00:00:00 Speaker 1: Hey, what's up all its people. I'm Tyler Jones and this is the Bad Country many series from the Element podcast Casey fill them in. Since we're diving head first into the back country hunting this season, we decided to call in some help and talk to some experts that know how to crush it in the back country. So make sure and subscribe. And if this is helpful, we'd love for you guys to give us a five star rating and and I Teams review. Absolutely. Now let's get into it because I still have a lot of mountain house flavors to try before September gets here. Okay, today on the show, we've got Mark Hilson of Exo Mountain Gear. What's going on, Mart? Oh? Not much, man, just excited as we're in the summer here and preparing for hunts. So I'm glad to have this conversation with you guys. Yeah, that's good. We are doing the same. We've been talking a lot of whitail, talking a lot of elk, just kind of it's the season of dreaming, you know what I mean. Like I've got a pretty good tag, so there's a lot of dreams of all there. But it's just always fun to think about, like how the next season is gonna go for me and stuff? But are you can outdo any bear hunt this time of year? Yeah, So I'm actually getting ready to take off on a bear hunt. Um. We do this thing every year with X amount here called the Death Hike, and that sounds super fun. I've heard about it. It's as fun as it sounds, so yeah, last it's something different every year basically just test ourselves mentally, physically, test gear that type of thing. Last year we did just shy of a hundred miles UM in a couple of days in Idaho. And we're actually trying I go into the Eco Caps wilderness this year. And with the way that the winter they had in the earlier dates we have for the hikes, like snows going to be impossible basically like it it makes finding a route or at least a good fun high route really tough. And so we kind of called this audible just a few weeks ago, and we're turning the Death Hike into eight Death Hike slash Hunt and uh so we're gonna be doing a bear like a team bear hunt basically, so eleven teams of three and we're all heading off into different areas of the French Church wilderness, UM and then doing this kind of short challenging adventures bear hunts or actually starting its midnight and then you have to hike at least twenty miles before you can even start hunting, So you're essentially hiking through the night to hopefully get into a spot twenty miles deep by daylight to kind of start the hunt. And uh, we have some surprises along the way, So we're gonna have different envelopes that guys have to open at certain times throughout this couple of days of the hunts, and then those envelopes are gonna have to price challenges that no one knows about until they open the envelope to will be interesting to say, at least, that's cool, that's that's neat man, Like, I really like the whole hunt concept. And let me make sure I heard you right, said you have to try to cover twenty miles before daybreak. Yeah, So the rule is, um, you know, we have all these different teams and to kind of ensure that people weren't hunting on top of each other, each team had to submit three route options um. And then so we assigned routes to make sure that teams weren't hunting on top of each other. And your route has to include twenty miles in five thousand feet of gain and you have to do that before you can actually start hunting. So if you were to if you were to spot a bear before, then well sorry, you haven't covered your twenty miles yet. And then we're basically starting at midnight. Um, so the ideas you're hiking most of that twenty miles through the night, hopefully finishing um you know that after daybreak, and then having daylight to kind of hunt that day. So um, yeah, it's pretty a typical hunt, but it was kind of like a last minute planned. This area of Idaho that we're headed into, um is thick with bears and they've actually reduced rates for non residents and they're trying to get more bear hunting in there. And we have this plan for this hike that went awry until we just decided to trying to combine those two things. Yeah, that's cool. And I'm not real familiar with the Winding Wilderness, but everybody's heard of the franc right, and uh, that's the biggest wilderness area in the Lower forty eight, Is that right? Yeah, the franc Um I believe is the biggest. And then you you know, you talk about like the Bob, which I think is gets the most remote, like you can get the most remote um from roads with him about martial wilderness. But yeah, the frank is massive wilderness, big countries. It's pretty interesting. There's some areas in the franc where there's um airstrips that were established before the wilderness designation. So a lot of guys will actually fly into the franc Um and then get dropped off just because you can get in there. But um, that's not the route we're going for this one. I have the buddies actually just did that a few weeks ago on a bear hunt and have some great success. But yeah, we're essentially just hiking in. That's cool man. Now, I don't I don't know this much about this stuff, but I'm assuming this is grizz country and hockey and not in grizz country. Just sounds like the definitely the death march side of what you're talking about doing is like, how do you is that correct? And how do you take precautions for that? Yeah? Basically, just don't think about it. Uh no, it's not. It shouldn't be too bad, grizz We're we're gonna be Um, yeah, it shouldn't be too bad. So safety in numbers, um, you know, yeah, just you know, when you're hiking at night, you don't want to think about what's going on out there. Honestly, Like we are hiking in numbers and we'll be you know, chatting and b u s and in telling stories along the way and making noise. So it's not gonna be like the stealthy mission where we should surprise ourselves into a scary situation. Um, but yeah, that'll be interesting. I mean it is, Like that's fact a loan is a lot of guys just flat out do you think of hiking in the Wildernson? When you think of doing in the dark like that can start to play mental games with you. And I remember even on my first like my first wilderness hunt, Um, the very first night I was you know, our camp was four or five miles deep from the truck. But then we hunted, um one evening and we're a mile plus from camp and when dark went down and you realize you're miles from anywhere, and then walking through the wilderness like that stuff in the beginning, you can definitely play play some games with your head. Yeah, yeah, no kidding. Uh, And that's kind of um where we're at. You know, we're gonna be going on a wilderness hunt this fall, and it's gonna be we kind of had intentions of doing this one year out, but it's kind of, uh, a year sooner. You know, nobody ever expects to draw a tag like this, but sometimes you're you're the lucky individual who gets blessed with it. And that's so and happened this year. And so now we're kind of gonna scramble and trying to learn as much as we can from people who who are in the know, uh, and try to just listen that learning curve. But you know, you're just talking kind of about your first back country experience. What do you think is like some of the one of the biggest things that you took away from that first trip in that you wouldn't have thought would have been the case beforehand. Um, Yeah, I don't know, Like it's uh, it's kind of one. I mean, not that I've been doing it forever, but I've been doing it for a quite a few years at this point. I'm certainly not like the expert, but I certainly have some experiences and can tell you a lot of what not to do because I've learned the hard way. Um. I mean, it is one of those things where it's cliche but true. But as much as you look at maps, be it Google Earth for paper maps or something like on x or go Hunt, like you can look at country online or on paper, um, but everything is truly different until you get there. UM. And that's not to say don't study ahead, because I think the more you can study ahead, the more helpful it is in the field. But at the same time, uh, it's really really easy, especially when you know you're from Texas or I'm actually from Missouri. I'm from the Midwest. So when you're not used to um, mountain country and you're looking at maps, it's really really easy to kind of underestimate it, like oh, yeah, I'll go up over that mountain and you can sid and get there looking up at that stucker and you're like, oh, well that was a dumb idea. Yeah, you know, just that's one thing is just what it takes to um, not navigating the country because the country is usually big, train features are banks. I don't mean navigation in terms with like direction or getting lost, but more of just what it takes to cover ground in that country. Um, it's easy to underestimate that. I mean, I think of even going back to my first elk hunt, and I remember spotting an elk on on the hillside basically and thinking, oh, I'm just gonna like go up there, and it was an opposing hillside, and I didn't realize there was basically like a nasty creek bottom between myself and it. And I quickly realized as I started heading that way towards that elk that I had glass that it was gonna take some effort to get there. We're gonna take some time to get there. And so these little things like that of um, yeah, just just covering country and you'll soon realize that elk um are incredible in the sense that they're so big but they can move so efficiently. Yeah, and just make us look ridiculous. I know, man, it it's funny. You know you talked about as meaning from Texas, and I'm sure being from Missouri you