00:00:14 Speaker 1: My name is Clay Nukeleman. This is a production of the Bear Grease podcast called The Bear Grease Render where we render down, dive deeper, and look behind the scenes of the actual bear Grease podcast, presented by f HF Gear, American made purpose built hunting and fishing gear that's designed to be as rugged as the places we explore. Hello, print tell me, uh, tell me what you've got on your chain? All parts of it? That's called a watch fob, watch fob. I got a pocket watch on the long tucked into the top poultry overall, ye, and then there's a watch fob there for decoration, and that is a sterling silver coon. I just tolice that for the first time today. Where'd you get that? That was a Follow's Day present? Really? Where could a man acquire a sterling raccoon fob? That? Could the fob come out of Austin, Texas, but the pocket watch come from London, England? Really, if he wasn't so young, you had seen more of them all old timers used to wear them in their overalls, have the chain on the watch and had something that would have stuff, you know, something on the end of you could probably order that through night lot, Mike, could this right here? Um is? I can't remember? You know all this? This watch is made in England and it's hard to find a watch it. Well, I'm gonna put it. I'm gonna put a little video of your of your raccoon on my Instagram. So, hey, welcome to the Bear Grease Render Podcast. Mile mind. Do we have a great show today? We've got a a not so normal group of people. Usually have that defense. Don't take offense at that, guys, Well I do, I do know. So we we've got We've got one guest too. I'm gonna always introduce our guests at the end. Okay, so I have we have one guest here who is this is first time. Usually the group of guys that are here and woman, my wife is usually on the podcast. We kind of have my dad, Gary nucle my wife, Misty, uh Josh Spillmaker, Brent Reeves, and then the sixth person kind of comes in and out as a as a special guest. A lot of times it's Isaac Neil, but today is way different. Uh Me and Brent are the only regulars. Now, you guys are almost regulars, and I'll introduce that. But to my left, Brent Reeves. Good see Brent beards looking nice and trim looks. We get a little haircut. Okay, yesterday I went and got got my hair pools. What my grandmother would say when she went to the beauty parlor, I don't I go to a barbershop? Sure enough, barbershop. Had you clarified that? To your left, Rusty Johnson, Old buddy, Rusty, you've been on the Render one time and then you've been on the Bear Grease podcast at least once. Because you're a white tail secret keeper. H do have secrets. You're the ultimate white tail secret keeper. So special guests who have not named yet, we did a whole podcast on white Tail Secrets and basically explored how and why people keep secrets, and how we distribute those secrets and how relationally as humans there's some like deep like psychological DNA stuff about who we tell stuff too. And so Rusty, uh he was one of our feature guests on the White Tail Secrets podcast, So we can get back to that. But we're gonna crack some of those secrets today for sure. Good. So to your left is rust and Johnson, rust and rustys Son, Yeah, and uh Man good to see you, bro, it's good to see you too. I get some intel on some of those secrets, but I don't think all of them really. Yeah, he tells you everything he knows. He doesn't keep anything from me. He's kind of right now. Yeah, i'd say maybe most, but no, the secrets are real, The white tail secrets are real. They're for real. I would in tend to agree. I get a lot of pictures from people on my phone and big Bucks and my my first my first question, Hey where's that at? And it's crickets. I mean there's there's no more answer. I mean I asked another question and it just it's just like it's like that takes killed. It's cricket. It's well, I got a brag on rust and rust and have you graduated from law school yet? I finally graduated. Really, let's lose some let's do it. So man, that's a big deal. Yeah, Russa is a whitetail guru, killer and a lawyer. Yeah, I'm taking the barks in February about taking it. Ye, I was supposed to take it back in July, but I got COVID and kind of stunted my study in so I just put a deferment in and taking it in February so we can't. Yeah, but doing that, you can just defend most shepherd when they finally come after him. Yeah, I might need a good lawyer. Uh No, that's that's a quite an accomplishment. Man. How old are you married to kids that try out Rutt and Huntly? If that tells you anything about me? My kids? Incredible, incredible. You know, I took a little bit of persecution from a few people who remain unnamed. Uh when we named our children, which were I've got a sun named Bear, daughter named River Willow. But I like it hunt That's say their names again, So I had I had my daughter first, her name is Huntley Huntley, and you know, that's just that's good. But I remember on our hunt in December, I was excited to tell y'all and y'all came down with fire. I said, I'm naming my son's bow hunter and y'all were like, oh, no, no, one straight up, just bow hunter first name, bow Hunter. And yeah, everyone at the camp was like, oh, that's that's crazy. So I backtracked just a little bit and it's Rutt. Now are ut? So I got Rusty, Rustin and Rutt. My son's name is Drake Hunter. You're yeah, that's when I was good and it was a full time guy. Yeah, I mean I know him. Its hunter. And I thought my name was go get Wood till I was like fourteen. Mine still is that? Uh so rust and your your wife's all on board with with with these names. Oh, that was the first date conversation for date. Yeah, I said I'm a hunter and she said, oh, yeah, that's cool. I said, no, you don't realize. Yeah, I'm a I'm a deer hunter. Right, that's good stuff. Great, well, skipping our our guests, who will introduce at the end? Mos Shepherd? Man, you be you're you're an old you're an old regular on here. Yeah, you're you're when you can't findbody else, you called me, so that's right, that's right. Yeah, Well, I guess I'll call MO now. And to Mos. Right is Ralphmaker of the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission. And now you are the what's your title? You're the dear biologist of state. Dear what state Deer Program Coordinator, State dear program coordinator. Man, We're honored to have you today. Man, I got a question for right off the bad. Well, let the man introduce himself. Learning I'm happy to be here away. Yeah. So you've you grew up in Arkansas your whole life. Yes, yeah, I'm from Sebastian County. Uh, born raised in Greenwood, of course, went off to college and uh got to live several places around the state. And Uh, I think I'm up to fifty two counties now where I've harvested the deer two out of seventy. I just love hunting everywhere. I mean, this state is so diverse. Um. I was telling somebody the other day that, you know, there are very few states that you can hunt uh deer, whitetail, deer, turkeys, uh, bear, elk an alligator. Uh you know, all in the same state. And the habitats that we have, and the people, uh the communities. Um. I just I just love traveling the state and hunting different places. All right, Editor, cut all that out. We can't tell all these people to come to Arkansas. We're supposed to tell him how hard it is. It's a correct place. I mean it's amazing. Uh when when I go to different meetings and meet different deer biologists and talk to them, Um, you know there. Of course, they're all proud of their state. But at the end of the day, you know, they're like, man, I'm coming to Arkansas to duck hunt. Uh, you know, is there someplace like deer hunt while I'm there? You know, you know, dick down. They're they're wanting to come to Arkansas hunt deer. Yeah. So, how long have you been with the agency? Uh? I'll have been with the Game and Fish twenty years in March. Okay, how long have you been the deer program coordinator? I have actually been in the deer program ten years, a little over ten years. I've been the deer program coordinator for about five now, five years. Okay, well, I want to get up. I guess I'm I'm afraid if I start asking you questions, We're gonna bypass a bunch of stuff. I've got a hundred questions I want to ask you about Arkansas deer. Yeah, exactly, But your question, this is gonna solve the mystery. Okay. Three episodes in a row, I've heard on Meat Eat Steve and everybody talking about the correct way to spell white tailed? Is it white tailed? White dash tailed? White tailed? White tails? I want to hear it from the gaff of Arkansas, would you write a report it is what dash tailed and that's the way it's official. That is the correct spelling of white tailed deer on the calendar. So so from a grammar perspective, there would be two adjectives that would describe the deer. So there would be a dash white tailed deer, and it's and it's only those adjectives. I used to be an editor, wouldn't God, that's very good. And it's only capitalized if you use it at the beginning of the sentence, So if he comes in