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Wired To Hunt

Ep. 324: Rut Fresh Radio 12/11/19

Silhouette of hunter holding deer antlers at sunset; text 'WIRED TO HUNT with Mark Kenyon'; left vertical 'MEATEATER PODCAST NETWORK'

Play Episode

33m

This week on the podcast we're back with our Rut Fresh Radio mini-series in which we hear from hunters all across the country about current deer activity, conditions, and the tactics that are working right now.

States/guests featured:

Ohio | Byron Horton | Whitetail Experience

Oklahoma | Caleb Combs | Stuart Ranch Outfitters

New Hampshire | Brett Joy | Realtree Sea Bucks

Iowa | Josh Sparks | Midwest Whitetail

Connect withMark KenyonandMeatEater

Mark Kenyon onInstagram,Twitter, andFacebook

Seeomnystudio.com/listenerfor privacy information.

00:00:02 Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your home for deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host, Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm your host, Mark Kenyan, and this is episode number We're back today for another rout Fresh Radio episode in which we're getting the latest late season intel on current conditions, deer activity, and how to fill a tag right now, all right, welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought by brought to you, brought by brought to you by something by Onyx. We're here on X is helping Spencers with me too, and we are actually recording the introduction of this episode of rot Fresh Radio in Montana together. I'm looking at Spencer's beautiful blue eyes right in front of me, the burly man Beard, the big deep voice himself in the flesh. It's quite a privilege, never been done before. I think rud Fresh in person, No, I don't think that's I think you're right. Well, like I said, we are here for the rout Fresh Radio edition of Wired Hunting, which we are going to be hearing from a group of hunters from across the country to get the latest on deer activity on how conditions are impacting deer and deer hunting right now this week, and tactics and ideas for getting it done over the coming days. The hunting season is approaching the end, so you might be feeling the pressure. Got to fill that freezer with the remaining days on the calendar, and uh, we're here to try to help you do that. Now. I gotta bring something to everyone's attention. Uh. And it's much more fun to do this with Spencer here in person. I got an email the other day. It was either an email or review. I can't remember where I saw, but somebody said Spencer new Heart is the worst co host because he's obviously faking his voice. There's no way he really sounds like that in person. He's trying too hard. Uh, he's a fraud. Get him off the show. So I just need to let everybody know, well, we actually have a third person in the studio with us today. UH. Special guest appearance on Refresh Radio, someone who you might have heard on the Mediator podcast. He might have heard on the Hunting Collective podcast. We got Phil the audio engineer helping us out here today. Phil, can you help us shine some light on the truth of Spencer's voice. Uh, well, it's pretty simple. That's that's what he sounds like. And there's no audio magic, there's no No. I don't do any manipulation. I don't think you do either. No, that's just that's what comes out of his his mouth. What do you How do you feel about that? Does he sound unbelievable? Does he sound impossibly deep and mellow and sensual to you? He does? But that's not a that's not a bad thing. I don't know, No, no, I agree, you know. It's like something I've been actually conscious of. I remember in high school there was this girl from a high school I was dating a guy from a different school, and like we we had a lot of reasons to dislike him, but one of them was that it seemed like he was trying really hard to make his voice deep. And so if we were like to list off things why we didn't like this person, be like, and he like tries to make his voice sound really deep. And so since then I've been conscious of like having that not be something that someone tries to call me out for, like really trying to be a tough guy and trying to deepen my voice. You don't want to be the pot calling the kettle black. That's right, I don't. I think back to that often. Well, there's this thing. I got criticized for this too. We were talking about this last night. There's this I don't even really know how to describe it, but some type of way that people uh talk that's been labeled as is called vocal fry. I don't. I don't know how describ some certain way people intonate or whatever. And someone also harassed me about doing that. So both of our voices have been underneath the spotlight lately. Um. I don't know to tell you. There's nothing I can do. We can't change it. Um, but I do wonder I have theorized. I've been curious. Are you familiar with the story of Samson. It's a bit long story, long hair Sampson, and when they cut his hair, he lost all his superhuman powers. Well, I've often wondered if Spencer shaved off his beard, would he lose his deep man voice. Let's