Speaker 1: Welcome back to Cutting the Distance. Today's guests. Grew up
Speaker 1: in Nebraska as a ranch kid and started hunting deer, turkeys,
Speaker 1: and calling Kyle's at a very young age. In high school,
Speaker 1: Jordan Bud taught herself how to run a camera and
Speaker 1: begin filming her friends and her own hunts, which grew
Speaker 1: into profession when she started filming the Western hunts for sheep,
Speaker 1: elk and mill Gear. This also allowed her a lot
Speaker 1: of time in the field and was a great platform
Speaker 1: for her to test equipment, so along with filming the hunts,
Speaker 1: she also started to write gear reviews. This has all
Speaker 1: led to her current position with Meat Eater producing content
Speaker 1: testing gear and now she is the co host of
Speaker 1: the gear Talk podcast that she works with Jannis Patellas on.
Speaker 1: Aside from the media, she also runs an outfitting business
Speaker 1: in Nebraska on the ramps that she grew up in
Speaker 1: called Running Water Hunting, where she guides and hunts for
Speaker 1: deer and Mariam's turkey. Welcome to the show, Jordan's thanks Jason,
Speaker 1: thanks for having me on. Man. How's everything going? Things are?
Speaker 1: Things are good, They're warming up, snows melting. I'm in Nebraska.
Speaker 1: How's everything going? Things are. Things are good. They're warming up,
Speaker 1: snows melting. Um. I'm in Nebraska currently helping out with
Speaker 1: some ranch stuff and then getting ready for turkey season,
Speaker 1: and I was a little worried about all the snow
Speaker 1: we had, but it seems to be melting and and
Speaker 1: been seeing a lot of birds, so I'm excited to
Speaker 1: get out there. Yeah. So you're talking a lot of
Speaker 1: snow in Nebraska as well as Idaho. Yeah, and it
Speaker 1: pretty much. I've been here for about a week and
Speaker 1: about the time I left Idaho it really cut loose
Speaker 1: and started snowing there. So um, yeah, it's been a
Speaker 1: little bit of a shift. Yeah. Yeah, it looks I've
Speaker 1: seen pictures and it looks like people are trying to
Speaker 1: dig themselves out in a few places in Idaho and Montana.
Speaker 1: And uh, you know, turkeys, turkeys hunting is gonna be interesting.
Speaker 1: I think I think your snow line is going to
Speaker 1: be a lot lower. But I'm starting to really worry
Speaker 1: for our deer and elk. You know, I've seen lots
Speaker 1: of videos and you know, Utah and Idaho and people
Speaker 1: often to do some supplemental feeding, so hopefully we don't
Speaker 1: lose too many and Um, you know, just just pictures
Speaker 1: on social media's people start to head out in the
Speaker 1: woods and maybe look for horns, like a few too
Speaker 1: many deadheads showing up. Not Yeah, it's been been a
Speaker 1: tough winner on them. Yeah, it's been really difficult. But
Speaker 1: uh yeah, things are things are good, good good. So,
Speaker 1: like all of our podcasts, we're gonna start off with
Speaker 1: a few listener questions I'm gonna throw at you, and
Speaker 1: if you have any questions of your own, h that's
Speaker 1: to our listeners, feel free to get hold of us
Speaker 1: on social media, send us a message, or you can
Speaker 1: email us at CTD at Phelps Gamecalls dot com and
Speaker 1: we'll do our best to get your questions aired. So
Speaker 1: the first question we have is from Alan Rodgers. Um,
Speaker 1: he was asking what does your layering system typically look
Speaker 1: like for spring Turkey? So I'll let you you take
Speaker 1: that one on first and see what you come up with. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So typically here we're looking at like, you know, thirty
Speaker 1: degrees in the morning, maybe even a little bit colder,
Speaker 1: and then getting up like into the fifties. We might
Speaker 1: be hitting sixty degrees as we move on in April.
Speaker 1: So I typically just wear like a a mid like
Speaker 1: a midweight style pant. The cord Get Guide pant is
Speaker 1: what I like to use. And then I like the
Speaker 1: wick hoodie has been a staple piece for me and
Speaker 1: pretty much everything. Um. I really like to have that
Speaker 1: little lightweight hood on there. And then I go with
Speaker 1: like an Origin hoodie, so just a midweight fleece over
Speaker 1: the top of that, and then a catalyst jacket over
Speaker 1: the top of that. That pretty much rounds me out.
Speaker 1: If it's you know, like dipping into those thirties in
Speaker 1: the morning, I'll put like a Brooks vest or like
Speaker 1: a lightweight puffy jacket underneath my catalyst jacket. But that
Speaker 1: pretty much will We'll get me through that first little
Speaker 1: bit of oldness in the morning, and then it seems
Speaker 1: to heat up pretty quick and especially if we're moving,
Speaker 1: So that's that's what I use. Yeah, and I'm very
Speaker 1: similar um, you know, core Get Guide. It seems to
Speaker 1: be kind of just my go to pant. And then
Speaker 1: if I need to if it's getting really chilly, um,
Speaker 1: you know, maybe throw just a wick layer on under it,
Speaker 1: you know, just a bass layer on. Um, and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, I I will go to just like my
Speaker 1: Chamberlain UM you know coat if needed over the top everything.
Speaker 1: Of course, we have to cut our noise, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's a little bit of a noisier piece, so
Speaker 1: we have to be a little bit more cognizant of
Speaker 1: our movement. But very similar to you. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: we've got got the hoodie on. Um. I like to
Speaker 1: be able to get the wind off my ears, my
Speaker 1: neck if needed. Um. You know, I used to wear
Speaker 1: the Klamath hoodie, but now it switched to the origin Is.
Speaker 1: Things have kind of changed. And then um, you know,
Speaker 1: on top of that, we'll we'll either throw the Chamberlain
Speaker 1: or if it's not too cold, I'll just stuff it
Speaker 1: back and um carried around. You know, usually once the
Speaker 1: sun comes up, things warm up a little bit. But yeah,
Speaker 1: very very similar. Um. One thing I've been doing also,
Speaker 1: it's just like in addition to to the lightweight hoods,
Speaker 1: it's just like a gator seems to be a little
Speaker 1: bit of a game changer as well for me because
Speaker 1: I now use that as my my mask. But it
Speaker 1: also helps like just keep that cold air off of
Speaker 1: my my neck. So um, I also make sure that
Speaker 1: that that net gator kind of goes with me everywhere.
Speaker 1: And there's a couple different weights. Yeah, I like the
Speaker 1: really light one. Is that the one you use? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the one I use the majority of the time.
Speaker 1: I do have the heavier one, but um yeah, usually
Speaker 1: just that real light one so I can keep it,
Speaker 1: you know, around my neck most time. But you know,
Speaker 1: I use it for my mask now as well when
Speaker 1: it comes time to turkey hunt, and I'll just pulled
Speaker 1: up and that acts as my mask, you know, even
Speaker 1: though the origin hoodie now does have you know, a
Speaker 1: mask that comes out of the hood. I just usually
Speaker 1: there's too much a movement. I like to be pretty mobile,
Speaker 1: and you know it's usually pull my mask up at
Speaker 1: the at the last second, so I don't want to
Speaker 1: pull my hood down and you know, get my hat
Speaker 1: rearranged as I'm trying to get that mask over. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Sweet is a great set up. Yeah yeah. So yeah.
Speaker 1: And and there's places where where we know in Northeast Washington,
Speaker 1: we're gonna hunt Meriam's and I might dress a little
Speaker 1: lighter because I know my my my the first half
Speaker 1: hour of my day is going to be climbing a
Speaker 1: thousand feet up to a ridge, you know, or or
Speaker 1: a spot. So it's just it's depending on where you at.
Speaker 1: But I I usually always similar to to big game hunting,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna carry that that same kit, and I'm just
Speaker 1: adjust throughout the day if i need be all right,
Speaker 1: if I need to sweet. Um, next question from David Smith, Um,
Speaker 1: should I carry binoculars with me while turkey hunting? And
Speaker 1: I'm gonna kick this one to you, but I used
Speaker 1: to be I'll let you answer, but uh, I used
Speaker 1: to never carry binoculars. Like either if I hear the bird,
Speaker 1: I'll kill it and if not, then you know, I'll
Speaker 1: see the thing. But um, i'll see if your answer
Speaker 1: kind of drives with mine. Yeah, I think some of
Speaker 1: it depends on where you're hunting. Like here, it's you know,
Speaker 1: we have wooded areas on the river bottom, but otherwise
Speaker 1: it's pretty open and there's like big open openings between
Speaker 1: the trees. So like it's just fairly conducive to glassing.