had that experience at one point in time, and you're like, I'm a flat lander, but I'm in decent shape, and we go to the mountains and see what happens. And then you just start sucking wind hard and all of a sudden, the elk that you just saw you busted and they're three miles away. How did they even do that? You know, it's crazy, but that is one of the you brought up a good point, like about being able to navigate the terrain and not so much you know, uh, understanding how to get from pointing to point B. But like and like what you're talking about with the death March earlier, Um, that's twenty miles in you know, less than a day. Um, And I kind of am wondering, and I my plan is to try to make it out to this section in New Mexico this summer and try to get a good bearing for this. But maybe you just have a good idea, like what can a person assume they can how much distance can they cover, like say on a hike end um in a day? You know, Like, what's a good idea if you want to go in and backpack hunt, Like what can you bomb me in and do reasonably without killing yourself and then not without being like so far back in that that it doesn't make sense. Yeah, I mean I think it's different being on a hunt versus just seeing how much can I cover in that type of country and then elking specifically, Um, you really have to keep in mind. Okay, I might be able to get six miles in, but what happens if actually shooting elk now and then I get that thing six miles out? Um? And so it's easy to throw around numbers and you know, kind of glorify getting deep and going farther and all that, and getting in is not the issue. It's and again specifically for elk kiney, and it's thinking through what how far can I go and actually get an elk out and take care of it? And sometimes you know, there's no single answer. They're like everybody has different physical capabilities, but then beyond what you're physically capable of, you also have different conditions in terms of heat. Um, you know the time that you can have meat out in the field or do you need to get it back as soon as possible because it's hot so um. The first elk pack out that I did was six miles man. It's it's uh, you'll learn for sure. We've had some shorter ones it. But yeah, I mean in terms of just hiking and packing in Um. You know, one thing I always encouraged guys to do is set up your your schedule and your time to allow yourself to get in without feeling rushed. And I know that that's tough to do because this is a hunt you've been looking forward to for months or maybe even years, and you want to get in there and you want to get started. But at the same time, UM, don't burn yourself out humping in a forty fifty pound pack and going hard on day one where you're now in recovery mode on day two already, because on day two you need to feel fresh and not have to be recovering. And so it can be UM. And again for coming when you're a flight lander may be really easy to buring yourself out easy. UM. And so if you have, you know, five, six, seven days to hunt, I would play that first day or two pretty dank smart um in terms of not killing yourself because a lot I think guys can hunt hard for two or three days, But how you how effectively and how hard you can hunt on day four or five or six is really where the differences are. So that's really where your training comes into play. That's really where you know, your nutrition comes into play. And basically how well you prepared yourself and taking care of yourself is really going to manifest itself on you know, day three, four or five, six, not day one or two. Yeah, now, And that's I'm glad you brought that up because I haven't really thought about that too much. I've just I try to have the tough guy mentality when I'm out hunting like that, you know, and not to not to say that negatively, but like you know, sometimes you just gotta tough things out and just deal with it and hunt. But there's just so much you can do of that before your body tells, you know, right, And um my, I always try to look at my or not trying to look at them, but I end up approaching hunts to where I go as hard as I can until I can't go anymore. And like what you're saying, especially in l cunting, because it seems that the longer you're out there, the more September progresses a lot of times, the better the hunting gets. So why there's no reason to wear yourself out on day one and two when day four or five and six are gonna be the best days of the hunt. So not it totally makes sense. Man, Now when you're talking about wearing yourself out and going you know, a decent ways back in and that sort of thing. Um, let's talk a little bit about navigating terrain. Do you think it's better if you know you're gonna have to gain some elevation? Is it better to try to gain as much as quickly as possible or to do it gradually? And uh and just kind of have that steady incline. Um, Yeah, I know, I don't know that there's a right answer there. Um, it's a super interesting question. For sure. I usually have a spot picked out that I want to head into, um, and then I'm figuring out the best way to get there, not based off of just elevation um, but really just now like there's a there's an interesting combination of trying to use trail systems. But then the more you use trail systems, the more people you're going to have using those trail systems, just because it's that path of least resistance um. And so sometimes if you can look at accessing areas that don't have trail systems, you don't have to go as far to actually get further remote, and you can actually get further away from people by covering less distance. But just basically you know, covering some harder, shorter but harder miles. And so I've done I've done all the above. I mean we've done um, longer packs in using more gradual approaches, more trail systems, more friendly terrain, and then we've gone shorter distances but lacious climbs that maybe some people overlook or some people don't want to do, just to kind of find little hidden pockets. UM. So I don't know that there's one right answer there. It partially depends on I think your hunts and you know, are you packing in there for five to seven days and wanting to get further deep and then basically establishing like a back country base camp. Are you doing um, you know quicker still maybe overnight hunts like multi day hunts, but you're kind of bouncing around more and covering different countries. Um, you know, in the end, sometimes it's just difficult because elk are where they are. And so I think another thing to look at is you're covering terrain is not solely focused on not getting too narrowly minded focused on a spot like however good you think that spot looks, but really looking at how can I move and cover country efficiently? Um? Meaning can I like work a rich system to be able to call into two separate drainage is? Can I basically cover more ground smarter, so that if I'm not finding ELK, I can basically cover as much country as possible about killing myself. And then also either reach in the country as I mentioned, with either bugles with locating bugles, or if it's more open country, maybe by glassing. And so sometimes it's the approach of letting your calling or letting your glassing UM cover country for you, but putting yourself in the right position, Well you can essentially cover country with your calling or with your glassing, if that makes sense. Yeah, for sure, this sounds like a good way to approach it. So you mentioned training and nutrition as being very important to UM kind of like your pre hunt, um or I guess to your hunt as a pre hunt, UM thought, I guess, so, like, what what does that look like going into the hunt for you? I mean, obviously, uh, you know a lot of people talk about uh wearing your pack and just hiking with it. UM. Is there any other things that you might you might take on during the summer prior to elk season? Yeah, I mean I think, UM, you know, the closer you get to season, the more hunt specific training you want to do. UM. I mean, and you don't have to be killing yourself in November the training for next September's hunts. Obviously, it's good to stay in shape and get to do something active. I just mean that your activity, your training, your workout doesn't have to be hunt specific if you're eight months out, But as you get closer and closer and you're now eight weeks out, you wantn't your training to be much more specific to the demands that you're going to encounter on that hunt, And so it turns into a lot more you know, lakes and longs essentially. And so for me, I take that like high level UM kind of year round. Look at training in in the quote unquote off season. I'm still staying in shape, but I'm doing something less specific hunting, and then as they get closer to opening day, it's more specific than hunting. Obviously, training with your pack, hiking with a weighted pack, UM is invaluable. It definitely has to be a component of what you're doing. But if you're in Texas, you know, hiking with a sixty pound pack is all well and good, but you're going to struggle to find the elevation right, struggle to find the terrain to replicate the type of movement that you're gonna do with that sixty pound pack. And so especially for flatlanders, and I myself can relate, like, you want to hike with the pack no matter what, that you also want to supplement that with some um, some specific I think movements and exercises to help prepare for the elevation and for the terrains. Like just a few that come to mind, um, you know, just basically box step ups and so again with a weighted pack, stuff up on a box, stuff down, step up with your other