the middle of sentence, it's it's a lowercase W. Man problem solved there, you go, Well, I guess cloak coolly. We've we've we've turned the term white tail into like a single word. Even with like North American white Tail the magazine, it's spelled as one word. Yeah. Uh. But but the great thing about it is when you say white tail, everyone knows what you're talkingly. No matter how you spell it or how many hyphens you put in it. It's it's universally known. I can hear the dash in there when you say it. Now you know what it is. It white tailed d y E d so not white tailed deer, white tailed deer, tailed, white tailed. That adds like another syllable. It's gonna yeah, you can't say that very white tailed deer. So I got a lot of edits to make because I wrote a law review article with white tail just one word, and I got an A on it. But really they didn't call you out for it. Well, your third child could be called white tailed John. There we go, and probably not probably work work, So I said, I saw in the beginning of this white tailed, white tailed Deer Stories, white Tailed Deer Stories podcast that we just did add this collection storytellers, and you guys all heard the intro where, uh, I've made the statement that the white tailed deer hunting culture of North America is really unparalleled in the world in terms of hunting culture. Do you guys agree with that? Ralph? Would you agree with that? Absolutely? You know what the white tailed deer is actually the is the state animal of nine different states. Okay, I mean that's including including Arkansas. That's exactly right. I mean it's uh, I mean people take great pride in the white tailed deer. It's the number one sought after big game species in the world. Yeah, yeah, and there's nothing when when you talk about worldwide stuff, us been from America. Sometimes we don't have insight into exactly how things are done in other places. Obviously we're not experts on it. But you know, in Africa, for instance, there's a lot of hunting that goes on there. But it's it's it's seems to be much more general, like they're after a suite of species um And certainly they hunt specific animals in Europe and the red the red deer and all kinds of stuff. But white tail deer, I feel like, is the y geographic distribution of the white tail in North America coupled with liberal hunting seasons, big populations like we don't realize how good we have it, even in the midst of us really value and deer, Like everybody in this room and a lot of people listen to this really value dear. But when I I do have a lot of friends that don't live in the United States, and when they when they hear that I hunt deer on my seven acres that I own in my backyard, is just mind boggling, And it's super common. I mean, you know, it's it's it really is an incredible thing. And I said something else that that we're in the heyday of white tail deer hunting. Ralph, do you think that's a crab statement. Yeah. Absolutely. You know, um, we estimate or state farm estimates. So we we hit about twenty two thousand deer each year in Arkansas alone. We it wasn't until of the late mid to late nineteen seventies that thoud deer were harvested statewide, and we're hitting that many on the highways alone, just in Arkansas. In Arkansas harvest harvest being that lower lower, like he said, in the mid seventies or before. I mean, it's it's phenomenal, phenomenal in the last you know, hundred years where we have come from in deer populations and deer management. Why is that like walk me through just kind of at a high level, walk someone through from about you know, the market hunting days of the late eighteen hundreds to two, when we've got deer numbers like we have, Like just give us kind of like a high level overview of the extra pation, the reintroduction. And you can use Arkansas, but you know you can talk about broader picture too. Yeah. So you know, in the in the late eighteen hundreds up into the early nineteen hundreds. Uh. You know, unregulated marking hunting was almost the end to a lot of our species, not just whitetail deer, you know, black bear, turkeys, um. Uh you know, the passenger pigeon, all of these animals, black panthers, black panthers. That's right. That that'll be another episode, you know, with with Theodore Roosevelt, the Boone and Crockett Club. UM. You know, early conservationists really brought forth, um, the idea that if we don't take care of it, we're fixing to lose it. And so with the passing of uh, you know, several exercise tack you know, the Dingle Johnson Act, the Pittman Robertson Act, UH, the creation of the Department of Interior State Parks, UM. And then you know, soon after followed a lot of uh state agencies like the Game and Fish In nineteen fifteen, UM, you know, we started developing these game refuges, um, you know, places set aside both the both federal and state. UH. And they really started these restocking efforts and and uh, you know in the nineteen twenties and thirties that they estimated that we had fewer than five deer statewide. And uh so you know, going back and doing some research. UM there's a great book called Arkansas Wildlife, and it goes into a lot of these restocking efforts. But you know, the game and fish. They were asking people who had deerest pets they wanted to buy them. Uh. We started importing deer from Wisconsin, uh, North Carolina, Texas, UM, you know, and and uh you know, started stocking these game refuges and then wanted to do and then we had these game farms where we actually raised deer in pens that were captured and then they were uh you know, once the fonds were born, we would stock those and then we catch deer out of traps in different places like Felsenthal, White Rock of northern Franklin County, uh Black Mountain Game Refuge. Uh. And so they started moving deer around and populating these areas. Uh. And in nineteen thirty eight, we actually started recording, uh creating mandatory reporting for deer harvest. And in that year we we uh we harvested two hundred and three deer statewide. UH. And so from you know the early um, you know, nineteen thirties up until really really the nineteen nineties, UH, dough harvest was was pretty restricted, and it was for you know, the sole purposes of growing our deer population. You know, in in uh the late nineteen mid or mid I would say mid nineteen nineties, a lot of places we realized, how we better get ahold of this because the dear population is growing fast. And so then we went from growing dear populations, uh to really managing populations, molding them into what we what we wanted. And and this concept, you know in Texas, Mississippi had been done for several years at this point, so we really adopted the quality of deer management ideology where we start looking at balancing buckado ratios and managing cross age classes and protecting younger bucks to get because you know, up until the three point rule, about sixty eight percent of the bucks that we harvested were a year and a half and younger. Uh. Now we routinely rank in the top five in the nation, and the percentage of our three and a half year old bucks that are harvests so we have done a one eight so about about ninety six or so rule. The three point rules was ninety eight. Yeah. Um, and so now you know, in two thousand and sixteen, Uh, you know, the bomb got dropped on us and we found CWD, and so now we're having to rethink some of the things that we have really promoted in the past. Uh, in order to combat, you know, the spread of CWD. So, UM, you know, I and I tell folks you know, c W d is is is a bad thing. Uh. But disease management has always been part of the equation. Uh. It's just gonna be a bigger part of that equation now, so that we ensure that, you know, we have deer populations, you know, for for many generations to come. That's a good overview when you hear the nineteen thirties and deer harvests being tunter deer in the state. What's what's the deer harvest today in the state. We're we're averaging around two hundred thousand. We've these last few years have been kind of a roller coaster ride. That was the largest record, That was the our largest harvest on record at almost two hundred seventeen thousand. Wow. So that's a mathematician over here, my lawyer from two is that is that a thousandfold increase, or a hundredfold would be twenty thousand thousand. What I'm thinking about, though, is that this wasn't that long ago. I mean, like my grandfather was born in nineteen nineteen, and he would have been, you know, a teenager and a grown man during a time period when they're just weren't that many deer. My dad was born in nineteen ten, and he talked about when he got back from World War Two that there wasn't no dear to be found. That you know that that if you saw a deer track out of the mountains where I grew up and where he grew up and lived his old, live and ere thing, that people almost come to look to see the deer track because there just wasn't any deer. Yeah, isn't that story wild? Yeah? Everybody tells that same story because it's true. See a deer track. Neighbor would go and tell