00:00:01 Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, home of the modern white tail hunter, and now your host, Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm your host, Mark Kenyan, and today in the show, we are exploring the highs, lows, and lessons learned from my first experience bow hunting white tails in the suburbs of Washington, d C. With the one and only Taylor Chamberlain. All Right, welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you by First Life, and today, as I just mentioned, we are going to dive into my hunt earlier this year in Washington, d C. Yep, that's right. I was out there hunting in the neighborhoods the suburbs of our nation's capital, and I was out there with Taylor Chamberlain, who I will give you some more details on here shortly, but first let's recap what this hunt was all about. You likely maybe if you listen to some of our past episodes, you might understand what I've been up to this fall. But let me recap just in case you missed those. Uh, I'm filming a new show for me either this year that is about white tail honey across the country and the different unique traditions and styles and cultures of pursuing these critters that we all love, but in wildly different places and in wildly different ways across the country. And the first of those was this d C hunt. Now I'm filming this year. The show is going to come out next year. Um, I'm four episodes in at this point, and now I want to kick off this recap series of podcasts where I'm gonna go through each one of those hunts with the special guests that I visited with, with some of my camera crew that was out there with me, and recap what I did, what we experience into these different places, what I learned along the way, um, and then you know how the hunts themselves went. And here's the thing about this year. This year has really been about learning. Uh. For a long time, I've been doing this podcast, and I've I've traveled a decent bit, right, but but most of my stuff is in the Midwest. Most of my stuff is you know, your standard tree, standard tree saddle hunting, you know, figuring out how deer relating to agricultural land, YadA, YadA, YadA. And that's great, that's fun. I love doing that. But at the same time, I know there's a lot of different other ways out there that people are hunting, and I know there's a lot of you listening who come from different regions of the country, and you've probably been listening to these shows and thinking to yourself, Man, yeah, that's interesting, but it's not like what I do here at home, or it's not like the deer I hunt here, or it's not like this other place I go. And I wanted to try to put myself in a better position where I could understand where you're coming from, where I could understand and have some degree of context, some experience that would help me relate better to folks that are hunting in the cities, or help me relate better to people that hunt in the South, or help me understand what folks are up against hunting up in the Upper Northeast or these different parts of the country. So so that's why I did what I did this year. That's why I wanted to take on this new project. And the gist of each episode is this, I go to some different, unique region and I meet with an expert in hunting in that place and explore both the culture of this location and this unique way that this expert hunts. So in this first episode, this first story, I'm gonna tell you guys, it's all about hunting in the suburbs. It's all the hunting in cities. It's about bow hunting and tight quarters in neighborhoods, surrounded by people, and a guy who's really made a name for himself, and that is Taylor Chamberlain. Taylor lives outside of d C. He has star did a really popular YouTube series. He has you know, has got a podcast. He's got a social media handle where you can follow along and learn everything he's doing out there hunting deer almost every day of the year and getting it done in tough situations. So he was a guy who right away, when I decided that I wanted to learn how people hunt in these city environments, he was the guy knew I had to go talk to. And that's exactly what we did. In early October. I flew out there to Virginia, met up with Taylor and UH and had a heck of a hunt. So today that's the story I want to share with you. I'm excited to to hopefully pass along some lessons learned here. There's some things I learned there's some strategy elements that we're gonna get into. We're to discuss, you know, how to get permission on properties like this. We're gonna talk about how to actually find deer in these places, how to hunt deer without spooking him, some tips on shooting deer, recovering deer, a lot of different practical things like that, and then also discussed some of the maybe less expected um elements they go into this kind of hunt. So it's interesting. I'll tell you what. I have been on the road almost NonStop since October. Um. I haven't been home for more than about a week. Otherwise it's been go, go, go, gone for a week, home for a week, gone for a week, home for a week, gone for two weeks, home for a week. Uh. So I am absolutely tanked. I don't think I've ever been so worn out and exhausted from a season of hunting. But I'm hoping that the end result, these stories, these experiences, this show that we're putting together. I hope that this end product is something that you guys are really gonna enjoy and they're gonna be able to learn from. And uh, it's gonna be worth the long days and nights out there. So without further ado, let's get to it. I I've got Taylor Chamberlain here with me, and I also have Justin Michelle, who is one of my cameramen on this shoot. He's been on some of our past episodes too, so you'll probably recognize him. Hope you enjoy it. Here we go all right with me on the show today. I have my partners in crime from the recent adventure of sorts on my Washington, d C. Suburbs. So I'm here Taylor Chamberlain and Justin Michelle. Taylor, Justin, thanks for getting back on here with me, hey man, thanks for you know, we have two careful saying partners in crime when we're talking about urban hunting. It's a good point committed in the urban hunting this that we did, you know, but that that kind of I was gonna say, it's like a little too close, yeah man, but you're you're skipping right to the ending, Justin um Man. But but yes, that is a really good way to set this whole thing up, because this was a memorable hunt in a lot of different ways, both from the hunting and some of the extracurricular activities that happened throughout uh and and a number of other things. So what I was hoping you guys could help me do here it is recap kind of the whole story of the week, what we did, what we learned. Taylor. I'm hoping we can kind of dive into some of the how to stuff that you were sharing with me that I found really helpful. Um justin I'm hoping you can kind of help fact check me and help me as we walk through the story of our kind of are are on our own hunts and kind of layout lay out the journey, lay out this crazy experience that was my first real suburban, you know, in a big city hunting experience. So that's that's the game plan. Are you guys down for that? Yeah? That sounds great man. And first off, thank you for coming to the bourbs and uh getting to experience it, because I really feel like you can speak to this. But you get an idea of what it's like. And even if you watch you know, some of my videos, some of the content that's out there, or you're even stuff where it's not revolving around me hunting, just urban hunting in general, you kind of get an idea about what it's like, but then to experience it is totally different. Would you say that's a fair and accurate statement? Oh dude, it is so so true, so true, because what you see on the videos, what you see is nothing but well not entirely, but it's mostly just like the the simple fun part, the sitting in the tree, the watching the deer, the shooting deer. Um. What you don't see when you watch videos like yours or Seque or anyone else like that is all the work are on the edges, all the relationship building, all of the dealing with all the different weird logistical challenges, um, all the different pressures that the suburban environment puts on you. Um. The the feeling is just entirely different than you can pick up in a TV show, and entirely different than you know, I could even imagine going into it. Would you justin is that? Would you agree with that? Being another guy that was new to this, Yeah, absolutely, you know, like I'm I'm used to. You know, it's always a little bit nerve racking trying to gain permission places, and but you know, doing it and farmland where it kind of feels like home. Um, you know, it definitely gives you a bit of a different approach. But yeah, just rolling into the city and and uh, just realizing like this is where we're gonna hunt, it just felt like extremely wrong, definitely different. Um, So here here I'll set I'll set the stage for what our plan was going into the week. The idea was this, we were gonna show up me justin the other camera guy Chase, who couldn't be with us here tonight, and we were gonna arrive meet up with you Taylor in like the on in the National mall right, downtown Washington, d C. Spended on half a day or a day kind of just picking your brain about how you got into this kind of hunting and why you love suburban hunting, and you know, just just kind of a deep dive into the whole world and culture of this way of getting outside and doing stuff. And then from there we're going to spend I think it was a half day where plan was to actually go out and do a hunt with you. So I was going to tag along with you, follow along, see what you do, understand what your gears you use, how you handle you know, getting into a property. We're gonna go and chat with a landowner about this whole situation and what they thought about meeting with you and all that. And then after that whole kind of set up period where I was learning from you and chatting with the landowners and kind of getting my head wrapped around this whole idea, then I was going to have three days to go hunt on my own and try to figure this whole thing out. And oh, by the way, also try to get my own permission by knocking on doors too. So that was that was the plan for the week. Um, we showed up that first day. I don't know if there's much worth touching on on that first day where we kind of toured downtown. It was fun to get to kind of see I hadn't been to Washington, d C. Since I was a little kids, so it's fun to see everything again. I think the most notable thing was that Taylor, you and me sat down on some benches to do an interview and all of a sudden, You're like, dude, what is that stench? And we looked down and like, Oh, someone's been pissing all over these benches. That's what stands out to me about that day. Yes, that was fun. When we sat down, it was pretty obvious that we were sitting in a homeless person's restrooms. So that's never fun. In downtown. It's always kind of cool to to like see d C proper and and walk around and kind of realized like the history and the power that reside in d C. And we got to see a Netflix special being filmed too, But other than that, not much memorable. Now. A lot of people that come in from out of down Uh, they see these surprised by the topography of northern Virginia d C, like the metropol are I was expected to see, like the rolling hills or was it? Did you do extract something different? No, I would agree with that. I was especially you know, we saw downtown and then we crossed the river into Virginia and started driving almost immediately into some very deery looking spots. Like right away, I was like, oh, now I can understand why deer would be here. And you're right. It was a lot of rolling hills, really kind of steep, thick ravines, lots of good cover um and and yeah, just a ton of nooks and crannies and crevices where you could see deer houlding up and living. Um. Would you agree with that, Justine, Yeah, for sure, it was. It was right away I could see there being deer. And what that first I guess is that afternoon, I think we went and we went and chatted with one of the homeowners that you hunt on her property. We kind of picked her brain about, you know, how dear have become a problem for her, why she was interested in having someone come hunt her land. Um, Taylor, is there anything on that front that maybe is worth kind of you know, let me take a step back here. We kind of jumped right into the story, but one thing we didn't really