Speaker 1: Welcome to Wired to Hunts rutt Fresh Radio, bringing you
Speaker 1: the latest reports from the White Tailed Woods and now
Speaker 1: your hosts, Casey Smith Tyler Jones. This is rut Fresh
Speaker 1: Radio powered by Vortex Optics. The rut has come and gone,
Speaker 1: or has it? This week we're talking hunters from all
Speaker 1: across the country who are either just now getting into
Speaker 1: their ruts or are still seeing the tail tille signs
Speaker 1: of some late rut action. This is rut Fresh Radio
Speaker 1: powered by Vortex Optics. I'm your host Casey Smith. Tyler
Speaker 1: Jones is here as well, and we have the illustrious
Speaker 1: Mark Kenyon on the phone telling us all about his
Speaker 1: December plans. Here, Mark, how is thanks to Thanksgiving us great,
Speaker 1: got to spend some time in the family, got to
Speaker 1: get in the woods a little bit. Um, there's everything
Speaker 1: you can us for. Yeah, good man. Did you embrace
Speaker 1: gun season? Uh? Sort of? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I guess
Speaker 1: I would say I do embrace gun season. You know.
Speaker 1: I leave some of my best spots alone, usually at
Speaker 1: the beginning of gun seasons, so that they kind of
Speaker 1: become a sanctuary. But then once the pressure lays down,
Speaker 1: I tend to sneak out for careful hunts and uh
Speaker 1: I've done that here recently. Yeah. Cool, Well enough about
Speaker 1: deer hunting. Do you'all have Thanksgiving noodles? Where are you from?
Speaker 1: Thanksgiving noodles? Yeah? Exactly. It's not a thing. It's not
Speaker 1: a thing. So you've met Eric, right, um Eric, he
Speaker 1: spears by Thanksgiving noodles and it's literally cream of chicken
Speaker 1: soup with noodles in it. And it does not look
Speaker 1: very good. So Illinois. Yeah, yeah, they acted like it
Speaker 1: was like a northern thing. You know, everybody hands should
Speaker 1: know that, you know. Well, no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: I'm pleased. I'm pleased. What is the best Thanksgiving food
Speaker 1: in your opinion? Like the single dish that's the best. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but but you know, make it actual Thanksgiving top stuff?
Speaker 1: Oh man. Because there's three things that form like the
Speaker 1: trifecta for me, and it's hard to from the three.
Speaker 1: But fact it can be it's singularity or it's like
Speaker 1: the trinity, it's it's one is three. So speaking speaking
Speaker 1: from the gospel here, the trinity of turkey stuffing and
Speaker 1: mass potatoes is just the thing. I mean, I will
Speaker 1: eat that three food combo for days and days, like
Speaker 1: I'll eat the main meal, and then I like to
Speaker 1: put them all on a sandwich, and then later I'll
Speaker 1: do like an open face sandwich. And then sometimes i'll
Speaker 1: do like day four or five, I'll go back to
Speaker 1: the original, just regular dinner style and that it's just
Speaker 1: the best man, just all about that Thanksgiving sandwich. Ross.
Speaker 1: Ross is a good dude. Done done deep Yeah, man, scientist,
Speaker 1: you know he's cool like me. So did you bring
Speaker 1: a Thanksgiving sandwich to stay with you? No? But I
Speaker 1: do eat them just before heading out. The little messes.
Speaker 1: Those they call those swich Oh. Man, there's getting worse
Speaker 1: by the week. That's funny. Getting We're getting tired, man,
Speaker 1: it's getting getting late in the season. You know. So
Speaker 1: what do you have on the horizon here for next week? Mark, Well,
Speaker 1: I got two things going on. Um, you know, there's
Speaker 1: still some of that late running action. I've actually been
Speaker 1: seeing on some of my Michigan spots, um kind of
Speaker 1: kind of light. There's definitely that transition. So I've seen
Speaker 1: the transition of a lot of deer refocusing on food.
Speaker 1: So the good food sources that are just keen in
Speaker 1: right now, which has been for me, some green food
Speaker 1: sources and like cut beans. Actually has been lighting up
Speaker 1: like all of a sudden, big groups of deer back
Speaker 1: on those food sources. So I've been heading out the
Speaker 1: last a couple of times. I was out just before
Speaker 1: Thanksgiving for hunt, and then just after I got back
Speaker 1: from the Thanksgiving holiday, I went out for another hunt
Speaker 1: and then also glassed a couple of nights and saw
Speaker 1: one of the target bucks I've been after um out
Speaker 1: in daylight, kind of pushing dose around slash feedings. It's
Speaker 1: not like chasing like crazy, but he's still sent check
Speaker 1: in does UM. So the action is still on in
Speaker 1: Michigan here and there where you can find the pockets
Speaker 1: of unpressured deer, which which I found here UM. And
Speaker 1: then so I'm doing I'm actually hunting that buck again
Speaker 1: tonight with my son. I've been trying to kill this
Speaker 1: deer and my son um, which would be a pretty
Speaker 1: special thing. So that's Michigan. And then I'm going to
Speaker 1: Ohio probably tomorrow. Their guns season just opened up, uh
Speaker 1: at the beginning of this week. So I'm gonna go
Speaker 1: down there and throw a couple of hunts at my
Speaker 1: properties down at that neck of the woods, and again
Speaker 1: you know, hoping for maybe some late writing action or
Speaker 1: if nothing else, um, other gun hunters pushing stuff around
Speaker 1: and getting something that's from these sanctuary zones where I've
Speaker 1: got some really good cover that should provide security for
Speaker 1: a buck or two, I would hope, And uh, that's
Speaker 1: I'll be pinning my hopes on. Are you seeing any um,
Speaker 1: freshly worked scrapes anywhere? I'm seeing them come back to scrapes. Yes,
Speaker 1: so definitely the scraping action went way down for the
Speaker 1: last probably three weeks on most of the cameras and
Speaker 1: places I'm walking around and stuff. But it seems to
Speaker 1: be picking back up a little bit. Well, it sounds
Speaker 1: like you had an exciting week or so coming up.
