sure like I did the hole? Are you
Speaker 3: sure you don't want to do it the bout? She's like, Tom,
Speaker 3: don't question me, give me the gun. Okay, the gun.
Speaker 3: There you go, And and she got up and shot
Speaker 3: the caribou. And then then we're like, oh, shoot, now
Speaker 3: we have a cariboo that's dead. We have a bear
Speaker 3: still chasing caribou, trying to get a dead Caribooh so
Speaker 3: so now we have our heads on a squibble as
Speaker 3: we're skinning out. But our savior came. Tanna sent an
Speaker 3: inReach message to Adam's come get us, and he came
Speaker 3: and landed pretty close to the cariboo, so we were
Speaker 3: able to debone it right then and there Oh no, that. No,
Speaker 3: we didn't debone. That one. We kept the bones in
Speaker 3: because yeah, we got the got the plane right there,
Speaker 3: so that was nice and yeah that makes an easy
Speaker 3: pack when you have a plane that you can land
Speaker 3: next to, you know. But yeah, no, So that then
Speaker 3: I finally got back home and unfortunately I missed elk season,
Speaker 3: so I know, but but I haven't had it moose
Speaker 3: in a long time. So I'm like, you know, it's
Speaker 3: a sacrifice. But I'd say the mistake I made was
Speaker 3: I purchased the archery tag and I should have got
Speaker 3: the rifle tag, so because now I'm stuck with the
Speaker 3: archery tag, right, oh yeah, so I'm like, well, shoot,
Speaker 3: I should have got the rifle tag, but I ended
Speaker 3: up having you know, I'm like, I had to catch
Speaker 3: up with work anyways in October, so I'm like, I
Speaker 3: didn't really think I had much time to huntoke with
Speaker 3: a rifle anyway. So that was pretty much the sacrifice. Well,
Speaker 3: if I hunt moose this year, I'm not hunting elk.
Speaker 3: And so I got my moose and I'm super happy.
Speaker 3: He's a big bull.
Speaker 2: So yeah, that's awesome. Did you film any of this stuff?
Speaker 3: Yeah, so it was all on film, the moose and
Speaker 3: the caribou, and then well, then I had to go
Speaker 3: to Alaska to back up. I had to go to
Speaker 3: Alaska early because Adam had a big bowl down. He
Speaker 3: killed it solo, he worked it up solo. But he's
Speaker 3: just like it's a long hike in and he needs help.
Speaker 3: And so he's like, Tom, can you come to Alaska
Speaker 3: a little bit earlier than your planet too? So I
Speaker 3: had to do overnight flights to get to Alaska and
Speaker 3: help out him finish packing his So as soon as
Speaker 3: I stepped foot in Alaska with my crocs, I was
Speaker 3: immediately thrown in the bush plane. We were backing moose quarters.
Speaker 3: Oh man, and I literally, yeah, the kid you not
Speaker 3: went from yeah, Idaho? Yeah, so that was it that well,
Speaker 3: I think that was September fourth or something. I don't
Speaker 3: even remember at this point, but yeah, by the time
Speaker 3: I made it to Alaska, I mean here it was.
Speaker 3: We packed out two rears that night as soon as
Speaker 3: I arrived, and so and then we finished finished packing
Speaker 3: out the rest the next day, which we were glad
Speaker 3: to do because we're like, we have the household. There's
Speaker 3: a big storm coming and yeah, I think that sums
Speaker 3: up Alaska though.
Speaker 1: Man sounds like, yeah, it sounds like a pretty good
Speaker 1: trade off. I mean, I love l cutting, but man,
Speaker 1: that that would be a fun, fun trade off.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, And the antlers of Moose are just so
Speaker 3: unique and cool, you know. And one thing I love
Speaker 3: with Alaska it's still like I still considered as the
Speaker 3: last frontier where you can get away from people still,
Speaker 3: you know, like, and it's getting harder, of course, I
Speaker 3: feel like more and more people are discovering it. But
Speaker 3: I feel comparative to the Lower forty eight, you can
Speaker 3: you can get in the no Man's Land and and
Speaker 3: it and it's it's nice. It's just there's a different
Speaker 3: spirit to it, you know what I mean. So it's
Speaker 3: but yeah, no, I'm back now in the lower forty eight.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well hunting pressure, Yeah, back to normal life, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So I hear a bunch of background noise. Where
Speaker 2: are you at?
Speaker 3: So this is a funny sit. Well, I've not given
Speaker 3: too much detail my unit. I set up a base
Speaker 3: camp kind of in the valley next to the town,
Speaker 3: and and so that's why you might hear a little
Speaker 3: bit of background sound. There is a highway behind me.
Speaker 3: But but I thought was really nice. I was like,
Speaker 3: this saves a lot of money from spending on a
Speaker 3: motel or hotel, which just I just I did as
Speaker 3: I paid for a camp spot and I have power
Speaker 3: and running water. Oh sweet, So I have a power
Speaker 3: with a with a big heater right here. It gets
Speaker 3: really cold that night. It's been in freeze temperatures at night.
Speaker 3: And yeah, I'm toasty in here, and so and from here,
Speaker 3: I'm kind of like to where I can get to
Speaker 3: my areas pretty quick, you know. And then I what
Speaker 3: I did. Well, I guess people can't out necessarily, They're
Speaker 3: not necessarily have a video to watch. But uh, I
Speaker 3: packed a smaller tent to if I have an area
Speaker 3: where I really want a camp back there, I have
Speaker 3: a smaller tent that I can I can pack on
Speaker 3: my back, you know, and go farther back. But this
Speaker 3: is kind of like my base camp. This is like
Speaker 3: this is where most my stuff is. Okay, and you're
Speaker 3: hunting mule there and I'm going after mual there.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, tomorrow is the first day for your tag.
Speaker 3: I'm finally starting to feel it, like it's starting to
Speaker 3: creep up on me. You know, I've got the what
Speaker 3: do you call it? The butter butterflies. I got the
Speaker 3: butterflies today, just like I did it. I got here
Speaker 3: a couple of days early to scout. But when I
Speaker 3: when I mean scout, it was there's more for I
Speaker 3: wanted to see where my access points were. I want
Speaker 3: to see where I can get my pickup at. I
Speaker 3: spend a lot of time E scouting. I mean, I've
Speaker 3: been working a lot lately to prepare for this hunt
Speaker 3: and to get all my projects caught up. But every
Speaker 3: evening I've been on the computer E scouting, and I
Speaker 3: have I have three main trail systems that I'm like,
Speaker 3: one of these trail systems is gonna pull. Is going
Speaker 3: to help me get a buck? I know it is,
Speaker 3: you know. So that's and and I felt like I've
Speaker 3: accomplished my first mission, which was being able to get
Speaker 3: my pickup to all those sites because I've I know
Speaker 3: one thing I know about Colorado. There's a lot of these,
Speaker 3: uh these road systems. They look great from the scouting,
Speaker 3: and I don't care the clarity of the scouting. You
Speaker 3: know of Google Earth and Onyx or whatever you guys
Speaker 3: like to use. You get there and you're like, holy crap.
Speaker 3: I actually can't get a pick up up this road.
Speaker 1: It's so bad, right right, Well, New Mexico's a lot
Speaker 1: like that too. It's like, oh, yeah, there's a road
Speaker 1: here and it's open, and you get there and it's
Speaker 1: like washed out eighty seven times. You know, you have
Speaker 1: to have a side by side to do all the
Speaker 1: little crossings and stuff.
Speaker 3: So yeah, and and me being sol in as far
Speaker 3: as I had to drive, I'm like, I didn't want
Speaker 3: to drive a four wheeler down here. But now I'm like, kick,
Speaker 3: there's a part of me that's slightly kicking myself, but
Speaker 3: I'm I'm not because I did find a way to
Speaker 3: get to all the trail systems comfortably with my vehicle,
Speaker 3: So I'm like that is a plus. There was one kid,
Speaker 3: you know, I was like, oh, I wanted to get
Speaker 3: to that trail so aboud, I'm like, it's just not
Speaker 3: doable with a pickup, And I just did a little
Speaker 3: more ea scouting. I found another way in. So I
Speaker 3: was like sweet. I was like, because that was a
Speaker 3: spot I really wanted to go, but but I found
Speaker 3: some Like we were talking, well, we kind of just
Speaker 3: talked a little bit about you know, with the scouting
Speaker 3: and stuff. And the one thing I really do is
Speaker 3: I'm I'm trying to get far away from people as
Speaker 3: I can. That's like my first step.
Speaker 1: Okay, I was gonna ask you, like, when you're going
Speaker 1: out of state or into an area you're unfamiliar with,
Speaker 1: what are you looking for? Like, Okay, I'm gonna go mule.