cover was why this kind of hunting is is important or why is it worth considering? Um? And I'm curious, I think of this because when we went and chatted with this landowner, you know, she was sharing with us how she was experiencing this problem with there being too many deer in her area and why someone like you helping out was a service to her. So I'd be curious if Taylor, you could expand on you know, how hunting in urban areas like this can help solve other people's problems. But then also can you give us a little bit of your spiel on why you like doing this so much like why is this also a great thing or hunter? Yeah? Well so, um, you know the dear present difference different individuals based on you know, those individuals certain circumstances and and uh kind of outlook on everything. But generally speaking, our area has an insane overpopulation and white tailed deer and to the point where they're unable to quantify how bad the overpopulation is. So the average carrying capacity according to the state biologists, of how many gears should be in our area, because I mean we have relatively like mediocre hardwoods, right, there's really there's no agg there's no supporting brows other than just woody brows and um in landscaping, which we can touch on later. But I mean basically, the caring capacity in our area is ten twelve deer per square um, so many deer that when they do a study they can't count them. They're getta mixed up. It literally looks like you kick the ant hill and their best guests is that there are four and twenty four mile so you know you had met bowling hills and gets and that's exactly right there their pockets where there are just so many deer. It's insane and they are eating everything. They've decimated their brows to the point where if you get down and I don't know if you guys even noticed this or we kind of talked about it, but if you get down at like five ft six ft or four ft even and you look, you can see as far as the topography will let you. Because the deer of eating everything that they're able to get their mouths on, whether it's palatable or not. Um So they destroy landscaping. They cause a lot of issues with you know, people wanting to plant stuff. You really can't plant anything, uh, And they cause a huge danger two motorists and people on the on the roadways. So why is that great for bow hunters. Well, we've taken mediocre habitat and with urban sprawl, we've replaced it with lush, fertilized grass and landscaping and stuff the stars can eat on. And we've taken away I'm doing air quotes now, but a traditional hunting habitat, and we've replaced it with these subdivisions and homewers associations. And because of that, people are not comfortable hunting in those environments, and it really creates a lot of hunting opportunity and a very target rich environment. Hence the former in twenty plus deer for a square mile for people that want to climb a tree and shoot stuff with a bow and arrow. So, is there a lot of red tape a on it? Absolutely? Is there a lot of barriers to entry and you know laws that you need to read through and kind of navigate these land mines through. However, if you do it, you are rewarded with an endless dear season where you can hunt three hundred and sixty five days a year and shoot as many antler lists dear as you want. And um, the absolute icing on the cake for me is like, I'm a big guy, but even I can't eat all the deer that I shoot in the year. And so we're able as hunters to take these deer and feed the homeless with them and you know, just take them to a butcher, drop them off the butcher process of them. There's no fee to the hunter, and that food goes to food banks and people in needs. So it's a really fantastic use of overabundant resource to help people that need it. Yeah, it's it's like you said, it's a win win, it's a win for hunters, it's a wind for landowners, it's a wind for the habitat out there. It's a win for the dear population to become at least hopefully a little bit in more in balance. Um So, so let's rewind back to where I kind of was triggered this idea, which was going to this homeowner's place, and we visited with this gale, this this this woman and her husband, and kind of heard their story and this set up kind of paint a picture. Is just a really nice, really nice big home with a couple acre grassy yard, and these folks probably owned I don't know what is it, three acres, maybe Taylor something like that, with maybe two acres or acre and a half yard and then an acre and a half of woods kind of edging around it, kind of dropping down a little point um and they had I don't know, there were some oak trees, there was some landscaping. While we were up there talking to the owners, there were deer feeding in the yard on I can't remember what they're feeding them, but they're feeding on something. Um that kind of place, you know, a big yard, a little bit of woods butting up into a little bit larger section of kind of scattered timber and stuff. Is that kind of the average kind of place you hunt, Taylor, Or if not, can you kind of paint a picture for people of the types of places that you might hunt in a suburban environment like this? Absolutely, so that that piece of property was uh and in the du shell exactly like my typical standard property. So in northern Virginia, pretty much every bit of developable land has been developed. There are no pieces or I'm never gonna say never, but there are very few, if any pieces of ground that are subdividable to the point where you can build out houses on them. Basically farms or properties that you would want to seek out and hunt the areas that are left over our areas that are undevelopable. So the property that we were hunting had a point that dropped down into some woods that that property owner doesn't own, but a lot of deer bed in there and come up into their field. Well, there's a big creak in there, and that's why you can't build houses there. So that's a very typical property that I hunt. Or maybe like a creek bottom or a floodplaine that's between a bunch of houses. And if you kind of look at an aerial map and look from like a fifteen thousand foot view, you can start to see these floodplains and see these these undeveloped areas between all these houses. And and for a guy like me who's been doing this for a long time, you can, to me, that looks like a road map, right, That's where I'm seeing deer movement, and those are the areas that I'm keying in on hunting a bunch. And that's my kind of standard area. So a yard or some some little trunk of timber that backs into a cree bottom or you know, somewhat goes into places of where deer would bed or travel or feed. And at the end of the day, like that's what deer are doing their betting for security. They're traveling and they're eating, right, and they're not going to be in places that they can't do that uninterrupted or or somewhat um without the ability to move somewhat freely. Yeah. So so let's stive in that a little bit further, Taylor, Because that first day we showed up at this person's house, we chatted for a while, and then we came back the next day to do this hunt. And as we were basically you were gonna hunt, I was going to fall behind you and climb up in a tree with you and just watch what you do and kind of pick your brand and all those things. As we are going through all that, you kind of ran through a couple key concepts are like really really important things that are unique to hunting in suburban environments. Um, can you kind of walk us through what you think those very most important things are when it comes to hunting in an urban environment like this? Like what stood out to me. I'm just to put a couple of things in your radar. Maybe you've got some other things you want to mention, But you kept talking about the bubble. You were describing something as the bubble and how important it was not to go inside the bubble. So that would be something I'd love to hear you talk about a little bit more. And then another thing that stuck with me was you continued you constantly discussed and talked about how deer within these areas kind of move like water flows through a stream. And and that was helpful for me as I was thinking about where should I set up in these kinds of zones, or how should I think about how deer will move between this yard and that yard and this clearing in this thicket. Um, those are two things that stood out to me. Could you expand on those two? And then if you remember any of the other important things that we walked through on that first kind of trial run um kind of the main most important how twos of hunting these places from your perspective, Yeah, for sure. So the bubble is the most important aspect of successfully hunting urban deer and really dear in general. I think you can apply what I refer to as the bubble very effectively too. But I mean, basically, deer are very very good at adapting uh to a new area and and kind of surviving, and they know exactly where the humans go and where they don't go. So using the same property that we're talking about, there's a grassy field, what we call it a field's receptic field. You know, it's probably eighty yards long, maybe a hundred yards long, by thirty five yards wide forty yards wide, drops down into a creek bottom. Well, those deer know that those homeowners, they might come out there on the deck, they might move around a little bit and you know, like what you were talking about before, when we stood on a deck, those deer were feeding right there. No problem. Now if we have walked down off the deck and walked towards them, they would have run off because we would have entered kind of their bubble. And the same thing is true where those deer know that if you're up in the yard, you're fine. If you enter the woods, well that's rare, Like not a lot of people are entering the woods here. Now we've triggered their their predatory prey type response, and they're gonna they're gonna get out of there. So it's very important to figure out where those dear I think that bubble is, where the human interaction bubble is, and try to get as close to the edge of it without instruding too far into it to trigger that response, but still get yourself in a position where you're able to shoot a deer. And so that comes from doing your scouting, doing your homework, figuring out how those deer are moving. And that's where we were talking about kind of like these deer move like water, where you know they're gonna move through an area that has the path of least resistance. To them just like water does. And I think you and I were talking about how you're a big fisherman, and that really resonated with you because it's the same way that you look at gear moving or excuse me, fish moving or feeding when they're kind of waiting behind a bullet or whatnot. Right and and um, you know, I I like to look at the property from an aerial view and make a educated guess as to how I think deer going to move to these connected areas, because the deer kind of like to run a circuit. The deer always getting bumped around there. You know. They might be because the landscapers are out there. Might be because you know, the dogs off leash and running after them, or something spooked them, whatever it is. They seem to kind of always be moving through their home range. And that home range is pretty large, um. And so what they're doing is there if you look from above and you can see those connected chunks there, that's where deer are going to flow, much like a water pipe or a creek or however you want to, um think about it yourself to to you know, make that analogy stick. But I like to think of it like water. And I try to find where that water is flowing and and get to a spot where I can do my homework, get permission, and and then get in there um. And that's where doing your homework and trying to figure out where that bubble is is the next best thing. I think that a lot of people try to dive in and find a spot that they think looks really deery, or a spot that you know traditionally is where you were hunts, and that's where they go wrong because by the time you get to the tree that's quote unquote deary, you've blown this deer out of it. There, Like those deer sitting there, they're watching you. As soon as you cross thee their bubble, they're gone. And I think a really good example of that was where we actually hunted that first night, right because we talked out our access and how we walked in there. I knew where the deerer bedding, I knew what they could see and what they couldn't see. And we picked a