Speaker 1: So like I'll use glassing a lot, even when locating
Speaker 1: birds from a long distance, you know, even like the
Speaker 1: night before we go out or whatever. But I do
Speaker 1: carry a set with me, but I just go with
Speaker 1: like an eight power lightweight, like really compact. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm not looking to put them on a tripod and go,
Speaker 1: you know, like high power on a tripod or anything
Speaker 1: like that. I'm just looking for something with like a
Speaker 1: wide field of view, lightweight, easy to carry in my
Speaker 1: chest harness, and then like just be able to give
Speaker 1: a little look, you know. But uh yeah, I don't
Speaker 1: go too crazy on it. But I do like to
Speaker 1: carry binoculars. Yep. I was. I was in the camp
Speaker 1: of you don't need optics for turkey hunting. You know,
Speaker 1: they gobble at you, you know where they're if they're there.
Speaker 1: But so many times we started getting busted, and then
Speaker 1: I knew I needed binoculars. But then I didn't want
Speaker 1: to carry them my big you know what I would
Speaker 1: consider my Western hunting binoculars, you know, my big ten
Speaker 1: by forty twos, or my range finding binoculars or whatever
Speaker 1: I might have. And so I still went a few
Speaker 1: more years without carrying them and just kept getting busted.
Speaker 1: And now I can't imagine turck hunt without them, you know,
Speaker 1: whether I'm crossing you know, food plots in Kansas, and
Speaker 1: they need to glass like the other timber edge because
Speaker 1: I can't pick things out versus you know, if I'm
Speaker 1: hunting in um, you know, more open stuff like eastern Washington, Idaho.
Speaker 1: Like we'll just sit on a ridge, you know maybe
Speaker 1: and when those birds are in lockdown and they're just
Speaker 1: not gobbling, you know, they're just they're hind up, they're
Speaker 1: not gonna gobble. Um, we'll just spot them with the
Speaker 1: binoculars where it's like you may not have spotted them
Speaker 1: with your naked eye across the canyon. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: they sometimes are easy to spot. But we've you know,
Speaker 1: similar to UM to spot in you know, mule deer
Speaker 1: that are in tough to see areas or in the shade. Um,
Speaker 1: we're able to just spot turkeys. And that kind of
Speaker 1: gets us back in the game. So UM, like you,
Speaker 1: I carry a very small eight by thirty twos. They
Speaker 1: have a spot in my chest rigg. I can still
Speaker 1: carry my calls and UM yeah, I'm I'm always carrying
Speaker 1: binoculars with me now when I'm in the Turkey woods.
Speaker 1: Sweet the other they're nice to have, man. Yeah, So
Speaker 1: that kind of wraps up our our two listener questions.
Speaker 1: Once again, if you have questions for us, for my guests,
Speaker 1: for myself, UM, please email them to us at CTD
Speaker 1: at Phelps Gamecalls dot com and we'll do our best
Speaker 1: to get them on here. So now we're gonna kind
Speaker 1: of jump into to the discussion. Um, we're gonna talk
Speaker 1: kind of stay in your lane. We're gonna talk about
Speaker 1: gear for turkeys. Um, you know, we're gonna talk about
Speaker 1: you know, seat versus seatpad, turkey vest versus chess regg.
Speaker 1: We're gonna dive a little deeper into optics, um, you know,
Speaker 1: ground blinds and all of that. But before that, UM,
Speaker 1: I want you to give me a little bit of
Speaker 1: the lowdown on the gear Talk podcast. I'm I'm maybe
Speaker 1: the worst because I don't listen to podcasts, not even
Speaker 1: my own. After I've done so, I haven't listened to
Speaker 1: any of the gear Talk podcasts. But give me kind
Speaker 1: of the what you're doing, where it's going, and what
Speaker 1: you you and Janna's hope to accomplish with the podcast
Speaker 1: before we jump into our conversation. Yeah. So there. You know,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of podcasts out on different networks now
Speaker 1: and a lot of times they're hitting gear on like
Speaker 1: one episode, but there wasn't a podcast that was really
Speaker 1: talking a lot about gear and I think that that's
Speaker 1: something that people really like, is they like hearing your
Speaker 1: kit and what you're using, and it helps them narrow
Speaker 1: down there's so many options on the market, like it
Speaker 1: helps them narrow down a little bit, you know, of
Speaker 1: what they really actually need to buy. And that's really
Speaker 1: what we wanted to do with the podcast was just
Speaker 1: have it be a source for that, you know, consume
Speaker 1: can go listen and get a little bit better idea
Speaker 1: of like what they actually need for an upcoming hunt
Speaker 1: and what they can get by without. And then also
Speaker 1: just be a really educational platform to how some of
Speaker 1: this stuff works. Because a lot of this gear we're
Speaker 1: using is super it is technical, and there's a lot
Speaker 1: of thought and process that goes into it and new
Speaker 1: materials that do different things, and we wanted to give
Speaker 1: a platform to be able to have experts on to
Speaker 1: talk about breathable laminates and to talk about dwr's for
Speaker 1: your outerwear and why it's important to wash those because
Speaker 1: it like revital It can revitalize the DWR and just
Speaker 1: make your clothing perform a little bit better. So that's
Speaker 1: really what the podcast is about. We're doing some stuff,
Speaker 1: we got some stuff coming up that's going to be
Speaker 1: really interesting. We got soft shell jackets from of course
Speaker 1: First Light, but we also have them from qu Sitka
Speaker 1: arc ICs, Stone Glacier. So we're gonna do kind of
Speaker 1: I don't know if like I don't really think like
Speaker 1: a head to head, but we're gonna go through those jackets,
Speaker 1: talk about fit, talk about some of the materials that
Speaker 1: they use and the ideas behind them, and just give
Speaker 1: folks like a hopefully a place to go that they
Speaker 1: can be like, hey, I've been looking at these jackets
Speaker 1: like these are kind of how they fit. This is
Speaker 1: the difference in some of the materials and just the
Speaker 1: idea behind like what they built them for. And so yeah,
Speaker 1: we're doing things like that with those jackets. We're gonna
Speaker 1: do pants, eventually, we're gonna do like backpacks. We're trying
Speaker 1: to do like a few different things with it. But
Speaker 1: really it's we really wanted to make it to educate
Speaker 1: and just you know, be a source of learning so
Speaker 1: consumers can like better make a decision on their purchase
Speaker 1: nice nicely. I'm we talked a little bit before we
Speaker 1: got started here and I'm kind of like a gear
Speaker 1: nerd as well, Um, you know, especially early on once
Speaker 1: you kind of I feel like once I figured out
Speaker 1: my gear, I kind of just settled in and don't
Speaker 1: look at the new stuff as much. And that's where
Speaker 1: I think like a podcast like Gears, if if if
Speaker 1: I was to listen, if I if I was, you know,
Speaker 1: somebody that hadn't figured out my gear and didn't want
Speaker 1: to spend a bunch of money like we have in
Speaker 1: the past to kind of figured out, you could tune
Speaker 1: into a podcast like that and just kind of get
Speaker 1: the lowdown and people that have you know, touched, felt,
Speaker 1: and used all this gear in the field. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: maybe maybe save save a few bucks and make sure
Speaker 1: that you're getting you know, good gear that other people
Speaker 1: have reviewed. Um, you're not everything's gonna work or fit
Speaker 1: and function like it does, um, you know for you
Speaker 1: and jannat but I think you can get a pretty
Speaker 1: good sense on on what's gonna work and and um,
Speaker 1: like I say, cuts cuts a lot of costs out
Speaker 1: of trying it all for yourself. Yeah, it's been Uh,
Speaker 1: it's been fun and we've got a lot of good
Speaker 1: feedback on it. So con forward to seeing what it
Speaker 1: does good. Yeah, I might I might have to change
Speaker 1: my ways and put you guys on like the Spotify
Speaker 1: the Spotify playlist, so I can have you guys in
Speaker 1: the rotation. Um so no, no, I wish you guys
Speaker 1: the best of luck. Um it's on the it's a
Speaker 1: meat Eater brand podcast. Uh, it's gear Talk and it's
Speaker 1: hosted by Jordan and Joannas. Go check it out if
Speaker 1: you're looking at um all their gear reviews. Is it
Speaker 1: a does it come out weekly or you guys every
Speaker 1: other week? Right now we're in every other week. Yep.
