Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
Speaker 1: the whitetail woods, presented by First Light, creating proven versatile
Speaker 1: hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First Light
Speaker 1: Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on
Speaker 2: the show, I'm joined by Tony Hansen to break down
Speaker 2: everything you need to know to find a hunting lease.
Speaker 2: All right, welcome back to the Wired to Hunt podcast,
Speaker 2: brought to you by First Light and their CAMO for
Speaker 2: Conservation initiative. That means that every time you purchase I'm
Speaker 2: going to try and say here, every time you purchase
Speaker 2: a piece of first Light gear in the Specter Whitetail
Speaker 2: Hunting Camo, a portion of that sale is donated to
Speaker 2: the National Association, which is a pretty darn cool program
Speaker 2: in my opinion. And today, as I just mentioned, we're
Speaker 2: joined by my pal, Tony Hansen. Tony has written for
Speaker 2: all the major hunting publications. He has done a lot
Speaker 2: of hunting TV work, he has been in real estate.
Speaker 2: He's kind of been all over the place when it
Speaker 2: comes to the hunting world, and he's one of the
Speaker 2: best whitetail hunters out there. He's someone who I have
Speaker 2: followed since the early two thousands and have learned a
Speaker 2: lot from. And the topic that we're discussing today is
Speaker 2: one that I want to cover for the next couple
Speaker 2: of weeks, and it's related to access, access to places
Speaker 2: where we can hunt. It's becoming more and more of
Speaker 2: a challenge every year. I think, if you are a
Speaker 2: avid deer hunter, this is obvious to you. If you
Speaker 2: are a new hunter, this might be something that's kind
Speaker 2: of daunting to you, and so I want to break
Speaker 2: that down and explore what our options are. There's a
Speaker 2: couple different things out there. Right you can hunt public land,
Speaker 2: you can get free permission somewhere. You can buy land,
Speaker 2: or you can lease it. And that's our topic today.
Speaker 2: Today we're going to talk about leases because that's something
Speaker 2: that Tony in particular has been thinking a lot about lately.
Speaker 2: He's been stewing on, spitballing about and brainstorming if and
Speaker 2: how he might want to utilize leases more in his
Speaker 2: hunting kind of quiver of access solutions. He's in the
Speaker 2: past spent a lot of time in public and he's
Speaker 2: still doing that, but he's looking at possibly leasing more,
Speaker 2: and so that's the topic we're going to dive into.
Speaker 2: Why Tony's considering that, What circumstances have pushed him to
Speaker 2: explore leases more, and what has he learned over the
Speaker 2: last ten twenty years of leasing many different properties in
Speaker 2: many different circumstances. What's he learned along the way that
Speaker 2: he's going to be taking forward with him now in
Speaker 2: this next phase of his hunting journey. And that's something
Speaker 2: that I've been going through too. I've done the public thing,
Speaker 2: I've done the permission thing. I've done well. I've sort
Speaker 2: of had some land only our family's owned land, and
Speaker 2: I was on own that we land, or I was
Speaker 2: on land that Meat Eater owned for the back forty
Speaker 2: also leased ground in a number of different states in
Speaker 2: a number of different ways. So I've learned a thing
Speaker 2: or two over time as well. And the thing with
Speaker 2: leases that I found is it's not as easy as
Speaker 2: just saying, oh, I have the money to get a lease,
Speaker 2: now I'm just going to go get it. There's actually
Speaker 2: more to it. It's harder to find leases than you
Speaker 2: might realize. It's harder to determine the value of a
Speaker 2: lease than you might realize. It's harder to get a
Speaker 2: fair price on them than you might realize. There's a
Speaker 2: lot more gray area, there are many more questions when
Speaker 2: it comes to the details of actually getting a quality
Speaker 2: lease and getting the most out of it. So all
Speaker 2: of these topics and more are covered today with Tony.
Speaker 2: I guarantee you're going to learn something today. If you
Speaker 2: are in the market for new hunting properties, new access,
Speaker 2: and the lease is one of the things you've been considering,
Speaker 2: definitely give this a list, and I think it'll help
Speaker 2: you understand whether a lease is a good fit or
Speaker 2: you for you were not in how to go about
Speaker 2: getting one if you decide to. So with that out
Speaker 2: of the way and without further ado, let's get to
Speaker 2: my chat with mister Tony Hanson. All right now, with
Speaker 2: me on the line as a returning guest, I've got
Speaker 2: mister Tony Hanson. Tony, how are you good?
Speaker 3: How's it going?
Speaker 2: It's great. I appreciate you making the time to do this.
Speaker 2: It's been a little while.
Speaker 3: It has been I enjoy it. Anytime you call, I
Speaker 3: have to answer that's how it goes well.
Speaker 2: I do appreciate that, and I'm selfishly picking your brain
Speaker 2: today because I, as well as a lot of other
Speaker 2: people out there, are at that time of year where
Speaker 2: we're thinking, like, where are we going to hunt this
Speaker 2: come and fall? It's inevitably spots come and go right.
Speaker 2: And I just had a pretty darn nice piece of
Speaker 2: property that I had gotten permission on last year. Just
Speaker 2: a couple of weeks ago, I found out it's getting sold.
Speaker 2: I lost access to two hundred acres, which is by
Speaker 2: far the biggest property I had access to anywhere gone.
Speaker 2: So I'm back at square one thinking about how I'm
Speaker 2: going to get access to new places, kind of get permission?
Speaker 2: Is there new public or do I want to explore lease?
Speaker 2: And that brings us to our topic here today. So
Speaker 2: does any of this sound familiar to you? Have you
Speaker 2: been in a situation late that before?
Speaker 3: Yeah? For sure, and actually like more times than I
Speaker 3: carried account and actually more like scenarios are different now.
Speaker 3: So the way that I look at Lisa's ten years
Speaker 3: ago is different than I looked at it five years ago,
Speaker 3: and it's different than how I look at it now.
Speaker 3: You know, Lisa's have definitely been the tool that I use,
Speaker 3: but I would not say that the primary focus of
Speaker 3: my hunting season at each year is on property that
Speaker 3: I it's not, but here in Michigan, it's kind of
Speaker 3: what I mean, you kind of have to except for
Speaker 3: some very rare special circumstances that I don't have, I'm
Speaker 3: just not able to do the things I do in
Speaker 3: other states here at home. So leasing is kind of
Speaker 3: what I've had to rely on.
Speaker 2: Yes, So what's that history look like for you? It
Speaker 2: sounds like you've kind of been like on leases off leases.
Speaker 2: I know you've done a lot of public I know
Speaker 2: you've owned land. Can you just kind of recap folks
Speaker 2: on what your kind of land access journey has been
Speaker 2: this led you to this point?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, obviously, like so many other people, I
Speaker 3: don't know how many years ago, let's say fifteen, I
Speaker 3: was able to get permission a lot of places, and
Speaker 3: growing up in Michigan, I had, you know, properties that
Speaker 3: essentially were like mine even though they weren't. They were
Speaker 3: neighbors or whatever that I've hunted on ever since I
Speaker 3: was a little kid, and nothing had really changed with
Speaker 3: them until it did. Grandkids get old enough to start
Speaker 3: hunting those types of things, and everything about it switches.
Speaker 3: At the same time as just a lot more focus
Speaker 3: on kind of that exclusive place to hunt. It just
Speaker 3: got a lot harder to find ground. So I probably
Speaker 3: probably about fifteen years ago is when I first started
Speaker 3: being able to afford a lease and to know what
Speaker 3: to do. So I started leasing some places there around Michigan,
Speaker 3: and it was probably seven or eight years ago or
Speaker 3: so I just decided I'll still do some of that
Speaker 3: here in Michigan, but I'm not going to really get
Speaker 3: into it like I was before because I kept losing them.
