WEBVTT - Ep. 011 0:00:00.560 --> 0:00:04.200 This is the Meat Eater podcast. We're recording just outside 0:00:04.200 --> 0:00:09.440 of Kasan over Wisconsin. UM, in the Driftless Area of Wisconsin. 0:00:09.560 --> 0:00:12.800 Moments ago, I was asking my friend here, who's who's 0:00:12.880 --> 0:00:15.240 joining us today along with the honest but tell us 0:00:16.200 --> 0:00:19.159 that was a confusing sentence. I'm joined right now by 0:00:19.239 --> 0:00:21.720 j Honest to tell us and Doug Dern. And moments 0:00:21.720 --> 0:00:24.240 ago I was asking Doug Dern if he had heard 0:00:24.320 --> 0:00:28.040 the term driftless area of Wisconsin as a child or 0:00:28.080 --> 0:00:31.280 if it was just some kind of new marketing scam. 0:00:31.320 --> 0:00:34.360 And the answer is yes, but it really has become 0:00:34.440 --> 0:00:40.360 more prevalent in the last you know, ten to fifteen years. Yeah. 0:00:40.440 --> 0:00:44.120 So the word that term comes from is, you know, 0:00:44.200 --> 0:00:47.839 during the Ice Ages, glaciers leveled the Midwest. That's why 0:00:47.840 --> 0:00:51.880 it looks the way it does, flat and homogeneous. Um. 0:00:51.880 --> 0:00:55.120 But the glaciers missed this spot. They're like spread apart 0:00:55.160 --> 0:01:00.160 and split apart. They saw Doug standing there in all 0:01:00.320 --> 0:01:03.720 his hugeness, and the glaciers just didn't want to tangle 0:01:03.760 --> 0:01:06.080 with him and went around the driftless area and left it. 0:01:06.520 --> 0:01:12.680 Much topography like we're pissing distance from brick trout stream, 0:01:12.959 --> 0:01:18.280 beautiful brick trout Stream. We're a thousand yards if from 0:01:18.319 --> 0:01:20.400 where we just killed a turkey this morning. Oh, I 0:01:20.400 --> 0:01:22.640 would say we're five yards from there from where we 0:01:22.720 --> 0:01:25.960 killed a turkey this mor We're way closer where Doug 0:01:26.040 --> 0:01:31.400 is downed a lot of nice bucks. Well yeah, in fact, 0:01:31.440 --> 0:01:34.280 I one eye down that's hanging on the wall over there, 0:01:34.400 --> 0:01:39.240 which probably doesn't work on a podcast, but uh, it 0:01:39.319 --> 0:01:41.760 actually died right down here by the barn. I know 0:01:41.840 --> 0:01:45.039 that story. So yeah, we're we're in Doug. Like Doug 0:01:45.120 --> 0:01:48.960 Derren's family for several generations has had this farm here, 0:01:49.520 --> 0:01:55.040 um going way back hundred fifty years. In this final 0:01:55.320 --> 0:01:57.760 that's what we're recording, this old farmhouse. It's just what 0:01:57.840 --> 0:01:59.720 they called the buck check. Knox is full of giant 0:01:59.760 --> 0:02:05.400 bull ucks. Um, we're gonna talk a bunch about that. Oh. 0:02:05.520 --> 0:02:07.120 I was gonna tell you about the Driftless Area though. 0:02:07.560 --> 0:02:13.320 I was up and up on Lake Superior, Ashland, Wisconsin, 0:02:14.560 --> 0:02:16.160 and the guy up there has got a sugar shack. 0:02:17.320 --> 0:02:19.960 This guy named Bill Hart, hell of a nice guy. 0:02:20.480 --> 0:02:24.560 He's got a sugar shack up there, and he in 0:02:24.639 --> 0:02:29.799 response to the Driftless Area and all of its coolness, 0:02:31.040 --> 0:02:34.120 he has on his bottles of maple syrup. He writes 0:02:34.160 --> 0:02:39.440 from the famed drifted area of Well, that's a great thing. 0:02:39.440 --> 0:02:42.040 When you get getting something in some kind of label 0:02:42.160 --> 0:02:44.520 or marketing thing going, you can try to take you down. 0:02:45.240 --> 0:02:46.919 Trying to take you down. But yeah, this part of 0:02:46.960 --> 0:02:49.000 Wisconsin doesn't look like the normal Middle I mean there's 0:02:49.000 --> 0:02:51.519 a ton of topography around here, in rock out croppings. 