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 saddler blind, First Light, Go Farther,
Speaker 1: Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon. Welcome to
Speaker 1: the Wire to Hunt Podcast. I'm your guest host, Tony Peterson,
Speaker 1: and today I'm speaking with Dan Johnson about ODDA state
Speaker 1: hunt planning and the future of nonresident hunting. Hello, my friends,
Speaker 1: Mark Kenyon here again, just jumping in for a quick
Speaker 1: update before another episode here with mister Tony Peterson. But
Speaker 1: wanted to remind you that this coming weekend, if you're
Speaker 1: listening in real time, on March twenty six, twenty twenty three,
Speaker 1: I'm kicking off my first event or the Working for
Speaker 1: Wildlife Tour, I'm going to be out on the ground
Speaker 1: outside of Massachusetts or outside of Boston, Massachusetts, working on
Speaker 1: a massive trash cleanup on the Martin Burns Wildlife Management Area.
Speaker 1: If you're listening in time for this on Thursday, the
Speaker 1: day this podcast comes out, you can still register to
Speaker 1: participate in that event. You can get all the details
Speaker 1: over at the Mediator website. If you search for the
Speaker 1: Working for Wildlife Tour. You'll find the link there to register.
Speaker 1: We're giving away twenty five of these sweet new I
Speaker 1: Work for Wildlife t shirts that I help design. I
Speaker 1: want to meet you, I want to shake your hand,
Speaker 1: I want to hear your stories, and I want to
Speaker 1: pick up a bunch of trash and clean this place
Speaker 1: up so that future generations can enjoy these places. Heck,
Speaker 1: so that current generations can enjoy this place. Next week,
Speaker 1: and we've got a whole bunch of these kinds of
Speaker 1: events continuing throughout the year. The second one is on
Speaker 1: April twenty second up in Calcaska, Michigan, with collaboration from
Speaker 1: the Michigan United Conservation Clubs, and we're going to be
Speaker 1: doing some brushpile creation, some different cool stuff on the ground,
Speaker 1: improving that habitat. So all that said, there are some
Speaker 1: other great events happening this weekend that I wanted to
Speaker 1: bring to your attention in the back Country Hunters and
Speaker 1: Anglers website. Over on the event page you can see
Speaker 1: that there's a whole bunch of stuff happening March twenty fifth.
Speaker 1: This coming Saturday is a WMA habitat improvement project in
Speaker 1: Fairfield Vermont. There is a tire cleanup going on on
Speaker 1: March twenty fifth in Perryville, Arkansas. There is a back
Speaker 1: Country Hunters and English Trash and Trout Day in Greenbrier
Speaker 1: Ranger District over in bartow West Virginia. That's all this
Speaker 1: coming weekend. There's all sorts of stuff like coming this
Speaker 1: coming up. I want to mention another one April fifteenth.
Speaker 1: Down in Indiana, there's an event being put on by
Speaker 1: some of my buddies at BHA, going to do some
Speaker 1: other great habitat work in the southern part of Indiana.
Speaker 1: Point is, if you care about these places, if you
Speaker 1: care about wild critters, public lands, public waters, one of
Speaker 1: the best things we can do to get out there
Speaker 1: and help these places out is be on the ground
Speaker 1: doing real things. It's one thing to worry about this
Speaker 1: stuff is one thing about sending an email place in
Speaker 1: a phone call. That's all good, it's all important. But
Speaker 1: I think sometimes actually getting your hands dirty and giving
Speaker 1: back to these places, seeing these places in person, I
Speaker 1: think is a great way to kind of refill the reservoir,
Speaker 1: kind of recharge you personally, get you connected to these
Speaker 1: places that we're trying to keep around and it does
Speaker 1: some real tangible good for the deer, for the turkeys,
Speaker 1: for the fish, for the birds. Whatever it is, we
Speaker 1: can make a difference. That's what this Working for Wildlife
Speaker 1: Tour is all about. I really hope to see you
Speaker 1: at this event this coming weekend in Massachusetts or next
Speaker 1: month in Michigan, wherever it might be. Again, full details
Speaker 1: over at the meat Eater website. That's the meat eater
Speaker 1: dot com. Go to the search bar search for Working
Speaker 1: for Wildlife Tour. You get the full scoop. You can
Speaker 1: sign up. I really hope to see you there. Welcome
Speaker 1: to the Wire to Hunt podcast, which is brought to
Speaker 1: you by First Light. You guessed it. This is not
Speaker 1: Mark Kenyon's voice, it's Tony Mark is. Well, let's be
Speaker 1: honest here. Mark is on vacation again. I don't even
Speaker 1: want to talk about it since I'm stuck here keeping
Speaker 1: the lights on while he's off eating caviar and fly
Speaker 1: fishing exotic species of South American fish while rubbing elbows
Speaker 1: with the Kardashians or something. Who knows what that lucky
Speaker 1: fella is spending his book royalties on. This week, Anny Whoski, Today,
Speaker 1: I've got an old Wire to Hunt favorite on Dan Johnson.
Speaker 1: Dan is the host of the Nine Fingers Chronicles podcast,
Speaker 1: the owner of the Sportsman Empire network of outdoor podcasts,
Speaker 1: and a diehard white tail hunter. And even though he
Speaker 1: lives in Iowa, Dan travels every year out of state
Speaker 1: to hunt deer and other critters, which is what this
Speaker 1: episode is all about. So we start out with kind
Speaker 1: of a doom and gloom festival on the future of hunting,
Speaker 1: but eventually get into the realities of planning an out
Speaker 1: of state hunt where we cover the logistics and what
Speaker 1: it really takes to have a great hunt no matter
Speaker 1: where you travel. And I'll say this, whether you travel
Speaker 1: to hunt or not, you're gonna want to give this
Speaker 1: one to listen because it's gonna be worth it. I
Speaker 1: promise you that. Dan. How are you doing, Buddy, I'm
Speaker 1: doing good. Man yourself, I'm good. But we just we
Speaker 1: just off air here got into a little conversation that's
Speaker 1: not all rosy about the future of hunting. And you know,
Speaker 1: this episode I want to get you on to talk about,
Speaker 1: you know, planning hunts and you know, how do you
Speaker 1: decide where you're going to go on your white tail hunts?
Speaker 1: And all that good stuff. But we got to talk
Speaker 1: about a few things that you know, proposed legislation out
Speaker 1: there in a few different states, and you were just
Speaker 1: telling me, Iowa has some stuff that might go through.
Speaker 1: That sounds pretty freaking wild. What's going on down there? Man.
Speaker 1: So for the first thing I want to do is
Speaker 1: pref for us this conversation that we are about to have,
Speaker 1: and I want to step into the shoes for a
Speaker 1: second of the Michigan hunter, of the Pennsylvania hunter, of
Speaker 1: the New York hunter for a moment. Because in the
Speaker 1: in the nine Finger Chronicles podcast and when I used
Speaker 1: to host the co host the Wire to Hunt podcast,
Speaker 1: I had the ability to talk with hundreds, if not
Speaker 1: thousands by now of people all over the country about
Speaker 1: their how they hunt. And so places like Michigan, nine
Speaker 1: guys probably out of every ten would say, dude, Michigan
Speaker 1: hunting sucks or Pennsylvania hunting sucks, or you know, it's
Speaker 1: so high pressure and there's so many deer that gets
Speaker 1: shot every year, and there's multiple tags, and the rifle
Speaker 1: season is during the rut, and and so all these
Speaker 1: negative things that I hear, and it's consistent and it
Speaker 1: has been consistent since two thou and fourteen when I
Speaker 1: started doing all this stuff. And so there's a common
Speaker 1: theme here that star is starting to snowball into other states.
Speaker 1: And now I'll get into that Iowa topic, where there's
Speaker 1: everybody knows Iowa as the mecca of what like big
Speaker 1: mature whitetail hunting can be. And not only from just that.
Speaker 1: You know, we have the habitat in the southern half
Speaker 1: of the state. It's really the rules and regulations that
Speaker 1: keep Iowa great. And now some of these proposed some
Speaker 1: of this proposed legislation is only going to take away
Speaker 1: from that, and really it's going to destroy everything that
Speaker 1: we currently have, that top age structure, All of these
Speaker 1: bills are designed to take away from what makes Iowa great.
Speaker 1: And it's it's all about money in politics, and it's
Speaker 1: unfortunate that those that's how the decisions are being made.
Speaker 1: So you're painting a pretty bleak picture what's going on here. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: So first things first, and this is I'll start with
Speaker 1: one topic that has been is somewhat controversial. Actually two topics.
Speaker 1: The first one is at as of right now, nonresident
Speaker 1: landowners still have to go through the draw system like
Speaker 1: every other hunter. Right, just because you own land doesn't
Speaker 1: mean that you're and live in another state. Doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that you automatically get to get your archery tag every year.
Speaker 1: You have to apply for it. You have to wait,
Speaker 1: you know, three four wherever you're whatever zone you're in,
Speaker 1: that zone has that zone has an amount of like
Speaker 1: preference points, so to speak, just like Wyoming does. And
Speaker 1: so certain states are certain zones, like in the southern
Speaker 1: half of the state that's a high commodity. So some
Speaker 1: guys are waiting four years to five years in order
Speaker 1: to hunt. They're the farm that they own. And so
Speaker 1: there's a there's a a new it's not new because
Speaker 1: they try to do it every you know, almost every year,
Speaker 1: every other year, and it continues to get shot down.
Speaker 1: Is that and that law would be landowners get have
Speaker 1: the ability to hunt every year, right, And that sounds
Speaker 1: like a good thing for landowner nonresident landowners. But because
Speaker 1: Iowa is only two percent public land, because like eighty
Speaker 1: percent to ninety percent of the cover and what I
Speaker 1: mean by cover is like CRP and UM and Timber
Speaker 1: is south of Interstate eighty. In Iowa, we have this
Speaker 1: gigantic flood of people coming into it, residents and nonresidents
Speaker 1: every year. And so you open that up, what that
Speaker 1: is going to do. The state of Iowa is in
Speaker 1: a population decline anyway, So people are moving out of
Speaker 1: the state of Iowa, and that means that the current
Speaker 1: landowners will then sell that to a non resident hunter
Speaker 1: and it will one one bad thing is is that
Speaker 1: it will displace hunters. They have nowhere to go, and
Speaker 1: so then public becomes even more crowded than it already is.
Speaker 1: And I know a lot of people are listening to
Speaker 1: this and saying, hey, oh this, Oh woe is me.
Speaker 1: Listen to Dan, who's an Iowa resident gets to hunt
Speaker 1: Iowa every year, complain about the situation that he has.
Speaker 1: I'm not complaining about the situation that i have. I'm
Speaker 1: complaining about the situation that will be if all of
Speaker 1: these land all of this passes. Talk to anybody in
Speaker 1: western Illinois in that Pike County who is a resident
Speaker 1: and ask them what hunting was like twenty years ago
Speaker 1: when the big buck craze hit Western Illinois. And every
Speaker 1: piece of property in some of these counties is either
Speaker 1: outfitted it became least or a non resident that landowner
Speaker 1: purchased it and displaced all these all these other hunters. So,
Speaker 1: so explain this to me. Hold on a second. So
Speaker 1: I know that Iowa has historically limited non resident licenses
Speaker 1: to like six thousand a year, I think, right, and
Speaker 1: each zone is allotted, you know, some of the northern
Speaker 1: zones without a lot of cover. You know, there might
Speaker 1: be like thirty five nonresident tags total or archery tags
Speaker 1: or whatever, and then the southern zones will be more.