Speaker 3: So over the pandemic there, I wrote a book just
Speaker 3: trying to get my thoughts together on deer hunting, and
Speaker 3: one of the things that I said in it is
Speaker 3: I'm just not going to invest heavily into something that
Speaker 3: I don't own, which you know, I own public land,
Speaker 3: so I will definitely spend the time and learn that,
Speaker 3: and of course private land that you own, but when
Speaker 3: it comes to leasing, I just wasn't going to go
Speaker 3: all in and devote too much time because every lease
Speaker 3: I've ever had, I've lost. I mean that's just and
Speaker 3: that's like a guarantee everyone you ever have you will
Speaker 3: lose someday. So at some point, yeah, so where I'm
Speaker 3: at now is I haven't really backed off that approach
Speaker 3: of like, I'm not gonna invest a ton of money
Speaker 3: and energy and resources into leasing, especially out of state,
Speaker 3: where I feel like you can get on some good
Speaker 3: deal without having a lease or private. But the last
Speaker 3: couple of years I've had to really re evaluate as
Speaker 3: the public has just it's much, much, much different than
Speaker 3: it was. So I'm right there with you. I'm currently
Speaker 3: actively trying to find a lease for Michigan and deciding
Speaker 3: what I'm going to do in other states where I
Speaker 3: normally would have probably relied one hundred percent on public,
Speaker 3: I might I'm not sure I can do that anymore.
Speaker 2: So see that that brings up an interesting question, which
Speaker 2: is you know how you look at least as differently
Speaker 2: on your in your home state versus out of state.
Speaker 2: Why do you why do you look at them differently?
Speaker 3: So the number one thing is I don't look at
Speaker 3: it necessarily differently. I look at the available ground to
Speaker 3: do the type of hunting that I want to do,
Speaker 3: and I realize not everybody wants to hunt the way
Speaker 3: I do. Like I want to be in a tree stand.
Speaker 3: I don't want to do spot in stock. I don't
Speaker 3: want to I'm pretty mobile with a stand or saddle
Speaker 3: or whatever, but I like to hunt them elevated. I
Speaker 3: like to hunt kind of scrape related activity. And I
Speaker 3: really don't have a whole lot of interest in shooting
Speaker 3: anything that's less than four years old. It's not it's
Speaker 3: just not what I do. I can do that in
Speaker 3: other states. I can hit four year old and older
Speaker 3: deer on public ground, not as easily as before, but
Speaker 3: I still can. I can't do that at Michigan. I
Speaker 3: really can't do that on most of the private either.
Speaker 3: So the difference is in order for me to have
Speaker 3: a season where I'm at least pretending to hunt the
Speaker 3: way I want to hunt and the type of deer
Speaker 3: I want to hunt, I kind of have to have
Speaker 3: some private ground, and the only way I've found to
Speaker 3: get it consistently is to be willing to pay the
Speaker 3: landowner for the option, because knocking on doors doesn't work
Speaker 3: anymore here, at least within reason, and it doesn't necessarily
Speaker 3: work for what I'm looking the type of deer I'm
Speaker 3: looking to hunt, and I mean last year I spent
Speaker 3: a lot of time in Michigan on public scouting. I
Speaker 3: didn't hunt it, and I did learn a lot, and
Speaker 3: there's a lot more there than I thought. I still
Speaker 3: never got a picture of a three year old. So
Speaker 3: it's kind of where it is out of state I
Speaker 3: can get. It's not that I'm unwilling to lease out
Speaker 3: of state, it's that I feel like I haven't had
Speaker 3: to previously. That's changing a little bit, though.
Speaker 2: Now what about you know, the comments you made in
Speaker 2: your book and when we talked last time was kind
Speaker 2: of around this, like you didn't want to invest in
Speaker 2: something that you couldn't guarantee you'd be able to use
Speaker 2: in the long run. So what about this idea of
Speaker 2: like leasing versus owning, Because now, I mean, it sounds
Speaker 2: like it's getting to the point a lot of people
Speaker 2: agree with this. It's getting harder and harder to get
Speaker 2: access without paying something. But why would you look at
Speaker 2: a lease versus, you know, buying a small property again
Speaker 2: or something.
Speaker 3: This is especially true. So this is where I've totally changed.
Speaker 3: Seven or eight years ago, I had two small pieces,
Speaker 3: actually I think I owned three at one time, but
Speaker 3: whatever less than twenty anchors, like one was seventeen, one
Speaker 3: was like seven, one was nine. You could own those
Speaker 3: for the cost of or less than leasing someplace because
Speaker 3: I was getting I got those at like eleven hundred
Speaker 3: bucks an acre. You cannot do that any They were
Speaker 3: just like they were garbage ground, Like you couldn't build
Speaker 3: on it. It's just swampy, wet stuff. Even now, the
Speaker 3: stuff you can't build on is it's I mean whatever,
Speaker 3: it's stupid. I mean, why would someone pay for grand
Speaker 3: and acre for something like that? I don't know, but
Speaker 3: they are so the economics of owning even a very
Speaker 3: small piece, it's not the same as leasing. So you
Speaker 3: can lease and hunt one hundred acres that you probably
Speaker 3: or at least for me, like I'll never likely want
Speaker 3: to buy that much land or afford to be able
Speaker 3: to do that. So that's where the math really works out.
Speaker 3: Also out of state, and I've kicked this around forever,
Speaker 3: and I really use a piece of ground that I
Speaker 3: own in Kansas. I mean, how often can I actually
Speaker 3: get there and utilize it? And then am I gonna
Speaker 3: have to get into a situation of doing other things
Speaker 3: like whatever lease in it for farming or just all
Speaker 3: that other different weird stuff. It's like, I don't I
Speaker 3: don't know how much I want to get into it.
Speaker 3: So that's where a lease out of state is a
Speaker 3: smaller financial investment than trying to own it. Is it
Speaker 3: the smartest thing long term financially, I don't know, But
Speaker 3: practically and logistically for me, the owning right now is
Speaker 3: just not It doesn't compare.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so you've leased stuff off and on over the years.
Speaker 2: If you were to put together like a pros and
Speaker 2: cons list from your experience to this point with your leases,
Speaker 2: how would you break that down for yourself?
Speaker 3: Yeah, Well, obviously the pros are and I'm I'm going
Speaker 3: to primarily relate this pretty heavily to Michigan, which it
Speaker 3: can apply to any place where there's a lot of
Speaker 3: hunting pressure. The pro is like you legitimately legally have
Speaker 3: a say and how much hunting pressure is on that property.
Speaker 3: That's by far the number one thing, and that's for me,
Speaker 3: that's worth almost the cost of admission. It's a big
Speaker 3: deal because even if it doesn't have the deer that
Speaker 3: I want, I can in my mind think, well it
Speaker 3: might next year or something can move in, but I'm
Speaker 3: kind of left alone, and that's the most important thing
Speaker 3: to me. That's definitely the biggest positive, the biggest con
Speaker 3: for sure is you know, you're putting money and time
Speaker 3: and energy and effort into something that likely is going
Speaker 3: to go away. And I'm not saying what you learn
Speaker 3: or experience there is worth nothing, but it's worth a
Speaker 3: lot less when you take it away and then try
Speaker 3: to go apply it to another property or something. Just
Speaker 3: the one I had in Michigan that was so good,
Speaker 3: and I had it like probably ten years, Like I
Speaker 3: knew so much about how those deer moved and where
Speaker 3: they were betting and what they were doing. I can't
Speaker 3: duplicate that anywhere, and so I went in and I'm
Speaker 3: still learning, even four years after I've lost it. I'm
Speaker 3: still trying to figure out what the best setup in
Speaker 3: situation that I have of the places I have to
Speaker 3: hunt right now. So I feel like I've been chasing
Speaker 3: my tail for four years. Whereas if I had, of
Speaker 3: course owned the property that doesn't go away, or if
Speaker 3: I had invested it into public land that I know
Speaker 3: isn't going away, I still probably wouldn't have any three
Speaker 3: year olds to hunt, but at least i'd know where
Speaker 3: those two year olds are going to walk, So you.
Speaker 2: Know, Yeah, So with the public land thing, you know
Speaker 2: a lot of folks look at public land as that
Speaker 2: best alternative if they can't. You know, a lot of
Speaker 2: people don't want to knock on doors. They're not comfortable
Speaker 2: doing it. So they if they're they're gonna pay or
Speaker 2: they're gonna use the public access thing. Has it how
Speaker 2: seriously of a decline in quality do you feel like
Speaker 2: we've experienced over this last five to ten years? I mean,
Speaker 2: is it has it been? Has gone down from a
Speaker 2: B to a D? Was it that? Yeah? I mean
Speaker 2: just that experience and from your perspective, how drastic of
Speaker 2: a issue hasn't been for you? That's steering you now
Speaker 2: towards or towards the lease.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So I want to be careful because I don't
Speaker 3: want to. Public land is still awesome. It's an amazing resource.
