Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your home for
Speaker 1: deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host,
Speaker 1: Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Podcast. I'm
Speaker 1: your host, Mark Kenyan, and this is episode number four one,
Speaker 1: and today I've got the one and only Dan Johnson
Speaker 1: of Sportsman's Nation on the show, and I'm running through
Speaker 1: my what would you do gauntlet of challenging deer hunting
Speaker 1: situations to see exactly how he handled them. All right,
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Podcast, brought to you
Speaker 1: by First Light. Today we have got a treat, a
Speaker 1: treat of treats, especially for those of you who are
Speaker 1: longtime listeners, those of you who who yearned for the
Speaker 1: days of old when me and Dan Johnson got to
Speaker 1: talk every week, back before we had night teen kids
Speaker 1: between us, and seventy two different projects and all manner
Speaker 1: of crazy adult responsibilities. We've got the nine Fingered Wonder,
Speaker 1: my brother from another mother, the guy they based the
Speaker 1: Ukorn kind of Cornelius character on from all those Santa
Speaker 1: Claus videos. Dan, thanks for being here, buddy, Mark. Every
Speaker 1: time I'm on this podcast, the intro for me keeps
Speaker 1: getting longer, but the blows are getting a little little
Speaker 1: bit lower. At some point, it's going to be more
Speaker 1: of a roast of Dan Johnson than an introduction. Yes,
Speaker 1: so I mentioned that there was a surprise today. That's it.
Speaker 1: This is just the Dan Johnson roastow just gonna talk
Speaker 1: shit about me for one straight hour, No, but two hours,
Speaker 1: two hours Dan long episode. There's a lot to cover
Speaker 1: on that topic. Oh man. No, in all seriousness, I
Speaker 1: wanted to do two things, and I'm hoping your game
Speaker 1: for it. Number one, I wanted to catch up a
Speaker 1: little bit it because you know, back in the day,
Speaker 1: we used to have these weekly conversations that we got
Speaker 1: to talk about what was going on in our personal
Speaker 1: lives and our white tail worlds and all that, and
Speaker 1: I missed that, Like that was a lot of fun. Um.
Speaker 1: So I want to catch up on that stuff. But
Speaker 1: the second thing I want to do is something I
Speaker 1: have not warned you about, but maybe you've seen me
Speaker 1: post about it in the past. We have done. I've
Speaker 1: done a little mini series over part of last year
Speaker 1: and a couple of times this year, basically I referred
Speaker 1: to as the what would you Do? Gauntlet, in which
Speaker 1: I present a hunter with a bunch of different hypothetical scenarios,
Speaker 1: really specific scenarios, like you're in this place, at this time,
Speaker 1: with these conditions, what would you do? I've done this
Speaker 1: with you know, John aber Haart and Tony Peterson and
Speaker 1: Mark Dreary and the best and the best and the
Speaker 1: only person I haven't covered yet who falls into that
Speaker 1: category is Dan Johnson. So, so I wanted to mentioned
Speaker 1: me in the same breath as Mark Brewery. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: basically if you were to look at my Mount Rushmore
Speaker 1: of the White Tailed World, it's it's Mark Jury any
Speaker 1: May Dan Johnson. So I want to run you through
Speaker 1: the what would you do? Gauntlet? Are you down for
Speaker 1: the gauntlet? I'm down for the gauntlet, But I have
Speaker 1: I have a feeling there's a specific set of questions
Speaker 1: that you're gonna ask me that you didn't ask Mark Breury.
Speaker 1: There are a few questions on my list that yes,
Speaker 1: would never would never make it to Marjorie, like like
Speaker 1: the sky dope question. Well that you know, that's let
Speaker 1: me add some notes here. That's a great one, oh man.
Speaker 1: So that's that's what I want to do to that.
Speaker 1: I want to I want to cover a lot of
Speaker 1: good stuff. So that sounds good plan of you. It
Speaker 1: sounds like a good plan. I just want to say
Speaker 1: something to your audience real quick. For those of you
Speaker 1: who are longtime listeners and we're here since like episode
Speaker 1: number one, it's good to be back. And for those
Speaker 1: of you who are brand new to the Wired to
Speaker 1: Hump podcast and this you will might only be a
Speaker 1: couple episodes in. I'm sorry. That's a good preface. That's
Speaker 1: a good preface. So so there you go. What the
Speaker 1: hell have you been up to? Man? What's what's new
Speaker 1: in the world. You're chasing kids and chasing work. Keyball coach,
Speaker 1: you know, ball coach, keyball coach. Yeah, big thing, Mark,
Speaker 1: someday you'll probably you'll probably get there. But keyball coach,
Speaker 1: you know, shuttling kids around to dance and all that stuff,
Speaker 1: making sure the refrigerators full of food. Oh, and then
Speaker 1: working at the end of the day. Yeah, what does
Speaker 1: your schedule look like? Is your is your work time?
Speaker 1: Literally night? Yeah? Yeah, right now, my work time is
Speaker 1: who it is? Wait up in the morning, get the
Speaker 1: kids ready for school, get the two oldest ones on
Speaker 1: the bus, go to the gym, work out for an hour,
Speaker 1: come back home. Uh, feed the you know, get lunch
Speaker 1: ready for the other one. And in the meantime, my
Speaker 1: wife has a job where she has to be on
Speaker 1: her computer from eight to five. Okay, so I'm playing
Speaker 1: daddy daycare and you know, shutting him around, taking taking
Speaker 1: him to parks, keeping him busy, you know, making sure
Speaker 1: he doesn't fall into that category of there's the iPad,
Speaker 1: watch it for eight hours. I don't like. I don't
Speaker 1: want that. So I'm doing the whole shuttle shuttle the
Speaker 1: kids around thing. And then somewhere about eight thirty nine o'clock,
Speaker 1: once I get the kids into bed, then me and
Speaker 1: my after supper, after you know, the kids are in bed,
Speaker 1: then I sit down and I start working. So I
Speaker 1: don't know when this was four or five, six years
Speaker 1: ago we started talking about, you know, I was going
Speaker 1: full time with wire Dohn once we started the pod guest,
Speaker 1: but for a number of years we talked about your
Speaker 1: cubical life and how much you kind of hated it,
Speaker 1: and how you dreamed of, Yeah, you dreamed of getting
Speaker 1: to go off and do your own thing, do the
Speaker 1: outdoor media podcast type of thing full time, and you know,
Speaker 1: we we we kind of dreamed about it and spitballed
Speaker 1: about it for so many years, and then one day
Speaker 1: you told me that the issue was kind of forced
Speaker 1: because of stuff with your day job, and it was happening.
Speaker 1: And now how long has it been? Two years? Three years? Uh,
Speaker 1: it's been going on three Yeah, so you're going on
Speaker 1: three years in Is it everything you thought it would be?
Speaker 1: Is the crazy child hustle all day and then work
Speaker 1: at night? Are you living the dream or or what
Speaker 1: do you think? Let me just I'll put it to
Speaker 1: you this way. It Yeah. I do not Like if
Speaker 1: someone said to me, uh, Dan, it's time to go
Speaker 1: back to the cubicle, I would shoot that person and
Speaker 1: then I would like, I would pick my family up
Speaker 1: and like leave. I there's no way, Like I'm not
Speaker 1: built for that anymore. I can't. I could not do that.
Speaker 1: I am like these movies where they start talking about
Speaker 1: an oppressed group of people being free, like a brave
Speaker 1: heart or whatever. I am a free man. I get
Speaker 1: to do whatever I want, whenever I want, with you know,
Speaker 1: a little asterix at the end of that sentence. But
Speaker 1: you know, I I set my own schedule. I can
Speaker 1: do what I want. I get to take my little
Speaker 1: boy to swimming lessons and watch that. I get to
Speaker 1: play with them, spend time with my family. I can
Speaker 1: do things like coach t ball and and then you know,
Speaker 1: the work is it's very important, but at the same
Speaker 1: time it's I don't know, it's it's not work. It's
Speaker 1: still not work. I mean there's some times where it
Speaker 1: feels a bit repetitive, but it's not. It's not repetitive
Speaker 1: in the sense that sitting in a q Google would be. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, I'd get to talk about hunting and fishing
Speaker 1: like every day, every day I get to do That's awesome. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you said that you used to do whatever you want,
Speaker 1: except for with an asterisk? Is the asterisk name Ryan
Speaker 1: with Farah? Yeah, well that's a different story as a
Speaker 1: guess question. Next question, Uh so what about the Well,
Speaker 1: I can say one thing I'll add to that is
Speaker 1: I feel like I'm in the same boat as far
Speaker 1: as the childhood hustle craziness right now, because it's it's
Speaker 1: interesting how our lives sort of mirror each other now
Speaker 1: with you having to watch all these kids and your
Speaker 1: wife having to be at the computer. Both my wife
Speaker 1: and I are working at home of course, and then
Speaker 1: we both have the two kids now at home, so
Speaker 1: I definitely definitely can can relate to that chaos. What
Speaker 1: I was gonna say is um hunting stuff, hunting, planning,
Speaker 1: where's where stuff looking like so far this year turkey
Speaker 1: hunting I heard didn't pan out. What's what's going on there?
Speaker 1: And looking forward? Yeah, I mean, I'll tell you what
Speaker 1: turkey hunting was. I took my daughter, uh for a day,
Speaker 1: basically pulled her out of school on a Friday, took her,
Speaker 1: got real close a couple of times. Uh, and a
Speaker 1: group of Jake's with a strutter was coming in and
Speaker 1: I was gonna shoot him, and my daughter had fallen
Speaker 1: asleep wrapped in this brown blanket. And right as I
Speaker 1: start bringing the gun up two pull the trigger, she
Speaker 1: rolls over in her sleep and like make some kind
Speaker 1: of noise and all their heads pop up and look
Speaker 1: right at her, and then they turned around and ran away,
Speaker 1: and uh that it didn't work out. But then you
Speaker 1: know the rest of the weekend was me chasing gobbles.
Speaker 1: They chased them, they were hand up and then they
Speaker 1: would go onto a property that I didn't have access to.
Speaker 1: And that was it. Man. Three days that three days
Speaker 1: in three days out. Still fun though, right, even though
Speaker 1: in the philipp Oh yeah, I mean, like I tell
Speaker 1: everybody I'm a Turkey hunter during Turkey season. Turkey season
Speaker 1: is over for me now and back to white tails.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, I kind of feel the same way. I
Speaker 1: had a fun quick quick season two. I think half
Speaker 1: the fun now is actually leading into Turkey season. I've
Speaker 1: just been taking my son out and you know, before
Speaker 1: you can actually hunt, just going out there just to
Speaker 1: call in a burden and I can't pray, did I did?