Speaker 1: Are they are they proposing that that that six thousand
Speaker 1: cap is gonna That's that's different than these non resident tags.
Speaker 1: I mean, are they increasing proposing essentially? Yep? Essentially, if
Speaker 1: you're a landowner, you get your landowner's tag every year,
Speaker 1: you don't get your state tag because a resident landowner
Speaker 1: in Iowa can not only get there their landowners tag,
Speaker 1: but then they can also get their state wide archery tag. Yep.
Speaker 1: So this would just allow landowners to get a tag
Speaker 1: every single year. Okay in it. And then you said
Speaker 1: that they are there's the potential to sell those tags
Speaker 1: kind of like a I don't know, a New Mexico
Speaker 1: ELK landowner voucher. That's that's in the proposal the proposal too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so this was I just found this out two days ago.
Speaker 1: There is some new legislation out there. So in Iowa,
Speaker 1: in order to get a landowner's tag, you only need
Speaker 1: four acres of ground and as of right now, there's
Speaker 1: some new proposals going out to where Iowa landowners maybe
Speaker 1: they don't hunt, but if you own that four acres
Speaker 1: and you qualify for a tag, then you will be
Speaker 1: able to get that tag and you will be able
Speaker 1: to sell it to anybody you want, any non resident,
Speaker 1: any resident that you want to. So potentially this could
Speaker 1: mean hey, I could buy you know, they're going to
Speaker 1: go up for bid, right, and potentially a guy could
Speaker 1: buy a tag on four acres a guy could you know,
Speaker 1: a landowner could sell his Iowa tag for you know,
Speaker 1: three four five. How however, many thousands of dollars that
Speaker 1: the highest bidder wants to because there's definitely a commodity
Speaker 1: for it, um it would it would allow them to
Speaker 1: sell the tags to whoever they wanted to, and then
Speaker 1: that person could come in and hunt. So who who
Speaker 1: does this come from? Because this I mean if you're
Speaker 1: sitting there at the Iowa DNR and You've got this
Speaker 1: kind of monopoly on these tags and these this you know,
Speaker 1: highly sought after trophy experience, and they've proven that they're
Speaker 1: going to raise prices and you know, kind of play
Speaker 1: that Western looking game a little bit with the with
Speaker 1: the resource. Why would they get why would the DNR
Speaker 1: be for this, Like, why would they want to devalue
Speaker 1: that experience and dilute that pool of tags? Or does
Speaker 1: this come from somebody else? This isn't coming from the DNR.
Speaker 1: This is coming from the leg from This is legislation
Speaker 1: and politicians, got it that are proposing bills. Now the
Speaker 1: next one gets a little even more tricky, right, and
Speaker 1: this tells you how dirty everything is starting to get
Speaker 1: in this space and in this world. Right. So, now
Speaker 1: we have this natural resource that if these just imagine
Speaker 1: adding all of those people to the state of Iowa.
Speaker 1: Whether you have four acres or whether you have four
Speaker 1: thousand acres, you're adding all these additional tags. Let's not
Speaker 1: get it twisted. Hunting in Iowa is easier than hunting
Speaker 1: in Michigan. I'll be the first to agree with that, right,
Speaker 1: especially with the rules and regulations where dude, you can
Speaker 1: rattle in a three year old Iowa like that, if
Speaker 1: you're patient and you're on the right farm, it's not
Speaker 1: hard to do right and so and so we have
Speaker 1: this older age structure that is very sought after. Older
Speaker 1: age structure means bigger antlers, which makes them even more
Speaker 1: sought after you add all of these nonresident landowners. You
Speaker 1: add all of these nonresident tags, you're just going to
Speaker 1: So imagine a guy who has who gets an Iowa tag.
Speaker 1: He's comes from a state or a location where a
Speaker 1: one thirty class three year old would be a gigantic
Speaker 1: deal for him. So what are these people are gonna do.
Speaker 1: They're gonna go in, They're gonna go, oh my god,
Speaker 1: this is the biggest buck I've ever seen. And I
Speaker 1: don't blame them, and they shoot it right. The next
Speaker 1: guy does the same thing. The next guy does the
Speaker 1: same thing. So all of a sudden, you have this
Speaker 1: the top tier age structure just completely wiped out in
Speaker 1: a full of years, and now we're no different than
Speaker 1: any of these other states. I think that that's possible.
Speaker 1: I think that it's it's easy to sort of, you know,
Speaker 1: pin this on. You know what I would have to
Speaker 1: see to play Devil's advocate. Here is how many people?
Speaker 1: This is? How many tags? Is this? Because if you're
Speaker 1: talking about you know, if this goes through the way
Speaker 1: it could, and you're talking three, four or five thousand
Speaker 1: dollars nonresident tags, you're talking about somebody who's probably not
Speaker 1: necessarily hunting one thirties. But I guess it kind of
Speaker 1: depends how the market bears out and what the tags
Speaker 1: would cost, and how many people are actually involved in this.
Speaker 1: And I say that, so this is this is like,
Speaker 1: this is just like a little warning and people listening
Speaker 1: to this goal. I was never gonna hunt away anyway,
Speaker 1: because I'm not going to spend seven hundred dollars on
Speaker 1: a deer tag. That's not really the point. This is
Speaker 1: this is sort of an echo from other states and
Speaker 1: other strategies, And the gist of the whole thing is
Speaker 1: we're not really staring at a brighter future if you're
Speaker 1: a white tail hunter in an awful lot of situations
Speaker 1: and we so you might be thinking, you know, I
Speaker 1: know you like to hunt South Dakota. I've I've hunted
Speaker 1: South Dakota whole bunch. We were just talking, you know,
Speaker 1: before this, about how there's a proposal there from the
Speaker 1: Game and Fish. I think it's from the Game and
Speaker 1: Fish to limit non resident any deer tags to twenty
Speaker 1: two hundred for the entire year, and there's going to
Speaker 1: be a lottery or that's that's built into the proposal anyway,
Speaker 1: which to me says, Okay, we're probably going to be
Speaker 1: playing the points game there, sort of like Wyoming. And
Speaker 1: it's another revenue generator and and you know, agree with it,
Speaker 1: disagree with it, whatever, it's it's another potential lost opportunity
Speaker 1: for an awful lot of hunters. And that trend is
Speaker 1: happening all over the place, and so you know, we're
Speaker 1: we're going to talk. We'll get a little rosier here
Speaker 1: in a second. But if you're paying attention out there,
Speaker 1: you know in Nebraska just did this with limiting nonresident
Speaker 1: deer hunters and turkey hunters. This this stuff's coming to everybody,
Speaker 1: like it just is. And if you're if you're interested
Speaker 1: in going out and hunting across state lines, i'd start
Speaker 1: thinking about it now, because this is this is a
Speaker 1: slippery slope type of thing. And you know, I get why,
Speaker 1: I get why people are forced some of these proposals,
Speaker 1: and I get why if you're a resident of a
Speaker 1: certain state, you don't want anybody else coming in. But
Speaker 1: at the same time, you're you're advocating the loss of
Speaker 1: hunting opportunities from your fellow hunters. And the more we
Speaker 1: do that, the worst this thing gets. And so it's
Speaker 1: not just a it's easy to be like, oh, hey,
Speaker 1: I don't want anybody coming here to hunt the public
Speaker 1: land that I like to hunt on. It's like, yeah, obviously,
Speaker 1: but there's repercussions for that mentality, and we're all going
Speaker 1: to deal with them across the entire white tail world here.
Speaker 1: And I mean we already are right the thing, the
Speaker 1: thing that impacts Iowa, I feel the most compared to
Speaker 1: a state like South Dakota. I mean, you've been to
Speaker 1: South Dakota, and how much public land there is available
Speaker 1: to hunt. I mean, it is ridiculous. You know, other
Speaker 1: things go into that equation, like grazing, and you know,
Speaker 1: just because it's public doesn't mean it holds deer, right,
Speaker 1: But in Iowa, there is less than two percent of
Speaker 1: the total surface area in Iowa is public hunting ground,
Speaker 1: and so there's nowhere really for it the locals to
Speaker 1: go if they're displaced by some of these laws. So
Speaker 1: this is a great thing to talk about, and it's
Speaker 1: something you know, we see the whole fight between Matt
Speaker 1: Ronella and Steve and Matt doesn't want any more hunters
Speaker 1: out there, and a lot of people say, we don't
Speaker 1: need them out there because everything's too crowded already. And
Speaker 1: I look at it and I go, we don't have
Speaker 1: I feel like not recruiting is a bad idea, Like
Speaker 1: I think we need people coming into our ranks. And
Speaker 1: so I look at that and I go, Okay, if
Speaker 1: you're Iowa, and I've said this about South Dakota, I
Speaker 1: said this about a lot of states. If you're Iowa
Speaker 1: and you're looking at something like that, and you're you're
Speaker 1: staring down the barrel of ninety eight percent of year
Speaker 1: land is private, how do we get more public? Then?
Speaker 1: We never we never talked about this. I mean, do
Speaker 1: you build in an extra ten bucks per preference point
Speaker 1: and use that as too fun to walk in program
Speaker 1: or something like? We're facing this everywhere, right, and I think,
Speaker 1: I think, like the best thing we can do for
Speaker 1: so many of these situations in these states is figure
Speaker 1: out how to get more land open to everyone. Yeah, yep, yep.
Speaker 1: And that's that's that's hard to do, and especially in
Speaker 1: a state like Iowa, where the main focus is depending
Speaker 1: on where you're at, the main focus is not the
Speaker 1: natural resource. Right. Just look what happened with a pheasant
Speaker 1: poppylation in this state. They farmed up to the fences
Speaker 1: on absolutely everything. They tore out buffer strips so they
Speaker 1: could farm an extra two rows of corn or you know,
Speaker 1: agg ground, right, and so the main focus in this
Speaker 1: state is still and always has been agriculture. And so
Speaker 1: unless you can get the current landowners on board, probably
Speaker 1: the only way you're going to do that is some
Speaker 1: kind of financial reward. Then you know, then I like
Speaker 1: it will be very tough, especially when you could, you know,
Speaker 1: you can use that ground to plant more corn, or
Speaker 1: plant more you know, or have more cattle or put
Speaker 1: up a hog confinement or whatever whatever whatever people do
Speaker 1: to make money in the egg world. Yep. Well, I
Speaker 1: mean we've seen this in Minnesota has it. South Dakota
Speaker 1: has that, Kansas has it, Western states have it. There.