Speaker 1: You're hunting, So you're like, Okay, how how do I
Speaker 1: get away from the masses. Yeah, we'll find a place
Speaker 1: like that, like get away into a roadless area, I'm assuming,
Speaker 1: and then and then go from there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So that's pretty much it. So that that was
Speaker 3: the first thing I saw, is like, there's a lot
Speaker 3: of this unit where and what's great with this unit
Speaker 3: there's a lot of deer, which is which makes me
Speaker 3: excited just because there's good numbers here. Quality I don't know,
Speaker 3: but I did just yesterday, just driving around, I saw
Speaker 3: a dozen bucks, which is I'm not I'm not used
Speaker 3: to that. Oh I used to. I'm used to hunting
Speaker 3: areas where there's very little numbers of mule there and
Speaker 3: you're putting on a lot of miles on the ground
Speaker 3: just to see a couple bucks. You know what? I
Speaker 3: mean and and so to be able to hunt a
Speaker 3: unit like this is kind of cool. But the only
Speaker 3: thing that slightly concerned me is I talk to a
Speaker 3: lot of guys that have hunted this in the past
Speaker 3: and are like, the quality is just not here though,
Speaker 3: you know, that's what a lot of them say, But
Speaker 3: I've also take that in my mind. I'm just kind
Speaker 3: of I'm just trying to make you put you in
Speaker 3: my own mind and how I how it works. But
Speaker 3: for me, I'm like, well, are they going far enough
Speaker 3: back to the big bucks? Are they getting away from
Speaker 3: the hunting pressure to find the big bucks? And so
Speaker 3: for me when they when people are telling me, oh,
Speaker 3: expect between one hundred and thirty one hundred inch or
Speaker 3: one hundred and sixty inch class muleies, I'm like, I'm
Speaker 3: not I'm not going to go buy that right now.
Speaker 3: I'm just like, I'm just going to pretend I didn't
Speaker 3: hear that. I'm going to go after one eighty right
Speaker 3: And then every day a couple of inches will drop,
Speaker 3: so it's like, okay, So so first day season one
Speaker 3: eighty inch buck, second day season a one seventy eight
Speaker 3: inch buck. Maybe the last day season, maybe it is
Speaker 3: a one sixty.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, I kind of do that with ELK two.
Speaker 1: And this year was a tough year. So you know,
Speaker 1: first day it's like, oh yeah, nothing but a nice
Speaker 1: six point.
Speaker 2: By the second day.
Speaker 1: The spike walks out and well, sorry, dude, bam, you're done.
Speaker 3: He walked out on the wrong day.
Speaker 2: Yeah he did, he did.
Speaker 1: It was a bad day for him and a really
Speaker 1: good day for me. But sow, No, when you say
Speaker 1: you're getting far back, are you like one mile, two mile,
Speaker 1: eight miles? Are you like or whatever? You know, it
Speaker 1: takes like, okay, you know, average people are good. Let's
Speaker 1: say they're going a mile or two. Then you're like, well,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go deeper.
Speaker 3: So let's just say this. So so my first the
Speaker 3: first spot in my mind, I'm gonna, well, i have
Speaker 3: all this energy built up and I've been driving. I'm
Speaker 3: gonna go to the hardest spot first. And there's this.
Speaker 3: It is a good plan, right, And then when I'm
Speaker 3: and I and me, when I'm getting older now, I
Speaker 3: used to hit just hard every day, really long miles,
Speaker 3: and now I'll do every other day where I'll go
Speaker 3: one really hard day and one lighter day, one really
Speaker 3: hard day, one lighter day, and so tomorrow is going
Speaker 3: to be a really hard day mapping it. It looks
Speaker 3: like it's seven and a half miles back. Uh so.
Speaker 3: But but what I like is, you know, there's not
Speaker 3: a lot of elevation gain. But I'm just gonna get
Speaker 3: up early in the morning. Like I said, I have
Speaker 3: a lot of energy built up. I had the past
Speaker 3: couple of days to sleep in. I got a lot
Speaker 3: of sleep. So I'm just going to get up really early.
Speaker 3: And there's a big, beautiful place where I can glass
Speaker 3: from good eyes on on deer. And you know, in
Speaker 3: my mind when I when I looked at that spot
Speaker 3: on the map, like it just it just you know,
Speaker 3: we all have those spots like with you elk hunting
Speaker 3: or it's just like, man, that area just looks elky,
Speaker 3: Like that spot of the mountain just looks like if
Speaker 3: I was a big monster meal there, I'd be right
Speaker 3: there in that opening, you know, away from all the
Speaker 3: hunting pressure. But the bounce side is there's a lot
Speaker 3: of horses back there, and so I made the initiative
Speaker 3: of getting in contact with them and asking them, what
Speaker 3: hunters are you packing back there? Am I is it
Speaker 3: if I go back there, is it just going to
Speaker 3: be am I going to be just you know, walking
Speaker 3: on top of people? And the response I got was
Speaker 3: actually good, and so that the outfitter told me, Hey, no,
Speaker 3: we just do a bunch of drop camps and they're
Speaker 3: just they're just elk hunters. So You're honestly going to
Speaker 3: be the only meal there hunter back there.
Speaker 2: Oh wow.
Speaker 3: So I'm like sweet and they're like, you're not going
Speaker 3: to interfere with us. Do what you're going to do
Speaker 3: a big buck And so I'm like, all right, sounds
Speaker 3: like a plan. And they even said, you know, I like,
Speaker 3: I said, this is a unit I've never even hunted before,
Speaker 3: and but they told me there's big bucks back there.
Speaker 3: So I'm like that even that even clarifies my mind
Speaker 3: of that spot even more. And so it is my
Speaker 3: day one spot. So that's what I'm going to do tomorrow.
Speaker 3: But yeah, no, I I like to get away from people.
Speaker 3: You know. I know a lot of people like to
Speaker 3: call and find people with advice, and I do that too,
Speaker 3: but it's like the one thing that always goes through
Speaker 3: my mind is if somebody else knows about the spot,
Speaker 3: then who else knows about the spot too, right, and
Speaker 3: you know big bucks are going to get big by
Speaker 3: avoiding hunting pressure for long periods of time. And so
Speaker 3: those are the places I want to find, right. Yeah,
Speaker 3: it could be hard in Colorado.
Speaker 2: Yeah, very hard.
Speaker 1: It's it's a popular place for people to go, and
Speaker 1: you know, and and maybe people before you get there,
Speaker 1: you know, people shoot the deer or you know, in
Speaker 1: the last few years, they just don't have an age
Speaker 1: class in the place you want to go, like, you know,
Speaker 1: they just don't grow old enough.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I get it.
Speaker 1: You're trying to find those places where the deer can
Speaker 1: be undisturbed, they can grow a lot, they can grow
Speaker 1: old enough, and you know, sometimes that's just further out
Speaker 1: than some people are willing to walk.
Speaker 2: Most people are willing to walk.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So, okay, I got a question. This This question is
Speaker 1: our Pendleton Whiskey question and answer for for the episode.
Speaker 1: And this question is going to be a little bit
Speaker 1: uh self serving, because this is a question for me.
Speaker 1: Normally it's a question from our listeners. But uh, I'm
Speaker 1: just gonna say I'm not your your best backcountry mule
Speaker 1: deer guy. And here's here's here's the dilemma. Every time
Speaker 1: I go mule deer hunting, I can't find mule deer.
Speaker 1: I'm covered up in elk right.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: If I were elk cutting, i'd probably see nothing but deer.
Speaker 1: But every time I go a mule deer. I just
Speaker 1: got home from a mulder hunt here in Idaho. You know,
Speaker 1: I've got quite a waste back. The access was pretty good.
Speaker 1: But I'm back there and I had some good intel.
Speaker 1: Phelps had just hunted there and he's like, yeah, you
Speaker 1: should go this spot, this spot. Then I get there, man,
Speaker 1: I'm just not turning deer up. And then I start thinking, Okay,
Speaker 1: maybe maybe I'm just not good at glassing. I can't
Speaker 1: pick out deer. But then I start I'm glassing and
Speaker 1: I see a little tiny I'm like it, like eight
Speaker 1: hundred yards. I picked out a little weasel running across
Speaker 1: the ground, you know. And I'm like, I'm seeing little
Speaker 1: things like that. I'm seeing an owl in a tree.
Speaker 1: I'm like, I'm picking out things like I think I'm
Speaker 1: sharp eyed enough, but I'm just missing these deer. But
Speaker 1: I'm not seeing the deer.
Speaker 2: But Doug on it elk, like the last the last
Speaker 2: day I was there, I woke I was woke.
Speaker 1: Up in my tent to bugle an hour before daylight.
Speaker 1: And I get up and these elk. It was an
Speaker 1: incredible day, Like you know, this is I'm asking about
Speaker 1: mule deer, but these elk rudded. They bugled on their
Speaker 1: own more than I had any I didn't have this
Speaker 1: good action in September. And this was the twenty third
Speaker 1: of October. And these bulls are screaming all day. I
Speaker 1: watched three different bulls breed cows and these are five
Speaker 1: point bowl Two of them were five points well, one
Speaker 1: was a four by five, one was a five by five,
Speaker 1: and one was a spike. I seen the spike jump
Speaker 1: up and breed a cow too, And I'm just like,
Speaker 1: what the heck is going on with these elk?
Speaker 2: Number one? But where the heck are the dang deer.
Speaker 1: This one night, I hiked out and glass glass till
Speaker 1: almost dark and I get back to my tent right
Speaker 1: at dusk, like it's too dark to shoot. But I
Speaker 1: get back to I didn't see nothing. Get back to
Speaker 1: my tent and there's two meal deer does standing next
Speaker 1: to my tent. It's like insult the injury, right, But anyway,
Speaker 1: I'm not turning up deer, I'm turning up elk, or
Speaker 1: you know, maybe nothing at all. So is it like,
Speaker 1: am I just in the wrong spots? I see tracks everywhere.