leg stuff down. Mind iminally boring, you'll hate yourself within ten minutes. I promised to you. I absolutely promised you. But it's super sneaking effective, um, and so just being I mean, you can take just those and like if you can hike one or two days a week, do those one or two days a week and then scale right, so you might start by doing uh, you know, let's call it fifteen minutes with forty pounds, and then the next session you're doing five minutes with forty pounds. The next session you're doing forty minutes or forty pounds, And so you can either scale time or you can scale weight. So either the duration of that is going up or the weight in your pack is going up, or over the long term, maybe both. So those box stuff ups are really important. I think, UM, sand bag get up UH might not sound like something to do with hiking, UM, but they're incredibly effective, not only working the lower body, but actually work your midsection a ton, And sometimes I think a lot of guys might overlook if you're newer to packing and specifically packing weight, is there's a huge huge demand on your mid section UM and on your core, and by core I don't mean like beach muscles in terms of having a six pack, but just basically your midline stabilities are really important because you're carrying weight up top and through your midline and trying to transfer that stability into your lower body, where you know your legs are essentially carrying that load and moving us your country. So that midline stability is really important. Something like sand back get ups are really effective there. Um yeah, I mean I've done a lot of different things, tried a lot of different programs. Those are some of the things that stamed out. We actually do have a free training program that we offer UM if you just go to Excello, mountain Gear dot com forward slash Train you can get that. It's actually with a gym with some guys from Texas, so you know Texas again, but they're in Austin. They're called a tomic Athlete. One of the owners of that gym, Jake, is a former Army ranger but also a super passionate back country hunter and so he knows what it's like to go from Texas to the back country enough the elevation UM and he also has you know, a ton of experience with training, so he has a very um, a very helpful perspective and outlook and a ton of knowledge. And so we actually did that free training program with him, so that'd be something to check out. It's awesome. But yeah, so that's I mean, that's just again we could talk for an hour on that. I'm sure because again myself that like being a flat langer, I've gone through that UM and trying to prepare for you know, elevation when you don't have it, and being physically prepared for the mountains when you can only get out there maybe a time, you know, one time a year for a lot of guys. Yeah, so what what do I mean? There's definitely like to me, a lot of guys, especially if you know, if they have decent and enough money to go on an ice l cun or something like that. Um, there, you know one thing that they're not going to have as much of as time And I feel like that, you know that, That's where hiking with a backpack for hours a day just doesn't make sense, you know. So I'm sure you guys in that program address that in some of your workouts. Huh, Yeah, for sure. I mean I myself struggle with that just because I'm busy with you know, family and small kids and work and all the other demands that everybody else has, uh, And so it is difficult. That's where for me, even though I hate hate doing like weighted pack stuff up, if I can do those for forty five minutes, I get a much more intense workout than I were to hike for forty five minutes. So you know what's gonna kick my butt most in the shortest amount of time, and sometimes the factor I'm looking at. There is nothing to replace time on your feat though too. Um. I mean, you do, uh, work your body differently if you're on your feet and under a pack for three hours than if you're doing it for a more intensely five minutes. So I think as much as possible, you do have to work that in and that doesn't have to be an everyday thing. I mean, congratulations if you have a time to work out two or three hours a day every day. I certainly don't, but I will say that, Um, I've consistently and again this is something I do more and more as we get closer to the season, that I'll do what it takes to find the time. Meaning there's been days I've woke up on a Saturday at three am to drive to a trail to hike for three or four mout you know, hours and then still be back basically shortly after my kids are waking up. Right, So you know, if I can hike from four m to eight a m and be home for the family at eight thirties and my family didn't really miss out. I certainly had that kind of suffer for it. But in the end, as much as four hours of hiking as your career you and it is that whole component of performing on a little sleep on struggling to see that whole like mental toughness piece of doing that is also I think just as important as it is the hike for four hours, because you're going to hit the point where you're tired up there where you don't want to keep going. And so sometimes the suck of those long early training sessions is as much as about kind of the mental battle of going through that as it is getting the four hours under your pack. So it's kind of a win win, right. So um, to kind of go along with this is the nutrition side of things, and and like going into your hunt, what does that look like? And then how do you how do you maintain decent health from what you're putting in your body on when you're back there you just eating mountain house or what does that look like? Yeah, it's um, I mean iviously, I think the it's it's interesting because it's all over the map. I think the nutrition that you do in the field for your hunt is only going to matter to a certain extent based on what off of what you're doing the rest of the year. Um, So if you're not you know, eat and I'm not saying like you have to the perfect but if you're not eating super healthy, you're eating junk all years, and it probably don't matter what you're doing in the field, Like eating super high quality stuff for four days during hunt is only gonna have so much effect if you're really not in the best shape anyway. Um. But yeah, so at the same time, if you do eat pretty clean um and you stay in pretty decent shape, I think it's important to somewhat keep that up as much as possible in the back country. At the same time, you also have to realize that if you're hunting hard, your body is a furnace, and so some times just getting calories in and getting sufficient calories in it is really important and it's okay to throw in something. So like I look forward to the back country hunts for fifty reasons. Maybe we can talk about the hunt itself and the adventure and the piece and the quiet, but like one of those fifty reasons that I look forward to back country hunt is I can eat pop tarts because I don't eat pop starts throughout the year, but like, hey, I'm I'm out here working hard and I need the calories, and so I can need pop starts, right, Um, So I think it's an interesting balance. Um. You know, we've had discussions with this on our podcast. I think one of the things a lot a lot of guys do wrong, um, is not that they don't necessarily pack enough food, but they actually don't eat enough food. And so you've got guys all over the scale. Some guys don't pack enough food because they're trying to be light. Some guys pack ridiculous amounts of food, but it's not something you know. Again, you get like day two, three, four into the hunts, and now they have this food that they don't have the appetite four um. And so part of this is trial and air. But it's easy to get burned out on stuff even in a few days if you only have the same things, or if you only have certain types of things. And so it comes into like personal what actually sounds good on day four of a hunt when I'm hot and tired and don't necessarily feel like eating, but know that I need the calories because again, if you get behind on calories, and a huge factor is if you begin to get it all be hydrated, that stuff takes a massive toll on what you can do later in the hunt. So I think getting a proper number of calories is really important, and then picking foods that you know you can eat and that you're not going to basically like if I see one more Cliff part, I'm gonna puke type thing. Um is really important and sorry Cliff bar, I'm not picking on each that eat them, but if you don't have any sort of variety, you can burn yourself out there. So in terms of specifics, UM, I do a bunch of really easy stuff. You mentioned Mountain House, I've done them. A lot of them are pretty good there. I mean there's more and more similar brands every day. UM, so you can you can kind of tailor if you want to be more more clean. If you will, UM you can go how there's choice or off grade food company or Peak Refuel. Like there's more and more cottage brands doing more natural food. I would say that's free drives compared to like a Mountain House that has a bunch of crap in it. I actually dehydrate a lot of my own stuff these days, UM, which sounds really intimidating, but it's actually stupid, stupid easy UM. And so I've been able to tailor exactly what I want and then dehydrated myself and rehydrated in the field. So UM again that the plug stuff that we have, we have podcasts on nutrition and on dehydrating and all of that. We can actually have another UM food guide, so you can plug in some numbers on your body weight, your activity level on the hunt, and actually get some calorie