not find out, Phil, what's your guests? Yeah, well, I I had to grow a bad mustache for Ben's show, so I think it's only fair that Spencer has to shake his beard. I think that's a good idea. Now, I haven't seen my chain in like four years. Don't plan on it. I guess we'll never find out that. We'll have to find some way to make this happen over the over the coming years. I'm gonna do some thinking on it. But uh, with that out of the way, we do want to talk about de We do want to talk about deer hunting. Um. We've got a whole bunch of people that have reports on what's been going on in the woods over the last seven days or so. I've got a couple small updates on my end in Michigan, Spencer, how do you want to hear about that? All? Okay? Quick update is that there are still some decent bucks moving around in pockets of sanctuary cover. There's little zone on one of the properties I hunt where there's still two mature bucks moving in daylight. I saw Trand the other day when glassing from my little hillside, UH, spying location on him. I saw him. He's still alive. Then I got pictures. I want to check trail cameras. Checked trail cameras over the weekend and got pictures of him as recently as that weekend. So he's out there moving around a little bit. And then I talked to a neighbor who saw him moving in daylight one morning, as well as a different mature buck that I've never seen and never gotten pictures of. But he's right there next to us. UM, So that's positive. That's good to see. UM. I think it is conditioned dependent, though, And I know that's something that we're probably gonna talk about or here about from other folks today in the episode. Is that at least what I'm doing right now. I'm here in Montana with you, but as soon as I get home, I'm gonna be looking at the weather forecast and trying to plan careful strikes on this property when conditions are right. Yeah. And until we started doing a radio UM once the calendar flip to December, I never really considered how the weather affected dear movement. I would consider, like how really cold weather or snow or wind would affect me as a hunter and like being comfortable out there. But until I heard you and a lot of other guys start talking about um warm spells and cold fronts and precipitation come December, I never really considered how that can play a part in the set up for a haunt, and we do hear about that this week, and you just covered it on the Meat Eatior dot com. So give us a quick overview on like what is good weather in bad weather for late season? Yeah, so there's this article. I think we titled it something like how late season weather impacts deer movement or something along those lines. Basic just being right. At this point in the year, these deer have been hunted for months. They're extremely weary, they're sick and tired of humans hunters badgering them all the time. So these deer are reluctant to move, especially mature bucks. So at this time, the way I look at things is that you have to be extra careful about when you go in there and apply hunting pressure because any mistake you make, and this is true any time of year, but even more so now given that worth at the end um any mistake you make could turn that buck nocturnal again, could keep him from ever giving you an opportunity. So I wait until the right conditions are present, which would be one of these late season fronts that will get those deer up on their feet earlier and for longer periods of time. So that's typically to come in the form of two things. Number one, a significant snow system. When you get a lot of precipitation that covers the ground and it puts deer down for a while. You've get this um oh, I don't know how you describe it. But when you've got a strong storm coming. This could be true with a rainstorm or a snow storm, but heavy precipitation, strong winds, that's going to usually slow movement down for a period of time around that actual event. Right, they don't want to be out moving as much in a big blizzard. They're gonna bed down through the worst of it. But as soon as it slows up, as soon as it dies down and that high pressure system moves through, usually the cloud cover might break, blue skies, high pressure, colder temperatures, and all that snow settled. All those deer all of a sudden on their feet, and there's this latent hunt. Right. They've been haven't been feeding for a while. Now they're hungry. They want to get after it. They want to start accruing some calories. So that's gonna get deer up on their feet and moving earlier as well as then the second thing, which hopefully comes with that, which is colder temperatures if you get a significant cold front. We talked about this all year, right, cold fronts make a difference, but especially in the late season, when you get a super duper arctic front pushing through where you're dropping down to maybe single digit temperatures or something, you might have that special circumstance with that one old buck in the area. Finally is like a damn it, I'm moving. It might be an hour before dark. I usually don't like to move