Speaker 3: I'm glad we have it. I know I will still
Speaker 3: spend a buttload of time hunting public ground. I drew
Speaker 3: and i wa tag last year. I looked and looked
Speaker 3: for lease and couldn't find one, and really thought, I'm fine.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's Iowa. They're everywhere. It's super hard to draw.
Speaker 3: It's almost one thousand dollars now for that deer tag.
Speaker 3: By the time you add up your points, surely, and
Speaker 3: I have what I've been there three times bow hunting,
Speaker 3: so I have experience, like I'll be fine. I was
Speaker 3: not fine. I hunted thirteen days and I never I
Speaker 3: think I saw one buck that I would shoot, And
Speaker 3: in previous journeys to Iowa, I would have never considered
Speaker 3: shooting that buck. Yikes, it's now. They did have CWD,
Speaker 3: and that certainly played some sort of a role, but
Speaker 3: there was too many people and the quality of the
Speaker 3: bucks was half of what it was. And I've seen
Speaker 3: that in Kansas, and I've seen it in Nebraska. It's
Speaker 3: definitely not what it was. Still can be good, still
Speaker 3: can be fun. I'm still gonna you know, I've got
Speaker 3: to find those places. But the hard part that I
Speaker 3: will want to such a good example because in my mind,
Speaker 3: I'm thinking I really should get a lease because I'm
Speaker 3: not gonna get this license maybe ever again, I mean,
Speaker 3: five six years down the road, who knows. I don't
Speaker 3: know that I want to put on my eggs in
Speaker 3: the basket of public and it's what exactly happened. You know,
Speaker 3: I'm there. I've got four days into trying to find
Speaker 3: a place where I can be left alone and couldn't
Speaker 3: find it, and yeah, public is definitely harder than it was.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so if someone's in a similar boat, they're lacking
Speaker 2: access or maybe they do have acces. You know, there's
Speaker 2: plenty of public land, but to your pot, like, there
Speaker 2: is like an experiential difference. Yes, right, I mean yes,
Speaker 2: if you are willing to suffer through some stuff on
Speaker 2: public land and deal with other people and really, yeah,
Speaker 2: you've got time and all the effort, like, yeah, you
Speaker 2: can find deer, like you said, you can have a
Speaker 2: good hunt. But some people might simply not want to
Speaker 2: have to worry about seven other trucks of the parking
Speaker 2: lot every day, or worry about bumping into people like
Speaker 2: that just might not be fun. Ye, I mean, hey,
Speaker 2: sometimes I absolutely feel that way. I am very I
Speaker 2: have a very different level of stress when I'm going
Speaker 2: into a public land hunt versus when I'm just going
Speaker 2: to go into a spot where I know, like it's
Speaker 2: just me, I'm just hunting. I'm hunting deer versus I'm
Speaker 2: hunting around people, Like those are two very different hunts. Yeah,
Speaker 2: So I think it's not always. I think some people
Speaker 2: just assume, like, oh, if you have a lot of
Speaker 2: money you can get at lease. If you don't have
Speaker 2: a lot of money, then you're stuck with public land
Speaker 2: or something. But I think it's also like just what
Speaker 2: you want your hunting experience to be. But That'll said,
Speaker 2: probably the biggest thing, at least for me, has been
Speaker 2: even when I've had money, like I've saved the money
Speaker 2: or had money for a proger, so I had like
Speaker 2: something to pay someone, I can't even find someone to pay, Like,
Speaker 2: I can't even find a lease. What's been your experience
Speaker 2: over the years of how to actually find one of
Speaker 2: these suckers?
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I'm probably the worst person asked for this
Speaker 3: because I haven't figured it out either. I can tell
Speaker 3: you how I've got mine, So let's I've just to
Speaker 3: make it round numbers. I think I've least eight different properties,
Speaker 3: and I think like five of them were in Michigan,
Speaker 3: two of them were in Ohio, and then I did
Speaker 3: at least once in Missouri. All of those except for
Speaker 3: one were like people that I sort of knew or
Speaker 3: they knew friends of mine, and then like they just
Speaker 3: talk to them. The other one in the way that
Speaker 3: I have tried to make this work, and I'm pretty
Speaker 3: much convinced that it doesn't. I don't know how. I
Speaker 3: don't have the skills of leaning those guys off SEQ one.
Speaker 3: I just don't have it. But I've sent hundreds of
Speaker 3: letters to landowners saying, this is what I want to do.
Speaker 3: You know, I see your property on the map, would
Speaker 3: you be interested in leasing it? And I did get
Speaker 3: one response, and I got a lease out of that.
Speaker 2: That's it.
Speaker 3: I've been doing the one I did get a lease
Speaker 3: last year through base Camp. That's how I prefer to
Speaker 3: it because I do not like I mean, this is shocking, Mark.
Speaker 3: I don't like talking to people I don't know.
Speaker 2: So I'm right there with you.
Speaker 3: You know, I'm not good at knocking on the doors.
Speaker 3: I'm not good at that stuff. And just like the
Speaker 3: cleanliness of the transaction through something like that is really
Speaker 3: worth it to me. Here's the downside of that. So
Speaker 3: they have I don't know if people are familiar with
Speaker 3: base Camp, but you know, you've got different levels of subscriptions,
Speaker 3: and you get access to the to the leases earlier
Speaker 3: than other people. And I'm at the highest one, and
Speaker 3: so three times a week they they release these things.
Speaker 3: They're all gone within sixty to ninety seconds of release.
Speaker 3: Really just terrible, you know, unless it's like a cow pasture,
Speaker 3: a forty acre cow pastor with not a tree on it.
Speaker 3: Anything decent is least sight unseen within ninety seconds.
Speaker 2: Who's doing that? Like, who can least something without even
Speaker 2: knowing what they're getting themselves into?
Speaker 3: Apparently a lot of people wow and it so here
Speaker 3: my like the way I got the one in Michigan
Speaker 3: is it looks terrible. It's exactly. I mean, it's one
Speaker 3: that sat there for three weeks before even I went
Speaker 3: and looked at it, and it was not that far
Speaker 3: from my house. So that's kind of the approach I
Speaker 3: take to them now, and even with public too, Like
Speaker 3: I am no longer searching for the premium stuff. I
Speaker 3: am searching for that one overlooked thing that nobody knows
Speaker 3: is good until you figure out that it's good. And
Speaker 3: the one I got here in Michigan, I think is
Speaker 3: it's really good, but it's one hundred percent reliant upon
Speaker 3: the neighboring properties being good. Like I'm never going to
Speaker 3: hold a deer or produce a deer. I'm going to
Speaker 3: basically shoot the neighbor's deer when they come through. But
Speaker 3: you know that's what it is.
Speaker 2: Something now that piece, that piece was a base Camp piece,
Speaker 2: or that piece is a word. Okay, So I'm curious
Speaker 2: about what that experience was like. So I have looked
Speaker 2: at base Camp and there's I can't remember. The other net,
Speaker 2: the hunting Leaset Network, I think, is another one. I've
Speaker 2: looked at them over the years. I've never actually followed
Speaker 2: through on one, but I've always thought two things. Number one,
Speaker 2: either both or at least one of them is like
Speaker 2: an auction based model. So it seemed like the price
Speaker 2: has got crazy. That was one thing. And then the
Speaker 2: second thing that worried me was that I, at least
Speaker 2: in the past, when I try to understand the system,
Speaker 2: it seemed like you had to rebid and go through
Speaker 2: an auction again the next year too. So it was
Speaker 2: never like you could just like feel confident you'd have
Speaker 2: the place again next year or the next year. It
Speaker 2: could just the price could just keep on going up, up,
Speaker 2: up up. And all that made me uncomfortable is what
Speaker 2: was your experience of that? Was I reading it right?
Speaker 2: Is that now? How it worked different?