Speaker 1: I like that cadence. It seems like sometimes producing these
Speaker 1: is tough enough to do every other week. I couldn't
Speaker 1: imagine doing it every week like some of our podcasts.
Speaker 1: So well, yeah, no, I really appreciate you having having
Speaker 1: you on. So now we're going to jump into some
Speaker 1: of my discussions. Uh, you know, the discussion I want
Speaker 1: to have with you because you honestly have a better
Speaker 1: grasp on some of this stuff like ground blinds that
Speaker 1: we're going to get into. Um, We've got a good
Speaker 1: conversation coming up about boots for tricky hunting and kind
Speaker 1: of how I've had to change, you know, the way
Speaker 1: I think. So we're gonna jump into it to our conversation.
Speaker 1: The first thing I wanted to talk about is are
Speaker 1: you a seat person? Are you a seat pad person
Speaker 1: kind of? And is your style running gun or if
Speaker 1: you're on the ranch there in Nebraska, are you kind
Speaker 1: of uh, you know, set up and you know ground
Speaker 1: blinds in a in a high seat, you know, kind
Speaker 1: of kind of give me your take on that, and
Speaker 1: then I'll expand on it with what I found to
Speaker 1: be the most comfortable set up. Yeah. So a lot
Speaker 1: of times, if I'm hunting myself, I'm probably just archery hunting.
Speaker 1: And a lot of times like we uh me in Leah,
Speaker 1: my wife, we shot a turkey out of or just
Speaker 1: on the ground out in the open with a bow
Speaker 1: last year and that was like super fun to be
Speaker 1: able to do that. But for the most part, like
Speaker 1: I'm probably sitting in a blind for archery season. Um.
Speaker 1: But if we're if we're guiding, then I'm like we're
Speaker 1: more running gun with a shotgun. Um. I've mostly been
Speaker 1: a seat pad person, but now that I've gone to
Speaker 1: something more like a chest rig, it's I don't always
Speaker 1: grab it. I seem to forget it, so I just
Speaker 1: haven't been using one. And when you were talking about
Speaker 1: the little chair that you've been using, that's what I
Speaker 1: want to hear more about that, because I think that's
Speaker 1: what I need to do. Yeah, And so I grew
Speaker 1: up with a new turkey vest every year every other
Speaker 1: year for some reason, you know, the young guy thinking
Speaker 1: that turkey vests mattered or the butt pad was going
Speaker 1: to get better. And I still found and maybe it
Speaker 1: was me being impatient as a younger hunter, where maybe
Speaker 1: I'm finally starting to get a little bit of patience.
Speaker 1: But that was my biggest I think my biggest fault
Speaker 1: when it came to turkey hunting is I wanted to
Speaker 1: move and some of these seat pads, no matter how
Speaker 1: thick they are, no matter what tree is sit under,
Speaker 1: I think fifteen to twenty minutes in and you're like,
Speaker 1: all right, my ass is numb, it's going sore. You're
Speaker 1: rocking from your right to your left, and you're thinking
Speaker 1: of now you're starting to tell yourself why this plan
Speaker 1: isn't gonna work. And you know what, I should get
Speaker 1: up and move from this tree because it's because you're uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: And I've went through that enough times, went out to
Speaker 1: my buddy's place and to hunt in Kansas where we've
Speaker 1: been hunting a lot, you know, deer, and we cut
Speaker 1: the line one tree down everything out there. So I
Speaker 1: have a lot of stories about Kansas, but we go
Speaker 1: back there and hunt twice year. My buddy Randy handed
Speaker 1: me this this bag that looked just like your normal
Speaker 1: you know, foldable beach chair, you know the one you
Speaker 1: can buy for fifteen dollars at Walmart. You know, springtime
Speaker 1: rolls around, they've got them out in the boxes. But
Speaker 1: this was a low to the ground that sits maybe
Speaker 1: two or three inches off and they're built a little
Speaker 1: bit more sturdy, right, um camouflage. I think that brown
Speaker 1: was like Cabella's. So we hunted out of those, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, man, I could fall asleep under every tree
Speaker 1: that I sit under. It's just super comfortable. It adjust
Speaker 1: to a little bit of unevenness, and it just was
Speaker 1: a game changer for me and it allowed me to
Speaker 1: be a lot more patient. I think the one I'm
Speaker 1: using now was like a Browning I don't remember the
Speaker 1: exact name, like a Browning strutter hunting chair or something. Um,
Speaker 1: it's just it folds out and now that I'm using
Speaker 1: a chest rig rather than carrying at my vest. Um,
Speaker 1: I just throw it over my shoulder kind of, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't cross saddle across my back. And that's just
Speaker 1: something I carry everywhere. And when we go to set up,
Speaker 1: within about twenty seconds, I can, you know, throw the
Speaker 1: thing out, get it set in, and we're we're we're
Speaker 1: in place, and it's just allowed long sets. And like
Speaker 1: I said, I'm getting more patient. A lot of our
Speaker 1: turkey call ins are taken thirty to forty five minutes,
Speaker 1: especially when we're hunting in that that time of the
Speaker 1: year where the talms are just completely hand up and
Speaker 1: aren't moving very fast and they're kind of moving at
Speaker 1: their own pace. Um, those little folding chairs are are
Speaker 1: We're a game changer for us. And I can't imagine
Speaker 1: turkey hunting off of a seat pad or a little
Speaker 1: we used to have, like those little hard seats like
Speaker 1: the the cordrea was stretched really tight. You know, Um,
Speaker 1: those things aren't comfortably. This is this is the best
Speaker 1: system I've found. So Um, if you haven't turkey hunted
Speaker 1: off of a small folding seat and you don't think
Speaker 1: it would change things too much, I highly encourage you
Speaker 1: to try it, um, because it's it is a game
Speaker 1: changer for me. And like I said, I fell asleep
Speaker 1: under a tree more than I ever have, um, you know,
Speaker 1: in the past. It's just super comfortable. Um yeah, so
Speaker 1: I ditch seatpad. I'm a seat guy now. I like it, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and like not to change it from turkeys, but I
Speaker 1: think colin kyotes, I've seen people use those two yep.
Speaker 1: And uh, well we'll jump into it a little bit
Speaker 1: on the tick side as well. But I like getting
Speaker 1: myself like another barrier of protection off the ground, um,
Speaker 1: you know, and only giving them four legs to climb
Speaker 1: up to start to get on, you know, and and
Speaker 1: my feet to get on me. Um. So yeah, it
Speaker 1: just has it's it's been a good system. Um. And
Speaker 1: uh yeah, that's kind of a great segue into seat
Speaker 1: versus seat pad and then you know with the chest
Speaker 1: rig versus a turkey vest conversation, Um, what's your system currently.
Speaker 1: I've never been like a big turkey vest person. Um.
Speaker 1: I've had a couple and I just always seem to
Speaker 1: end up figuring out how to put stuff in my
Speaker 1: pockets enough stuff in my pockets to just make it work. Um.
Speaker 1: But then I started using a chest rig and that's
Speaker 1: been really nice just to have everything in one spot.
Speaker 1: Like I can toss it on, I can still get
Speaker 1: in and out of the pickup with it easy. Um,
Speaker 1: I don't have to take it off. Everything's just in
Speaker 1: one spot. And really, like when I'm done with turkey season,
Speaker 1: like the thing gets put on the shelf and then
Speaker 1: it's like I pull it off the shelf and pretty
Speaker 1: much everything is in there that I need. So yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's what I use. An FHF just the regular
Speaker 1: chest rig and then I put in an E four
Speaker 1: pouch on the front of it this year just for
Speaker 1: a little bit extra space for like my headlamp and
Speaker 1: stuff like that. Um. Yeah, but that's been a that's
Speaker 1: been a good system for me. Yeah. Are you also
Speaker 1: using uh, I'm I'm the most unorganized hunter in the world. Like,
Speaker 1: as long as it fits in the pocket, it's good.
Speaker 1: So when you look at my chest rigg, it's two
Speaker 1: pot calls, my strikers, my locators are all just like
Speaker 1: just in there in the bottom right. Are you using
Speaker 1: any of the divide like the striker dividers, the shotgun
Speaker 1: shell dividers and stuff. HF for you just kind of
Speaker 1: if it fits and it zips and you're good to go, zips.