Speaker 1: There are walk in access programs absolutely landowners, and I
Speaker 1: kind of feel like that format is something we really
Speaker 1: need to pay attention to because you know, so you
Speaker 1: think about that, you've got, you know, an egg heavy
Speaker 1: state like Iowa and a whole bunch of the flyover
Speaker 1: states in the Midwest. There are a lot of farmers
Speaker 1: out there that where if you were like, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: three bucks an acre, five bucks an acre, whatever, and
Speaker 1: roll your farm, they're gonna do it like they're you know,
Speaker 1: they're gonna do it because they can still make their
Speaker 1: money on it. And you know, those those programs tend
Speaker 1: to have pretty good liability insurance and things like that,
Speaker 1: so the landowners off the hook if you go out
Speaker 1: there and blow your head off or whatever. I think
Speaker 1: I think we need to get serious about that. And
Speaker 1: what you were talking about with Iowa and being able
Speaker 1: to sell landowner tags is the exact opposite, because that
Speaker 1: is going to lock up land in a way that
Speaker 1: is going to be really rough for everyone. And this
Speaker 1: this kind of stuff, it's, man, it scares me because
Speaker 1: it's just it's getting so difficult out there, and I
Speaker 1: what I worry about is sort of like I want
Speaker 1: to just get mine mentality and giving up on states
Speaker 1: like I know I've got. I've hunted quite a few
Speaker 1: different states in my life, and some of them I
Speaker 1: just have a hard time caring about anymore because it's
Speaker 1: like there's no opportunity for me there. I don't it's
Speaker 1: hard for me to muster up a whole lot of
Speaker 1: you know, rah rah rah, let's fight for your hunting
Speaker 1: opportunities when it doesn't matter to me. And I know
Speaker 1: that sound shitty, but it's like, I don't want to
Speaker 1: see that happen on a large scale where we're super
Speaker 1: apathetic and we don't care about our hunters who are
Speaker 1: across state lines because we've been screwed so many times
Speaker 1: by license prices and cuts and opportunities, and I just
Speaker 1: don't want to see us get more divided. And I
Speaker 1: can feel myself sort of just like I don't give
Speaker 1: a shit about some of this stuff anymore, and I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't like that. Yeah, And I mentioned, man, that's
Speaker 1: where it gets muddy and it gets gross and like greedy,
Speaker 1: and it becomes you know, there's groups of people out
Speaker 1: there that are trying to treat our natural resources like
Speaker 1: commodities and not like the natural resource that needs to
Speaker 1: be delicately managed. Right, They're out there going, well, the
Speaker 1: land is going to produce more deer so you know,
Speaker 1: just like cattle prices are this, and the next thing,
Speaker 1: you know, they're going to have futures and on tag
Speaker 1: sales and things like that. Well look, you know, I
Speaker 1: mean it can go whatever way you can imagine it.
Speaker 1: It could possibly go that way. And so like like
Speaker 1: right now, there's large groups of people in the state
Speaker 1: of Iowa who are rallying together to let politicians know,
Speaker 1: do not change this right, do not change these laws.
Speaker 1: We want them the same, keep them the same. We
Speaker 1: don't care if non residents come in, but put them
Speaker 1: in line. Just like every state. And I'm going to
Speaker 1: say this, and I don't know if this is going
Speaker 1: to be controversial or not, but I really do feel
Speaker 1: like all states should manage their their natural resources with
Speaker 1: the residence in mind first and then worry about the
Speaker 1: non resident that I know that may seem unfavorable because
Speaker 1: it you know, there could be a potential law change
Speaker 1: that could keep me out of a state. As much
Speaker 1: as I want to do, I feel like non residence
Speaker 1: in all situations have their you know, have their say
Speaker 1: in some of this, in some of this, but it's
Speaker 1: the people who are paying the taxes on an annual
Speaker 1: basis in their state should have a little bit more
Speaker 1: of a voice on rules and regulations than someone who
Speaker 1: doesn't even live here. So I looked into that because
Speaker 1: that's a very common argument to make. I looked into
Speaker 1: it into a woman because Wyoming pisses me off so
Speaker 1: much sometimes. And if you look at and this is
Speaker 1: this is the case with Wyoming, not I'm not saying
Speaker 1: this is any other state. But if you look at
Speaker 1: the amount of federal tax that Wyoming contributes to the
Speaker 1: federal dowry and then how much they take out, the
Speaker 1: ratio isn't even close. They rank like forty nine, So
Speaker 1: they're they're putting in a little bit and taken out
Speaker 1: a lot. And so if I'm a federal taxpayer from
Speaker 1: some other state, which I am, where does that leave me?
Speaker 1: You know what I mean? So this is not it's
Speaker 1: not so simple. I definitely think that I agree with that,
Speaker 1: because there's a lot of federal public land in states
Speaker 1: like Wyoming. But it's not But it's not about It's
Speaker 1: not about federal public land. It's about if you say, okay,
Speaker 1: we pay the taxes in this state, well, federal taxes
Speaker 1: are building roads for you. They're doing all kinds of programs.
Speaker 1: It's not just a natural resource thing. And I look
Speaker 1: at that and I go, I get it. I get
Speaker 1: the argument. But we're if you're traveling to hunt, you're
Speaker 1: all paying enough taxes. Hey, we're all reaping the benefits
Speaker 1: of federal taxes and we're paying them. And it's not
Speaker 1: so cut and dry that it's just the state residents
Speaker 1: who are funding everything. And then you look at the
Speaker 1: non resident revenue that's coming in in some of those
Speaker 1: states and how much money they're generating off of that.
Speaker 1: It's it's not it's like not so simple, you know.
Speaker 1: And I get the argument, right right, I just feel like,
Speaker 1: and maybe I'm a little jaded because I've been through
Speaker 1: this before where and you know, kudos to the family
Speaker 1: for making their money and you know, putting the land
Speaker 1: up for auction, but I've been I would say over
Speaker 1: my lifetime, I have lost permission hunting farms in or
Speaker 1: i've grown up. I would say probably four to five
Speaker 1: thousand total acres since I've started hunting that I've been
Speaker 1: lost to nonresident landowners. And so then instantly that gets displaced.
Speaker 1: Everybody on those farms gets displaced, and now they have
Speaker 1: to go find another place to hunt, right, And typically
Speaker 1: even with a resident landowner coming in, unless they're from
Speaker 1: out of county. Let's say someone in a bigger like
Speaker 1: Des Moines buys a farm just to hunt, then typically
Speaker 1: there's going to be some displacement there as well. But
Speaker 1: for the most part, if it's another local who's buying
Speaker 1: the land, then I will still have my hunting opportunities
Speaker 1: there not not a lot changes with that. That's just
Speaker 1: that's just my examples that I've lived through. Well, I
Speaker 1: can tell you that's probably because you live in Iowa
Speaker 1: and I live in Minnesota, and I've lost plenty of
Speaker 1: hunting opportunities and they've all been to residents because nobody's
Speaker 1: paying to come in there to hunt, right, right, But
Speaker 1: in it doesn't matter, Okay, So that happens to you,
Speaker 1: and it's non residence happens to me, and it's residents
Speaker 1: happens some dude in Pennsylvania who cares. The net result
Speaker 1: is fewer places to go rome like, fewer places to hunt,
Speaker 1: and we need to address that, and it sucks, but
Speaker 1: we still have some opportunities now, and you better take
Speaker 1: advantage of them. If you're listening to this and you're like, man,
Speaker 1: these guys are all doom and gloom and they're pissed off.
Speaker 1: There's still opportunities out there, there's still places to go. Well,
Speaker 1: we still have some fight left in us, and you know,
Speaker 1: there's still some really really cool places to travel that
Speaker 1: are going to sell you a tag or you could
Speaker 1: play the points game for a little bit. And I
Speaker 1: don't want to discourage people from doing that because I
Speaker 1: still think that the experience is worth it and the opportunity,
Speaker 1: if it's there, you should take advantage of it. Now,
Speaker 1: you said you're going to Nebraska this year, I'm set
Speaker 1: sure where I'm going. Ok. I know, I know I'm
Speaker 1: going to go to South Dakota given the rules and
Speaker 1: regulations don't change too much, all right, Like I love
Speaker 1: South Dakota. I also am gonna apply for Kansas. So
Speaker 1: my uncle he lives in Kansas, and he's probably gonna
Speaker 1: help me out finding a place to hunt down. And
Speaker 1: Kansas is the number one state for the least amount
Speaker 1: of public ground in the entire country. I believe Iowa
Speaker 1: is second and Kansas is first, And so I might
Speaker 1: be hunting some public there, I might be hunting some
Speaker 1: private through my uncle. He lives down there, and so
Speaker 1: I'm going I'm gonna try to hunt Kansas. If I
Speaker 1: hunt Kansas, I'll probably take the extra miles and also
Speaker 1: hunt Oklahoma. And so just because of how close they
Speaker 1: are to each other, So Kansas in Oklahoma and Iowa.
Speaker 1: If I don't draw Kansas, then what I'll do is
Speaker 1: I'll probably do um Iowa and South Dakota for sure.
Speaker 1: I had a pretty tough go of things in my
Speaker 1: September hunt in uh in Nebraska, So I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm still I'm still debating on if I'm going to
Speaker 1: go there. And that's you know that Oklahoma in Nebraska
Speaker 1: are both over the counter as it right now, Uh,
Speaker 1: if you go to hunt Kansas and you and you
Speaker 1: get on some land that your uncle's gonna put you on,
Speaker 1: or you're gonna make sure you don't displace any residence,
Speaker 1: and that's a that's a fair that's a that's a
Speaker 1: fair smart ass question. And I will say that I
Speaker 1: will not be displacing any I will they will just
Speaker 1: be adding a hunter to that to that form. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm just giving you a shit, buddy, all right, So
Speaker 1: I know you. I mean, that's pretty ambitious, right, But
Speaker 1: I guess that is the way that you describe the
Speaker 1: potential plans for your fall is sort of a good
Speaker 1: counterweight to all the bitch and we did for the
Speaker 1: first twenty minutes of this podcast saying loses an opportunities
Speaker 1: because you're going, Hey, if I draw South Dakota, a
Speaker 1: hunt there because I love it. If I might go
Speaker 1: to Nebraska, even though Nebraska can kick my ass sometimes
Speaker 1: I still love it. And I know that I might
Speaker 1: draw Kansas and I'm gonna be able to buy it
Speaker 1: over the counter tag in Oklahoma. That's solid, Like it's yeah,
Speaker 1: it's good to hear that. Why why those states? Like
Speaker 1: let's start right up on the top of South Dakota.
Speaker 1: Why why start there? So the first time I ever
Speaker 1: went to South Dakota, I instantly fell in love with it.
Speaker 1: More less about the hunting and more about the landscape.
Speaker 1: Like you know, our buddy Mark Kenyan talks about the
Speaker 1: West and he talks about the mountains like he's a
Speaker 1: mountain guy. He wants to be out in the mountain. Dude,
Speaker 1: I'm a prairie guy. I there's something about the bad lands,
Speaker 1: There's something about the wide open prairie where you can
Speaker 1: get on the point and see until you can't see anymore,
Speaker 1: until if everything fades away. Yep. I love that feeling.
Speaker 1: I love the feeling of feeling extremely small in a
Speaker 1: large area. And so that's why I go hunt in
Speaker 1: South Dakota. And it gives me the opportunity to hunt
Speaker 1: multi species. My tag allows me to hunt mulder and
Speaker 1: or a white tail, and so those are the biggest
Speaker 1: contributing factors. Yeah, so that and so you mentioned multiple
Speaker 1: times everybody who listens to this knows you're an Iowa resident.
Speaker 1: You live in the best state to hunt white tails.