Speaker 3: Now? So Hunting Lease Network is an auction it has
Speaker 3: a minimum bid and then it auctions. I don't I've
Speaker 3: never leased from there, so I don't know what the
Speaker 3: renewal is. Base Camp is just it's a listed fee.
Speaker 3: Once you lease it, you have you get to renew
Speaker 3: it and it can increase, but no more than five
Speaker 3: percent of the year, and if you don't renew it
Speaker 3: within your thirty day window, then it goes back up.
Speaker 3: So from that perspective, it's been really it was really easy,
Speaker 3: you know. Every Yeah, there's a lot of like confidence
Speaker 3: in it for me because like here's the document, they
Speaker 3: signed it, I signed it. This is what I've got.
Speaker 3: I don't have to deal with you know, are they
Speaker 3: going to be sending their son in law out there
Speaker 3: to hunt and pretending like you know that sort of stuff,
Speaker 3: Like it was great. The pricing is crazy, like I mean, my, my,
Speaker 3: the probably at least like you would. You would totally
Speaker 3: I'll show you someday the aerial like you'll totally laugh.
Speaker 3: And it was cheap and it's not good. But there's
Speaker 3: like one tree on it that's good and that's I mean,
Speaker 3: that's why I'm leasing. I'm leasing one tree. Wow. So
Speaker 3: it's totally fine because I know for most of the rut,
Speaker 3: I'm going to be somewhere else, so I only needed
Speaker 3: it for a certain timeframe.
Speaker 2: Interesting, what a wild world we're in now where this
Speaker 2: is becoming necessary.
Speaker 3: And so I've actually written about this a little bit
Speaker 3: before too, and had conversations and people are like, oh,
Speaker 3: well when you and I'm afraid they're probably some of
Speaker 3: that'll come out of this conversation. People are like, oh,
Speaker 3: you're you're making it so may the rich guys can hunt. Well, A,
Speaker 3: I'm not making it anything like the market's doing that. B.
Speaker 3: Everybody has a truck or a car. If someone came
Speaker 3: up to you and said, hey, I need to borrow
Speaker 3: your truck for a week, wouldn't you expect them to
Speaker 3: pay for the gas or something. So for me, I
Speaker 3: don't like that I have to do it, but I
Speaker 3: don't feel like it's, you know, kind of selling our
Speaker 3: souls to the devil by paying a landowner a little
Speaker 3: bit of money to help with the property taxes and
Speaker 3: all of that stuff. So the hard part, the hardest
Speaker 3: part for me though, is I never I never used
Speaker 3: to have to worry about going somewhere else. I was
Speaker 3: just gonna hunt public ground and I almost feel a
Speaker 3: little bit like, I don't know, almost dirty, because I'm like, man,
Speaker 3: because it's exactly like you said earlier. If I have
Speaker 3: a week to go, I kind of just don't want
Speaker 3: to have to really kill myself. I'm fine killing myself
Speaker 3: ninety percent of the season, but I do want one
Speaker 3: week where I can just go in there and jump
Speaker 3: in a tree stand and watch dear b dear.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know that's how I felt two years ago
Speaker 2: or something I was. I just remember thinking to myself, like,
Speaker 2: I just want to have at least one place where
Speaker 2: I know, like I can see the show and it
Speaker 2: can be like what you really hope it will be okay,
Speaker 2: So the rest will be a suffer fest, but I
Speaker 2: at least want one place where it's gonna be like
Speaker 2: this is just like type one fun. Yep. And like
Speaker 2: you said, see deer being deer. That is a really fun,
Speaker 2: unique thing that you can usually see in Iowa, but
Speaker 2: you can't usually see in Michigan unless you've got a
Speaker 2: good spot's kind of locked down. And if you're fortunate
Speaker 2: enough to have the means or have the opportunity to
Speaker 2: get that, like that's a it's a worthwhile thing to
Speaker 2: experience for sure, So you can't fault anyone for wanting that.
Speaker 2: And like you said, it's easy to bemoan the state
Speaker 2: of things, right, I've done it too. I've complained about it.
Speaker 2: But you make a great point, like it's not unreasonable
Speaker 2: to think, like, hey, there is a very there's a
Speaker 2: resource and high demand here, and there's limited supply of it.
Speaker 2: Why should we feel like entitled to have it for free?
Speaker 2: Like we've had an awesome privilege that that's been the
Speaker 2: case for so many years, Like we've been so lucky
Speaker 2: that's been the case. But you know the fact that
Speaker 2: that's not always the case moving forward. I don't while
Speaker 2: we may not like it, it's kind of hard to
Speaker 2: deny that it's gonna happen. It's like you said, it's
Speaker 2: the market. The market will bear with. The market will.
Speaker 3: Bear for sure, And I do feel that same way.
Speaker 3: I'm public too, Like I know some states do have
Speaker 3: like a habitat stamp or something like that. But I've
Speaker 3: benefited an awful lot from public ground. I don't have
Speaker 3: problem paying a little bit for it if I have.
Speaker 2: To, So I agreed. So I have least three or
Speaker 2: been a part of three properties, maybe four, and one
Speaker 2: of them came through like just a buddy who found
Speaker 2: a lease through like word of mouth, and then I
Speaker 2: just chipped in on it. One of them can through
Speaker 2: a piece that I had by permission property, just like
Speaker 2: they're getting to know someone, and then eventually they said, hey,
Speaker 2: I need to start making some money from this, so
Speaker 2: would you pay a lease fee? So that's how another
Speaker 2: one came to be, and then a third one came
Speaker 2: to be by talking to realtors. I talked to realtors
Speaker 2: and expressed like interest in maybe buying, but also like
Speaker 2: if you ever happen here of leases in that area,
Speaker 2: I'd love to get to know the area better to
Speaker 2: kind of like fact check or ground like ground truth
Speaker 2: the area before I invest in buying something. And that
Speaker 2: ended up leading to a realtor finding a place that
Speaker 2: he was kind of trying to see if they would sell,
Speaker 2: and they weren't ready to sell, but they did say
Speaker 2: they would lease, So that one worked for me. But
Speaker 2: I do feel like it seems like the online thing
Speaker 2: is the isn't not easy. It's not even easy. It
Speaker 2: seems to be a way to get access to a
Speaker 2: larger number of properties, but the price is like the downside, right,
Speaker 2: And and like you said, like the fact that you
Speaker 2: don't get much time to look at them anymore, it
Speaker 2: seems like if I kind of look at least as
Speaker 2: now the way I looked at knock on door permission,
Speaker 2: which was just like I always have my feelers out,
Speaker 2: and like anytime I happened upon someone who maybe owns
Speaker 2: land or has a family farm, or if somehow hunting
Speaker 2: comes up in the conversation and they mentioned land but
Speaker 2: they don't hunt it, I'm just always just like kind
Speaker 2: of asking around and just kind of hoping that one
Speaker 2: of these days and I kind of start with like permission,
Speaker 2: and then if that's not an opportunity, then it's like
Speaker 2: would you ever be willing to accept a little bit
Speaker 2: of money to help with taxes or something like that,
Speaker 2: And like that's my hope is that that kind of
Speaker 2: stuff will work. It hasn't worked for me in recent years.
Speaker 2: Although I just mentioned that one piece that I had
Speaker 2: permission on that I just lost to because I got sold.
Speaker 2: I am trying to get in touch with the new
Speaker 2: landowner who by way of the old landowner, it sounds
Speaker 2: like he does want to lease. So now I'm going
Speaker 2: to see if that's something that maybe I can afford
Speaker 2: that lease or not. But you know, do you have
Speaker 2: have you had any of this kind of word of
Speaker 2: mouth stuff leasing, word of mouth leasing success? Do you
Speaker 2: have any tips? I guess what I'm getting at in
Speaker 2: a very unwieldy wayers, Do you have any advice for
Speaker 2: people who want to try the word of mouth friend network,
Speaker 2: family network approach to trying to get a lease.
Speaker 3: So, even though I've sent lots and lots and lots
Speaker 3: of letters and I've only had the one that was positive,
Speaker 3: I have gotten I don't know, probably fifteen to twenty responses,
Speaker 3: which I think is a lot. I mean that's like
Speaker 3: maybe twenty percent of the people I'm contacting, because I
Speaker 3: probably sent over one hundred letters. In my letter, I
Speaker 3: always say like I'm looking to hunt. I primarily hunt.
