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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide

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Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,

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Speaker 1: creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.

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Speaker 1: First Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host,

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Speaker 1: Tony Peterson.

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Speaker 2: Hey, everyone, welcome to the Wire to Hunt Foundation's podcast,

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Speaker 2: which is brought to you by first Light. Today, I'm

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Speaker 2: going to talk about something that plagues so many hunters,

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Speaker 2: even if they might not want to admit it. Sometimes

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Speaker 2: inspiration falls right into your lap, or at least pops

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Speaker 2: up in your email. An old acquaintance of mine recently

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Speaker 2: sent me a note about how much he's struggling with

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Speaker 2: bow hunting. He feels like he can't get over the

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Speaker 2: hurdle that separates being a deer shooter adder type of

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Speaker 2: guy to a deer shooter type of guy. His frustration

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Speaker 2: was palpable, and there were a lot of clues in

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Speaker 2: his message that spawned the idea for this whole podcast.

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Speaker 2: He admitted to not being super good at bow hunting,

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Speaker 2: but also targeting mature four and a half year old

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Speaker 2: plus bucks. That's a bad combo that happens a lot.

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Speaker 2: It's also what this whole episode is kind of really

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Speaker 2: all about. There used to be a progression to hunting

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Speaker 2: that allowed someone to start small and worked their way

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Speaker 2: up to the deer. Not only was it a good

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Speaker 2: way to develop some serious woodsmanship skills, it's also something

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Speaker 2: guys my age were romanticize and remember in a nice

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Speaker 2: glow of nostalgia. It doesn't always jive with reality. It

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Speaker 2: always started with rabbits and squirrels, and as a young

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Speaker 2: man with a bolt action Remington twenty two, in a

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Speaker 2: real bloodlust in my heart, I spent a lot of

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Speaker 2: time roman the woods with that rim fire, trying to

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Speaker 2: remove bushytails from the trees. I also got to carry

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Speaker 2: a pump twenty gage for bunnies, and if you think

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Speaker 2: I didn't love that shit, you're off your rocker. Some

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Speaker 2: of my best memories of my childhood involved hunting small game,

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Speaker 2: mostly with my dad. I remember rallying around a squirrel

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Speaker 2: family with a pocket full of shells one time, which

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Speaker 2: is a rage against the machine reference for you young

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Speaker 2: lads listening on that morning, my dad put me in

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Speaker 2: a tree stand, probably without a safety harness, and told

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Speaker 2: me to work on my squirrel accuracy. I think that's

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Speaker 2: where a lot of my problems started, because even though

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Speaker 2: I was surrounded by bushytails, I couldn't hit a squirrel

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Speaker 2: well to save my life. I literally had squirrel fever.

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Speaker 2: And I'll never forget him walking in to pick me up,

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Speaker 2: and he asked me how many I got, because he

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Speaker 2: had spent all morning listening to me shoot. The body

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Speaker 2: count was one, and it wasn't even a clean kill

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Speaker 2: until I got down and sent that poor bushytail to

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Speaker 2: the great big oak tree in the sky. Another time,

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Speaker 2: while rabbit hunting a lot a stretch of abandoned railroad tracks,

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Speaker 2: I looked down in the grass and saw a cottontail

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Speaker 2: pulling his best If I stay real still, maybe he

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Speaker 2: won't see me move. But I did see him, and

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Speaker 2: I don't know if you know what a well aimed,

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Speaker 2: loaded lead shot does to a bunny that is about

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Speaker 2: six feet off the end of your shotguns barrel. But

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Speaker 2: the disappointment in my dad's eyes when he tried to

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Speaker 2: pick up what was left of that poor rabbit was

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Speaker 2: pretty obvious. I probably knew it at the time without

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Speaker 2: really knowing it, But the whole stage was being set

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Speaker 2: for me to become a deer hunter then. Now, at

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Speaker 2: that time, twelve was the minimum age, and it took

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Speaker 2: me forever to get there. We hunted everything we could

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Speaker 2: but deer until that season. And then I gradulated to

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Speaker 2: the big leagues. And let me tell you something, I

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Speaker 2: was a born natural. Just kidding, I was definitely born unnatural.