Speaker 1: I'll see tracks everywhere deer here also deal a lot
Speaker 1: of deer tracks everywhere, but just catching them there at
Speaker 1: the right time. Maybe I'm just not on the right
Speaker 1: vantage point. I do know, like one area I glassed
Speaker 1: all morning and I didn't turn anything up, But once
Speaker 1: I dove in a bit, there were some places I
Speaker 1: couldn't see that I couldn't glass up, and there were
Speaker 1: deer tracks everywhere in there. So is it just the
Speaker 1: matter of like finding the right glassing point, the right
Speaker 1: elevation band?
Speaker 2: What? What?
Speaker 3: What?
Speaker 2: Where Am I going wrong here?
Speaker 3: Well? That's that's a great question. And you know, there's
Speaker 3: areas I hunt where elk and mealders seem to run
Speaker 3: the same areas, and and there's vice versa. We're sometimes
Speaker 3: it almost seems like where there's elk, there's not meal there.
Speaker 3: Where there's meal there, there's not elk. I've been told
Speaker 3: by multiple people in the past that they notice that
Speaker 3: when there's more elk numbers that'll it'll drop the meal
Speaker 3: their numbers a little bit, you know. But for me,
Speaker 3: a lot of the mule deer that I hunt and
Speaker 3: kill are are in Elk Habitat, and so I'm hunting
Speaker 3: around Elk all the time. There's obviously there is. I mean,
Speaker 3: you can look at any mountain range with mule deer
Speaker 3: and you can put a big buck just about anywhere
Speaker 3: on that mountain. But there's always those places where, like
Speaker 3: like I was mentioning, where it's just like really mealy
Speaker 3: and what I mean by that, I've always considered, like
Speaker 3: mule deer a sheep with antlers. They they love steep.
Speaker 3: They they they they feel safe out there, you know,
Speaker 3: naturally you see the big ears. They have really good eyes,
Speaker 3: and you know there sometimes there's a misconception, especially with
Speaker 3: the younger bucks when they get shot, people are like, oh,
Speaker 3: they're stupid. They just stand out in the opening. That's
Speaker 3: like their actual natural instinct is to see from a
Speaker 3: distance and see their predation coming from afar. And but
Speaker 3: they also have those spots too. They're they're very adaptable.
Speaker 3: Like you know, I've seen it with hunting pressure where
Speaker 3: all of a sudden the deer realized, well, they're not
Speaker 3: safe in those openings, and after a couple of days,
Speaker 3: you don't see them anymore, and they now they're timber.
Speaker 3: They're timber animals, and so now you're gonna have to
Speaker 3: focus on that. But primetime is really important to me.
Speaker 3: You know the question you ask, It really depends on
Speaker 3: weather and what the weather's doing. But primetime is so
Speaker 3: important to me. With meal they're hunting, especially when you
Speaker 3: have hot, sunny days, when you have a consistent cool
Speaker 3: at night, warm in the day. You know, these deer
Speaker 3: are they have a area, they have a feeding area,
Speaker 3: especially the Bigger Bucks especially, and if it's before the rut,
Speaker 3: they're gonna put themselves in a place where they feel safe.
Speaker 3: And I've noticed not just with Big Bucks, but Big
Speaker 3: Bull Elk too. They safety is more of a priority
Speaker 3: for them than a food source. And so you'll be
Speaker 3: in these bases just like, OK, right where they're all
Speaker 3: there's all this feed, and you're like, why aren't the
Speaker 3: mule there down here where all the feed is. Well,
Speaker 3: they don't feel safe there. They need this. I've talked
Speaker 3: about this before, the groceries, shelter and the safety. They
Speaker 3: need to feel safe. They need to be able to
Speaker 3: have an escape route too. So when I'm looking at
Speaker 3: e scouting, sure like I can look at the top
Speaker 3: of this basin and you'll see rocks, rock cliffs as
Speaker 3: far as I can see up the canyon. Then there
Speaker 3: might be a little timber patch. Well, if a big
Speaker 3: millie buckles in that little timber patch's I kind of
Speaker 3: stuck there, right. He doesn't have an escape route because
Speaker 3: he goes to the rocks here, is going to get
Speaker 3: killed if he goes in the rocks here. So so
Speaker 3: there has to be a balance there of the grocery
Speaker 3: shelter and the safety. And like I said, a big buck,
Speaker 3: the safety is the biggest priority. And they're always expecting
Speaker 3: predation to come from below them. That's one thing I
Speaker 3: always look at. Secondly, they just like a good escape route.
Speaker 3: So they're going to pick a spot where if a
Speaker 3: predator is coming through, they know how to get out.
Speaker 3: They can get out of the camp country without being realizing.
Speaker 3: You know, And you got a meal their buck that's
Speaker 3: seven eight years old. He's smart. He's actually you know,
Speaker 3: like I said, people think meaales are stupid, but that's
Speaker 3: if you kill young bucks. An old buck is no
Speaker 3: different than hunting an old bull elk, an old white tail.
Speaker 3: They adapt, they learn there's a reason why they're alive
Speaker 3: when they're eight years old. And you know, you get
Speaker 3: that seven to eight year old class, you got a
Speaker 3: mature mealy on your hands. And so that's what I
Speaker 3: like to pursue, you know, And you will find younger
Speaker 3: bucks in those areas. There's a lot of feed, right,
Speaker 3: So like you can get the older lower elevation, you'll
Speaker 3: find young bucks young does and you may not find
Speaker 3: the big bucks there because frankly, it's not a safe
Speaker 3: place for him.
Speaker 2: Right right, answer your question, Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think.
Speaker 1: Like timing too, Like when when when Phelps was there,
Speaker 1: you know, they were hunting, they were seeing a lot
Speaker 1: of deer, but there was a lot of other people.
Speaker 1: And then I feel like sometimes by the time I
Speaker 1: like on this on this particular trip, by the time
Speaker 1: I got in there, those deer had been disturbed a bit.
Speaker 1: You know, There's been quite a few people through there.
Speaker 1: I've seen guys on horses, There've been dirt bikes through.
Speaker 1: I feel like at a certain point those deer are
Speaker 1: just like, yeah, we've seen enough, We're gonna just hang
Speaker 1: super tight. You know, they're not gonna they're not gonna
Speaker 1: expose themselves unless you knew exact the right little exact
Speaker 1: open patch at the right time and the you know,
Speaker 1: the first light or the last light at night, you
Speaker 1: might catch them, but you're not going to see him
Speaker 1: out on a big open hell side.
Speaker 2: Is that kind of thing exactly?
Speaker 1: That's kind of like or they may just move out
Speaker 1: of that and just move on to the backside that
Speaker 1: little basin and where they don't get disturbed.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So they're so now they're looking for a bit
Speaker 3: more safer place, right, Yeah.
Speaker 1: So the next drainage over on the back side of
Speaker 1: this basin, the next drainage over, maybe there's no trails
Speaker 1: in it, and now they're not disturbed anymore. Maybe that's
Speaker 1: where a guy should be looking more so than on
Speaker 1: the side where there's more access.
Speaker 3: That's exactly what I do. Yeah, I'm that. I'll give
Speaker 3: another story. So this was twenty nineteen. I a friend
Speaker 3: of mine who never killed the meal deer. He drew
Speaker 3: a meal deer tag ins othern n Idaho, and I
Speaker 3: was actually that was going to be also the first
Speaker 3: year I ever hand of Colorado too, and I was like, oh,
Speaker 3: my way down, I was like, well, how about this, Like,
Speaker 3: I'll help you around this time. I was like, you
Speaker 3: can go down whenever you want, but this is the
Speaker 3: time I can help you, the last day or the
Speaker 3: last week of your season. And I was like, because
Speaker 3: that's the time I can also from there in southern Idaho,
Speaker 3: I can go to Boise, or not Boise, but go
Speaker 3: to kind of you. I did have to drive through Boise, Boise,
Speaker 3: Salt Lake, and then into Colorado, but I can make
Speaker 3: my route through it, you know. So anyways, my first
Speaker 3: stop was his hunt, and you know he already had
Speaker 3: a couple of weeks of hunting pressure, right, just like
Speaker 3: what you're saying. So so where I was first thinking
Speaker 3: we're going to see deer, we were not seeing deer,
Speaker 3: not a lot. But but we are looking on the maps.
Speaker 3: I'm like, well, as soon as this road ends right here,
Speaker 3: there's a lot of side by side trails, so's this
Speaker 3: road ends here. There's a couple draws that just look
Speaker 3: really undisturbed, and it's something that I would personally think
Speaker 3: that someone would overlook. It was funny, as we put
Speaker 3: in at that time, we were four and five half
Speaker 3: five miles in and we were just we were hiking.
Speaker 3: Another time I should have packed a side by side
Speaker 3: or before. We didn't, but we were crossing from uh,
Speaker 3: we were crossing, you know, side by side trail, side
Speaker 3: by side trail, just hiking and we're seeing side by
Speaker 3: sides just driving up and down glassing and we're just like, man,
Speaker 3: this is I don't know, We're this is gonna work,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean. But in my mind, like
Speaker 3: I said, I was looking at that map, I was like,
Speaker 3: if if I was a meal there, and I had
Speaker 3: a couple of weeks of hunting pressure, this is where
Speaker 3: I go. And as soon as we left the road
Speaker 3: system and we got in that part of that section
Speaker 3: of that unit where there was no roads, groups of does,
Speaker 3: groups of dos, and this was late October, the next
Speaker 3: drainage over a bachelor group of bucks. And I handed
Speaker 3: it was my gun, and it's all dialed, so I
Speaker 3: trust it. I handed it to my friend. I said,
Speaker 3: he's never killed a meal in his life. He smokes
Speaker 3: a buck. And this thing, it's it's lopsided, but even
Speaker 3: as being lopsided as it is, it's still scored close.