0:02:52.040 --> 0:02:53.919 This used to be like Indians used to hide out 0:02:53.960 --> 0:02:57.200 here when they're trying to hide from the army. That's 0:02:57.200 --> 0:03:01.079 a great area. And in the honest else the Latvian 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:05.960 lover and hunter. You guys got a Latvian camp not 0:03:06.080 --> 0:03:10.079 far from here, talk about that. Why do the Latvians 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:14.440 like this place? As far as I know, they settled 0:03:14.440 --> 0:03:17.280 here when they all came over during the Second Well, 0:03:17.400 --> 0:03:19.799 some of them came over before the Second World War, 0:03:19.919 --> 0:03:22.799 but most of them emigrated during the Second World War. 0:03:22.880 --> 0:03:26.880 But it was very similar to Latvia's topography and landscape, 0:03:27.200 --> 0:03:30.160 so it felt like home. Yeah, there's only about three 0:03:30.160 --> 0:03:35.200 million Latvians alive today, something like that. One million in Latvia, 0:03:35.680 --> 0:03:37.920 two million in the US. Is that right, I think 0:03:38.000 --> 0:03:42.880 too in Latvia and then million worldwide. So explain that 0:03:42.880 --> 0:03:44.680 place you hunt on if you don't need to give 0:03:44.720 --> 0:03:49.360 like the GPS coordinates. But no, it's very similar topography 0:03:49.400 --> 0:03:52.200 to hear. You know, just beautiful oak ridges, you know 0:03:52.320 --> 0:03:55.120 oak flats. You know a lot of little bowls that 0:03:55.280 --> 0:03:57.440 just kind of, you know, peel off the main ridge. 0:03:57.960 --> 0:04:00.880 And uh, there's no agg. A lot of the neighbors 0:04:00.880 --> 0:04:03.880 have agg around us, but the country that we hunt, 0:04:03.880 --> 0:04:06.440 it's all just basically big oak forest. Yeah. It's a 0:04:06.440 --> 0:04:09.240 bunch of Latvian mugs who all bought property by each 0:04:09.280 --> 0:04:11.760 other to be by each other. And there's a Latin 0:04:12.160 --> 0:04:15.680 all owned once by maybe like one main Latvian guy, 0:04:16.320 --> 0:04:19.279 and over the years it got divided up, but it 0:04:19.360 --> 0:04:22.400 stayed in the Latvian communey and there's a Latvian pagan 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:26.080 church camp Yep. It's spent a lot of time they're 0:04:26.240 --> 0:04:30.160 growing up. Is there is there a lot of Is 0:04:30.160 --> 0:04:32.640 there a lot of instruction involved with turning someone into 0:04:32.680 --> 0:04:37.240 a pagan? No, not much at all, really, you just 0:04:37.320 --> 0:04:40.560 kind of go with what seems very natural. They teach 0:04:40.600 --> 0:04:46.320 you a lot about nature, yes, Like, um, what's the 0:04:46.320 --> 0:04:47.839 word I'm looking for? I think we were talking about 0:04:47.839 --> 0:04:50.159 this word the other day. Yeah, it's definitely do you 0:04:50.160 --> 0:04:52.680 find God in nature? It's like, what's that? What was 0:04:52.720 --> 0:04:56.600 the word for it? Not like polytheism, multi goods, there's 0:04:56.640 --> 0:04:59.640 like a word for finding God in the land. Yeah, 0:04:59.680 --> 0:05:03.560 so there's evidence. There's like the wind mother, and there's 0:05:03.640 --> 0:05:09.039 you know, the um uh, like the god that takes 0:05:09.080 --> 0:05:11.400 care of farm animals, and then there's like the God 0:05:11.480 --> 0:05:14.960 that watches over wild animals and the like. There's just 0:05:15.000 --> 0:05:17.280 like kind of you know, God's kind of do their 0:05:17.320 --> 0:05:19.960 own little thing all about you in life. You know, 0:05:20.400 --> 0:05:22.240 I think animism might be the word I'm looking for. 0:05:22.279 --> 0:05:24.360 I can't believe Dug the fact checker during is a 0:05:24.520 --> 0:05:30.880 fact checking that. So, yeah, Yanni hunts turkeys here totally coincidentally, 0:05:31.080 --> 0:05:33.640 we came out the way Wisconsin runs are turkey seasons 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:35.600 is and some dudes were complaining about this last night. 