tree that was right on the edge of the yard overlooking that point where we thought those deer, we're we're going to come up the point into the yark um. And that spot probably didn't look good traditionally for you guys being normal hunters, Is that right? Yeah, I mean I'm not normally looking for a tree inside a yard, that's for sure. I would I would have wanted to go further down that point probably. Um, But your point is, your point is a good one about understanding the bubble, and and that really ended up being pretty key the whole week when you would see what these deer learned to accept and what they learned not to accept, and being right on that side, right there in the edge of the yard allows you to you know, not go past and into their danger zone. Um. So yeah, I mean it made sense once you described it, and then we'll shoot. I mean we climbed up in that tree, and it kind of worked in a lot of ways, kind of just how you would expect it to, both the good and the bad. I mean, I think that night you described it as kind of the perfect example of what an urban hunt can be like, right, Yeah. I mean we got we walked in to the sound of mowers and just ripping. I mean there were mowmowers everywhere and were a couple of houses away, and I thought that was because actually it was going to push the deer over towards us, and then you know again the deer and nother bubble. They're very comfortable with people mowing grass and blow and leaves. I really try to go in for an afternoon hunt when I know the landscapers are there. Um. The deer really like to eat grass that have had leaves on top of them that they are freshly blown off, Like they will run in after landscapers leaves, uh, that have just finished one leaves. So I try to keep their schedules and know where they're gonna come by. And I try to donate a lot of deer to to those different h employees of those places so that they'll tell me when they're going to properties that they know I hunt. Try and create something sent up for them to let me know um when they're going, and kind of built some camaraderie and team teamwork there. But um, we walked into a lot of mowers blowing, which was great cover. We climbed up. We we took a path that we've probably most people wouldn't take. We kind of hung around the side of the property and kept some bushes between us and where we expected the deer to be betting and uh, most people probably walk right down the middle of that yard. And then we climbed the tree right on the edge, and uh, you know, justin you guys got set up and we thought we were in good shape. And then mowers got closer and closer, and then we saw some guys cutting grass and property, riding their mower up and down, and then finally they stopped, and almost as soon as they stopped, the geer started moving. Yeah, it seemed like that was going to be the dinner bell. The mowers stopped. You spotted I think it was you who spotted some deer down the bottom, and then they started moving our way, and they were kind of heading up this There was a couple of little ditches of sorts or kind of draws that were on either side of this yard. And you described how likely these deer either come right up the point or move across the edge of one of these drainages across in front of us. You and I were sitting in a tree together, and they started going that way, and then well what happened there? Did they was that when they were coming our way and then something spooked him and they ran off. Was that it was that that encounter they just spooked out of nowhere. They were, I mean pretty close to being in green Light string Dunk territory. Um they were. They just needed to come cross out from some bushes, um. And I think Justine, you probably had the best view of them based on your angle and where they were working. But for whatever reason, they just turned inside out and they were behind the bushes, but they clearly did not see us. Maybe the thermal started dropping. I mean that was pretty close to sunset, so it's possible. But they got the heck out of dodge and and blew out of there. And that's again a really good example of how did your react with their bubble is breached? Right? I mean, those deer did not question it. They you know, a lot of people assumed that because you're hunting in the suburbs, you can get away with a lot of human scent. The deer used to smelling humans. But they're smelling the humans and so when they smell them and then they get that visual identification, they're like, okay, I smell Mr Johnson on his porch. That's fine. Well, if they get a really strong sniff of human and they had no idea where where that human is that's what triggers them into a very you know, predatory prey type response, and they'll they'll booker exactly like those deer did. Um and I thought we were done for. But then we had a handful of deer come from where they really should not have come from, which were between the two houses where the motors had just been. So who knows if if those are gotten kicked up or something from the from the neighbors. But they circled around and always got shot off. But they were like thirty three thirty four yards out, and uh, just we weren't going to send it at dusk at thirty four yards on a super alert does so sometimes the best shot that you can take in the suburbs is not taking the shot because um, you know, and we talked about this some hunting small properties. Marsian ship is is key. Yeah, I mean that that was one of the most important things that you impressed upon me, was just how you know, there's there's no room for error when you're bow hunting in the suburbs because any little mistake, anything that's not a perfect shot, can lead to a lot of challenges. You kind of ran me through some rules, some things that you you know you do when it comes to like choosing the kinds of shots you'll take in this environment. You even talked about some gear considerations. Can you walk me through that stuff? What those how you think about max range or the types of shots you take and and all of that. How's that unique in this environment? Absolutely? So. The difference between a deer running forty yards and piling up in a deer that's running a hundred and fifty yards and piling up is night and day. That's the difference between a quick recovery back to your truck, awesome morning or evening hunt and knocking on three, four or five doors, you know, eventually finding your deer, getting yelled at by all those homeowners, and then eventually losing permission on the property that you hunted from. Um So, it's it's important that you're not just ten ringing deer. You're hitting the twelve ring and you're putting them down absolutely as fast as possible. I do not shoot deer unless they are broad side or slightly quartered away, and I do not shoot deer unless they are under twenty yards. Sometimes, if there's a deer that is super calm and the conditions are perfect, and I'm reading your body language. I might shoot one at like twenty two or twenty five yards max. But I will never ever ever shoot a gear and not use my top pen um, just because there is a lot of stuff that can happen between a deer at eighteen yards and a dear at thirty two yards. Can I make that shot? Absolutely? I'm a boat nerd. I shoot at long distances all the time. I have like an absolutely you know, insane tuning process, etcetera. But it's just imperative that the deer that you shoot, you hit right at the top of the heart. You take out their lungs and they they were in fifteen yards and pile up um. And for that, I'm shooting insanely heavy arrow. Well, not insanely, I'm shoting a five hundred and sixty five grain arrow, and I'm shooting a very large cut on contact broadhead because what I'm trying to do is blow through the absolute top of that heart. If I can take out some of that front landing gear, I love to do that so they snowplow and sad of running dead on their feet. Um. And it's just very important to to get the deer down as fast as possible. There even some properties of the hunt where I will put on a giant, expandable broadhead because I know that I'm only gonna be taking a twelve yard shot and I'm not gonna be hitting any bone, and I need to put that giant coke can size hole through the deer as opposed to a smaller fixed plate type chopped. Yeah, and and that that whole line of Um, this whole lesson, I guess is is definitely one that stuck with me coming out of this hunt. Um, as I had some experiences along these lines that proved a lot of what you discussed to be true. Um, But that night, I mean, you didn't take the shot in that dough. She was a little too far to arrange, and that was that was it. There was a good lesson for us to learn to see you pass up a shot there when she you know, it looked like a great opportunity, but to your point, not a risk worth taking. Um. Justin what did you think about that first hunt, seeing Taylor set up, seeing Taylor's way of going about things, Do anything stand out on that whole thing, either with what he did or how the whole they went, Well, It's it's interesting because, like you know, in our typical hunting scenarios, there's like to you know, we go into it knowing like we want to make an ethical shot, we want to like do our due diligence, um to put this animal down quick. But there is a level of um angst that that I felt going into these situations like that first night hunt. I mean, you you have to break these properties down at such a micro level that it's I mean it is like next level really, because you know, if I go hunt a fifty acre piece and I have some timber, and I know they're going to uh food egg field over here, a food platter, whatever, there's always like some padding, you know. And when we went in that first night, you know, it was great because we we had the blessing of these people to be able to hunt there and hearing their story and knowing, like one, like, these are real people's like daily lives that are being like you know, pretty pretty heavily interrupted um by the deer, which I don't experience that in my day to day. So like it's a huge problem. So you're you're really doing a good thing for these people, and so going into their yard and knowing like okay, well this like they have our back here. Um. And but then when you get back there, it's like while I ought to be easy, you know, like we're standing there talking these deer at like twenty or thirty yards like feeding there looking at us like at home, no way, you know, and um, but you have like a three anchor piece that is like mostly mode lawn in a house. But there's such a micro level that this whole process has to be out because like Taylor said, like you you have to get in and you have to do that right. And even like the way we were set up that night, Um, you know, I think we had three different trees, guys in three different trees, and like those deer, uh they did exactly what you thought they would do and using that to rain. But man, like like you said that there was like zero tolerance for anything out of the ordinary, which which was pretty surprising to me. I'm thinking, like, you know, these people, Ali, there's guys mowing all around us. But and that somehow seemed really normal to these deer. But they come up and like I really think what happened was at that time and night that we did have some thermal shift and it started to pull into that bottom and there there was deer coming from like two different directions, and there was one dough that just was like suit like she just was on edge and she ended up like alerting everything. But man, it's just like looking at that, I mean that little chunk was like not not you know what a quarter of an acre and that was like the spot you know. So it's cool to see like how fine tuned you have to be with your wind in a yard that's like you know, like just everything is so condensed. But um, it's cool because it kind of takes it to another level because you don't have the wiggle room. Like one, you got to be on your game with your set and understanding your your winning your thermals. But you also like have to you know, like Taylor said, you can't be taken like thirty five forty yard pokes idea like that, Um that are coming in just like expecting something to be like wrong. You know, yeah, I think that. I think what you said, the fact that there's there's there's no padding, like there's no wiggle room. That that is I think the overarching theme of everything, like there's no room for error, whether it be with how far you push in, whether that be with how long shots you take, whether that be with how you manage