until dark, but it's so cold I need I'm burdening a lot of calories to stay warm. I gotta get that food bag on. And you might have this special opportunity when those one of those two things happened. Um, So that's what I'm watching for. Of course, there's a whole lot of other things, Like you mentioned how snow and cold impact us as hunters, how it might impact your ability to scout. I mean, snow on the ground really changes the game. As far as the sign you can see, that's something else to think about. Um. But more than anything, I want to see those weather systems helping me choose the days to get out there and take those last few calculated strikes. Yeah, all good things to consider and all things that we'll talk about with our guests this week, who are Byron Horton from the White Tail Experience in Ohio. Then we go to Oklahoma and talk to Caleb Combs from Stewart Ranch Outfitters. Then we go to New Amshure and talked to Brett Joy from Real Tree c Bucks. And then we end with Josh Sparks and Iowa from Midwest White Tails and Brett Joy. We gotta we gotta mention here. You get a double dose of Brett Joy this week because he just had a hell of a hunt, had some really um I don't know how you describe that whole lot of different factors, many years of work came together leading to an incredible late season buck over there in New Hampshire. So we're gonna hear from him a little bit today as he talks about the activity he's seeing in a little bit of what led to his success. And then tomorrow on the main Wired Hunt episode, you get the deep dive with Brett. I brought him on the main episode of the podcast to go through his story in detail. This this four year story in detail. Break it all down and how he eventually did kill a mid December, big old, mature white tail buck in the mountains of New Hampshire. Mean, it's a cool story. We talked about that, and then we talked about some other ideas when it comes to late season hunting. Um to help everybody, myself included, I'm still trying to kill my laces and buck um to help us all get those final ideas. Um, those final ideas for the final days. That's what That's where we're at. Spencer. Do you feel at this point in the year any sense of sadness that the season is closing up or any sense of remorse that it slipped through your fingers and you didn't get you didn't squeeze every last little bit of juice out of the orange of the hunting season, or do you feel like you got it all, you soaked it all? And where are you at right now? Yeah? I think this year is no different than other ones that I'm typically not satisfied come mid December, and then I'm already looking forward. What can I do different? Um? Where can I pick up additional tags, how can I plan better? All that sort of stuff. So I think even if I had killed ten bucks this year, all poping Young and Bud and Crockett. I'd still be like, damn it, I want it to be next fall right now, I want more. Yep. Well, soon here, we're gonna do a wrap up episode on Refresh Radio. I'm not exactly sure which week we're gonna do that, but soon, and I'm gonna grill you a little bit more on your year and your thoughts and and mostly just how irritated I am with you for you not white Tail anymore. Um, but we'll say that for a later days we'll talk to you that. Let's do it alright. And joining us on the line first is Byron Horton from white Tail Experience in Ohio. Now, Byron in Ohio, what would you say the bucket activities been lately on a scale of one to ten, So I would say we're at a solid too right now as far as buck activity in Ohio. And that's mainly due to we are at max hunting pressure. We just wrapped up our our gun season week and uh, you know, especially here on the public land, we hunt a lot of drives that have occurred, a lot of people in the woods, and it just seems like right now, it is a very difficult task to get a buck on the ground if you're trying to to shout the season and fill the tag. What are you looking for then on public land? To account for that pressure, Yeah, a couple of things you've got to consider, Uh is actually like rabbit hunting pressure. Rabbit hunters kind of start hitting the oh, the timber, the farmland country, and we kind of concentrate on areas that can hold deer late in the year, um, whether that be oh, southern facing betting areas, um brows, because then they can you know, feed while they're they're they're essentially close to betting. And uh, you know, you're you're looking for maybe a private food source that's next to a public land that's got the betting, and so you're trying to intercept those deer. You're looking for the most part, for any sort of food source that may may be you know, not harvested by a farmer or in big woods country, you know, it's the clear cuts. Those become very relevant and we kind of steered towards hunting big was just due to you don't have a rabbit hunter so much. How do you find where bucks are now betting sure those you know those bucks, you know they they they've definitely experienced some hunting pressure now and uh, you go from where you possibly have