00:00:02 Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your home for deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host, Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm your host, Mark Kenyan, and this is episode number eighteen. Today we're joined by Donnie Vincent, adventure bow hunter and filmmaker most well known for his two thousand thirteen epic whitetail film The River's Divide, And in this episode, we're going to be chatting about some of Donnie's greatest adventures and discuss how he's chased white tails another big game through some of the most extreme conditions of circumstances that hunting can throw you. This is one of my favorite interviews we had yet, so sit back and enjoy. Hello, and welcome to the Wire to Hunt podcast. Within this afternoon, as always, is my co host Dan Johnson, and joining us as a special guest today, Donnie Vincent. Welcome to the show. Donnie. Hey, guys, thanks for having me. Yeah, absolutely, we're we're thrilled to talk with you, and there's gonna be some some pretty interesting things I know we're going to discuss. I can't wait. But first off, you know, how are you this afternoon. I'm good. I'm good. I'm I'm I'm on pins and needles here. I leave on our next expedition here on August fifteen. So it's it's the point of no return within two weeks. It's running around and trying to shoot my bow every day in a common orderly fashion, and while trying to get gear together and fixed cameras and fixed gear, and so it's it's getting down to the wire. And for some reason, this is all the ways when we have gear failures. Yeah, the never ending to do list gets worse when when gear starts taking a crap, doesn't it. Yeah, yeah, it's it's completely done. So but I'm good, I'm excited, we're you know, this summer went really fast, and I really appreciate you guys having me on it's this. I'm looking forward to it. Yeah, well, thank you. And you know, over the past few years kind of kicking things right off here. You know, you've released, you know, several incredible films documenting your hunts, and I'm sure probably this next expedition you're going on, you're going to be filming some pretty neat neat things too, most notably for lov our listeners. At least last year's release, The River's Divide Um was was a film that a lot of people were talking about, and so we're excited to talk about that film and talk about that hunt you had for an incredible white tail out there in the bad lands, and of course we want to talk strategy and tactics. But before all of that, you know, I would love to understand a little bit about, you know, how you got into hunting and hunting deer and all of that in the first place, and then maybe how that all led up to what you're doing now with these different expeditions and the films and and everything that comes with it. Sure, yeah, absolutely, Um. I have a very what I think is a non traditional hunting back from you know, most most guys their their mom and their dad hunted. Usually the dad hunted and dad would take him out duck hunting or or you know, they have their family deer camp or whatever, something along those lines. And it just wasn't that way for me. My father, Um, he always appreciate the outdoors, and he did go and and he hunted northern Maine with with some of his bodies. And I've heard some of the stories and occasionally actually when um, when times are tough, my parents, for for for my birthday, occasionally my dad would give me a squirrel hunting trip, if you will, for my birthday and he take me out squirrel hunting, and I really I love that. And I remember sitting on logs with him and just drilling him with questions about deer and squirrels in this and then you know, some of the times he had the answers and some of the most of the times he's just would say, man, I don't know, you know, it's a good question. And so you know, that's kind of where I you know, I honestly I think my my hunting heritage is just in my jeans, and I think I actually think it and all of us, um, you know, going back to being hunters and gathers. I think everyone from the President of Peter to the most stock anti hunter animal rights activists today, Uh, nobody would be here unless you come from an ancestor. And that's a strong hunter. That's that's a point in fact. So I think sometimes we all have a difficult Yeah, I think we have a difficult time explaining it, and we want to use conservation as an excuse. If you will and that, and it is a big piece of hunting and we want to use you know, that's how we choose to feed our families as an excuse, and that's a big piece of it. But I think a lot of us struggle to describe kind of where where we got our hunting heritage. But I think it's kind of deep down. But I'm getting a little too deep here. But um, you know, I hung out with my father. I saw that he had guns. He would take me hunting. It was it was something that I was hardwired for. But um, when he was when my dad was younger, his parents, my