Speaker 1: I like it. Yeah, No, I do use that that
Speaker 1: turkey I think it's just called like their turkey accessory
Speaker 1: kid or whatever. That velcro's in the inside, UM, one
Speaker 1: thing that's kind of cool. With the diaphragm U divider deal,
Speaker 1: I can like stick it to the inside. But then
Speaker 1: with the velcrow the E four pouch has a velcrow
Speaker 1: patch on the outside, and so I can unstick that
Speaker 1: and I can stick it to the outside if I'm
Speaker 1: if I need to just get to my calls more,
Speaker 1: if I don't want to just keep my thing open
Speaker 1: as I'm running around. Um. But for the most part,
Speaker 1: I keep that stuck in. But yeah, I've got it
Speaker 1: pretty I've got it pretty organized in there. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've they sent me all the Turkey accessories and I
Speaker 1: haven't ran it. Um, But I'm gonna try to do
Speaker 1: a better job of, you know, setting setting it up.
Speaker 1: And I wanted to touch on turkey vest just a
Speaker 1: little bit. As I mentioned earlier, I had I had
Speaker 1: all kinds of turkey vests growing up. Um, and I
Speaker 1: got to the point where I had to have seventeen
Speaker 1: pot calls, you know, fourteen strikers. I had two. You know,
Speaker 1: it's like you just had to fill up every pocket
Speaker 1: and then when it was time to like where did
Speaker 1: I put my scour pad or my chalk, You're like, oh,
Speaker 1: it's inside the front left pocket, two pockets deep, and
Speaker 1: then the zipper that's inside. You know, it's like you
Speaker 1: couldn't find anything. And so I think it just comes
Speaker 1: with a lot of experience and learning, like, hey, you
Speaker 1: probably only need two pot calls, Max, even though I'm
Speaker 1: the game call guy, right like I need to have
Speaker 1: calls on, may need to be promoting them. But you're like,
Speaker 1: I can probably get away with maybe a box calf.
Speaker 1: I want to use it on this hunt. Is it
Speaker 1: a windy day? Is a big country? If not, maybe
Speaker 1: I'll leave my box call the truck or the or
Speaker 1: the side by side for that day. So I think
Speaker 1: it was just like learning that I didn't need to
Speaker 1: have so much stuff on me to turkey hunt. You know,
Speaker 1: I can leave the truck with three different mouth diaphragms,
Speaker 1: you know, a couple different strikers, maybe a crow call,
Speaker 1: maybe a woodpecker call, and my binoculars. And maybe a
Speaker 1: couple extra shotgun shells. To be honest, I actually just
Speaker 1: been carrying my three shotgun shells in the gun, and
Speaker 1: it's do you do I really need to bring a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of backups, Like if I do my job,
Speaker 1: keep my shots close, like I shouldn't even need to
Speaker 1: shoot more than once. So it's just like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't need to carry a whole extra box of shells anymore.
Speaker 1: And the chest rig is just like you said, it's simple.
Speaker 1: I grab it at the beginning of the year. It's
Speaker 1: got everything I need in it, and I don't have
Speaker 1: to carry this big, cumbersome turkey best. The one thing
Speaker 1: I wouldn't say it's it's a knock on the chest rigg.
Speaker 1: It's just one of the things I don't have a
Speaker 1: good solution for. It is like carrying a little bit
Speaker 1: of water. I'm not gonna lie like we're not hiking
Speaker 1: mountains for turkeys. But it's like, all right, you've been
Speaker 1: away from the for three or four hours, like I'm thirsty, Um,
Speaker 1: Like what am I doing for water? And usually that's
Speaker 1: just you know, a little cheap disposable water bottle like
Speaker 1: just shoved in my origin pocket, you know, or something
Speaker 1: that's what it ends up being. Um, so that's the
Speaker 1: one thing I miss on the turkey best having a
Speaker 1: spot for water. And we're going to talk about decoys
Speaker 1: here in a little bit, but you know, my turkey
Speaker 1: best used to also just to hold all of my
Speaker 1: decoys in the back, and now that we're using you know,
Speaker 1: some Dave Smith decoys and whatnot, I don't have the
Speaker 1: need to carry a bunch of foamies around. So it's
Speaker 1: like the vest just really doesn't have a lot of
Speaker 1: utility anymore for me. Yeah. Yeah, And I will say
Speaker 1: I'm pretty like I like turkey hunting. I don't like
Speaker 1: love love love it, so I don't get too crazy.
Speaker 1: I keep like my call is pretty simple. I have
Speaker 1: like a pot call, and I have mouth diaphragm calls,
Speaker 1: even like last year, even guiding people I don't remember.
Speaker 1: I think I just like forgot my actual old turkey diaphragms.
Speaker 1: I called in at least three birds with an Elk
Speaker 1: campre dude. Yeah, and it works like it's super clear,
Speaker 1: it's a super clean there's no rasking this to it,
Speaker 1: but it works. Yeah. I'm always amazed how many people
Speaker 1: we get sending us pictures in what Turkey's killed with
Speaker 1: our ELK calls. It's just they're more comfortable. They don't
Speaker 1: have to do a whole bunch of professional calling. You know,
Speaker 1: it's just it works. It gets a job done. And
Speaker 1: you know, even though you know, my job is to
Speaker 1: make and sell game calls, like it's really ninety percent
Speaker 1: of the equations right place, right time, right mood, right,
Speaker 1: it's it's not necessarily the calling does help and finish
Speaker 1: them off. But you know, very rarely, Um, you know,
Speaker 1: are you is the culling making up the majority of
Speaker 1: of you know, the the am on a word that wrong.
Speaker 1: The calling isn't very big piece of the pie when
Speaker 1: it comes like you're, you know, putting the success together.
Speaker 1: It's it's a small portion. And I recognize that. Um
Speaker 1: so optics, we talked about it a little bit. Carrying binoculars.
Speaker 1: Um do you do you carry like spotters in your truck?
Speaker 1: Like not with you for sure? If anybody carries a
Speaker 1: spotter white turkey hunting and I want to talk to
Speaker 1: you and figure out why. But like in your rig,
Speaker 1: are you using anything else? Do you bring range finders
Speaker 1: to maybe just check your range? Where you're sittting decoys
Speaker 1: up or are kind of what do you look at
Speaker 1: as far as like your optics package while you're tricky hunting. Yeah,
Speaker 1: for the most part, you know, I'm just carrying those
Speaker 1: like an eight power on my chest and then I
Speaker 1: will carry a spotting scope in my pickup just to
Speaker 1: like really sometimes what I'll do guiding wise is I'll
Speaker 1: go put people in a blind in the evening and
Speaker 1: then they can just kind of hunt themselves, and then
Speaker 1: I'll go and do some scouting try to find birds.
Speaker 1: And I can, dude, I've picked out birds in trees
Speaker 1: with my spotting scope from like long ways away, like
Speaker 1: a mile away, yep. And then it just gives you
Speaker 1: an idea of like, all right, well those birds are
Speaker 1: like kind of over there, like we can probably you know,
Speaker 1: slip in this way or whatever. So that has been
Speaker 1: nice for me. Um, something I'm gonna use a little
Speaker 1: bit more of uh this year. And not like I
Speaker 1: don't want to do super shameless plug for a sig.
Speaker 1: But there have you seen their image stabilizing binoculars. I've
Speaker 1: looked through them. Yeah, I think um at the Western
Speaker 1: un somebody had them last year and looked through them
Speaker 1: a little bit. Yeah. Yeah, they're they're ten powers, are
Speaker 1: super little and super light, and they're like if you're
Speaker 1: hand holding all the time like you are often with turkeys,
Speaker 1: like that thing is so nice just to steady it up. Cool. Cool. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And one thing I used to also not carry was
Speaker 1: a range finder and my my rifle one. You know,
Speaker 1: I use loophold stuff. So like my twenty eight hundred
Speaker 1: was just too much for turkeys, Like right, it's it's
Speaker 1: not geared up. So I just grabbed my my full draw.