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Speaker 2: That's probably not the right way to say it, but

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Speaker 2: if there wasn't a word for being really, really bad

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Speaker 2: at deer hunting, I'd have definitely been in the running

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Speaker 2: for some hardware for my trophy case. Those first couple

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Speaker 2: of years, I could barely lay eyes on a deer,

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Speaker 2: and if I did and it got within twenty yards,

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Speaker 2: it definitely got shot at, and it always walked or

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Speaker 2: ran away totally unscathed. My daughter's recently asked me if

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Speaker 2: I've missed more deer than I've shot, and I honestly

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Speaker 2: couldn't answer. I'd say maybe, because just in those first

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Speaker 2: four years alone, I racked up a string of whiffs

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Speaker 2: that should have got me sent back down to the miners,

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Speaker 2: or worse, sent down to carry the mobile hot dog

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Speaker 2: heater thing while hiking up and down the concrete steps,

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Speaker 2: yelling at people. It was brutal and it was the

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Speaker 2: source of my first white tail meltdown. When I was fifteen,

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Speaker 2: the thing I wanted so much was so close, yet

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Speaker 2: so very very far away. I told my dad I

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Speaker 2: was done. I was going to become a gun hunter.

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Speaker 2: Now I was going to start killing deer. He said, okay,

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Speaker 2: let's get some slugs and figure this thing out. But

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Speaker 2: he didn't, and I didn't really want to go that route.

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Speaker 2: I wanted to arrow a deer. If you're wondering if

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Speaker 2: I really have any character flaws, I'll tell you this.

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Speaker 2: I'm a pretty stubborn fella. I don't know why. It

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Speaker 2: mostly doesn't serve me very well. But in some ways,

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Speaker 2: if I set a course for myself, it takes a

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Speaker 2: hell of a lot to get me to steer in

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Speaker 2: a new direction. So I kept hunting, you know what.

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Speaker 2: I eventually started to hit a few deer. Then I

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Speaker 2: started to hit a few correctly, and over time the

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Speaker 2: young bucks and even some two year old started to

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Speaker 2: die with enough frequency where I got a little cocky.

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Speaker 2: My progression to that point in my life had involved

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Speaker 2: a whole lot of small game, a whole lot of

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Speaker 2: upland birds, quite a few turkeys, a fair amount of

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Speaker 2: deer well rounded. I was for sure and totally clueless

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Speaker 2: about what I was getting into when I said it

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Speaker 2: was time to kill a pope and young buck. When

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Speaker 2: I made that move, what I didn't realize was that

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Speaker 2: I was turning back the time to old Tony or

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Speaker 2: I guess young Tony. Anyway, it was like I was

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Speaker 2: twelve again, and while I could always get my bow drawn,

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Speaker 2: I definitely could not get the pin anywhere close to

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Speaker 2: where it needed to be meltdown. Number two happened again

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Speaker 2: on a night I've talked about on this podcast before,

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Speaker 2: where in the span of maybe ten minutes, I missed

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Speaker 2: a solid one hundred and fifty class year and then

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Speaker 2: a really nice eight pointer that was close enough that

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Speaker 2: I probably could have dismounted from my stand and very

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Speaker 2: briefly wrote him like a rodeo bowl. In fact, that

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Speaker 2: probably would have been more effective than what I actually did,

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Speaker 2: which was see him pee my pants, a little shoot

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Speaker 2: over his back, and then pray to the deer guys

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Speaker 2: that lightning would take me out of this life that

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Speaker 2: I definitely wasn't meant to live. As all stories go,

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Speaker 2: I finally did kind of get my shit together and

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Speaker 2: I killed a couple of big bucks in consecutive seasons.

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Speaker 2: Let me tell you something. I thought I had the

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Speaker 2: whole thing tied up with a nice bow after that.

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Speaker 2: What I didn't expect was to get a job in

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Speaker 2: the hunting industry and suddenly have a whole lot of

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Speaker 2: pressure to be good at this stuff. My deer hunting

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Speaker 2: life has been a lot like trying to go up

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Speaker 2: a super steep driveway that is covered in mostly ice.