Speaker 1: We did? I have you on? And we talked about
Speaker 1: there someone I don't know if I talked about this
Speaker 1: with someone I don't know who I've talked about this with.
Speaker 1: But the highlight of that was me and Everett went
Speaker 1: walking back on one of the properties and just happened
Speaker 1: to strike up a bird. We're just kind of going
Speaker 1: for a walk. My son had an umbrella and we
Speaker 1: were just kind of taking taking a look, and we
Speaker 1: struck one up and then ended up getting three birds,
Speaker 1: like really fired up and coming in and I was like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, these birds are actually gonna him into us.
Speaker 1: So we ran up and got into a blind and
Speaker 1: actually called in these three gobblers right to us, and
Speaker 1: I had my son like already he pretended he was
Speaker 1: he was pretending his umbrella was a gun. So he
Speaker 1: had his umbrella gun on the rail of the blind
Speaker 1: and he was aimed at and he was like, can
Speaker 1: I shoot him dead? Okay? Should like yep, Wait till
Speaker 1: they getting range and the birds keep getting closer, and
Speaker 1: he's like kind of whispering and holding dead still but
Speaker 1: kind of commentating as we go, and then he's like,
Speaker 1: they're walking by your tree stand and stuff. And finally
Speaker 1: he's like, I'm ready, like all right, shoot at the
Speaker 1: front bird, aim at his head, the aims of the
Speaker 1: bird's head with his umbrella, and then he goes comple
Speaker 1: and the birds I'll stop and look up and I'm
Speaker 1: like shoot again. He says, Coba, like did I get
Speaker 1: him dead? Did I get him? And if he had
Speaker 1: had a gun, he would have smoked it because those
Speaker 1: birds were at twenty yards. So that was that was
Speaker 1: the highlight of my turkey season. But then like a
Speaker 1: week later the real season opened up and I went
Speaker 1: out day one and I went out in the morning,
Speaker 1: was really quiet, had one coming in, but he was
Speaker 1: he never closed within like sixty yards and then I
Speaker 1: actually spotted some at mid day and took off like there,
Speaker 1: going across the field. I sprint it out there and
Speaker 1: try to cut him off and end up spooking them.
Speaker 1: And then again that night I spotted birds coming back
Speaker 1: to roost across the field, so I did another like
Speaker 1: big loop, got around in front of him and actually
Speaker 1: came really close to killing one of those. It was
Speaker 1: a deal where they got out into this little clearing
Speaker 1: at the edge of this field, just inside from the field,
Speaker 1: and I watched him and I basically knew that they
Speaker 1: were going to go one of two ways to go
Speaker 1: back to roost, and I was laying on the ground
Speaker 1: prone and if they were gonna go one direction, I
Speaker 1: could crawl and probably cut them off, and if they
Speaker 1: went to the other direction, I'd have to figure out something.
Speaker 1: And what basically end up happening is that they went
Speaker 1: the direction that I was hoping they would, and I
Speaker 1: was able to belly crawl right to the edge of
Speaker 1: this crest of this little rise that was kind of
Speaker 1: blocking me from them, and so I was set up there.
Speaker 1: Didn't call or anything, because I just knew evening birds.
Speaker 1: My best bet was just to be where they wanted
Speaker 1: to go, and and basically they did exactly what I
Speaker 1: thought they'd do, except for instead of coming out at
Speaker 1: my twelve o'clock, they cut at my nine, and so
Speaker 1: I wasn't able to move my gun from twelve to
Speaker 1: nine to get a shot. And so he popped up
Speaker 1: and his head was there and he, you know, saw
Speaker 1: this thing laying in the middle of the timber and
Speaker 1: immediately buggered. UM. So that was that. And then the
Speaker 1: next day I went out in the morning and it
Speaker 1: was it was just like kind of just how you
Speaker 1: hope it would go. As far as I struck out,
Speaker 1: heading into an area where they usually roost, I hadn't
Speaker 1: roosted one specifically, but I head into where they usually are,
Speaker 1: and as I got closer to it, you could hear
Speaker 1: birds firing off in that spot. And I got as
Speaker 1: close as I could until I thought i'd be, you know,
Speaker 1: as close as I could get without them seeing me,
Speaker 1: and yelped a couple of times. They came down shortly
Speaker 1: there after and basically worked their way down the edge
Speaker 1: of the field all the way to across from me,
Speaker 1: hung up at like sixties sixty seventy yards and then
Speaker 1: some hens came out across the way and eventually edged
Speaker 1: their way closer to me, and and I just laid
Speaker 1: there for like thirty minutes, again laying on the ground
Speaker 1: in kind of the ready position, and they finally closed
Speaker 1: the distance and let her rip and got myself my
Speaker 1: first double bearded tom. So that's kind of cool. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it was nice, little surprisingly, that's pretty sweet,
Speaker 1: unique something I've never actually seen in person, So that
Speaker 1: was cool. And then got Everett out there and he
Speaker 1: quote unquote found the turkey for me and health carry back,
Speaker 1: so that was cool. It was a fun, quick turkey
Speaker 1: hunt turkey season, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. My daughter
Speaker 1: was more along the lines of let's see. She was
Speaker 1: bouncing up and down the whole time, like couldn't sit still.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, okay, sweetie, you know, like you gotta
Speaker 1: stop moving because I had like multiple time responding to me,
Speaker 1: and they've flown down and one was working his way
Speaker 1: in and that I and I'm just like, okay, it's
Speaker 1: over this hill. We have we have to be quiet.
Speaker 1: We have to stop moving. We have stop moving. I
Speaker 1: look and she's like vibrating and uh. And then from there.
Speaker 1: It was just like Dad, hey can I have some
Speaker 1: snacks now? Just like, hey, can we wait a second
Speaker 1: this let's just wait. This bird is gonna come in
Speaker 1: if you just gotta be patient. And uh, I think
Speaker 1: he saw us, to be honest with you, he I
Speaker 1: think he got up on top of a ridge that
Speaker 1: flanked us and saw her bouncing around and then because
Speaker 1: at one point he just shut off and then the
Speaker 1: next time he gobbled, he was like two yards further
Speaker 1: down the ridge. So but she wanted to go out.
Speaker 1: She was still interested in it. She still wanted to call,
Speaker 1: She still wanted to you know. We walked down to
Speaker 1: this big egg field and we saw some strotton Tom's
Speaker 1: in there, and then we flanked them and that's when
Speaker 1: the Jakes came in. Didn't But yeah, I mean she
Speaker 1: still found it interesting. But she's just not quite not
Speaker 1: quite there yet. Yeah, that's just cool to get out
Speaker 1: there with him. That's been that's been so much fun.
Speaker 1: I was contemplating taking a real gun with Everett, but
Speaker 1: I'm still waiting on that. But he is I just
Speaker 1: got I don't know, I got lucky with him. He
Speaker 1: is obsessed. He's just I mean all he wants to
Speaker 1: do is look at hunting magazines, look at fishing magazines.
Speaker 1: He wants to come do everything with me. He's he's
Speaker 1: constantly re uh, I don't recreating, I guess recreating hunts.
Speaker 1: Like he'll watch one of some video of mine or
Speaker 1: Immediator or something, and then he will be obsessed with
Speaker 1: setting up animals, just like the animals and the show
Speaker 1: we're and then getting in a blind and then you know,
Speaker 1: living out the whole hunt and he's you know, he's
Speaker 1: gone out I think we talked about this, um, this
Speaker 1: win or something. He's gone out there in track deer
Speaker 1: with me. And he's a better blood tracker than I
Speaker 1: am because it's not color blind. Um. And he's all
Speaker 1: about like wanting to help me gut the deer and
Speaker 1: like your three man and he's like, I want to
Speaker 1: help I would. Um. So that's awesome, though, That's a
Speaker 1: good problem to have. It's been so much fun. It's
Speaker 1: been so much fun. So that's uh. I mean, as
Speaker 1: you've been telling me for years, that becomes more and
Speaker 1: more of a thing that you want to prioritize, and uh,
Speaker 1: I get it now. Yeah, absolutely, What about your future hunts?
Speaker 1: How's the planning coming for white tails or big game
Speaker 1: or anything else? So obviously the white the Iowa white
Speaker 1: tail Rut is in the books right same time every year.
Speaker 1: It's really as long as I needed to be. I
Speaker 1: just I got two kids in school. Um, by the
Speaker 1: time fall hits, I will have my youngest one in school,
Speaker 1: uh school slash daycare four days a week. So that's
Speaker 1: really gonna lighten the load on my life. And uh,
Speaker 1: I I don't know, man, I'm really looking forward to
Speaker 1: this season with all the kids. Like it's just you
Speaker 1: know how it is, man, when you go on a hunt,
Speaker 1: especially out of state, and your wife is behind with
Speaker 1: the two kids, it just becomes something you're thinking about.
Speaker 1: And I've never really had a hunt where I'm not
Speaker 1: thinking about things. Like I've talked to so many people
Speaker 1: and they're like, to really experience a true hunt and
Speaker 1: experience it in a certain way. And I don't want
Speaker 1: to just like cast like completely forget about my children
Speaker 1: because that in wife, That's not what I mean by this.
Speaker 1: But when you're like, oh God, my wife called me.
Speaker 1: She's sounding pissed, and my kids are being naughty and
Speaker 1: there's all this stress at home I'm not there to
Speaker 1: help out. I'm not focusing on the hunt like I
Speaker 1: need to. And at the same time my mind, I
Speaker 1: feel guilty for not being there. So this year will
Speaker 1: be a lot of stress removed, so to speak, from
Speaker 1: the equation, and I'm really looking forward to that. So
Speaker 1: Iowa white tail obviously, Um there is uh South Dakota
Speaker 1: mule deer again. That's that's happening in October. And then
Speaker 1: in a couple of weeks, I find out if I
Speaker 1: draw a Wyoming elk tag, So how many points? How
Speaker 1: many points you cashing in for that? It was either
Speaker 1: six or seven, So six or seven years worth of
Speaker 1: points two go into this unit and uh, I don't know,
Speaker 1: we'll see man. So that's gonna be a big hunt.