recommendations based on that. You can get x amount of here dot com fwoord slash nutrition on that one, and it's kind of another freebee that goes into a lot more detail on if you really want to look at numbers and kind of plan and you're the guy who wants to kind of get out a little bit on nutrition, that's definitely a great resource to look at or just something to do quick and dirty to make sure that you're not underestimating calories, because there's this idea of out there that you know, the quote unquote two thousand calories standard diet, but a lot of guys, if they're hunting hard, they're gonna need you know, three to four thousand calories a day, and so now it's a question of how do you get that many cowries and do it smart leads where you're not packing too much weight, but you also have the right types of food. So, I mean, it's there's there's part there's a lot of preference to it, and then there's heart trial and air. But there's a lot of good information out there as well. Yeah, yeah, for sure, man. Yeah, And that's uh, that's just part of the stuff that we have to learn, you know, part of the stuff that we're working on trying to understand. And I don't kind of from what I see is like everything that you're gonna put in your pack is the same, but food is what's going to change for the most part. Right, Like, if you're going on a hunt and it's a four day hunt, it's ABC D and E plus however many days of food. So at that point in time, it's kind of like, especially with this hunt, we have to decide how are we gonna go in for four days, come out and resupply. Are we gonna go in for nine days the whole extent of the hunt and try to pack for that much? So you know, uh, exo. One of 'all's big things is packs a right, Um, what are you looking at for a path? Ack? Uh and trying to make sure it has enough room and enough capability to do a back country style hunt like this? Yeah, yeah, I think there's UM, I tend to see a lot of crossover and you just kind of referenced it. But this idea of you guys might have like a seven eight day hunt, But the question becomes, are you packing everything for seven or eight days? Are you packing for three or four days? And then you know, coming out to either resupply, to move to plan b et cetera. Um, So many guys go, I have a seven day hunt, so I need to pack so big. But the question isn't how long is your hunt, it's how long are you packing for it at the same time? Um, So you might be going out to Colorado or New Mexico or wherever and have eight days to hunt, But does that really mean you're carrying eight days worth the stud and gear at a time. Most, and especially as or newer, I think a lot of guys default um to thinking they they should pack for all seven or eight days at a time, when in reality they should be packing for three or four days at the time, and especially if you're heading into new country. If you're packing for seven or eight days, I mean you're you're kind of putting all your eggs in that basket. Um, you're hoping to find the elk um And I've certainly done that. I've I've gone into new country with a weak source of gear, and I've I've basically set up a that country base camp and hunted from there for seven days, and um, shoot, I've killed an elk on day seven. So I'm not saying don't do that, but also saints through maybe we should go in with gear and food for three or four days and either we're into elk in three or four days or we're not. Either we've killed something or we haven't. Either we know we need to move to a different area or redount, or like the worst cases, yeah, elk are still here. We haven't filled our attack. We have to make a quick run out and resupply and come back in. So I think that that strategy determines a lot on your pack um selection. We always like with our packs, specifically, we want to focus on even if you are getting a larger pack, we wanted to compress down really well. Um. And so even if you do get a larger pack that has the capability of carrying seven days worth a year, it's going to compress down really well. Um if you're only carrying three days worth a year, and it's going to compress down really well if you're heading out into a ground blend in Texas for four hours. Um. You know, packs, good packs or an investment, And so that's always something we're keeping a nine, especially if more and more guys are doing all different types of hunts. Myself included you guys as an example. If you're dropping some decent coin on a really good pack system, we won't be you'd be able to use that in New Mexico and elk count, but we want you to be able to use that at home in Texas as well. UM. So we always want the pack itself to compress really well. And then something else we really focus on is we have one stream system and you can put different bags on it. So if you wanted to, you can get a pack system with a day pack and then have a different bag that goes on the same frame that is now good for a week long hunt. So um, in the end, versatility is key UM to that. But in terms of actual pack sizing, you know, if you stay in UM three three to four thousand cubic inches like in that ballpark, you're kind of gonna stay within that good three to five day range. If you're wanting to get beyond five days, you want to you want to get up closer to five thousand cubic inches are larger. Again, this is like generalities for most guys. UM. It's tough too because is the newer guys tend to carry more UM and so they're going to tend to need more space. Whereas the guy who's been doing this a long time and you know, has upgraded high quality gear and doesn't carry a bunch of extras, he might be able to take a pack further UM than another guy. So there's a lot too that I would say in the end. Um, Again, I'm not I'm not at all trying to be salesy, but whether you're looking at our packs or another company, I would say, just talk to him. UM. So I mean, you can call us up and tell us about your hunts and your need to like you do, and we'd be happy to kind of talk through the pros and cons of specific models that we offer and how they might benefit you. Um, and I would hope that if you're looking as another company they do the same for you. I can obviously only speak for ourselves here. Yeah, yeah, sure, And it makes sense to me. And maybe it is because I'm a newbie at like the backpacking style hunting, but it makes sense to get something a little bit bigger that you're prepared for, say if you do go on like a sheep hunt in Alaska in ten years or something like that, Hey, you want to pack that's gonna last that long, but be like, you're gonna want something that's going to hold everything you need, um for, like a big venture style pack like that is opposed to having to buy something you know. Again it's gonna be a bigger pack, you know, So to me it makes sense to go with that, you know, whatever it is that that you that um you were talking about well ago and then like you were saying, it will always compress down. You can always day pack with it, right, and it's gonna what you might add like a half pound, three quarters of a pound or whatever to your overall pack weight, but that's that's minimal in comparison to you know what, what else you might have to do if it if it makes you hoick out a whole extra time because your pack isn't quite big enough to do what you needed to do, then you really just murder a lot of extra calories. So I know it kind of makes sense. And then I like the idea of you know, just havn't multifunctioning, you know, like, uh, I don't know. We were talking um actually Tyler now on just kind of our weekly show about how it's cool like y'all packs. Well, let me just let you explain this, um, how does the load sheld situation work into all your packs have load shelves? There's some of dude, some of them now, Yeah, So we have one frame and then different bag options that go on the frame. So you basically buy a complete pack system and it's a bag in a frame. Uh. And then as I mentioned down the road, you could always buy your step back only and it on your same frame. But the frame basically dictates your fits um function and performance. Meaning you can buy our smallest bag and have the same load capacity in terms of max weight and in terms of hauling meat. Yeah, you have the exact same load capacity as you would if you bought our biggest bag, because it's gonna have the same frame. So the back choice xtaates internal gear storage. But basically all of the bags quickly detatched from the frame. Um think of like folding it open, kind of like a clamshell. And now you put your load between the bag and the frame. So there's compression straps on the frame itself that begin to secure the load. And then as you reattach the bag to the frame, but now with your load in between, there's four more compression straps that make connections. And it's kind of subtle, but if you look at it, all of the connections from back to frame there're sown at an angle. And the reason there's some is an angle is that as you add compression, is you're pulling the bag to the frame over the load. It's an upward angle. So as you're adding compression, you're also adding a lift. So if you have you know, sixty pounds of meat between the bag and the frame, you're sucking the bag back to the frame. It's providing the lift and holding that meat up nice and high and tight, so it's not sagging weight on you. So, yeah, all of our systems do that. You're gonna have a load shelf between the bag and the frame. We're gonna have the same load hauling capability, um, no matter which bag you choose, because you have that frame. The frame itself is uh it's a titanium frame. So you have incredible amounts