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Speaker 2: You know, I can throw it and four low and try,

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Speaker 2: but the odds are pretty good that my best efforts

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Speaker 2: will eventually leave me at the bottom of the hill,

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Speaker 2: sideways in the road, with nothing to show for it

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Speaker 2: but elevated blood pressure and the desire to set the

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Speaker 2: world on fire. That meltdown was so bad that it

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Speaker 2: forced me to switch up how I shot, how I practiced,

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Speaker 2: what I thought about, and pretty much reinvent myself as

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Speaker 2: a deer hunter. That's not that easy to do, my friends,

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Speaker 2: But so far this mostly worked. Now I'm too conditioned

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Speaker 2: to failure to believe another meltdown isn't coming, But for

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Speaker 2: now it feels like I might not regress anytime too soon.

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Speaker 2: I'll think about this. That's a pretty abbreviated version of

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Speaker 2: thirty one years of bow hunting, and I still struggle

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Speaker 2: all the time, And I mean all the time. Do

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Speaker 2: you know why? Because bow hunting white tail deer, specifically

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Speaker 2: mature bucks, is really, really hard. It's not easy for anyone,

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Speaker 2: at least if they are hunting pressure deer.

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Speaker 1: Oh.

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Speaker 2: Sure, we have ways to hack the system, and if

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Speaker 2: you have the right land, you can all but ensure

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Speaker 2: an opportunity are free. But most folks don't have that option.

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Speaker 2: Most folks are like you and I, where they work

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Speaker 2: and have kids and are under constant strain of life.

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Speaker 2: They have small spots to hunt, or share farms with

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Speaker 2: other folks, or trek across public land all season. For

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Speaker 2: most of us, this stuff is really difficult. There's a

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Speaker 2: silver lining. If you've been a passenger on the old

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Speaker 2: Big Bucks struggle bus for a while, you can get

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Speaker 2: over it. Unfortunately, you might not like the remedy. You

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Speaker 2: might not like the cure a whole lot. I'm going

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Speaker 2: to be blunt about this in a way that for

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Speaker 2: some reason in society we look down on We just

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Speaker 2: don't value honesty over hurting people's feelings. And I'll admit

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Speaker 2: there's always room for tact. There's also always room to

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Speaker 2: just lay things out and not pull your punches. So

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Speaker 2: here it goes. If you're struggling with killing a mature buck,

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Speaker 2: whether it's your first or maybe you sporadically make it happen,

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Speaker 2: but there's no consistency to your game, here's the deal.

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Speaker 2: You're probably not good enough at hunting to make that

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Speaker 2: your goal. Now. I know, goals are subjective and you're

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Speaker 2: free to do what you want to do, but keep

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Speaker 2: that in mind, especially if you find yourself having a

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Speaker 2: meltdown over not achieving that specific goal. If you're super

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Speaker 2: content with your hunting, great, If you're not, you can't

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Speaker 2: understand why deer hunting is so frustrating and not all

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Speaker 2: that much fun. Listen up, you're not good enough at

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Speaker 2: it to set your goals where they are. They're just

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Speaker 2: too high and you either need to live with that

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Speaker 2: or make a real change. Now. A lot of hunters,

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Speaker 2: I think they realize that, and they do what we

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Speaker 2: just kind of often do in life. They look for

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Speaker 2: a quick fix, like maybe if you ask Andy May

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Speaker 2: to look at your screenshot of your property, he'll tell

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Speaker 2: you how to hunt. And if you do you know

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Speaker 2: you'll have andy may results not quite though, or maybe

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Speaker 2: if you buy a sweet decoy or some new calls,

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Speaker 2: or you go all out on the salad game and

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Speaker 2: decide the best way to kill big Bucks is to

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Speaker 2: be in a new tree stand every night. Give that

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Speaker 2: a shot. Whatever floats your boat. But this strategy is

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Speaker 2: like trying to reason with your physical fitness, trying to

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Speaker 2: rationalize why you don't really need to do cardio or

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Speaker 2: why it's not that big of a deal to eat

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Speaker 2: ice cream every night. The formula for getting in shape

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Speaker 2: is real simple and it hasn't changed a lot in

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Speaker 2: a long time. You can make bargains, but you don't

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Speaker 2: make the rules. They are there, like the laws of physics,

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Speaker 2: and whether you agree with them or not, you're still

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Speaker 2: beholding the gravity and the law of thermodynamics. So are

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Speaker 2: you good enough for your goals? This is a tricky

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Speaker 2: one because if you don't set challenging, somewhat hard to