Speaker 1: And yet you're saying because this is this is something
Speaker 1: that happens a lot, and this is one of the
Speaker 1: issues you guys are dealing with down there. And I
Speaker 1: was like, everybody wants to go there to kill a
Speaker 1: big buck, right, you know, I mean Kansas, same way
Speaker 1: Illinois was Buffalo County all that bullshit. But you're saying,
Speaker 1: and this is something that this is a point that
Speaker 1: we can't stress enough. Is Yeah, I live in Iowa,
Speaker 1: I have awesome hunting. I'm going to leave Iowa to
Speaker 1: go hunt South Dakota. Not because I want to kill
Speaker 1: one set and these, But because I want to hunt
Speaker 1: in an environment that speaks to me, Yes, that that
Speaker 1: matters so much. We we frame these these traveling hunts
Speaker 1: so much around just the kill or the like the
Speaker 1: trophy potential. But when you start doing this, I feel
Speaker 1: the same way about the bad Lands, Like, man, I
Speaker 1: don't know what it is, but it's awesome. I don't
Speaker 1: I don't know why. It's the same thing. And you know,
Speaker 1: like when I hunt western North Dakota, that environment is
Speaker 1: just special to me, like I just I want to
Speaker 1: spend time there. And when you start doing these hunts,
Speaker 1: it's easy to plan around, like, well, I want to
Speaker 1: go I want to draw my Kansas teay because Kansas
Speaker 1: has giants. It's like okay, sure sort of, But where
Speaker 1: do you want to go experience a hunt? What kind
Speaker 1: of ground speaks to you? And that's such an important
Speaker 1: consideration that we kind of don't give a lot of
Speaker 1: weight to. Yeah, yeah, I mean just a successful day out.
Speaker 1: There's sitting at the top of the highest point and
Speaker 1: just spotting all day, like even if even if I
Speaker 1: make a stock or not, you know, going back sleeping
Speaker 1: in the back of my truck, kicking cooking all my
Speaker 1: food on my tailgate, or pitching a tent somewhere, you know,
Speaker 1: two miles in. It's just it's something that I just
Speaker 1: can't get enough of. Yeah, it's a it's a it's
Speaker 1: really fun to get outside your comfort zone. Yes, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's different. It's weird to travel to hunt the
Speaker 1: exact same stuff you can travel at home. You know.
Speaker 1: It's it's fun to have some variety, all right. So
Speaker 1: South Dakota is an easy one because South Dakota is cool.
Speaker 1: Man that that state offers so many interesting you know,
Speaker 1: just different regions of different kinds of habitats. You know,
Speaker 1: like you said, the meal deer, the white tail thing.
Speaker 1: You can go pick up an antelope tag out there.
Speaker 1: It's pretty cool. What about Nebraska, Yeah, Nebraska, in the
Speaker 1: area of Nebraska that I hunt, it's a lot like
Speaker 1: it's a lot like uh, South Dakota. All right. So
Speaker 1: a lot of people drive through Nebraska and all they
Speaker 1: see is flat cattle pasture. Well, if you get into
Speaker 1: the northwest corner of Nebraska, there's a ton of terrain change,
Speaker 1: and I mean it can get pretty gnarly back in there.
Speaker 1: I mean there's where I where I hunt in Nebraska,
Speaker 1: there is wintering elk in that in that same public
Speaker 1: that I hunt. So there's I mean, and the and
Speaker 1: even even further west. They have big horn sheep in
Speaker 1: Nebraska as well. And uh in South Dakota they have
Speaker 1: big horn sheep that I've seen in some of these spots,
Speaker 1: and so it's just it's just a continuation of South Dakota.
Speaker 1: I wanted more of it, and so I said, hey,
Speaker 1: might as well get a tag and uh go go
Speaker 1: do western Nebraska too. Yeah, that Nebraska has some really
Speaker 1: really cool opportunities and things are getting a little tighter there,
Speaker 1: and I get it. You know, Uh, Nebraska for a
Speaker 1: while was like the biggest sleeper state and it got
Speaker 1: really busy. But you know, Nebraska also promoted the ship
Speaker 1: out of their non resident hunting opportunities and really pushed,
Speaker 1: pushed hard to compete with South Dakota and a couple
Speaker 1: of other states. And now it's kind of, you know,
Speaker 1: there's a course correction going on there, but there's still
Speaker 1: some really badass opportunities out there. And I will say
Speaker 1: this that that western northwestern corner of Nebraska that everybody
Speaker 1: wants to head to is pretty bad ass. It's it's
Speaker 1: bad ass, but I will be the first to let
Speaker 1: you know there's a lot of other hunters out there there. Well,
Speaker 1: it's a it's yeah, it's a magnet for hunting pressure.
Speaker 1: And if you drive through Nebraska, you're driving by a
Speaker 1: lot of pretty good hunting opportunities. To get to that
Speaker 1: corner of the state, I would say, don't be don't
Speaker 1: be afraid to check out some other parts of Nebraska.
Speaker 1: All right, So those are two options. And you said Kansas.
Speaker 1: Have you hunted Kansas before? I have not hunted Kansas.
Speaker 1: I've been in a tree stand in Kansas with my uncle,
Speaker 1: but never never hunted. I do want to add something here, though.
Speaker 1: I have been collecting preference points in Wyoming for eight
Speaker 1: years now. So I at this July, when I purchased
Speaker 1: my preference point, I will have like eight preference points
Speaker 1: for elk, eight preference points for antelope, and like six
Speaker 1: preference points for deer, I believe. And so I'm while
Speaker 1: I'm doing these other things, I'm also planning and calculating
Speaker 1: for a like a really big once in a lifetime
Speaker 1: hunt where I'll probably try to schedule two weeks out
Speaker 1: there to go try to chase elk or some of
Speaker 1: these other species. So it's just one of these things.
Speaker 1: And that's why I kind of like I kind of
Speaker 1: I personally kind of like the preference point system because
Speaker 1: you're waiting in line while you're also hunting other other places,
Speaker 1: and the more you wait in line, the It's not
Speaker 1: necessarily true this next statement isn't necessarily true all of
Speaker 1: the times, but most of the time, more preference points
Speaker 1: that you have, the better unit you can get into,
Speaker 1: has a little bit more access, has less hunters in it,
Speaker 1: and it just gives you an opportunity to do something
Speaker 1: really special. Yeah, I'm I'm kind of agnostic on the
Speaker 1: preference point saying I've got the same deal going on
Speaker 1: in Wyoming, but I have quite a few more points
Speaker 1: than you do. Yeah, but I look at it as
Speaker 1: long as they don't change the rules halfway through, which
Speaker 1: which you see some states do that. So you've bought
Speaker 1: into the promise of this kind of system, and then
Speaker 1: when they change it and you're already you know, eight
Speaker 1: points deep, that sucks. The The other thing I would
Speaker 1: say on that is anybody listening to this who's like,
Speaker 1: oh man, I'm gonna go buy Wyoming points, and then
Speaker 1: they're gonna get there and they're gonna go, oh my god,
Speaker 1: I could draw a big horn sheep or a moose
Speaker 1: tag or you know this premiere ELK unit. Do some
Speaker 1: research before you start buying in on preference points because
Speaker 1: people starting today and some of these really once in
Speaker 1: a lifetime type animals you're never gonna draw. Like you,
Speaker 1: look at how many people are ahead of you, and
Speaker 1: look at what it takes to draw now if it's
Speaker 1: twenty or twenty two points or whatever it is, and
Speaker 1: they're given three tags a year in this unit. Like you,
Speaker 1: some of these situations you'll never get into, and so
Speaker 1: just pay attention to it. There are some opportunities out
Speaker 1: there to buy some points and get into some you know.
Speaker 1: I mean you you're probably gonna need them for general
Speaker 1: units here, or you might already, I'm not sure, but
Speaker 1: just pay attention to that. I mean, that is one
Speaker 1: thing I like about Iowa is every May, I can
Speaker 1: buy my point and I can look at what it
Speaker 1: took to draw each zone in Iowa and I go, okay,
Speaker 1: I should theoretically be able to hunt here in two
Speaker 1: years or three years, And you can plan around that,
Speaker 1: and honestly, this is where everything's going, and it's not
Speaker 1: going to just be a nonresident game. In ten years, twelve,
Speaker 1: fifteen years, people are going to be playing the Points
Speaker 1: game in their home state too. I think, like I
Speaker 1: think this is just coming. As you know, we have
Speaker 1: more people on the landscape and fewer places to hunt,
Speaker 1: So learning about it is not a bad thing. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely,
Speaker 1: God forbid it ever gets to that. But I don't
Speaker 1: disagree that something like some big changes to some of
Speaker 1: these states are coming. Well, I mean it's it's coming.
Speaker 1: I mean, these these state game agencies are going to
Speaker 1: have to generate revenue. And if you you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: we haven't really seen the price situation, even as crazy
Speaker 1: as it has gotten, we haven't seen that. You know,
Speaker 1: people go, I'm not I'm not going to I am
Speaker 1: I'm not going to play the game. But theoretically, you
Speaker 1: just think it would happen eventually, and you just you
Speaker 1: look at the resource management and I just think it's
Speaker 1: coming at some point. I know a lot of people
Speaker 1: probably don't, but I think the face of this world
Speaker 1: is going to change a lot in the next ten years.
Speaker 1: And it's just it's not going to get easier for anyone,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean you think about you know, you
Speaker 1: look at Colorado right now you can go buy and
Speaker 1: over the counter ELK tag at least you could. You know,
Speaker 1: that's that's probably gonna change too, and the residents are
Speaker 1: going to cheer that. But you know, wolves come in, CWD,
Speaker 1: hits hard, whatever, bad winners, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: your ELK herd is fifty percent of what it was,
Speaker 1: like like you that could happen, and then what you know,
Speaker 1: and then it's like, okay, well we're not going to
Speaker 1: let everybody go buy a license and go hunt these
Speaker 1: because this is a resource we have to manage. So
Speaker 1: now you're gonna have to play this game. And that's
Speaker 1: a pure hypothetical, but I just kind of think that's
Speaker 1: coming to a lot of states eventually. Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 1: So all right, So Kansas, Kansas is an interesting one.
Speaker 1: I've only ever I've only hunted there one time, and
Speaker 1: I had arguably maybe the most amazing morning of my
Speaker 1: life with buck activity. It was pretty crazy. But Kansas
Speaker 1: is Kansas is a weird one for non residence to
Speaker 1: go to because I think some people kind of underestimate
Speaker 1: how like how prevalent baiting is on private land and
Speaker 1: how that can affect things. And you know, like you mentioned,
Speaker 1: you know, it's not like a state that's overrun with
Speaker 1: public land. It's it's an interesting opportunity because there's big
Speaker 1: deer there, but it's not Sometimes I think it's not
Speaker 1: what people expect, right, I would I would say that
Speaker 1: my interest in Kansas is two things. One, my uncle
Speaker 1: lives there and he is somewhat responsible for me getting
Speaker 1: into the outdoors. Right. He took me peasant hunting when
Speaker 1: I was a whipper snapper, you know, and so that
Speaker 1: that that's that's a big one. But second is how
Speaker 1: some people think of Iowa. I mean, I live in Iowa,
Speaker 1: so I get to see Iowa for its true beauty.
Speaker 1: But my day my daydream state, like some people daydream
Speaker 1: about Iowa, my daydream state is Kansas. And so when
Speaker 1: I when I think about, hey, an opportunity outside of
Speaker 1: Iowa to run into a big buck, that's probably that's
Speaker 1: that's where my mind goes. Yeah, well understandably, So, Uh, Kansas,
Speaker 1: Kansas has plenty to offer. Uh what about what about Oklahoma?
Speaker 1: Why Oklahoma? So? Oklahoma? Um is one of those things where. Man.