of strength at a lightweight um and really the the weight capacity. And we don't say this like to be you know, marketing whatever. It's just the truth of we don't put a weak capacity on it because it's it's it exceeds what you want to do basically. I mean we've tested it with two d and fifty pounds of sand just testing teger to the frame. I'm like doing that in the field, right. So if you're if you're a stud and want to past a hundred whatever pounds, the pack is going to do it. And if you're smart you know, like want to pack more amount of weight, the pack is going to be ready for it. So, I mean we'll get questions a lot as guys are like say they're deer hunting, be at White Taylor mule deer, Like can I haul out a whole deer? Sure? Go for it um elk, can we do like a half of a bow apple? Yep. Absolutely, So, Like it's basically ready to do whatever you want to throw at it UM basically at any time. And that's the whole beauty of the system is you go back quite a few years and you had a pack that was good to hunt in, and then a separate pack that was good to haul loads in. But like trying to find one pack system that could do all that because if you if you only have a rigid frame, it might be good for heavy loads, but it's super cumbersome to hike in to hunting, et cetera. So if your frames just rigid, now you're limiting your mobility. It's difficult to hike in, it's difficult to draw your bow, it's difficult to get into shooting position. So for us UM, there's this combination of providing some level of freedom of movement, especially tortonally meaning kind of twisting and turning through your mid upper body, but at the same time the pack needs to be super vertically rigid to support heavyweights and not barrel or buckle or have you know any sort of discomfort issue there. Yeah, yeah, it makes sense, and I just think about all the capabilities and possibilities of like having that true load shelf situation where I mean for us, um, you know, talking about versatility. Uh, A lot of times we're trying to figure out a way to strap a tree stand onto a bagfull of cameras and it just doesn't work. But if you can put that thing between your actual bag and frame, you know, it might be yeah, it might be for meat hall on, but it's gonna have some other you know, great benefits too. So it's cool that it works. So I mean it's uh, you know, the origins of the company or certainly in Western hunting that's certainly where um the focuses. But at the same time, um, more and more guys are seeing the beauty of a pack system like ours for hunting that they're doing Midwest, East Texas, whatever, Because exactly what you said, if you're the guy who's packing in tree stands on public land and trying to get a decent ways you know, from the crowd, even in the Midwest or wherever, like been there, done that, it sucks to carry the tree stand just with its little straps. But if you can have a valid pack system, that's going to pack your tree stand and sticks. Whether you're doing a mobile set up or whether you're just packing in preseason to get it hung. Um, it's super valuable. And then you know, it's just the versatility that open it opens up. Like this past November, I was on a white tail hunt in Missouri, and I mean it wasn't super far, but I was on some public land and got about a mile and a quarter deep and shot a buck and just pack the whole buck out in my path. You know, forget dragging that thing a mild plus like everybody else is doing or writing four wheelers in the areas. I can get away from the four wheelers. I can go where they can't go. And now I can hunting new spots that everybody else in Missouries overlooking because they're like, how the heck do you get a deer out of there? Well, you've got to be a decent pack system. You can do it. So it's you know, I certainly get some looks when I'm packing a deer out in a pack like that and everybody else's sitting on their four wheelers, But it really does open a new opportunity. Now it's cool, and it's i don't know, there's kind of just like a fun factor knowing that you do it under your own power to I don't know, maybe I'm weird like that, but it's like it's pretty fulfilling to do that. So no, that's cool, man. Whenever you're talking about like going in with a pack and having that pack on your on your back and stuff like fits a huge thing. And I only know that from like hearing other people talk about it. Right, I've never been truly fitted for a pack. I don't know exactly what fits. I just in the past have bought daypex and strap them on and kind of make it fit tat and go, you know, but like what what are you looking for in fit for a pack? And how do you go about deciding exactly what fits you the right way? Yeah, I mean it's um, it's it's hard to speak in generality. So I'm not trying to talk about our stuff and only talk about our stuff, but in the sense like that's the context I have. And one thing to look at is basically is the pack adjustable period. And so you get into a lot of pack systems and they're just flat out and not very adjustable. So to some extent that pack either fits you or it doesn't. UM. But if you get into more of a high end system, it's going to have a lot more versatility and options to fit you specifically, which is you know what we do UM so we have UH and I'm not sure when this is airing, so it's kind of an interesting I mean to talk about it. But as of today, UM we have one frame system, it's called a K to frame. This summer, UM it will be launching a new frame system. The next generations to the K three frame. K three frame will have UM even more adjustability in in options to it. But in general, there's there's a couple of main things you want to consider. One is your torso heights UM, which is essentially, and I'm grossly over simplifying this, but basically the length of your midsection. UM. So you can be six foot and have shorter legs and longer torso, or you could be six foot and have longer legs and a shorter torso. Essentially, high quality pack systems are going to have some sort of adjustable fit for your torso length UM and we have quite a range of adjustment in there, and really really easy adjustments to make I mean some tax systems you kind of like you have to tear it apart and do all this crazy stuff to adjust the torso length, whereas on ours, that's in a couple of seconds. You can tune it. We get try it during it, we could try it. It's super easy. But so towards the length is something. And then something that some people tend to overlook is just your hip belt and how key that is. If you're using a pack that's one size all in the hip one size fits all in the hip belt, you might be fine if you're say the average thirty inch waist or whatever, but if you're smaller or larger, you might run into trouble. Uh. And so we have three site specific hip belts that cover a range. Obviously, building a hip belt that works for a guy who has a thirty two inch waste and a forty two inch waste like that ten inches is a big, big difference. And so especially with our system, where are we design our packs so that they transfer weight to your hips and you're not carrying it all in your upper body. I'm sure we've all been there where we've been carrying some level of weights. Uh, and you're basically carrying it in the shoulders, your upper body gets super fatigued fast. Our system is designed to have very very small percentage amounts of weight in the shoulders and actually the vast vast majority of weight transferred to your hips and into your lower body. And when you're doing that, hip belt um sighting becomes critical factors. So long story short, um torso height, hip belts, all that needs to be you know, very adjustable or size specific for you. Um, unless you just happened to be the super average guy and that happens to fit you. But I am a very super average guy. We did We had a wedding last year that I was in and one of the groomsman was not average at all. He was I think a forty four waste and the twenty nine n seems so it was a little different probably than your average guy. Uh, it might have tough time finding the pact that fits him, right, But that's where you might just have to like do a lot of box step ups, right. Um. So, so okay, so you've talked a lot about the pack and then how the core, your core, whether it's you know, the belt is going around your core to kind of hold up the whole pack or you're just talking about like mobility in the back country. Your core is very important and so like moving on down. Um, your feet are very important when you talk about like having a hundred pounds on your back as well, so um, and then taking care of your feet. So like what are you are you wearing boots, you're wearing trail runners, and what does that look like for you? Yeah, this is like maybe the most important in the worst thing to discuss ever. I mean, your feet can make or break your hunt, uh quickly. So I mean if if you're if you get out there and you're having significant blister or pain or discomfort in your feet, I mean, how the heck can you keep honey? How can you hike in the mountains? How can you chase l how can you cover ground? Is your feet are tore up? And so it's back there, like I don't know if I can get back to the truck even Yeah, So it's it's super super critical. And then it's also the worst thing ever to talk about because I could tell you about my favorite boot and how great it is and you could try it and it could absolutely wreck your feet. Um, And so that it's just super difficult to make like specific recommendations there. Um, yeah, it's tough. I mean this, I've we've tried to do podcasts on this, We've talked. I mean, I'm not the