found sheds. We pulled some trail cameras that like have been out all archery season and so we just pulled one the other day that we were actually the only other hunters on camera and it was on a pretty oh, pretty obvious hunter route into the but it's a it's a section that's way far back in and if you're going to shoot a deer there, you've got to either have a team or pack a deer out. Um. So that's something we'll key in on. Uh, if you do your homework after a fresh snow, tracks can can come into play if you've got that skill set. Um. I won't say we're we're the Joe Elsing or guys of tracking, but that's a skill set we're looking you know, we've kind of improved upon over the last few years. Um, So that's something to consider as well. What would you consider to be ideal whether for deer hunters in December. Oh, let's see her, how I got to have some sort of a cold front. Actually, we don't have much in the in the forecast. But give me a cold front, northerly winds. Uh, maybe a day that where is the temperature starts in the morning and never really climbs high and kind of continually drops once you get into the afternoon. Um through the evening hours. Um too. Now it's scouting and scouting and then just timing that drone strike and hope you get a lucky To be honest, when you're trying to relocate bucks this time of year, are you looking for rubs and scrapes at all? You know, rubs scrapes not so much a huge factor. I do know of a few scrapes that kind of popped up what I'll call like late November into December. At this point, UM, I'm not so much concerned on that second runt, just because our gun season here in Ohio falls right in that first week of December. Um. If I can recall path hunting expenses. UM, I have seen some third rut type action once we kind of get to that first week at January when our mother the letter season picks up. Um. But yeah, right now, I'm not looking at any sort of rud sign in my tactic. It's brows it's foods, it's it's snow tracks. That's what that's way more valuable mean or visual sightings. Obviously you briefly touch on trail cameras earlier. Where are you running those trail cameras that in mid December? So right now I think, yeah, probably of our trail cameras have been pulled. We try to get those out of the woods for that gun week. Now is it's a matter of redeploy and uh, you know, we'll use any sort of late season food source, uh if we can or um, two of us have tagged out, we may actually deploy some cameras and some areas that we're kind of curious about for next season. Um. And obviously those turn up a buck grade. Um, so it's probably a fifties fifty split. And like I will use oh if I do find late season food sources, occasionally I will go back to scrapes or any sort of like creek crossing, uh, something that really funnels deer. And if I get snow on the ground, that's that's when I'm gonna at least hold it, hold at least oh camera two for for if if that aligns, because I can I can see what's going on there and attract a quality track then allows me to throw that camera on a higher percentage area going forward. Then in the six week or so, what do you think that bucket activity is going to be on a scale of one to tend in Ohio, I think this is the toughest time to use. I don't see it knowing what. Whether we've got here for the next week, you're still two to Yeah, you're still two on public land. Um, we've got two weeks till another fun run and then picks up. Um. These deer traditionally, based on on on kind of past experience, they don't really get to daylight active um until end of December starting into January. Um, we we do have a muzzleloader season, but there doesn't seem to be as much hunting pressure with that. UM. So so this this is a tough time and I'm gonna give it a two max I Byron, I hope you're pasted. Is um is wrong? Good luck and thanks for joining me. Thank spensor all right and joining us online. Next is Caleb Combs in Oklahoma from Stewart Ranch Outfitters. Now, Caleb in Oklahoma, what would you say the buck activities been lately. On a scale of one to ten, I would say about Nate, Uh, this is one of my favorite times. Two hunts of the year. I like everything pre rut, you post rut, and so I'm always optimistic about the time of the year. But also I went Friday and Sunday and I saw good bucks both times. Some were still chasing dose and heat, and some were back on food sources that look like them. I mean as far as they didn't have any interest in rud activities, that didn't appear to me. But I like the mixture, the combination of both. You can get them a couple different ways this time of year. As far as food sources go, what your deer hunters in Oklahoma be focused on right now? The late season, I'm always focused on acorns, whatever's left, specifically red red oaks late season, and then anything green so that's not dry, you know, not dry forwards. But if you can find a good food plot or good agriculture that's still growing, that's preferred to me. You said that you saw a little bit of chasing the other day. This time of year, do you expect to find any sidemaking