Speaker 1: That's gonna be a hunt where you know, six or
Speaker 1: seven years worth of preference points. Um, you put a
Speaker 1: lot of time and energy researching and planning and trying
Speaker 1: to you know, all of a sudden getting those hunts,
Speaker 1: and now it's you know, it's a potential that it
Speaker 1: could happen. And if it happens, I think I'm gonna
Speaker 1: go out there for like twelve days. So you got
Speaker 1: you got a local contact or friend who knows the
Speaker 1: area you're thinking of going or what's your game plan
Speaker 1: on that stuff? Man. So the unit that I am
Speaker 1: going to for the most part is it's big chunks
Speaker 1: of public but at the same time, there's not much
Speaker 1: wilderness in it, so I don't need a Wyoming guide
Speaker 1: or uh, you know, I don't really need it unless
Speaker 1: I want to get up there, uh and do. I
Speaker 1: may find out that they're they're up in there, but
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's a very small percentage of wilderness,
Speaker 1: so I don't necessarily need a local guy to be there.
Speaker 1: But for the most part, um like I I with
Speaker 1: all this COVID, the guy that I was hoping to
Speaker 1: go with had to back out because last year's plans
Speaker 1: got ruined. So he's gonna do that hunt with his
Speaker 1: family again. And now this might be just a solo trip.
Speaker 1: To be honest with you, shoot, shoot from the hip.
Speaker 1: My dad might. My dad might drive out there with me.
Speaker 1: But that's that's really it. I do. I do know
Speaker 1: some people out out there, but it's not like they're
Speaker 1: gonna be like, UN need to go to this spot
Speaker 1: right here, you know, you need to go. They've they've
Speaker 1: guided me to the unit. I applied for that unit,
Speaker 1: and now we just kind of wait and see and
Speaker 1: then from that point on, it's, uh, you know, just
Speaker 1: a lot more research. Are you is this grizzly country
Speaker 1: or no? No, that was that was a purpose driven decision, right,
Speaker 1: I'm not prepared, nor do I have any experience with grizzlies.
Speaker 1: And I feel like, for the most part, you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a black bear out there that could be aggressive,
Speaker 1: but further the most part, everything I hear is they'll
Speaker 1: just run away like uh, you know, like a dog
Speaker 1: or coyote wood. Yeah, yeah, you don't need to worry
Speaker 1: about them too much. That's good. That's that's the one trick.
Speaker 1: Like with our place out in Idaho, we're we're in
Speaker 1: grizzly country. So every time I'm out there and scouting
Speaker 1: for black bear hunting and stuff, it's just a different, uh,
Speaker 1: different edge to everything. That uh that does just change
Speaker 1: some of your decision making. So yeah, that'll be good
Speaker 1: for yeah, other than that, man, it's just like if
Speaker 1: that hunt doesn't happen, if I don't draw that um,
Speaker 1: I didn't put for any second, you know, second units.
Speaker 1: I just was like all or nothing on this one.
Speaker 1: So if that doesn't happen, I might go over the
Speaker 1: counter Colorado again. Or I might go to Colorado and
Speaker 1: one of my buddies has drawn a pretty good unit
Speaker 1: and I might just go there and hip hunt and
Speaker 1: hip with him, not you know, just call for him
Speaker 1: and pack out, you know, just go for fun. Basically. Yeah,
Speaker 1: what's the time frame that you're thinking if you do
Speaker 1: that wyoming outcome, It's gonna be like the eight through
Speaker 1: the nineteenth or something like that. September, Yes, in September. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna try to be out there in prime
Speaker 1: time for a long time and uh, you know, basically
Speaker 1: just trying to locate something and give my give myself
Speaker 1: enough time to mess up and rebound. If that makes sense,
Speaker 1: it does, well, I think that'll be like right when
Speaker 1: I'm driving home from Idaho. So what I'll plan on
Speaker 1: doing is you just give me a ring when you
Speaker 1: get the arrow through that big bowl, and I'll stop.
Speaker 1: I'll come help you pack it out, and I'll be
Speaker 1: able to get right back on the road at home
Speaker 1: in time. My wife will never know it. Hey, that's
Speaker 1: a win man. I'll take all the help I can
Speaker 1: get our buddy, Bob Planic. Actually, if he doesn't draw Montana, uh,
Speaker 1: he's gonna go to I like, he's gonna be in
Speaker 1: Idaho hunting. And then I think he if he draws
Speaker 1: his Montana tag, he's going to do that. But if
Speaker 1: he doesn't draws Montana tag, I think he actually might
Speaker 1: come and help call for me, just because he's gonna
Speaker 1: be out there. So it's kind of it's all those
Speaker 1: plans are up in the area, and a lot of
Speaker 1: it depends on what the drawing results are. It sounds
Speaker 1: like fun. One of these years when when everything lines
Speaker 1: up right, we're Bob Goes is right where I'm at
Speaker 1: in Idaho too, So one of these days we'll have
Speaker 1: to get all three of us connected in this zone
Speaker 1: and use my cabinets a base camp and uh, I'll
Speaker 1: show you show you a few fishing things too. Hey,
Speaker 1: I'm down man, Bob urn worms right, Sure, you can
Speaker 1: do whatever you want. What about you? So all I know,
Speaker 1: I think you've probably talked to your ear off about this,
Speaker 1: But have you solidified any more plans as far as
Speaker 1: your white Tail uh tour that you're taking, You know,
Speaker 1: not much more than we talked about in February. Basically
Speaker 1: just that whole slate estates all over the place. UM
Speaker 1: as far as the exact dates, that's still up in
Speaker 1: the air, but basically doing a tour to force of
Speaker 1: the White Tail world and we're filming two different shows
Speaker 1: this year. Um So it's gonna be kind of crazy,
Speaker 1: but it'll be it'll be good. A little different, you know.
Speaker 1: The last couple of years have been so local, focused
Speaker 1: on a lot of like habitat management stuff for the
Speaker 1: back forward and everything, and this year I'm doing essentially
Speaker 1: none of that or very very little, so different, but
Speaker 1: it will kind of be a nice change of pace,
Speaker 1: just seeing a bunch of new country, learning a bunch
Speaker 1: of new spots. Uh. So I'm excited about that a
Speaker 1: little bit. Uh already concerned about what you talked about,
Speaker 1: which is just like being away stress and just knowing
Speaker 1: that my wife's there solo watching the kids and and
Speaker 1: that that's something we gotta kind of work through and
Speaker 1: hopefully we can line it up so I can spread
Speaker 1: all this travel out and not be gone for too
Speaker 1: long at one point, you know. So I'm gonna try
Speaker 1: to do like one trip a month and spread over
Speaker 1: six months and see if we can make that work. Um,
Speaker 1: there'll be a couple of times with his doubles, but um,
Speaker 1: but yeah, you know, doing that, and then I'm gonna
Speaker 1: do the local Michigan hunting and then I'm gonna try
Speaker 1: to get the white tail hunting by my cabin too,
Speaker 1: um in Idaho. So we'll do that. Um, and that's it.
Speaker 1: But just no, I don't think I'm gonna able to
Speaker 1: do any other big game, no elk or older antelope.
Speaker 1: I just can't. I can't fit anything else in outside
Speaker 1: of the the basic responsibilities. But it's uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I can't complain about it at all. There is a chance.
Speaker 1: I forgot to say that, there is a chance I
Speaker 1: do go to Missouri for like a uh they're like
Speaker 1: before their gun season comes in. Like my goal is
Speaker 1: to tag out early in Iowa. Best best case scenario.
Speaker 1: Hopefully it's not like a fourteen day or like it
Speaker 1: was two years ago, but something where I can. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna try to go to Missouri for like four days,
Speaker 1: be sweet, just over the line, yep. Just it's gonna
Speaker 1: be not too far from Iowa. Um. I think it's
Speaker 1: maybe two hours from my house, so not very far
Speaker 1: across the line at all, but just a real quick
Speaker 1: sleep out of your truck opportunity that I've never done before.
Speaker 1: And uh, you know, give her hell you got some permission,
Speaker 1: or again try public public nice. It sounds like a
Speaker 1: fun adventure. Yep, first thing that comes by, I'll probably
Speaker 1: shoot it. That's the way to do it. Man, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna be I'm gonna be eager on the trigger this
Speaker 1: year too, So it's gonna be it's gonna be a
Speaker 1: nice change of pace. Uh. Speaking of new adventures, do
Speaker 1: you wanna do you want to dive into the gauntlet
Speaker 1: before we uh we run that time? I was born
Speaker 1: in the Gauntlet? Mark all right, man, you better be
Speaker 1: careful what you say, though. I'm not gonna take it
Speaker 1: easy on you. You know, I gotta go as hard
Speaker 1: with you just as anybody else, So be prepared it
Speaker 1: all right? Okay, So the rules of the game, as
Speaker 1: I describe the gid beginning, are that I'm gonna lay
Speaker 1: out a scenario with a bunch of details, and then
Speaker 1: you've got to think that through and then tell me
Speaker 1: what you do, and then you know, explain your thought
Speaker 1: process or why or how you would do it. Okay,
Speaker 1: all right, so we're starting the summer. We're gonna start
Speaker 1: with something going on pretty soon here. Let's say you've
Speaker 1: gone out to your properties at Forever, write your Iowa spots,
Speaker 1: you get your summer cameras out like you usually do,
Speaker 1: which seems to be like July ish in his his
Speaker 1: story history has told me. And then you'd like to
Speaker 1: let him selk for quite a while. You go back
Speaker 1: out there in August and you pull them all and
Speaker 1: there is not a single shooter buck nothing. There's no
Speaker 1: shooters on here. You're wondering, what in the world's going on?
Speaker 1: What do you do now? Do you not even care?
Speaker 1: Or are you going to scramble and try to relocate things?
Speaker 1: What's your game plan in that scenario? Mark uh In
Speaker 1: this scenario, and we've talked, we talked about it all
Speaker 1: the time, is if there's no shooter bucks in July
Speaker 1: or August, right, I honestly I'm probably not gonna be worried. Um,
Speaker 1: I am going to be worried after the September shift happens.