0:05:35.640 --> 0:05:38.600 I gave a talk at the university last night, and afterwards, 0:05:38.800 --> 0:05:40.560 instead of waiting in line to meet me and shake 0:05:40.680 --> 0:05:44.680 my hand, Janice went to a bar um and got 0:05:44.680 --> 0:05:46.360 to yapp with some guys in the bar and never 0:05:46.440 --> 0:05:50.440 complaining about the Wisconsin runs their turkey seasons. But Wisconsin 0:05:50.520 --> 0:05:55.720 Divide has a not doesn't have a long Turkey season, 0:05:56.600 --> 0:06:00.599 but has many short Turkey seasons that make up a 0:06:00.680 --> 0:06:03.040 long stretch of time. Yeah, I think you guys got 0:06:03.040 --> 0:06:06.880 like a B, C, D F and G season. I 0:06:06.880 --> 0:06:09.600 think there's an E in there also and a youth C. 0:06:12.480 --> 0:06:14.760 I don't know you said six. I counted to six, 0:06:15.520 --> 0:06:19.240 but I thought, but you didn't say. Oh, yeah, you 0:06:19.360 --> 0:06:23.760 just want to think number seven. It does go F 0:06:23.880 --> 0:06:30.320 to G the alphabet you went, you skip d um 0:06:30.880 --> 0:06:33.920 minor issue. Yeah, I'm not. I'm confident in my ability 0:06:33.960 --> 0:06:39.280 to say the alphabet. So when you put in when 0:06:39.320 --> 0:06:42.600 you apply to hunt turkeys Wisconsin, you gotta pick a zone. 0:06:43.040 --> 0:06:45.600 What's Tommy zones at State? But I think there's only 0:06:45.680 --> 0:06:47.040 three or four Now, I'd have to look at the 0:06:47.080 --> 0:06:50.159 man Zone one. Yeah, we're zone one and that's pretty 0:06:50.240 --> 0:06:54.320 much the whole southwest corner. Um, I don't remember. And 0:06:54.360 --> 0:06:56.560 if you're a nonresident and you don't have any bonus 0:06:56.600 --> 0:06:59.920 points saved up, and you put in for zone one 0:07:00.000 --> 0:07:02.000 in season A, you will not draw the tag as 0:07:02.000 --> 0:07:04.760 I now understand. Like I didn't draw it. You might 0:07:04.800 --> 0:07:07.880 have a chance to draw it. Yeah, but I didn't 0:07:07.880 --> 0:07:10.600 get it. That's to get the first crack. But you 0:07:10.640 --> 0:07:14.120 don't just get the first crack, because there's a youth 0:07:14.240 --> 0:07:18.600 season that's get the first crack. But that's almost like 0:07:18.680 --> 0:07:21.800 too early of the first crack. They're not like hot 0:07:23.600 --> 0:07:28.400 Well yeah, I guess, but um ah, I know the 0:07:28.720 --> 0:07:30.920 people have pretty good success in it. And certainly the 0:07:31.080 --> 0:07:34.120 birds have been active the last two or three weeks. 0:07:34.600 --> 0:07:36.360 There's not a leaf on the trees, right, I mean, 0:07:36.600 --> 0:07:39.840 there's like buds. They'll be probably the two weeks it 0:07:39.880 --> 0:07:43.040 will look leafed out. Oh no, no, no, we're two 0:07:43.080 --> 0:07:46.000 weeks probably from well some of them will be like 0:07:46.080 --> 0:07:48.880 the soft woods, the willows and red maples. Will you 0:07:49.080 --> 0:07:51.280 be getting there, But you know, we're still waiting for 0:07:51.360 --> 0:07:54.480 that most here size that you found the when the 0:07:54.560 --> 0:07:56.720 morals will be up. So it's a couple of weeks off. 0:07:56.800 --> 0:07:58.800 Yet we went out this morning, just walked out of 0:07:58.880 --> 0:08:02.640 Doug's farmhouse up the main valley here um to the 0:08:02.760 --> 0:08:06.240 end of the field. Heard one freaking gobbler And that 0:08:06.400 --> 0:08:08.200 was a long ways off. And I wasn't even sure 0:08:08.240 --> 0:08:09.880 it was a gobbler when I first when I first 0:08:09.920 --> 0:08:12.080 heard so far away, but I mean it certainly was. 0:08:12.200 --> 0:08:16.120 But he didn't do anything by fly down time. He 0:08:16.200 --> 0:08:23.040 had shut up, and we hunted our took uses off. Yeah, 0:08:23.560 --> 0:08:25.840 hunter our asses. I can't say the hunter asks off. 0:08:26.120 --> 0:08:28.880 We listened around a fair bit and eventually called in 0:08:28.960 --> 0:08:32.360 two towns. It didn't make a peep. We got one 0:08:32.520 --> 0:08:34.560 half gobble out of one