Speaker 3: It was high one eighties, almost one.
Speaker 2: Holy wow. Wow.
Speaker 3: And I just told him yeah, And I told him
Speaker 3: I'm like, I'm just letting you know now that you
Speaker 3: may never kill a buck this big again.
Speaker 2: That's by the buck of a lifetime.
Speaker 3: And it was like, this is your first, like, this
Speaker 3: is your first ever mule deer, like a lot of
Speaker 3: experience mule deer hunters don't kill bucks like this. And
Speaker 3: he was super grateful, he was really excited. And you know,
Speaker 3: with two guys to boned mule there, we were able
Speaker 3: to get it out pretty easy. We were six we
Speaker 3: were I think, yeah, we were a total of six
Speaker 3: miles back and we had to pack it house.
Speaker 2: W wow.
Speaker 1: That's another question I was going to ask earlier or later.
Speaker 1: But a boned out mule deer, if you're solo, can
Speaker 1: you expect to let's say your day tripping it?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 1: Can you bone out a big mule deer buck and
Speaker 1: pack that one trip? Or you think I might want
Speaker 1: a two trip. But they're a pretty big animal.
Speaker 2: It's it's heavy.
Speaker 3: It's like it's like an elk rear.
Speaker 2: Okay, so that's seventy eighty pounds.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, give or take too, you know, And it
Speaker 3: depends on the unit because some units, they don't require
Speaker 3: you to pack the rib meat, you know, in some
Speaker 3: units due and and so I I typically like, there's like,
Speaker 3: especially in Idaho, there's like no rib meat on a deer,
Speaker 3: and I'm like, I don't want to mess with ribs.
Speaker 3: So but I'll pack everything else out obviously. But uh,
Speaker 3: but yeah, it's I've done it. Where like let's say
Speaker 3: it's just one of those days I don't feel like
Speaker 3: packing heavy. I'm like, this is going to be a
Speaker 3: two day trip, like but Sundays, I'm like, I don't
Speaker 3: want to be back here again. I'm a long ways back.
Speaker 3: Let's take as many breaks as I have to. I'm
Speaker 3: getting this whole thing out in one trip. I've done it.
Speaker 3: It's it's comparable to it. Like I said, it's about
Speaker 3: comparable to an elk quarter, like a like a big rear,
Speaker 3: I would say, but if you're on a k and
Speaker 3: stuff too, like I did that. I packed not last year.
Speaker 3: So last year I killed a big buck and they
Speaker 3: weren't paying much for capes and I was like, it's
Speaker 3: half the trip, half the hikes up hill, and I'm
Speaker 3: like I'm leaving the cape. Just just just the meat,
Speaker 3: just the meat, in the in the skull, you know,
Speaker 3: and so but yeah, you can do it if you're
Speaker 3: if you're dedicated, if you can do it one trip,
Speaker 3: you know, it's just it's extra.
Speaker 2: Wait.
Speaker 3: After packing moose quarters, I tell you what, el quarter
Speaker 3: is so light? I so I packed Travis killed a
Speaker 3: big bowl the other day and you saw that.
Speaker 2: I saw that so jealous.
Speaker 3: Yeah it's a giant and yeah, so but that quarter,
Speaker 3: I can you know. I was just like, is this
Speaker 3: really a rear? Like it? After packing a rear moose,
Speaker 3: I was like, I can actually manhandle this quarter. I
Speaker 3: can pick it up and put it in the bag
Speaker 3: a moose Like, I'm it is so hard to manhandle
Speaker 3: those moose quarters. I also would not use a qu
Speaker 3: bag for a moose quarter either, Like I like a
Speaker 3: lot of a lot of Alaskans use the Barney's. But
Speaker 3: I'm sure everybody has their own special packs. But a
Speaker 3: qu bag gets me through with meal dear nelk any
Speaker 3: day just fine. But for but for moose, I need
Speaker 3: a Barney's like a big metal frame bag. And they
Speaker 3: got good like you can get the weight high too.
Speaker 3: They kind of have a big shelf where you can
Speaker 3: pick the weight up high and stuff, so that makes
Speaker 3: it nice. My little you see my sister, she's she's
Speaker 3: a short little girl, and she throws moose quarters on
Speaker 3: that are just as tall as she is, and she
Speaker 3: just walks out.
Speaker 2: She's tough. She's amazing.
Speaker 3: She's tough. Yeah, but yeah, yeah, I guess I'm answering
Speaker 3: every question very slowly and detail.
Speaker 2: No, I love it. I love it.
Speaker 1: How many days do you think, you know, if someone
Speaker 1: wants to be a successful mule deer hunter, can you
Speaker 1: just weaken warrior it? Or if you want to, like,
Speaker 1: if you really want to get into this, you want
Speaker 1: to take like a ten day trip, how many days
Speaker 1: should you really expect to take off to go on
Speaker 1: a on a mule theier trip? And and like how
Speaker 1: many days do you expect to be in Colorado where
Speaker 1: you're at?
Speaker 3: So with this this season, it's it's a very it's
Speaker 3: called second season, which which this season kind of goes
Speaker 3: throughout a lot of states. I'm not giving out any
Speaker 3: detail of this, but it's about an eight day season
Speaker 3: and so it's short, so I'm going to stay the
Speaker 3: whole time. For me, I think this is the most
Speaker 3: important thing for hunters to know, and we don't, and
Speaker 3: I don't think people think about this often, but I
Speaker 3: before every hunt, I try to prepare myself financially, right
Speaker 3: like that. I try to get all my tea's cross
Speaker 3: and I's dotted. If there's bills I need to pay,
Speaker 3: I try to get those done. You know. The last
Speaker 3: thing I want to do with when I go on
Speaker 3: a trip is feel like half of myself's at home.
Speaker 3: Like it's really hard for me to focus. I mean,
Speaker 3: for sure, I still like to. You know, I'm consistently
Speaker 3: anytime I'm in service, call my wife and kids, tell
Speaker 3: them how much I love them and stuff. But when
Speaker 3: I'm out there hunting, I don't want to feel like,
Speaker 3: oh shoot, I have all these work obligations at home.
Speaker 3: I don't have all this stuff I need to get
Speaker 3: done at home. Like that stuff will make a guy
Speaker 3: come home early, you know what I mean. And so
Speaker 3: and also not be prepared either, so not bringing everything
Speaker 3: you need, not you know, not having a comfortable camp.
Speaker 3: You know, Like like for me, what I do is
Speaker 3: I and I'll rough a camp. But I'll tell you
Speaker 3: what I did on this trip in which we kind
Speaker 3: of talked about it. Right, So this right here is
Speaker 3: so I said, this is like a base camp right here.
Speaker 3: Got my wal tent and I have power here, which
Speaker 3: is nice. Yeah, I just I picked a camp site
Speaker 3: in my unit and close to town. I can get
Speaker 3: groceries and stuff and then at least in this area,
Speaker 3: in this you not have that luxury, right, not all
Speaker 3: units have that. But now I also have a small
Speaker 3: little qu tint. So if I have somewhere, I want
Speaker 3: to spend a couple of days in the back country
Speaker 3: and not have to wake up like crazierly in the
Speaker 3: morning to hike four to five miles to get to
Speaker 3: where I'm actually a mule deer. I can actually pack
Speaker 3: a little day camp, you know, back there and sleep
Speaker 3: and then hike tomorrow. I've got a lot of energy
Speaker 3: to burn off, so I'm just going to do it
Speaker 3: one day, seven miles in seven miles. It's going to
Speaker 3: be at least that's how the trail goes. But you
Speaker 3: know how it is, you start taking your own routes
Speaker 3: and stuff, it's probably going to end up being fifteen
Speaker 3: or sixteen miles by the end of the day.
Speaker 2: Oh definitely.
Speaker 3: But I got energy, Like I said, I've just been
Speaker 3: I've been scouting and a lot of my scouting has just
Speaker 3: been running road systems and stuff and trying to find
Speaker 3: trail heads to you know, seeing if I can access
Speaker 3: the trail heads. And but no, I'm looking forward tomorrow.
Speaker 3: I'll be doing a lot of hiking. I'll be burning
Speaker 3: a lot of energy. You're asking earlier about on average
Speaker 3: how far you can hike, I'd say, how far do
Speaker 3: you expect to hike? I'd say, you know, it depends
Speaker 3: on the area. But for day hunting. For day hiking,
Speaker 3: I like places between four to five miles and and
Speaker 3: four to five miles out, Like if you start getting
Speaker 3: a little further than that, you kind of want to
Speaker 3: Typically I'll like to camp it out and just wake
Speaker 3: up and not and be fully rested as a you know,
Speaker 3: as I'm starting to hunt me ole deer. But like
Speaker 3: I said, tomorrow, I'm just going to try to do
Speaker 3: it all one day. Though it's just gonna oh it's
Speaker 3: going to be a.