Speaker 1: I really like, once you start saying something is a
Speaker 1: sleeper state or something is good. And I got a
Speaker 1: buddy on the network here that every time I say
Speaker 1: the word Oklahoma, I get a text from him and
Speaker 1: he's like, dude, shut up, just like stop talking about it, man.
Speaker 1: And so I really do think from a from a
Speaker 1: public land standpoint, Oklahoma has a lot to offer that.
Speaker 1: I mean, shit, a couple of years ago, Oklahoma had
Speaker 1: the most two hundred inch deer come out of it
Speaker 1: in one year. That more than Nebraska, or more than Iowa,
Speaker 1: more than Illinois, more than Kansas. So we we have
Speaker 1: we have this opportunity not only for just good deer hunting,
Speaker 1: but potentially great deer hunting in that state. And so
Speaker 1: why I'm interested in Oklahoma is because of the proximity
Speaker 1: to Kansas, and so it's an opportunity to just hit
Speaker 1: two places at one time. Yeah. Have you have you
Speaker 1: hunted Oklahoma? Not? Not yet? No, are you planning to
Speaker 1: hunt in public land? Yes? Um, I've hunted Oklahoma a
Speaker 1: couple of times. It's it's one of my favorite states
Speaker 1: as far as just high deer density. Like I've hunted
Speaker 1: a couple different regions in that state. They're pretty far apart,
Speaker 1: and there's just a lot of deer down there. The
Speaker 1: public lands pretty decent, there's there. You know, one thing
Speaker 1: I will say about Oklahoma is it feels to me
Speaker 1: sort of like when I hunt Wisconsin, Like it's like, man,
Speaker 1: everybody hunts, you know what I mean, Like there's just
Speaker 1: like a high proportion of the of the state that hunts.
Speaker 1: But also, I've never had a bad interaction down there.
Speaker 1: Like every resident I've met down there that was out
Speaker 1: hunting where we were hunting has been awesome. And I
Speaker 1: know that's like a really small sample size, but it's
Speaker 1: just a cool state. It's cool opportunities over the counter.
Speaker 1: For now, you get a whole bunch of tags. I think.
Speaker 1: I think there's talk of maybe limiting buck tags down
Speaker 1: there eventually, which you know kind of makes sense, but whatever,
Speaker 1: But it's a cool opportunity. And and like you said,
Speaker 1: you can hunt you know, northern Oklahoma and be damn
Speaker 1: near hunting Kansas type deer in a different situation, or
Speaker 1: you can hunt out western Oklahoma. You know, that's where
Speaker 1: I hunted the first time, in kind of southwestern Oklahoma,
Speaker 1: And man, it was like it was almost like a
Speaker 1: Texas hunt kind of with the terrain and totally different.
Speaker 1: And then I hunted southern southern Oklahoma one time, real
Speaker 1: close to Texas, and it was like a pure Texas
Speaker 1: hunt with fire ants and everything. So it's pretty wild
Speaker 1: down there. Yeah, and on top of Oklahoma, this is
Speaker 1: another another couple of things that I've really been thinking
Speaker 1: about lately, and it's just I don't know why it
Speaker 1: didn't hit me sooner, but I have Iowa. I lived
Speaker 1: in the eastern part of the state. I'm three hours
Speaker 1: from Minnesota, I'm an hour and a half from two
Speaker 1: hour and a half, two hours from Wisconsin, and I'm
Speaker 1: forty five minutes to an hour from Illinois. And I've
Speaker 1: never taken the opportunity to hunt any of those states
Speaker 1: and they're right next door. And so I just have
Speaker 1: this feeling that if I go east, I just run
Speaker 1: into more and more people, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And so I just I'm going to start putting some
Speaker 1: as my kids get into more activities and as life
Speaker 1: just eventually gets busier and busier, I think I'm going
Speaker 1: to find myself looking into Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Illinois a
Speaker 1: lot more. Yeah. Well, I mean a Missouri excuse me
Speaker 1: for Missouri as well. Yeah, one thing to consider there too,
Speaker 1: because this is you know again kind of back to
Speaker 1: we kind of start our planning or our daydreaming on
Speaker 1: this around where can we go kill a big one?
Speaker 1: But just take if you take Iowa, for example, and
Speaker 1: you have your October one opener, so many states that
Speaker 1: are close to you will let you hunt for two
Speaker 1: weeks or more before that, right, And and that's something
Speaker 1: you know, like one of the main reasons I started
Speaker 1: traveling to hunt. You know, in Minnesota this year, our
Speaker 1: gun season starts on November fourth, So if I want
Speaker 1: to bow hunt the rut, I gotta leave, right And
Speaker 1: so it's like you sort of start planning around that too.
Speaker 1: So if you have an October opener, you might be
Speaker 1: able to get somewhere and have a couple of weeks
Speaker 1: of hunting, or you know, when your state's gun season opens,
Speaker 1: you might be able to skip across the border and
Speaker 1: go bow hunt somewhere else. Like there's a lot of
Speaker 1: reasons to go. Or like you said, if you're taking
Speaker 1: your kids and you want them to experience a cool
Speaker 1: trip where you're camping and doing stuff. But you don't
Speaker 1: want to drive them, you know, twelve fourteen hours out west.
Speaker 1: There's there's things to do, there's opportunities out there for
Speaker 1: the white tail hunter with a little bit of ambition.
Speaker 1: Who can afford it. Yeah, yep, it's it's the it's
Speaker 1: the white tail. But my have a I have a
Speaker 1: bucket list, and it's I have it written down that
Speaker 1: it's right here on my desk. And so I was
Speaker 1: looking into a couple of these hunts and I'm just like,
Speaker 1: I'm going to have to save a lot of money
Speaker 1: in order to even get close to some of these animals.
Speaker 1: But elk and mule heer, Like, I still have not
Speaker 1: killed a mule deer, and I really want to kill
Speaker 1: a mule, to kill an elk, I want to kill
Speaker 1: a prong horn. I think those three animals are I
Speaker 1: feel like I'm going to be able to accomplish that fairly.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna say easily, but I should be able
Speaker 1: to accomplish them from a financial standpoint, with not a
Speaker 1: lot of effort. And I'm not looking for giants, right,
Speaker 1: but I'm just looking for a cool opportunity those three animals.
Speaker 1: I've two more animals that I want to kill one
Speaker 1: is a moose, and I want it to be a
Speaker 1: certain way, Like I want to get on a boat.
Speaker 1: I want to I want to take a plane into
Speaker 1: the middle of nowhere. I want to get on a
Speaker 1: boat and I want to float down a river and
Speaker 1: I want to stop. I want to call moose and
Speaker 1: I want that, you know, I want that that experience
Speaker 1: like I saw it on TV when I was a kid.
Speaker 1: I was like, I want that experience. That's a once
Speaker 1: in a lifetime deal. Right, then I want a caribout.
Speaker 1: And really, if I kill those five animals, I'm going like,
Speaker 1: I'm going to be happy with my life as a hunter.
Speaker 1: All of my bucket lists animals and experience his at
Speaker 1: that point have been met. And then maybe from there
Speaker 1: I'll go on and do some some other different things.
Speaker 1: But those last two are going to be expensive. And
Speaker 1: I don't mean from necessarily just if I could go
Speaker 1: into Alaska and go on public and go do that
Speaker 1: thing and do it cheap, but still from Iowa to
Speaker 1: Alaska is a big trip, right, There's no saying that
Speaker 1: going to Alaska and doing it is going to be
Speaker 1: cheap in any way exactly exactly, And so those two
Speaker 1: things have take a little bit more planning in preparation
Speaker 1: and a little bit more in the savings account, in
Speaker 1: the hunting account, I guess I'll say, and then just
Speaker 1: realize that a couple of those trips are going to
Speaker 1: be once in a lifetime, so I want to make account.
Speaker 1: You know. Yeah, well, and I mean that's a good
Speaker 1: point too, right, Like if you if you're sitting there
Speaker 1: listening to this and you're like, oh, man, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's hard for me to even conceive of making
Speaker 1: over the road whitetail trip happen, but you're sitting there
Speaker 1: daydreaming about some of these Western critters. Man, the only
Speaker 1: way to to get there is just to start learning
Speaker 1: how to do this stuff, you know, I mean it goes.
Speaker 1: We talk a lot about, you know, figuring out how
Speaker 1: to get tags and played the points game and by
Speaker 1: the buy your license or whatever, but it's also how
Speaker 1: how sharp are your e scouting skills? Like how comfortable
Speaker 1: are you driving quite a ways away from home and
Speaker 1: camping and hunting out of a camp if that's what
Speaker 1: you're gonna do those things, you know, once you start,
Speaker 1: you know, I started doing that with turkeys when I
Speaker 1: was in high school, just just cause you're like, you know,
Speaker 1: I mean that that was the thing that we could
Speaker 1: afford to go travel the hunt and you just realize
Speaker 1: like how many holes you have in your game. But
Speaker 1: you also start building some confidence in that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: And it takes time. You know, like a lot of
Speaker 1: people go I'm gonna go do that elk hunt. First
Speaker 1: it's like, okay, great, but that's an expensive prop even
Speaker 1: for a DIY over the counter deal is not really
Speaker 1: very cheap. And then you've got, you know, the added
Speaker 1: stress of like that's a big you know, like a
Speaker 1: big license to buy, and you tell everybody you're gonna go,
Speaker 1: and you got to get in shape, and then you
Speaker 1: get out there and you're like all your EA scouting
Speaker 1: is kind of like, oh I found some meadows, I
Speaker 1: found a water hole or watering hole, Like yeah, so
Speaker 1: did everybody else, now what you know, And it's running
Speaker 1: through this stuff and getting used to it a little
Speaker 1: closer to home on like a little bit less stressful
Speaker 1: type of hunt, like a whitetail hunt is really beneficial
Speaker 1: and still a hell of a lot of fun. Yeah, yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: one thing about collecting information, you know, EA scouting is
Speaker 1: great when I here's what my first years, first two years,
Speaker 1: my first year in Nebraska, my first year in South Dakota,
Speaker 1: I drove or walked by everybody I saw. If I
Speaker 1: saw someone, I just kept moving. If there was somebody
Speaker 1: on the road, I just kept moving. And you know,
Speaker 1: I didn't want to tell them what I was about.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to tell they didn't want to tell
Speaker 1: me what they're about. That's what I thought. Man, I
Speaker 1: couldn't have been more wrong. Now. I talked to absolutely
Speaker 1: everybody I see, because most of the time people will
Speaker 1: drop some kind of information. And so a perfect example
Speaker 1: of this is I ran out to some antelope hunters
Speaker 1: when I was in Nebraska, and I said, you know,
Speaker 1: I just started talking with them. We sparked up a conversation,
Speaker 1: and they're out there for they're out there for antelope.
Speaker 1: I'm out there for deer. And I said, hey, man,
Speaker 1: I saw some antelope over here, and they're like, hey, dude,
Speaker 1: I saw some I saw a really big buck over here.
Speaker 1: And so we change we shared information, and it really
Speaker 1: didn't affect us, right. And so man, it's just one
Speaker 1: way to continue to gather information out there is to
Speaker 1: be friendly and talk to people. Man, I talked to landowners. Now.