the ask, and they where's that track? We'd actually a deer track. I've never seen one. And what surprises me about most of those stories is they track that sucker down and kill it. Yeah. No, but that that it wasn't that long ago. And so you can see that in the span of a humans life, like a lot can change, which is which is really encouraging, but it also puts you on kind of red alert, you know, with some of the stuff that's going on, I mean primarily c w D and some of these other diseases that you know, when you know our kids and when when uh rutt is an old man? Um, should the earth even be here? Which I don't think it will be, um, but will there be deer here? I mean, you know, nothing's nothing and stays the same. Yeah, it's always moving, but hopefully we can, you know. I mean that's why we're here. I mean, you're exactly right. I mean, I mean we we are enjoying really the golden age of white till. I mean I I had the fortune enough to uh speak to a guy on a telephone, um, just a couple of years ago, and uh he he was a founding member of a deer camp in Bradley County and he had was telling the other gentleman. He was the oldest man in his camp, and he was telling them about when we stalked deer in a game refuge that was right there on the county line, right next to their deer camp. And uh, he had called me in and um, you know, I did some research after talking with him, and I called him back. I said, you know, I think you're right. But he said he remembers them opening the boxes they had caught these deer in Wisconsin and opening the boxes and those deer jumping out. I think he said there was nine of them. And he said there wasn't one hair on those deer. Really had shipped them by train down here. And he said he remembers when they first stocked that and I think it was not teen forty six. Um, But you know, just to be able to speak to somebody that experienced history like that, to be able to tell the other members of his camp, hey, you know, and now they're they're harvesting a hundred deer a year in that deer camp or whatever it is, and it's like, you know, maybe they started from those first nine deer and that's yeah, that's pretty pretty neat. That is it? Really? Is? It really is? Um? Who else had a question for Ralpha as specific question? Did you say you had a specific question? Bo No, I was just gonna say, when you guys are real mouth. When he was talking about the game refuge, and stuff. My dad took me when I was just a young kid and showed me some of the little boundary posts and stuff of the Black Mountain Refuge and all that, and he said, you know, we would drive over here just then, said here and when it wasn't even dear seasons, see if we might see a deer. You know. Yeah, And you know a lot of a lot of deer camps. Not I actually started deer hunting on White Rock. That's where our deer camp was when I when I first started deer hunting. Uh. And a lot of deer camps across the state. Uh, they were established right next to these game refuges. When they opened up, they would allow people to camp there on the on the refuge or adjacent to it. And and that's where they hunted. That that was what my dad talked about, He said, when when they allowed it to hunt, and that's where everybody went and hunted when they first opened him up. Even though the deer were this person O there is the biggest concentration of deer was in those refuges. I mean, that's that's part of the game. Is I mean, where it says no hunting, that's where you go, that's where you go. Put up your gap, right deer the deer. No, is that the biggest The biggest challenge now is that CWD the stuff that you that's your yellow deal with. As far as the I would say that's one of a few different challenges. The CWD is definitely a big challenge. Number one is because you know, we're still learning, I mean on on the g and scheme of things. I mean, c w D is a fairly new disease um. You know, it wasn't really identified until since the eighties. Uh. They they think that it started in Colorado in the sixties where they first discovered it. When they go back and look at all the documentation of deer they were, you know, exhibiting the same kind of issues, but the pre on itself wouldn't describe until you know, the early eighties. Uh. And so the management of the disease on the grand scale of things is very very new. So we're still learning where do you fit on the scale? Like so if if if a one is this is a hoax and a ten is in the next twenty years there will be zero white until deer on the landscape. Where do you stand with the severity and the severity of the risk that CWD poses on a national scale to deer. I'd say a five, and I don't have to be I don't like to be in the middle ground. But um, you know, if there is a silver lining with c b D is that as long as you're not moving infected material, whether it be live or dead animals on the landscape, it does move rather slowly. Um, so you know there there is a possibility to get out ahead of it. Uh. And where you get out ahead of it and you implement these management strategies, there's a potential that you could slow it there. Uh. There may be places in the state where where beyond that point, um, you know, ground zero, Newton County, that that may be kind of tough. Now, we might be able to reduce the prevalence rate, but as far as slow the spread from that area, we may not be able to do. Now. So Newton, Kunty, that's that's a that's a good I've got a question about that. That is where we first found c w D. It's where years ago, I mean seventy years ago they introduced ELK in there in and we wasn't in the early eighties that put the elk. However, so the Black Mountain Creek and all in there. There were several elk that were stocked in the forties by the Fourth Service and rather than Franklin County, and those disappeared, and we don't know what happened. Now those Mountain folks may ate them, but you know, we don't know what I think some of my incests, but you're right, I mean, we the elk that were in the in the Buffalo National River Valley there, Um, those were stocked in the mid or early to mid nineteen and it's I know, there's no maybe no way to prove it, but probably c w D came with them. It's a possibility, It's possible. But at that point, you know, when those animals removed, nobody knew what c WD was. Yeah, they couldn't have even measured it. No, I mean, they wouldn't have known. And you know, in all honesty, we we have been testing elk here in Arkansas since the late nineteen nineties, Um, whether it found dead, whether harvested, and you know we would if if we had it in the elk first, we probably would have detected it earlier on the funded Okay, so you're so so there. It's a good possibility that it wasn't from malcom. We've we've had deer shipped in from all of the over places, um, you know, illegally. Uh you know, we we it's really scary. UM. Like I said, we we talked a lot of deer bolish across the nation. UM. And in Wisconsin they're dear bolished. They put a map up of their hot zone and then they show all the zip codes of where people come from all over the nation to hunt in that hot zone. And it's very scary knowing that those people are bringing deer back. So we could have been you know, it could have originally come from a carcass and we don't we don't know that and really at this point it's out of the ba Okay, this is my question though, is that dear populations in that hot zone in Arkansas are going down a lot? Though they are and we don't know, we can't pinpoint exactly what that is. Uh, we don't know if that's because uh and of course we uh we support that those observations with our harvest numbers, UM. And we don't know if people are you know, not hunting there as much UM. We have a CWD research project going on it right now where we've UH rate. We're putting GPS colors on deer and we're tracking them. We're looking at mortality rates, we're looking at reproduction rates UM. And so you know, it could be that, you know, the prevalence rate of CWD in Newton County has gotten to a point where it may be impacting. We don't know that for sure until our our research. Could that be a good thing where it dips so low that it and I'm not I don't know the disease terminology, but where the population gets so low that it the disease is weakened in some way and then then when they come back they don't have it as much or well. And so that goes back to one of our management spread strategies where we were mooved the three point rule. And so right now research suggests that uh buck harvest is across all age classes is actually can slow the spread of c w D because when you have a lot of older age classes or age class bucks in population, you know what happens when a year and a half old is there, he's gone. He's gonna disperse. And so if you can, you can reduce that tension though that that need for dispersal. Maybe animals that potentially have it won't go as far. We didn't send Rusty over there to kill some forking horns like he usually does. Right, Yeah, I'll harvest being the only the only way to manage it is through harvesting, right, that's