grandparents, got him a book subscription to Outdoor Lie and he got all these books written by Jack O'Connor and el Murkeith and all these different old old style outdoor writers. And man, I read those books from cover to cover. I can't even play how many times about dolls sheep and grizzly bears and moose, and um, just reading that stuff, I had it bad. I mean, I consider myself a sheep hunter since about the age of five or six. And I was the only one in my family and they even know what what a doll sheep was. But I was just addicted to it. That's awesome. I think I think a lot of us can relate to that type of thing, especially like you mentioned, um, you know that primal, deep down piece of all of us that that connects with being a hunter. And you know, I really do believe like you said, it's it's the most human thing about us. I think it's it's where we came from it and it really is what it means to be, you know, the beings that we are now. So I guess, but like you said, we could get really deep with this and talk about that for probably an hour. But yeah, and I apologize these are how must answers will go because I probably talked too much. Well, I love where we're started already. That's awesome. Um. Now that said, before we get any deeper on any of these topics, whether it be philosophical or strategy, we do like to start every one of our interviews on a little bit of a lighter note and throw a curveball on occasion. So Dan, this is uh, your usual job, So let's talk to down here about whatever crazy question might be on your mind today. All right, Donny, I'm just gonna let you know this is probably gonna be the hardest question you'll ever have to answer with anybody in the industry. Okay, if they ask you, this is gonna be the toughest one. All Right, there's a little bit of a build up, but I'll keep it. Uh, I'll keep it short because I'm a I'm a talker too. But you're you know you've had you've had a hard day at work, all right, you and your buddies. You know you're gonna go out to a bar for a cold one. All of a sudden, the lights go down low, there's a glow from the front of the room. There's a karaoke machine. Okay, you are forced to sing one song? What song are you going to sing? Oh, don't ask Okay, I can tell you what song I'm probably gonna sing, but I'm not gonna sing it well, but it'd probably be Oh, it'd probably be simple man. I would imagine by Leonard. I love that song. That is a great answer. That is a great, great answer. That's that's that's probably again, you're not gonna You're gonna not gonna confuse it with Leonard Skinner or shine Down. But but it will be that Okay, So it's my turn right down. Yeah, um, I think I don't know, Um, you know a song. The first thing that came to my mind here when you said this actually happened. I actually had a similar situation a little bit. It was my first day on a summer internship in college with this big company, and the first day of the job. It was like a social event and it took us out golfing and then back to a bar and they had us to karaoke, and of course I was the intern. I was like nineteen years old, and they said you gotta go up first. So I went up there and I sang courtesy of the Red, White and Blue by Toby Keith, and I kind of I kind of nailed it, So I think that's what I'll stick with it. And there's no video proof, so we'll just go and nailed it exactly. Yeah, if there was proof, I wouldn't be saying that myself. Yeah, I have a I have a go to song every time, and whether there's a karaoke machine there or not, I'm typically singing along with it. Um is David allen Co. You don't have to call me Darlin. Nice David allen Co own that good old country. Well, this is great. If we ever do end up at a bar in some random town, we know exactly what we're gonna be hitting on the karaoke machines. Is great, that's right, right, we know, that's great. Oh, always leave it to you Dan for some good questions there. But now we better get talking about white tails or something other than that, right, yeah, I think so. So. You know, Donny, as I mentioned, you've been hunting and filming across North America in some of the most extreme environments, and you know, there's some incredibly tough circumstances. Just from the films I've seen it. From trailers for those films, I can tell it you've been in some pretty gnarly spots and you've had some pretty incredible experiences. So, with all that being the case, I wanted to focus today on how you hunt under such tough conditions and kind of see if we can piece together some different lessons, learn from your different hunts, from some of your stories, and see what from those experiences we can apply back to our own hunts here for white tails or whatever it might be. And you know, when I started thinking about this topic, I got to thinking about a really great example of this, and that was your first film or the first of myself from you, being The Rivers Divide, in which you were hunting a single buck named Steve, which I