Speaker 1: We're actually trying to figure out how to see a
Speaker 1: deer while hunting in the next week. We're kind of like,
Speaker 1: it's hard to call it that, but we're kind of
Speaker 1: in the lockdown portion of where we live. Uh it's
Speaker 1: not as pronounced uh because he's always running activity, you know,
Speaker 1: kind of throughout the fall are are just isn't as
Speaker 1: uh peak. I guess you would say, you know, the
Speaker 1: bell carver doesn't go as high. But um, overall, our
Speaker 1: dear movement is down right now. We're also having the
Speaker 1: Indian summer right now to tomorrow it's gonna be seventy five.
Speaker 1: I just saw which is we had. We had really
Speaker 1: good weather in late November, but as we push into
Speaker 1: early December here, we uh we have some kind of
Speaker 1: warm weather as well, so we're kind of dealing with that.
Speaker 1: But uh, either way, the hunt must go on. Man,
Speaker 1: we have some hunting to do. So this week we
Speaker 1: actually talked to got some all over the country, right, Tyler, Yeah,
Speaker 1: we talked to actually right here in our neck of
Speaker 1: the woods, Mr Troy Waldron from Texas. Uh. We got
Speaker 1: Tony Treach on the phone to to tell us what
Speaker 1: the deals in Colorado. I know Mark, you spent some
Speaker 1: time with him last year learning his ways. Um, we
Speaker 1: got Garrett Praul who has been up in Minnesota and
Speaker 1: oh WE'RENNI because Strickland from Mississippi giving us a report
Speaker 1: down there. So we got them from all over uh
Speaker 1: the US, and I think some of these southern states
Speaker 1: are gonna start having some good reports for us coming up.
Speaker 1: As you see some of these ruts starting to phase
Speaker 1: in and those weird stay It's like Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana,
Speaker 1: you know, those those Gulf coast states. So pretty excited
Speaker 1: to see some bucks hitting the dirt from down there,
Speaker 1: and uh, I don't know, it kind of gives me
Speaker 1: hope for uh some late season you know, potential places
Speaker 1: that we might go as well too, So I love it. Yeah, man,
Speaker 1: I'll tell you what I do like the late season. Like,
Speaker 1: of course, the ruts sexy and it's fun. But the
Speaker 1: late season, if you have those spots, you can find
Speaker 1: those spots where they're not where they haven't been harassed NonStop,
Speaker 1: it can be really really good. They become predictable. And
Speaker 1: if Casey doesn't die in the next hour or two,
Speaker 1: I think you guys could be in for some terrific
Speaker 1: on it this morning if he does. If he does die,
Speaker 1: then I'll still be able to hunt in play season.
Speaker 1: There's always a silver life. I finally get the good spot,
Speaker 1: you know, but no Ick Truck episode, we can actually
Speaker 1: you know, incorporate the harst and you can give me
Speaker 1: my final goodbye, you know, well before that happens, you know,
Speaker 1: I definitely hope to hope to get out and shoot
Speaker 1: some deer. The uh the December is has been a
Speaker 1: pretty good month for me overall throughout my hunting time
Speaker 1: for sure. So I like it. Man, if you like
Speaker 1: you you were saying this earlier, Mark, But if you
Speaker 1: can find a place that's just not super pressured or
Speaker 1: hasn't had the pressure for one reason another, where it's private,
Speaker 1: public doesn't matter. Um, those deer can you know, they're
Speaker 1: gonna always be interested even through the end of the
Speaker 1: year in a lot of places in it and some
Speaker 1: sort of a hot doough if it if it ends
Speaker 1: up being that that's the case in your area, and
Speaker 1: then there's always just the consistency of that uh you know,
Speaker 1: especially once it gets cold, that bed to feed. So
Speaker 1: it makes things patternable for analytic guys. It works really well,
Speaker 1: you know, so analytical guys anyway. And then there's there's
Speaker 1: this old product that like I don't know, Hunter Specialties
Speaker 1: or something made like years and years ago. I think
Speaker 1: it's called it the cough Catcher or something, and you
Speaker 1: just whenever you get a cough, you you just cough
Speaker 1: right to that thing and it eliminates the sound and
Speaker 1: it makes podcast episodes much more palatable. So next time
Speaker 1: you should have put that on your Christmas list. Add
Speaker 1: here a little bit next time. Okay, well, we expect
Speaker 1: that you bring one of those down to Texas, you know,
Speaker 1: for Casey's Christmas present, Like thank you' blowing your grunt
Speaker 1: call and it's actually just not making any sound at all.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, let's get these guys on the phone.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us again this week, Mark, and I'm
Speaker 1: sure we'll be talking to you saying sounds good. All right,
Speaker 1: I'm talking to Tony treats a lot of guys know
Speaker 1: this dude. He's a hardcore hunter. I think it's appropriate
Speaker 1: to say that he's a guy that gets after it
Speaker 1: as much as any working man out there does. Tony,
Speaker 1: what's been going on? Man? Well, yeah, but I'm about done.