Speaker 3: I don't have to gun hunt. If you don't want
Speaker 3: me to, doesn't matter. And I say very early on,
Speaker 3: I'm not looking to take someone else's spot. So if
Speaker 3: you already have people hunting, if you have family, whatever,
Speaker 3: thanks for time. It's not what I'm looking to do.
Speaker 3: I'm just looking for those places that maybe they had
Speaker 3: a bad experience with hunters or they haven't allowed them.
Speaker 3: So that hasn't helped me, but it might help the
Speaker 3: people who are a little bit concerned or just maybe
Speaker 3: don't like the approach of leasing in general. I'm not
Speaker 3: trying to take somebody's spot. I'm trying to find one
Speaker 3: that you know, access to a place that has been
Speaker 3: locked off. The writing letters, to me, is the best
Speaker 3: way to find people that you aren't going to see
Speaker 3: face to face. The better approach is if you have
Speaker 3: people in your community that you want to talk to
Speaker 3: that you can actually go and visit. That's going to
Speaker 3: work better or having you know, the ones that I've
Speaker 3: got through word of mouth have been because someone talked
Speaker 3: to them directly, that knew them. Yeah, you have to
Speaker 3: use that relationship. I just everybody I know hunts. Everybody
Speaker 3: around here hunts, So I mean the best, the best
Speaker 3: chance I'm going to have is is finding that one
Speaker 3: person that's had a bad experience with hunters or something,
Speaker 3: or who just they just want to have one single
Speaker 3: person in there and they want to be paid for it.
Speaker 3: So you keep slicing the percentages of properties, every little stipulation,
Speaker 3: it's like smaller and smaller than number of them that
Speaker 3: are available.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you bring up an interesting point. Maybe we just
Speaker 2: need to start making more non hunting friends. Like we're
Speaker 2: hanging out in the wrong circles, Tony. We got to
Speaker 2: start hanging out with doctors or someone from Detroit. These
Speaker 2: these guys that aren't interested in using their family inheritance.
Speaker 3: You know. The other thing that is super import and
Speaker 3: I think seek one. If they like on their YouTube
Speaker 3: or whatever, they mentioned this quite a bit, they might
Speaker 3: have a series on it. The liability thing is real, Yeah,
Speaker 3: even though it's not. I mean the way I understand it,
Speaker 3: there's not actually a whole lot of liability risk to
Speaker 3: a landowner if you're on their property. So you just
Speaker 3: have to offer to buy insurance or get something, you know,
Speaker 3: in writing that says this is how we're going to
Speaker 3: handle the liability thing. Because every lease that I've had,
Speaker 3: the landowner has asked about that. Yeah, and so that
Speaker 3: is definitely something they think about. So I try to
Speaker 3: address that too. In any letter communication. I always say, hey,
Speaker 3: there's really not any liability risk to you, but to
Speaker 3: you know, give you peace of mind. I'm going to
Speaker 3: sign a waiver and I'll get insurance.
Speaker 2: How have you gone about getting that insurance? How you
Speaker 2: who've done that through?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just do it like there's a if you
Speaker 3: just google it, there's a bunch of them. But generally,
Speaker 3: like the American Hunting Lease Association, they probably sell the
Speaker 3: most policies just for that. So but your own agent
Speaker 3: probably can do it way less. I think it's like
Speaker 3: thirty dollars for the year. It's not it's not anything expensive.
Speaker 2: It's good to know. What about pricing, that's a big one.
Speaker 2: I mean, how do you go about determining whether this
Speaker 2: is a fair price or what's fair for an area?
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's no right of reason. So you will see
Speaker 3: if you start looking at some of the base camp things, like,
Speaker 3: it's crazy some of the pricing that's totally market driven
Speaker 3: and demand driven and it's not reflective. That's like they're
Speaker 3: serving a market of people who are there specifically to lease,
Speaker 3: and they're specifically competitively leasing against each other, so obviously
Speaker 3: that's going to have the most inflated prices. The way
Speaker 3: I've always approached pricing is I go to them, and
Speaker 3: I will know how much their property taxes are, and
Speaker 3: I basically will offer very close to what their taxes are.
Speaker 3: So in Michigan, roughly one hundred and fifty ish acre
Speaker 3: farm is roughly going to be fifteen hundred to twenty
Speaker 3: two hundred bucks for property taxes. And you can see it.
Speaker 3: It's I mean, it's public knowledge. You can see it
Speaker 3: on the BSA. The I can't think of the name
Speaker 3: of it, but when you go to the county's site,
Speaker 3: you'll be able to look up all of their tax records.
Speaker 3: So it's a very good idea that I do, and
Speaker 3: I may I mention it. I'm like, hey, I know
Speaker 3: your property tax is there this much? What if I
Speaker 3: paid half of it or all of it, or depending
Speaker 3: on how good the property is above that. It's just
Speaker 3: I mean, as much as I love to, I'm not
Speaker 3: gonna spend ten thousand dollars a year on a lease.
Speaker 3: I'm just not going to do it. So you know,
Speaker 3: fifteen hundred isn't cheap, but I feel like I can
Speaker 3: play with that. So that's generally where I'm going to
Speaker 3: be offering is roughly their property tax.
Speaker 2: When you're going about, you know, signing one of these agreements,
Speaker 2: whether it was their base camp or through these various
Speaker 2: other handshake deals, word of mouth deals and all that
Speaker 2: kind of stuff. Is there anything you've noticed over the
Speaker 2: years as far as it red flags to look for
Speaker 2: in lease agreements or particular clauses that you definitely do
Speaker 2: want to include in an agreement.
Speaker 3: So I always like make it very clear that it's
Speaker 3: exclusive access and nobody else is hunting at all unless
Speaker 3: there unless there was an agreement you know prior, like
Speaker 3: they say, oh, my grandson wants to hunt, I'm way
Speaker 3: more willing out of state to do that. Like I
Speaker 3: don't care if you hunt during gun season, going to
Speaker 3: be there, and I'm probably not going to have this
Speaker 3: as a multi year thing, so that's fine, but I
Speaker 3: definitely get in there the that I'm doing this exclusive
Speaker 3: if you can. I always tried to like say this
Speaker 3: is a five year agreement, like you want to lock
Speaker 3: it up for as many years as you can, unless
Speaker 3: you're worried that like you're taking a little bit of
Speaker 3: a flyer and you don't know how good the place
Speaker 3: is going to be, then don't lock it up for
Speaker 3: that long. Probably another thing that you really want to
Speaker 3: pay attention to. And this this does happen a lot
Speaker 3: on the base camp, like there'll be trail camp pictures
Speaker 3: or pictures of deer, and it'll be like the landowner
Speaker 3: has shot some great bucks over the years, why the
Speaker 3: hell's he leasing it? Right? Like to me, that math
Speaker 3: doesn't add up. Clearly, I'm not going to lease it.
Speaker 3: I'm not going to lease the property where the landowner
Speaker 3: is hunted in the past, because I don't know anybody
Speaker 3: who's ever said I don't want to hunt anymore.
Speaker 2: Right, just kill a bunch of big bucks there and
Speaker 2: it's a great spot.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So that is definitely, I mean, of the online ones,
Speaker 3: that's a real red flag. Another thing, it's not really
Speaker 3: a red flag. It's just an annoyance. And I'm sure
Speaker 3: I'm going to offend somebody, but I don't mean to
Speaker 3: eight of the pictures of their giant buck robes. They're
Speaker 3: not rubes, They're not They're just like bad spots on
Speaker 3: the tree or something.
Speaker 2: Anyway, Yeah, speaking of that, and I guess that, well,
Speaker 2: this is obviously not possible with online services. But in
Speaker 2: the past, have you ever tried to get an in
Speaker 2: person like look at they before leasing it. It's like
Speaker 2: in these cases where it's through a friend or word
Speaker 2: of mouth and stuff. Is that something that you recommend
Speaker 2: that you've done the past or is that even like
Speaker 2: these days?