Speaker 1: I think last year I used the four. This year
Speaker 1: I'll have the five. But you know what, just any
Speaker 1: archery range finder that's good. Um, short distant ranging. Um,
Speaker 1: it just helps your setup. You know when you're when
Speaker 1: you're out there, you know, if you're on the edge
Speaker 1: of a field, your depth perception is off a little bit,
Speaker 1: like just making sure you're not shooting too far. You're
Speaker 1: you're setups right, Um, So we typically range stuff and
Speaker 1: when we set up just real quickly, all right, we
Speaker 1: can shoot out to that bush, we can shoot to
Speaker 1: that line. Um, we can shoot ten yards past the decoys,
Speaker 1: whatever it may be. And it's just just so we
Speaker 1: have some confidence and we're not miss miss you know,
Speaker 1: ranging something by fifteen twenty yards. Um. Yeah, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: it's a great thing to carry with you. Now we're
Speaker 1: going to roll into the next Uh. Question I have
Speaker 1: for you is on ground blinds, which you you know,
Speaker 1: guiding and having you know, customers that you may want
Speaker 1: to limit their their movement or somebody that might not
Speaker 1: be experienced. Um in the woods. Um, I've never hunted
Speaker 1: out of a ground blind, um for turkeys. So what
Speaker 1: do you feel about ground blinds? Um? What's where were
Speaker 1: they useful? And then maybe where do they have their drawbacks? Yeah,
Speaker 1: drawbacks can definitely be just your ability to move is quick. Um,
Speaker 1: you kind of have to. And it seems like when
Speaker 1: I when I go to hunt in a ground blind,
Speaker 1: I bring like the kitchen sink with me because I
Speaker 1: feel like I got to sit there for a long time. Um.
Speaker 1: But then I always if they're not moving or something,
Speaker 1: I always feel like I got to get out and
Speaker 1: and get after them. So there's a patience factor there
Speaker 1: for sure. Um. But I like ground blinds for especially
Speaker 1: if the birds aren't moving, um something that or aren't talking.
Speaker 1: Sorry if if they're not talking, Um, I can set
Speaker 1: that ground blind up in a spot where I've just
Speaker 1: seen turkeys go buy a lot or something like that.
Speaker 1: Sometimes like you just got to wait them out. And sometimes,
Speaker 1: like you know, clients always come in and they want
Speaker 1: that like gobbler running in from a long ways away
Speaker 1: and they want to get the whole experience. But the
Speaker 1: reality is it just doesn't always happen like that, and
Speaker 1: so you got to be able to adjust. So that's
Speaker 1: where I see ground blinds really coming in. I put
Speaker 1: them in places where I just know that turkey's like
Speaker 1: to be or pass through, So if we can't get
Speaker 1: them talking, that's always a good place to put somebody,
Speaker 1: like in the evenings or the afternoons or whatever. But yeah,
Speaker 1: it's just kinda they're nice because you can move around,
Speaker 1: You can move around, kind of have more stuff with you,
Speaker 1: like if you think that you're gonna especially I think
Speaker 1: like on a really small chunk of property where you
Speaker 1: can't really you don't really just want to walk through
Speaker 1: it and blow it out. Just spending a lot of
Speaker 1: time in a ground blind seems to be like just
Speaker 1: kind of how the East, you know, more Eastern type
Speaker 1: hunting is um just due to parcel size. So, um,
Speaker 1: they can be really nice, but I definitely see where
Speaker 1: people get impatient and they just don't want to sit there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then um continue on my uh me not knowing
Speaker 1: anything about ground blinds, you can see them for you know,
Speaker 1: you see him out there one hundred twenty ninety nine
Speaker 1: and then you can see ground blinds at five hundred dollars.
Speaker 1: Are you of the opinion that you get what you're
Speaker 1: paid for on ground blinds? I know that, like the
Speaker 1: space inside may be different, like the shooting windows may
Speaker 1: be laid out different. Um even I mean, I'll even
Speaker 1: give you a chance, like is there a brand that
Speaker 1: you like to use or is it more of those
Speaker 1: just a ground blinds of ground blind you. So I've
Speaker 1: gone back and forth on this a lot. Um. I
Speaker 1: think if you're in a spot where it's really windy
Speaker 1: and you're dealing with a lot of winds, um, you're
Speaker 1: gonna want a more expensive one. Just it seems like
Speaker 1: the poles or b fere where the joints like come
Speaker 1: in usually they out those are just better, um, because
Speaker 1: the wind just destroys them. That's that's a huge problem
Speaker 1: we have here. Like I have muzzloader. Deer hunters in
Speaker 1: them a lot, and the winds just kill them. Um, Honestly,
Speaker 1: I've I've gone to a I've bought a ton of
Speaker 1: those things, and uh, the double bowls just seem to
Speaker 1: like be holding strong and it's it's Um they're expensive, man,
Speaker 1: They're like four hundred bucks. Um. But they've got some
Speaker 1: They've got some really cool ones. Now. I bought one
Speaker 1: just this last year for deer hunters that it's like
Speaker 1: the sea through but you can't see into it, like
Speaker 1: the whole the whole wall in front of you or
Speaker 1: the whole two walls in front of you. You You can
Speaker 1: completely see through them, um, but they are not supposed
Speaker 1: to be able to see in. So like that's super
Speaker 1: cool too. It's just kind of fun to sit in
Speaker 1: it because you're not just looking through a tiny little
Speaker 1: window all the time. That's awesome. I hunted um a
Speaker 1: little bit out of them. Um. They were elevated ground blinds,
Speaker 1: but the ones in Kansas they had more of like
Speaker 1: a metal structure like and then they were screwed down
Speaker 1: to like a palette or like a platform. But yeah,
Speaker 1: those ones are like frustrating because you would have deer
Speaker 1: running from your right and you could hear them and
Speaker 1: then they'd pop in front of you. It's like, man,
Speaker 1: I wish I could see like I it almost like,
Speaker 1: I don't want to say it took away from the experience,
Speaker 1: but it did take away from the experience because I
Speaker 1: was limited. I can only see, you know, ninety degrees
Speaker 1: out in front of me, nothing to my right. But
Speaker 1: yet Yeah, so it would be cool to have like
Speaker 1: that double bull system you're talking about where you can
Speaker 1: actually see through and see everything versus out out you know,
Speaker 1: strategic windows that you have opened. So yeah, yeah, pretty cool.
Speaker 1: One one quick thing Baronet. There's a company called Baronet
Speaker 1: that makes a blind called an OX five and instead
Speaker 1: of four you know, usually you usually it's a five
Speaker 1: hub blind, so you have four sides and then your top.
Speaker 1: This one's actually a six, so you have one more
Speaker 1: U The thing is huge. Um so, like people with kids,
Speaker 1: like multiple kids, and like they want to sit in
Speaker 1: and have a lot of room to like, you know,
Speaker 1: have the kids laid down and stuff like that. OXX
Speaker 1: five is great and I think it's like three hundred
Speaker 1: bucks or something like that. The thanks for educating me
Speaker 1: a little bit on ground blinds. Now we're gonna jump
Speaker 1: into boots for turkey. Um. You know, as I got started,
Speaker 1: it was always just took whatever boots I was MAO
Speaker 1: hunting Western big game in um and and those those
Speaker 1: kind of got the nod for for turkey hunting. But
Speaker 1: you know, the more I've learned, the more I've you know,
Speaker 1: got the chance to try different boots. Um, I'm turning
Speaker 1: into more of a like a lacrosse like arrowhead type guy. Um.
Speaker 1: It seems like every morning the grass is wet, um,
Speaker 1: you know when during spring turkey, regardless of whether it's
Speaker 1: a clear night or not. What's your boot system, um
Speaker 1: for for turkey hunting? And what do you what do
Speaker 1: you go with? Yeah, so here we're not really dealing
Speaker 1: with like swampy type stuff. In the spring, the ground
Speaker 1: like hardens up pretty quick. So I'm kind of the
Speaker 1: same honestly, just like even a flexible pair of boots,
Speaker 1: like not even really a mountain boot, you know, just
Speaker 1: like one that's pretty quiet when you're walking, just like
Speaker 1: a comfortable, nice boot. But if I'm using my like
Speaker 1: rubber boots and stuff, a lot of times it's really
Speaker 1: nice with rubber boots because they're warmer in the morning
Speaker 1: and stuff. They're just warmer, and if you do have
Speaker 1: to like do a crieker river crossing or something like that,
Speaker 1: they're just easier to use that with. But I have
Speaker 1: always been like, even for all this ranch stuff, I've
Speaker 1: always been a muck boot person, Like that's just always
Speaker 1: what I've bought, Like that always seemed to be the
Speaker 1: gold standard to me was muck boots. And I recently,
Speaker 1: like a couple of years ago, I tried apparel across
Speaker 1: that were I don't remember what they were called, but
Speaker 1: they were just like a little bulky like they were
Speaker 1: pretty much the same as muck I was like, yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: that's kind of one and the same. Well, this last
Speaker 1: year I got the Arrowhead model from Lacrosse. Dude, it's
Speaker 1: like a different situation, Like it's I got the seven
Speaker 1: millimeter ones. They make a lighter one too, but it's
Speaker 1: supposed to be like negative forty to forty degrees is
Speaker 1: what those things are supposed to be good for, like
Speaker 1: cold weatherwise, And they're so much more comfortable once you
Speaker 1: put them on. It's like a running shoe. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: that's that was the reason I always hated rubber boots.