after we were staring at 0:08:34.600 --> 0:08:38.040 for twenty minutes. Yeah. These I was sitting there trying 0:08:38.040 --> 0:08:39.839 to get comfortable and taking nap. It was like getting 0:08:39.880 --> 0:08:42.079 that time of day nine in the morning, and I 0:08:42.160 --> 0:08:44.400 was like, couldn't get my head quite how I wanted it, 0:08:44.679 --> 0:08:48.199 you know, to sleep. And also I noticed like the 0:08:48.360 --> 0:08:51.400 top of a tail fan maybe seventy yards eighty yards 0:08:51.440 --> 0:08:55.160 away and there's two gobblers out there strutting that just 0:08:55.280 --> 0:08:59.080 never made a sound. You know. We had a decoy 0:08:59.160 --> 0:09:01.840 out and we had to said it a little crossroad 0:09:02.520 --> 0:09:06.320 what you guys called the big woods, right, Um has 0:09:06.360 --> 0:09:09.040 said a little crossroad. And those times come in saw 0:09:09.120 --> 0:09:11.559 the head must of it just set to Stratton and 0:09:11.600 --> 0:09:13.760 then we kind of toyo Raulphi for long time. Adventually 0:09:13.760 --> 0:09:16.360 they came in. It was a great They were convinced. Man, 0:09:16.800 --> 0:09:19.360 they were he was ready to make love today there. Yeah, 0:09:19.440 --> 0:09:21.000 he was ready to make love to the decoy. Him 0:09:21.080 --> 0:09:24.800 and his body. That was just the great twenty minutes 0:09:24.920 --> 0:09:29.600 or half an hour of observing turkeys and watching them 0:09:29.720 --> 0:09:31.600 do what they want to do. And I kept thinking, 0:09:31.720 --> 0:09:35.439 can they see that decoy? And from where we were, 0:09:35.559 --> 0:09:37.719 we thought, well, maybe they couldn't see the decoy. So 0:09:37.960 --> 0:09:41.320 after we killed the one, UM, I walked up where 0:09:42.200 --> 0:09:44.560 they had been while they could clearly see the decoy, 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:49.760 and they just they just they just waited. They were 0:09:49.840 --> 0:09:53.240 waiting for her to come and and um, giving full 0:09:53.320 --> 0:09:56.240 credit to Steve Ronella and the calling job, he was 0:09:56.480 --> 0:10:00.400 so subtle and so quiet. That's how I talked a lady, 0:10:01.040 --> 0:10:04.160 even though I was talking about smooth like butter and uh. 0:10:05.840 --> 0:10:08.920 And then he stopped because they wouldn't. They didn't move 0:10:09.000 --> 0:10:11.400 for twenty minutes. They just were in full struck because 0:10:11.400 --> 0:10:17.120 I overcalled. My specialty is getting turkeys attention. And then 0:10:17.200 --> 0:10:19.480 once they once I got it, I feel like I'm 0:10:19.520 --> 0:10:24.280 like the puppeteer man, it's so hard to shut up. Well, 0:10:24.360 --> 0:10:26.800 if they had been gobbling, it would have been impossible 0:10:26.840 --> 0:10:29.600 to shut up. He's like this, I can make him goblin. 0:10:30.800 --> 0:10:35.040 And it was just one short It didn't even wasn't 0:10:35.040 --> 0:10:38.160 even a full gobble no, and then they and then 0:10:38.200 --> 0:10:40.439 you shout. If you around the woods listening, you'd heard 0:10:40.520 --> 0:10:42.640 that and been like, I don't know what was that. Yeah, 0:10:42.880 --> 0:10:44.679 it was just like a half ask gobble, but there 0:10:44.679 --> 0:10:48.640 were mature birds, you know. Give give a recap on 0:10:48.760 --> 0:10:51.079 your morning, man. I played hard to get on our 0:10:51.320 --> 0:10:53.840 second set up this morning and it did not work. 0:10:54.000 --> 0:10:57.000 It did not pan out. I was very confident because 0:10:57.200 --> 0:10:59.040 hard to get worked for me about four days ago 0:10:59.080 --> 0:11:04.280 in California, and he kind of cruised on the opposite 0:11:04.320 --> 0:11:05.719 side of the ridge that we were set up on. 0:11:06.040 --> 0:11:08.120 I heard him gobble four or five times as he 0:11:08.160 --> 0:11:12.319 went by. Well, we never heard we. I would have 0:11:12.360 --> 0:11:14.679 thought we could hear your