always got a kick out of, and you're hunting him in North Dakota. So maybe if we could take a look at this hunt as an example to get kicked off, could you maybe tell us a little bit about you know, this hunt for Steve and that story, and then we'll take it from there. Sure, yeah, absolutely. Um And just and to give you a tiny bit of background, I've been hunting this ranch for ten years. I've killed um, uh, something like seven or eight deer I think on that eight deer off the ranch prior to the year that I started hunting Steve and uh and and a friend of mine was was working out there several years ago and we ended up. You know, we'd see a lot of good deer on this ranch, but basically a really good deer on this ranch was a four or five, five or six year old white tail and they'd usually be somewhere around a hundred hunter forty eight pointers. It was was relatively rare to find a pen pointer. And so that's kind of the deer that we always we always went after and and sometimes they have kickers and stickers and it was really cool. But the place is just insanely beautiful. And then and one day we just saw this three year old and he was a nice ten pointer and so we just made a remark of it that you know, he's just a really nice deer. And we hadn't really named him yet, and we we we didn't do a lot of beer naming, but we just you know, kind of to kind of talk about a particular book. We you know, we would just come up with some sort of a little anecdotal note for him. But um, and then and then when he turned, when he went to four and a half, that's when he got the name Steve. My friend Jeff Morygan gave him the name, named him after a body of his who kind of thought naming deer was stupid, but it was. It was a long, funny story. But we we saw him, and you know, at four and a half, we're like, man, he's he's a pretty good deer. And we're talking western North Dakota and he's probably a hundred and fifty five inches at that point. And funny little story I was in the same little clearing where I had my encounter with Steve when he was four years old, and I was sitting in the same clearing in a little double bowl in a little different area to clear him in the same clearing, and I ended up having Steve come out and walk in front of me in December, and at that point he would have been my biggest boat kill. And I grabbed my bow. I saw him. I knew it was somebody away because he had bladed G two's. I saw him, I knew it was him, and I was like, man, this is gonna be my biggest boat kill of the date. I'm really excited. And he just kind of stood there in front of me in the grass, and um, for whatever reason, I was just like, man, we rarely see dear like this on this ranch, you know, with this much potential. So I said, you know, and I'm just gonna see what he's gonna blossom until I set my boat down, and I thought, you know, hopefully makes it through winter, hopefully doesn't get eaten my mountain lion. And so I let him walk, and uh, and it's not to be a you know, a great a great part of the story is to let him walk when he was four and a half and and uh, fast forward. I didn't end up going to the ranch because I was just busy and I was another place. I didn't end up making it back to the ranch when Steve would have been five, But I talked to the family you know, occasionally throw up the winter and stuff, and they and they had a couple other ball and there's a couple of family members that hunted there and stuff, and and they say, man, there's a deer. There's a deer across the river that guys keeps seeing. And I heard kind of rumors that a few guys had missed him at you know, thirty and last yards, and so he said, you know, he's a pretty good deer. And and so then I heard that, and then I went out to the ranch again when he would have been six. And that was the year that the rivers divide started. And um, I literally I say this in the film. And if nothing in our films has ever contrived or made up or embellished or or you know, drama creative, we just kind of tell it like it is. And when we have a bad day, we have a bad day. If I miss I miss if I have. You know, it's we were just kind of laying out there and and I'll never forget I set trail cameras up over there. I was kind of hoping to get a decent deer, and we were getting again, we were getting a nice five year old on camera over there on a pointer probably go a hundred, but a big mature block, gorgeous. And then all of a sudden, one day in the broad day, like boom, we got the photo and those are the photos that you've seen in the film. And I saw that blade to G two and I was just like, oh my word, Steve. You know, because you just to anticipate drew blue tongue or drought or mountain lions or a hard winter. You just figure that you know this deer that you you know, no quote unquote no, you just figure he's not going to show up. He's dead, or he's moved on whatever you can go or anywhere he wants. It's a huge property, and uh lo and behold there he was. So we were just