Speaker 1: And so really all I'm gonna do is just give
Speaker 1: it more time until the year go hardhorn and then
Speaker 1: September happens. And there's that big redistribution of the deer
Speaker 1: across the landscape, especially on the farm. So I'm I'm
Speaker 1: hoping that that is a benefit for me where nothing's
Speaker 1: there summertime, and then things change and the deer shift
Speaker 1: into that area during the fall, and I basically I
Speaker 1: just give it more time until that October time frame
Speaker 1: and check my cameras again, and I probably won't be
Speaker 1: worried about it until that October, you know, that early October,
Speaker 1: mid October card pull to see if there's you know,
Speaker 1: if there's no big deer on it by that point,
Speaker 1: then I may have to start thinking of alternate strategies. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So then what then? You you come back in October,
Speaker 1: you show up for your first hunt or whatever, you
Speaker 1: yank a bunch of cards, and still it's like a
Speaker 1: bunch of Michigan bucks running around. Yeah. Um, So at
Speaker 1: that point point, it is just a continue to check
Speaker 1: the trail cameras, uh and check and check and check
Speaker 1: there's no if there's no um, if there's no deer
Speaker 1: on camera on and let's say like active scrapes or
Speaker 1: big fence crossings or pinch points, um, I just continue
Speaker 1: to check them, continue to check them and check them
Speaker 1: until something pops up. And uh, as we all know,
Speaker 1: just because deer aren't on trail camera doesn't mean they're
Speaker 1: that they're not there. So I just am waiting for
Speaker 1: that that time. In the meantime, though, I'm out scouting
Speaker 1: other properties public near my house, new farms, trying to
Speaker 1: get permission, just real active in the scouting and trying
Speaker 1: to find more property to hunt. Okay, so would you
Speaker 1: reposition cameras at all, Like, would you take any of
Speaker 1: those that have been dead and put them new places
Speaker 1: or put them on a new public peace or anything.
Speaker 1: Are you sticking with your treading true and just waiting
Speaker 1: for them to show up because you know they will. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so on that, I will definitely be moving trail cameras.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, uh where historically there's a
Speaker 1: good deer movement come uh late October in the rut,
Speaker 1: I'm leaving those cameras up because I know at some
Speaker 1: point they're gonna show up. I mean, at some point
Speaker 1: a big mature deer is going to come through these
Speaker 1: betting areas where these does are at, and I just
Speaker 1: have to to wait for that. I Mean, I've had
Speaker 1: several years and I've talked about this before on the
Speaker 1: podcast The there's a couple of years where the first
Speaker 1: mature buck I had on my farm showed up on
Speaker 1: October and it was still right at that nocturnal time frame,
Speaker 1: like just barely shooting light. And then after that is
Speaker 1: when they slowly start picking up all the way up
Speaker 1: until the rut. So I mean, I've had deer on
Speaker 1: camera all year, and then I've had years where there's
Speaker 1: no deer on camera until the rut or anything else.
Speaker 1: But in the meantime, I'm out being active scouting moving
Speaker 1: trail cameras, hoping to find one that's you know, easy,
Speaker 1: easily patterable. How about the flip side. You check your
Speaker 1: cameras in August. We're going back to the summer, and
Speaker 1: Gnarly Charlie or something like that is on it like clockwork.
Speaker 1: He's there every day or every other day. He's visiting
Speaker 1: a lot over and over and over and over again.
Speaker 1: And so you check in August, he's there. Now, I
Speaker 1: know what you're gonna say. You're gonna say, Well, the
Speaker 1: September shift is gonna happen. Stuff is gonna change. But
Speaker 1: are you are you gonna are you going to use
Speaker 1: that intel in any kind of way or are you
Speaker 1: going to think, well, golly, he's here, like crazy? Should
Speaker 1: I have a few things set up specifically for this
Speaker 1: area just in case um or is it not? Not?
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna I don't give a rip that he's here.
Speaker 1: It's just nice and nose here. But wait till October September,
Speaker 1: like what's what's that scenario? And then and then my
Speaker 1: folip will be is same thing fast forward a month
Speaker 1: if it's still happening in mid September, So answer me
Speaker 1: both of those. Yeah, So all all information, in my opinion,
Speaker 1: is good information. Some of that information is just waited differently.
Speaker 1: So if and I've talked about this with you before,
Speaker 1: and and there's that I have a picture of him here,
Speaker 1: and I have a picture of him here, and I
Speaker 1: have a picture of him here. So I take all
Speaker 1: that information. Remember that awesome name I came up for
Speaker 1: the strategy. It was like the Dan Johnson connect the
Speaker 1: dots to develop something like some crazy strategy rectified. I
Speaker 1: don't know, big big big intagram or whatever that right,
Speaker 1: So and that's that's honestly what I do to track
Speaker 1: specific dear dude, is I will lay a map out
Speaker 1: with all my trail camera locations on them or historical data,
Speaker 1: whether that's finding a shed or finding a UM, having
Speaker 1: an encounter from the tree stand, you know, seeing him
Speaker 1: the tree stand, and I put a dot on a map,
Speaker 1: and then I take that dot and I draw the
Speaker 1: line to every other dot. Right, So what you have
Speaker 1: here is this unique shape, and that what I feel
Speaker 1: is that inside this unique shape is his core at
Speaker 1: area and not that he necessarily beds there, but he
Speaker 1: travels through those areas at some point throughout the season.
Speaker 1: So I am going to find terrain features, pinch points,
Speaker 1: um food sources within that, active scrapes, rub lines, whatever,
Speaker 1: and set up in that shape hoping that he comes
Speaker 1: through at some point during you know, during the year.
Speaker 1: So every picture is important, you know. Obviously big you know,
Speaker 1: pictures of big velvet deer awesome to look at, but
Speaker 1: they're weighted a little bit lower in my opinion, than
Speaker 1: a chill camera picture in October or September, when after
Speaker 1: that shift happens and they start to um get into
Speaker 1: a more of a fall routine, if that makes sense. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: So you check your cards mid September he's doing that,
Speaker 1: You've done your connect the dots map reading approach. You
Speaker 1: kind of have a sense of where he's at. And
Speaker 1: would you get aggressive, you know, early season more so
Speaker 1: than usual, if you had that buck that you know
Speaker 1: the last time you check your cameras early September, mid September,
Speaker 1: whatever he's he's doing this thing still, would you dive
Speaker 1: or not dive? Would you swing for the fences and
Speaker 1: try to kill him that first night right there? It
Speaker 1: depends on if it's not turnal or daylight pictures. Historically
Speaker 1: all of those pictures have been not turnal. Right, he
Speaker 1: comes through the area, that's fine, but I can't hunt
Speaker 1: him right so my in my opinion, a nocturnal picture
Speaker 1: during the hunting season doesn't mean too much. He's in there,
Speaker 1: you gotta try to find where he's coming from. But
Speaker 1: if he's coming from a different property, he's already on
Speaker 1: whatever property you can hunt. But it's past light, all
Speaker 1: you're doing is distributing scent across the landscape that you
Speaker 1: don't want there. So what I like to do is
Speaker 1: wait for that late October time frame to where he's
Speaker 1: up and coming through the property. Certainly, you know sent
Speaker 1: checking on a cold front or some kind of you know,
Speaker 1: closer to the end of the beginning of the breeding season,
Speaker 1: and just kind of start cycling through good spots. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know you did show up here. Is he's still
Speaker 1: on camera? Yes, Okay, let's go to a different place.
Speaker 1: He's still on camera. Yes, Is he's still on camera? No?
Speaker 1: All right, let's go back and cycle through that again,
Speaker 1: and just keep doing that cycle and hopefully your access
Speaker 1: routes to these tree stamp locations are are are good
Speaker 1: to where they're you're not blowing deer out. You're not
Speaker 1: you know, after the hunt, on an evening hunt or before,
Speaker 1: you're not blowing to your outcoming in, and you're not
Speaker 1: blow into your outcoming out. At the same time, you
Speaker 1: don't want that scent there, for if they come buy
Speaker 1: a three in the morning, you know, it's all you know,
Speaker 1: it's there, and they they probably won't get spooked in
Speaker 1: my opinion, but it's it's still not good for them
Speaker 1: to hit human scent anywhere. Really. See, I feel like
Speaker 1: I feel like that, I feel like that's not even
Speaker 1: what you do though, Dan, as far as I understand
Speaker 1: like you like to plan an access route, that just
Speaker 1: walks right up on where the bucks are standing. You
Speaker 1: get two of them, about thirty yards of them, and
Speaker 1: shoot him while they're standing there, right right right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: last year, last year at work, you know, And as
Speaker 1: a joke, I always tell uh everybody that that buck
Speaker 1: was blind in his left eye, so he had no
Speaker 1: clue I was there. Anyway, I gotta find more bucks
Speaker 1: like that. That's a summer scouting strategy. Go find a
Speaker 1: blind buck, Go find blind bucks. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: with all that stuff, you know, I'm a running gun
Speaker 1: type guy. But if I am going into an area
Speaker 1: and I'll do a running gun in, I'm not opposed
Speaker 1: to leaving that tree, stand up and coming back to it,
Speaker 1: so I don't have to do a full set up
Speaker 1: on a later time. Just leave it up and then come,
Speaker 1: you know, use it in that that cycle. But at
Speaker 1: the same time, man, just historically, I'm a I'm a
Speaker 1: believer in annual patterns. I'm a believer in annual deer movement,
Speaker 1: and I just feel that none of the deer, none
Speaker 1: of the deer I want to shoot. I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: say all the time, but you hit, you hit mid October,
Speaker 1: early October. They's they're moving, but they're still nocturnal and
Speaker 1: you can't do anything about that. So you're big on
Speaker 1: annual patterns. You've got some spots. You've been on the
Speaker 1: hunt for a long time. You know him well, so
Speaker 1: you can say stuff like what you just did with confidence.
Speaker 1: Right on the flip side, I know you came out
Speaker 1: and hunted my home state in Michigan last year for
Speaker 1: a little bit, running gun new spots, all brand new adventure.
Speaker 1: So what I want to know is this. Let's say
Speaker 1: I offered you five thousand dollars, five thousand dollars and
Speaker 1: all expenses paid, food and lodging for to Michigan. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but you can't hunt in Iowa. Would you take it?
Speaker 1: Or would you say, screw your money and screw your
Speaker 1: mitten state. I'm taking Iowa. But think of what we
Speaker 1: can do that five thousand dollars, Dan, and you could
Speaker 1: pay for an elkcount, you could pay for you know,
Speaker 1: whatever you need, a bunch of those trail cameras. What
Speaker 1: would you do? We're telling me. So you're you're saying,
Speaker 1: let me lay this out again. You're gonna pay me
Speaker 1: five thousand dollars. You're gonna feed and house me, but
Speaker 1: I can't hunt Iowa, only Michigan. Yeah. So, so that
Speaker 1: basically says you can't hunt your homestay at all. Michigan's
Speaker 1: your only location. But I'm gonna pay all that money
Speaker 1: and all of your needs in Michigan are taking care of.
Speaker 1: You're gonna eat five star chef meals, you're gonna sleep
Speaker 1: in a beautiful resort hotel with a spa, and they'll
Speaker 1: do your nails and they'll wax your back whatever you need.