exactly right. I mean there's there's no known cure, there's no shot, there's no feed um. Harvest is our only way right now that we can manage. And that's that's why having hunters is so important. I mean, if we we stop hunting, we're really in trouble. I saw a guy on YouTube one time. I'll send you the link. It may help you. Ralph Uh this guy, this guy, it was he was dead. He he had some kind of mineral lick or something that he he was confident was making his dear immune to c w D forward you that. I'll forward you that I have seen it wouldn't it wasn't a type of Arkansas, but I watched it. I was just like, wow, yeah it was. It was some I can't remember, but it's probably got cast role in it. You remember, get the port on the spoon and yeah, well no, I man, I c w We've everybody in the deer community has talked a lot about c w D. So that's not necessarily what all I want to get into today. But uh, but you asked what other you know, our other problem is in one of them is hunter recruitment. You know, there there are fewer and fewer youngsters now that are that are hunting. There there's a lot of uh petition for their time. You know, a lot of athletics, you know, extracurricular activities and so you know, and when I was, when I was growing up, hunting, I mean, when dear season happened, the world stopped for nine days, that's all you did. Uh. And we we didn't muslot hunter or archery hunt when I was a kid. We we were modern gun hunters. But for nine days, that was it, you know, that's what you did. There used to be a time when when you played baseball in the summer. Now they do it year round. I know folks that have that take kids every weekend to baseball. Same thing with basketball used to but now they have all these other sports and camps and youth leagues and stuff that play nearly year round basketball and stuff. The Friday before opening day and the Monday after opening weekend, a lot of schools were closed. Yeah, now that I graduated high school and the first day of um dear season, well that Monday, even if it opened on a Saturday, school was out. That's right. The same was as where I was at Mountainburg that day. I always hated that my school did not have dear days, but all the smaller school and we were a small school, but for the area, we were a bigger school. If you hunted before you got caught the bus or before you went to school, however you got to school, if you killed a deer that morning, you was late. If you brought in your hunting license where you had taken deer, it was hey. I remember multiple times, and my dad's not here today, but this is a good story about my dad. I remember multiple times being in school and we had a pay phone in the school and my dad worked at the bank, you know, before cell phones, you know, and I would just it would be a fall day and it would be cool outside and we would have gone outside, you know, at lunch or something, and I was just like, man, I'd call my dad and say Hey, dad, will you call and check me out of school? I want to go, Dear, I gotta go. Call him on the pay phone and he'd call the office and twenty minutes later, the intercom would come on, can we have Clay Nuwcomb? Can we have Clay Nucombe please come to the office, And I just I just kind of I don't know what's going on again. And one of my good friends his his dad said that when he was a kid, he would load on the bus with shotgun and his dog, my brother, and they would go to school and he'd laid his shotgun in the corner and the dog would sit outside, and then after school they would hunt the fence rows for quay all the way home. And uh, he said, that's what he did, you know during quail season. That's what he did every day. And they let you get on the bus with the shop. I'll be darn. My older brother can tell the same story, really taking a gun on the bus on five. They kept it on the school bus. The school bus driver was his football coach. They kept it on the bus, locked up, and he got on the bus in the evening. He got off at a friend's house and they went shooting wood ducks. Well, I think I've told this story before. If we're talking about guns at school, if I told the one about the principal coming old story, Yeah, yeah, I had a I brought a gun that my dad bought from me to school one day and the principal calls me aside and he goes they Clay, I heard you got a gun your truck. And I was like yeah, and he's like, I want to see it. I went in trouble. We walked out, We walked out to the parking lot, and he wanted to see it, like just because it was a cool gun. Different day, we all had guns in our Yeah. Yeah, those racks stick in the backglass, that's where they stay. Well, so this this podcast that we just came out with, this white Tailed Deer Stories podcasts, there's gonna be two. There's gonna be two full episodes dedicated to white Tailed Deer Stories. Mose On gonna be on the second one. He tells the story. Um, I I when I hear James Lawrence, Andy Brown and my dad tell a story, it's like I could just listen to those guys talk. I tried to imply inside of the podcast, how to me, those just aren't stories, but they're like really personal to me in different ways, just like that's the sound of my world, you know. And and and the I kind of got into these deer stories are so cool because they do. I mean, we all like dear stories because we're deer hunters and we want to hear the details of what happened. But stories carry so much more than that. And that's what I tried to show and and tell in some ways that m person to person human communication. It's so valuable. I mean, it is so valuable. And I think the reason that I liked whitetail deer hunting as a kid was because of the way I saw my dad and the men that he hunted with, the way they handled it, the way they talked about it. It's like, all this stuff's going on in my life. But boy, that's really important because the way they talked about it, in the excitement in their voice and the detail that they went in. Because I'd hear those same men tell a story about something else and it wasn't nearly as passionate, you know, you see what I'm saying. I mean, just there's these default messages that are coming to you as a kid in in Uh, it had value. Yeah, the value you had in and it's like you could tell those I've heard. I've heard Gary tell that story before, and I heard him tell it again, and I was as glued to it then as I was the first time, because I had value in that in telling that story to a guy that you know, somebody else that just played golf, you know, or just played baseball or something, that he's not gonna connect as quick because he's not gonna put as much value in what he's here. And as as you are telling it, well, I can tell you too, from you know, being a kid, You're exactly right. I mean those stories were valuable. But sitting around the campfire at nighttime with your grandpa and his buddies and your uncle and your dad and their buddies. I mean as a as a nine year old or a ten year old, you felt like you were an equal and they were telling stories and you're eating dear chili, you know, and and uh, you know, staying up past what your normal bedtime was, and and uh, I mean it was a I mean just hanging on every word that those guys were saying, that the stories that they were telling that was it was just phenomenal. Yeah. My dad and all my uncles were all hunters, and a lot of times they'd get together and when I just a kid and be talking about their hunts from that year, the year before, the upcoming hunts, and you was just glued to it, you know, even when I wasn't allowed to go hunting. It when I was just a young kid. I remember that. You know, any of those guys real good storytellers. Would you would you have would you have characterized them as that? Yes? I would. Uh, I've I've got, I say I've got. I had two uncles and my dad. They're all passed away, all my families passed away with my uncle's and my everybody. But the three of them that hunted a lot together, they all could tell a pretty good story. I mean it, it got you glued to it. Like he was talking about your dad's and Brent was talking about listening to that story of your dad's. Uh, you didn't matter how many times you heard it, you was stuck to it. You just sit there and you listened, and you listen on every word, you know, and tried to pick out what was going to happen. Next, even though you knew what was gonna happen because you already heard the story, but it's still you was just in ten on wanting to listen to it. So, yeah, what was So the stories that were told and I want to hear some of you guys stories here in a minute. Of the stories that were told on that podcast, Rusty, which one stood out to you? Oh, the moun shraft really? Yeah, I mean that that's just extraordinary. I mean that that was a wild story. I mean yeah, I don't know if I've heard anything close to that. Yeah, I mean hoisting that thing about that mine shaft. Yeah, and it just only had a little bit of water in the bottom of it. Yeah, I mean it could have been full of water, you know. Yeah, that was definitely about hunting. Word of y'all all missing