Speaker 1: So yep, it's it's time to go back to the
Speaker 1: real life and actually makes some money. Yeah do you?
Speaker 1: Uh so are you done until pretty much next fall? Well,
Speaker 1: I do still have a Colorado you're tagging in my
Speaker 1: pocket because I didn't I didn't find what I was
Speaker 1: looking forward when I was there, So I might be
Speaker 1: going back if I can convince the wife let me
Speaker 1: go for a week in December. Uh, but that that's
Speaker 1: yet to be determined. Yeah, for sure, So Colorado I
Speaker 1: didn't know if we'd have a guy to talk about
Speaker 1: Colorado white tails this year, and we already had Heartland's
Speaker 1: uh Harland bow Hunters Mike hunt Sucker on the podcast
Speaker 1: talk about it. But I'm I came across the fact
Speaker 1: that you've been out there. I know you guys hunt
Speaker 1: quite differently most of the time, and so I wanted
Speaker 1: to get your perspective on this. Um, you know, tell
Speaker 1: us a little bit about what you're seeing this past
Speaker 1: week out there. So I was in the Eastern Plains
Speaker 1: and uh, the rut was in full swing. Lots of
Speaker 1: bucks on lockdown, which for me and the type of
Speaker 1: hunting that we're doing with decoys in the in the
Speaker 1: Eastern Plains, Uh, it was fantastic. Um. I would imagine that,
Speaker 1: you know, if you're sitting in a tree stand, it's
Speaker 1: probably not gonna be what you want to be happening,
Speaker 1: because there's gonna be bucks. Maybe you've been pattering, they
Speaker 1: are going to disappear and just all of a sudden
Speaker 1: going to be off the radar and they've got that dough. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know on lockdown somewhere some goofy spot that maybe
Speaker 1: you know you're typically using because because that's what he
Speaker 1: wants to do. He wants to keep them all the himself.
Speaker 1: So for a tree stand hunters, it might have been
Speaker 1: tough hunting. Um, for us, it was. It was great,
Speaker 1: minus the fact that I just couldn't find one that
Speaker 1: I wanted. Uh, but that's just has to do more
Speaker 1: with the area I'm hunting. There was there was a
Speaker 1: lot of activity. Uh, I would say have probably subordinate bucks. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, through a lot of three year olds, maybe
Speaker 1: occasional four year olds that just uh we weren't the
Speaker 1: dominant buccaneer around the food sources there was. It seems
Speaker 1: like if you could find you know, the planes have
Speaker 1: been pretty darn and dry this year, and both Kansas
Speaker 1: and Colorado were just dryer than I've ever seen it.
Speaker 1: And if you didn't have food, uh, boy, it was
Speaker 1: pretty tough. They were. They were definitely you know, congregated
Speaker 1: around areas. The few areas that had standing CRP grass
Speaker 1: um because a lot of people down there it was
Speaker 1: so dry they actually had to bail it up to
Speaker 1: feed their cattle otherwise cattle day and those few standing
Speaker 1: CRP fields and those few uh semi green alf Delpa
Speaker 1: fields were just I mean they were hubs of activity.
Speaker 1: M So would that be a situation where um, you're hunting,
Speaker 1: you know, close to that egg, but looking for those
Speaker 1: places and glassing the stuff. It's like those little lockdown
Speaker 1: hottie holes. Yep. Yeah, I know. The hardest part for
Speaker 1: me was actually gaining permission uh to those fields they
Speaker 1: you know that the areas that that the deer were
Speaker 1: actually using. Uh, we couldn't gain access to. So every
Speaker 1: book that we even considered you know, mature and uh
Speaker 1: one that was when we wanted, we couldn't. We couldn't hunt.
Speaker 1: But yeah, if you had, if you had access to
Speaker 1: h the few grassy areas that a few areas that
Speaker 1: held enough you know, tawna up brush to to to
Speaker 1: bet where they could bed uh and the planes there. Man,
Speaker 1: you you were having a good week. Yeah. So, um,
Speaker 1: let's talk a little bit about that decoy strategy that
Speaker 1: you use. I think that a lot of people are
Speaker 1: intrigued by that, and I would really specifically like to
Speaker 1: talk about how you use the wind in those situations,
Speaker 1: because those are teer bucks are so smart even on lockdown, right,
Speaker 1: So how do you approach buck in that situation? So well?
Speaker 1: Like I always say, the number one rule when you're
Speaker 1: using the decoy is you just gotta be able to
Speaker 1: see where they're betting. And in a lockdown phase. That
Speaker 1: almost becomes easier in the planes because they do pick
Speaker 1: random spots. Maybe it's out in the middle of a
Speaker 1: cut corn field, or it's up milo fielder along an
Speaker 1: open fence line that you know, some guys will typically
Speaker 1: look at it and well, that might be a good
Speaker 1: about to kick up a pheasant. But that's about it.
Speaker 1: Those are the spots where I'm finding embedded with their
Speaker 1: dough hopefully you know, maybe if you don't see them
Speaker 1: at first, but you can pick them up, wepping the better.