Speaker 1: Is there is there a limitation on the time that
Speaker 1: I can hunt, Like, can I hunt all the time,
Speaker 1: every day, hunt whenever you want? Mm hmm. That's at
Speaker 1: run that by my wife. But dude, that's it's tempting
Speaker 1: from the point where I can go to Michigan or
Speaker 1: whatever the end state is and have time to figure
Speaker 1: everything out. Right, I can go into an area, throw
Speaker 1: up the trail cameras, hunt it, scout it, check trail cameras,
Speaker 1: and start to put more pieces of the puzzle together.
Speaker 1: And I feel like if I could do that, I
Speaker 1: could locate a top notch buck in any state. Like
Speaker 1: I'm I'm pretty confident in that if I had the
Speaker 1: ability to spend a lot of time scouting, show camera
Speaker 1: data and hunting, and I'm like observation, hunts or whatever.
Speaker 1: I feel like I could find a top notch back
Speaker 1: and put a plane together to get him on the
Speaker 1: ground with that set. Okay, I knew there was I
Speaker 1: knew there was a butt coming here. Uh dude, Iowa
Speaker 1: is magical and every year it is. Ye're like, it's
Speaker 1: like nothing you've ever seen before. Mark, you can attest
Speaker 1: to that, even even one weekend in Iowa is different.
Speaker 1: Like even on my farms, I have other people hunted right,
Speaker 1: like some of these people, Like I talked to people
Speaker 1: on Instagram and Facebook just like you do. These people
Speaker 1: have never seen dear that big from a tree stand before,
Speaker 1: like art like this sounds like an arrogant thing to say,
Speaker 1: but from the deer that I would never shoot. This
Speaker 1: is the biggest deer some of these people have ever seen.
Speaker 1: And although I would be up for the challenge, I will.
Speaker 1: I will say that I would take that. I would
Speaker 1: take that offer, but just not this year. Okay, all right, Well,
Speaker 1: when I win the lottery someday, I'm gonna I'm gonna
Speaker 1: actually make you do it. I'm gonna have the five
Speaker 1: dollars and and try to see if you will actually
Speaker 1: take me up on that than uh, you know, thank
Speaker 1: God for hypotheticals. Yes, you're not You're not true. I'll
Speaker 1: put this. I'm not gonna give you time frame, but
Speaker 1: I will come back to bow hunt Michigan again. Good
Speaker 1: all right, it was fun when he came out. I
Speaker 1: want to do it one of these times. And I've
Speaker 1: got time in like a place where we could actually
Speaker 1: like tag team a spot, um for a week. That
Speaker 1: would be pretty cool. Yeah, and maybe you'd buy Andy
Speaker 1: May and then where you going And I'll be like,
Speaker 1: oh man, I'm going to the spot over here, and
Speaker 1: then basically just me following into I mean, that's not
Speaker 1: that's not a bad idea to get a buck on
Speaker 1: the ground. Man. For some reason, this place was just
Speaker 1: calling Jimmy. It's weird. I don't know what happened. Um. Alright,
Speaker 1: new scenario and this is one that you can uniquely
Speaker 1: answer because you've had to deal with this, and I'm
Speaker 1: curious if you would. I'm curious how you'd approach if
Speaker 1: you had happen to you again. So your head in
Speaker 1: to hunt your best spots, like your best farm and
Speaker 1: it's your first ton of the year, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: I know sometimes your first time of the year is
Speaker 1: until later in the month. But let's say it's early
Speaker 1: ash October. You go in. Their conditions are great, You've
Speaker 1: stayed away from it for the last month. You've let it,
Speaker 1: you know, soak and keep pressure low. You show up,
Speaker 1: you're excited, and you realize that there are a bunch
Speaker 1: of logging trucks. The owner of the property is logging
Speaker 1: the sucker out. What would you do now that you've
Speaker 1: been through this once before. Yeah, that's a very tough
Speaker 1: question because the farm was different that year. Uh, and
Speaker 1: I shot they Luckily they didn't. They didn't logged the
Speaker 1: whole farm at one time. They logged half one fall,
Speaker 1: and then into that spring and the late winter and
Speaker 1: spring they logged the other half. So it was a
Speaker 1: fifty fifty type deal. Uh. And I was able to
Speaker 1: bounce uh and kill my dear that that year on
Speaker 1: the opposite side of the farm. But um, let's just
Speaker 1: say for this question the purposes of this question, UM,
Speaker 1: I did that that they were logging the whole farm
Speaker 1: at one time. I would just try to find the
Speaker 1: pockets where the does aren't being kicked out. I mean,
Speaker 1: they can only logged so much at one time, and
Speaker 1: I feel like there would still be deer coming through there.
Speaker 1: I would probably hunt more towards the fringes in the
Speaker 1: main terrain features leading in and out of the property.
Speaker 1: Let's say that border up to a neighboring farm that
Speaker 1: let's let's just say isn't getting logged, and set up
Speaker 1: there and try to watch watch the traffic coming through,
Speaker 1: a lot of observation, hunts, a lot of um you know,
Speaker 1: if that hopefully he's he's there the next time, and
Speaker 1: trying trying to find out where this movement is and
Speaker 1: then real aggressive moves in again. Right, So pretty much
Speaker 1: the same thing that I'm doing, just more observation, more
Speaker 1: trail cameras, more uh more looking for that fresh deer sign.
Speaker 1: I guess you want to say, and then and then
Speaker 1: make it hard moves into it so it's not gonna
Speaker 1: you're not looking like you have to find a new place.
Speaker 1: You believe you could still make it happen. Well, I mean,
Speaker 1: if it was so bad, I mean I have multiple farms,
Speaker 1: so for me, there's always times where if let's just
Speaker 1: say there's a couple other hunters, I'm I'm bouncing to
Speaker 1: a new piece, or I'm going to the public down here,
Speaker 1: or I'm gonna go to a different farm and and
Speaker 1: see what's going on there. Like, my net is pretty
Speaker 1: is cast pretty wide when it comes to like having
Speaker 1: options on where a hunt, because I don't want that
Speaker 1: scenario to have to affect me. Right, It's like, oh, ship,
Speaker 1: they're logging, alright, Well the spot's blown out. Let's go
Speaker 1: over here, you know what I mean. So having options
Speaker 1: and having multiple farms to hunt and multiple pieces of
Speaker 1: public picked out is something that I go into every
Speaker 1: season having anyway. So it's just it's it's almost like
Speaker 1: a good practice to have always have a backup and
Speaker 1: a backup for your backup and a backup, back back up. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a good way go about it, all right. Speaking
Speaker 1: of other hunters, it's October, and because there's a mega
Speaker 1: cold front that came through and you're super pumped about it,
Speaker 1: and you've got the good the right wind direction to
Speaker 1: hunt one of your favorite areas, you're gonna start your
Speaker 1: rutcation a little bit earlier, so you're sneaking in. You
Speaker 1: had to take care of the kids, in the morning,
Speaker 1: so it's like mid day kind of thing. You're gonna
Speaker 1: head in to start your big trip, and you're coming
Speaker 1: up to the top of a ridge. You came in
Speaker 1: through a ditch. You're coming up to the top of ridge,
Speaker 1: and just as you cresh the ridge and you can
Speaker 1: see over the rise, another hunter appears like ten yards
Speaker 1: away from He was doing the same thing, but came
Speaker 1: from the opp of the side. You guys meet up
Speaker 1: at the top of the ridge or ten yards away.
Speaker 1: You look at him, he looks at you. He's got
Speaker 1: something in his hand. You look in his hand. He's
Speaker 1: holding one of your trail cameras. Yeah, what do you do?
Speaker 1: My heart just started beating real hard. All right, he's
Speaker 1: holding my trail camera. If I'm picking up the phone
Speaker 1: and I call the I call the DNR officer immediately
Speaker 1: and out loud so he can hear me. I am
Speaker 1: saying it is if I know him, I'll say his name,
Speaker 1: I'll say I'm looking at him right now. He's holding
Speaker 1: my trail camera in his hand. Um, why don't you
Speaker 1: get out here and that's it and let him take
Speaker 1: care of the rest. I mean, I'm not gonna I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna sit here and mess around with mess around
Speaker 1: with it. I'm not gonna say, hey, I'm gonna give
Speaker 1: you an option. I've had too many trail camera stolen.
Speaker 1: I'm unfortunately, whether that's the first trail camera he's stolen
Speaker 1: or the tenth show camera this guy's stolen, he will
Speaker 1: be prosecuted to the fullest extent. And like if it's
Speaker 1: up to me, because I'm I'm done with that ship,
Speaker 1: Like I'm done with it. So if that guy wants
Speaker 1: to play that game, he's gonna win fines, he's gonna
Speaker 1: win whatever penalties that a guy gets for stealing ship,
Speaker 1: that is what he's gonna get. So I mean, at
Speaker 1: the same time, I'm just gonna be like, you know,
Speaker 1: you're a dirt bag, probably subtly, you know. I mean,
Speaker 1: let's be honest. As much as I would love to
Speaker 1: walk over there and just beat the ship out of him,
Speaker 1: right shot, I don't want to. I don't want to
Speaker 1: get shot, I don't want to get stabbed. Whatever. I
Speaker 1: am just I'm going right to the police and I'm
Speaker 1: gonna just say, hey, why don't you wait here, because
Speaker 1: I'm gonna follow you back to your truck or whatever.