Speaker 1: Where I was hunting in South Dakota was a like
Speaker 1: the worst experiences I've ever had in talking with people
Speaker 1: in South in certain parts of South Dakota. But in Nebraska, Man,
Speaker 1: I was talking every guy I ran into landowner cattle operation,
Speaker 1: you know, other hunters. Man. Everybody is willing to share information,
Speaker 1: and I think that's really a cool thing about about
Speaker 1: hunting out of state. A lot of people who are like, Hey,
Speaker 1: I want to go to Oklahoma and hunt public land too,
Speaker 1: or I want to go somewhere in the Midwest because
Speaker 1: I live out east and I want to go hunt
Speaker 1: those dumb cornfed deer. They'll they'll jump on a forum,
Speaker 1: you know, bow site or rock slide or whatever, and hey,
Speaker 1: I'm thinking about going to north or you know, North
Speaker 1: Dakota or Nebraska or whatever, and I want to hunt
Speaker 1: public land. Anybody have any suggestions, You're gonna get the worst,
Speaker 1: most bullshit information. So often do it because you know,
Speaker 1: first off, there are a lot of people who don't
Speaker 1: want you there, so they're gonna just lie to you whatever.
Speaker 1: These are strangers, they don't care about you. Secondly, they
Speaker 1: might not have a clue what they're talking about. Again,
Speaker 1: And the same thing happens if you talk to people
Speaker 1: in person sometimes where it you have to you have
Speaker 1: to just think, like what does this person actually know?
Speaker 1: You know, I mean, I can't I can't tell you
Speaker 1: how many times I've seen something on a forum where
Speaker 1: it's like, you know, don't come to Nebraska because our
Speaker 1: gun seasons in the middle of the rut, and the
Speaker 1: rifle hunters shoot all of the deer when they're two
Speaker 1: and a half. You're never going to kill a big
Speaker 1: one on public land. And it's like, okay, like you
Speaker 1: you have places where there's ninety thousand acres of public
Speaker 1: land in one spot, there aren't any big bucks in there,
Speaker 1: like you don't think so like, and so I just
Speaker 1: say take it with a grain of salt and understand
Speaker 1: just like generally what you're getting into to go to
Speaker 1: a spot, you know, like not not not necessarily maybe
Speaker 1: trophy quality, but like the deer density situation to some extent,
Speaker 1: the pressure situation to some extent, and just understand, like
Speaker 1: you can forge your own path and most of the
Speaker 1: people if you're if you're willing to go travel and
Speaker 1: hunt and do the work. You're probably going to out
Speaker 1: hunt most of the people you could get information from.
Speaker 1: That's just generally true. So just kind of you kind
Speaker 1: of got to go like Ford, your own path and
Speaker 1: really not listen to or not not pay attention to
Speaker 1: a lot of the information you might be able to
Speaker 1: kind of gather up because it might not mean anything
Speaker 1: to you and it might actually hurt you, know, mentally
Speaker 1: to take that in and go, oh, man, what if
Speaker 1: these guys are right about the deer quality or you know,
Speaker 1: HD killed them all here or whatever. Like, Man, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of bs out there right right, and you
Speaker 1: got to use your best judgment to weed that out. Yep, yep. Well,
Speaker 1: and you got to think, too, this is partially, like
Speaker 1: we said, to just go experience a new place, right right,
Speaker 1: Like it's just it's just partially to go have and
Speaker 1: experience somewhere else. And so if you're placing a little
Speaker 1: bit too much value on whether there's one hundred and
Speaker 1: forty inches all over, you're kind of missing the point.
Speaker 1: And if you're traveling to hunt like that, and especially
Speaker 1: if you're going to go hunt in public land, you
Speaker 1: there's there's probably deer there that you'd be really happy with,
Speaker 1: like generally, no matter where you're going to go. And
Speaker 1: I know people say, oh, yeah, come to my state
Speaker 1: and hunt the public land. I'm like, there's there's good
Speaker 1: deer in a lot of places. Now I'm not talking
Speaker 1: one seventies, but I'm talking deer that if you're on
Speaker 1: a five day public land hunt and it walks by,
Speaker 1: you're going to shoot it and be real happy. And
Speaker 1: so you kind I'm not expecting, yeah, I'm sorry. I'm
Speaker 1: not expecting to shoot Iowa quality deer when I go
Speaker 1: to western Nebraska or when I go to uh maybe Oklahoma.
Speaker 1: I'm not expecting that there's a sliding scale with everywhere
Speaker 1: I go. And I'll be honest, I haven't shot a
Speaker 1: lot of deer out of state yet. And so the
Speaker 1: deer that I did shoot in South Dakota, man, I
Speaker 1: look at it every day and I'm so jacked about
Speaker 1: that hunt. I relive it every day. And so it's
Speaker 1: less about quality of deer and and just keep coming
Speaker 1: back to the word experience. Man yep, well yeah, and
Speaker 1: I mean this is this is something I don't I
Speaker 1: don't know if people actually listen to me on it
Speaker 1: or not. But you know, like you talked about how
Speaker 1: you still want to go. You want to get an elk,
Speaker 1: you want to get a meal door, you want to
Speaker 1: get an antelope, and you know, I look at those
Speaker 1: opportunities the same way look at traveling for white tails.
Speaker 1: In most situations. I'm like, man, low standards are your friend.
Speaker 1: Like if you go if you go hunt, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: Oklahoma white tails and you you grew up in Michigan
Speaker 1: or you grew up in Ohio or whatever, that's a
Speaker 1: different world, a different thing, you know, I mean, judging
Speaker 1: those deers so different. There's there're a lot smaller, and
Speaker 1: especially in certain parts of it's just you're into it
Speaker 1: for a whole different experience. And if you bring your
Speaker 1: home standards to odd of state hunts, it's sort of
Speaker 1: a recipe for disaster most of the time. And this
Speaker 1: is true on white tails. This is really true. If
Speaker 1: you start to go hunt elk and meal deer and antelope,
Speaker 1: and if you're in you're pounding away on public land
Speaker 1: on easy to get tags. Listen, like it is it
Speaker 1: is not easy if you're a tree standing hunter to
Speaker 1: go out in spot and stock antelope. Trust me, Like,
Speaker 1: if you if you go and you're like, well, it's
Speaker 1: got to be seventy inches plus a good luck, Like
Speaker 1: you're gonna eat that tag? Like you just you just
Speaker 1: probably are, whether even if you're sitting in a blind
Speaker 1: on a water hole all day, which looks real easy
Speaker 1: on TV. It's it's just a different kind of deal.
Speaker 1: And you got to understand that you're you're getting into
Speaker 1: this for different reasons. Yeah, that's a fact. That's a fact,
Speaker 1: my friend. All Right, So let's let's run through this
Speaker 1: hypothetical here. All of your plans fall through and you're like,
Speaker 1: I guess I gotta go hunt Oklahoma public land. Where
Speaker 1: where do you start? Then? Wait, like it's like hunt
Speaker 1: timing wise? What do you factor in there? What do
Speaker 1: you start you know, doing e scouting wise? Like how
Speaker 1: do you how do you build the foundation of that hunt?
Speaker 1: All right? So the foundation of that hunt is is
Speaker 1: this first things. First, I'm looking at when the rifle
Speaker 1: season starts up in that state, and I think Oklahoma
Speaker 1: starts on like the tenth in November or something like that.
Speaker 1: And so that tells me I don't want to be
Speaker 1: in a I don't want to be in a bow
Speaker 1: hunting scenario. When a gun season's going around, I want
Speaker 1: to be as close to the rut as humanly possible,
Speaker 1: knowing that I have Iowa to hunt as well, and
Speaker 1: I want to be there for you know, the best
Speaker 1: time in Iowa. And so I also have to know
Speaker 1: that from a family standpoint, I can't just be gone
Speaker 1: for one month straight throughout the year, going from South
Speaker 1: Dakota to Nebraska to Iowa to Oklahoma. Right, So if
Speaker 1: I'm going to probably go in a pre timeframe, I'll
Speaker 1: probably stay as a late into October as possible. And
Speaker 1: and so that's my timeframe, okay. And so outside of that,
Speaker 1: then it just becomes e scouting on huntstand or whatever
Speaker 1: other like on x or whatever other app you use,
Speaker 1: Google Maps, Google Earth. I'm looking at everything, and I'm
Speaker 1: scouring everything. I get my leads just like other people do.
Speaker 1: I talk with buddies and I say, hey, man, you know,
Speaker 1: talk to me a little bit about what you've felt
Speaker 1: about this area, or I just gather information that way
Speaker 1: and that could potentially lead me into at least a
Speaker 1: starting point. And at that starting point, then I'm looking
Speaker 1: for access routes. Then I'm looking for edge, Then I'm
Speaker 1: looking for cover. Then I'm looking at satellite imagery, I'm
Speaker 1: looking at topo, I'm looking at water, I'm looking for
Speaker 1: potential food sources. All the things that I do here,
Speaker 1: but I'm just doing it on an app or computer there,
Speaker 1: and so that really is the foundation. And then that
Speaker 1: way I have a starting point and then from there,
Speaker 1: if that starting point sucks, then I start to get
Speaker 1: real mobile, and then I go figure out stuff on
Speaker 1: the fly. Well, I want to talk about that because
Speaker 1: and I'll use Oklahoma as an example again here it's
Speaker 1: just to just to further piss off your buddy on
Speaker 1: the network U when I when I hunted down there
Speaker 1: the first time I hunted on on their October one opener.
Speaker 1: So I was down there for six seven days camping
Speaker 1: on the opener. And my plan going into that, I go,
Speaker 1: I'm going to southwest Oklahoma on October one. It's going
Speaker 1: to be a million degrees. I'm gonna find every pond
Speaker 1: I can that's tucked as far back in as I can,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to build an entire plan around water.
Speaker 1: And then I drive fourteen hours out there and it
Speaker 1: rains for six days, miserable and immediately negates ninety nine
Speaker 1: percent of the East scouting I did because I got
Speaker 1: married to an idea and I got too cocky. And
Speaker 1: that happens a lot. And so when you when you
Speaker 1: think about this, like what you're talking about is like,
Speaker 1: I'm looking for this feature, that feature, these features, all
Speaker 1: of this stuff. What you're doing is saying, I'm building
Speaker 1: plan A through Z because I don't know what's coming
Speaker 1: for me when I get there, right. And so when
Speaker 1: you're when you're listening to this, think about that for
Speaker 1: your East coating, You're like, Oh, I'm gonna go during
Speaker 1: the rut to this state, so I'm only going to find,
Speaker 1: you know, the best most badass looking terrain traps and
Speaker 1: funnels and whatever out there. And then you get there
Speaker 1: and it's one of those ruts where it's eighty degrees
Speaker 1: in the day and you know, the NonStop chasing that
Speaker 1: you were counting on isn't happening. What's what's your fallback?
Speaker 1: Right right? Like? Or the other thing that I would
Speaker 1: say on this note is, you know, let's say, you know,
Speaker 1: you talked about how you want to plan your timing
Speaker 1: around being home for the best hunting during the rut
Speaker 1: in Iowa. Absolutely makes sense. Right now. What if I
Speaker 1: draw Iowa and I go, Man, I can't wait to
Speaker 1: go hunt that Iowa Rut. But I'm on public land
Speaker 1: in a place where there isn't very much public land.