flawer gases to see him on film. And as soon as we saw him, you know, the strategy started. Uh oh my god. Okay, now we've got you know this, this instant story just fell out right in front of us, and so now we had to grab this and grab this subject matter of the storyline and run with it. And so that's what we did. It turned out to be a heck of a story, that's for sure. I know, Dan, you've seen the film too, and I've I've watched the film twice now just again recently, and it's it is a compelling. It's a story that people can connect with. And it's a story you know, through the ups and downs and some really tough times and some tough conditions. But in the end, it's amazing how it all turned out. And and I love that now, you know, as we as I mentioned the beginning, I really want to focus on the tough conditions or struggles you've had along the way and how you push through them. And so just you know, from my own experience watching the film, it seems like you've dealt with, you know, some tough weather, hunting through snowstorms and things. It looked like you, you know, struggle the issues like having to hunt them two years, having the mishap. You know that that first year or when you got the shot at him. Can you talk to us a little bit about maybe what you think that greatest challenge was that you encountered over the several years you've had hunting that buck, and then maybe you know what you you know what you learned as you pushed through that challenge. Yeah, yeah, And I'm sorry, Like I said, I always digressed because my mind kind of watered and I get all over the place. But yeah, by far, um, by far, the biggest challenge with hunting Steed was the fact that he was a six and a half year old white tail, and the fact that he had really really good instincts, and the fact that he didn't move unless he really felt it necessary for him to move. And so obviously I don't know exactly where Steve spent his days, but basically, as a six and a half old white tail, he laid in a bed most of the day. You know, most of the pictures we'd get would be in the middle of the night as he was passing through to go eat or get a drink of water. Um. And so the biggest challenge was being over there because you have to we have to be there hunting to create opportunity. And so it was being over there, but being over there with the right wind and trying to just get those two opportunities, if you will, those two elements to have an intersection. So we we literally sit on them on the north side of the river. He was on the south side of the river, and we'd sit there and just wait for the wind to be right, and then what was We'd slip over there and hunt and you know, obviously of time he wouldn't show up, and so it was just kind of that struggle of waiting for the right wind and then slipping over there to hunt him. And and I'll be honest with you, in the second year that we hunted him, Um, I used what I would call the the cheater tactic. And it's not something that I It's not that I'm not proud of it. It's not that I'm proud of it. I like backing off the technology. I like acting away from technology a little bit when I'm hunting. Obviously I still shoot a modern com pambo with all the with all the goodies and things like that, but I had in the second year, I ended up starting to use osonics in our ground blind. We built a ground blind specifically for Steve because the trees where we were hunting, and you can see from the first year, Um, the trees are just really small, they're nearly dead. It's really tough to get on them in a tree stand. And so um the high Street you get with Tennant twelve Peacefull. We built this really cool ground blind. It was a buddy of mines and we just kind of built it up and we started using osonics and that made um, you know, that made all the difference in the world. I'd love to tell you that it was my hunting prowess that that that kept us over there, But what kept us over there was, um, you know, we had the mental fortitude, but we had the confidence that are O two molecules are being converted into oh three molecules which are virtually they're not sent pretty, but you know, the deer at least they're didn't sem to react to them. So that that was a little, you know, a little trick that we kept in our bastard. But you know, it was mental perseverance. We enjoyed it. We kept going and having a little trick in our bag. I guess, yeah, it's funny. Me and Mark. Yeah, me and Mark both use osonics. So we know we know what you're talking about there, and I have just so you know, just so your listeners, No, I have no affiliation with those onics. If they call those ons moments and hey, yeah we heard Donny Vinson's interview, they say, lu I you know I perfected mysonics. They I am not on this Christmas list. I promise you know. It's a It's funny that you mentioned all that because I actually just posted an article last week on Wired Hunt about you know, ozonics, and there was a recent test done by a writer for