Speaker 1: You're gonna do, so just stay here and we can
Speaker 1: figure this out with with a conservation officer. Yeah, all right,
Speaker 1: I thought that one muld hit home with you. And
Speaker 1: if he hunts on the same property that I that I,
Speaker 1: uh hunt on, I'm going straight to the landowner and
Speaker 1: I'm gonna tell her tell him. Listen, I just caught
Speaker 1: a guy stealing my trail camera. It's this guy. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, you do what you want, but I want
Speaker 1: to let you know that if any more of my
Speaker 1: trail cameras gets stolen, I'm holding him responsible for all
Speaker 1: the throughout the years. And I think I have a
Speaker 1: pretty good standing with my landowners that they would probably
Speaker 1: just kick that person off off the farm. So now
Speaker 1: they've not only lost you know, they're probably gonna have
Speaker 1: to pay some kind of fine, they're also going to
Speaker 1: lose some really good hunting property. M Yeah, i'd say,
Speaker 1: I'd say it's not a risk worth taking. No, Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I want to find him. I want to find him,
Speaker 1: get hit him. You know. Maybe I'll just knock an
Speaker 1: arrow and launch one right like a little bit to
Speaker 1: the left and see my luck. I'm so bad at him,
Speaker 1: and they'd probably shoot the guy. Yeah, I man, that's
Speaker 1: not a good idea for you. All right, let's take
Speaker 1: a step back from Fiery Dan and uh talk about
Speaker 1: another fun thing that I know about you. Um, it's
Speaker 1: November one. You made it past the trail cam debacle. Uh,
Speaker 1: this guy's gone. You're hunting again, and it's one of
Speaker 1: those days that's special. You get it set up in
Speaker 1: your standing in the morning and they're chasing there, running
Speaker 1: in the woods, are on fire. Then it slows down
Speaker 1: a little bit around nine o'clock, same thing. Ten o'clock,
Speaker 1: ten thirty rolls around, and you're thinking about lunch. I
Speaker 1: know you, you're already thinking like, I'm getting hungry. And
Speaker 1: then you see him mature buck cruising. He's cruising out
Speaker 1: of out of range though, so you saw him, Well, like,
Speaker 1: I gotta stick it out a little bit longer. So
Speaker 1: now eleven o'clock rolls by and you see a little
Speaker 1: yearling chasing a doll. And then eleven o five comes
Speaker 1: by and there's a two year old cruising. So it's
Speaker 1: eleven thirty now, and there's been a lot happened in
Speaker 1: the last hour. But at the same time, you didn't
Speaker 1: bring in a lunch. You had some snacks, your plan
Speaker 1: on getting out to go somewhere else midday. Your knees
Speaker 1: are hurting. I know your knees are hurting at this point, man,
Speaker 1: give me. I told her this is the Dan Johnson roast.
Speaker 1: What what do you do? What do you do at
Speaker 1: this point? Uh? So, where your question is completely flawed
Speaker 1: is there is always food in my backpack. There's always
Speaker 1: something to eat, something to drink, always every time. So
Speaker 1: I'm not too worried about that. Um, but I do
Speaker 1: have a rule, believe it or not, that if there
Speaker 1: is continuous movement throughout uh whatever time frame I'm sitting,
Speaker 1: I'm sitting right. But at the same time as at
Speaker 1: that when that big mature buck came through at whatever time,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to call to get him to come to
Speaker 1: me right, I'm trying to get his attention and to
Speaker 1: see if that works right, and then I'm gonna give
Speaker 1: him if he if he doesn't respond, I'm going to
Speaker 1: give him enough time to where I think he can
Speaker 1: loop around and then try to come into my position.
Speaker 1: So and then you know, here comes another you know,
Speaker 1: one year old, two year old whatever, three year old
Speaker 1: coming in and messing around I'm not. I'm not just
Speaker 1: gonna get out of my tree stand if there's good action. Uh,
Speaker 1: when I leave my tree stand, it's been an hour
Speaker 1: or so since the deer have, you know, have come by,
Speaker 1: and so I'm probably gonna get out of my tree stand,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm Or what I'll do is, if I
Speaker 1: see where that buck went into, let's say a thicket,
Speaker 1: I might move closer to that thicket, or I might
Speaker 1: move to a different tree stand location right away and
Speaker 1: hunt mid day there. But I just it's just one
Speaker 1: of those things. It's hard. I've I've hunted specific farms
Speaker 1: so much that my farm so much that I feel
Speaker 1: like I don't need to I don't need to hunt
Speaker 1: mid day to be successful. Now that will change. If
Speaker 1: I let's say, say I go to Missouri and I
Speaker 1: find a really good trail and deer are constantly coming by,
Speaker 1: but it starts to slow down. You know, I'll probably
Speaker 1: stick it out. I'll probably stick it out until multiple
Speaker 1: hours have passed with no siding. But then by that
Speaker 1: time it's two o'clock, and then it's three o'clock, and
Speaker 1: now you're you're gonna stay there? Anyway, I might get
Speaker 1: down and do a little bit many scouting session or
Speaker 1: something like that, come back up, or just climb up
Speaker 1: and down my tree stand just I don't know, get
Speaker 1: some blood circulating. But I don't know. It's just for me.
Speaker 1: It's not about not hunting all day. It's about the
Speaker 1: activity that I see when I decide to leave the
Speaker 1: tree stand. If the activity is there, I'm gonna do it.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna sit it out. But for me, uh, I
Speaker 1: guess I got other things to do, jet trail cameras. Um,
Speaker 1: I don't know. Just not an all day guy. I
Speaker 1: get it, man, I get it. Uh, here's another one
Speaker 1: for you. Let's say you had that situation and the
Speaker 1: movement died down and you had to move a little bit, right,
Speaker 1: So let's say at eleven eleven thirty bailed went back
Speaker 1: to your truck. But in your head, you're like, you
Speaker 1: know what, I'm gonna just grab something from my truck.
Speaker 1: Maybe you want to grab another stand or something and
Speaker 1: some water or whatever, and then I'm gonna head right
Speaker 1: back out and I'm gonna stay out there till dark.
Speaker 1: So you know, you've got a good six seven more
Speaker 1: hours of sitting to do. And it's one of those
Speaker 1: long sits. It's gonna be. As you're grabbing your gear
Speaker 1: at the back of the truck, all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: I pop out of the woods. I just jump out
Speaker 1: of nowhere and I've got three bags in my hand,
Speaker 1: and I run at you. You're shocked because I'm not
Speaker 1: suppos to be an as you thought I was in Michigan.
Speaker 1: But here I am. I've got three bags. One of
Speaker 1: my bags has got a three cheese to loop a
Speaker 1: combo meal from Taco Bell. One of these bags has
Speaker 1: a classic double cheeseburger combo meal from Wendy's, and one's
Speaker 1: a fuji apple salad from Panera Bread Taco Bell. That's
Speaker 1: a bold, bold move with seven hours in the tree
Speaker 1: head of you, dude, I got an iron gut, like
Speaker 1: I've already had my morning poop. Right, I'll take it.
Speaker 1: And that's the thing, Like I don't drink coffee in
Speaker 1: the mornings for that reason. Right, I will switch my
Speaker 1: my bowel movement schedule to post evening hunt. It's like
Speaker 1: this is a practice that I've It's like monks, right,
Speaker 1: they're able to like not feel pain. Dan Johns comparison.
Speaker 1: This is one right, I am able to shift my
Speaker 1: bowel movements from after morning coffee to after dinner meal. Right,
Speaker 1: so it's I don't know, I'm not afraid to eat
Speaker 1: a talk. I'm not afraid to eat taco bell before
Speaker 1: afternoon hunt. All right, well you heard it here first, folks,
Speaker 1: Dan Johnson will take Taco Bell to the tree stand
Speaker 1: and you know this mark. Uh if nature does call,
Speaker 1: I'm sky dumping. We had to find a way to
Speaker 1: sneak that in. Right there is there. We can wrap
Speaker 1: this one up now, all right, So speaking to sky
Speaker 1: dumps then, and uh in you know setting up midday, Uh,
Speaker 1: you've headed back in. You're gonna set up in a
Speaker 1: new location. And this is mid day now you've you've
Speaker 1: had your t bell, you're heading back in and you
Speaker 1: know the spot you need to get to write. You
Speaker 1: had this sighting and maybe that sighting just happened to
Speaker 1: line up with some trail camera info. Two. So you're
Speaker 1: really confident that this little pinch point zone maybe it's
Speaker 1: maybe it's a thicket with where some dos are bedded.
Speaker 1: And this buck is cruising the down one side of it,
Speaker 1: and you know that there's this little train feature that
Speaker 1: just like pins him into this little tight spot. It's
Speaker 1: it's picture perfect. It's great. Uh Honestly, I don't know
Speaker 1: why you weren't hunting there in the first place in
Speaker 1: the morning, but you didn't. You decided to be seventy
Speaker 1: eight yards back, and now you're making the move to
Speaker 1: get right there. Here's the problem, though, There's two trees
Speaker 1: available within range of that spot. One of them is
Speaker 1: a bean poultry like it's it's like eight inches in diameter,
Speaker 1: straight up and down and almost no cover at all.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's it's it's just a big bean pull.
Speaker 1: But man, that sucker is perfectly positioned. If you were
Speaker 1: to hunt that, the wind is gonna be almost bullet
Speaker 1: proof for you because there's a little bit of a
Speaker 1: ditch behind you that's gonna blow over and you're not
Speaker 1: gonna get busted from a wind perspective, and any buck
Speaker 1: that comes through that pinch point that you're gonna have
Speaker 1: a beautiful twenty yard shot. I mean, it's gorgeous, and
Speaker 1: you know, if you sat there and bucked it, what
Speaker 1: you wanted to be a chip shot even for you. Dan.
Speaker 1: The the the alternative though, and the thing to think
Speaker 1: about here is that that bean poultry is lacking some
Speaker 1: things that this other tree has. This other tree is
Speaker 1: short and scrubby. It has got all sorts of branches,
Speaker 1: it has got all sorts of winding, just junk and brush,
Speaker 1: and I mean it's it's perfect camouflage. You can get
Speaker 1: up in there and nothing's ever can see you. The
Speaker 1: problem is you can't get any higher than like eight
Speaker 1: or nine feet up. That's this tree is short. So
Speaker 1: you're gonna get up in there, it's gonna be eight
Speaker 1: or nine feet up, and you're gonna have to clear
Speaker 1: out a lot. I mean, there's gonna be some work
Speaker 1: to even be able get into the tree, let alone,
Speaker 1: to get any shots. Which tree you're gonna pick, I'm
Speaker 1: probably as you described it, I'm probably picking the bean poultry.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get as high as I can with four sticks,
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna face my tree stand on the opposite side,
Speaker 1: facing away from where I believe your movement's gonna come to.
Speaker 1: So although it's a small bean poultree, uh, it's still
Speaker 1: something between me and the deer. So I'm gonna get
Speaker 1: high and i'm gonna get you know, and I'm gonna
Speaker 1: be facing away so that i'll be facing the tree
Speaker 1: when the shot, when the shot comes, Does that make sense?
Speaker 1: And the reason I'm the reason I'm not picking all
Speaker 1: of that other work is because like for me, when
Speaker 1: I get into an area like I'm in pretty tight
Speaker 1: as it is, so I want to get up, Like
Speaker 1: I don't want to spend any time on the ground.
Speaker 1: There's times where I have to, you know, like potentially
Speaker 1: taking a pole saut or a handsall with me and chopping,
Speaker 1: you know, cutting some branches down. But that is a
Speaker 1: lot of noise, that's a lot of work, that's a
Speaker 1: lot of time spent on the ground where something couldn't
Speaker 1: potentially come by or you know, choose your scenario what
Speaker 1: happens there. And so I guess I would rather be high.