birds, but never heard that 0:11:14.760 --> 0:11:16.840 any of that. Yeah, there's a little bit of wind. 0:11:17.200 --> 0:11:19.160 I think it's actually blowing from you guys to us, 0:11:19.200 --> 0:11:22.120 so that would oh, it was quiet. If there would 0:11:22.120 --> 0:11:24.120 have been birds goblin, we would have heard him. Well 0:11:24.240 --> 0:11:29.600 that's not true because they go within half a mile 0:11:29.679 --> 0:11:33.120 of us. But anyways, he gobbles. I've been calling every 0:11:33.200 --> 0:11:35.559 ten or fifteen minutes, just you know, one little set 0:11:35.600 --> 0:11:38.360 of helps and I can hear him gobbile by us 0:11:38.520 --> 0:11:40.800 and kind of goes away, and I'm thinking, man, we're 0:11:40.840 --> 0:11:42.800 gonna we'll give him one more call. If we can't 0:11:42.800 --> 0:11:44.599 turn him, we got to go chase him. And the 0:11:44.720 --> 0:11:46.880 next time he gobbles, he's like, come up on top 0:11:46.920 --> 0:11:48.880 of the ridge, and then he gobbles again. He's a 0:11:48.880 --> 0:11:51.040 little bit closer. You're probably thinking you're gonna kill the bird. 0:11:51.160 --> 0:11:52.800 Oh yeah. At that point, I'm like, I'm gonna give 0:11:53.000 --> 0:11:55.559 one more soft little call, and I'm gonna set the 0:11:55.600 --> 0:11:57.679 call down. And the next thing is gonna happen is 0:11:57.920 --> 0:12:00.240 you know, Tie is gonna pull the trigger and set 0:12:00.320 --> 0:12:03.120 that call down. And thirty minutes later, it was as 0:12:03.240 --> 0:12:05.400 quiet as it had been at that moment, And so 0:12:05.640 --> 0:12:07.200 it didn't work, you know, And I don't know if 0:12:07.240 --> 0:12:09.000 I if I had called more, had I pulled him 0:12:09.040 --> 0:12:11.440 in an hour later? I think we end up spooking 0:12:11.480 --> 0:12:14.360 that bird with either another gobbler or with a hand, 0:12:14.400 --> 0:12:16.240 maybe had two hands. I don't know. We spooked three 0:12:16.280 --> 0:12:18.719 birds not far from where we last heard. Did you 0:12:18.840 --> 0:12:21.920 see the bird? Not when we're not when I was 0:12:21.960 --> 0:12:24.040 working him. I saw him an hour later when we 0:12:24.520 --> 0:12:27.920 but when you quit calling, you didn't see. But when 0:12:27.960 --> 0:12:29.960 he gobbled, I was like, he is at a hundred 0:12:30.080 --> 0:12:33.079 or less and he's closing the dish alone. I'm just 0:12:33.120 --> 0:12:35.640 gonna set the call down. It's nice when a gobbler 0:12:35.760 --> 0:12:41.600 has the courtesy to gobble a lot when he loses interest. 0:12:42.200 --> 0:12:44.160 But let you know, because then you can gauge like 0:12:44.880 --> 0:12:46.400 this is going the other way, and then you know, 0:12:46.559 --> 0:12:49.959 just to like no holds barred, like any you know, 0:12:50.040 --> 0:12:52.480 it's like, what's the lose now, I'll just make insane noise, 0:12:53.160 --> 0:12:55.360 you know, I'll be like I'll do my hand dying noise, 0:12:55.440 --> 0:12:58.679 you know, like anything, because but when they just shut up, 0:12:58.960 --> 0:13:02.199 you're thinking, he shut up. He's coming to you like, 0:13:02.280 --> 0:13:04.360 you know, here fifty misses, like it's gotta because he's 0:13:04.400 --> 0:13:07.880 walking over here, you know. But then like you know, 0:13:08.360 --> 0:13:10.480 when nothing happens, you stand up and he's just gone. 0:13:11.040 --> 0:13:12.680 Every thing that happens turkey hut. We're talking with us 0:13:12.679 --> 0:13:16.160 the other day. Is we used to hold out west 0:13:16.200 --> 0:13:18.360 You can sneak up on turkeys. You know, we used 0:13:18.360 --> 0:13:19.839 to get where you knew the round the other side 0:13:19.840 --> 0:13:21.679 of the ridge. You call and call and call, and 0:13:21.760 --> 0:13:23.760 nothing happens, like oh they must have wandered off, and 0:13:23.800 --> 0:13:25.880 you stand up. They're still standing there, but like you 0:13:26.000 --> 0:13:30.840 just suck at calling. It's a pro this just don't care. 0:13:31.800 --> 0:13:35.200 Before we get onto farther turkey stories. Let's just take 0:13:35.240 --> 0:13:41.559 a quick break to our sponsors. Very smooth. My other 0:13:41.640 --> 0:13:44.480 morning set up, I just got very lucky. We heard 0:13:44.520 --> 0:13:48.040 birds goblin on a classic like point off of a field. 