the whole thing here, holes in the ground, you don't want to go there, coon out in the whole lot. Actually hunting where there is a mind shaft is blowing my mind. Yeah. Yeah, And oh it certainly wasn't marked. There wasn't a road to it. There. There's just out in that part of the world, there's just there's just mine shafts, random places. Uh, and and yeah, I thought Randy did a good job of telling that story too. He uh um, yeah, he just I like the way he I liked the way he told it, and and I like one of my favorite parts was the very end when he said, and I went back with my kids, and that mine shafts the water and there's a fishing. I thought that was funny. But yeah, but that was good resting what she said. And there was a lot in that too, if you when he was telling that story about he called he called it was it Andy Scott, Andy's son and my good friend Scott Brown called Scott and uh He's like, yeah, man, I'm bringing your powder. I'm coming to you. Yeah. That's that was the whole thing to me, the whole thing getting that buck out of that was he called somebody he cared about, that cared about him, that knew who left work. I'm pretty sure, yeah, to go out there and help him, man Tom Rodderie right there. But the moral of that story is, don't ever go hunting without telling somebody we're going. Yeah. Yeah, one time in the ozarks On public Land, I remember, I was turkey hunting. That was talking about holding the ground and and and telling somebody where you're at. I was turkey hunting by myself public land, and I was hiking up this real steep ridge and I stopped to take a break and was leaning on my shotgun, just breathing hard, and I looked down by my foot and there was a hole about as big as a softball in the ground. Just it was kind of odd because there were no rocks around it. It was just leaf litter, and there was just a hole. And it didn't look like it was angled like armadilla hole. There was no debris pile like where something had been digging, just a hole. And I was like, huh, that's weird. I took the butt of my shotgun and Bopp just kind of tapped on it, and that that thing just collapsed and opened up into a hole a bout as big as a beach ball, and it was so deep that you could drop a rock down and it would be like ding dinging. No way it was. It was a sinkhole. And you know, you you had a hard time falling in it, just because I mean big as a beach ball. You'd have to like put your hands in the air and just jumped in it. But I was like, holy smoke, I guess only one of my legs will probably fitting it. It was it was in the Ozarks where we have this limestone shell and a lot of stuff, and the rocks dissolved, like there's big there are big sink holes in the Ozarks. That's just what it was. Yeah, it was weird. It was game and flat ground. For the love of humanity, you're gonna get killed. Rust of which, what was your bouncing off of that as a youth, um my dad, I mean he's a crazy deer hunter and he didn't take up no slack with me as like an eight year old or whatever. So we'd walk in it, you know, three thirty am, two hours before daylight. And then on the way back to the truck, I'd be like, there's a drop off right by the trail that we walked in. He's like, oh, yeah, shut up, fell into it. I'm gonna I'm glad I didn't, Yeah, because I mean we were going on some steep up. I was like, I couldn't say anything in the dark, though, better followed close behind him. Favorite story you heard for sure, and then I really like my favorite part was they didn't want to damage the handlers. Yeah, yeah, let's Laris think how we're getting them out of here. Yeah, that's value. Which one stood out with you? That one obviously, I mean that's the one in the minute. You can't say the same one they but okay, new rule, can't say the same one the other Terry, Terry the Yankee. That was a good story, Tony, Tony, Tony was good like Tony story and he told a good story. Yeah in the beans. Yeah, and you know he's he said everything that happened, he never thought it would happen. He already he's already cursed, he says, he never one he's got. We're gonna talk to him about going to that wed and dear in Deer Season for the love of humanity, who his friend absolute he was not his friend friend, he would have never done that. But then you know, he didn't get to go opening day, and then everything that he proved the old point that you can't kill him at the house, regardless if you got an opportunity to go saddle up and get out there. And then just when he thought things were there's no way that deer is going to come from there. There's no way that deer is gonna keep coming. There's no way that deer is gonna be ten ft, no way he's even gonna see a deer. Because he ran in there and got all sweaty. He had already wrote it off. I mean, he basically just wrote it off. And and those are the funny stimes when you get one you really weren't expecting. Which story stood out to you mind that I liked the bass was Andy Brown's about the deer, you know, on the finding the tracks and and then hunting and killing that big deer. And then at the end of the the story he talks about he said, but that wasn't the deer that I was. But that whole story this way told it was really good. I can associate with that because he huts a lot of the same not the same area, but the same type of train with the mountain saddles and all that that I do. And I could I could just see everything that he was talking about. Man, When when when Andy and and Scott and some of these other guys that that they hunt with tell stories. Man, sometimes somebody can belabor something so much you're just like, come on, get to the point. Sometimes people tell the story and you just wanted to keep going, and you're sad when it ends, and and and a lot of that has to do with context, Like if you pull up on the side of the road and talking to somebody where your cars running, you know, you kind of got to understand, this is not the time to give like the extended version of this story. But in the right moment, in the right context, a good long story, especially from someone you deeply respect, is just what you order. And man, Andy I Love actually had to cut down some of his story, so he didn't really hear the full version with all the pauses and different things, just because the format. We had to tighten it up a little bit. But man, he tells a detailed story. I mean it starts off with the with the scouting trip, and I mean he just he just kind of went into everything. But what you learned from that kind of stuff is you learned a lot about how to scout, what to look for, when to move on, when to keep going, how his season laid out. I mean, there, if you listen to it, just like, okay, when is he gonna kill this? There, You're you're missing the point. But there was I was telling Misty, even him talking about a cotton mouth that he wished he'd killed. And uh and and just and he's a great storyteller and a great hunter. I like what most said, want to go. He he left the story were that big track that was not so it sticks in your mind. And I've been wondering ever since. I wonder how big? Yeah, yeah, I mean I'm wanting to go and see you know, yeah, but I've gotta By the time this comes out, I will have already posted. But I'm gonna post a picture of the deer that he killed. Uh it was it was a nineteen point just a while. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Yeah, you can't count very good. Uh, heck of a deer. And uh and it wasn't the biggest deer and he's ever killed either. He said it was the second biggest, is what he said on that wasn't it? Well, if he said that, I don't remember that. That's what he said. I'm pretty sure he said this was a second. I'm pretty sure this is my second for sure, said that he never killed one like it before. Yeah, but then only he said, I've killed a bigger deer too, And he said, I come to think it, I think this is probably the second biggest deer either that or your or your Dad's story one because I get him confused. Yeah yeah, talk about it. So my favorite story I think has to be James Lawrence, even though Andy, Dad and James kind of all were right there. And then as far as the excitement of the story, the mind cheft story, I loved that one is just kind of a shocking ending, you know. But James Lawrence, I mean, mainly because he's just my hero and he uh, you know, James is not a big storyteller, like if you're sitting around a room like this, like he's not gonna talk, like he's the guy that's just kind of sitting back waiting to be spoken to. But when he talks, he knows what he's talking about. And uh oh, I I kind of I just like, I just liked h James really got fired up about that deer, which you can kind of I mean, because he was actually afraid the deer was gonna run him over, is what he was trying to say, you know, because he had those hawks on the deer was coming and he never used hawks on his body again because it spooked him. And you know, I mean, he's a veteran hunter. And if he tells me he was spooked in the woods, he wasn't being dramatic. He really got spooked. He thought that deer was