and have you been seeing any this season. Yes, I mean it's still out there. They're definitely still making scrapes. I saw several bucks hit in the same scrapes Friday and then last week as well, So I still look at scrapes. I'm just not as focused on them. It's almost always food for me, food and then if you just happen to get on the couple of hot dogs that are left. But I kind of moved further away from rods and scrapes. I still watch them, just especially with cameras. I just don't hut them as hard because I don't expect them to produce that much. If I would have talked to you a month ago, I know you would have been looking for cold fronts. Are you still looking for cold fronts? This to have a your or just weather play less of a factor now. I mean, if if it's colder, I will assume they're up and they're eating more. But if it's just not hot, if it's real hot, it's less attractive. But if it's normal a tempts and lower than I'm good from there. With this being one of your favorite times of year to kill a mature buck, where are you running your trail cameras? At my trail cameras are still I pretty much leave them on scrapes all year. Uh. But then I I do leave on food horses as well, But food horses I try to leave in the same places all year long, so my cameras don't adjust based on the time of the year. I just if I need more cameras, I buy more cameras, but I leave in the same places all year long. I would like to just see the patterns more than the patterns on what I had left year. Wife in Oklahoma, do you find that there's a shift in bedding come late season? I would say no, but I had a lot of areas of low pressure. I usually try not to go to my places rifle season. I'll skip rifle season half the time after years, which sounds crazy. Half the years, uh, and then I'll just let them move in. But on most of our bedding days same. It's pretty hide population as far as books are concerned. So the good betting areas remain good. They're almost always pretty consistent. They might lay down more and random areas, but you know through the nine but the key the key places are always the same. Are you concerned with moon phases at all? This time of year. I'm not I don't. I don't pay a lot of attention to the moon. I mean a little bit, uh, a little bit, not not that much. It doesn't usually affect me. If I can go, I go. I'm not gonna not go because of the mood, whether it be more important, and definitely having food is really important going forward. Then in the sex week or so, what do you think that buck activity is going to be on a scale of one to tending Oklahoma, I'm forever optimistic, so still like seven, seven eight. If you're on good food sources, if you have food plots that didn't get hammered, and you have some food left, I think you'll be very successful. Our Kale, congrats on the great buck this year. Thanks for joining me. I appreciate it. Thank you all right in joining us online. Neck in New Hampshire is Brett Joy from Real Tree Sea Bucks now Brett in New Hampshire. What would you say the bucket activity has been lately on the scale one to ten, I'd say it's been pretty variable day to day, but probably five or six. You know, there's a lot of factors going on that now are done. Season actually just ended, so there's been a lot of pressing in the woods the last six weeks or so, five or six weeks. Um, we've got a lot of we just had a big snow event. Um, it's been cold, and we've got rain. Um, food storess are changing. Um, and uh, you have some late red activity occurring as well. So there's just kind of a mixed bags of different factors that really affecting that activity. I'd say overall it's pretty decent. Um, you know, nothing like it was maybe two or three weeks ago, but um, it's uh, it's pretty good. I mean, you can definitely have some luck out there. There's some bucks moving around daylight. Um. No, it really depends on your situation and where you're hunting and with the food sources, and you know, if there's late does or you know whatever. So there's a lot that goes in up. Let's say, overall, it's it's pretty good. You just killed a big mature buck on Saturday. Tell us a little bit about that set. Yeah, So that was an interesting one that was never been after for a number of years and was after really hard during the rut um and he actually shifted into an area I believe that he was in because um, it's preferred a winning habitat. Uh. You know, it's gets pretty cold up here and we have love snow, had a lot of snow. It's well melping now. But um, you kind of moved into an area where I think there's some good brows, good thermal cover. Um it's a little more protected area and um, I know there's a number of those in there. So he was kind of hanging out down there. I was lucky enough to get a blanket of fresh snow and went in to check some cameras and actually get walked by my camera. You know, after that snow a couple of hours before, So I had this fresh track, had plenty of mountain of stuff and and big woods chaseman. So got on his track and it took me about four miles and five hours, but ended up