relationships. It seems like that, you know, it's just the little things really matter in this kind of hunting environment, which which brings us, I think kind of nicely to what we had to do the next day, which was this whole relationship side of things in a to a degree. Uh, Now that I got to hunt with you, Taylor, once, it was now up to me to try to go and do it on my own and get my own permission, to see if I could get my own permission at least. Um, you had some spots that I could hunt, but I wanted to try to get my own spots to to kind of have the whole experience. Um. So that morning we went over to your house and kind of walk through your best ideas, like your best practices for knocking on doors, for finding spots, um, kind of the Tailor Chamberlain approach to getting hunting permission. So I ran through that whole deal with you, and then I took off on my own. You want to give us cliff notes on some of your hot tips for getting permission in these kinds of places before I discuss how my attempts actually went. Yeah, so, um, in in our area in northern Virginia, people tend to be very abrasive. You know, it's the city man, like, you're not you you don't have this communal neighborhood where you're like really good buddies with your neighbors. Most people don't want you at their drawer. They don't know why you're there. And so to build rapport instantly, I mean it's really no different than any other type of sales. You're just selling yourself instead of selling a product. Um, And so you know, if you can try to build instant rapport, just try to communicate clearly, and the biggest key is to just not be intimidated. Like if you're confident in yourself and what you're saying, people will believe in you and they'll understand and and you know, I try to not have emotional conversations with people about the gear because emotions you can't control on somebody. Um. You know, we all feel differently about lots of different things, and the three of us are very like minded people on this call, But I'm sure that there are things that we could talk about that all three of us are very passionately, you know, opposed to how we feel about things. But you can't argue with facts, and so I try to very softly and not ambrasively state my facts interlineated with the service that I'm providing and explain why it's important, and um, you know, I do that kind of socratically by asking a lot of questions and just try to build report. And then also it's all relationship building. And I think you guys got to see some of the relationships that I've built with these homeowners and the report that I have with them, and you know, by doing that, you're able to then build kind of a referral based network and have the clients that you have reach out on behalf of you to their friends. And that's where getting permission like this really snowballs, because even if you do knock on a thousand doors, you get to communicate clearly with those people, hunt them appropriately, provide a quality service for them, and and I guarantee you one thousand percent guarantee you at some point very soon that homeowner will ask you what can I do to thank you? And you say, hey, just tell all your friends that you know what I'm doing and give them my number. To this day, I get more phone calls in a week of properties than I can hunt. And there are people asking me to come over and hunt their properties because somebody that I hunted on their property of told them about me. And much like anything else in life, you know, a referral from somebody that is a trust and source carries an unquantifiable weight with it. You know, if if you guys were somewhere and I said, oh, hey, you gotta go try this, you know Irish restaurant, You're gonna go there probably without even thinking about it, right, You're just gonna be like, oh, te are some of those place is awesome? Like I'm gonna go there, and it's it's no different than anything else. Doctors and service providers, and you know I'm a service provider. I just I'm more of an exterminator than a than an attorney or a doctor. But yeah, you know, service is being provided. That's that's needed. So builder poor and and speak confidently and and not facts. And there's some data that supports your case. Because you can't argue with data, you can't argue with math. You can argue with feelings and you will lose that argument ten times out of time. Yeah, yeah, that's a that's a good way to kind of sum it all up, Taylor, and I tried to take the approach that I've used knocking on doors in more rural areas and and kind of combine that with some of the stuff you said. And a couple of things that stuck with me were the fact that you kept telling me to make sure you answer their questions before they have them, and do it quickly, like, don't give them an opportunity to object before you're able to lay out the base sick important things, you know, the basic important things being why you're there, how you're gonna do this safely, and what problem you're solving. I think of those are the main things I was trying to get across, UM, and I really tried to try to distill it down into a tight, short, quick and succinct kind of introduction and explanation. Um. Sometimes when I'm knocking on doors in the middle of the country, you know, I think people out there prefer a little bit more winding approach. A lot of these people are like inviting you into their homes and asking you to have a bite to eat, and they just want to talk to someone. I didn't see that. Yeah, people like do you see the lad bad banking man? We wanted to what do you Why are you here? I mean a lot of people will answer to say what do you want? Yeah, I'm like, hey, I'm Taylor, break down the street. I'm not selling anything. I you know, I'm here to solve a problem for you for free. You're welcome, and because it's going away, just trying to create some sort of incentive there to get their attention before they just think that you're some salesman or you're trying to get in their pocket. You know, when you're making somebody's doorbell, they are very defensive. You know, why are you here? What do you want? You're trying to get my money, You're trying to ask me for something. You're interrupting me at some point of my day. You know that they're they're they're very much on their heels. And so I try to do a lot of things and you hit the nail on the head. I try to answer their questions before they asked them, and and that makes something very confident. When you do that, you know, like it's really no different than any other sales type tactic. You're just selling yourself. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh so basically at after you kind of ram me through all that stuff, we went through and looked on Onyx and just pinned a bunch of different houses that you thought had good potential or were in areas where you've seen deer in the past, and just some spots worth checking out. Um. And then I hit the row and uh, it was like I don't know, like a CI A covert mission or something. I had Justin and Chase in the vent or in the STV and we're driving like secret Service black um Forward Expeditions or something, and uh Jason Justin had the cameras, and then I was in the front seat driving around and I don't know how many pins I had, but I ended up gosh, do you remember the number justin. I think it was something like twelve or thirteen houses that okay, Yeah, so I ended up going up to and asking for permission at thirteen places. Um. And I'll tell you, the first thing that really stood out to me about these places in these neighborhoods that I was in was that not only are they kind of in the city and you know, wham bam, thank you man type people, but like they were all almost all like mega mansions, like I've never been I don't think I've been in a place like neighborhoods where there's in such a concentration of of wealth and big, huge homes like just everywhere, Like every little road you turned down, it's like mega mansion, mega mansion, mega mansion. You go down another way, here's a whole another slew of these places. You go down another road, there's I mean, there's just everywhere. And some of these places are just like way back, like you drive down some like quarter mile or half mile drive and gates here and gates there, and security cameras everywhere, and then you come into this called the sack that's a private calder sack with fountains in the middle and like a private basketball court or basketball court. And I mean, I've never felt so uncomfortable in my life, Taylor. I think as when I was pulling up to some of these people's houses and just thinking like, Okay, at any point, like an armed guard is gonna apprehend me, or someone's gonna be really upset that I'm back here. I mean, was it very it's very typic and that's where a lot of people, I think Paul short is. You know, at the end of the day, it's a numbers game, right, and I can network and use my spiel and use the you know, the knowledge that I've built over the last twelve plus. Ye're doing this but for fourteen years now, jeez um, But there's just no substitute for you know, trying to stay calm, and you get those butterflies walking up to the door because I still get them, and you gotta ask, and you gotta knock on the door. And the thing that I always tell myself when I'm at the driveway and I'm like trying to talk myself out of that kind of that that like devil on your shoulder and the angel on the other shoulder kind of thing, is I just tell myself, Hey, the answers already know, so you might as well ask and verify, right, because unless you ask, the answer will always be no. So effort, maybe you get it. Yes, let's go come on. And and that's what I told myself thousands of times a year to motivate me and go walk down and bring the gate doorbell and um and try to get permission. And you know, you just have to be comfortable being told a lot of things of of no, and all kinds of things about yourself that aren't true or maybe they are, but you're gonna hear a lot of stuff, and you just have to keep reminding yourself like, hey man, the answer is gonna be no unless you ask. So let's let's go verify it. And and like keep on keeping on. And you know the other thing to really consider, and I think we talked about this, but don't ever rule out the property. Don't ever go like, oh, that property is so big and perfect. I bet you know. They always get asked because I find it's kind of like the really hot girls at the bar that everybody's so intimidated by them, they're not talking right. And and so of course that was a long time ago for me because I sit, but um, when there's a property that looks really, really really good, go try because again, like the answers, no until you ask. And some of my best best properties, I mean humongous properties are ones that I thought, there's no way this is gonna work, kind of scoffing at myself, and next you know, I'm like, holy smokes. I can't believe I just ended up or you know whatever it is right and in places is crong with deer, and and then I have to figure out which one of my buddies I can bring in to help manage the place. Right. So, um, just never ever ever assume anything and go have a conversation with people. And I try to give them my phone number and just say, hey, if anything changes, give me a call, right, because sometimes they'll call you back and they'll say, hey, you know, I talked to my wife, or I thought about it and or I started noticing there are a ton of deer in my yard and please come shoot them all. So you just never know until you tried. I was with I was with you, Mark, because nothing says don't talk to me, leave me alone, like a like ten thousand dollar gate and cameras hanging off of trees. Uh. The anxiety that you felt, I think I told you was like it was just like oozing out of that car, like everything every door, every door you went to guys like, oh my gosh, I want to throw up. Mark. You're on top of it, because once you got permission, you then have to be like, oh, by the way, these are my buddies with these really nice cameras and they need to come with me. Also, we need you to sign this whole other piece of paper now, right, So that's like a mother layer. Um. That was tough, and we tried to kind of talk about some different angles of of how to appreict that as well in a productive way. But at the end of the day, like, people are different and and they have different reasons for want of us shop here, and you can never really assume either why they want you there. You know, Um, I would be willing to to bet that every property owner