expert, but I know so many experienced hunters. I'm talking with them and it's like, what is there? I mean, we're having this conversation with some my yesterday. We always say it's like part trial and air. Um, but how do you like, what are some shortcuts? Like how do you lessen that curve about finding the right boot for you? And honestly, I don't know that there is a shortcut. Yeah, there's not like any any like tips. So if I was to walk into a Cabela's or something, I could try on these boots and if it was touching here there, then it's probably going to create a hot spot or a blister. I mean, other than than than spinning thousands of dollars on boots. Possibly, there's really no way to tell. I guess yeah. I mean, obviously, the in terms of shopping goes somewhere local. If you can, um, try as many different options if you can. For some guys, that's difficult because they don't have a cabellas. They don't have an r I, they don't have a whatever to try a bunch of different options. At that point you can fall back on be at Amazon or just appos or backcountry dot Com or all those different places that are going to give you free returns basically where you can try it in the house. UM, is you're trying boots on, you want to, I mean two things come to mind. Obviously more than just walking around the house, UM, trying to do some level of inclines, like whether that stairs or what have you. But the way that your foot interacts with that boot on flat ground is going to be different than the way it interacts when you're climbing or when you're sidehilling or what have you. And so not only doing you know, say stairs in your house. If you're trying to boot, you can't go outside because of the returns. I would go so far as to set up some some level of uneven surfaces in your house, meaning like step off the edge of things like plant your foot where it's not perfectly flat and level, stand on some incline decline like feel your heel pockets slipping or not. UM, try different leasing techniques, think about what socks you're gonna be wearing, because socks can make a huge difference. And I mean, yeah, we could talk a ton about that, but I mean things to look for. Obviously, he'll flip is going to be one of the major issue that can make things go wrong fast. If your heels moving creating fiction, you're gonna get hot spots, You're gonna get blisters. That's not playing out. So how a boot fits you in the heel cup is really important. Um What complicates that is a boot might have a really great heel cup for your for your foot, but sometimes you might feel like your heels a little high or a little low in that heel cup, and so sometimes it's just a matter of training different insul in that boot before you just chuck that boot altogether. Because insults have different volume or different stack heights, and so as you increase or decrease insul height, it's moving your foot or your heel up or down within the heelcup, which can be really important to kind of fine tune that. Another thing to look for is um room in the footbox. So if you have a wider or more narrow foot, are your toes cramped Basically up in that footbox. Because another place is this if you're toes or cramps like on the outside, especially on your pinkie side, you can get lots of rubbing or bad contact or pressure there that can create problems. Um. You want to ensure that, like a boot needs to be relatively snug, but not tight. So if it's too big, it's gonna be more prone to hunt, more prone to heel slip if it's too small. Um, think about what happens to your foot on day four or five when you've been hiking quite a few miles. Your foot's just gonna naturally swell because you've been doing a ton of miles um, and it might be warm, and so you're you think through if my foot swells, do I still have room? And then also think through downhills. So if you don't have enough room at the end of the boot and you're doing downhill, which you're no doubt going to do, and your toes are making contact at the end of the boot, especially while going downhill, you're gonna be in the world to hurt quit. Um. So you need enough space at the toe end of the boot so that you're not making a ton of contact going downhill because you'll basically start losing toe nail in a hurry. Oh that sounds terrible two in that so yeah, I mean those are some things to look at. I know that was Rambili. Hopefully that helps. UM. And then just in terms of like feet care, I can't say enough how important it is to change socks. Um. Even on like a seven day hunt, I'll typically only have two pairs, meaning a pair of wearing a pair of extras, but I'm changing those not only daily, but even usually through the day. UM. So if I take a lunch break, a lot of times I'll change socks, put my quote unquote fresh ones on. UM. If ones I take off or super wed or nasty, instead of throwing them in my pack, a lot of times they'll hang them off the back of my pack so that they can air dry. And just keeping on top of changing socks is really important. UM. If you do start to experience any sort of hot spot, like maybe a blister, but just a hot spot, like stop and take care of it right away because it's just gonna get worse. UM. One of the best things I've found is Luco tape. It's like l u E k O I believe tape. Um, if you that stuff like compared to a band aid or an actual like call it blister path or whatever, Luco tape sticks and holds um like nothing else. So if you put Luco tape on, you can sweat as much as you want. You can go jump in the creaker, the pond and take a bath on day three. But that Luco tapes canna be on your foot at the end of your hands on day seven, like the stuff just stays put. Is that is that much? Is there a difference between Luco and athletic tape, Yeah, there is. Um, there's a lot of similarities for sure, and I'm like not the guy to tell you exactly how they're different. Certainly, I have Luco tape and I have you know, you're basic like white athletic tape. The Luco tape is a little bit thicker, holds a little bit better. Um, it doesn't seem to be quite is like porous um. So it's a little more dense if you will. Um that a lot of your common athletic tape, and then it tends to I know the stuff I have, which I just bought a role and I've had it for years and think they don't have to be issues. I don't have to use it too much. But um, like my role anyway is wider UM. It's probably two two and a half inches, which obviously we can buy wider athletic tape, but a lot of times it's going to come in like maybe an inch with UM. So yeah, there's it's definitely not the exact same. They might feel similar, but there's there's certainly some not only tactile differences, but performance differences there. Yea, I will say sorry, just on a Luco tape situation, if you have a blister, like an actual blister, how would not put Luco tape correctly on it? I would put some sort of gauze or something over the blister itself and then put the Luco tape over it because that blist, the Luca tape is gonna hold so well that when you have that sock blister e skin, if you were to remove the Luco tape, it's removing all of that skin. Yeah, yeah, like it's it's coming off. So if you have a developed top spot or blister or like an open like say a popped open blister or something like that, do a thin layer of gauze on that and then Luco tape over the top, because if not, you're going to be peeling off the junks of your feet with tape. Man, every time we asked this boot question, it always ends up going into like something nasty and off putting about feet every time, Like I, if you want to talk about it, we have stories like from that death hype we did last year. Um, you know, it was almost a hundred miles and death, but the listers who literally started getting blisters within like the first six and and they fit like, there's only about two thirds of the guys finished. There was a bunch of guys who didn't finish, But there were guys who finished where like I legitimately looked at them and I would never question their man card because the way the condition of their feet and how many miles they hiked on absolutely torn up feet was unbelievable. I mean there were guys who finished the hike with more Luco tape on their feet than they had skin on their feet. I mean it was people like we're peeling off Luco tape and toenails were attached to it. I mean, we can we can get I don't know, man, there's a there's a thin lie between tough and stupid sometimes, and I flirted with it pretty often, don't get me wrong, but oh yeah, man, there So there's a guy who like the death hike tore him up so bad last year. And this was late June, early July. His feet were still in such rough shape come Elk season, like September October. He's still couldn't I mean, he hunted, but he couldn't speak. Still, we aren't normal, um this. He was like, no, I'm not doing it. Yeah, I ain't risking that, you know, I don't know. It's it's kind of funny you bring that up. Um. So, I'm a part time youth minister, so I hang out with kids a lot and they're always want to race and mess around and stuff. And the other day we were at a at a major league ball game like this, one kid wanted to race back to the van. Well, I'm like, I don't really turn down challenges ever, and it's like all right, And so it's a it's like tuner yards and we take off sprinting and he cheats and and jumps off, you know, uh goes before go and I'm about to catch him, and then I feel my hammy tweak and toppen up, and like, oh no, did I just draw a HELI tag and pull a hamstreak? And luckily it didn't. It was just like a you know, kind of a little tweak. It wasn't like a bad tear anything. I'm kind of over it now. But