0:13:48.160 --> 0:13:50.600 They were up above us. You had like a season 0:13:50.679 --> 0:13:52.680 is worth of turkey hunt this morning, and we gotta 0:13:52.679 --> 0:13:54.360 had a lot of good turkey hunt this morning. And 0:13:54.440 --> 0:13:56.839 we got in right underneath them at the bottom, and 0:13:56.920 --> 0:13:59.679 I think they flew down into the field kind of 0:13:59.720 --> 0:14:01.760 a way from us, and we had time to drop 0:14:01.840 --> 0:14:04.480 a decoy in sitting against a tree, and I looked 0:14:04.520 --> 0:14:06.760 back up on the horizon. I could see, you know, 0:14:06.880 --> 0:14:10.480 them moving, and I made one little scratch and they 0:14:10.520 --> 0:14:12.480 were walking down the hill and it just happened to 0:14:12.520 --> 0:14:14.240 be that they were gonna come right down that How 0:14:14.280 --> 0:14:17.199 do you know that, I don't, but it just seemed like, 0:14:17.440 --> 0:14:20.000 you know, they were very confidently coming down that hill, 0:14:20.040 --> 0:14:21.840 and I don't They couldn't see the decoy at that point. 0:14:22.240 --> 0:14:24.480 You only there. Well, you just never know. You never know. 0:14:24.680 --> 0:14:27.880 That's the problem too with hunt hunting, lots of hunting turkeys, 0:14:28.000 --> 0:14:31.160 like you're always doing stuff you don't know, Like today, 0:14:31.160 --> 0:14:33.720 I could say, well, once those two that were I 0:14:33.760 --> 0:14:35.200 don't want to say they were hung up because they 0:14:35.200 --> 0:14:37.680 weren't like suspicious. They were just strutting the odd of range. 0:14:39.600 --> 0:14:41.680 Once I started being like, Okay, that's gonna scratch the 0:14:41.800 --> 0:14:44.640 leaves and purr, right, and eventually they came in. So 0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:46.800 now do you sit and go like, oh the trick, 0:14:47.320 --> 0:14:49.920 the trick is scratched leaves and purr or was it 0:14:50.000 --> 0:14:52.520 just that they came in even though I was doing that? 0:14:53.280 --> 0:14:55.240 You know, it's so hard to You gotta see things 0:14:55.320 --> 0:14:57.200 happen again and again and again and again and again 0:14:57.360 --> 0:15:01.160 before you start formulating an idea. But I'm coming to 0:15:01.360 --> 0:15:04.920 see that shutting up when you got a bird, it's 0:15:06.640 --> 0:15:10.320 just he's responding. He likes what he hears. It's in 0:15:10.400 --> 0:15:12.360 your best as as fun as it is just to 0:15:12.440 --> 0:15:15.120 get him to keep him talking. It's just give it 0:15:15.200 --> 0:15:17.440 ten minutes, give it fifteen minutes now and then and 0:15:17.520 --> 0:15:19.800 see if that doesn't move that bird way in your direction. 0:15:20.120 --> 0:15:24.000 And that ten minutes when we sat there was both 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:28.560 really short and really long. It's just like and I 0:15:28.680 --> 0:15:31.000 did without having to watch. You can't tell. Yeah, you 0:15:31.080 --> 0:15:33.760 can't tell I have how long is this going on? 0:15:35.520 --> 0:15:37.960 But it was, you know, just to watch him. I 0:15:38.000 --> 0:15:40.000 mean that was the visual on that was, you know, 0:15:40.240 --> 0:15:42.600 kept your interest in the numbness of my leg and 0:15:42.800 --> 0:15:46.480 shoulder and my neck up against the tree. It all 0:15:46.520 --> 0:15:49.320 went away. Checking those birds out man. Yeah, I was 0:15:49.360 --> 0:15:52.320 saying after that was over, if you're like hunting turkeys, man, yeah, 0:15:53.000 --> 0:15:54.440 I can't tell you what I said, but I said, 