gonna run him over. My favorite part of it is when he said that towards Enevy's story there he told he said, he said, you know, he shot the deer and all that, and then he I forget how he quoted, and he said, and I realized that that deer was coming to me. He he was gonna he wanted to take care of me because he thought I was, you know, taking over his area. Yeah, yeah, uh, Ralph, which one stood out to you? Man? The mind shafted me was just one of those is like, that's the craziest thing I've ever heard. And I've loaded a lot of deer, so I can only imagine two guys pulling that thing up. But as a biologist, the clicker, dear, dear to me? Was it interesting? Because I'm thinking the whole time, I'm thinking, I'm wondering to that guy, I'm wondering if that deer's grinner's broke U why was he clicking? I was wondering what was going on? Do you have any inside that. I have no idea. That's what I'm thinking the whole time. I'm thinking, I wonder if it's Grinner's broke. I've actually heard, hey before we go today, I've actually seen those little things he talked about, the little tweel thing you turned. Have you ever seen those ralphs clicking call? I really thought it was to uh to imitate you know, you know, I don't know, but that's but the click. I was like, that thinks that Grenner's got to be broken. I've actually heard that one time in the wild. What did it sound like? Just like a like a single click. Grunt is a series of clicks. Clicks, no grunted, No, no, no, I'm saying that grunt is a series of clicks. So yeah, yeah, if you could just do like one, pop your tongue with it, Yeah, that's it. I've heard it one time in the wild and Arkansas. It was a hall of being and that's the only time I've ever heard it. Huh, this is told me so when I first it was, there was three bucks And when I first heard the bucks coming, it was like a loud just a b I mean, I'm like, whoa, what is that? Yeah? I was like on a little island and I was in the middle of a cut cornfield. Well I've seen the dog coming and this book was behind her or yeah, he was right behind her and they come out there in front of me. They stopped, and there's another buck run up there, and then another little six point run up and they were just kind of circling her. She was out there and at six point got over really close and that one that biggest buck started. Yeah, and he looked over at him and he just charged him and hit him in the side and just rolling. Yes, So this story is confirmation of what said. Have you ever seen a black panther? No, I have not, how about ever built woodpeck. That's that is for real. That's I've been hunting all my life and that's the first time and the only time I've ever heard it. But I have heard it, and then, I mean it was loud and distinct. He said, them old timers he talked to you that said that that They said that dominant buck was he was the dominant buck making that noise. It was the big one that was doing it. That's interation. Yeah, yeah, I've never I've never heard one click like that. But I can't. It's so wild. Deer vocalizations are so elusive. I mean, I've hunted my whole life, killed quite a few deer, ben in the woods a lot in the fall, and I mean it's like, did I hear a buck deer grunt last year? I don't even know if I did. I mean, like, it's not really Yeah, I don't know. I just don't. You don't. You don't hear him all the time, do you guys hear him? Yeah, y'all just don't ever kill him, y'all just let him go, especially especially in the Midwest, are really vocal out there. But I'm I hear it every year here in Arkansas. Yeah, if it's a rut and I don't see a buck and he's not grunting, and I'm like, what's going on? Yeah, I hear a lot. I hear a lot of grunting. I've heard a lot of different vocalizations, but the clicking one, to me, is is kind of new. Yeah. Now, I don't hear a lot of fighting, like clashing of antlers. No, they'll tickle them, but they just don't get after it like they do in Midwest. Right. Well, Hey, I I meant to do this at the beginning, but I gotta do it now. So Phelps Game Calls just came out with a full new series of grunt tubes. It also they've got multiple styles of grunt tubes. Yeah, they got a clicking call, Jason felt. Yeah, let me know what. So Rusty Johnson the other thing that he has a secret grunt calls he's clicking on click. Um these calls are there's a there's Alpha Pro, which is a just a smaller call with a tube on it, and then there's the Beta Beta Pro with uh it's acrylic. There freeze proof that if if you feel it full of suraliva blowing on the thing, it's not gonna freeze. What I like about him is that you can blow them super soft. Sometimes when you're blow on a call, you gotta before it goes and you'll end up. You can you can blow it just as soft. I mean sometimes a deer will be right up under your stand and you can just barely hear him. And then sometimes he's out there sixty seventy yards and you can hear him. Why why you know that they a deer has a pretty big range of volume, and so man if he's if you just want to soft ground. To me, that's what makes a good grunt call. And they won't top out when you just blow on him. Sometimes the reed sticks on one when you're if a deer is out there a hundred and twenty yards and the winds hallen and you're just trying to throw a hell Mary and just just hit it hard. Sometimes the red will flatten out and it won't blow. But these Phelps calls are for real, the real deal, and uh, there they are. They they were launched on October the eleven, so this here podcast comes out on October the twelfth. So you can buy these at at the Medior dot com, Phelps dot com. So they've got they've got a couple of tubes, the Alpha and the Beta that have the the tubeottom which man, I I like, you have some good inflection with that flexible tube. It sounds good. Yeah, But if you don't, if you want a smaller call and you don't want the tube they make. Uh they call this the Omega hybrid, which is like an acrylic call kind of almost the size of like a goose call. No tube and uh it's uh, it doesn't have the doesn't have the tube, rest of the institubes the ticket. Yeah, but anyway, those are for sale. Phelps start, Phelps, Phelps game calls. They've also got a doubly eat and a fawn, uh fawn call full line of deer calls. So faun, that's what I like. That's what Brent likes to kill. That's a brand call. That's it. Um, I look like I had to be a bear attractive. Now. Yes, I used as a predator call. Now I told on this podcast. No, I wasn't on this podcast. Y'all. Remember the story of my son. My son, Bear's got a cool name. When he was couldn't have been more than a year and a half old, eighteen months or something. Uh, I took him to hang a tree stand with me, and it was in in uh like late summer. Took him, carried him in, carried my sticks and my tree stand and before season, we're just going to hang a stand. I started hanging the ladders and get way up in the tree. So I'm like twenty ft up in the tree and uh, bear gets scared down on the ground because I'm not down there with him, and he's scared and he starts crying, just straight up, just crying. And I'm trying to hang this tree stands so I can't go down to him. So I'm just like, hey, but it's okay, it's okay. I'm whispering. He just gets crying all the more. He cries for I don't know a couple of minutes, and directly I hear the woods just coming just crash, crashed. I mean, I hear something running in. It's real thick woods, and a doe deer comes busting in and skids to a stop. I mean, I remember it being like six or eight feet from him, maybe it was fifteen feet, but this doe deer, it was real thick and she just ran. She believed it was a faun in distress, skinned to a stop, seize him, and then you know, disappears, and bear quit crying and looked up at me, and he said, you knew what was He said, Dear, It was just like he said, you're not gonna believe. I was down there on the ground and a deer red up. She thought it was a deer. There was a boothy birth. Dear, Corrant needs to get a spotted pone uh pocket watch. Deal that'll be for Sunday. Yeah, yeah, Ralph, I told you. I asked you when you came, I said, bring your best dear story, so we want to hear it if you got it. Man, I've got a lot of great deer stories, but one of my favorites, uh was actually I was living in lonok and I put in for a permit muzzloader permit draw on Holland Bottom's w m a right outside of a cabin and uh my brother in law, who is from eastern Arkansas, he put in for as well, and he drew one. And uh, I've always wanted to hunt out of a canoe, and so I went to a place there, uh in Ozark body used canoe so proud of that thing. And I was like, I'm gonna float this canoe in hauling bottoms his permit hunt, I'm gonna kill a deer. And uh So the Friday before the permit hunt, I go out there. The ditches are dry, the bios are dry. There was there was hardly any water in place. And I was so broken hearted, and the mosquitoes were eating my eyes out. And I told my brother and I said, We're not gonna be hunt. The mosquitoes are so bad. He saw, no, I'm for me. Stark saw I can do this. And at that time I