man, that's like a big consideration. Like the older you get in, the more like hunting becomes important to you. Um, not that those two things kind of go hand in hand, but often they do. Uh, you know, your off season preparation and things you do. You're like we're talking about fitness and nutrition and stuff like that becomes more important. And then you think about like, man, maybe I shouldn't climb this tree just to have fun because I could fall out of it and then I miss miss hunting season. You know, just things like that kind of kind of start to pop up. But so, okay, let's say that you've done your death hike into uh, you know, twenty eight mile bear hunt, and uh, you've prepared well with your boot and socks selection, your feet are not too torn up, but you just in general you're very tired. Um, what does Mark have in his pack to sleep on and sleep in a good question. I saw you two things. One is sleep is really important. The other thing is I've actually as the getting older, I mean the views, but you know, I'm definitely not twenty anymore. I pay more attention not only in something like the death hekes, but even like a hunt to like quote unquote recovery. Um. And so it's something that is easily overlooked, but I do a lot that you might already have with you is your trekking poles are fantastic for rolling out muscles. At the end of the day or mid day, I'll roll out my calves or my clods, or my Hammy's or my key band or if anything is bucking me or just feel fatigued or tight. Um using your trekking pole is either a roller or basically like a pressure stick um to work on your muscles is definitely more important if you get older, and something that I do more and more. So that's kind of a like on the topic of recovery, that's really important. That's and that's a new one for me. Man. I hadn't heard that so good. Yeah, and then I've even gone as far as um like last year in the Death Hike, I've tacked one of those UH balls that are meant for rolling out pressure points UM and that was specifically for the Death Hike, just because I knew we were doing crazy mileage. But since then I found one. It's from this company called Raw Allergy like r A W. Raw Allergy, and they make UM cork balls for rolling out on and the reason their cork is they're just crazy light. So I had this. I the one to use last year was seven ounces and this this one's like one point something UM. So I'll even pack that now. And that's really good for rolling out your feet again any sort of muscles. So yeah, that's not like the super macho thing to talk about, but doing that type of thing to make a difference on multi day hunts for sure. UM. Sleeping is obviously important. I've you know, I'm always looking for ways to save packway when possible. I will say that sleeping is one of those things where after trying to go as light as possible for a while, I'm just slowing theo tingle and back and realized how important sleep is and comfort is, and basically the lightest pad isn't the best pad. UM. So in terms of sleep on the sleeping pad, I'm looking for something that's three inches at least probably in sickness Um. Obviously we're talking to inflatable pads here. Also, don't underestimate the importance of the art value of your pad, meaning the insulation of the path, Like it's the only thing between you and the ground. Um. And if you don't have a pad that's insulated well, it can make a massive difference and help hold you sleep. Whether or not you have a great sleeping bag or not, the path can be a huge factor. UM. So yeah, I use UM. There's a pad from the company Nemo m and e Mo Nemo they have one called the tim sur Um insulated. We can pound up and using that first three or four years and absolutely love it. Um. I've had some good luck um with like big agnes paths in the past. UM see the sum it makes them good insulated paths. But what are those inflatable insulated sleeping paths. It is totally worth it, and I would be weary of going with the lightest option and just to save some ounces because from a comfort and durability perspective, I've definitely had some issues. Is I've tried to kind of push that boundary of just going yeah, I want this pet because it's light. Um, yeah, that's important. What did you what else did you ask about the side sleeping pets? Well, like, uh, as far as your bag goes, you know, are you running like kind of the it seems to be the standard is like a twenty degree bag for a lot of dudes. Do you go one way or the other and then like you know down synthed ache, like, what's your bag look like? Yeah, um, I do. I'm a down for the most part. Um. I think for most guys, if we're even the conversation to lower forty eight, um, and we're kind of keeping it to you know what we're talking about, like say you're new Mexico, elk hunt like that type of thing. Downs usually fine. Obviously, give me a different story for getting coastal Northwest Alaska and something like that, Like sometimes it down is too much of a risk with moisture, but um, it's easy to take care of down in your average forty conditions And even a lot of it down these days is treated um where it's likely water proof but still performs um well when it gets some level of moisture. So UM down is essentially it's inna take up a lot less space in your path than synthetics. It's going to have a longer life in the end than synthetic fibers. UM and yeah, I mean it's just better UM, better performance for the weight in space and longevity. So down Yeah, I'm definitely a fan of. Yeah. I think twenty degree is a good number. The difficult thing with like degree ratings UM and this has gotten better, But in the past, like a company could claim basically whatever they wanted UM on temperature ratings on their bags, Like there's some storm, some standardization standardization on that. Now there's like called e intemperating UM, so where some companies do more of standardized tests. So when company A is making a rating and company B is making a rating, they're making that rating from the same testing protocol, if you will, whereas before they didn't have to UM. The other thing to be really cognizant of with temperature ratings is most companies are going to have a UM different temperature ratings. One is the comfort temperature and one is the basically you're going to freeze your nuts off, but you live temperature. Um. And so the twenty degree bag might keep you alive at twenty degrees um, but you're gonna hate life because the actual comfort rating on that might be thirty five. Um. So that's something to look at as well. Is if you're looking at temperature rating. Number one? Is that the standardized like actual temperature rating? And number two is is it I think they called the lower limit, which is basically kind of like the safety survivability rating or is it the comfort rating, which is basically what you want to pay attention to if you have a thirty bad in knowing that you actually be comfortable at thirty degrees. Yeah, for sure. Comforts a big thing for me and Tyler both. We've discussed this, like, Man, I'm willing to go a couple of extra pounds if it means I'm going to be comfortable and and just enjoy my experience, you know. So, Um, I got a down bag that I'm looking to try out this season and kind of excited about it. But um, I've just kind of been worried about the down things some just because of like I'm learning more and more about how bad moisture is for you know, and uh, like you were saying we're going to a very arid part of the country, so it's not so much to worry about getting rain every day, but like what precautions do you take, like for monsoon season, you know, like whenever you pack your stuff up in your packs, so you got pack on your back to go hunt that day, are using a dry bag or what do you do in there? Yeah? I'm not most of the time. Basically only am using the drive back if the conditions called for it. Um. So, I mean, it is certainly smart to have that as an option. There's advantages to um, like when you're sleeping bag, specifically to not having it within its own dry back. If you pack it within the dry back, um, it's obviously protected. But if you don't need that protection if the weather allows for it. We really prefer to loose pack to sleeping bag in the pack basically because it conforms to fill any shape and void within the pack, versus if you put it in the compression sack. You know, have this giant block, this blob, and now you're gonna have this blob in your pack and all kinds of little voids and nooks and crannies that other people won't fit in where it's basically you just put your down back in your pack first and you let it naturally compress as you're adding other gear to it. The paths are the sleeping bag. It's going to basically conform and fill these nucking crannies and in the in the end you can pack more efficiently. Yeah, if the conditions are you know, dicey. Um, a drive back is a really good option, whether that's a drive back specifically for your sleeping back, like an ANTAC systems actually have a complete driveback liner um, and the packs are very water resistant. But on our system you can actually have a where your whole pack bag is basically lined with a water proof liner. So that's an option. Um. But yeah, something to look at. I pretty much always will have a dry bag with me that's capable of carrying my sleeping back, even if I'm not using it all the time to compress my sleeping back, because for me, a drive back conserve multiple purposes. Um. If I'm in country you where I need to hang my food, sometimes I'm just throwing all of my food in that dry bag and looking that up into the tree. Um. So yeah, it's just one of