that I had permission on, either they or one person removed from them that they know, has either had limes disease or hit a deer with their car. And and those are a lot of the reasons that they're like and again we're back to how to get permission. That's factual. It's like, yeah, Susie had limes disease, or yes, like Becky hit a deer with her car and totaled it, or Jim did you know whatever, Like those are factual things they happen, and those are things that point to overpopulation and and what we're trying to take care of yea. Um, so so I tried it and knocked on like you said justin doors. Um you said that the anxiety was palpable. Justin Um what did you think about? I mean, you watched me do what I did? What did you think about? How went? What do you think about my spiel? Uh? What stood about that whole experience? Well, that was the closest I've ever been to be in the Secret Service because I had an I had a camera on you, but I also had an earbud and and could hear every one of your conversations and uh, you know, like when you got back in the car, I was like, dude, like I don't know how you're doing this, but if anybody could do this, like you're the guy because um, you know again you're immediately caught off guard because you're like entering people's sanctuaries, you know, and then once you get up there, they are like, wait, how did you get in here? Kind of and but you know, like as soon as you would start, uh, it was it was just like great because you and I'm sure Taylor is the same way, Like he he has like worked up a speech that like he said the facts and and you going into that, um you just like you you knew what the you know, the issues that they're having. These homeowners are knowing the same thing. Um. And when you when they rejected you or they said no or uh, like you were always like dead on with your your responses. So I was like, I was, like, I said, you were the guy to do that. I would have probably quit after the first note and just like found in McDonald's UM. But like, yeah, it was you know, it wasn't It was encouraging because you know, in in this outdoor world, we hear you know, you there's a lot of people that have voices in that that can speak into this industry or to our lifestyles that have no idea what what it's like. And I think we were at the some of those doors and it was great to hear like the openness that people you know, they would tell you know, but then you would have a chance to then, um, explain what you were doing or why you were doing it, and then hearing their rebuttals and uh, their opinions and whatnot. Like I really think that even though we got like a lot of nose um, we also were able to kind of uh, you know, maybe plant some seeds of like okay, like you know, all these hunters are not the same, you know, And here is another way we could think about, like possibly attacking a situation where you know, my kid could get lines disease in the yard like that. The first lady said that she didn't want to have her grandkids over because she doesn't want them to have like have to play in a yard where there's ticks everywhere. Um. And so even though we heard some nose like those might be yeses for Taylor, you know and the future, because of the conversations that you had again, I felt like it was super informative, um, because there was a lot of the information you're given out was like stuff that these people probably had never heard. So I thought it went really well despite all the knows that we got really bring up a good point there justin and that you know everybody well, again, I don't want to generalize to say everyone. The majority of people that I talked to have never ever met a hunch or before. And so there are a lot of a lot of properties that I had permission on that started with a no. And and I always will ask like, well, why you know, do you mind if I ask why the answers know, because I mean, now we're going down in flames, right, Like the answer is no, so we might as well put me downloading and uh but I mean and and then when they say well, because it's barbaric or something, and you can say, well, you know, actually it's not, you can have a counterpoint to it. That's that's factual. And you know, what you'll find out is that a lot of people have really no concept what hunting is about. And they understand, you know, right now. And it's very common to be you know, cognizant of what you're eating too. Maybe want to eat on the organic stuff or grass bed or you know, non non hormonal stuff, and you're going like, well, hey, I'm sorting organic protein my family, right, And and so what's different than me going to Whole Fuits and paying forty bucks a pound for bison or me helping you remove these gear from your property and feeding my family with them. Um, it's hard to our do that, right. And and I've had many, many many homeowners tell me, you know, once you get to know me, they'll say, you know, you're not what I expected. And I want to asking them, like, what do you mean by that, I know their answer. They expect elm or fun, right. They expect somebody that is, um, you know, the stereotypical hunter and not somebody that they'd want to hang out with and have a beer with and have a conversation with. And UM, you know, we're fortunate that we're getting to kind of change people's perception of of hunters. And you hit the nail on the head that we're not all the same, Like, you know, we can be educated, it's still hunt we can you know, we can do this ethically and responsibly and um, in an appropriate manner. That's beneficial for everybody. And it's really kind of cool to watch people who have had never been experienced to hunting figure that out. Yeah. I felt the same way. And I felt like even even with all those nose, I felt that at least all of an opportunity to be a positive light, to be to be like, uh, one representative of the hunting community that they get to have some kind of engagement with and if that can be positive or surprisingly better than they expected or intriguing, you know, I did something good there. So so yeah, I mean there was there was a couple of people who were you know that talked to who were you know who described bad experiences they've had with past hunters. Uh. There were a couple of people who were just like hesitant about the whole thing in general. There was one person that I went and talked to where the husband answered the door, and he was very dismissive of it, like he was. He was probably the most um agitated that I was there and like, what do you mean? What what were you doing here? There's no problem? Why, there's no, there's not too many deer. Just he was like angry I was there. Um. But then his wife came up behind him, and she, uh, she was very different. She was really curious about it. She kept asking questions and he was trying to push her off, not physically, but I mean he was trying to be He was like, no, no, no, this is fine. He's like, no, well, let's just just Kevin, get out of here. Stop asking these questions. And she said, well, I'm kind of curious, why why do you do this? How do you do this? Or you do use a bow? Or this is legal? How do you guys? How do you guys manage these situations? And eventually he stormed out of there, but every once in a while he like yelled from the kitchen to like just close the door, just let's get back to what we're doing. He was very irritated. And she stood there and asked me questions for I don't know, minutes, fifteen minutes something like that. UM. And we ended up having I think a really productive conversation, and I think she left it, you know, having learned some stuff. And she was like thanking me. She said, oh, this is really interesting, this is great to kind of learn about this. UM. And then there was a handful of people who were just kind of like they didn't care. They're kind of like, you know, I'm fine, I'm fine with hunters, but I just don't want someone here to just be a bother. I don't want to worry about people around here. I've got a guy already, the hunts here. UM. There was a handful of types of things. It was a handful of people that just weren't home. UM. And there was you know, a handful of just said no and that was it. UM. There was one guy who was on a phone call. And this is kind of like a longer story that I'll try to make short. But the night before or two nights before, we had done like a drive around scouting as you guys are called, and we had spotted one house with like five bucks, like four or five six bucks feeding in the front yard, including one like really nice one. And so I had come back to knock on that door and that guy answered the door but was on the phone and he kind of like waved me off. It's like come back later. So I was excited to hopefully get permission there, um. But ultimately I did get one yes. Um. There was a couple who were kind of leaving their home to go for a walk, and I walked up their driveway as they were walking down and chatted with them, and they were they were the perfect the perfect culprits and that they were like, yeah, shoot them all, we've got too many there, a nuisance, their trouble. Do whatever you need to do. Um, And they were fine with us filming and fine with us doing the whole deal. So so I got the yes one out of one out of thirteen. Um. But I'll tell you by the time like we got that part done, I mean I was just like shot. I was emotionally exhausted. It just like there's like an emotional debt that you accrue every time you go through like the hype up, the walk to the door or the knock on the door, the talking, the the yes or the know or whatever, like every time you do that, regardless of how it goes. It was just like each one was a little bit more exhaustion, a little bit more so after thirteen of them. I mean, you you tell me if this is true or not justin but by the time we stopped for I guess it was like a late lunch we stopped for. I mean, I was just like a zombie. I could hardly even like talk to anyone. Would you say, that's true? Absolutely, because I felt the same way, like I think, being like hearing and and just like the flow, you know, the up and down of all those conversations. It was just like, yeah, I didn't really want to talk to anyone. I knew you didn't really want to talk to anyone for a while. Well, yeah, when we got that, when we got that, yes, it was like okay, like this is what Taylor has been talking about, Like you know, there's here's people that that recognize the problem, and uh yeah, it really felt like a home run even it wiped out all the notes, you know. Yeah, now one other thing to point out back to that house with the bucks on it, and we'll kind of speed through this because it didn't end up working out. But Taylor, you had like a friend of a friend who knew those people, and through a phone call we were able to get a hold of them and they said that they would be okay with us us hunting there. But I had to go back and talk to the guy. And so I went back and I knocked on the door again and he never answered, and then I waited outside and then went back again and they never answered. And now it's like three thirty or four or something. I don't it's pretty late, and we're down to just not a whole lot of time left before trying to hunt that night, and we were trying to get in a hunt UM, And so I ended up just bailing on that spot and deciding to go and hunt a spot that you had gotten permission on UM previously. That would be a good one for us to get into quick since we didn't. We had to still this paperwork taken care of on the place that I got permission on UM. So so that was how we're gonna try to end up the night was just to go to this new spot I've never been to before. You drove us down there and just kind of said like, hey, here's the access point, um, go for it, here's your property lines, um. And this spot was was actually a little more normal feeling than a lot of the other places that we saw. A lot of the places that knocked on the doors, um doors of um. This was kind of a I don't know, how would you describe this tail like a like a just a big brushy bottom dur rainage kind of area where there was houses up high and then this is like a low area where just nobody was gonna build, right yeah. Yeah, So once that ran you see the gauntlet, I actually could take you to some properties that are really hunted. And yeah, it's a it's a big kind of floodplain with a lot of houses up on the high ground and then that land in the middle there that you were hunting on is just undevelopable. But it's like super brushy, a lot of like thickets and poison ivy and sumac I think