Speaker 1: You know, growing up, we just probably had the cheap
Speaker 1: ones where if you walk more than you know, out
Speaker 1: to your mailbox and back, you had blisters everywhere and
Speaker 1: they were just uncomfortable from your your your heel slipping. Um.
Speaker 1: I got those arrowhead sports, you know, the same seven
Speaker 1: millimeter and it's like I could probably you know, hike
Speaker 1: all day in them and not have any issues. I
Speaker 1: don't know about going up a mountain for too long,
Speaker 1: but that was always the reason I would just go
Speaker 1: to go to my my mountain boots. Um. And so yeah,
Speaker 1: if if I know I'm not climbing mountains, if I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna you know, put on five or six miles
Speaker 1: on in a morning or a day turkey hunting, I'm
Speaker 1: always gonna go for those, um, you know those knee
Speaker 1: high lacrosse boots at this point, you know those type
Speaker 1: of boots. Um. Now we were talking a little bit before. Now,
Speaker 1: if I'm showing up in my spot northeast Washington, where
Speaker 1: it's public ground, it's super rugged. Your day near you know,
Speaker 1: mule deer or sheep hunting for turkeys, Um, I'm still
Speaker 1: gonna lace up my my mountain boots. Because it's it's
Speaker 1: just kind of matching the terrain you're in. But um, yeah,
Speaker 1: if you haven't tried, you know, like like say, I'm
Speaker 1: not not trying to give any specific brand or company
Speaker 1: a plug, but those Lacrosse arrowheads, Um, they're they're a
Speaker 1: legit boot that you can cover some ground in and
Speaker 1: they're super comfortable. Um, it's it's nice, Like you say,
Speaker 1: they're warmer, I know my feet aren't gonna get wet, um,
Speaker 1: and they just they're they're a good boot and you
Speaker 1: know we're gonna get into ticks here in a little bit.
Speaker 1: The other thing is that's nice, um, is that they're
Speaker 1: they're a tall boot. You know, they cover more of
Speaker 1: your they they give kind of and if you tuck
Speaker 1: your your pants in, it gives like access for ticks
Speaker 1: is a very difficult path. Yeah that's a really good
Speaker 1: point man. Um Yeah, those those boots. I I go
Speaker 1: through this thing, like just to mention it real quick.
Speaker 1: Every time I put them on, I'm like, are these
Speaker 1: lighter than the other ones? And I'll weigh them and
Speaker 1: they weighed pretty much the same, but just the way
Speaker 1: that they fit, they just seem like nimble and lighter.
Speaker 1: I can't explain it, but I'm just like I've been
Speaker 1: blown away the last couple of weeks season them. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: they're legit. So if you you're going out trick hunting, UM,
Speaker 1: don't don't um discredit rubber boots. Um that they they've
Speaker 1: got their place for sure. So uh, ticks one of
Speaker 1: the things that used to just drive me nuts. They
Speaker 1: still drive me nuts, but we've kind of got them
Speaker 1: under wrap. Um, every every year I came back from Kansas,
Speaker 1: I've been bit or had ticks some kind of stuck
Speaker 1: in me. So yeah, it's it's it bothers me. My
Speaker 1: little funny story. I cannot get my boy to youth
Speaker 1: turkey hunt. And it's not just a it's not just
Speaker 1: he's scared of ticks. It's like a serious phobia. Like
Speaker 1: if my dog comes in the house with a tick,
Speaker 1: like my kids like running through glass doors to get
Speaker 1: out the other side of the house. Like it's it's legit. So, um,
Speaker 1: ticks and what do we what do we do to
Speaker 1: fix it? And I'll let you go. And now I've
Speaker 1: got kind of a gross little story about um what
Speaker 1: what what happened to me last year in Kansas? So
Speaker 1: what do you go to prevent ticks. Um, there's I
Speaker 1: think there's like the chemical side, and then there's what
Speaker 1: I would consider like housekeeping before you sit down, before
Speaker 1: you do this or that, like you can prevent a
Speaker 1: lot of this from happening. Yeah. I we don't have
Speaker 1: a huge tick problem here, like they're definitely around. Um,
Speaker 1: but you know the story you're gonna tell. I don't
Speaker 1: think we have anything. I've never seen anything quiet like
Speaker 1: that here. Um. But I've got the just the basic
Speaker 1: like the off or the sawyer stuff in the house
Speaker 1: where it's just like a ticker or repellent, just spray
Speaker 1: it on the outside of your clothes. Um. I've done
Speaker 1: that a little bit. It seems like if I haven't
Speaker 1: really seen any ticks, I just kind of forget to
Speaker 1: do it, and then I don't do it. Um. I
Speaker 1: do just when I get home, though, I try to
Speaker 1: like look through all my clothes and just do like
Speaker 1: a body check and make sure that there's none stuck
Speaker 1: to me. Um. But I'm really interested to hear what
Speaker 1: you guys say about ticks. Yeah. Yeah, so yeah, chemical wise,
Speaker 1: like we use sawyer or repel like aerosol. Um. I
Speaker 1: think I think it's mixed like a half percent permethrin. UM.
Speaker 1: I know you can get higher concentrations off of like
Speaker 1: Amazon and stuff. I'm I am in no way doning
Speaker 1: like the safety of that here on the podcast, but
Speaker 1: there are ways to get it in like higher concentration.
Speaker 1: But yeah, we we lay out all of our gear. Um,
Speaker 1: when we get to where we're going, we spray it down.
Speaker 1: I think it lasts like two weeks and it makes
Speaker 1: it through washings and Whatnotum, So that's really helped. I
Speaker 1: would I got. I got like some. I sprayed my
Speaker 1: gaiter last year because I was always worried like if
Speaker 1: something landed on my shoulder it came off the tree.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't recommend like necessarily spray it on your gaiter
Speaker 1: and breathing through it for long periods of time. But yeah,
Speaker 1: the chemical treatment does great. But yeah, last year in Kansas,
Speaker 1: our buddy Chris Parrish was the last one with a tag,
Speaker 1: and me and Dirk set up maybe thirty yards behind
Speaker 1: him into the woods to help do some just some
Speaker 1: supplemental calling occasionally and set up in my seat kind
Speaker 1: of set up in a bunch of oak leaves, and
Speaker 1: I could see that I always wear my gaiters as
Speaker 1: well as another if I'm wearing leather boots or I'm
Speaker 1: not wearing my rubber boots, like I still I just
Speaker 1: want those ticks to have like a crazy path to
Speaker 1: get on me, you know, if possible. We're sitting there
Speaker 1: and I start to see some ticks like crawling up
Speaker 1: my leg. Like visually, I'm like, this is interesting. But
Speaker 1: you could watch them get to like your knee, and
Speaker 1: they get kind of almost what I would consider drunk.
Speaker 1: They were like they would start walking crooked, and then
Speaker 1: they'd walk to the side of your pant and like
Speaker 1: literally just fall to the ground like permeteran was killing
Speaker 1: them by time they got to my knee, and then
Speaker 1: they were I must have sat in a nest, a
Speaker 1: nymph nest or a midge nest. Like they were mostly babies,
Speaker 1: but I had a couple of big ones. And then
Speaker 1: I realized that I was sitting in a lone star
Speaker 1: tick nest, which is it for those that don't know,
Speaker 1: those are the ones that carry the alpha gal syndrome.
Speaker 1: Were when they bite you. When they bite you, you
Speaker 1: could no longer eat red meat. So now I no
Speaker 1: longer cared if Chris Parrish ever killed a turkey. I
Speaker 1: was getting up and moving once I put it all together.