0:15:54.480 --> 0:16:00.640 if you don't like turkeys, you can expletive deleted exactly 0:16:01.200 --> 0:16:10.720 you can. Yeah. Um, so yeah, during's farm. Now, tell 0:16:10.800 --> 0:16:13.880 these guys, tell listeners about like when you were a kid, 0:16:15.360 --> 0:16:19.760 about the deer situation out here. I remember that. This 0:16:19.880 --> 0:16:28.200 is a way ass interesting story. Wow, that's uh uh, 0:16:28.720 --> 0:16:30.440 it's a big deal. When I was a kid, you 0:16:30.520 --> 0:16:31.880 saw a deer out in the field, I mean you 0:16:31.920 --> 0:16:33.520 got a car and drove. I mean somebody said, hey, 0:16:33.600 --> 0:16:36.120 it were some deer out on mcglenn's Ridge or Cunningham 0:16:36.160 --> 0:16:37.680 Ridge or something like that. You drove out there and 0:16:37.760 --> 0:16:42.440 checked it out. Um, the deer in this area, we're 0:16:42.520 --> 0:16:47.920 over in the Bearable Bluffs, the Barable Hills. Um. Prior 0:16:48.000 --> 0:16:52.200 to that, I remember my brother David did a speech 0:16:52.360 --> 0:16:55.680 conservation speech when he was in seventh or eighth grade 0:16:55.720 --> 0:16:58.120 about the management of the white tailed deer. Is he 0:16:58.200 --> 0:17:01.560 an expert? No, he was doing one of those you know, 0:17:02.120 --> 0:17:04.960 competitions at school or whatever. And uh, he did a 0:17:05.000 --> 0:17:07.920 great job of it, as I recall, under some very 0:17:07.960 --> 0:17:10.720 difficult circumstances. Should I tell you what that was. He 0:17:10.800 --> 0:17:15.119 had kicked in the growing and was all swollen up 0:17:15.160 --> 0:17:18.200 and and the night that he gave that speech was 0:17:18.440 --> 0:17:22.200 in incredible pain. Yeah, and he did a great job 0:17:22.240 --> 0:17:23.880 of it. I think he got second place. I'm sure 0:17:23.880 --> 0:17:27.360 he'd have wanted had he not not taking a blow too. Yeah. 0:17:27.920 --> 0:17:33.840 But through the uh management program of the of the 0:17:34.240 --> 0:17:37.800 Department Natural Resources. Um. And when I was a kid, 0:17:37.840 --> 0:17:39.640 you would you'd have to if you want to shoot 0:17:39.680 --> 0:17:41.919 a dough, you'd have to have get four guys together, 0:17:42.080 --> 0:17:44.760 like months ahead of time and sent in for a 0:17:44.840 --> 0:17:47.520 party permit. So one guy or you would get one 0:17:47.560 --> 0:17:50.359 dough tag for four guys, so your deer tag was 0:17:50.440 --> 0:17:53.080 a buck tag. Um, and then there would be this 0:17:53.280 --> 0:17:55.639 one tag for four guys to be able to shoot 0:17:55.640 --> 0:17:58.119 a doll. Let me dre up because I'm doing a 0:17:58.160 --> 0:18:01.560 bad job of hosting right now, because just for people 0:18:01.600 --> 0:18:03.840 who live in all their areas or who don't follow 0:18:03.840 --> 0:18:06.600 this kind of thing. This area right now, like right 0:18:06.640 --> 0:18:09.560 now is the good old days on deer or maybe 0:18:09.560 --> 0:18:11.080 a couple of years ago is the good ol days. No, no, 0:18:11.320 --> 0:18:15.919 I would say, right. It's just this place produces tons 0:18:16.000 --> 0:18:23.359 of deer, and it's famous and becoming for gigantic bucks, 0:18:25.080 --> 0:18:27.920 and we should be able to produce more of them. 0:18:28.040 --> 0:18:31.000 And I don't know how hop on a soapbox I 0:18:31.040 --> 0:18:33.240 want to get about, you know, deer management. We have 0:18:33.400 --> 0:18:36.680 too many deer in my opinion, and where I hunt 0:18:36.800 --> 0:18:39.480 and what I you guys are in the these This 0:18:39.720 --> 0:18:41.960 area is also part of the c w D, the 0:18:42.040 --> 0:18:44.960 chronic wasting disease on the northern edge of it. Chronic 0:18:45.040 --> 0:18:48.919 wasting disease goes hand in hand with shiploads of deer. Oh, 0:18:49.000 --> 0:18:50.359 you don't get c w D in the area that 0:18:50.359 --> 0:18:52.159 doesn't have a lot of deer, that's right. High deer 0:18:52.240 --> 