catch up with him and killing him. Is that a common tactic for you this time of year? For me, it's someone common for for this area, It's very common. It's probably the most effective tactic for a late season that you know you can have whenever you have an opportunity to track and get fresh snow. In New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont or you know, really in the northeast of the Big Woods. Uh, you can be really effective, um, you know tracking down these bucks. If you have sorting of idea sort of an idea of what you're doing. UM, you know you can have you can at least be, you know, in the game, whereas you may not be if you don't have that snow. UM. So yeah, I would say it's pretty common. You talked about how that buck and moved into a sort of wintering range. Tell us a little bit more about what you're looking for embedding in mid December. Yeah, so the number one thing is low process. So really haven't been um, haven't had a lot of pressure in the Big Woods. That may not be as big a factor. If there's not much pressure, if you're maybe in the suburban type area, a lot of times will actually hang out and protected areas like with no hunting or even like behind neighborhoods stuff like that. UM, as far as habitat goes, UM, good brows is big if there either hasn't been much mass crop um, so areas that have been locked obviously really growing with that type of thing. UM. And then obviously a mass crop acorns and apples are a big big factors. Still there's still some left on the ground if you're in areas heavy with those types of trees. UM. And the last thing is really um conifers, So that's a huge, huge deal in the Northeast, especially in Hampshire. UM. These wintering habitats are critical for the deer. So UM. You know, if you can find a stand of mature spruce or refers or white pine or really hemlocks, this is the biggest one. UM. Those deer really start to gravitate towards those are is because it gives them great thermal cover. UM. The snow depths aren't as deep, and they actually do brows on that stuff pretty heavily because we just don't really have much for quality food sources this time year. Back real quick to tracking a buck through the snow. At what point did you give up on a set of tracks? I would say when he goes into an area you can't hunt, which most of the time that doesn't happen if you're tracking, because you usually are trying to track in areas where you have thousands of egers thrown, I'd say it gets dark or you kill them. That's those are would be the things. I mean, you can really pursue when it comes to tracking. And I'm not an expert tracking my any means, let's say I'm, like I said, enough to be maybe maybe would be a little dangerous. But um, all the the expert trackers that i've I've talked to you all say persistence is what gets it done, just staying on that track. I know. Um, for example, and I talked to you, uh my budget of films hell Blood is a very well known tracker and main and he actually tracked a buck two differ days, tracked him all day one day for a number of miles, and then got on that buck the next morning and tracked him the whole rest of They ended up killing him and he bumped him, you know, a handful half dozen times in those two days. So persistence is deadly when it comes to tracking. And are you sometimes tracking a group of deer or is it often where you're just tracking a single fuck? Um? You know it's it's much more challenging tracking a group of year, especially if snow conditions an ideal. Um, it can be confusing trying to figure out what track you're on and keeping track. Actually on Saturday, when I tracked my buck he was on with some does or was swallowing some dough tracks and I actually lost his track for a period of time and had to backtrack and see where you left. So it could be more challenging. I think at the best scenario is a buck by himself. Um it's maybe his done slicing dose and it's maybe looking at bed or just browsed around. That's probably the best situation. It's really difficult when they're on the looking for dose and covering on the ground or with dose chasing them so um, you know. And then when you finally get up the animal, if he's got three or four does, there's that much more chance you're gonna get busted before you get a shot at the bucket. After going forward, Then in the next week or so, what do you think that bucket activity is going to be on a scale of one to ten in New Hampshire, I'd say it's probably gonna stay pretty consistent, maybe a five or six. You know, see far is a good activity some days depending on like you said, all those factors um based on pressure, food, weather, um, and some late does or maybe even early um, you know, near links coming in so I'd say it's gonna stay pretty good. Um, definitely, uh, definitely a good time to be in the woods and and keep at it. Our riful seasons over, but we have another week of both season, so I think it's definitely worth, you know, spending some time if you have it all right, Brett will congrats again on the awesome dear, thanks for joining me. Thank you. Thanks