justin call hell, so some not always at bottom. I'm sorry to give me more of a head cup. But to be I did not know where you were going, so we wanted it to be not like a guiding hunt, more like a you know, Mark figures out where to go. And so I just said, hey, park here and and go in. And I should have warned you about the uh, the CIA operative that lives next store, that is figuring out texting people randomly, but um, yeah, I mean it's just a big brushing floodplaint. And that spot is fantastic because if you think about how the water flows, again our analogy about where to find deer, like, they're all getting pushed into that area from everywhere around there, right, And if you even looked at that spot and zoom back out, you'd see that it's a giant crossroad of a crossing. I mean, that's one of the better hubs in the area that I hunt. And they are just tons and tons of deer in there, including a couple of pretty good bucks. And I think you saw one that night, didn't you. Yeah? I did, and and so you know, we we we parked and going in there. I remember keeping in mind the two main points that you had been preaching to me over and over again, which was one was thinking about all the water is going to flow, you know, the metaphorical water. And then number two, but most importantly was the bubble. So I I was looking at this stuff on the map, and I'm looking at this thick, brushy bottom and right in front of me, and I'm thinking, Okay, I could get right into the middle of this, I could be thinking about what my winds doing and and pushed to the opposite side. But I thought, man, I don't want to breach the bubble. I don't. I don't know where the bubble is because I've never been here before. But I, you know, figured I need to be a little bit more conservative than not. So I tried to find as decent of the place as I get to without diving deep into this place, because they could be better than anywhere anywhere in there. And I remember thinking, like the main things that I thought I could work off of where that there was these there was this ridge that ran on the neighbor's property, and two points that dropped down off of that, And I've envisioned that, Okay, hypothetically, I bet you there could be oaks up on those ridges, and there could be acorns up there. So I thought all right, they're very well could be deer either bedded up on those points and then our dry popping down into the bottom to get to the opposite side. Maybe this food over there, so this might be a place that they're dropping down to, or it could be the opposite maybe dear coming for the other way, and they might be going up those ridges to feed. So I thought, okay, if I can be tight to that, I might peple intercept that movement. Secondly, there's a creek, and I remember thinking to myself, all right, let's see if I could find a creek crossing, and if I could be hunting where there's a creek crossing and those points and what looks like the edges with really good thick betty betting kind of stuff, that might be three different potential you know, movement, lines of movement that I could take advantage of. Those are the things that I was trying to key in on with with just a very ah bird's eye view of what I was dealing with. Having looked at the map and walked in like seventy yards or something, we didn't go very far in, but I found those threes, three things lining up, and I thought, okay, I think this is worth, you know, trying, so you know, we got set up. Justin was in one tree and me and Chase weren't another. And sure enough, like an hour before dark or something like that. Um, Justin was actually the first one to see him because of your angle. He was. There was this really nice buck coming down that creek and he got to the creek crossing. He came all the way to the creek crossing, but was on the other side of it, so he was on the one side. He was at forty yards and if he crossed the creek where the crossing was towards me, he would have been to thirty. And I'm like, man, this is gonna work out so perfect. I can't believe we nailed it, Like this is great. He's gonna come into thirty and and I was gonna take a thirty yard shot in in this scenario. Um. And then he just never crossed totally fine, And there is enough buff there that yeah. Yea never never presented itself though, because instead of crossing, he instead turned up that point and worked up the point, probably up to oaks or something up in there, and we never saw him again. I tried some grunting, and he looked but wasn't half that, but he was. He was a nice, you know, mature buck. I mean I was stoked. Yeah, I mean, I couldn't ask for anything better than that. But what I was surprised by really I got some yeah, some cameras out there, and he was walking around today. So I'm like, when I get back to that's awesome. Man, he's asking for it. Um, that was an encouraging first time. I was like, man, I mean I saw a shooter buck first night. This is great. And so we went back intore that next morning. Uh, I didn't end up seeing anything. I don't think right justin I don't think we saw any deer that is right anything. So it should we point out that I forgot. We need to explain a little bit about what you alluded to Taylor, which was the neighbor. So we that that that night. I just described when we hiked in and we're setting up our trees, you putting up our sticks and saddles and stuff. As I was getting up in the tree, I could see our vehicle parked off the side of the road and a truck pulled up behind it and then drove away. And then came back later and parked there for a while, and I'm thinking, oh, man, someone's messing with their stuff or someone's freaking out there and to call the cops or call their neighbors or who knows what. And I don't know, half hour later, something like uh, justin it was you right? You got a text message? Yeah? I did? And and what the text message just said? Like, hey, what are you doing here? Your trucks on my neighbor's property or something. Yeah, He's like are you huh are you hunting? Right? Like I can't remember exactly what it said, but it was like, okay, big brother definitely knows. Yeah, it was freaking or something, and the neighbors does not like it. We were very perplexed by how this person had gotten Justice's phone number. UM, and we're thinking, like, man, is this guy like in the c I A and he pinged our cell phones or something, and like being being in this area, your mind jumps to all sorts of crazy conclusions when you're around um and here are some of the stories you told this Taylor about the crazy things that going out there. I was thinking, man, we've got like I don't know, Um, I don't. I don't know what I thought, but it ended up being that there was a luggage tag that could be seen through a window, and that's how my family. I was assuming my family was being swept away in a white fan uh at the very moment that I was getting that text. But it turned out that I just happened to have a luggage tag pressed against the window that had my phone number on it. So that was quite the relief, a much more simple explanation. It was weird because I said that you guys sent me a screenshot of the text, and I looked up the number on my phone and I realized it was a neighbor. I quickly sent a text and said, hey, you know my buddies are down there hunting um. When I said hey, like, how did you get his number? He said? His response was like dot dot dot passed life. And I was like, yeah, okay, I'm not gonna fraud there. But then we found out that there was a luggage tag, and I'm like, oh, dude, come on, don't make yourself seem cool like like or maybe maybe he didn't look at the luggage tag. Maybe he really did do some sneaky hivert stuff, you know, I don't know. Yeah, we'll never know. He's probably listening to this phone call right now. Maybe just laughing, he could be. Oh Man. Definitely kept us on the toes that day. But but yeah, next day didn't see anything. So mid day decided, Okay, we had a paperwork done at the spot I've gotten permission on, so we're gonna head there. Um, I'll kind of fast forward significantly now because we don't have a whole lot of time left. Um, But we went to that place. Um, had like just the same kind of deal. There was like landscapers everywhere, and there was neighbors pulling in and out, and this proper is very narrow like it was right along two roads. It was just a long, skinny piece the head road frontage on half of it. And um, it just wasn't a lot to work with. So do you have a on the backside. Yeah, the neighbors had deer fencing, so like like kind of nylon netting, like kind of plastic netting that was maybe like six seven ft high or something to try to keep deer from going in and feeding in their yard. Um. Interestingly, that first night, the only deer we saw were in their yard inside the deer fence that's there. That's how that works. But um, but yeah, it was cool to go and hunt the place that. You know, I had actually knocked on the doors and got permission on myself, and I just didn't see the activity. I thought we're gonna see. Um it was it was across the road from some really good looking stuff. So I thought for sure there was gonna be deer piling off of the neighboring property, crossing the road and feeding on all the acorns that were in the stuff that we could hunt. But it didn't happen that night. That was basically what I was doing, was was hunting, um basically thinking about the whole flow of movement situation. What we had there was that there was as long, skinny property as I described, and there was a bunch of oak trees in it, and so there was tons of acorns. And then the neighbor as we just mentioned, had this deer fencing. So the whole length of the property had deer fencing along the edge, and any deer that wanted to get from the good thick cover across the road to other good thick cover on the other side of that person that other neighbors home had to go around the outside of that deer fencing in between that deer fencing and a cul de sac. Um. Never thought i'd say those words, but um, I found. I found this funnel. But I thought would be a funnel between the end of this yard with a deer fencing and the calder sack where there's a little gap crossing a driveway and then leads into another draw with a bunch of good cover. So we set up on that side of the property to catch any movement funnel that direction, while also hopefully taking advantage of deer feeding on those acorns. Didn't happen the first night, went back into that next morning. I saw a bunch of does coming like they were going to do that, but I think our winds swirled and blew out that group. I don't know, there was like fifteen deer or something in that group does. Yeah, a bunch of deer coming through there. Um, but they buggered And then we had a six point buck, had a year and a half old buck come across, carossed out of the cover across the road, came into our spot and did exactly what I was hoping. The deer would do. And he came walking right to the base of my tree, and I was thinking in the moment, like first I was like, alright, I'm gonna shoot him because I thought maybe he was like a two year old six or eight or something. So I drew back. And then as soon as he got close and I had my bow, and I think I'm trying to remember what the order here was. I think that as I was drawing back, I was thinking, I had like, oh, man, he's a year and a half old. I can't shoot this buck. But I got to full draw and he's right there like five yards, and I had like a back and forth like should I take this deer? Should I not take this deer? Like I haven't shot a year and a half old buck in like fifteen years. Um, you know, just a personal goal thing. But I've been trying to kill mature bucks and it's been a long time since I was in a situation where I thought about doing something different. But then I had like a I thought like, man, maybe I should take this deer. Like we're trying to help control dear populations, we're trying to show how to do this kind of thing, so I should shoot it. But then I was like, ah, but I don't really want to shoot this deer, and and all this went through my mind in like five seconds, and and ultimately I just couldn't bring myself to do it. Um So I let down and he just walked past and went on and and Rent was I don't know, maybe I should have shot him. Um maybe not. I don't know. What I told myself. What I've told myself many times in different scenarios but other way other times, is that if you ever are on the fence about shooting a deer, it's like, if you don't want to do it, regardless of what the reasons