0:18:55.119 density makes a big difference. And and then to control 0:18:55.200 --> 0:18:58.679 the diseases, you want fewer deer. And um, there are 0:18:58.680 --> 0:19:01.119 a lot of reasons to to have fewer deer in 0:19:01.160 --> 0:19:03.600 this area. And and again you know, I don't know 0:19:03.640 --> 0:19:06.680 what other guys experiences are in various parts of the 0:19:06.720 --> 0:19:10.000 state and all that I just know around here and 0:19:10.119 --> 0:19:11.920 on the land that i'm hunting, which is our farming 0:19:11.920 --> 0:19:14.520 a little bit in the area around it. I'm not 0:19:14.600 --> 0:19:17.360 hunting that, but seeing it, we have way more dearer 0:19:17.400 --> 0:19:20.760 than than what we should have. And from a forestry perspective, 0:19:20.840 --> 0:19:23.920 from well, it depends if what you want to see 0:19:23.960 --> 0:19:27.280 as a ton of deer, I guess you should be 0:19:27.359 --> 0:19:31.960 happy as a clamp. But uh, if you want to 0:19:32.040 --> 0:19:36.880 have deer in the future, then we should have fewer deer. 0:19:37.000 --> 0:19:40.000 Now we're gonna I mean, it's possible that we'd have 0:19:40.040 --> 0:19:42.440 a crash of the of the deer here heard here, 0:19:42.520 --> 0:19:48.439 because because our habitat will be depleted. Um, I'm sure 0:19:48.440 --> 0:19:50.399 there are guys who are gonna, you know, from around here, 0:19:50.440 --> 0:19:53.760 got each other over discussion. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, No, 0:19:54.000 --> 0:19:56.520 it's a heated discussion. And I still think, say, I'm 0:19:56.560 --> 0:19:58.440 old enough. I'm fifty six years old, and I'm old 0:19:58.560 --> 0:20:01.359 enough that there are in my generation won't shoot a 0:20:01.440 --> 0:20:04.440 doll and you know it's just that way. You don't 0:20:04.480 --> 0:20:07.000 do that. Oh, I know tons of old guys like 0:20:07.080 --> 0:20:09.119 that because they come from the day when they were 0:20:09.280 --> 0:20:11.720 any well, right, but the mentality, I mean you have 0:20:11.800 --> 0:20:14.280 to shift that mentality. A lot of a lot has 0:20:14.359 --> 0:20:16.159 changed about deer hunting, and one of the things is 0:20:16.200 --> 0:20:18.600 the numbers. But if I want to back up, yeah, yeah, 0:20:18.600 --> 0:20:20.520 I know, because I was just trying to set the 0:20:20.600 --> 0:20:24.600 stage that right now there's a ton of deer, giant 0:20:24.720 --> 0:20:27.080 box for this area right now is the good old 0:20:27.119 --> 0:20:31.159 days of deer hunt now I was, But yeah, I 0:20:31.200 --> 0:20:32.639 mean look at this. I wish you could see this 0:20:32.720 --> 0:20:34.720 room like I'm staring eye to eye right now with 0:20:34.800 --> 0:20:37.680 the buck known as the standard. I don't know, I 0:20:37.720 --> 0:20:40.040 want to talk about the standard, because that's that to 0:20:40.119 --> 0:20:42.040 me in the story of this area, like the standard 0:20:42.280 --> 0:20:46.960 at for YouTube like that deer sort of like is 0:20:47.040 --> 0:20:50.359 this like sort of the epitome. Yeah, it's like this 0:20:50.440 --> 0:20:53.320 really important moment in this area. So dogs growing up, 0:20:53.320 --> 0:20:54.840 it would be a big deal to cut a deer track. 0:20:55.600 --> 0:20:58.479 You now live like your family lives. And I mean, 0:20:58.480 --> 0:21:00.080 if you're gonna sit down and list like top and 0:21:00.200 --> 0:21:02.480 white tail locations in the u S, you probably wanted 0:21:02.480 --> 0:21:05.240 them to be around here. And you're a man always 0:21:05.320 --> 0:21:07.560 drove north the year. Yeah, Dad always went up north. 0:21:07.640 --> 0:21:09.560 He hunted. They're still guys in this area that go 0:21:09.640 --> 0:21:12.280 up there for the tradition of it. Uh. He went 0:21:12.720 --> 0:21:14.440 and hunted up in Phillips. They lived in a tent 0:21:14.600 --> 0:21:18.440 for you know, a week or ten days. Um. And 0:21:18.520 --> 0:21:21.000