Speaker 1: Now my plan might look a lot different than yours,
Speaker 1: because you you might be going into a situation where
Speaker 1: you're like, I'm not dealing with public land pressure, but
Speaker 1: I could be if I planned it around that. So
Speaker 1: I show up, not only is it me and every
Speaker 1: other nonresident there who wants that Iowa rut, but all
Speaker 1: the residents are like, hell, yeah, we're getting onto the
Speaker 1: woods now. So you have to think about that stuff
Speaker 1: when you're looking at this. It's not just like how
Speaker 1: can I how can I preserve my best hunting at
Speaker 1: home while still having this cool experience over the road,
Speaker 1: Like what are you going to deal with? And you mentioned,
Speaker 1: you know, the gun seasons or something like that, Like
Speaker 1: when you when you plan this stuff, man, you know
Speaker 1: there's youth seasons out there. There's there's early antlerless seasons
Speaker 1: that you know you don't you won't have them in
Speaker 1: your state the same way. And then you travel somewhere
Speaker 1: and it's like, okay, now you got to wear blaze orange,
Speaker 1: or now you can't shoot bucks for four days, or
Speaker 1: now you can't hunt state owned public land. All of
Speaker 1: that research. You got to do that stuff ahead of
Speaker 1: time so you don't get surprised when you get out there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: or there's antelope hunters or pheasant hunters or small game
Speaker 1: hunters or coyote hunters doing this exact same thing that
Speaker 1: you're trying to do, but they're they're doing it louder,
Speaker 1: and they're doing you know what I mean, like yep.
Speaker 1: I can just remember when I got bit by that dog.
Speaker 1: I had put all this time into this one particular
Speaker 1: piece scouting it, and I go, dude, I'm gonna get it.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get back there. It's gonna be money. And
Speaker 1: it was. It was good. But the first sit, I'm
Speaker 1: sitting there with a spotting scope waiting for all these
Speaker 1: deer to come off off private back down into the bedding,
Speaker 1: and that morning here comes this cocker spaniel or whatever.
Speaker 1: He was just jumping into the weeds and busting pheasants out,
Speaker 1: busting deer out left and right. And it took a
Speaker 1: day or two for that proper, you know, for that
Speaker 1: area to recover. And so That's one thing that you
Speaker 1: got to think about too. It's like, Okay, I'm traveling,
Speaker 1: is there any other seasons for any other game open
Speaker 1: as well, because that can have an impact as well.
Speaker 1: Big ten, that's a good point. And that's a special
Speaker 1: concerning if you travel to a state like South Dakota,
Speaker 1: where the pheasant opener is like a religious experience, like
Speaker 1: it's a it's a different level. And you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: or you can see this, you know, we we dealt
Speaker 1: with this in North Dakota a lot where the archery
Speaker 1: opener would coincide with the resident once in a lifetime
Speaker 1: elk hunt or or or some people could draw that tag.
Speaker 1: So what you ended up with was people who are
Speaker 1: only going to draw that tag once in their lifetime.
Speaker 1: And everybody's uncle and brother and cousin comes along to
Speaker 1: help them scout and glass, and they're pushing and it's
Speaker 1: a it's even though you're like, oh, it shouldn't be
Speaker 1: that busy because they're only selling this many tags to
Speaker 1: hunters like me. If you don't know what else is
Speaker 1: going on there, you can be in for a real surprise.
Speaker 1: And and I would say on top of that, one
Speaker 1: of the things you know, like when you're talking about
Speaker 1: you know you you're like, this is my spot, I'm
Speaker 1: watching it, or the deer here, this is going to happen,
Speaker 1: and then something like that happens where a thousand hunter
Speaker 1: comes through or whatever. If you don't have that backup
Speaker 1: built into your plan ahead of time, there's lost time
Speaker 1: right there. Like there's a mental aspect of it that sucks,
Speaker 1: and there's just a logistical aspect of like now what
Speaker 1: do I do? And I've told this on here a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of times, but I'll tell it again quick.
Speaker 1: The last time I went to Oklahoma, I put all
Speaker 1: my money on red Man. I was like, this spot
Speaker 1: I'm going to is several thousand acres. It's gonna be
Speaker 1: all I need. And I drove all the way down
Speaker 1: there with a buddy of mine and we set up
Speaker 1: camp and started looking for deer. And it was a
Speaker 1: ghost town. I mean, it was brutal, and I didn't
Speaker 1: have a backup, and so I'm sitting there in this
Speaker 1: kind of like isolated region going We're not this isn't
Speaker 1: gonna happen here, and We're halfway through our hunt, and
Speaker 1: so we just we started looking for new places to
Speaker 1: go and called an audible and drove four hours to
Speaker 1: a totally different area and we got lucky. We ended
Speaker 1: up killing some deer there and it ended up being
Speaker 1: pretty good. But that was lucky. You know, like you
Speaker 1: don't you don't want to get into a situation where
Speaker 1: you're like, this is this is it. I'm camping here,
Speaker 1: I'm hunting here. This is all I'm gonna do without
Speaker 1: at least considering where would you go if that place
Speaker 1: sucks for some reason. And there's one more trend I
Speaker 1: really want to mention here is a lot of people
Speaker 1: try to hit openers. So South Dakota has the nonresident
Speaker 1: opener or um. Certain states have the like the hunter
Speaker 1: the residents can hunt before that, but non residents can't
Speaker 1: hunt until a certain date on a couple of these states.
Speaker 1: And so what we do then is we go in
Speaker 1: there and I just wait for that mass. The first
Speaker 1: year I went, it was okay, but I was running
Speaker 1: into a lot of other hunters. You let that, you
Speaker 1: let some of those dates slide a week, or you
Speaker 1: go before a certain holiday or after a certain holiday,
Speaker 1: then it opens up because everybody what hunters are almost
Speaker 1: like animals. We trend. We tend to do the same
Speaker 1: thing over and over again. Humans do that as well,
Speaker 1: and so if you can find your niche outside of
Speaker 1: the trends that other hunters are using, I feel that
Speaker 1: just gives you a one up compared to everybody else
Speaker 1: big time. That's that's a really good point. I mean,
Speaker 1: we saw that with a couple of the you know,
Speaker 1: the Dakotas and a couple of western states in Kentucky
Speaker 1: when the velvet thing got really hot and everybody wanted
Speaker 1: their velvet buck. And you go hunt those states on
Speaker 1: the opener, you know, which is typically going to be
Speaker 1: like a September one deal and it's like overrun with people.
Speaker 1: But you go back three weeks later or four weeks later,
Speaker 1: and you can have the place to yourself. And that's
Speaker 1: that's something. You know, I mentioned that with Iowa and
Speaker 1: the planning down there, and you know, I'm looking at
Speaker 1: I'm gonna apply again down there now because I have
Speaker 1: enough points where I might be able to get into
Speaker 1: that unit I hunted the last time, and I'll probably
Speaker 1: go in mid October for the majority of my hunt
Speaker 1: because I'm hunting public land and I know the opener
Speaker 1: will have a bunch of people out just because it will,
Speaker 1: and I know the rut will have a bunch of
Speaker 1: people out. And if I want to catch deer and
Speaker 1: kind of work against the deer and not have to
Speaker 1: worry about tons of competition, there's going to be a
Speaker 1: window there in October where people just kind of they
Speaker 1: take their foot off the gas a little bit. And
Speaker 1: you see that. I see that in northern Wisconsin, where
Speaker 1: I hunt a lot too. My best hunts on public
Speaker 1: land there are always during the lull, just because people
Speaker 1: aren't out there. So you gotta I know, it sucks
Speaker 1: to plan a kind of an expensive hunt that you
Speaker 1: gotta take some PTO four and whatever and then be like, man,
Speaker 1: I don't really want to go hunt the second week October.
Speaker 1: But it's like, yeah, well, I mean you gotta, like
Speaker 1: you kind of got to make an educated guess what
Speaker 1: you're going to get into. Pressure wise. Yeah, And so
Speaker 1: I can I can say this for many and I
Speaker 1: know for archers or bow hunters, you're you're up against
Speaker 1: your state's gun season, right, and sometimes that comes in
Speaker 1: early November, and sometimes, luckily for Iowa, doesn't even happen
Speaker 1: until December. So but one thing that I've noticed is
Speaker 1: people will blow their load real easy, real fast, and
Speaker 1: then they'll leave. Okay, so November first hits in Iowa.
Speaker 1: The next five to seven days are crazy. Everybody. Everybody
Speaker 1: comes the first week, everybody, even the resident hunters. First week. Dude,
Speaker 1: if people are more patient, they let that, they let
Speaker 1: some of this slide. Let everybody else blow their load.
Speaker 1: Then you come in and and and I feel like
Speaker 1: you you'll have the woods would be empty on certain
Speaker 1: certain times. Yep. And that's that's a good point too.
Speaker 1: And I'm starting to I don't know, maybe this is
Speaker 1: just because I've spent so much time on public land,
Speaker 1: but I'm starting to think the second and third week
Speaker 1: in November generally are maybe a better time to kill
Speaker 1: a big one than that first week. Absolutely, and I'll
Speaker 1: say this trail camera data for me proves that. Now.
Speaker 1: I'm also in this category where I want to hop
Speaker 1: in and I want to I want to strike while
Speaker 1: the iron is hot on a local, local deer. And
Speaker 1: this is this is when I have tons of information available.
Speaker 1: But one thing that I've noticed in some of these
Speaker 1: these closer to home whitetail states that I've hunted is
Speaker 1: once you get past peak breeding, then things open up,
Speaker 1: and then shell camera camera data indicates tons of deer
Speaker 1: that I've never seen before cruising through. And that is
Speaker 1: when I have my trail camera pictures of my biggest bucks. Yep, yeah,
Speaker 1: I've I've noticed that up in Wisconsin where I hunt too.
Speaker 1: If I leave a camera up one of my properties,
Speaker 1: it's wild. It's not like a ton of consistent movement,
Speaker 1: but the deer that show up are real interesting to me, right,
Speaker 1: And it's you know, it's not like it's not even
Speaker 1: up there. It's not even one a day for sure,
Speaker 1: but in those that week or two, it'll be a
Speaker 1: couple where you're just like, man, I wish I had
Speaker 1: been there, like enough to get you to go spend
Speaker 1: all day sits there on the off chance that today
Speaker 1: is the day, right right? Absolutely? Yeah, all right? What else? Uh?
Speaker 1: You you sleep in your truck a lot when you
Speaker 1: go on these trips. Why Number one? Uh? Money? Right?
Speaker 1: I mean a hotel room even even off season in
Speaker 1: some of these states are they're they're pretty cheap. But
Speaker 1: my truck is zero dollars a night, and so I
Speaker 1: have just found a real comfortable air mattress I've found
Speaker 1: a comfortable you know, pads and and I can get
Speaker 1: really comfortable in the back of my truck. I got
Speaker 1: a really good sleeping bag this year. I upgraded my
Speaker 1: sleeping bag and it was crazy expensive, but still it's
Speaker 1: cheaper than sleeping in a hotel room. You know how
Speaker 1: expensive that my I bought a Western mountaineering bag made
Speaker 1: in America. I think it was six eighty five, so
Speaker 1: real expensive for a sleeping bag. Yeah, but that replaced
Speaker 1: the caught that that prevented me from having to get
Speaker 1: a hotel room. Very comfortable in the back of my bed,
Speaker 1: and I'm spending less on gas money because I'm sleeping
Speaker 1: on the road or on some of these states, you
Speaker 1: can park on the pub look and you can stay
Speaker 1: there overnight, and so that's what I'm doing. And it
Speaker 1: just it's it's less travel. I get more sleep because
Speaker 1: I'm not driving too and from a hotel room and
Speaker 1: I pop up all my stuff's ready, get and go
Speaker 1: and then come back, eats upp or go to bed,
Speaker 1: and so I'm getting a ton of I'm getting more sleep,
Speaker 1: I'm spending less energy, I'm spending less on gas, I'm
Speaker 1: spending less on hotel rooms and I pack a cooler
Speaker 1: full of all my food and I'm good to go.