Speaker 2: Big day tomorrow.
Speaker 3: Looking forward to it though, all I need is one day.
Speaker 3: I just need one deer.
Speaker 1: So oh yeah, yeah, and if you have to double
Speaker 1: you can make two trips.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'll make two trips out of it. So that's
Speaker 3: not a problem at all. Like I said, I got time. So,
Speaker 3: like I said, I like to financially prepare myself. And
Speaker 3: it's not just like doesn't mean you have everything paid off.
Speaker 3: Just you have everything, all your ducks in line before
Speaker 3: you leave your house. Otherwise you're going to feel like
Speaker 3: you're missing things at home. I said, if you rough
Speaker 3: it too much, then I feel like a lot of guys,
Speaker 3: you got to know your own self too, and what
Speaker 3: you can handle, because if you're roughing out too much,
Speaker 3: you realize you can't handle that. That also might make
Speaker 3: you come home early. So so don't rough it as hard,
Speaker 3: take your time. You know. I'm the type of guy
Speaker 3: like I I can live like a nomad. I can
Speaker 3: just you know, I can spend weeks in the bush
Speaker 3: without having any soeul service and I'll be okay. And
Speaker 3: but but there is something to be said about having
Speaker 3: a nice base camp. We're comfortable, got good food, and
Speaker 3: then go from there, you know, especially when you're hunting
Speaker 3: out of towns.
Speaker 1: Right right, I found if I'm let's say, like this September,
Speaker 1: we did a lot of backpack hunting, bivy hunting, and
Speaker 1: well spike camp after being in there four or five days.
Speaker 2: Man, you kind of get chewed up.
Speaker 1: And sped out a little bit by the mountain and
Speaker 1: the elk, you know, and and if you can come
Speaker 1: out and take a shower or like we didn't have showers,
Speaker 1: but we could jump in a We jumped in the
Speaker 1: creek right and washed and cleaned up and like just
Speaker 1: had some normal food instead of freeze dried. It's like
Speaker 1: a really good reset, like just getting clean, getting refocused,
Speaker 1: like okay, you know, maybe had cell service called home
Speaker 1: made everything sure, everything was good, Everything's good, and it's
Speaker 1: almost like, okay, round two, we're just fresh as a
Speaker 1: fresh as a daisy again. Just that means a lot
Speaker 1: to be able to have that kind of a backup
Speaker 1: spot or a place to like kind of recharge, clean up,
Speaker 1: and then go go again without. You know, if you
Speaker 1: didn't have that, you may you may just throw in
Speaker 1: the talent say you know what, heck with it, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna go home.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Well, and probably the longest I've ever stayed out
Speaker 3: is because of a wall tent too. When you have
Speaker 3: a wall tent, like for me, it's staying dry, like
Speaker 3: you know, I can the camping in September is actually
Speaker 3: it just depends in the area too. If it's like
Speaker 3: really rough weather. But if it's like nice weather, I
Speaker 3: can stay a very long time, you know, hunting in September.
Speaker 3: But with a lot of weather and stuff that does
Speaker 3: wear on you, you know, and it doesn't matter if
Speaker 3: there's good weather or bad weather. A wall tent with
Speaker 3: a wood stove, man, I tell you what, that's a
Speaker 3: game changer. So if you're able to pack in with
Speaker 3: lamas or horses and mules, or if you guys use goats,
Speaker 3: use that, utilize that. If you're going far back, I
Speaker 3: will tell you right now, you will. You'll be really
Speaker 3: comfortable at camp. You know, pack some good meals like
Speaker 3: space those mountain houses or Peak Refield or whatever. Space
Speaker 3: out those freeze dry's meal. I do my own freeze dried. Well.
Speaker 3: When I say I do my own, I make the
Speaker 3: list of things I want and I give it to
Speaker 3: my wife. I'm like, make that for me, please, And
Speaker 3: so she makes packages them for me, and so I
Speaker 3: just give her the ingredients and so she makes me
Speaker 3: the meals. And so I got plenty of free dried
Speaker 3: meals right now. And it's good to feel prepared, you know,
Speaker 3: like you know, on this hunt, I may you know,
Speaker 3: you never know it's a hunt, so I may come
Speaker 3: out without a meal, dear. But the thing is, I'm
Speaker 3: I'm prepared on this hunt. I have everything I need.
Speaker 3: I feel comfortable at camp and I've done enough eat
Speaker 3: scouting enough to where even like my brother today, I
Speaker 3: was talking to my brother, He's like, hey, I have
Speaker 3: another lead for you of somebody that may have hunted
Speaker 3: that union in the past. I'm like, honestly, it doesn't
Speaker 3: matter what they tell me. It's great to have more information,
Speaker 3: but at this point of the amount of scouting I've done,
Speaker 3: I don't think I need any more information. Like I
Speaker 3: feel like I'm ready. I just need to put in
Speaker 3: the miles. I just need to hunt like you can.
Speaker 3: I can litter this whole unit with pins and where
Speaker 3: there's once a big mule there once lived, you know,
Speaker 3: but it's dead now, so I can't kill that meal
Speaker 3: there anymore.
Speaker 2: You can't chase gut piles.
Speaker 3: You can't chase gut pile. And you know, like I said,
Speaker 3: the more hunting pressure in an area, the less age
Speaker 3: class you have. So but he that being said, I
Speaker 3: feel ready on this hunt, and I'm excited, you know,
Speaker 3: the nervousness is kind of gone, i'd like to say,
Speaker 3: and I'm just ready to throw my pack on. I'm
Speaker 3: just itching the hike. And but I don't want to
Speaker 3: push everything out some of the areas where I want
Speaker 3: to go. I feel like if I go in there now,
Speaker 3: I'll push the mealis out. So I'm just like, just
Speaker 3: go opener, don't push anything out, and go from there.
Speaker 1: I think that's smart, would you say so? So primetime,
Speaker 1: that's first light, last light, midday? Are you still like
Speaker 1: just picking apart, like looking in the shadows of tree
Speaker 1: tree wells and just looking everywhere like with a spot
Speaker 1: or just trying to Okay, I haven't spotted the buck
Speaker 1: I want, but I think there's probably some other deer
Speaker 1: betted on this hillside or these little clumps of timber
Speaker 1: or whatever you can glass into. Are you just glassing
Speaker 1: to those midday just trying to like find something or
Speaker 1: are you kind of recharging the batteries a little bit,
Speaker 1: you know, and just taking a break, taking a nap.
Speaker 2: Are you hiking? Are you like are you are you.
Speaker 1: Busting through timber just like trying to like maybe jump
Speaker 1: one what are you doing are you that mid day?
Speaker 1: So if it's not primetime, so it's usually that's that's
Speaker 1: a lot of great.
Speaker 3: That's great question. And I think it depends on the weather.
Speaker 3: It depends on the habitat. Like if it's an area
Speaker 3: where there's just like there's only one little opening them
Speaker 3: for them to feed in. Let's say, like and it's
Speaker 3: going to be hot in the day. I mean to me,
Speaker 3: the writing's on the wall, right, especially if it's early
Speaker 3: season meal there. And when I mean early, I'm talking
Speaker 3: like still in October. I might take a nap, I
Speaker 3: might just rest up, you know, I especially if you
Speaker 3: take a lot of time off the meal there. Hunt.
Speaker 3: I want to like, I'm trying to utilize the best
Speaker 3: days possible on the hunt. Like if there's a good
Speaker 3: weather day, I'm like, this is the day I want
Speaker 3: to put in all my energy.
Speaker 1: And a good weather day is that Like is that
Speaker 1: kind of like an overcast day, maybe a drizzled day,
Speaker 1: it'd be a cold.
Speaker 3: Yeah, a cold day could be a weather day. One thing,
Speaker 3: I really I like to hunt, not just it's I
Speaker 3: love hunting in the weather. I just hate dealing with
Speaker 3: technology in the weather. So us with our filming and stuff.
Speaker 3: It's just a hassle dealing with a video camera. But
Speaker 3: man if I didn't have to do with a video camera.
Speaker 3: I love hunting on a stormy day. When the storms
Speaker 3: are going on and off throughout the day, it makes
Speaker 3: like they'll they'll bed down, feed, bed down, feed throughout
Speaker 3: the day, and you're just like you're getting all day activity.
Speaker 3: Another thing I like is right after a massive storm
Speaker 3: and it just cools everything down, they'll just pound the
Speaker 3: next couple of days just hard. I'm like, this is
Speaker 3: all my energy I've saved up for and you know
Speaker 3: it's the same I see what they'll cunt in Tea
Speaker 3: where you'll see a storm, Like you look at the forecast,
Speaker 3: you see a big storm coming and it's like, in
Speaker 3: the next couple of days it's going to be super hot.
Speaker 3: I'm like, honestly, I'm not gonna waste my time in
Speaker 3: these really hot days. Like I'll hunt the prime time,
Speaker 3: I'll hunt the evening, but all day on those after
Speaker 3: that storm hits off's I'm gonna put all my energy in.
Speaker 3: People burn themselves out before the hunting gets good, and
Speaker 3: so I like to pay myself sometimes, so I'm not
Speaker 3: trying to be like a lazy hunter, but sometimes you
Speaker 3: like to pace yourself to say that you can't glass
Speaker 3: up a mule there mid day in the hot day.