Field and Stream which proved that ozonics seemed to work pretty well, and so I threw my two cents in as well. Not affiliated with ozonics at all, But actually it was Dan who had been using ozonics man maybe four five years ago, who convinced me to finally try it, and I was really skeptical. I finally did try it, and you know again, I I can't speak to the technology. I can't speak to the safety. I can't speak to anything except for the fact that my own personal experiences with it. It's it's proven to me beyond a doubt that I need and want to have one of those units with me whenever I go out deer hunting now, because I've just seen it help me. Not saying it's perfect, but I've seen it helped me so many times that you know, my for me seeing was believing. Um. But it's definitely one of those topics a lot kind of gets people talking and rilese people up because some people you love to hate on technology like that, and that's okay, um, but hey, here's three guys right here that have that have been happy with it, so it's something to think about. Yeah, you know, it's for us and you can call it lazy, call it whatever you want. But we drive, you know, all that way, and again we loved going, but we drive all our way. You know, it's money, we're filming, we're trying to put this film together, it's all these things. So I just tried to but you know, it's a little it was a little curtick in our basket to try to increase our hours spent in the blind. And we loved sitting, um, but when the wind is wrong, the wind is wrong. So we were just trying to increase our hours over there and the opportunity and it happens to it just happens to be that the second time we ended up seeing Steve, the wind was blowing directly from us to him, just absolutely straight in line. So um, and and you know it's he's still walked by, so wow. Yeah, that'll Um, that will help you feel comfortable with that technology when you see something like that happen, that's for sure. So you mentioned a lot of hours, you know, sitting out there hunting and stuff, So let's talk about that. Um. You know it comes to hunting white tails, and sounds like you've had some experience over the in the Dakotas and maybe elsewhere too. How do you handle those long hunts, whether it be days on end or maybe a full day on stand or in a blind. Do you have any tricks or experiences that have maybe given you some kind of advice you could share the readers about how to just to push through and persevere through intense amounts of hunts or length of funds. Yeah, and I'm gonna be a terrible guy to talk to about this, and all I my friends, some of my buddies wrapped me about this a little bit. But almost always when I hunt other than early season, I almost always starting you know, mid October. Whatever. If I'm hunting deer. Um, I sit dark to dark, and uh, it's I'm I'm used to spending ridiculously long hours on stand or in the ground blind. I don't often hunt from a ground blind, but when I do, it's there's just long days. And I just like, Um, I just like being out there. I like taking a stealthy approach as I can to get out there. And I like knowing that when the afternoon This is going to sound so silly, but I like knowing that when the afternoon rolls around, I didn't go out and get launch or whatever and then come back in. You know, when you come back in in the afternoon. This is me personally. When I come back in and climb up into my tree, you know, I'm sitting there going man, did see me? Did something? Here? Me? Did? Did something happened? Whereas when I stay there all day, you know, hey, you know, as the afternoon rolls around, I'm already in there. I'm quiet, I'm set up. But be I cannot tell you, And I'm sure if you talk to any serious deer hunters like Leewakowski or Adam Hayes or any of these guys, I cannot tell you the amount of deer that I've seen, including big, huge trophy box in the middle of the day. I personally had an arrow two or three different big box um around the noon hour, noon, one o'clock, something like that. And I used to hunt a place in Illinois that had fantastically huge deer. And you know, this is an odd an outfit in operation. I was one of the only the few guys that sat all day and every time when I come in for dinner at night, you know, all the guys that you just see anything in the middle the day because they kind of wanted some validation of that, they came in and watched football. And it was really funny because I I hunted this place for like three years before I realized that they actually served lunch at the lodge in the middle of the day. But I would come in and they said, you see anything, you know, and I would. But I really enjoy hunting. I really enjoy sitting there. And I don't know if it's that I convinced myself and I only have a short time laught, but basically, whenever I go to a place where there's three days, five days, fourteen days, I just say, hey, I'm only here for fourteen days, I'm here for ten days. I have to make the most