Speaker 1: Now if you told me I'm still ship, I'm still
Speaker 1: sitting low to the ground, but didn't have to do
Speaker 1: all that cutting, then I would probably take eight foot
Speaker 1: off the ground with good back cover as opposed to high.
Speaker 1: And note ever, but in that scenario, I'm not I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna trim all that just for an eight foot
Speaker 1: set like I'm gonna get high. Maybe I'm a little exposed,
Speaker 1: but I'm not bouncing around in a tree okay, so
Speaker 1: let's play it out a little further. You go up
Speaker 1: in that bean pole. You're I don't know how many
Speaker 1: sticks do you bring? Four or five? Four? Six? Alright?
Speaker 1: So your four sticks high and you spread them out wide.
Speaker 1: So you're up there, yeah, I don't know, twenty something
Speaker 1: like that. And you're you're up there. I forgot, I've
Speaker 1: got a little bit longer legs than you. Um, and
Speaker 1: you're you're facing away from where they think they're coming.
Speaker 1: And here comes a big old buck. He's the one,
Speaker 1: and you just like you knew it. This was the spot.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is the spot of spots. Big Buck
Speaker 1: comes rolling through and he busts you like he he's
Speaker 1: the eighty yards and like, head up, he sees something
Speaker 1: doesn't like, turns goes the other way. You're like shit,
Speaker 1: but you know, you know, maybe ten fift twenty minutes later,
Speaker 1: here comes a Doe family group coming down the trail.
Speaker 1: They get all the way into the pinch point. They're
Speaker 1: at thirty thirty five yards. But then big Mama Dough
Speaker 1: head up. Bam, she spots you up there too. So
Speaker 1: now I've been busted twice. And you think this is
Speaker 1: by sight or by smell, this is by sight or both.
Speaker 1: This is by sight. So I've made I've made a
Speaker 1: bad decision, right, and I've I've gotten busted for it. Right,
Speaker 1: You've been busted by a mature buck and some does.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, man like they're deer moving
Speaker 1: like deer coming through and all these deer want to
Speaker 1: head right to this spot. So you you know you're
Speaker 1: getting busted. But at the same time, you know, like geez,
Speaker 1: like I picked the right area. They want to be here.
Speaker 1: What do you do? Do you stick it out thinking
Speaker 1: and hoping that maybe you'll get away with it one
Speaker 1: of these times, or do you say, shit, I gotta
Speaker 1: you know, I can't get away with it. There's no
Speaker 1: point being the best spotted. Yeah, if I've gotten busted
Speaker 1: by to like by the mature dough and the mature
Speaker 1: box of whatever of that area is you're coming through there,
Speaker 1: that's just two indicators saying that I made the wrong decision.
Speaker 1: So you have to move right, like, you can't just
Speaker 1: wish that away. It's not gonna happen. So I come down, Uh,
Speaker 1: I mean, there might be a couple of other options
Speaker 1: there where you go. You go down to the actual
Speaker 1: bottom of the tree, and you start cutting some branches
Speaker 1: or some stuff off of a um, a different tree,
Speaker 1: and you start hanging those in the tree with you.
Speaker 1: So so you're you're bringing up cover with you, so
Speaker 1: to speak, and uh, it's taking away your silhouette. But
Speaker 1: at the same time, that's a lot of work too.
Speaker 1: So for me, I guess I would probably one of
Speaker 1: there's different scenarios here, But for me, I would probably
Speaker 1: tear down, stack up, walk up the trail where these
Speaker 1: deer came from, and then I would find a different
Speaker 1: tree up there. If if we're talking about like a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of trails intersecting with each other, and that's
Speaker 1: why I had to make that decision in the first place, well,
Speaker 1: then I'm probably gonna get into that other tree and
Speaker 1: you know, blow it out that night potentially because it's
Speaker 1: later in the hunt, but I'll have it set up
Speaker 1: for the next morning. If the wind direction is going
Speaker 1: to stay the same, all right, I like but for
Speaker 1: the most part, I don't know. Just like being real still,
Speaker 1: you know, in that scenario, like I got a couple,
Speaker 1: I got a couple tree stand locations that are just
Speaker 1: like that where they're coming off the top of a
Speaker 1: ridge and at some point they are almost eye level
Speaker 1: with you before they drop down to cruise into this
Speaker 1: little pitch, you know what I mean. And and so
Speaker 1: you have to be still. And dude, I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: say I don't get busted every year, because I do.
Speaker 1: I get busted every year by too much movement or
Speaker 1: not paying attention and deer are coming, you know, behind
Speaker 1: me or whatever. But if it's is it is it
Speaker 1: because of where I'm at and how I'm set up?
Speaker 1: Or is it because I was doing something dumb like
Speaker 1: I can I m But if I'm so silhouetted and
Speaker 1: so skyline that I'm getting picked off by immature does
Speaker 1: and young bucks, then there's a problem. Yep, I get
Speaker 1: that logic for sure. All right, how about this one.
Speaker 1: We've had to deal with circumstances kind of like this
Speaker 1: to varying degrees over the years. Both of us have
Speaker 1: curious where your heads at these days. Uh, you've got
Speaker 1: a wonky thing going on with your schedule when in
Speaker 1: your wife's availability, really where you could hunt the first
Speaker 1: week of November and it's it's clear you got the
Speaker 1: whole first week in November and it's yours, no other obligations.
Speaker 1: You've got babysitters, you've got school, your wife's all sets beautiful.
Speaker 1: Problem is, October thirty one arrives and you look at
Speaker 1: the fourth cast and man, November one, seventy two, November two,
Speaker 1: November three, You've got a full week of seventies. Lousy,
Speaker 1: not what any of us dream about. So you're sitting
Speaker 1: there thinking, man, and let me let me add one
Speaker 1: more qualifier. For whatever reason you worked out with your wife,
Speaker 1: it's only gonna be a week for rutcation this year,
Speaker 1: just because it's been a crazy year. So you could
Speaker 1: you could pick that first week and you'll have the
Speaker 1: whole darn week, man, but you're gonna have to deal
Speaker 1: with those weather, those weather situations. On the flip side,
Speaker 1: Sarah said, you could also have the second week and
Speaker 1: you look at the forecast and man, there's a cold
Speaker 1: front coming through. Those seventies are gonna drop down to
Speaker 1: the fifties and forties. It's gonna look better. Problem is,
Speaker 1: you've got some obligations throughout the week. You're gonna be
Speaker 1: able to hunt to maybe three days. If you play
Speaker 1: your cards right, Max, you might be able to get
Speaker 1: three days that week. But man, the weather looks dynamite.
Speaker 1: Which week are you picking? And let me add a
Speaker 1: second deer hold, okay, which week are gonna pick? And
Speaker 1: then how are you going to approach hunting those two
Speaker 1: unique circumstances? Yeah, all right, so in a crazy way,
Speaker 1: deer hunting you take away all of the details to
Speaker 1: that question. Per se. Deer hunting is trying to get
Speaker 1: in a spot where you have a shot opportunity at
Speaker 1: a deer, right, not then we start throwing in all
Speaker 1: this other stuff. Right, The only thing I'm thinking about
Speaker 1: at this point is I'm still picking that first week.
Speaker 1: I'm still picking that first week. Like, to me, the
Speaker 1: rut is happening, whether it's eight hundred degrees or well,
Speaker 1: then we'd all boil alive. You lost, You lost the
Speaker 1: game right there, right right there, it's eighty degrees out
Speaker 1: or it's the perfect third high pressure thirty you know,
Speaker 1: thirty five degree days. Right, the deer are still gonna
Speaker 1: breed the movement at this point. To me, the way
Speaker 1: I look at it is, man, this is kind of cool.
Speaker 1: This is kind of good for me, because now the
Speaker 1: deer are only moving early in the morning, you know,
Speaker 1: for that first couple of hours where it's still cool
Speaker 1: out in November, and as that sun starts to set
Speaker 1: and it starts to cool down again, then they're moving again.
Speaker 1: So all that does is just the limit dates any
Speaker 1: midday thought process that I have to do. Right, it's
Speaker 1: morning hunts and evening hunts, and I'm getting in tight
Speaker 1: everyvery single hunt I'm gonna get into. I'm gonna back
Speaker 1: door bedroom, I'm gonna get right close to where I
Speaker 1: believe they're betting or where um I feel that these
Speaker 1: bucks are going to come out right. So for me
Speaker 1: time to figure are out that problem of getting a
Speaker 1: deer within shooting range consecutive days as opposed to a
Speaker 1: couple of days here, A couple of days there has
Speaker 1: a more of a has more of a benefit to
Speaker 1: me than just hunting one or two days, right, just
Speaker 1: you know, hunting a day and then having two days off,
Speaker 1: and then hunting two days and having four days off,
Speaker 1: or whatever that scenario is. I'm picking the seven days
Speaker 1: in a row where I can start the process, check
Speaker 1: the trail cameras, get into the betting areas, observe, and
Speaker 1: put the pieces of the puzzle together. Knowing that the
Speaker 1: next day, I can use what I've learned to make
Speaker 1: a move, and then use that day to make a move,
Speaker 1: and then use that day to make a move, so
Speaker 1: that hopefully I've you know, I've gathered enough information over
Speaker 1: however many days I've hunted to put myself into a
Speaker 1: position to shoot a deer. I like it. You got
Speaker 1: a system, play the system, all right, system, and that's
Speaker 1: what that's what works for me, and I love, Don't
Speaker 1: get me wrong. I love going in and hunting that
Speaker 1: late October time frame, or if I have a post
Speaker 1: rut hunt or a late season hunt where you're just
Speaker 1: going in and kind of hoping something's they're not really
Speaker 1: knowing if anything's there. But I like to the process
Speaker 1: that I've established for myself has led me too. It's
Speaker 1: just like information gaping, information gathering, go more and more
Speaker 1: and more and more, and then I don't know. It
Speaker 1: all adds up to putting a tree stand in a
Speaker 1: right spot to where you can shoot a dear. I
Speaker 1: value you, all right. We got a new face here, Dann,
Speaker 1: We got the rapid fire phase here. I'm gonna ask
Speaker 1: you a series of questions, one after the other. You
Speaker 1: can only give me like a one word answer. Okay,
Speaker 1: it's gonna be yes or no, or this or that.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna run you through these and then we're gonna
Speaker 1: wrap it up, all right, Okay, all right, here we go,
Speaker 1: and some of the stuff we've talked about over the years.
Speaker 1: Of course, we've talked about probably everything under the stars
Speaker 1: over the years, but this is gonna be a nice
Speaker 1: way to synthesize it all down into thirty seconds. So
Speaker 1: here we go. Does the moon matter to dear movement? Yes?