are, like, don't do it. So for me, it's been either going to do it or not at all. Um So I'm okay with that. But absolutely, unless the deer makes you go like I'm gonna shoot him, if you have to talk yourself into it or convince yourself you should not shoot that deer. Yeah, it's kind of my rule of thumb, even though you are correct that you know we're doing a management and and if you wanted to shoot it, there's no problem shooting a year and a half old deer in the in the suburbs because that's one lest year to breed um and potentially get hit by a car. But at the same time, you know, if you're not excited about it, then don't do it, because at the end of the day, that's really what it's all about. Yeah, you know, is a tough one, but um, but I felt like, you know, after it happened, I felt I felt fine with what I did. It was the right call and we got The only thing was that we got you know, after that hunt, we were basically out of time. That was our last day. We had one more hunt that evening, so we really only had two and a half days to hunt. Um, now that I think about this, because we had spent you know, so much time on the front end, you know, kind of getting the education with you and then going through and getting permission and all that just took a lot of time. So UM ended up just having that last night hunt and so I just said, okay, last chance, let's go back to the very first place we went, which is that property that we met the landowners on and they had the doughs feeding in the yard and you were hunting that first night with us and had the close call and I thought, man, that sure seems like a slam dunk. And I texted with you and talked with you, and you thought the same things with that. Okay, it's our last chance. Try to shoot a doll. That's our best chance. So snuck back in there and I decided to hunt a slightly different spot. Not dramatically, I think I just shifted like forty yards over um, but shifted down closer to the other edge of the yard where we could shoot down to where those last doughs came through that you couldn't get a shot at because they're a little bit too far away. UM. So we got set up chasing me. Were in one tree justin, wasn't another? And m how did everything go here? Justin? I think the first year we saw were on the neighbors across the ravine, up on the hilltop, feeding in the yard. And then those deer dropped down the valley and came across and actually fed into the yard that we were hunting. But they crossed the yard, two of them. One of them disappeared, but two of them crossed the yard and went to the other neighbors and fed out of range. And they kind of continued at like I don't know, seventy eight yards ninety yards heading off the other direction. There was one mature dough and like a year ling or something with her. And when she got out of our yard into the other yard, like she was definitely not going to come my way. UM, I started doing like a faun and distress call, just you know, just kind of using my mouth to make the sound that I think that I've heard in the past that a faun might make that. And um, sure enough, she turned and stared and turned and stared, and then I don't remember exactly how long it was, but she eventually turned and started coming back our way. Um. And over the course of I don't know how long this was, maybe ten minutes, maybe longer than that, that whole encounter fifteen minutes, she she slowly worked her way back towards us. And then when she started she got back into our yard and then came out into the open was like crossing the open yard to the other side towards me. That's when I was like, okay, wow, this is this is actually gonna happen. Um, what were you thinking of that moment? Justin when she learned and started coming back, Well, I was like, I couldn't believe that she was actually doing it. But I think she seemed like she was on edge a little bit. And I remember her taking her time. Uh she had that young woman behind her, and but she you know, she didn't just like feed across he could. It was like she was looking for whatever was making that that distress call. And um, so I think she was on edge. But I'm like trying to calculate from my tree, like was she you know, managed she like in his shooting range, because you know, I know we were trying to stay pretty close. And but then when I saw you draw back, I was like, man, like, here we go, Like this is going to happen. And she continued to work across and uh yeah, so I was I couldn't believe it worked. That's what I kept thinking. I was kind of thinking the same thing. She came across the yard, and what happened was that she it looked like she was going to come right into twenty yards and so I remember she was gonna go behind one set of branches, and I thought to myself, all right, this is my chance to draw she as soon as she goes behind these branches at this angle, if she continues on, she'll step out right around twenty yards and I'll have my shop. So as she's walking through the branches, I draw back. But instead of instead of stepping out and continuing the way she originally was going to go, I thought in my mind, she stopped behind the branches, and it seemed like forever. I don't remember how long it was, but I was at full draw a long time. And then she started moving again, but her angle was angling off further away, and so she went behind a tree. I'm stuck a full draw. And the whole time, I don't know, I think you went back and looked. Wasn't like a minute a half or two minutes or something that I was a full draw. Um the whole time, I'm like, I need to draw down. I need to draw down, like this is not I'm not like I'm just barely holding on, you know, um. But I just couldn't. I just did not see a way I could get drawn down without this dough booger and out of there, because she definitely was, you know, on edge. She knew something was going on, and so I just kept at full draw. I remember, I believe that, I remember, you know, I wasn't anchored anymore. I was just kind of like holding the bow back and just trying to relax in some kind of way, and just like, all right, just wait, just wait, just wait, like I don't like, there's no shot right now. It's just a matter of hole in the back. And then as soon as soon as she starts moving again, you can get back, get anchored, and you'll be good. And sure enough she did start to move. She moved behind this tree. I got back into shooting position and anchored. And I had ranged earlier that day this little opening on the other side of this tree, and so I knew that she was going to step out somewhere between twenty and twenty five yards, and so I thought, if she comes out in this opening, it's it's it's probably a shot I can take. And sure enough she stepped out there. I remember, we're thinking, all right, I bet she's like yards something like that, and and I put it behind her shoulder and uh and let it. Let it rip um. And for the sake of time, I'll describe this scenario quickly. The shot felt decent, other than the fact that I just had been holding a long, long, long time, But I felt like I was in the right spot, and I didn't feel like I flinched or did anything crazy. Um. But when I saw her run off, she ran off like yards and then I saw her disappear behind a big clump of trees down in the bottom of a ditch. And I never saw her come on the other side. Somethinking, man, I bet she she went down right there, like she's gotta be down right there. And we waited until dark. Went down there, looked at the arrow, and the arrow didn't look as good as it should have. Did not look like a double long. There wasn't a lot of blood. There was a little bit of like meaty stuff on it. Taylor, you swung by, stopped by, took a look at it, kind of walked me through the different things you think about when recovering a deer in this kind of scenario. Picture brand a few things, and I think you felt the same way. The arrow didn't look great, Um, So we decided to wait a couple of hours, right, I think we wait a couple of hours, um, and then we're gonna take up the trail. I gotta ask you, Taylor, you were so kind as to drive over to check out the arrow and chat with me with your wife in the car on your way to date night, and uh didn't seem like she was super thrilled that we were doing that. Did how much trouble? How much trouble did you get in for that delay? We had lots of expensive bottles of wine at dinner, so it's all okay. Yeah, she was fine after the first bottle, but the second bottles, of the third bottle, we're just more of an insurance policy, smart man. I was glad. I was glad that I texted you and I did not have to come out and help track, because I don't know how helpful I would have been after uh that much wine. But yeah, she was. She was less than less than pleased to find out that we were actually not going to dinner. We were going to go over to a property real quick. And uh, look at look at what you know? That's what kind of having some buddies around for he's really helpful in the burbs and have an extra set of eyes. It's really very invaluable. Yeah, well, I certainly appreciate it was just great to be able to um go through you know, Taylor Chamberlain's rules of of recovery in these settings, and you know the important things where don't draw attention to yourself. Um, you know, hopefully this you know, hopefully I did everything right in the front ends that we don't have a long track job. But you know, don't draw attention because in the middle of night, people seeing lights and stuff. If you draw concern. Um, you know, if you do cover the deer, get it out of there quickly. Don't leave gut piles and you know places where they would be terribly um conspicuous. Uh YadA, YadA, YadA. So we cover all that kind of stuff, and then eventually I went back to track track that deer down into that ditch up the other side and unfortunately to a property line where we didn't have permission yet, and it actually went it was going right to like the edge of two properties. So I was like at a t junction with the property we had permission on, and then there's two other properties and the blood trailer went right to the corner of those two spots. So me and uh my producer went to go knock on those doors to get permission to go track. And this is where the story gets particularly uh interesting, I guess, because one door. One person answered the door and was like, oh, well, okay, sure, whatever you gotta do, no big deal. Um. Now I gotta remember this is by this time, it's after dark. We're in the suburbs outside of Washington, d C. As you described, Taylor, people that live out here don't want to be bothered. They're not you know, they don't want people around. Now it's dark and someone's at their door with a flashlight. Um. So this guy handled it well, but the other person did not handle it well. The other person, you know, got to the door and you had their spotlight on me. Um. And I'm trying to make myself as unthreatening as possible. Like my hands are visible, Um, I have a flashlight, but I'm not pointing at their eyes. I'm like pointing in my direction more so so they can see me clearly. Um. And you know I stand away from the door, so like I'm not right up in their grill. Um yeah, because I know this could be like an uncomfortable situation for a homeowner or so I'm trying to think of anything I can do to seem less threatening. But this person won't even open the door. He just presses his face against the glass. And he's like, what are you doing? What are you doing? Why are you here? Um? And I said, I'm so sorry. You know, here's the situation. And I explained that, you know, I I'm hunting on your neighbors, I have permission to be hunting there, got a shot of the deer, blah blah blah, just just kind of try to quickly explain what's going on. Explained that I was hoping to get permission to to continue tracking the deer and also just let you know, like why you're seeing lights back there, and immediately the guys, I'm calling the cops. I'm calling the cops. I'm like, you don't need to call the cops, sir. I've just you know, this is what I just wanted to explain what was going on, and if you don't want me on your property, we we won't do that. I just wanted to, you know, respect your wishes and explain the situation. He just kept saying, I'm calling the cops. I don't care. I'm calling the cops. You can't come on my property. You can't come to property. I'm like, okay, hey, alright, I'm not I'm not gonna come on your property. No need to call the cops. Um, you we'll we'll get out of your hair. So we leave and go back to the property we're hunting, go