Speaker 3: I'm not saying you can't. Yes, sometimes they are glassy,
Speaker 3: you know, if you have nothing else to do, to
Speaker 3: put your eyes in the glass and scan the whole hillside,
Speaker 3: look under every you know, under every tree, every nook
Speaker 3: and cranny, every every rock. You know. But my time
Speaker 3: is best spent in prime time on those hot days.
Speaker 3: And you know, I see in the weather too, we're
Speaker 3: going to have some storms next week and I'm just like,
Speaker 3: bring it barring the storms, and I'm looking forward to it.
Speaker 3: I really love a snow background too, So that's always helpful.
Speaker 3: All of different techniques, I mean, I it's and it's
Speaker 3: all scenario based, right. That's why it's really hard to
Speaker 3: it's really hard to say if you do a B
Speaker 3: and C, this is what you're going to get on D.
Speaker 3: You know, hunting's very especially hunting the older it's it's
Speaker 3: one of those things you have to adapt to, right,
Speaker 3: you know. And I always wish I can give a
Speaker 3: direct answer for everything, because it's like, you know, You're like, Okay,
Speaker 3: in this scenario, time, what do I do. I'm like, well,
Speaker 3: it depends what's the weather doing. Because if the weather's
Speaker 3: doing this, I'm not going to do that. If it's
Speaker 3: doing this, then I will do that. You know, in
Speaker 3: the rut, I will hunt the rut differently than I'll
Speaker 3: hunt pre rut. Right so, right now, at this time,
Speaker 3: it's not the rut, and so I'm gonna hunt. I'm
Speaker 3: gonna find bucks. I'm going to ignore dose because the
Speaker 3: bucks are not where the dos are. Maybe some younger bucks,
Speaker 3: but if I see a do, I'm likenk like, oh,
Speaker 3: there could be a big buck near by. No, I'm
Speaker 3: going to ignore every dough I see. And I'm just
Speaker 3: gonna go where I think a big Buck's going to go.
Speaker 3: When the rut kicks in, I my my gears change.
Speaker 3: I am like, I'm not going where I think a
Speaker 3: big Buck's going to go. I'm going where the dose
Speaker 3: are because that big buck he's going to make his
Speaker 3: routes and he's eventually gonna connect to those does.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he leaves his fortress of solitude and then he
Speaker 1: goes he goes on the prowl for those does.
Speaker 3: So exactly. We're talking about that safety that they like,
Speaker 3: those big bucks lose that all of a sudden they're
Speaker 3: in the rut. That is your window. It's the same
Speaker 3: with elk. That is your window to kill a big bull.
Speaker 3: Elk is during the rut. Same thing with the mealy buck.
Speaker 3: That's the time when they their guard is down. They
Speaker 3: still can be skittish, but their guard is down. They're
Speaker 3: focused on dos and they're focused focused on breeding. And
Speaker 3: you can catch a big buck, you know, and for
Speaker 3: him the wrong place at the wrong time for you
Speaker 3: the right place, right time.
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely, But I love tracking bucks
Speaker 1: in the snow.
Speaker 3: It's fun.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you've you've had some really good success. I've watched
Speaker 1: some videos. You've got some crazy videos on YouTube. In
Speaker 1: case our listeners haven't seen Tom and his family, they
Speaker 1: have stuck in the Rut YouTube channel, and man, there's
Speaker 1: so many, so many good in credit videos of all species.
Speaker 1: But there's some really cool ones.
Speaker 3: A mule there too, Yeah, thank you. Yeah, i'd say
Speaker 3: in my family because like I said, Tana, Tanna's a mule.
Speaker 3: There's Lebra Adams, a moose snob. Travis is the elk snob.
Speaker 3: I'm like, I'm an elk, like I you know, and
Speaker 3: our whole family will everything. But everybody has their own
Speaker 3: animal that they just like really gravitate to and hunting,
Speaker 3: And for me, I mean wolves. I got into wolf
Speaker 3: fund just because I was a pissed off elk hunter, right,
Speaker 3: So that's how I got in the wolf But Meali's
Speaker 3: there's just some about mellies that I've always loved and
Speaker 3: and Mealie's that's my a Mealy Snob's that's that's like,
Speaker 3: you know, And I wouldn't say there's something about the
Speaker 3: magic of September and bulan elk, but there's also some
Speaker 3: about the magic and chasing a big rut and Mealy
Speaker 3: buck with a swelled neck in the snow in the rocks,
Speaker 3: just looking back. I always have this image in my
Speaker 3: head of a big muster but just looking back at
Speaker 3: me in the rocks, and and it's just like, as
Speaker 3: I'm hiking, and I know I have a long ways ago,
Speaker 3: it's like, how do you occupy yourself in that long hike?
Speaker 3: I just that image just replays my head over and
Speaker 3: over and over again, just on repeat, of that big
Speaker 3: buck just around the corner on the next drainage, you know,
Speaker 3: and and that's what keeps my blood going.
Speaker 2: I love it.
Speaker 3: I love cafe.
Speaker 1: So I have to ask you this because I know
Speaker 1: I have this. It's like an internal monologue. And this
Speaker 1: plays throughout the year, and of course more intense in September.
Speaker 1: But I get this internal monologue in this little voice
Speaker 1: inside my head. It's my own voice, but it's like,
Speaker 1: got to kill a big bull, got to kill a
Speaker 1: big bull, got to kill a big bull, got to
Speaker 1: find a big bull. Like this little thing in my head,
Speaker 1: Like it's like on repeat, and it's almost like your
Speaker 1: your your little vision of that of the big mule,
Speaker 1: your buck is that kind of Do you have that
Speaker 1: internal monologue that, oh my God, says that same stuff
Speaker 1: to you.
Speaker 3: It's worse when I'm solo because I actually start saying
Speaker 3: it slightly out loud. I'm like, if somebody, yeah heard me,
Speaker 3: I think I'm a crazy person.
Speaker 1: I know I need to say, like if I'm by myself,
Speaker 1: I was, yeah, I mutter it.
Speaker 3: I was driving, right, I was driving, and I was
Speaker 3: I'm just like, you can do this toime, you can
Speaker 3: kill a big bug. I was saying it out loud,
Speaker 3: and I'm just like if somebody was sitting with me
Speaker 3: next to in my seat, or just like what dude,
Speaker 3: you need to calm the freak down, or you know.
Speaker 2: Like, what's wrong with this guy?
Speaker 3: What's wrong with this guy?
Speaker 1: Okay, well I didn't know if I was a weirdo.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, no, I don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 1: So it's good other people have this stuff going inside
Speaker 1: their head. And I wonder about, you know, all of
Speaker 1: our listeners who are dedicated hunters, if they have that
Speaker 1: same little internal monologue or maybe sometimes they mutter mumble
Speaker 1: to themselves that same kind of stuff like.
Speaker 2: Oh, I gotta find the big buck, where's the big poll?
Speaker 2: I gotta get it, Like.
Speaker 3: I think meal deer too, So like elk hunt and
Speaker 3: stuff is one of those animals I like to hunt
Speaker 3: as a group with other people and stuff, you know,
Speaker 3: and it could with post ra elk and then also
Speaker 3: with just hunt Mealle's for something to be said. I
Speaker 3: love the solo part of it. And you know, there's
Speaker 3: a lot of ways you can prepare for a hunt.
Speaker 3: You can you can prepare yourself physically, right, but I'm
Speaker 3: going back to like preparing yourself mentally, like for me, Like,
Speaker 3: I know, some guys that are just really good in shape,
Speaker 3: are really in shape, you know. And I'll use my
Speaker 3: little brother for example, Trevor. He's really in shape and
Speaker 3: he he's he's like a very avid elk hunter, so
Speaker 3: you know, so just not to confuse there, I have
Speaker 3: my older brother Traps my little brother Trevor. Trevor is
Speaker 3: a very avid elk hunter, and he's very avid in
Speaker 3: a lot of other hunts, but meal deer is one
Speaker 3: of those animals he never really got into. And so
Speaker 3: he's physically in shape to kill a mule deer, but
Speaker 3: he just like doesn't put in the time right. And
Speaker 3: not a dis on your brother if you're listening, but uh,
Speaker 3: he's a good hunter, like everybody in the family is.
Speaker 3: But like and even even Travis and even my brother
Speaker 3: in law Adam, they all say, like, dude, like Travis
Speaker 3: is a little bit more Mealy hunter than you know
Speaker 3: with me. But you know, Adam says, he's just like, dude,
Speaker 3: I just can't do what you do with Meal there,
Speaker 3: like just putting in the time, you know, like with
Speaker 3: Mealy's And.
Speaker 1: He's not that mad at him, He's not that bad
Speaker 1: at the Meal there, like to put in that amount
Speaker 1: of time and effort.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: He's like that with Moose right and and Travis. Like
Speaker 3: I said, he's more of like elk, Like elk is
Speaker 3: one of those things. He just feels like that's his fix,
Speaker 3: Like he has to kill his elk, you know. And me,
Speaker 3: that's my meal there. I'm like, I have to get
Speaker 3: a meal there. This year. I have two meal there tags.