Speaker 3: Yeah, not realistic, honestly. It's why I'm I'm struggling so
Speaker 3: much with the base camp situation right now. Like I
Speaker 3: really would like to get something within eight hours of home,
Speaker 3: So that's Indiana, Ohio and maybe Illinois for us. I can't.
Speaker 3: I can't pull the trigger on something, even if it's affordable,
Speaker 3: because I can't look at it. If I go to
Speaker 3: look at it, I'm going to lose it if I
Speaker 3: put the That's the other thing too, If you put
Speaker 3: a deposit to hold it and don't lease it, you
Speaker 3: lose the money. It's not a refundable deposit. So I
Speaker 3: won't lease it unless I've looked at it. And I
Speaker 3: would not advise anybody unless so maybe like you've hunted
Speaker 3: the neighbor's place, or you've hunted on that road and
Speaker 3: you know that property, you know necessarily have to look
Speaker 3: at it then because you know it. But for me
Speaker 3: to go to some place, you know, down by Athens, Ohio,
Speaker 3: and I need to see, like is that thing straight
Speaker 3: up and down? And there's one trail that a deer
Speaker 3: could even balance on? Like I and I can't really
Speaker 3: tell that from Onyx not well enough.
Speaker 2: So, yeah, you mentioned multi year leases. Is that something
Speaker 2: you've been able to finangle in the past. Is that
Speaker 2: ever an option with a service like base Camp or
Speaker 2: is an always single year?
Speaker 3: If it is an option in base Camp, they usually
Speaker 3: say actually, the National Hunting Leaks people will list that
Speaker 3: in their listings more often than any place else where.
Speaker 3: It says like potential for long term lease. Base Camp
Speaker 3: doesn't really say that that I've seen, and I've never
Speaker 3: seen them offer a multi year thing individually. I've definitely
Speaker 3: heard a lot of people, mostly when I used to
Speaker 3: do like media or writer hunts and I would pick
Speaker 3: the brain of the outfitters and stuff. None of them
Speaker 3: were signing leases unless they were five to ten years.
Speaker 3: Difference is like they were a corporation essentially, and they're probably,
Speaker 3: you know, leasing one thousand acres at a time for
Speaker 3: much higher fee than I would ever be able to do,
Speaker 3: so it was a totally different situation. But they would
Speaker 3: not lease unless they had at least five to ten
Speaker 3: year terms. I've never had that.
Speaker 2: So I'm kind of bouncing all over the place, but
Speaker 2: I keep on all these random thoughts that I've had
Speaker 2: kind of store away in the back of my mind
Speaker 2: when it comes to my lease, and challenges are now
Speaker 2: bubbling up as I'm hearing about your similar challenges in
Speaker 2: one of these things. When I've looked at when I've
Speaker 2: looked at pieces of land to lease, or even when
Speaker 2: I have at least a place, and then I'm trying
Speaker 2: to side, like, do I want to keep leasing this?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I have had a different set of expectations for the
Speaker 2: quality of a property for a lease. Yeah. So, for example,
Speaker 2: at least a place a couple of years ago, and
Speaker 2: it was it was like more money than I really
Speaker 2: wanted to spend, but I thought like, man, this could
Speaker 2: be worth it, Like it's in the right neighborhood, it's
Speaker 2: pretty darn good. And then it just didn't pan out
Speaker 2: at all. And I remember thinking to myself, Man, I
Speaker 2: don't want to spend a bunch of money in a
Speaker 2: place that's like not worth it. If I'm gonna spend
Speaker 2: money for a lease, like I want it to be
Speaker 2: a lease, how's your like when you're judging the quality
Speaker 2: of a property for lease, has like your calculus changed
Speaker 2: it all compared to like free permission or or not
Speaker 2: so not necessarily.
Speaker 3: I actually the hardest thing in Michigan. It's harder like
Speaker 3: I actually let a lease go that is seventy five
Speaker 3: acres of really good river bottom, and that place sucked.
Speaker 3: There's no deer, like, there's nothing big and I tried
Speaker 3: it for two and it's like I cannot I'm not
Speaker 3: that bad of a deer hunter. I should have seen
Speaker 3: something in two years. That was really hard to let
Speaker 3: that go because it's so hard to find it and
Speaker 3: to get it. But my expectations weren't higher there. They
Speaker 3: were kind of normal. Now when I'm out of state,
Speaker 3: like a place any any of the Great Plain State,
Speaker 3: I'm I am expecting if I leased a place to
Speaker 3: get a really good one on camera pretty fast, and
Speaker 3: if I don't, there's probably a reason for it, and
Speaker 3: I'm about to find out when I go to hunting.
Speaker 3: But it was like something going on on that place
Speaker 3: that I was not aware of. So but I would
Speaker 3: feel that way on the public too for the most part,
Speaker 3: Like I might be instead of seeing a you know,
Speaker 3: one hundred and sixty inch five year old, I might
Speaker 3: be expecting to see one hundred and fifty inch four
Speaker 3: year old. But I still expect to see them, I camp.
Speaker 2: Have you had the experience yet of I'm assuming you
Speaker 2: have based on some past knowledge, but maybe I'm wrong
Speaker 2: on this. Have you shared leases with hunt buddies or
Speaker 2: other people?
Speaker 3: I'm weird, dude, so like, I don't hunt with other people,
Speaker 3: mostly because I don't want to ruin their time and
Speaker 3: I just have such weird, little specific ways that I
Speaker 3: want to hunt that I don't want to mess it.
Speaker 3: I did have a shared lease one time with a
Speaker 3: friend in Iowa, but the place was huge and it
Speaker 3: worked out great. I mean that's back when like it
Speaker 3: was so easy. I mean, it took us two days
Speaker 3: to kill him. Like I shot one that I shouldn't
Speaker 3: have shot on the first day. It was still a
Speaker 3: four year old. But and then he shot like one
Speaker 3: hundred and ninety I mean, just a giant and it
Speaker 3: took two days. So that was fine because it was
Speaker 3: such a large I mean it was like three hundred
Speaker 3: and some acres I think I can't remember exactly, but
Speaker 3: the way it laid, we could come in from different
Speaker 3: sides of it, different roads, and it wasn't like it
Speaker 3: wasn't an issue at all. But I generally I don't
Speaker 3: see me leasing in place with somebody else. It just
Speaker 3: doesn't appeal to me. But the pooling of resources is
Speaker 3: a good thing. But think about it. You're now also
Speaker 3: you need more acres. So if you divide up the
Speaker 3: acres that each person has, are you better off or not?
Speaker 3: I don't know, but yeah, I don't. I think for
Speaker 3: a lot of situations it's great to partner up. I'm
Speaker 3: just weird and I can't hunt with other people very well.
Speaker 2: It is, it is, it's just trickier, and it's like,
Speaker 2: it seems like you have to set expectations and have
Speaker 2: like kind of like a setup, like a process in
Speaker 2: place for how do we decide who's gonna hunt wear
Speaker 2: and how do we make sure that we never get
Speaker 2: into a position where we're mad at each other because
Speaker 2: of hunting? Like, how do we make sure we're all
Speaker 2: on the same page, comfortable with the arrangement, no questions,
Speaker 2: no assumptions. Let's put all on the table and make
Speaker 2: sure we're all on the same page here so that
Speaker 2: we're not messing up a friendship over a deal. I
Speaker 2: think that seems to be the key, right.
Speaker 3: And I just get yes, it is, and I just
Speaker 3: get like I mean, I care about it, probably too much.
Speaker 3: So if I'm not seeing deer, it's not going right,
Speaker 3: Like I'm going to be grumpy, and I'm not mad
Speaker 3: at you. I'm just mad. Like I'm just mad it's
Speaker 3: not you, it's not anybody else. I'll be fine in
Speaker 3: the morning or whenever I see a deer. And what
Speaker 3: happens is like I think I have felt it in
Speaker 3: the past where people are like, oh, he's mad because
Speaker 3: I shot this deer, like it had nothing to do
Speaker 3: with it. So I just don't just take all that
Speaker 3: human stuff out of the equation for me, because you're right,
Speaker 3: like you have to. I spend more time worrying about
Speaker 3: everybody else because I don't want to. I don't want
Speaker 3: to mess up their situation. And it was a little
Speaker 3: different for me back then because I hunted so much
Speaker 3: because of my job, right, so I knew it was
Speaker 3: like that person's one week, whereas I'd been going for
Speaker 3: three months.