worked on fish farm, so I was pretty used to mosquitoes, the term itsels, though, oh no, there were no thermurselfs this and this is this is and uh, I was like this, this is it. I can't believe I just bought a canoe. And so we went out Saturday morning hunted that morning about nine o'clock. My brother in law he tapped out and he said, I can't handle this. I said, I told you it's bad. So we're we're walking out with our muzzluvers between our tails, when legs, and these two girls to two ladies, uh in in black sweats and in rubber boots. They're walking out out with what I thought were howitzers over their shoulder, that caliber musselotters, big god octagon barrels. And my brother in law goes, they're more of a man than I am. And so we were kind of kind of whipped and and uh, I said, now I don't I'm not gonna hunt this evening. So Sunday rolled around the next day and a storm blew in and it was a cold front. Uh just dumps like two inches of rain and I saw I called my brother in law, said, hey, let's go back out there. Let's just look and see what happened. And mosquitoes were gone, there was water and everything, and uh a lot of the hunters left and this was a five day permit. So we walked in there with our boots we had hit boots on and we found this this ridge, I don't know, probably about three quarters of a mile and we'd walked down this road that was flooded and it was just like a tunnel. It was just beautiful. Just everything was calm. I could swear it. And down there was there was snowflakes every once in a while. And this was in October, and uh so we walked in there and I had my stand with me, and uh, I said, Clay, we're gonna we're gonna hunt this this afternoon. I said, this, this is perfect, and I mean I was just riding on cloud nine. And so I hung my stand and I said, you meet me back here at the truck at two o'clock. We're gonna get the canoe. We're gonna ride in here. I'll hunt this end of the ridge and you hunt the other end. So I had meant there was a boat missing on my on my dear stand. It was just a lock on stand. I said, well, I'm gonna go back find a boat for that. You meet me here, we'll go hunting. So I go back, and uh, I was like I told my wife. I said, a load up canoe. I said, I gotta find a boat, and I'm I'm gonna meet Clay. So we get down there and two o'clock rolls around and he's not there. To thirty rolls around, he's not there. I'm like, ah, I gotta go. So I get in the canoe and I take off. You out there hang my stand. At three oh three o'clock straight up, I'm sitting in my dear stand and it starts to miss and I got my muzzloaded land across my lap and so I had this old army punch on. I just laid it across this this gun, and uh, when I'm deer hunting, I like to chew the back of That's just what I like to do. And so I just put one in my mouth. About two minutes later, I hear this walking in the I can hear water splashing. I was like, what is that? And so I kind of look and this deer comes up out of the water. I can tell he was a buck, and he wouldn't have a huge Bucky's two an half year old buck. And he walks up and he just lays down about forty yards from me and just lays down. And I'm thinking, man, this is the coolest thing ever. And so every time I try to spit, that deer would look at me. At some point I'm thinking I'm not swallowing well at I here's more water coming, you know, just rustling around like, man, there's more deer. And I looked back there and it's my brother in law and he had to have hit boots to get in there, and he walks up there. So I got the deer about forty forty five yards laying down in front of me. And my brother in law has a launch chair and he's like seventy five yards to my right, and he's he never sees me in the tree, even though I'm wearing orange and I'm sitting there watching him open his launch chair. He takes a leak and he gets a deer year out and this deer is laying there and there's some some coral berry about I don't know, knee high and this deer would pick his head up over and I'm watching this deer watch my brother in law who's not seventy five yards from him. This whole time, for two hours, my brother get up and he'd cough, and I'm thinking, Clay, what are you doing? And so I'm watching this deer. And then ever so often that deer w with jerk his head and he would look at men, both of them us. But it really, I mean watching his reaction to Clay. Really, I mean opened my eyes to how you know, you could be in the woods and deers laying down he's watching him. And as long as you don't he don't smell you, you know, or it's no quick reactionarything, he may not jump. And so I'm sitting there watching the deer and I'm I'm learning, you know, I'm having a heck of a time other than not being able to spend And it just happen to know Clay, but uh, and I love Clay. We've had a lot of we've had a lot of different adventures together. But I'm like, what the world are you doing? You know? And so um at five oh five, this so this deer had laid down between beside two trees. There was a bigger tree and a smaller tree around next to it, and all I could really see was the front part of his his chest and his neck when he was tick his head out to look at clay. Now, where you wanting to shoot this dere? Well, So you know, when I first, when we first got there, I thought, Man, this is elaradly in the hunt. I'm not even gonna shoot this there. Who knows what else is gonna come up here. So as it got darker and darker, and my brother in law started making more and more noise, I think, if I'm going to shoot one, I better do it now, because there was water all around us. The you know, the chances of finding him with a muzzleloader in the dark through the water is pretty low. I thought, if I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it now. And so, because a lot of my buddies had told me I was crazy for buying that canoe for hunting in Holland, bombs with a canoe, and so I wanted some vindication, you know, And so that there he and so finally he reaches back to lick himself and I pulled that poncho off that musslo or put a cap on it, and I just waited about ten more seconds, and he kind of turned his head and I pulled a mussloer up, and my brother in law made a sound, and that deer stuck his neck out, and I shot him right in the neck and just I mean his head. It's wonder he didn't break his jawb on his head hit so hard, you know, And and then I could hear through smoke, I could hear my brother and lost a couple of expletives. And so when the smoke clears, I could see him picking himself up off the ground, had fallen back out of his chair, and so I yelled over, I said, clay, and he's like and then he yelled a couple more explosives, and so I got down and said, hey, you ain't gonna believe this. So I explained to him what happened this whole time, and said, hey, come help me pull this deer out. And he said, you didn't shoot, no, dude, you just did that scare of me. I said, oh no, I did. It's laying row here, and so he walked up there to it and he said, a couple more exploitives. I can't believe this. So we pulled that deer up to the canoe and uh, I've got I've got a picture of him, that deer and me in that canoe, floating out in that tunnel, trees on that water. And that was that was probably the great one of the greatest deer hunts that I've ever had, uh, because I told those boys that worked that I was coming back with a deer, and he was like, you're you're lying, You're lying. And so when they've seen that deer, they they're like, I can't believe that. Oh, that's awesome. That's a great story. And I've got I've got those antlers in a picture in my office at work. I mean, that's gotta be one you need. You need to text me a picture of that photo if you would. Yeah, I'd like to see that. Yeah, it'd be cool. Yeah. It was just one of those that it went from high, super high to get the hunt on that that permit hunt and knowing what caliber deer there to a super low with the mosquitoes and no water and buying a canoe, not getting floated back to a super high again, I mean it was just a roller coaster ride of a of a hunt. That's a good one, man, that is a good one. All right, So now it's time that we do the bear Grease swap shop. Here we go. Yep. So did y'all know that we uh we we have our listeners send stuff into bear Grease at the medeator dot com, stuff that they want to sell and uh and that. But they have to have their Instagram handle, their Facebook handle to be able to to sell it. And we, you know, we we we we we pick and choose what we put on here. But here we go. All right, we've got this. Uh, we've got a listing from a man by the name of buck Lester with an Instagram handle of buck dot Lester, and he has this is what he says. He said, Hey, I heard on the podcast that one of you mentioned hoping to have a nineteen eight two trans am. He said, well, I don't have a trans am, but I do have the next best thing, a nineteen eighties seven El Camino with a three oh five small block in a four barrel carb my first vehicle and a heck of a rig. He has a picture of it here and it's it's a nice looking el Camino man, and