Speaker 3: But I'm like, at least one of them needs field
Speaker 3: and it has to be on a big buck that's
Speaker 3: in my head, you know. And also when and not decinating,
Speaker 3: but I okay, I'm just gonna I'm just gonna speak,
Speaker 3: just just say what I'm going to say. And uh,
Speaker 3: you know a lot of people say that it's about
Speaker 3: It's just about the whole experience of the hunt. Just
Speaker 3: imagine anyone playing a sport. They imagine an NFL player saying,
Speaker 3: I'm just here to have a good time.
Speaker 1: Yeah no, No, they're not there for that. Hey, they're
Speaker 1: they're they're on a mission, right or there for a win.
Speaker 1: They're there for a win. When I go a meal,
Speaker 1: they're hunting and hunt any animal. I'm on a mission.
Speaker 1: My mission is to kill now what if I don't
Speaker 1: kill like And then I'll reflect back on the experience
Speaker 1: and I'll say, you know, still, I learned a lot
Speaker 1: on that hunt. What can I do better?
Speaker 3: So I don't make the same mistakes, right, Like, I'm
Speaker 3: not going to go out of the hunt not learn something.
Speaker 3: I'm not going to say I come out every you know,
Speaker 3: out of every hunt successfully. But when I go on
Speaker 3: a hunt, I'm on a mission. I didn't travel away
Speaker 3: from my family for this many days. It's it's an
Speaker 3: eight day hunt. But I'm I'm I've been down here
Speaker 3: for a couple of days already, and then the drive
Speaker 3: back is a long drive, and so you know, there's
Speaker 3: a lot of time I'm away from the family. Once again.
Speaker 3: I'm not here just for oh I just I'm here
Speaker 3: for take a picture of the sunset. No, I'm not
Speaker 3: here for a sunset photo. I'm here for a big
Speaker 3: mealy buck. And I would love that. I would love
Speaker 3: to take a photo of a big millied buck with
Speaker 3: a sunset in the background. That would be nice with
Speaker 3: you in it, with me exactly, No, not someone else
Speaker 3: but me in it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I get that mindset too, you know, Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: of course we we love the whole experience of hunting
Speaker 1: and being in the woods and just being immersed in it.
Speaker 1: I mean, who doesn't you know, but you can. You
Speaker 1: could kind of get those same fixes if you just
Speaker 1: wanted to go on hikes in the summertime, just being out,
Speaker 1: you know, in beautiful places in the woods, and the
Speaker 1: weather's probably a little nicer, and it might even be
Speaker 1: a little funner without the pressure of killing. But I'm
Speaker 1: the same way. I want to I'm i'm I want
Speaker 1: to know, I'm showing up to notch my tag. I
Speaker 1: want to I want to bring home an elk, I
Speaker 1: want to bring home a deer or whatever. But I
Speaker 1: can see your point though, too. It's like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: have that same mindset or feeling when I go elk hunting,
Speaker 1: maybe not so much Muldier hunting. I'm not as maybe
Speaker 1: driven or as as like mad at the deer. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I always give Phelps a hard time while you're so
Speaker 1: mad at.
Speaker 2: These deer, these bears.
Speaker 1: But but but I do understand that whole mindset, which
Speaker 1: I can appreciate.
Speaker 2: So we're we're about out of time. I wanted to.
Speaker 1: Talk quiz a little bit. So you you've talked here
Speaker 1: for an hour about mule deer hunting and stuff. You
Speaker 1: actually have a hunting course on how to hunt mule
Speaker 1: deer that you've you've built, designed and can you.
Speaker 2: Talk about that a little bit?
Speaker 3: Yes, I can, And you know, for the m pformation
Speaker 3: we shared today is honest, just like a sliver or
Speaker 3: what you can learn on that meal their masterclass. So
Speaker 3: I did this online course. It's been going for now.
Speaker 3: I think it's has it been three years? I think
Speaker 3: I've had this course now for three years. I updated,
Speaker 3: I put new information in it every every single year.
Speaker 3: At the end of the meal of their season, I
Speaker 3: have a lot more new content when I post a
Speaker 3: hunt on YouTube, and I would do it for the entertainment,
Speaker 3: I don't really show the whole process when on the
Speaker 3: meal of their master class, I show the whole process.
Speaker 3: I show from e scouting to arriving to showing what
Speaker 3: I do and finding the bucks. I said, most of
Speaker 3: these hunts, you know, as much as I want to
Speaker 3: feel like people are giving me way points, that's not
Speaker 3: really how I'm finding deer. Like I said, I'm I
Speaker 3: try to hunt deer that don't have any hunting pressure,
Speaker 3: and so I'm out going in places where there hasn't
Speaker 3: been a gut pile in a while, and I'm trying
Speaker 3: to create a new gut pile with an old with
Speaker 3: an old, mature meal deer, and I'm hunting, and I
Speaker 3: guess a couple of questions that I've had to answer,
Speaker 3: you know, because it's kind of a similar one is
Speaker 3: does it work in all terrains? And I'd say, yes,
Speaker 3: it does. You know, when I there was a time
Speaker 3: when I started hunting sagebrushed country mule deer. The first
Speaker 3: time in my head I ever thought was these are
Speaker 3: a different meal theer that when I'm used to hunting,
Speaker 3: I'm hunting heavy timber bucks and in the high mountains
Speaker 3: and not this flat country in the desert. Well, I've
Speaker 3: come to find out they're the same deer. It's just
Speaker 3: their habitat's different. That's the only thing that's different. They're
Speaker 3: the same deer. If you threw a big, old timber
Speaker 3: buck in the sage brush, he's going to eventually adapt
Speaker 3: to the sagebrush terrain and he's going to act like
Speaker 3: any other sagebrush mule deer vice versa. You throw a
Speaker 3: sagebrush mule theer up in the heavy mountains, he's going
Speaker 3: to act the same. Some some migrations are far like Wyoming,
Speaker 3: where you get so much snow. If the deer stay,
Speaker 3: they died, right. Some areas don't get as much snow,
Speaker 3: so they the man the ameaalies pulled to the base
Speaker 3: of the mountain. Instead of making this one hundred mile trick,
Speaker 3: you know, maybe it's as simple of just dropping some elevation.
Speaker 3: So Maryas don't get snow at all, right, and so
Speaker 3: so in the meal their Masterclass, what I do is
Speaker 3: I try to help people understand the meal deer itself.
Speaker 3: And so that's kind of the first thing I do
Speaker 3: is we teach. And I'm using this not just on
Speaker 3: my own knowledge, but it's knowledge from other experienced meal
Speaker 3: their hunters. So and I'm talking like old timers, guys
Speaker 3: that I've looked up to for years who taught me
Speaker 3: how to hunt meal deer. These are guys that are
Speaker 3: they're in their seventies and they're too old to hike,
Speaker 3: and they kind of live through us. They see the
Speaker 3: big mealies I kill and it just brings them joy
Speaker 3: because they're like they know they're the they're responsible for
Speaker 3: teaching me. These things and these hunting tactics and and
Speaker 3: so so when I'm saying, when I create this meal
Speaker 3: their master class. Remember it's not just my life experience,
Speaker 3: but it's several years, several generations of experience in hunt
Speaker 3: meal deer bucks. And so this is from covering, you know,
Speaker 3: and I cover throughout the year, from shed hunting to
Speaker 3: scouting in the summers, to hunting in the fall, from
Speaker 3: September hunting, October, November and even December hunting. If you
Speaker 3: if you guys have a unit where it's a post
Speaker 3: rut meal there hunt, so we cover everything meal there.
Speaker 3: And and as you guys know too, is I have
Speaker 3: If anyone who's follows stuck in the rut, you would
Speaker 3: know that we hunt heavy timber a lot too. And
Speaker 3: so which is a completely different tactic than most meal
Speaker 3: their hunters know. It is hunting timber, hunting close range
Speaker 3: to these mealy bucks. You know. For me, I'm either hunting,
Speaker 3: I'm either glassing for long rain shot a six of
Speaker 3: seven hundred yards, or I'm shooting a meal there. Like
Speaker 3: last year, I'm hunting. I was hunting an area where
Speaker 3: the mountains nine timber, you know, And as soon as
Speaker 3: the snow gets deep in the above tree line, above
Speaker 3: that above tree line. Then they just they pull the
Speaker 3: timber right and you're timber hunting. There's no glassing, you know,
Speaker 3: maybe a little glassing, which I explain in the video.
Speaker 3: And you're but you're doing a lot of observation. You're
Speaker 3: you're you're observing scat, you're observing tracks. You know. The
Speaker 3: one thing I teach about tracks is, you know, tracks
Speaker 3: always tell a story. You know, when you're when you're
Speaker 3: all cunning in September, same thing, you're seeing a herd
Speaker 3: of coug, you see a bull track, you see what
Speaker 3: you're seeing. What's going on? You're seeing a story right there.
Speaker 3: And you're trying to put the story together. And what
Speaker 3: they're doing are they feeding is are they just passing through?
Speaker 3: Are they bedding down? Like you know, you're trying to
Speaker 3: find everything. Like the tracks tell a story, A rub
Speaker 3: tells a story. Trying to find out if it's a
Speaker 3: rub line that mealies frequently pass or is it simply
Speaker 3: just a random rub that a buck made. You know, Yeah,
Speaker 3: I teach about rub lines. I teach about calling a
Speaker 3: lot of how many people do you hear of callin mule? Deer.