back to the truck, kind of unload any last year. And we said, okay, well let's go track to the property that we do have permission on, and sure enough, that ended up being where the doe went. So we followed the blood that property, and unfortunately the blood trail at this point had really diminished. It had been decent and it had never been a ton, but we were able to follow it across where we did a permission onto the new property, and then we got to drop here, a little drop there, nothing. We're doing circles. We're doing circles. We're doing circles. Um. And at this point, based on the arrow and just the drop, drop, drop, it was like, okay, this this deer either we're gonna find it dead right away or this is like a flesh wound based on the meat on the air and everything. But I'm still, you know, having hope. And then all of a sudden, I see these lights pull up, cars pulling up, lights pulling up on the neighbors, and I just knew right away I'm like, they called the cops, and sure enough, here come, here come big flashlights coming our way, and a couple of cops came over, and uh, you know, I want to know what the heck was going on. So um, my producer was there with us. This is our our, our our buddy Andreas was out there with us too, and he's like, let me, let me take care of us. And he's got like of our paperwork. He has our our filming permits and our permission slips and all the stuff that shows that we're doing what we're doing legally and everything. So he went over there and the cops talk to him and had us explain what we were doing and what was going on, and explaining what we told the neighbors and why we stopped at their house and so on and so forth. And it was like a very stressful situation in the moment, and we're all like trying to you know, keep our hands up and like not up. But I mean, like I just remember thinking about it. Don't do anything weird, don't you know, Just let's just stand still. Let's just do nothing threatening. Let's not give anyone an excuse to get over excited, because We're in the middle of the night. There's flashlights pointing all over the place, and there's cops, and everyone's stressed out, and I'm upset, and we're not finding the deer. And eventually they let us go and continue our stuff. But to make a long story short, we were not able to continue tracking that deer much further. We found one little other drop of blood after that, and it was it was dried up, and seemed at that point that that this was like a brisket shot, a super low shot. If I were to guess what I think happened is that I must have dropped my my arm, my bow arm, so on that shot. I was at full drop for so long that when I released, I must have came down a little bit low, you know, just that arm being tired, and I probably just hit super low, you know, on the belly or a little forward and low, something like that. And that deer gonna flesh, wound bled some, but dried up, and UH, and she carried on her way and we dealt with the cops. I couldn't find the deer, went back to the car, was super depressed and bummed out about it, and UH and had to end end our trip on that low note, which is a bummer after you know, a lot of fun and excitement. It was a bummer way to end it, but I guess it was a a really full circle look at what suburban and urban hunting can be. Like. We had we saw a big buck, We had a shot at a young buck. We had a bunch of cool encounters with doe as we saw lots of deer in yards. We saw a big buck in a yard. We talked to landowners who liked us, we talked to landowners who hated us. We got permission in some places, we got a lot of nose from others, and we end up getting the cops called. I mean, it was it was everything you could ever dream of right here. We get it all. You got the full, the full gauntlet thrown at you. It's amazing how unnerving having the cops called on you can be when you know that you're doing everything one by the book. But still, I mean I probably have the cops called on me probably fifty times, you know times, um yeah, because I don't feel so bad, yeah, but but it's never once have I been doing anything illegal or wrong? Right I'm like, you know, when the cops come, and it's kind of unnerving because a lot of the times with offs have never dealt with a hunter before either, and they're like, you know, winds deer season like now like obviously like you know, okay, people answer that differently, you know, I mean, they just don't, uh, they don't deal with it a lot either, and so it's kind of like an unknown for them, which makes it a little hairy. And I don't know, it's very unsettling to have to deal with the police and um. But you know, like unfortunately you're hunting a quarter acre or half acre or three acre a lot whatever. Um. Still, even on that three acre a lot, there's only like a very small buffer on the fringe, that is where where the bubble overlaps with where you can actually hunt them. And like the deer end up off property a lot even if you take a perfect shot. And unfortunately sometimes you have to knock on doors and get permission and deal with piste off people and police and weird recoveries and you know, it's just it's the nature of urban hunting. But at the end of the day, you know, would you say the juice is worth a squeeze? Like was it was it that interesting of a hunt? Or would you prefer rural, standard market hunting spots. So I will be as I'll be honest with the Taylor. I I one see the appeal, and I had fun, and I'm really glad I did it, and I learned a ton and it was really cool. But I will also say that I did find certain elements of it stressful and um like, like like many of them, like many of them, And so I think I prefer the Mark Kenyan way, is what I'll say. I prefer my rural countries loots where there's less stress. But I definitely see why this is so much fun for you and why it's a really cool thing that people can get out and do, especially if you live somewhere like this and it's not easy to get out in the country. Um, I mean it's it's sure a heck of a lot better than sit on the couch. Um. And anyone who does this like you do and does it consistently and gets it done and has figured out how to navigate the red tape, I mean that is no easy task. So so kudos to anyone who's doing it. And and I want to second or I want to kind of qualify that what by when I say it's no easy task, Like yet, it's not easy, but it's definitely possible. Like I mean I was able to pull it off in a couple of days, Like I was able to get permission, I was able to find places to shoot deer. I had opportunities of deer. So it's it's also something to be said that, like this thing is out there for you, it's accessible, it's available. If you've not been able to get out and hunt as much as you want because you have to drive a long ways, consider this because this kind of thing is available in a lot of cities and a lot of suburbs and a lot of neighborhoods, and it can be a really cool thing. So so I saw the good and the bad, that the fun and the stressful and um and I think that you know, expecting a little both is probably a good thing to having. Mind. Yeah, I would think that if anybody lived in a rural area and they chose to drive into a suburban area to hunt, there's something wrong with that, right because in this stress and just bs that you have to deal with. But if you live in a metropolitan area, you should not be driving. I mean, you can drive, I remember, the heck you want to hunt, but there are ample hunting opportunities hidden right under your nose that you probably are overlooking. And so if you're a guy who really wants to get out more, I mean, that's how I ended up hunting in the suburbs. I you know, my family lives in northern Virginia. UM, I came back there after college. I was really bummed out because I was not able to hunt. And then I slowly kind of realized that this hunting gold mine that I was sitting on top of in terms of quantity and the length of the season, Like, yes, it is very stressful. There's a lot of stuff that is tough to deal with, you know. Right now is we're recording this, I'm in Ohio, and I'm like really, really really enjoying being able to drive out to a farm and go out to a property and just hunt wherever I want. Um. But you know, that's amazing, And I would take that ten days out of ten if I could. But you know, if you want to go hunt before work and then drive into the office like I do all the time, like that, that's where urban hunting comes in, so there are these amazing opportunities in front of you, and and all it takes is a little bit of hard work to kind of get up to the top of the hill there, and then it's pretty soon sailing from there. Yeah, I was gonna say, like it, you know, there, it does kind of you know, there's part of it that does feel like we've kind of showed a bit of a negative light on it. But I think to like some of the stress that we um we're having was coming you know, We're we're diving into a community, right, we're coming out of like where what we're used to here, and just like going into d C and trying to knock on doors and were immediately caught off guard by just like gates and cameras and this and that. But like, yeah, like you're saying, uh, if if that's your community, then you know it's definitely right there for you, and it probably you probably won't have this the amount of stress that we did because the shock value isn't there for you like it was for us. So I mean, I wouldn't want to discourage anyone from trying this either. Definitely, definitely it was a hell of an experience. I'm really glad I did it, and I do still have like a craw in my I don't know what to saying is, but I've got something that makes me want to go back at some point and get the job done. Um, So I'm not writing off the possibility of me showing up at your door again, Taylor and saying, damn it, I'm gonna get it here. The door is always well. I can't thank you enough, man, Um, you were the consummate host. It was. You were a great teacher. It was so much fun to get to spend some time with you and learn your ways of doing this stuff out there and getting to explore your neck of the woods. And uh, just just thank you again, just over and over, and thank you justin for for dealing with me and dragging along behind me everything and doing all these crazy things we do. It was. It was a lot of fun, guys, my pleasure. Guys. That's sure, well, Taylor, real quick, before we go, where can Pete will learn more about this kind of hunting. You've got a lot of different stuff you're putting out their classes, YouTube videos. Where would you point people towards if they want to learn more? From you about how to do this whole urban hunting thing. Yeah, check out. So I'm on Instagram as Urban Bowman. Feel free to check me out. UM. I have a podcast and YouTube series on hunt Urban and our podcast called Hanging Hunt. And I actually partnered up with the sek one guys, who are the only other guys I know that have been doing this as long as I have. UM, and we went through and created what we call our Masterclass, which is a uh tip to tail full on how to do everything urban hunting from our literal word to word pitch everything online so you can google that and check so on kline and get down the rabbit hole of all things urban. I love it, all right, gents, Well thanks again, and uh let's wrap this up all right, and that's a wrap. Thank you for tuning in. Let me leave you with a couple of plugs number one. If you're looking for any gift ideas, If you're looking for anything for your friends or family here with Christmas coming up, head on over to the Meat Eater store. We've got all sorts of gear that we're selling now merchandise, some of our favorite partner gear, like we now have our tethered Phantom saddle that I love. We can sell that now on the Mediator site. We've got the Timber Ninja climbing sticks that I swear by. Those are available now, a whole bunch of other stuff. Why are didn't T Shirts? Check it out, good gift ideas out there. Also the show that we're filming that we did film earlier this year and that we are releasing this year, So this is different than the DC hunt I just described, But one week in November is the show that I was co hosting that you can watch this year on the Mediator YouTube channel. Check that out for the story of my iole hunt, as well as what Spencer new Heart, Tony Peterson, and Clay Newcome were at up to across the country, So check it out. Best to suck out there in the woods if you were still hunting, and until next time, stay wired to h

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