Speaker 1: But once you got them in there and you got
Speaker 1: them bedded somewhere, as long as you have access you know,
Speaker 1: around them, you know, so you can't you're not limited
Speaker 1: to which direction you can come from. I do not
Speaker 1: like to come from down wind, and that, you know,
Speaker 1: for a true stand guy, that might just sound like craziness.
Speaker 1: You know, you want to always put the wind directly
Speaker 1: in your favor. But you gotta remember, when they're betted down,
Speaker 1: more than likely they're going to be facing down wind
Speaker 1: where they can't smell. Their their weaknesses the direction they
Speaker 1: can't smell. So I like to come in degree angle
Speaker 1: from from up wind almost um, not you know, in
Speaker 1: ninety degree. If it's kind of swirling, I'll put it.
Speaker 1: If this this is all things being equal to uh,
Speaker 1: and all this goes out the window. If you've got
Speaker 1: let's say a train feature that you say, a small
Speaker 1: cooler or a draw something you can crawl up that
Speaker 1: gives you more concealment that where you can get into range.
Speaker 1: If you have that, use that. But if you don't,
Speaker 1: and everything else is equal, I'll and And it's you know,
Speaker 1: in the planes you typically have more consistent winds out
Speaker 1: cheap that wind a bit to almost a forty five
Speaker 1: degree angle up window, um, whereas the wind is almost
Speaker 1: blown at him, but not quite up the shoulder. They're
Speaker 1: facing almost dead away, And I can use again within range,
Speaker 1: get that decoy set up in the ground, you know,
Speaker 1: ideally not on my boat because it's always windy in
Speaker 1: the plans, And get that thing on a stake in
Speaker 1: front of me and let it do its magic once
Speaker 1: he sees it. And that's that's how I killed my
Speaker 1: Kansas buck just last week. Yeah, that's awesome, dude. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a good advice. I love you can tell that.
Speaker 1: Like we're on a short scale. Uh, you know, we're
Speaker 1: on a short podcast here, and we're trying to hurry
Speaker 1: this information. But you've got so much to offer. We
Speaker 1: might have to get you back on our podcast at
Speaker 1: some point. But um, you know, at and in the
Speaker 1: next week, do you expect that lockdown face to kind
Speaker 1: of continue and the success with that style of hunting
Speaker 1: to potentially be good or uh? Are things going to change?
Speaker 1: You know? For for a tree stand guy in in
Speaker 1: in Colorado, if you're hunting the draws, Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I would start making a transition to to food. Um,
Speaker 1: I think you're just you're gonna you're gonna start seeing
Speaker 1: less and less um dose uh in heat and less
Speaker 1: bucks attending them and having them out in the lockdown.
Speaker 1: So it might Uh, I'd say we're probably in a
Speaker 1: solid transition period because where you know, if I were
Speaker 1: if I were to go back out there hunting, if
Speaker 1: I were to be able to get permission from the
Speaker 1: wife to go out there, I'm not gonna be you know,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be looking around the food. Yeah. Okay, so
Speaker 1: many permissions that you have to get to go hunting. Man,
Speaker 1: it's crazy to get married A yeah, no doubt. Well, uh,
Speaker 1: last question, man, will scale one to ten. What do
Speaker 1: you predict buck movement to be like next week? Colorado Boy,
Speaker 1: that's a tough one. I would say, not as it's good,
Speaker 1: you know, it's not as good as it was this week,
Speaker 1: and not you know, even as you're as good as
Speaker 1: it was last week. I think if you're you're gradually
Speaker 1: going down, um, they'll still be a few does that
Speaker 1: might keep them keep interested? And who knows, you get
Speaker 1: one or two hot ones in the right spot and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, every rebuccaneera could be on that
Speaker 1: one dough. So if you don't find that one dough,
Speaker 1: you're probably looking at a four or five. But if
Speaker 1: you can find that one last dough that is coming
Speaker 1: into the late estris um, it might be literally on fire.
Speaker 1: Yeah sure, Okay, Well, great information. Thank you for hopping
Speaker 1: on the phone with Tony, and I'm sure we'll be
Speaker 1: talking to again. Sounds good. Now we've got Troy Waldron.
Speaker 1: He is a hunter in Texas, right here in the
Speaker 1: lone Star state. Troy, what's been going on? Man. Oh no,
Speaker 1: how much. Man, it's been hunting hard every day, get
Speaker 1: out and getting out. Yeah, it's good, especially after the
Speaker 1: holiday man or during the holiday. I know a lot
Speaker 1: of guys struggled to balance that. Did you do a
Speaker 1: good job of that? Yeah? Yeah, so I got I've
Speaker 1: got land that is pretty accessible from my house, so yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not too hard to break away, even if I
Speaker 1: just have to leave for a couple of hours to
Speaker 1: come back. So it didn't put a lot of burden
Speaker 1: on the family too much. That's cool. Well, I have
Speaker 1: seen a picture of you behind a public land stud
Speaker 1: and it just happens you have on an Element shirt,
Speaker 1: which is just the craziest thing. Congrats man on that
Speaker 1: great deer. I appreciate it, man. Yeah, so what were
Speaker 1: you doing uh to uh run across that guy? Uh?