of this. So I'm here to put all of my eggs and just you know, I'm here to push it to the limit and try to be as successful as I possibly can. And that's that's it just drives me. I love it. I love what you're saying. Down I think we're cut from the same cloth. I am. All my friends think I'm nuts too. A lot of my buddies here that I hunt, you know, locally here in Michigan. Stuff. I'll think I'm crazy as I'll get out for hunting fourteen hours straight. But like you said, when for me, I feel like I'll feel I'll be upset at myself if I feel I haven't done every single possible thing I can possibly do to make sure this hunt is a success. And if I'm not out in the woods for several hours in the middle of the day or spooka deer walking in the afternoon or whatever it is, you know, I put that on myself. So now for me, though, I usually don't start doing that until the end of October. You know, I'll usually end of October through November. That's the type of thing I do. But it's interesting to hear that you start that a little bit earlier. But yes, it's yeah, I do if I get the opportunity to hunt. Now, with the nature of how I hunt and the things that I enjoyed, a hunt usually August, September, and most of October, I'm in the mountains, so it's it's rare that I'm actually even hunting white ties early in the year. I'm usually in the mountains. But but when I do get the TuS, you get out there, Um, I like to sit there. I like to just kind of be out there and see what shakes out. Awesome. What do you think? What do you think about all this? Dann? Are you and all day hunter? Um? Typically my tree stands are set up for UH specifics like coming to a food source or going to a betting area in the morning. I typically only hunt mornings or evenings unless it's a rhet in a big old pinch point, then I'll be sitting all day. But for me, um, and just the way my property is is laid out, UM, I'm not. I'm not hunting all day because my stands are are basically set specific fair enough, so that's just a complicated way of saying that you're kind of kind of weak when it comes to sitting all days that week. I am sorry, I am a weaker man. Yeah. I actually hunted with a guy in um Kansas and he had huge, huge, huge deer on his wall and at several kind of a just a guy that kept to himself, but several one seventies eighties, a few one nineties, and he would like he would sit nine minutes to a hundred and twenty minutes at a time, and I was, I could not believe that when he told me that, and basically his whole plotsop he was. He'd go in there and he always set up his stands to where he like his stands didn't even have seats. He would go in there and he'd stand on this platform absolutely perfectly still, not even look around, just sit there still as a statue. He's like, I can only do that for about two hours before I need to start moving, and he goes and if I need to start moving, then I get down and get onto there because I just want to sit there absolutely perfectly still. And obviously he does his homework beforehand. But that guy killed several and I mean several huge, huge box and that was his tactic. Wow. I love that. One of the things that me and Dan always talked after these different interviews is that we hear from so many different people that are all having success killing you know, big deer, mature deer, and they're all doing it in almost completely different ways. And it's it's so neat to see that there's a lot of different ways of skin of cat um or kill a deer in this case, and it's all about you know, the right tactic for you and your style and what you know makes it still enjoyable for you. Um. But it's it's just fascinating to hear about the many different ways you can do this. Now absolutely, Now, Dan, did you have kind of on the same topic when it comes to extremes or anything that any anything on this topic you want to run by by? Donnie? Yeah, just a couple of things, um, one, and will use Steve as an example. Uh, you've hunted him a long time. And this is kind of a two part question going back to when you mentioned it. But first first question is how hard was it for you to pass Steve When you had your bow in your hand, you were getting ready to shoot him and then are just like, well, I want to see what he uh, what he grows into? Was that Was that a hard decision to make? Or was it fairly simple? Um? It was it was a little bit of both. And I'll say this in sometimes when I say this to people, they look at me and they say, man, I've been waiting a long time for somebody to say it back to me because that's how I feel. And sometimes when I say this to people, they look at me like I am blue. So it for me, killing an animal is a really big decision for me. When I actually come to full draw and I'm going for my trigger and I'm the guy that I actually consciously think I'm about to send an arrow through this deer's vitals. In ten seconds, this deer's life is going to be over with, and it's going to be because of me. It's just that