Speaker 2: So you know, Yeah, that leads to another challenge too,
Speaker 2: is like having different amounts of free time available to
Speaker 2: spend on the least too, Like that causes like, well, hey,
Speaker 2: like Tony's out there four weeks a year. I only
Speaker 2: get five days. How's that fair? All that stuff does
Speaker 2: get complicated. So I mentioned the fact that I've just
Speaker 2: recently lost a permission piece. Same things happened to me
Speaker 2: with the least too. I'm betting this the same things
Speaker 2: has happened to you. Has there been anything you've learned
Speaker 2: over the years that have helped you keep a lease,
Speaker 2: you know, other than just having the money to do it,
Speaker 2: Any advice on that side of things.
Speaker 3: So yes, but it's like common sense, and I don't
Speaker 3: know if it helps you keep it, but it helps
Speaker 3: you to know what's going on. So when I lost
Speaker 3: the lease I had in Michigan, that was the best one,
Speaker 3: Like I'll never have another place like that here. I
Speaker 3: never talked to that landowner, like literally, I sent him
Speaker 3: a check once a year with a letter, never talk
Speaker 3: to him, and then I got a letter back when
Speaker 3: you're saying, hey, I'm deciding to not lease this. I've
Speaker 3: always wondered if I had been more personable or friendly
Speaker 3: with the guy, if maybe because it still sits there,
Speaker 3: like it's still nobody. I mean, he lets some other
Speaker 3: people hunt it now, like it wasn't a family thing.
Speaker 3: And I just wonder if I had been a little
Speaker 3: bit better at the relationship building on that. The other
Speaker 3: the most recent one that I lost last season, I
Speaker 3: had that for two seasons. I had a you know,
Speaker 3: I would text that landowner and talk to him like
Speaker 3: there was no surprises. When it came that they weren't
Speaker 3: going to lease anymore because they wanted to sell it.
Speaker 3: That didn't help me keep it. But I had a
Speaker 3: much better line of communication with those people than I
Speaker 3: did the other one. So I still wonder if I
Speaker 3: had just been a little more talkative, if it will.
Speaker 2: It's hard to do when you're someone like you and me. Wait,
Speaker 2: Like I always know that I should do that, and
Speaker 2: I try to do it, but like in my heart
Speaker 2: of hearts, I'm like, I just want to pull into
Speaker 2: the drive. I want to go hunt, I want to
Speaker 2: get back my car, I want to go home. I'm tired.
Speaker 2: It's so hard to convince yourself to be okay. I
Speaker 2: got to like psych myself up to have this chat.
Speaker 2: There's some of my friends, like, you know, I'm sure
Speaker 2: some of your buddies too. It's like that's just all
Speaker 2: they want to do is bs with everyone they see,
Speaker 2: and I'm just not always like that. That's hard.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that too. Like I'm and I My
Speaker 3: wife is very different from me. So's she's saying hello
Speaker 3: to everybody, and I always say the same thing to her.
Speaker 3: I'm like, I don't want someone stopping in Walmart and
Speaker 3: talking to this somebody else.
Speaker 2: That's exactly how I feel.
Speaker 3: And she's like, that's not how it is, but for
Speaker 3: me it is.
Speaker 2: So yeah. Yeah. So what about the hunting side of things?
Speaker 2: Is there anything that you think differently about from a
Speaker 2: hunting perspective when on a least property versus public or
Speaker 2: by permission. I mean, there's one big obvious one, but
Speaker 2: I'll let you you know, how do you think differently
Speaker 2: behind it?
Speaker 3: I don't think this way, but I have had people
Speaker 3: that I know have had leases or whatever that I've
Speaker 3: talked to and it's like, hey, this is the last
Speaker 3: year of this lease. Let's kill every buck we can.
Speaker 3: And I think that there is something in that mindset
Speaker 3: that a lot of people if they think if they're
Speaker 3: paying for this, that they're entitled a little bit more.
Speaker 3: I don't think that, like honestly anymore. I mean, I
Speaker 3: still want to kill deer, but I kind of don't
Speaker 3: care if I don't like. I just want to hunt them,
Speaker 3: and I want to hunt them in a certain way.
Speaker 3: So I think my approach on a lease isn't any
Speaker 3: different than anywhere else other than I I know I
Speaker 3: don't have to. If I see a good one on
Speaker 3: public or something, I might be a little bit more
Speaker 3: inclined to push it and do something I maybe isn't
Speaker 3: super smart. I'm good at doing that super smart stuff anyway,
Speaker 3: But in that's it situation, I might do that. On
Speaker 3: the least, I'm probably going to be a little less risky,
Speaker 3: just because I trust more that it's not going to
Speaker 3: get as messed up. Right, But I don't change a
Speaker 3: whole lot because I don't, Like I said earlier, I
Speaker 3: just don't really look at the ground any differently. One
Speaker 3: is public that has what I need. One is private
Speaker 3: that has what I need. I just had to pay
Speaker 3: for it. They're the same thing.
Speaker 2: Now this isn't necessarily least specific, but but it kind
Speaker 2: of is. Is you just described that your overall strategy
Speaker 2: is mostly the same, public versus private versus a lease.
Speaker 2: We did a podcast together, I think two summers ago, right,
Speaker 2: was that when soon after your book came out, does
Speaker 2: that something right. And one of the things that stood
Speaker 2: out to me with that conversation and with the book
Speaker 2: is it's something you kind of just said, which is
Speaker 2: you've kind of figured out how you want to hunt. Like,
Speaker 2: you know, there's a bunch of different ways to hunt.
Speaker 2: You've tried many different ways success yesfully you've done them
Speaker 2: all successfully, but you've kind of narrowed down like how
Speaker 2: you like to do it, yeah, and like the way
Speaker 2: that's the right fit for you. So I'm just kind
Speaker 2: of curious, as you've kind of gone on this journey
Speaker 2: of access changing and your experience changing on public land
Speaker 2: and having these leases come in and out over the years,
Speaker 2: where you are today in twenty four has your opinion
Speaker 2: on how you like to hunt or how your approach differs,
Speaker 2: you know, or how you approach hunting is that different
Speaker 2: now than how you described it in twenty twenty two
Speaker 2: in the book and in our conversation. Is there any
Speaker 2: big change just happened over these last couple of years now?
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm pretty dialed in, Like I don preseason scout.
Speaker 3: I just don't think it's worth it. The only preseason
Speaker 3: scouting I'll even do this year is when I go
Speaker 3: turkey hunting this spring. If I'm if I decide to
Speaker 3: go to a place I haven't been, I'll look at
Speaker 3: the public and stuff with the eye on deer hunting.
Speaker 3: That's the extent of my and I'm still going to
Speaker 3: count on scrapes almost one hundred percent of the time
Speaker 3: from September through November. The difference is it's super hard
Speaker 3: now to get in the truck to drive overnight like
Speaker 3: I used to get it a place in the dark,
Speaker 3: a public place and beyond deer within two to three days,
Speaker 3: because I'm it's taking me two to three days now
Speaker 3: to figure out am I even going to stay here?
Speaker 3: Or am I going to drive another two hundred miles
Speaker 3: to a place where I feel like I can operate
Speaker 3: without getting walked in on or something like that. So
Speaker 3: the only change is this, like I'm more serious now
Speaker 3: about trying to maybe have one out of state lease
Speaker 3: than I have ever. I know I'm going to have
Speaker 3: to do what I have to do in Michigan, whether
Speaker 3: it's permission or lease or whatever, and continue to learn
Speaker 3: the public. I just haven't found anything to hunt. I'm
Speaker 3: still going to have a public land hunt somewhere. Used
Speaker 3: to have two, maybe three public land hunts. I have
Speaker 3: to curb those back now because of the time. I
Speaker 3: can't spend three days out of five days finding a
Speaker 3: place where I'm just not seeing boot tracks because that
Speaker 3: just it nothing spins me out faster than seeing these
Speaker 3: boot tracks. It just annoys that a lot of me.