Speaker 1: But yeah, and just it's not my place to tell
Speaker 1: everybody about that. But my research that I did is
Speaker 1: you got about a three percent chance if a lone
Speaker 1: star tick bites you, that you're gonna get that alpha gal.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, it's not worth it. So I picked
Speaker 1: up my seat. You know some things I could have
Speaker 1: did there better, like cleaned out the area when I
Speaker 1: first sat down, you know, get rid of all of
Speaker 1: those oak leaves, and gave myself, you know, maybe a
Speaker 1: six by six area to sit down, which maybe would
Speaker 1: have helped. But yeah, that permeteran I said one hundred
Speaker 1: ticks earlier. I bet you I probably had, realistically fifty
Speaker 1: to sixty climb up my leg and none of them
Speaker 1: made it past my knee. So the permethrin works. Um,
Speaker 1: it works well. Like I said, I was always worried
Speaker 1: about something coming into my neck area, so I sprayed
Speaker 1: my gator down, which is always kind of tucked in there,
Speaker 1: and I didn't feel real good after a couple of days.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if it was that or maybe
Speaker 1: I was sick, but I'm definitely not a medical doctor,
Speaker 1: but permetern works. UM. Everything else is like just extra
Speaker 1: precautions like tucking you know, a shirt in into your
Speaker 1: pants and cinching your belt up pretty tight. Like we
Speaker 1: talked earlier rubber boots put your pants inside so they
Speaker 1: didn't have to you know a long way around. UM,
Speaker 1: I've even went to you know, putting like elastic velcro
Speaker 1: straps like around my wrist just to keep things really tight.
Speaker 1: Just just extra precautions, not necessarily gear related, but just
Speaker 1: prevent any of that stuff from happening. So we talked
Speaker 1: a little bit earlier about vest versus chest riggs. We
Speaker 1: kind of talked about where vests maybe we're a little
Speaker 1: bit better carrying decoys are you? Are you bringing decoys
Speaker 1: in every turkey hunting situation or there's certain setups we're
Speaker 1: going to bring them. And then what what decoys do
Speaker 1: you tend to use? You know, for the most part
Speaker 1: we're especially during shotgun season, I'm just like not using one.
Speaker 1: We'll try to do that. We'll just try to not
Speaker 1: use one. UM just helps you like move setups quicker.
Speaker 1: And then sometimes I mean, I don't know, maybe if
Speaker 1: it's just a way that I set set them up,
Speaker 1: but sometimes many they might see a decoy and then
Speaker 1: just skirt you like they don't won't commit to it
Speaker 1: for some reason. Um, so that deal. But I just
Speaker 1: have a DSD hen that I use most of the time. Um,
Speaker 1: I've got some other cheaper one, uh that are like
Speaker 1: a Jake you could put a fan on it. Um.
Speaker 1: I gotta be honest, I don't like super Nerd out
Speaker 1: about all the different setups and all that stuff. I've
Speaker 1: got the hen that those ones from DSD like they
Speaker 1: look so realistic, like pretty realistic looking hen like finding
Speaker 1: a decoy. That's pretty much what I'm using. Yeah, I've
Speaker 1: been able. I've got a buddy that, um, Eric Broughton
Speaker 1: who's on the podcast last week. He's got a couple
Speaker 1: of like real life stuffer hens um we're in. I've
Speaker 1: seen but just like you, I've seen them not working
Speaker 1: situations where I almost wonder if we didn't have any
Speaker 1: decoy out, if we would, it would have worked better.
Speaker 1: You always hear about people like with a Jake and
Speaker 1: a breeding Hin setup, and I just feel like at
Speaker 1: times they they have worked, you know, maybe even like
Speaker 1: detrimental to the situation. But then like last year in Kansas,
Speaker 1: we were on a field edge. We we kind of
Speaker 1: crawled out there. We knew there were turkeys on the
Speaker 1: other end, set up our decoys and that was the
Speaker 1: only reason. You know, calling worked a little bit, but
Speaker 1: it was a visual that got those birds all the
Speaker 1: way to us. So I think they definitely have their place.
Speaker 1: And and like you, um, I've got a Dave Smith
Speaker 1: deco one of the hands and then a jake and
Speaker 1: you know, we can put the fan on and there's
Speaker 1: just times where we'll use it in times where we don't.
Speaker 1: We usually always carry them around with us for the
Speaker 1: most part, but um, you know when we're running and
Speaker 1: gunn and like like I said, I'm already carrying a
Speaker 1: chair and then now you've got like the hard decoy
Speaker 1: bags over your shoulders, like you can make it happen.
Speaker 1: But um, yeah, I'm I guess I'm I'm not bias
Speaker 1: either way. Like we usually carry them, we sometimes use them,
Speaker 1: sometimes we don't. I think they can be a great asset,
Speaker 1: especially where um, if the birds aren't real callable and
Speaker 1: you think that that visuals that's gonna work, like, well,
Speaker 1: we definitely throw them out there nice. So we're gonna
Speaker 1: talk about weapons in the in the gear that we
Speaker 1: ultimately use to kill the turkey. You're gonna touch on archery,
Speaker 1: and then I'm gonna go over just uh, real quick
Speaker 1: kind of what I use as far as my setup
Speaker 1: and you know, as far as like patterning and stuff
Speaker 1: like that. But you're you're an archery turkey hunter. What
Speaker 1: do you use? Are using like special broadheads? Are you
Speaker 1: lightning your setup? Kind of give us, give us the
Speaker 1: lowdown on an archery setup specifically for turkey. Yeah. The
Speaker 1: only thing that I change with turkeys is I will
Speaker 1: put an expandable broadhead on it. Um just seems to
Speaker 1: I don't know, just it seemed to work a little
Speaker 1: bit better for me for turkeys. UM, so it opens
Speaker 1: them up pretty good. I have the Grim Reaper. They
Speaker 1: have a white Tail Hybrid. It's like a two I
Speaker 1: think it's a two and a half inch cutting diameter. UM.
Speaker 1: That has been a really nice one for me. And
Speaker 1: they're honestly, they're turkeys are small and they're easy to
Speaker 1: miss with archery equipment, so UM, I tend to not
Speaker 1: want a super expensive broadhead up there. So those ones,
Speaker 1: you know, they're your basic like forty bucks a pack
Speaker 1: or whatever for three of them. Um, So I snag though,
Speaker 1: that's pretty much all I change. Um, I don't do
Speaker 1: like a big change difference in my archery set up
Speaker 1: from turkeys to like uh target shooting, you know, like
Speaker 1: three D season to then going into you know, elk season.
Speaker 1: I don't really change anything up like that. But the
Speaker 1: broadhead is something I do change. Gotcha. So you're just
Speaker 1: using more of what we consider like a big game expandable.
Speaker 1: You're not going to like the you know whatever, the
Speaker 1: turkey guillotines or like these big four inch cutting diam
Speaker 1: You're you're just sticking with something that's more accurate and
Speaker 1: smaller expandable. Yeah. Yeah, because honestly, sometimes man like especially
Speaker 1: if we're doing a running gun archery setup, that's like
Speaker 1: way different, more difficult. You're shooting these things at forty
Speaker 1: yards to um, they're not you know three yards from
Speaker 1: the from the blind, where I think those guillotines could
Speaker 1: really be uh, where they're more like it's likely to
Speaker 1: actually work. Um ye. So yeah, it that expandable seems
Speaker 1: to work good for me, gotcha, gotcha. Yeah. And then
Speaker 1: I've I've always felt like turkeys were designed to be
Speaker 1: shot with a shotgun. So I just I just haven't
Speaker 1: picked my bow up and taking them yet. But I
Speaker 1: really like having like a semi automatic shotgunning. I hunted
Speaker 1: with a pump forever when UM I first got going,
Speaker 1: it's what I could afford. I really liked recoil management. UM.
Speaker 1: Some of these turkey loads UM really kind of thump you,
Speaker 1: UM when you go to pull the trigger. It's not
Speaker 1: so much while you're hunting, it's it's more of the
Speaker 1: patterning and whatnot. But I'm using the weather be currently
Speaker 1: great gun. UM. I really I kind of got away
Speaker 1: from like changing AMMO and tinkering with my setup for
Speaker 1: a long time because my old gun shot so well.
Speaker 1: When I got a new gun, I'm like, oh, now
Speaker 1: we can get a new choke, we can get new ammo.
Speaker 1: UM did a bunch of research found that Indian Creek
Speaker 1: seemed to have a great following and like a great UM.