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Speaker 2: achieve goals, and how are you going to grow as

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Speaker 2: a person and as a hunter. The downside of this

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Speaker 2: is we often focus our goals on a simple metric,

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Speaker 2: which is antler size. Sure, we say we target mature bucks,

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Speaker 2: that's just weasel words, and we all know it. If

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Speaker 2: a deer comes in with one hundred and sixty inches

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Speaker 2: of antlers on his head, he's getting shot. Whether he's

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Speaker 2: a baby or a grandpa, dear, Mostly what we target

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Speaker 2: is actually antler size, and that's just the reality of

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Speaker 2: it all. But simply killing one hundred and forty inch

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Speaker 2: or when you've only ever killed two and a half

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Speaker 2: year olds, isn't the only way to go about this. Like,

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Speaker 2: I don't know how good of a shot are you

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Speaker 2: not at the range, but on real deer. If you

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Speaker 2: think you have the younger bucks and does mastered, so

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Speaker 2: it's time to target the big boys. Ask yourself when

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Speaker 2: you shoot those other deer, do you really always do

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Speaker 2: your job correctly or mostly always? How many of them

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Speaker 2: have you shot? When you're sitting in a stand and

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Speaker 2: you see one hundred inch two year old coming down

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Speaker 2: the trail and the weather is perfect and your heart

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Speaker 2: rate spikes, do you want to shoot him? Be honest

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Speaker 2: if you do, but you're worried he isn't big enough,

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Speaker 2: Ask yourself who is not big enough? For strangers on

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Speaker 2: social media? You're hunting buddies If you have good buddies.

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Speaker 2: They'll give you some shit, but they'll also be real

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Speaker 2: happy for you. If someone on social media disapproves of

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Speaker 2: the deer you shot, you have some options like not

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Speaker 2: posting your kills, which is pretty simple. If you just

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Speaker 2: have to post it, just be happy about it and

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Speaker 2: let folks know that you are happy about it. Some

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Speaker 2: people will still be pricks about it, but that's because

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Speaker 2: they are miserable with their own lives. Leave them alone

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Speaker 2: and let them suffer until they get their act together.

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Speaker 2: Celebrate your success. Those people aren't your problem. If you

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Speaker 2: have the world of younger Bucks and Doze totally dialed

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Speaker 2: and you are honestly ready for the big leagues but

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Speaker 2: have struggled mightily, think about this. Where are you going wrong?

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Speaker 2: Are you not seeing the big bucks well? Are they

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Speaker 2: there or are you hunting a place where the age

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Speaker 2: quality is lacking. If they are there and you can't

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Speaker 2: see them when you're hunting, then it's probably all about

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Speaker 2: scouting and hunting smarter. That's it. Got to put in

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Speaker 2: the work and really think through your setups. Try to

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Speaker 2: learn why your efforts aren't producing the sightings or are

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Speaker 2: you seeing the big ones getting shots at them? But

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Speaker 2: not quite able to make the right connection. This is

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Speaker 2: a big one and it happens to just about every

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Speaker 2: bow hunter who doesn't grow up with a thousand acres

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Speaker 2: a premale ground to hunt in Iowa. This stage can

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Speaker 2: wreck you as a hunter and as a human. It's

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Speaker 2: just rough. So what do you do? The only way

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Speaker 2: out is through, and for me it involved a lot

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Speaker 2: of target practice and a lot of inner monologue where

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Speaker 2: I told myself to focus on the shot, watch the

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Speaker 2: deer's body, plan for the moment when I'll draw the

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Speaker 2: moment went I'll shoot. Am I gonna stop him? Am

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Speaker 2: I gonna shoot him as he naturally comes through. What

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Speaker 2: I'm not gonna do is stare at those antlers and

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Speaker 2: think about how much I'm worried that I'm going to face. Now,

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Speaker 2: this seems easy enough, but even if you do keep

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Speaker 2: your kind of head in the game and plan out

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Speaker 2: the shot, most of those encounters are still going to

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Speaker 2: result in failure. That failure is going to tell you

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Speaker 2: what to do differently next time. That's how I look

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Speaker 2: at it. It's kind of like getting kicked in the

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Speaker 2: mental nards while getting stung by wass on your eyeballs.