those like a good size, lightweight, dry bag. Um. It's one of those things that there's a few ounces that can serve multiple purposes and so it's maybe something you always want to have with you, Yeah, for sure. So what about water man, how are you? How does your water system look? Are you now gene guy or a bladder? And and uh, you know, like what do you how do you take advantage of water when you're around it? Yeah? Um, I have a pretty simple system. I used ladders for the most part. I typically do have some sort of bottle with me, usually not a Nalgene UM. A lot of times I'll stop at a gas station and the those smart water bottles. Um, I could carry less about the fact that it's rody water and had the electrolytes and smart water, but the shape of that bottle is super nice and they're really light, um and durable. For a lot of times I'll have one of those, and I basically use that if I want to mix any drinks um, not meaning like a scotch on the rock next screen or something, but you know, powders um. And so if i'm you know, if i'm you know, whatever you want to call it, Like if you're the mountain, o ski or whatever, and you're mixing that type of thing. I'll keep that out of my bladder, just because bladders can get funky if you introduce things other than water in them. Um. Seeah, my primary water source of the bladder, I use a Sawyer squeeze filter UM, which is basically a little filter element next to a dirty bag. So you take one back, you fill it with dirty water, screw you screw this filter element on that back, and then if you basically squeeze squeeze your dirty water through the filter element, and the filter element has a stream output of mouth clean filtered water. UM. The baby on a kind of a key piece on that is you can take your average um drinking tube from your hydration bladder and stow yourselves. What's called it quick disconnect kit. Long story short is, UM can take your mouth piece off of your drinking tube, connects the water filter to your drinking tube, and now without removing your water bladder from your pack, you basically push clean filtered water down the drinking tube and into your water bladder, filling your water bladder without ever touching it. UM. And so that's the system that I use. It's really simple, pretty dame cheap, and it's been really reliable. So yeah, I can basically, you know, if I want to filter on demand, I can just fill up my bladder at anytime by quickly disconnecting the mouth piece and then essentially pushing clean water into my bladder. The other part of that system I really like is if I'm pretty good on water, but maybe passing the water source and know that I might not get to another one for a while, I'll just take um my dirty bladder and just fill up with that dirty water and just carry it and I can filter it later whenever the heck I want. I really like that option as well. Um, you know, there's obviously pumps and sprit kinds and all that, but uh, there's present times to each of them, and at least for me my needs and preferences. Um, that Slayer squeeze is the best of the best of all the of all the options. Yeah, it's an interesting little system, and uh, smart water thing is something we've heard. Um, so did you teach Trent or did Trent teach you about this stuff? Because I feel like I know where this is gonna go. But uh, you know, we had Trent Fisher on a while back, and he was He even said smart water bottle he gets at a gas stage. So like to hear those two phrases both, you know, from two different people. Somebody had to teach one of the others. So how did that go? Uh, you know, I don't know on that one specifically. I will say I've been doing that before I met Trent, the same thing, So maybe there's like a mutual inspiration that it wasn't direct from either of us. Yeah, that's the very humble way of saying it to you. Let him know. The thing I love about hunting with Trent, So we have we have this thing that we do with that come out and gear called What's in My Pack? So it's basically different guys and they take their gear list and they show what's in their pack. I've constantly Trent to shoot one. But if we ever do with Trent, it's not gonna be called What's in my pack. It's gonna be called what's on my pack? Because Trent is just like he looks like the guy from Mary Poppins with all the crap hanging off of them. Um like he dude, whole have like a jacket hanging off of his pack and his chrekking folder dangling and all have like something else flying out of his pocket. So I love Trent. It's uh, he uses his pack as like some sort of I don't even know how he straps crap onto it. I'm like, dude, why don't you just put it inside the back? Then that's what's made for. But he's got his own style, man, it's what's wrong. That's kind of like Tyler. Tyler uses bungee straps like you put on a foiler or something pretty often. I mean, just a little additions of it. No, it's funny. Everybody's got their own style. And that's uh kind of what we're gonna do is kind of take, you know, our ideas, take people who know what they're doing, and uh try what they're doing and kind of come up with your own things. So Mark, for sure, you know your stuff, dude, and we really appreciate your time that you spent with us and let us pick your brain about this stuff and it shows that you're pro man. So if people want to learn more about you and what excel Amount Gear has going on, where can we send them? Yeah, I mean I just um, I hit excell Amount gear to come. Even if you're interested in the pact, I would say go there, and under resources there's that training plane we talked about, that nutrition plan we talked about, and then you'll also see a link that just has gear list that's also under resources, like all those what's and my tax videos. Um, there's a dozen plus of those. And basically, if you're the guy who's trying to figure out what works or see what people are doing, I mean part of the beauty is you can look at you know, call it fifteen different gear lists from different guys who have different perspectives, but you also see a lot of what's in common. And so I'd say we learn from that, and especially where you see commonalities, pay attention because if five guys are doing the same thing, like, maybe it's worth trying it. So those gear lists are there, um, and that's just a really good resource to look at. Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome man. Cool. Well, Uh, we'll be sure linked to all that stuff down below. Do you have any big hunts? We've talked about the hunt we're prepping for. Are you have any big hunts coming up this season? Um? Yeah, so we're doing that bear hunt here, uh and just next week basically, um, and then this fall. I it's still pinching myself when I say this, and I can't help but smile when I say this. I'm going to Alaska, which is something I've always wanted to do. Um. And as it turns out, now we're just going twice to Alaska. So we're going for caribou in September and then we're gonna go up in November on Todiak Island for a black tail. So so we're kind of two uh bucket list adventures, if you will. And you know, we figured you're paying the hundred or whatever for the Alaska license, you might as well take two trips to get the best for your money. So you know, just trying to be asient. No, that's that's cool, man. That sounds like an awesome dream ship and I can't wait to see more about that. And real quick, y'all have your own podcast that you do that specific to back country UM stuff? Is that correct? Yeah? So it's called the Hunt back Country Podcast. Um. You can actually see that under that same resources section on our website or the podcast link there. Um. But yeah, backcountry podcast. You can wherever the heck you're listening to this podcast and Shrinking find ours there as well. But it is UM, it's pretty much myself and Steed, who's essentially the co host, basically just having all kinds of different conversations that relate to the back country hunting with guests. So sometimes we're doing a specific series, like we've done Building a back country Rifle with an archery series. Sometimes it's a very species specific, so there's a ton of great elk content or you know, bear hunting or meal dear, and then we dive into gear safety basically if it relates to backcountry hunting, whether it's hunting, tactics, training, nutrition, safety, like anything you can imagine, we kind of try and cover at one point or another. UM. And we've had it for a few years as well, so I would say if you do check it out, make sure you kind of scroll back to your older episodes because there's a decent chance that we've talked about something that you'd want to check out even an archive. Yeah cool, awesome, man, we'll be sure and linked to some stuff like that. Blow and uh again, Mark, good luck this season man, and thanks so much for spending time with us. Dud. Yeah, I can't wait to hear about your hunt. This will be the first year and in many years on the Hunting Oak in September, so I'm gonna have to look like curiously through you guys. Oh my goodness. Okay, well we will try to do you proud, man, I promise, so we'll do all right? Thanks, man, all right, so you good to see? Yeah, man, that was some killer info. If you found this interview helpful, be sure and leave us a review below and comment what you thought was the most helpful tip from this episode. For sure, make sure you also follow us on our social media platforms Facebook and Instagram, and also subscribe on YouTube so you can see how these hunts turn out. Remember, this is your element living net. Been waiting a whole lot for that.

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