Speaker 1: You know, they were shooting great patterns and they were
Speaker 1: really kind of designing for TSS. I know a lot
Speaker 1: of the guys within the Meater crew were using Carlton
Speaker 1: chokes with great success. So I screwed into Indian Creek
Speaker 1: and then I went to TSS ended up. You know,
Speaker 1: we used to have like a meat eater had like
Speaker 1: a five seven eight mix or something, and I ended
Speaker 1: up just going with a peer number nine. I wanted
Speaker 1: more babies, and I didn't have any intention of shooting
Speaker 1: the past fifty yards and TSS nine is fully capable
Speaker 1: out to fifty And so that combination of being able
Speaker 1: to drop down to a three inch magnum instead of
Speaker 1: a three and a half inch which I was shooting
Speaker 1: out of my old pump gun, that choke and that pattern,
Speaker 1: like it is an incredible I've never hunted with the
Speaker 1: red dot and was able to kind of you know,
Speaker 1: throw that on, and it's just I almost feel like
Speaker 1: it's cheating a little bit, like the gun is just automatic,
Speaker 1: you know. And I've got the problem of a of
Speaker 1: a twenty yard bird now of me missing if I
Speaker 1: don't do everything right. So that's the one downside. Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I we're shooting like a I don't know, a six
Speaker 1: inch circle. It seems like at about twenty, you know,
Speaker 1: with just a few a few errant babies. But yeah,
Speaker 1: there's all kinds of way. I'm not gonna tell you
Speaker 1: how to hunt but I would say, you know, get
Speaker 1: comfortable with what turkeys can pick up and seeing like
Speaker 1: maybe you know your first bird or two with a shotgun,
Speaker 1: and then once you've kind of got that down and
Speaker 1: what you can get away with like I'm one of
Speaker 1: these days, I just need to pick up my bow.
Speaker 1: But and then archery hunting, like you had said earlier,
Speaker 1: having success archery hunting for turkeys outside of a blind
Speaker 1: is like one of those ultimate, you know, ultimate accomplishments
Speaker 1: because they've got such good eyesight and getting your bow
Speaker 1: drawn is incredibly tough. Yeah, it seems like the best
Speaker 1: time to do it is coming right up when archery
Speaker 1: season is starting just here in about a week. The
Speaker 1: twenty fifth, I think is when we open here, they're
Speaker 1: just all in big groups. So then you got a
Speaker 1: ton of hands that are like looking around. So yeah,
Speaker 1: we uh we locked out with that. I just gotten
Speaker 1: in a pissing match with the hen and got her
Speaker 1: to bring the whole crew in. Bye. And then did
Speaker 1: they did they pick you up when you drew or
Speaker 1: did were you completely like yep? Yeah, they ended up
Speaker 1: I'm not joking, man. There were at least twelve hens
Speaker 1: in that flock, and they were like they were feet
Speaker 1: away from us, just pecking at the ground. I don't
Speaker 1: understand how they didn't see us, because you know, I
Speaker 1: was on my Leah was sitting down like kind of
Speaker 1: on her knees but on her butt, and I was
Speaker 1: just standing up on my knees beside her with a
Speaker 1: camera and I was almost laughing because they were so close.
Speaker 1: I was like, how is this even happening? But they
Speaker 1: ended up, Yeah, they came in. She ended up shooting
Speaker 1: him at probably fifteen yards maybe just strutted right by us.
Speaker 1: We kind of waited until they all got by us
Speaker 1: before she drew. But yeah, they picked us up when
Speaker 1: we drew, that's for sure. Yeah, that's cool. That's cool.
Speaker 1: So Um and then last thing with gear, which um
Speaker 1: this is gonna be a shameless plug for sure, is calls. Right.
Speaker 1: You know, everybody when you think of spring turkey hunting,
Speaker 1: everybody's got calls in their hand. You know. The whole
Speaker 1: idea is to interact, and um, you know we we
Speaker 1: bring we've got our al calls, we've got our crow
Speaker 1: calls for locators, we've got our meat eater x belps
Speaker 1: turkey lineup. Um. One thing I just wanted to highlight here,
Speaker 1: which I feel is worth mentioning is if you haven't
Speaker 1: checked out like our small batch UM pot calls or
Speaker 1: our small batch m al hooters. We joined up with
Speaker 1: James Harrison and Steve Morgans during this year. UM. I
Speaker 1: wanted to just build the absolute best sounding, UM, most
Speaker 1: durable UH Turkey calls we could, and so Steve Morganster
Speaker 1: knocked it out of the park. UM gave us some recommendations,
Speaker 1: really tweaked the specs on on some pot calls for us.
Speaker 1: So we have an aluminum inside an osage, but we
Speaker 1: went with a lot thicker aluminum than most people use
Speaker 1: on their calls UM, and that aluminum is just a
Speaker 1: smoking call. And then we built a green slate UM
Speaker 1: inside of a teak pot and teak is just one
Speaker 1: of those woods that's you know, it's a reason why
Speaker 1: it's used in marine applications all the time. It's you know,
Speaker 1: extremely durable, decay resistant, rot resistant UM. And then green
Speaker 1: slate is is an amazing UM you know surface to
Speaker 1: be used. And then UM Steve assembled all of those,
Speaker 1: tested them all UM and and those those pot calls,
Speaker 1: in my opinion, are as good as it gets um,
Speaker 1: and then we joined up with James Harrison to design
Speaker 1: those Alhooters, which I think at the at the time
Speaker 1: this uh podcast airs, we're going to be sold out
Speaker 1: and we hope to have a restock here. But those
Speaker 1: al calls are just at a different level. Um, they
Speaker 1: they're very very good. Um. So yeah, that's kind of
Speaker 1: the big change, uh, you know, or the additions this year,
Speaker 1: um in the phelps Turkey lineup, and then um, yeah,
Speaker 1: if you need to get your calls, um, they are
Speaker 1: in stock and Turkey season getting close. So in closing,
Speaker 1: what does one tip you feel would give Turkey hunters
Speaker 1: better odds at finding success this year? Uh? You know,
Speaker 1: from a pure filling your tag success standpoint, don't be
Speaker 1: afraid to switch things up kind of like I was
Speaker 1: talking about if if they're not talking for some reason
Speaker 1: or another, like it just you might not be able
Speaker 1: to change that. So I think a combination I don't
Speaker 1: be afraid to change things up and patience. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: can both really help. Yeah, and that's a great tip.
Speaker 1: Like as much as especially me going out there, it's
Speaker 1: to use the calls. But one time we just hit
Speaker 1: it wrong in Kansas where we could see birds, and
Speaker 1: we were hitting in with every locator we had. They
Speaker 1: had no intention of ever making a sound. Well, it's
Speaker 1: like the hens were feeding down to us, and it's like, well,
Speaker 1: I'm not opposed to shooting one when it walks by us, right,
Speaker 1: And so it's just like changing your strategy. Like we
Speaker 1: could have probably sat there and called and we would
Speaker 1: have scared them off, or those hands would have changed
Speaker 1: their pattern. But it's like all right, well, just you
Speaker 1: almost have to play with what the rules that you're given,
Speaker 1: right or the playing field that you're given, Like, this
Speaker 1: is what they're going to give us. We've only got
Speaker 1: so much time in so many days. Um, I'm not
Speaker 1: opposed to shooting when when it walks by. So um,
Speaker 1: it's just outsmarting them. But yeah, be patient, um, and
Speaker 1: and change your strategy. Don't just go in with you know,
Speaker 1: one way's got to work. Yep, Yeah, absolutely. I think
Speaker 1: that's where, like you know, your ground blind can come in.
Speaker 1: Just being able to chill there and be a little
Speaker 1: bit more comfortable and move around a little bit more
Speaker 1: while you're being patient can help um a little bit.
Speaker 1: But you know, then there's there's certainly people that just
Speaker 1: want to shoot, they want to have that interaction and
Speaker 1: they're just going to move around until they find the interaction.
Speaker 1: I mean really no different to Helk you know. Um
Speaker 1: so yeah, I guess it kind of depends what you want.
Speaker 1: But yeah, yeah, Well we really appreciate you having or
Speaker 1: having you on the show today, Jordan. How can people
Speaker 1: find out more about you, you know, through social media
Speaker 1: or you know gear Talk podcast or where they can
Speaker 1: they can find you? Yeah, so Instagram, it's just at
Speaker 1: Jordan dot bud on Instagram. And then I've got a
Speaker 1: YouTube channel as well. I've been kicking out some stuff
Speaker 1: that we've been filming on our fall hunts. So that's
Speaker 1: just Jordan budd On on YouTube. And yeah, the gear
Speaker 1: Talk podcast, I find it wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: All right, perfect, Thanks for coming on. Good luck out
Speaker 1: there in Nebraska this year, and we'll we'll touch base
Speaker 1: with you here middle of the season and see how
Speaker 1: you're doing. Yeah, I appreciate you. Jason Things