I just feel like it's a very big decision. And if I'm going to have any regrets or I'm gonna have any if there's any question that any element of it, you know, I just won't do it. It's just not for me. I just won't do it just to say hey, look at me on in a photo. Look at me, I'm successful. Hey, you know, look at me. I killed something. I punched my ticket. I'm not one of those guys that I'll tell you all day long. I eat tags all the time. I have a been in my basement full of unused tags. Until when he was there in front of me. Um. It was a beautiful, beautiful, snowy winter day. It was a little over thirty below zero, and I've been sitting for like six hours something like that. And so he walked out, you know, everything warmed up. I grabbed my bowl, you know, plicked my release on. It was go time. Like I was about to shoot the biggest deer in my life. And like I said, he's probably a hundred fifty inches and and I just kind of sat saw him standing there in the big snowflakes, and I was like, you know what, there's a chance. There's a chance that he's gonna that he's gonna make it. And I actually, rather than picturing myself dead behind Steve, I pictured telling my body who also knew Steve, I've pictured telling him, Hey, man, I saw Steve and I let him go. So it's gonna be really fun for us to see if it looks like a five years old and a kind of that seem the more alluring to me than than killing him. Does that make any sense at all? Makes a lot of sense, a lot of sense. And I think the good thing about it is I don't know if it's necessarily a conservation decision, but I believe there's two different types of hunters out there. You know, you've got your weekend warriors, you're running gunners, the people who go out basically just for a kill. And then and I consider myself the second one, which is more of a spiritual kind of a connect connect with nature, doesn't have to kill to have a successful season type of hunter. And um, when you you know, when you just told me that, because I don't think it shows it on the video of you passing him. I know you may mention it, but UM, showing that is kind of just I don't know what words to use, but I'll just say, awesome. I wish I would, you know, I just wish more hunters would kind of have that um that mew on hunting. Yeah, and I agree, I think the animals facts were hunting. Uh, you know, we owe it to them. I don't don't get me wrong. I you know, went out and shot my limited mallards. I've I've went to properties on you know do intensive um weekends or no intensive properties and shot four or five does in three or four days. And it's awesome and I'm excited about the meat is fantastic. But it's just when I'm there, Um, you know, maybe I have a weird vision, but I'm they're looking for a certain animal that's gonna fill you know, this experience for me, and that's what Um, you know that it's it's I just think it's a really big decision. Yeah. And now now my second question real quick is I'm a I'm a huge believer that failure creates a learning opportunity, especially for me and Mark have talked about this all the time. You know, we fail a lot and then have to use that failure to um make the next move towards you know, being a better hunter. Where that can you give a specific time or when you were hunting Steve or maybe another white tail that you had a failure, but we're able to learn from it. Oh my god, so so many. I mean my entire repertoire, my every call, I use, every tree stand, I use the clothing, I use, the bow, I use the arrow, I use. Every single thing that I use, every step I take when I hunt is because of a previous failure, every single one. I mean, that's the evolution of my gear alone of um has has effect. It has been affected by an absolute you know, just a plethora of failures. If I was gonna point um, you want to know one lesson learned, one big lesson learned from myself, Yeah, is um. You know I shot a mule dere. This is Oh, there's only a couple of guys that really know this story. But I arrowed a mule dere several years ago in Alberta. And the gentleman that was guiding me on that hunt, because you have to be guided in Canada, the gentleman that was guiding me on that hunt is a mule their expert, if you will. And I know I know quite a bit about mule there myself. But I basically I aroed a mule there that I believe would have absolutely shattered the world record, the current typical world record. And I shot him in. Um. I snuck up to about thirty five yards and I got him. Um. I went in a little bit too fast, and he stood up a little bit before I was ready. I came the full drawing. It was. It was probably about a fifty win that day, and I shot and my arrow hit him back and through the guts. And it's a very long story, but I ended up watching that deer tip over twice and I thought he was done and uh, and then I ended up watching him bed down because I was way up on this cool and I watched him bed down, and through a series of conversations I got talked