Speaker 1: I mean a lot of my tactic is great. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like I mean, even early season into late October, I'm
Speaker 1: in the timber trying to find, you know, scrapes that
Speaker 1: are pretty big or a cluster of them. So that's
Speaker 1: basically what I was doing, uh yesterday morning, and what
Speaker 1: I think, in fact was doing was checking a scrape
Speaker 1: line going from one betting area to to another one
Speaker 1: to the north, because between those two betting areas was
Speaker 1: also a big long red line. So this is a
Speaker 1: little bit thicker through that open field, and I think
Speaker 1: they'd like to stay in there. But that's that's what
Speaker 1: a lot of my tactic centers around is getting near
Speaker 1: or close to scrapes. A lot of times that's where
Speaker 1: a lot of the deer concentrated. There's trails that come
Speaker 1: together in those areas. So he came out right at
Speaker 1: first light and a good shot on I mean he
Speaker 1: ran about seven yards. So yes, sir, let's go, dude,
Speaker 1: I can ask anything more. So okay, So if you
Speaker 1: you're hunting a scrape line, Um, how's that deer working
Speaker 1: in regards to the wind? Is he working into it
Speaker 1: or is he working across it? Or what do you think? Well,
Speaker 1: yesterday morning was working into it. So we had a
Speaker 1: north wind. It wasn't much. It was about a six
Speaker 1: long hour. But um, I mean he was not far.
Speaker 1: He didn't he didn't die much further. I mean he
Speaker 1: was in line with that scrape. So he hit screap,
Speaker 1: you walked past me. He was going to another one,
Speaker 1: and then I think he was gonna work out the field.
Speaker 1: But yeah, he would he would have been working into
Speaker 1: the scrape from the direction got you. So how are
Speaker 1: you able to keep him from getting your wind? It
Speaker 1: was kind of off. I was to the east of him,
Speaker 1: and he was working south to north with a north wind.
Speaker 1: So you know, I know I was right up where
Speaker 1: I set up. Um that the thicker stuff was right
Speaker 1: where he was traveling along, and that's right where I
Speaker 1: shot him. So I got as close to that thicker
Speaker 1: stuff as I could get and get a shot, and
Speaker 1: he just happened to be walking there a little bit
Speaker 1: of luck, man, you know. I gotta admit it's not
Speaker 1: like I got him all figured out all the time.
Speaker 1: But yeah, what what's like a good comfortable range on
Speaker 1: Texas Public that you're trying to get deer within ten yards? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean he was at thirty five. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I actually shot another buck last year at about the
Speaker 1: same distance. I gotta admit I'm not all that comfortable
Speaker 1: with it, but at this point in the game, I
Speaker 1: mean he was a nice broad shots you know, broad
Speaker 1: broadside shot, so you know I took it. My my
Speaker 1: my bo has been shooting well. But yeah, if I
Speaker 1: could get it if I had my choice ten yards
Speaker 1: fifteen yards, it always feels better than YEA. So going
Speaker 1: forward here, as we look kind of up at this
Speaker 1: upcoming week. I know a lot of the country kind
Speaker 1: of doesn't look forward to December, but in Texas it's
Speaker 1: still usually pretty good time to hunt. What do you
Speaker 1: think the deer gonna be doing, uh, this first week
Speaker 1: in December. Um, So, this is my theory, and I
Speaker 1: could be wrong, and other people might argue with me,
Speaker 1: but I run quite a bit of cameras and in
Speaker 1: the last ten days or so, they've been a lot
Speaker 1: of less active, and a lot of the cameras are
Speaker 1: over scrapes, um so or thicker areas like that I
Speaker 1: assume to be betting. So because they've been a little
Speaker 1: bit quieter, I'm assuming that they've been in lockdown and
Speaker 1: they're gonna probably you know, the bell curve is going down,
Speaker 1: and my my thought would be that books will start
Speaker 1: to break away from those and start searching more. It
Speaker 1: may not be as heavy as like you know, Pekraut
Speaker 1: or right before, but um honestly, my tactic wouldn't change
Speaker 1: very much. I'm still gonna try to be close to
Speaker 1: betting if there's none scrapes, you know, within those betting
Speaker 1: areas are close by, I'm gonna probably be set up
Speaker 1: somewhere in there, depending on the wind and that specific spot.
Speaker 1: It would be, you know, dictating exactly what tree I
Speaker 1: just set in it in. So it sounds like you
Speaker 1: got it going on. Man, congrats in the buck. Before
Speaker 1: you get out of here, scaleing one to ten. What's
Speaker 1: the buck movement gonna be like in Texas in the
Speaker 1: next week? Um, in my area, I'd say seven. I'm
Speaker 1: pretty optimistic. Could be pretty good. That's pretty good. I
Speaker 1: like it kind of my area. So I'm all about
Speaker 1: a seven right now. You gotta be you gotta have
Speaker 1: optimism too, Yeah. Absolutely. Man. Well, hey, dude, thanks so
Speaker 1: much for the time and congrats again on the great buck.
Speaker 1: You guys having me. I've got Garrett Praul, the d
Speaker 1: i Y sportsman here. He's been doing some hunting in Minnesota. Garrett.
Speaker 1: What's been happening, man, Oh not too much? Thanks for
Speaker 1: having me on. Oh yeah, man, you're welcome. Uh you
Speaker 1: actually got on a pretty nice buck there in Minnesota
Speaker 1: recently in the snow. Huh yeah, yeah, it's uh, it's
Speaker 1: been a nut. I would say a great season, but
Speaker 1: I definitely can't complain. Oh, I had to shift plans
Speaker 1: a couple of times, but was able to make some
Speaker 1: stuff happen, which is always good. Yeah, that's cool man. So, uh,
Speaker 1: it's snow lock a constant for you, Minnesotna lock from
Speaker 1: late November on. It will it be white for pretty
Speaker 1: much the rest of the season. No, not not at all.