uh he says it does needs it says hundred forty nine thousand miles, four stock rams, four Kraiger rims, power locks and windows, has some large dents and rust, but it runs and drives. Needs some tires five thousand dollars all right, So you can contact buck Lester at buck dot Lester on Instagram. That's pretty legit man, you haul out some deer and that. Yeah, that could be like the machine. Yeah, that's a business in the front. Incredible. Okay, So this next one, uh is this is actually a pretty functional one. This guy says, howdy, he said, calling all fellow sasquatches which rest in my I'm how tall are you resting? Calling all fellows sasquatches. I got me a pair of Lowa Tibbot hunting boots sized fifteen. They're a little too small for me. All this guy is as they fit more like a fourteen used for about a season and a half. Two d and fifty dollars or best offer. So his Instagram handle is big Underscore Sasky Underscore man b I G Underscore s A s k Y Underscore mayn nice looking pair of low of boots. I would imagine those are four boots been Warren just a couple of times. Well, Clay, I just looked at my You wear a fourteen, so he might be marketing directly to you. You need some really good movies. Break up the pocket. Okay, and here we have our our last Burgary swapshop entry for the day. We've got a I'm gonna read what this man says. Well, for sale a thirteen foot Boston Whaler boat for the thirty horsepower Yamaha outboard and an easy loader trailer. He's asking fifty five dollars all right, This Boston Whaler is ready to help any p NW outdoorsman. What's that mean? Pacific Northwest job rust on their honey and fishing adventures. It's perfect for duck hunting on the coast, trolling, soak, baker, laker, brute. Oh, he's given away fishing spots and get into the secluded upland bird spots on the Columbia or the Snake. He's a salesman to a salesman, or any of the inland lakes. I recently got the boat dialed in, but I'm building my house and could use the extra cash. I like Sometimes a good salesman will tell you a little bit more information that you need to know to try to rope in to trust him with me. And this man said, you know, I need a little cash to build my house. I like it. Details recently repacked the trailer hubs with grease, installed new trailer lights. The motor is a two stroke and runs well, new steering, new throttle cables, new battery. Thirty five pound thrust electric trolling motor included build out a one inch marine grade ply built out of one one inch marine grade plywood. It was stained and sealed. The price also includes a five gallon gas tanks and a fish finder and fire extinguishers, flares, a horn, three rod holders, telescoping paddle man. Contact Cameron Stone. Oh wow. Cameron put his email addressed Cameron. You don't want to do that, brother, but we're gonna put it because he gave it to us. I can see an email Cameron, if you're serious, Cameron dot s dot Stone at gmail dot com. I can see reston right now, Paris sliding with them four number size fourteen or fifteen and the l Camino hooked up to this Boston oh Man sliding. I'm gonna get all three before this podcast drops. Yeah, Crade, you'd have loading that thing in. This is like a package deal that comes with a G five gallon gas tank? Is that full or empty? Because that don't affect You'll have to email cameras need some boxing glows. If you're going to buy me, then that. Yeah. But if you pull up the El Camino with that, nobody that's great. Preston don't want it, then maybe he used to bite for a new Doss Boat episode that Yeah, yeah, pull it el Camino across the I'd like to take that hunting about that strap of bear on top. There you go, put a wench in the back and we pull them up in the back luster by the del Camino and put that boat behind it. Mullet machine man, grow mullet ralph. I got a question before we get out of here, shoot forever and I've seen a study that was published out of I think it was South Carolina Department Natural Resources did a study on the effects of coon hunting bothering deer or deer hunters. If you got an opinion on that, if you get as far as what the I do so growing up coon hunting was my number one sport, even above deer hunting. We we coon hunted six nights a week. And the only reason we didn't coon hunt on Sunday night was we had school Monday morning, which we coon hundred rest of weeks. It really didn't matter. So I didn't figure that out. But U we coon hunted all time, and uh, you know, there were a lot of nights that we would walk in on a trade coon and our lights would hit deer and we'd walk right past them and it and it never bothered them. Um. I think what happens is when you get a dog that does chase deer, or you hunt in a location you maybe four or five times in a week, then you may uh you know, be creating some disturbance on those deer. But you gotta remember, you know, deer or primary. I mean they're primary's considered crepuscular, so they they move early morning in late evening, that's their primary times to move. Now, they'll they'll eat all day long, but you know at nighttime they have better vision, um, and so they don't probably get as much disturbance at that time of the night, so it probably doesn't bother them. I think what bothers them. And it's just like deer leases. When when somebody hunts a deer stands, they ride that foiler in their set even days a week. That dear patterns that person. They know when they're there and when they leave. And so it's as opposed to to coon hunters. You may walk into one place one time and a night and you may not be back there forever. You know, I just don't think that that, you know, just one you know, by happenstance and counter with with some hunters and a coon dog, that deer is gonna change. It's that's its movements or its patterns based on that. Now, if those dogs get after that deer, then yeah, there there maybe some change. But if that you know what I read that have you read that's seen that stuffy I have. There was even it was like there was one car. It was an enclosed place and they had these collar deer and there's like thousands of acres and they had this collar deer and they the one deer that was actually chased by the coon dog. It struck him and running before daylight the next morning, that deer has made his way back and was within just a few feet of where he was bidded, and that's flametry data. Got off it came back and laid back down where it'll get jumping. So and I've seen it forever. You know. I coon on a lot and my buddy right there on a tree and looking around. Hey there's a deer. My buddy Ford van Fawsen, who works for first Light, conservation director for first Light. He once brought up that study to me and uh, he said, uh. He said, yeah, you knew that was funded by the coon hunters of America, didn't You had those biologists in their back pocket. He was joking. It was a good joke though. Yeah, it's probably funnier he said, definitely. Hey, thank you all for coming Ralph, thanks for coming up. Man, Thanks for what you're doing with all your all your work inside of Arkansas deer hunting. And we know you guys are working hard and I appreciate being here. Yeah. Man, And now that I know you're a coon hunter, you gotta come back. You have to come back beyond the render podcast trapping man. If you can kill it needed, I'm all about it. There. Good Johnson boys. Great to have y'all. Y'all got some good bucks tied up somewhere, just busted. You're busted your trap? You got tied up? What you tell us about that? We got him fail? You won't believe it. But I was inadvertently after a two deer on opening week. I didn't know it yet though. Really yeah, so I got some intel. Tell you what state though? Arkansas? Oh, we just scored it, northwest Arkansas. The guy killed it. It's the one that guy killed. No, you were hut over by him? Well, technically I was hunting the same area. I won't say where. But I had a guy that gives me some intael, feeds me some intael, and he sent me a picture of it like two days before it was killed. And I was like, okay, I'm getting ready. I'm I'm amped up. I'm about to put cameras out. And then I get a picture because I know the guy that killed it, and he sent me a picture. He said, well, y'all score this. I said, oh, it's that, But it was two and three cross. Here's what we done. Just got killed off of public land in Arkansas. Uh Watton saw w M outside of hazing. Oh yeah, that's a beautiful deer. Wow, look at that G two with the it's a three pronged G two. Looked up, it looks like a G two. People always ask me, we're on even kill You can kill them anywhere as long as you can put some age on. I mean, our entire state has genetic potential. It's all about. If you want big bucks, you gotta pass them win they're little bucks. That's just I mean, really, that's what you gotta do. Good stuff. So y'all are onesome deer. Yeah, there's that big deer. Well, thank you all. MO. Good to see you man, Thanks for coming. I know you'll have a big buck story here soon, I hope. All Right, guys, let's see you next time.

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