Speaker 1: I can count on one hand and only use a
Speaker 1: couple of fingers. Not very many people call mule deer.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I've and I've killed quite a few call him,
Speaker 3: believe it or not, the bull or the buck. I
Speaker 3: called him last year. I called it and it was
Speaker 3: using I was using that Phelps uh phone call. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: yeah it was money man brought that buck right in.
Speaker 3: It was awesome. So yeah, it does work. But I've
Speaker 3: also used grunt tubes. I've rattled Mule's I did rattle.
Speaker 3: If you watched last year's YouTube episode, it shows me.
Speaker 3: I rattled a pretty nice h He needed one more year.
Speaker 3: He's about a three year old, so we'll see this year.
Speaker 3: I'll see how he looks this year if he crosses
Speaker 3: my path. But he was like he needs to get
Speaker 3: those forks bigger. But he had a good frame.
Speaker 2: Well yeah, how can people look this course up?
Speaker 3: So it's uh, it's it's wordy, but it's stuck in
Speaker 3: round mule der masterclass dot com.
Speaker 2: Okay, stuck in the rut.
Speaker 3: Spell that stuck and stuck s t U c K
Speaker 3: And instead of I n the rut dot com, I'll
Speaker 3: do it again, S T I cannot close my eyes.
Speaker 3: S T U C K and T H E R
Speaker 3: you T and then mule der Masterclass dot com. Okay,
Speaker 3: great and so and you'll have the well you have
Speaker 3: that in the s side notes of the podcast.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can.
Speaker 3: I can link.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can put the link in there absolutely.
Speaker 3: Okay. Yeah, So if you guys need that, go to
Speaker 3: the link and and it'll just I'll direct you right too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, check it out.
Speaker 1: I I think I definitely need to to to to
Speaker 1: dive in on that master class and learn a thing
Speaker 1: or five about mule your hunting. I'm definitely not an
Speaker 1: old pro at it, that's for sure.
Speaker 3: Yeah. And then then the other thing, and I know
Speaker 3: we're at a time here, Yeah, but I want to
Speaker 3: give some of the positive feedback I've got from it, because,
Speaker 3: like I said, it's been around for three years now,
Speaker 3: for three years, and and this is the type of
Speaker 3: feedback so I've got from beginning beginner hunters who have
Speaker 3: killed their first meal deer. But that which gives me
Speaker 3: a lot of confidence in the course that I created.
Speaker 3: But also the thing that means most of me is
Speaker 3: these experience hunters, experience hunters that have hunted for years
Speaker 3: that have said I never knew that about mule deer. Yeah,
Speaker 3: And I'm like, that means a lot to me for
Speaker 3: an experienced meal their hunter. You know, I hear experienced
Speaker 3: Meal their hunter buying the course of like, oh, he's
Speaker 3: going to judge, he's going to judge my experience. But
Speaker 3: I've had really positive experience, or very positive feedback from it,
Speaker 3: really experienced Meal their hunters, and that means a lot
Speaker 3: to me. And so and a lot of it too,
Speaker 3: especially with snow conditions and howp meal their handles snow
Speaker 3: conditions way different than any animal you've ever hunted, I
Speaker 3: tell you what.
Speaker 2: And there was well I know that.
Speaker 1: Whenever I came up and we went wolf hunting and
Speaker 1: we talked like schoolgirls for two or three days there
Speaker 1: about all hunting in general, and we talked elk hunting
Speaker 1: and mule you're hunting man. There was like all these
Speaker 1: little things you were telling me, and I was like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's every thought of that, Like that's that's pretty that's
Speaker 1: pretty smart, that's pretty good, you know.
Speaker 3: So, and.
Speaker 1: You know, we spent three days together and we talked
Speaker 1: all sorts of stuff, and I know your course has
Speaker 1: way more than that it's video based, right, it's not
Speaker 1: like you're not reading PDF.
Speaker 2: So it's like you're not going to just glaze over.
Speaker 2: You get to watch and listen.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and as mad ton as my voice is, I mean,
Speaker 3: you're gonna pick up a lot. But I got, you know,
Speaker 3: I have. You know, there's charts I show. I show
Speaker 3: East scouting, and that's the thing. And I even show
Speaker 3: you like in the woods, not just like some stuff.
Speaker 3: I'm just like explaining something, but I'm showing in the wood.
Speaker 3: It's like certain things to not ignore. And and it's
Speaker 3: all about being a you know, observant too. But yeah,
Speaker 3: I mean it's really I think what really taught me
Speaker 3: so much about meal there too, more than just a
Speaker 3: lot of the experienced hunters that, like I said, all
Speaker 3: these old timers that pass it down is I put
Speaker 3: it to work, and I put it to work in
Speaker 3: areas that have very little meal their numbers. Like these
Speaker 3: are places where honestly, if I had to travel, I
Speaker 3: wouldn't Like if I had to travel several hundred miles
Speaker 3: to hunt these places, I wouldn't go to them. I
Speaker 3: only go to them because they're convenient, because they're closer
Speaker 3: to home. And people like other experienced hunters aren't pulling
Speaker 3: big mullies anymore. And I am, And I'm not saying
Speaker 3: that in a cocky way. I'm just saying that I
Speaker 3: think outside the box a little bit with mealies, and
Speaker 3: and I've learned It's taught me so much, especially hunting
Speaker 3: meal there in wolf country. It's taught me so much
Speaker 3: about how to find where there's very little meal deer.
Speaker 3: I kind of feel spoiled actually where I'm at now,
Speaker 3: just because I'm like, there's a lot of deer here,
Speaker 3: like this is kind of cool. Like I that I'm
Speaker 3: obviously going for a big one, but I'm just like,
Speaker 3: I'm definitely going to take my time in this unit,
Speaker 3: and I'm holding out for a big one. And if
Speaker 3: I eat my tag hold out for a big one,
Speaker 3: so be it. But that's that's what I'm after here.
Speaker 3: And but yeah, you're gonna it's a great course. So
Speaker 3: I recommend checking it out for sure. Man.
Speaker 1: Well, I can't thank you enough for coming on the
Speaker 1: show again. Where can people find you on social media
Speaker 1: if they want to follow along on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube?
Speaker 3: Yeah, so we have. It's just stuck in the rut
Speaker 3: spelled s t U c K with an N instead
Speaker 3: of I N. So stuck m the Rut dot com. Uh,
Speaker 3: we have a website there. We we have it, like
Speaker 3: our Instagram is just at Stuck in the Rut YouTube channel.
Speaker 3: Stuck in the Rut YouTube's our baby. I always say
Speaker 3: that YouTube is what gave us our name because we've
Speaker 3: been using YouTube for years. I think now we're last
Speaker 3: I checked, we're at we're over three hundred. All I
Speaker 3: know is we're over three hundred thousand subscribers on our
Speaker 3: YouTube channel, and so we have a lot there. We
Speaker 3: start a little late on the Instagram, but we still
Speaker 3: have a fair amount of followers there and on Facebook.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I mean, if you want to stay updated
Speaker 3: for upcoming hunts and events that we do and when
Speaker 3: we post YouTube channels, definitely follow our instagram because we
Speaker 3: keep you updated. And obviously, like every as soon as
Speaker 3: I kill something and I'm in service, we posted on
Speaker 3: our Instagram, right, So so YouTube usually it's usually until
Speaker 3: after hunting season to where I have time to sit
Speaker 3: at a computer. I've tried the whole let's try editing
Speaker 3: these videos as we go. It does not work. Just
Speaker 3: so busy, this is the busiest time of the year
Speaker 3: for us, with between wrapping up work projects to hunting.
Speaker 3: It's like wintertime is really slow for me. That's when
Speaker 3: I put on pajamas and a hoodie and I just
Speaker 3: stare at a screen for nearly a month editing videos.
Speaker 2: Yeah, crawling your little cave and just edit. I hear
Speaker 2: I've been there too.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's almost like that. Well man, thanks a lot,
Speaker 1: and I wish you the best of luck down there.
Speaker 1: I can't wait to see your pictures and I can't
Speaker 1: wait to watch your videos once.
Speaker 3: Thank you, and I always enjoy talking to you, Derek.
Speaker 3: And like I said, the very small small amount of
Speaker 3: time we hunted wolf hunting, it was fun.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, we'll have to go do it again sometime.
Speaker 3: By the way, that wolf pack is still there. Dang it,
Speaker 3: that's that one that was that wolf pack. While I
Speaker 3: was in Alaska, somebody's telling me that wolfpack was still there.
Speaker 3: And the first time he's like, there was a I
Speaker 3: won't get too much detail, guess because I know we
Speaker 3: got to go. But the father he was telling me about,
Speaker 3: you know, the wolves, and then he's like he had
Speaker 3: his son go in there, and he's like what do
Speaker 3: I do? And I gave him just a couple of
Speaker 3: tips they're calling the wolves, and he brought him right
Speaker 3: in and he killed no kid.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 3: A part of me that's happy for him, A part
Speaker 3: of me I'm like, I wish I had time to
Speaker 3: go in there.
Speaker 2: That could have been you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but it was the same spot you and I
Speaker 3: went to. But I'm happy for him. I'm glad there's
Speaker 3: one nut wolf in that drainage.
Speaker 2: So yeah, so awesome.
Speaker 1: Well, well we'll catch up after hunting season, Yeah, for sure,
Speaker 1: Dame