Speaker 1: Or no? No? Would you take a fifty yard shot
Speaker 1: at a mega white tail with your bow? Yes or no?
Speaker 1: Broadside yes? If you could only have one of these
Speaker 1: for the rest of your hunts, would it be a
Speaker 1: set of Radley Antler's or grunt tube expandable or fixed
Speaker 1: play broadheads? If I only had to pick one, Yeah,
Speaker 1: you gotta pick. Should you stop a buck with some
Speaker 1: kind of sound before shooting if he's walking? Yes or no? Yes? Okay.
Speaker 1: If you were coming to hunt in Michigan and you
Speaker 1: had to pick a guide, someone's gonna guide you to
Speaker 1: a buck in Michigan. You can't have Andy May he's busy.
Speaker 1: You gotta pick either me or Further. Now me, I'm
Speaker 1: very analytical, but I'm also kind of cranky, and I'm
Speaker 1: high pressure, and I'm kind of intense. My hunting buddies
Speaker 1: say that I'm I'm tough to be guided by. Uh.
Speaker 1: While Further he's a little more laid back. Let's say
Speaker 1: he's calm and cool. He's uh, he's probably more fun though,
Speaker 1: you're picking Further, You're picking Kenyan Mark. God, this is
Speaker 1: this is the hardest question out of all because Further,
Speaker 1: I think I have fun with Further. Oh yeah, you would.
Speaker 1: I don't even know if. I don't even know if
Speaker 1: I want to answer that question, because I don't want
Speaker 1: to hurt you. I don't want to hurt your feelings. Alright, well,
Speaker 1: we know where this thing went. You're canceled. Podcast is done,
Speaker 1: your asshole. Next question, of course, I pick you. Next question,
Speaker 1: which state has better deer hunters, Michigan or Iowa? Michigan.
Speaker 1: Oh all right, this last one is not a rapid
Speaker 1: fire question. You made it through rapid fire. Um, you
Speaker 1: hast just barely. You've got an F plus. Um. But
Speaker 1: here's the final question. I have all the powers in
Speaker 1: the world, and I have been granted the ability to
Speaker 1: take away your rights to hunt forever. You will never
Speaker 1: get to deer hunt ever again, except unless you can
Speaker 1: kill a four and a half year old buck or
Speaker 1: older this season. You've got to kill a four and
Speaker 1: a half year old buck this season. If you don't,
Speaker 1: never hunting again. If you do, you're golden. Here's the problem, though,
Speaker 1: I'm only gonna give you one day to do it,
Speaker 1: and you've got one stand location to do it from.
Speaker 1: So you need to tell me what's the date you're
Speaker 1: gonna pick and describe in detail the specific spot location
Speaker 1: details of where you would set up for your one
Speaker 1: very high pressure set. Do do I get to uh?
Speaker 1: Do I get to pick the weather as well? Well,
Speaker 1: I've got I'm all powerful in this scenario, but because
Speaker 1: I'm a good friend, I'll say yes, Okay, all right,
Speaker 1: So here it is. It is. We're gonna be We're
Speaker 1: gonna be in a a staging area. Okay, We're gonna
Speaker 1: be on the top of a ridge leading to a
Speaker 1: food source that is potentially still standing or you know
Speaker 1: the dear activity nocturnally is happening here. I'm going to
Speaker 1: go into a staging area, I'm gonna say, and I
Speaker 1: like picking one specific day is is tough, but let's
Speaker 1: just for all intensive purposes, say November November eleven. Okay,
Speaker 1: it's November eleven. It is. Um. Yeah, So I'm gonna
Speaker 1: be in a staging area that's probably a hundred yards
Speaker 1: off a egg field. In this staging area is just
Speaker 1: a whole bunch of shredded trees. It's uh. It's the
Speaker 1: place where the deer hold up to chill out for
Speaker 1: a second before they head into that into that egg field.
Speaker 1: And I'm sitting on the downward side of this ridge,
Speaker 1: um where this in this staging area, and the wind
Speaker 1: is blowing like I expect, the deer movement had come
Speaker 1: to my left, but the deer the wind is blowing
Speaker 1: in my face over top of this ridge down into
Speaker 1: this uh valley below me, this drainage below me at
Speaker 1: a quartering angle in the deer are gonna be walking
Speaker 1: this ridge thinking that they have the advantage. Meanwhile, twenty
Speaker 1: yards to the right of them is my scent going
Speaker 1: right down into this drainage. So, I mean, I don't
Speaker 1: know what more you need. That is where I'm setting up,
Speaker 1: and that's the date, and it's probably gonna be if
Speaker 1: if I get to pick the weather it's gonna be
Speaker 1: after all day rain like it started raining the previous night.
Speaker 1: It rained for ten hours, and I got into the
Speaker 1: tree at three in the afternoon, and I got an
Speaker 1: hour and a half to hunt. And that's that's my scenario.
Speaker 1: I like it, and I like your boldness. Most people
Speaker 1: in the answer this question, they're gonna talk about what
Speaker 1: where does the boldness come into play? Right here? Most
Speaker 1: people would say they're gonna hunt the whole day. You said,
Speaker 1: give me an hour and a half and I'll get done. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: you know, most other guys would describe the spot where
Speaker 1: they're gonna hunt in the morning and they're hunt in
Speaker 1: the evening. But you said, give me this picture perfect
Speaker 1: scenario for an hour and a half and I'll get
Speaker 1: it done. So I would say you are the most
Speaker 1: confident in you're set up, which I can appreciate. Which
Speaker 1: I can appreciate. You look at my wall and all
Speaker 1: the deer that I've shot. Of all the deer that
Speaker 1: i've shot, I have right let's see one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.
Speaker 1: I got eight mounts, okay, and of those deer, four
Speaker 1: of them have been shot in evening hunts after long
Speaker 1: periods of rain. It makes sense the rain stopped, they
Speaker 1: got other beds and shot. You gotta love that. Give
Speaker 1: me that. I'm playing the odds at that point, So
Speaker 1: give me that scenario. All right, I'm giving it to you.
Speaker 1: I like it. Then you did well. You made it
Speaker 1: through the gun. If you're the all powerful, can you
Speaker 1: maybe make that deer have a drop time? Then yeah,
Speaker 1: I'll give him split brows too, split brows in the
Speaker 1: drop's mark. Get back every single bad thing I've ever
Speaker 1: said about you. Yeah, I was gonna say, I holpe,
Speaker 1: you feel really bad about picking further over me? Now?
Speaker 1: Uh man, uh tell tell folks what you've got going
Speaker 1: on these days? Where can people see the ten million
Speaker 1: pieces of content you're producing? Um, give us the Update
Speaker 1: and Sportsman's Nation and all that stuff. Yeah, I guess
Speaker 1: one thing really that I mean, I've been doing a
Speaker 1: lot on milf hunter dot com lately. Um, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of milf milf Hunter. I thought that's what you said.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, all right, yeah, I mean just the Sportsman's Nation. Man.
Speaker 1: One thing that we're we're really expanding on is state
Speaker 1: specific podcasts, right Like, so I'm getting ready to launch
Speaker 1: Wisconsin podcast. We have a Missouri podcast, we have a
Speaker 1: Ohio podcast, we have a Michigan podcast. Uh, we're working
Speaker 1: on in Pennsylvania themed podcast. So a lot of the podcast,
Speaker 1: like the Nine Finger Chronicles, is a great podcast, but
Speaker 1: it's nationwide. We don't really other than specific episodes, we
Speaker 1: don't get really niche about states. It's just like a
Speaker 1: story from here, a story from there, you know, content
Speaker 1: from here, content from there. But these these podcasts are
Speaker 1: gonna be state specific. So I mean that's one thing
Speaker 1: I'm pretty jacked up about. Um. And then on top
Speaker 1: of that, it's just like more podcast. I did a
Speaker 1: couple of uh cooking videos, the Nine Finger Kitchen on
Speaker 1: the Sportsman's Nation YouTube channel, and that is gonna pick
Speaker 1: back up in June once my camera guy gets back
Speaker 1: from his turkey hunting adventures. And uh, that's really it, man,
Speaker 1: Just a ton of a ton of badass content coming
Speaker 1: out of the network. That's awesome, dude. Well, UH highly
Speaker 1: encourage everyone listening to check it all out. Keep up
Speaker 1: the great work, man. It's been awesome to see uh
Speaker 1: all the things you've got cooking, and uh, it was
Speaker 1: a lot of fun to get to do this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: appreciate it, Mark, and you know, it's just like I
Speaker 1: can't believe it. I still can't believe that. I'm What's
Speaker 1: what's crazy about this is like the money, like people
Speaker 1: are paying me to have fun basically, and it's crazy.
Speaker 1: Like I I I love it, and I hope that
Speaker 1: comes off. And even my conversation today with you and
Speaker 1: I know that you're probably in some way, shape or form,
Speaker 1: is still kind of awe struck about where where you're
Speaker 1: at in your life. And it's just and that that's
Speaker 1: where like I appreciate that. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: I understand that as much as I am crazy about
Speaker 1: doing all this and I'm thankful for my business, like
Speaker 1: for me, it's equally as important to give back in
Speaker 1: some way, shape or form. So um like I'm I'm
Speaker 1: helping I'm doing some work for the National Deal Association.
Speaker 1: I'm a board member on two percent for conservation. So
Speaker 1: it's one of those things where I really like, I
Speaker 1: want to focus on giving back just as much as
Speaker 1: taking in. So that's that's one thing that I'm kind
Speaker 1: of pushing forward proud of too. That's awesome, man, That's
Speaker 1: what you gotta do. And uh, I'm right there with
Speaker 1: you on the au stark thing. I keep on waiting
Speaker 1: one of these days that someone's gonna tap me on
Speaker 1: the shoulder and say, you know that this is actually
Speaker 1: a mistake, that they didn't really mean to hire you,
Speaker 1: or they really people thought they were listening to somebody else.
Speaker 1: We're happy to send you back to the cubicle. So
Speaker 1: I'm waiting on that one. But so far, so good.
Speaker 1: Be the guy that like that information. Alright, man, let's
Speaker 1: wrap this one up, all right, and that's a wrap.
Speaker 1: Appreciate you tuning into this one. I hope I hope
Speaker 1: you laughed as much as I did. I hope you
Speaker 1: enjoyed this one, got a little more insight into how
Speaker 1: Dan's brain works in the white Tail Woods, and uh,
Speaker 1: I hope you had a good time. So thank you
Speaker 1: for joining me, and until next time, stay wired to Hunt.