Speaker 1: And I mean I can get out there for seven
Speaker 1: days if I wanted to. Yeah, there's a good way
Speaker 1: to look at that or these trips is the more
Speaker 1: money you can spend before you go, the more you'll
Speaker 1: save when you do go, because if you plan your
Speaker 1: food out and you know, the lodging is a huge
Speaker 1: one and staying in a hotel. I'm so biased against
Speaker 1: that for bow hunts or big game hunts. I just
Speaker 1: not only because it is expensive, but it's just a
Speaker 1: pain in the ass, like getting you know, drive into
Speaker 1: wherever you're gonna hunt, like you're talking about, as opposed
Speaker 1: to being set up there. There's a lot of reasons
Speaker 1: that camping is better. And on top of that, a
Speaker 1: lot of the places you want a deer hunt, there's
Speaker 1: not going to be a place to stay all that close,
Speaker 1: you know, and so that might influence you know, where
Speaker 1: you go and just getting you know, so I know
Speaker 1: people are going to listen to that and go, it's
Speaker 1: crazy that you spent that much money on a sleeping bag,
Speaker 1: and it's like, yeah, that's a lot of money, but
Speaker 1: that's a buy once cry want situation that you'll use
Speaker 1: out west and you'll use it for years, and or
Speaker 1: you could take six hundred and eighty five bucks or
Speaker 1: whatever it is and buy like I'm I'm using a
Speaker 1: wall tent. It's kind of like a I guess I
Speaker 1: don't know how many people it's supposed to hold, but
Speaker 1: it's a white duck outdoors wall tent. And that thing
Speaker 1: was I think it was seven hundred bucks. So like
Speaker 1: similar in price to that sleeping bag. But I can
Speaker 1: set it up by myself, have an entire cook station,
Speaker 1: have an awesome place to sleep, dry out my clothes, everything,
Speaker 1: and it's built like a freaking tank, like it's not
Speaker 1: it's gonna last me years. And so you think about
Speaker 1: that and go, yeah, okay, Well, seven hundred bucks to
Speaker 1: drop on a piece of camping equipment is a lot. Man.
Speaker 1: You can spend seven hundred dollars at hotels real fast
Speaker 1: and then drive in to the burger joint or wherever
Speaker 1: to get your food. All of that stuff adds up
Speaker 1: so much compared to eating some sandwiches or whatever back
Speaker 1: at camp. And so a lot of times when people say,
Speaker 1: you know, like I could never afford to do this
Speaker 1: like I don't know, maybe right, maybe, like everybody's situation
Speaker 1: is different, but there are ways where you can do
Speaker 1: some of this stuff. And you don't need a seven
Speaker 1: hundred dollars sleeping bag, but having good camping gear is
Speaker 1: real freaking nice for this stuff. And so there's certain
Speaker 1: pieces that really seem to matter and certain some that
Speaker 1: just don't. But overall, you know, like you're kind of
Speaker 1: making an investment into a whole bunch of good experiences
Speaker 1: and you're saving money other ways, and so it's it's
Speaker 1: worth it to plan that stuff out and understand what
Speaker 1: you're gonna ge into. Yeah, and don't get me wrong,
Speaker 1: even this year. So to piggyback off what you just
Speaker 1: said from a cost standpoint, that's that six hundred and
Speaker 1: eighty five dollars sleeping bag allowed me to save I
Speaker 1: want to say, a thousand to a fifteen hundred dollars
Speaker 1: over Nebraska and South Dakota on hotel rooms. And when
Speaker 1: I was in South Dakota, I only stayed in a
Speaker 1: hotel room one night because the temperature dropped to like
Speaker 1: five And I'm just like, I'm closer to a hope.
Speaker 1: I'll put in the thirty minutes drive in the morning,
Speaker 1: just so I can shower, just so I'm not like
Speaker 1: fridgid cold, and I just refreshed. And that was the
Speaker 1: last that last day of a hunt on my way
Speaker 1: back to Iowa. I also like to use hotels as backups.
Speaker 1: We got caught in a rainstorm in Nebraska to two
Speaker 1: years ago, I think it was two years ago, and
Speaker 1: it came out of nowhere. We weren't prepared. We got drenched.
Speaker 1: So we went to a hotel and we we took
Speaker 1: a shower, we dried all of our clothes out, and
Speaker 1: and it was it was good to have that as
Speaker 1: a backup, because from a convenient standpoint, trying to air
Speaker 1: dry wet clothes sucks if you don't have a dryer,
Speaker 1: right and so, But on top of that, man, it's
Speaker 1: one of those things like I just love the silence.
Speaker 1: I love looking up at the stars. I love everything
Speaker 1: about that. That minimalistic approach to an not a state
Speaker 1: hunt me too. And I honestly think, I mean, this
Speaker 1: might sound crazy, but I honestly feel like I sleep
Speaker 1: better and have a better hunt when i'm you know,
Speaker 1: because you get back and whatever time it's dark, you know.
Speaker 1: Six thirty seven o'clock, you make some food, and then
Speaker 1: it's like there's nothing to do. It's not like you're
Speaker 1: in a hotel watching TV and BS and with your
Speaker 1: buddies or whatever. It's like, well, I might as well
Speaker 1: go to bed because I got to get up at
Speaker 1: you know, four thirty two more morning or whatever. And
Speaker 1: I feel like you get into it's a little bit
Speaker 1: easier to just like get into the rhythm of the
Speaker 1: hunt when you're already there and you're in camp and
Speaker 1: your packs next to you, and you get it ready
Speaker 1: that night and you wake up in the morning and
Speaker 1: make your coffee and oatmeal whatever, and you go and
Speaker 1: it's just like fewer things to go wrong, fewer things
Speaker 1: to distract you. Just it's it's a really good move.
Speaker 1: And I know people. I know people are interested in
Speaker 1: camping on these hunts, and it just takes a lot
Speaker 1: of planning. Like I just say that, like you gotta
Speaker 1: know where you can camp, Like is there a campground
Speaker 1: close by or I on that public that you can
Speaker 1: just dump a tent down and go. Understand that before
Speaker 1: you go. Again, the work ahead of time pays off
Speaker 1: once you get out there, because then it's just like,
Speaker 1: I know what's legal, I know what to do, I
Speaker 1: know where I'm going, and if this doesn't work out,
Speaker 1: I know I can pull up my camp quick and
Speaker 1: go forty miles down the road and restart the process.
Speaker 1: And the more the more that you just handle those
Speaker 1: details ahead of time, the better these trips go. Yep. Absolutely, Man,
Speaker 1: It's actually making me really want to go gamp and
Speaker 1: hunt right now. And I I kind of have been
Speaker 1: not like super stoked for that over the last few
Speaker 1: years because I did it so much for so long.
Speaker 1: But when you have your system down and you've got
Speaker 1: some good plans in place to go hunt here or there,
Speaker 1: it gets pretty exciting. And I mean, I think we
Speaker 1: should maybe wrap up on this. That's one of the
Speaker 1: things like we don't talk about. I just uh, you know.
Speaker 1: Back in the end of January, two buddies and I
Speaker 1: went down to Florida for four days and fished. We've
Speaker 1: never done never done a fish and trip like that.
Speaker 1: You know, we we you know, drive here and fish whatever,
Speaker 1: but never like we're going to a destination. We're gonna
Speaker 1: fish saltwater. And one of the things that was so
Speaker 1: fun about it was just planning it and like talking
Speaker 1: about what what are we gonna buy for lures? What
Speaker 1: are we gonna bring there? You bring a cast net?
Speaker 1: What are we doing? And that aspect of a trip.
Speaker 1: It's like way underrated. It's just fun to have something
Speaker 1: to look forward to. And that's that's why the timing
Speaker 1: of this podcast is good, because when you're stuck in
Speaker 1: March and it sucks and we're still getting snowstorms and
Speaker 1: all this bs, it's fun to start thinking like, man,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make this hunt happen in six months or
Speaker 1: seven months whatever, and start it now. It gives you
Speaker 1: something to do toward the process, which is pretty fulfilling
Speaker 1: and can help you kill deer, you know, half a
Speaker 1: year away. Yeah, I agree, Tony. I'm looking forward to
Speaker 1: it as well. What are we going to go on
Speaker 1: a hunt together? Well, maybe I'll go to Oklahoma with you.
Speaker 1: You need somebody to go along, let's do it. I
Speaker 1: don't care. I mean, I'm literally right on the way
Speaker 1: for you to come down, right are you? You're southwest
Speaker 1: Minnesota though? Right? No? No, no, I'm up north of
Speaker 1: the City's okay anyway, you just take the same highway.
Speaker 1: We'll meet in Demoine and then and then we'll just go. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I can get to Demin in about three hours, three
Speaker 1: and a half hours, and I'm here pretty familiar with
Speaker 1: that route of getting down there. Um yeah, man, that
Speaker 1: would be a blast. Dan, This is this is always
Speaker 1: so much fun to talk to you. Let everybody who's
Speaker 1: listening know where they can find your podcast and the
Speaker 1: seventeen thousand other podcasts that you're involved in. My name
Speaker 1: is Dan Johnson. I was born in nineteen eighty uh No,
Speaker 1: nine finger Chronicles, man, just look it up, nine finger
Speaker 1: Chronicles podcast on the Sportsman's Empire podcast network and we have,
Speaker 1: like like Tony said, man, my podcast, The Hunting Gear
Speaker 1: podcast I also host is one of twenty three different
Speaker 1: RSS feeds on the Sportsman's Empire podcast network, all outdoor related,
Speaker 1: all hunting related, fishing, trapping. You know, you, if you're
Speaker 1: an outdoorsman, you're gonna love the content that we put out.
Speaker 1: Man ton of podcasts there under the network. And we
Speaker 1: should say this, if you don't mind listening to me
Speaker 1: talk and you like listening to Dan talk, we do
Speaker 1: podcasts together fairly often over there. And the wonderful thing
Speaker 1: about Dan's podcast is I can say a lot of
Speaker 1: other things on there that I can't say here because
Speaker 1: I don't want to get fired. So if you if
Speaker 1: you want to hear a little bit more of an
Speaker 1: uncensored version of these kind of podcasts along with mostly
Speaker 1: zero talk about actual deer hunting and talk about Nintendo
Speaker 1: and nineties bands and all kinds of stuff, Dan's podcast
Speaker 1: is the way to go. Dan, thanks again, man, It's
Speaker 1: always a pleasure, buddy. Appreciate it, Tony. That's it for
Speaker 1: this week, folks. Be sure to tune in next week
Speaker 1: for some more whitetail goodness. This has been the Wired
Speaker 1: to Hunt podcast, and I'm your guest host, Tony Peterson.
Speaker 1: As I always, thank you so much for listening. And
Speaker 1: if you're looking for more white tail content, be sure
Speaker 1: to check out the mediator dot com slash wired to
Speaker 1: see a pile of new articles each week by Mark
Speaker 1: my self and a whole slew of white tail addicts,
Speaker 1: or head on over to the wire da Hunt YouTube
Speaker 1: channel to view the weekly content we put up