Spencer all right and joining us on the line. Next from Iowa is Josh Sparks with Midwest White Tails. Now, Josh in Iowa, what would you say the bucket activity has been lately on a scale of one to ten on a scale wanted say? Then, I'm gonna go with a five. I'm just gonna attribute that to the fact that we've got some colder temperatures than we had the previous few weeks. So if you're hunting over food, um, and that's what we did on the tail end of the bow season, we had some pretty good encounters. Um. We ended up seeing on our last time of the year four different mature bucks. But the upcoming weather not looking so great. So replacing that weather, what kind of weather is ideal this time of year? Um, particularly where we're at we're hoping to get some snow, you know, just forcing this deer to feed a little bit more concentrated than they are right now. If we can get you know, a couple inches of snow, it'll really force these deer to go through the corn that we've got on this particular property. Um, there are some standing beans, but more or less there's just so much brows and when we don't have that snow, it's hard to concentrate them down to those particular spots. Do you notice the shift in the bedding for bucks and I all this time of year? Yeah, Um, at least again I'm resting this farm, we started to notice a lot more south facing ridge betting um, particularly just to stay out of was cold north winds. And on this farm there's a lot of CRP and those south facing slopes. Um, so it just offers good thermal cover. Um. It's kind of a shift more or less from the hardwoods to those areas of what we can see down here. I know you're just out checking trail cameras where your cameras focused at in early December. Uh Forrette, Now, that's what I've been doing today is actually moving them around and we're taking most of them off of all the scrapes that we had you know, October November, and we're putting them on most of mostly on trails going out to these fields. I was just talking about, Um, the biggest thing. We're trying to figure out where they're entering the food plots and then uh kind of basing that where we should set up the blinds or if we need to hang its hands. Did any of those scrapes have some recent activity? Yeah, no, when I was checking in the day, I mean it's definitely, you know, not like it was in November, but there are some younger bucks and does and then one of the bucks that we are hunting was on the great But it's not nearly as frequent for sure. How do you account for gun hunting pressure in a state like Iowa? For Iowa, UM, I think that's a pretty selective answer. You know, right where I'm at, gun hunting is pretty minimal. Most of the guys around here and waiting for the late muzzleoader seasons. Um. But I do know quite a few buddies that do face the shotgun pressure dilemma and a lot of their dear you know, getting ran because you can party hunt in Iowa, So that's a pretty popular thing. Um with pushing gear. So I think it can definitely be impactful, there's no doubt. But if you do have a farm where you don't pressure it, I think you can also you know, pick ups some deer from around your neighbors if they know that they're not going to get ran out on that piece of property. You mentioned that there's still some standing beans around earlier. A lot of the Midwest had a late harvest this year. But are you seeing that there's still a lot of standing crops in Iowa? Generally speaking, No, from what I've seen, most of everything's gotten taken out. Any standing food now, I would assume is purposeful for the use of you know, food plas and hunting. Most of the guys that I know that are farmers, we're able to get everything out. It was late, for sure, but they were able to. Have you been seeing any secondary running, Um, Yeah, I mean, like I mentioned, um when we sat that last day, I would have been December fifth, I believe we did see two of those mature bucks were bumping the does that we're in the plot, Um the does. Definitely, we're not having anything to do with it, and the Bucks gave up pretty easily. But I think, you know, looking for that last dough is definitely still on their mind, and you know that's the biggest thing too. We were thinking concentrated around food. Maybe we do get that last hot there, and if we don't, at least the Bucks will be thinking the same thing going forward. Then in the next week or so, what do you think that bucket TV is going to be on a scale one attendant Iowa. Um, on a scale one tendant Iowa. We do have some pretty cold attempts. Obviously, if you're shotgun hunting, who knows what it's gonna be like, you're gonna be driving everything around there. But I would say generally still around that four to five mark. Um, if you're you know, hunting over food, you've got a good shot. But really really looking forward to having some spell on the ground, hopefully within the next month. All right, Joshua, hope you get that weather you're looking for. Good luck and next for joining me, yes, sir, appreciate it.

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