Speaker 1: In the last couple of years, it's really hit and miss.
Speaker 1: I love having snow, but I mean there'll be times
Speaker 1: where you don't really get a lot of snow, say
Speaker 1: until January or even like February. By that time the
Speaker 1: season's out. But it can make a huge difference in
Speaker 1: hunting strategy throughout the later part of November and end
Speaker 1: of December, for sure. So do you look at that
Speaker 1: from a tracking and sign standpoint or from a dear
Speaker 1: behavior standpoint? Which one is better? More from a sign
Speaker 1: standpoint for me, And you gotta figure two that other
Speaker 1: people are keying in on the same things that you
Speaker 1: can see. But if you don't have snow and it's
Speaker 1: still cold enough, a lot of the sign that you
Speaker 1: are seeing is is probably old. It could be recent too,
Speaker 1: but it should really tough to tell because the ground
Speaker 1: is too hard for you to oftentimes really be able
Speaker 1: to see it. And it was this, you know last week,
Speaker 1: or was this yesterday? It just becomes much more difficult
Speaker 1: to tell. Versus if you have snow, that becomes much
Speaker 1: more clear. So what kind of what kind of things
Speaker 1: are signs or whatever have you been keying in on lately? Well,
Speaker 1: believe it or not, the buck that I shot last weekend,
Speaker 1: I was hitting a scrapeline, which sounds really odd for
Speaker 1: late November, but it can't happen. And I would say
Speaker 1: generally more so than anything this time year, I'm trying
Speaker 1: to key in on someone's really you know, far off
Speaker 1: the the common area betting areas thickets, UM doesn't necessarily
Speaker 1: have to be far back in, but just someplace where
Speaker 1: the deer and up and pressured as much. Because all
Speaker 1: the states that I hunt, Minnesota, North Dakota, Wisconsin, I mean,
Speaker 1: they they've all now had several consecutive weeks of heavy
Speaker 1: gun pressure and that's probably the biggest factor, more so
Speaker 1: than road activity, more so than um, you know, feeding
Speaker 1: areas and that sort of thing. Do you find that
Speaker 1: the pressure from the the gun seasons actually can extend
Speaker 1: the rut, could you say, you know, like because dear
Speaker 1: so mal Us did that, they don't get all the
Speaker 1: doze bread, so they come back into cycle. I think
Speaker 1: in some areas there's there's definitely something to that. And
Speaker 1: I will say that even between Minnesota and Wisconsin, I
Speaker 1: do see differences and sometimes we all have, you know,
Speaker 1: bigger bucking bucks moving in daylight. In Minnesota, for instance,
Speaker 1: that Thanksgiving week can be really good, and I think
Speaker 1: that's because their gun season comes in right at the
Speaker 1: beginning of November and it gets pounded. But then some
Speaker 1: of the pressure starts to taper off and there's still seasons,
Speaker 1: but guys aren't hitting the woods is hard, and you'll
Speaker 1: get some of those those big deer cruising a little
Speaker 1: bit later in the month of November, Whereas that's the
Speaker 1: exact same time where Wisconsin's gun season comes in, and
Speaker 1: I don't see that nearly as much on Wisconsin. Sure
Speaker 1: some of that late bread activity, so you know, you
Speaker 1: you kind of keyed in on some late road activity
Speaker 1: here with the scrapes and that kind of thing. Now,
Speaker 1: going forward in the next week, what will you change
Speaker 1: the focus or would you change the focus if you're
Speaker 1: out there and what would that be on I would
Speaker 1: say is still focused on heavy cover. I mean, if
Speaker 1: you if you find the rough sign popping up, I
Speaker 1: would definitely be on it. Because it always that first
Speaker 1: week in December. It doesn't seem like it's ever as
Speaker 1: strong as the first week of November in terms of
Speaker 1: daylight activity, but it seems like, man, every now and
Speaker 1: then you just have that that real big one that
Speaker 1: daylights and it's like maybe it was one of your
Speaker 1: cameras or one of your spots and it was like
Speaker 1: one deer, not several deer, but if you were in
Speaker 1: the woods at that time when you were hunting that
Speaker 1: one betting area, maybe a historical sign you can you
Speaker 1: can base that off of um, it's definitely worthwhile, but
Speaker 1: it's it's not a high odds type of a thing.
Speaker 1: You know, the moon kind of lines up well. Some
Speaker 1: would say, uh, for this first week of December where
Speaker 1: it's going to be a new moon. Is that something
Speaker 1: you look at much and would you consider that when
Speaker 1: it's time to go out. Not usually as much. I mean,
Speaker 1: certainly it's nice just from the standpoint that if you
Speaker 1: have the opposite, if you have a full moon and
Speaker 1: you do have snow on the ground. I mean it's
Speaker 1: you think you can pretty much see clear as day
Speaker 1: all night long. Um, how much that matters or doesn't matter,
Speaker 1: I've not really been able to have put together a
Speaker 1: solid um I guess conclusion on that. I just kind
Speaker 1: of look at the GPS studies and they usually seem
Speaker 1: to say that it doesn't matter as much. But I
Speaker 1: usually try and with my job just get out in
Speaker 1: the woods as much as possible and not let that
Speaker 1: factor in as much. I'd say weather would Weather would
Speaker 1: usually get a bigger boote for me than moon. Yeah,
Speaker 1: That's that's how it is for the working man, right,
Speaker 1: Like you gotta get in the woods anytime you can,
Speaker 1: but anytime you can have a confidence booster with that,
Speaker 1: it would be good. So you know, if the moon
Speaker 1: is a favorable then you didn't think about it. But
Speaker 1: if it's not, don't worry about it. So, Garrett, Um,
Speaker 1: for this next week, Uh, if you had to rank
Speaker 1: what you predict but movie to be locked on a
Speaker 1: scale of one to team, what would you think it
Speaker 1: would be, I'd say, Well, with ten being as good
Speaker 1: as it could be, I'd say maybe like four or five. Okay,
Speaker 1: this time of year is always it's always tough, right,
Speaker 1: I would say, you know, first week of September is
Speaker 1: gonna always rank higher. The run is always gonna rank higher,
Speaker 1: you know, last week October, first couple of weeks in November.