Speaker 2: It's it's not the fun part, that's for sure. No, no, man, Well,
Speaker 2: this is one of those topics that's like, I don't
Speaker 2: know anyone who's like thrilled by the prospect of having
Speaker 2: to do a lease, but you know, it's it's kind
Speaker 2: of a reality for more and more of us. And
Speaker 2: I think, like these kinds of questions are always bubbling
Speaker 2: around in my mind, and so it's helpful to be
Speaker 2: able to bounce some of these things someone else who's
Speaker 2: been through the ring or two, because you know, we're
Speaker 2: not going to be turning the clock back anytime soon,
Speaker 2: so you can, like folks can like complain about it
Speaker 2: all they want and be upset about it if they want, Sure, okay,
Speaker 2: But I'm kind of like a pragmatic guy. I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 2: this is just what it is now, So how do
Speaker 2: I make the best of the situation. That is on
Speaker 2: public Now how do I make the best of what
Speaker 2: might still be available for free on permission? But then
Speaker 2: also like, hey, lease is our reality of the world,
Speaker 2: and how can I do it in the smartest way
Speaker 2: if it makes sense.
Speaker 3: So it's a tool that's helpful. Yeah, it's It's a
Speaker 3: tool to me. It's not my primary tool. I'm still
Speaker 3: primarily a public public land guy, and I'm still going
Speaker 3: to be looking for that undiscovered place and figuring it out.
Speaker 3: But in between, I mean, I have an X number
Speaker 3: of places and times I want to hunt in the fall.
Speaker 3: I can't fill all of them anymore with just public
Speaker 3: I don't feel like I can.
Speaker 2: So this is a tool, yeah, yeah, and you can't
Speaker 2: necessarily fill them with the kind of experience you want to, Like,
Speaker 2: I feel like that just that resonates a lot with me.
Speaker 2: Is like, sometimes I want that grueling, mega public line experience,
Speaker 2: and sometimes I want just a little bit different, which
Speaker 2: I'm not going to apologize for. It's nice to be
Speaker 2: able to have a spot where you can sit and
Speaker 2: see deer do their thing and not worry about Tom
Speaker 2: and Jerry and Jarley and Matt and Bob and every
Speaker 2: other guy walking by so's I.
Speaker 3: Mean, there's one more thing that I hesitate talking about
Speaker 3: because it just feels weird. But I said, I'm almost
Speaker 3: always hunting alone. That means when I shoot it to
Speaker 3: an earned whatever pound deer, I have to get that
Speaker 3: thing out of there by myself. And that's not as
Speaker 3: easy now as it was ten years ago. So maybe
Speaker 3: I can haul two of them out, but I don't
Speaker 3: know if I can haul three of them out, So
Speaker 3: that that's another thing where I have to plan accordingly.
Speaker 3: And I'm sure that's like in another ten years, that's
Speaker 3: not like gonna be different. So sure, yeah, just the
Speaker 3: getting around and in and out over the course of
Speaker 3: the season is a little bit different now too.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, it's just like changes in circumstances and life,
Speaker 2: you know, phase and then just the changes that are
Speaker 2: happening across our hunting culture I think are making this.
Speaker 2: You know, for for a while, it's been this funny
Speaker 2: kind of path that the public land thing has gone
Speaker 2: where for a long time, everyone thought it was horrible
Speaker 2: and nobody wanted to hunt it at all, and then
Speaker 2: you know, the last decade or so, it has become
Speaker 2: very trendy and very popular, and now you're seeing like
Speaker 2: the backlash where there's like folks that are kind of
Speaker 2: like realizing, hey, it's great, but maybe it's not for
Speaker 2: me all the time or whatever. And you're seeing like
Speaker 2: there used to be like a within certain sub segments
Speaker 2: of the hunting world, owning private land or having a
Speaker 2: lease was almost like like like a scarlet letter almost
Speaker 2: like oh, well, they're just the one percent ers. They
Speaker 2: don't they're not they're not good hunters because they just
Speaker 2: have it all given to them on the silver platter.
Speaker 2: And and like there's some like everyone has different circumstances,
Speaker 2: and I don't like getting into the whole like such
Speaker 2: and such measuring contests that a lot of hunters get into.
Speaker 2: But I think what I'm getting at now is like
Speaker 2: I don't think you should feel guilty if you decide
Speaker 2: you want to get a lease. I don't think you
Speaker 2: should feel guilty if you know, however you choose to hunt,
Speaker 2: Like it's all challenging in its own way. It's all
Speaker 2: should come down to, my opinion, like down to like
Speaker 2: hunting your own hunt, like hunt the way you want
Speaker 2: to hunt, the way that you find enjoyment and satisfaction
Speaker 2: from as long as it's legal and you're doing it,
Speaker 2: you know, in a way that's not damaging others experiences,
Speaker 2: Like more power to you, and this is this is
Speaker 2: one of those options available.
Speaker 3: Yeah so, and definitely different levels to it, Like you know,
Speaker 3: the least is if I get any it's it's gonna
Speaker 3: be like twenty acres, thirty acres that's or it's gonna
Speaker 3: be like the one in Michigan where it's one hundred
Speaker 3: acres with two trees. So I mean, it's live, it's
Speaker 3: it's it's gucci sounding, but it's still uh, it's still
Speaker 3: pretty duller general, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, I love the fact that you're essentially leasing
Speaker 2: two trees. That that takes serious dedication, Tony.
Speaker 3: And I was, I was literally seconds away from shooting
Speaker 3: like one hundred and forty five inch year there the
Speaker 3: first night on it, and it's incredible. I totally screwed up.
Speaker 3: But that's my That's how I roll. It's always next year, right, Yeah,
Speaker 3: we'll see maybe maybe there won't be any deer there,
Speaker 3: but I will sit in my tree and see what happens.
Speaker 3: That's hunting.
Speaker 2: So before we wrap the sucker up, Tony, can you
Speaker 2: remind folks a little bit about your book and where
Speaker 2: they can find that, yeah, and anything else you want
Speaker 2: to mention.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So it's called The Antler Geeks Manifesto and that's
Speaker 3: on Amazon, just self published it. I'm actually working on
Speaker 3: another one. I don't know what I'm gonna call it,
Speaker 3: but it's basically like the half Life of a public
Speaker 3: land Hunter. So it's I don't know, I'm hopefully not
Speaker 3: quite halfway through my life, but I've no hunted public
Speaker 3: for over twenty years, which is crazy. And it's just
Speaker 3: going to outline, you know, how I got into it,
Speaker 3: what's been different, what's not as good, what is still good?
Speaker 3: Just you know, I love reading like Jeen and Barry
Speaker 3: Wentzel's books. I just love them, and I'd read everyone
Speaker 3: they wrote. So it's just kind of like that. It's
Speaker 3: just a collection of stories but also lessons in it too,
Speaker 3: and hopefully going to have that wrapped up by the
Speaker 3: end of the summer, but we'll see how many. I
Speaker 3: gotta start catching small moths, so that might say that might.
Speaker 2: I get it? I get it, Hey, you got you
Speaker 2: gotta live a little Tony. Don't feel guilty.
Speaker 3: You're with the trout though, So if I got you
Speaker 3: in a small mouth, you can never look back.
Speaker 2: I know that I would be very susceptible to the
Speaker 2: small draw, the small jaw syndrome as I've heard some
Speaker 2: people call it. Yeah, so yeah, I get it. Well, Tony.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 2: I enjoyed this chat. I really do appreciate you coming
Speaker 2: on here and talking through this. And yeah, the the
Speaker 2: never ending challenge of access, I think is something that
Speaker 2: we're all going to have to keep on working on
Speaker 2: over the years. So these are important conversations.
Speaker 3: Have Yeah, absolutely appreciate it.
Speaker 2: All right, that is a wrap, my friends. Thank you
Speaker 2: for joining me, thank you for being a part of
Speaker 2: the Wired to Hunt community. I'm wishing you all the
Speaker 2: luck in the world in your own access journey, whether
Speaker 2: that's knocking on doors for permission, sending letters to hopefully
Speaker 2: get a lease, maybe buying your first piece of ground,
Speaker 2: or putting in the grind to find some good public
Speaker 2: whatever it is, get out there, enjoy your time outside,
Speaker 2: and until next time, stay wired to hung