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Speaker 2: But it is a stepping stone. Did you shoot too high,

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Speaker 2: too low? Seven feet behind this tail? Where did you

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Speaker 2: go wrong? What went wrong? What would you have done differently?

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Speaker 2: What will you do differently next time? Do you consider

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Speaker 2: it a win to have a deer like that that

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Speaker 2: close to you? Because you should. Most hunters don't get

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Speaker 2: that in any given season. Listen, I know that's thin

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Speaker 2: gruel to live on, but it's not nothing. You did

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Speaker 2: it once, you can do it again. And this time,

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Speaker 2: instead of punching the trigger on your release before you

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Speaker 2: settle your pin, settle your pin. It's a difference of

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Speaker 2: one two seconds. But it's also the difference between another

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Speaker 2: meltdown or that sweet, sweet feeling of finally doing things right.

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Speaker 2: And remember this, You're not alone. This thing we do

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Speaker 2: with white tails so damn fun, it's so damn hard.

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Speaker 2: I promise you that. Just about every hunter you look

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Speaker 2: up to, and many others you've never heard of. But

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Speaker 2: who are the best of the best, all struggled. They

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Speaker 2: shared a seat with guys like you and me on

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Speaker 2: the struggle bus at one point or another, maybe for

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Speaker 2: a season or two, maybe for a decade or two.

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Speaker 2: The journey to becoming a content somewhat consistent. Big buck

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Speaker 2: killer is a long personal one for almost everyone. It

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Speaker 2: can be a lot of things, both good and bad,

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Speaker 2: and it will be just that. But it's also a

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Speaker 2: progression of sorts. If you treat it right now, you

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Speaker 2: don't need to murder a million squirrels and cottontails when

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Speaker 2: you're in grade school to work your way up to it.

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Speaker 2: You do have to look around and ask yourself, where

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Speaker 2: are you in your journey now? Did you get a

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Speaker 2: little too far ahead of yourself because of the social

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Speaker 2: pressure to not shoot young bucks. Did you take a

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Speaker 2: few wins and use them as conclusive evidence that it's

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Speaker 2: time to skip ahead by about forty seven steps in

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Speaker 2: the process, or are you getting there you know, naturally

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Speaker 2: in a way that feels pretty good. Where are you

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Speaker 2: on this journey? And what does it mean for you

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Speaker 2: to set certain goals? I don't take the easy way out,

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Speaker 2: but don't put yourself in a position where this thing

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Speaker 2: you are supposed to love becomes just a source of

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Speaker 2: stress and anxiety and disappointment. There's plenty of life to

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Speaker 2: do that for you. You don't need it from deer hunting,

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Speaker 2: So find your path, walk it at the pace you need,

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Speaker 2: and eventually you'll get to a point where the challenge

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Speaker 2: is real but also doable. That's a wonderful place to be,

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Speaker 2: even if it's just always kind of a temporary place

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Speaker 2: to be. So get out there, my friends. Make something

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Speaker 2: good happen in the woods. Come back next week because

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Speaker 2: I'm going to talk about gambling kind of. That's it

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Speaker 2: for this week, my friends. I'm Tony Peterson. This has

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Speaker 2: been the Wired to Hunt Foundation's podcast. As always, thank

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Speaker 2: you so much for listening. I can't tell you how

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Speaker 2: much all of us here at meat Eater truly appreciate

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Speaker 2: your support, but we do. It means the world to us,

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Speaker 2: so thank you for that. If you want some more

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Speaker 2: white tail content, if you want to listen to Clay

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Speaker 2: talk about you know, stone points. If you want to

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Speaker 2: go check out the meat Eater trivia podcast, maybe the

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Speaker 2: buck truck series that the Element guys put out, I

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Speaker 2: don't care, whatever it is. Go to the meeteater dot

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Speaker 2: com and you will find so much hunting and fishing content,

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Speaker 2: cooking content too. If you want to make some backstraps

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Speaker 2: or something really hum go there, check it out. Get

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Speaker 2: your fixed. You know, if you feel the need to

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Speaker 2: maybe treat yourself to something nice. The Meat eater Stor

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Speaker 2: is right there. There's a whole lot of good stuff

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Speaker 2: in there that's often on sale, so go check out

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Speaker 2: it as well. Thank you so much again. It