Speaker 1: But as far as as far as early December goes,
Speaker 1: I would say, not bad, um, but not bad for
Speaker 1: early Decembers in the midwest of the gun season is
Speaker 1: not as good as some of those other times a year,
Speaker 1: yeah exactly. But hey, you know you got a hunt
Speaker 1: the day you're given, right, So we appreciate the uh
Speaker 1: the report, man, and congrats on a great season up there.
Speaker 1: I appreciate it all right now on the phone, we've
Speaker 1: got cuzz strictly and everybody knows and from Ostio because
Speaker 1: what's been going on. Man, man, it's all good. You know,
Speaker 1: we've we've had a couple of colds snaps. I tell people,
Speaker 1: you know, we don't get a lot of winner way
Speaker 1: down here. I think it was on a Thursday last year,
Speaker 1: if I'm not mistaken, but we uh are winner was
Speaker 1: one day. We uh We've had a couple of colds
Speaker 1: snap and everything's good. We got some moisture late, so
Speaker 1: food plots came up way better than we were. We
Speaker 1: were kicking rocks there for a while. So it's it's
Speaker 1: all good, right now. That's good man. Yeah, that's the
Speaker 1: kind of same for us. I woke up this morning and, um,
Speaker 1: you know, I don't have a garage. My truck just
Speaker 1: sits out in the driveway, and so, um, I thought, oh,
Speaker 1: I just I was taking my daughter to school. I'll
Speaker 1: just you know, hit the windshield wipers and be on
Speaker 1: my way. And it was actually the water was frozen
Speaker 1: on my windshield. And that's a that was kind of
Speaker 1: news to me. You know, I didn't know it was
Speaker 1: getting that cold at night. And uh so it's uh,
Speaker 1: it's good to be in the South this time of year, though. Man,
Speaker 1: that's a that's one of those things that people maybe
Speaker 1: from the up north don't get, is that we have
Speaker 1: beautiful weather this time of year a lot of times.
Speaker 1: And it's a it's a good thing. I have you
Speaker 1: been seeing the same type of stuff. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: we've had a couple of heavy frost and uh you
Speaker 1: you get the false narrative that that runs all the
Speaker 1: snakes in And I checked the Instagram this morning, some
Speaker 1: guy in Ponatak, Mississippi, found a gigantic rattlesnake in one
Speaker 1: of his fire pots, and I'm like, they're not done yet.
Speaker 1: How you get them? Timp's over sixty or seventy, It
Speaker 1: don't matter how long it's been cold. You better watch out.
Speaker 1: So that's right that part. So you've been hunting the
Speaker 1: Mississippi a little bit, Let's talk about what you've been seeing.
Speaker 1: I know it sounds like you had a close call yesterday. Maybe, yeah,
Speaker 1: it was awesome. You know, I don't have a giant place,
Speaker 1: but uh, several cameras out and I don't check them
Speaker 1: that often. I'm beat on not encroaching in that area
Speaker 1: and trying to because you know, you leave some cent
Speaker 1: on the ground. It's just there for a long time. Anyway.
Speaker 1: I got one deer that's that's pretty regular, and a
Speaker 1: hadson daylight pictures of him, which is pretty rare just
Speaker 1: because of the area I live in. And maybe it's
Speaker 1: a straight dead west wind. And I took my middle grandson, Matt.
Speaker 1: That's Cranky's older brother, Frankie. The look Cranky, the little one.
Speaker 1: He's got too big deer on his wall Matt's been
Speaker 1: a good sport, so I'm kind of wanted him to
Speaker 1: shoot this one. Anyway, it was an interesting thing. We
Speaker 1: got there and saw dear immediately and they disappeared and
Speaker 1: it brocked on the five. Then a five point came
Speaker 1: out and a pretty nice seven point, and this deer
Speaker 1: was behind him, which tears you three running together. We're
Speaker 1: still nowhere near our run and here in my in
Speaker 1: my opinion, but anyway, the deer walked straight in towards
Speaker 1: us and then saw something over in the woods to
Speaker 1: the right and made a hard right and he went
Speaker 1: out of my camera view. It was just wide open
Speaker 1: for Matt, and Matt's like can I seet him and said,
Speaker 1: all this wait, he'll, he'll, he'll be there, He's not
Speaker 1: going anywhere, and whatever he was looking at snorted and
Speaker 1: everybody ran all That fourteen year old looked at me
Speaker 1: within my eyes wide open, like what just happened? I said,
Speaker 1: I couldn't see it with the camera and I didn't
Speaker 1: want to move. But anyway, it was cool because that,
Speaker 1: like I said, it was three bucks together, not giants.
Speaker 1: And then I got a text last night from a
Speaker 1: buddy of mine, David Allen and he saw five bucks
Speaker 1: together yesterday on his lease, which is twenty miles from me,
Speaker 1: and his note. At that he closed, I said, our
Speaker 1: ruts nowhere near, And I was like, well, that's a
Speaker 1: good time to talk to you guys. You know, you
Speaker 1: start you looking at Instagram and Facebook and all this,
Speaker 1: but you see these giant deer and people down here
Speaker 1: like okay, we're ready. Well, it ain't gonna happen down here.
Speaker 1: That's not this thoroughly that for a little time yet,
Speaker 1: So in your opinion there you know, Southern deer. Some
Speaker 1: of my other friends are gonna be mad at it's
Speaker 1: but Southern deer a little different, right. You and I
Speaker 1: talked about this on off air will Ago. But uh,
Speaker 1: in a situation like last night we had that close
Speaker 1: call and that uh every you know the field feel
Speaker 1: cleared because something smelled or got weird. How bad does
Speaker 1: that affect that buck you were thinking about trying to shoot? Well,
Speaker 1: you never know, I've gotten I've been on that farm
Speaker 1: for nineteen years and I can't tell you how many pictures,
Speaker 1: rare camp pictures. I gotta like three year old deer
Speaker 1: that never you never saw them again. They just they're vampires,
Speaker 1: they're weird. They come out at night, and there's little
Speaker 1: to no pressure on my farm, so the least little
Speaker 1: thing I think affects them. They're all individuals, but I'm
Speaker 1: they ain't no secret that hunting bucks now and here's
Speaker 1: way harder than it is in the mid in the Midwest,
Speaker 1: because I used to film them all over and it's
Speaker 1: just a different game. I don't know why lots of
Speaker 1: hunting pressure thicker to rain you. The list goes on
Speaker 1: and on, but I am very careful not to try
Speaker 1: to spook these dear and U because they I'm telling me,
Speaker 1: I've seen them disappear and not come back. So because
Speaker 1: let me know what you think, you know, is the
Speaker 1: next week gonna be any better as far as getting
Speaker 1: into the rut or what do you think about that? Well,
Speaker 1: it could be. You know, it was a fairly good
Speaker 1: mass crop down here, and when they're when there's a
Speaker 1: lot of acorns, I'm gonna say acorns because I know
Speaker 1: you've got some northern good ideas and uh, when there's
Speaker 1: lots of acorns, you don't really see you kind of
Speaker 1: getting to have it hunting food. Plus we've all done
Speaker 1: that and the reason I do. It's a great place
Speaker 1: to see dear and I'm always I always got a
Speaker 1: kid in told with me. But you know, as the
Speaker 1: acorns are depleted, you could see more deer in the
Speaker 1: food plots. So I think it's when it when he
Speaker 1: gets to December. Uh. I think the first ten days
Speaker 1: or so are always pretty slow in my place, and
Speaker 1: then the closer it gets to Christmas, the magic week
Speaker 1: in my house on my phone since I moved, there's
Speaker 1: always been Christmas the three best deer we've ever killed
Speaker 1: on that farm. Believe it or not, we're all on
Speaker 1: December and too. I'm just kind of showed up. So
Speaker 1: I don't have really high hopes until around the fifteenth
Speaker 1: of December. You know. That's when I started thinking, Man,
Speaker 1: we need to go, we need to go, and and uh,
Speaker 1: just you gotta make yourself wait for that right wind.
Speaker 1: And I got three or four spots that I can
Speaker 1: make a perfect approach and a perfect exit without bothering anything.
Speaker 1: And I kind of saved save those for that time
Speaker 1: of a a year. Okay, Well, that's good advice, man, I
Speaker 1: appreciate you. It's coming from a guy. There's a lot
Speaker 1: of experience in the area. Uh, last question I got
Speaker 1: for you, because on scale of one to ten, what's
Speaker 1: the buck movement gonna be like next week? Uh, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say, I'm gonna say it's six. All right. Uh yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, if we get a good west wind, I'm
Speaker 1: going back. I'll let that place rest. When it's just
Speaker 1: a wild guest, i'd say as six. Awesome man. Well,
Speaker 1: thank you for the information. We'll be talking to you
Speaker 1: again soon. Thank you, guys, appreciate the call. Sounds like
Speaker 1: it is still a great time of year to be
Speaker 1: in the woods. And if you need a little inspiration
Speaker 1: or you want to maybe rethink some of your tactics,
Speaker 1: you should go check out the most recent episode of
Speaker 1: the Element podcast, episode Too sixty one I Believe, where
Speaker 1: we talk about how to take yourself out of the
Speaker 1: game to actually help you win the game. Also, Tony
Speaker 1: Peterson has a cool article over and Wired to Hunt
Speaker 1: about how to bow hunt during guns season yea, and
Speaker 1: you know Meat Eat Season eleven is out now. They're
Speaker 1: releasing episodes right now on Meetator's website, The mediator dot com.
Speaker 1: I watched the Louisy and a Spear Fishing episode. It
Speaker 1: was really cool. It's very interesting to me. It's right
Speaker 1: down the road and they're killing some cool fish and
Speaker 1: eating them and preparing them all different ways. My dude
Speaker 1: love to eat them. Man, that's why we do these things.
Speaker 1: So remember keep it fresh. This is red fresh.