into from the alphame that I was with, I got talked into going down there and trying to get another arrow in him. You know, A long story short, that deer got a big and and fuse of you know, a big shot of adrenaline from from us going into that thicket and took off and we never saw him again. And and that thing has haunted me since the day had happened. I learned so much on that hunt of you know, going in too fast and I you know, I made too much noise and he got to stand up. If I would have just taken my time and flipped in there, um, you know, I could have got in on him and he could have stood up naturally or whatever. But yeah, I mean I've learned. I can't even tell you how many mistakes I've learned. That one of the reasons why I started hunting all day. I was hunting in Illinois one time and I got a really upset stomach. I went back to the lodge, and I want when I started feeling better, I was like, hey, I feel better, I'm going to head out to my tree stand. I went back out to my tree stand and there's a there's a ten or twelve point box that I would put at, you know, somewhere around the one eight mark was curled up like a dog sleeping not yards from my tree stand, and uh and I think of things like that, you know, and I'm like, oh man, I'm never leaving a tree stand ever again. Literally, never ever again, my leaving tree stand, you know. And then and then you know, my arrow hit Steven the shoulder. This you know that in the first part of the film. And so I started looking at arrow densities and arrow weights, and I started looking at momentum and penetration not just energy, and you know, all of these things. Everything has that, everything's been a learning and everything that I use is from from a failure. And I agree with you. Success Um, I believe breeds laziness because you think you've nailed it. You think you've nailed it, and and and really it's when you start missing the bulls eye that you have to start problem solving. And that is where you know, that's the mother of invention in the that's where you start to really find your true genius. I think one of the one of the things you just mentioned there, Donny, Um the time where when you hit Steve in the shoulder and you never recovered him. Um, can you talk to us a little bit about how you deal with the situation like that, whether it be even the mule there you shot gut shot at didn't find it. How do you handle a miss or wounded deer like that, just mentally? And then how do you get yourself up and ready for the next hunt? Because I think that's something that almost every single probably of deer hunters and any kind of hunter will eventually experience that no matter how much they practiced him might matter how much they try to do things right, things happen. So how do you deal with that? Well, first of all, when you're like wounding a deer, through a major cavity, or or even if you hit one in the leg and it's and you're finding a lot of blood or whatever, Number one hands down, I will. I refuse to do it any other way. Is I give them at least twenty four hours. I hear guys say, if I hit him in the liver, I'm gonna give him six hours. If I hit him you know here, I'm gonna give him eight hours. If I hit him in the gust, I'm gonna give him twelve hours. For me, it's twenty four hours period, end of story. Uh. And I learned that from that mule there, and I am a whole believer that if we would have given that deer twenty four hours, he'd be dead in that thicket. Um, but I got I got talked into going down there. You know. The oftener said, oh man, tonight, coyotes are coming in. They're gonna scare him into the river. He's gonna dine in the river, he's gonna sink, he's gonna float away. You're never gonna see him again. And I was popped into it. And it's because he wanted kind of that instant crowd vacation of getting him right now. And so wounding a deer the biggest advice. Get rid of the eight hours of ten hour, the twelve hour rule. If you wound a deer, give him twenty four hours. You will never ever regret it. Yes, coyotes might eat him or something like that, but just give him twenty four hours. If you can slip in close to him, if you see him go down, you can slip in there and get another air on and kill him quickly. Obviously that that trump's all. But um, you know, give the animals twenty four hours. That's that's absolutely number one. And as far as wounding one, wounding one that you know lived. Um, with Steve, I was pretty sure you lived. I found out positively in that November is when I found out, because they got they got pictures of him again. He started showing up again, walking on some of his old trails and he only looks fine. So um, but right, you know, right after when it happened to Steve, that was my biggest white tile at the time, and I was just really disgusting. I hated thinking about him being wounded. I hated thinking about him laying there in his bed in pain. And and and then I hated. You know, you don't get that many opportunities, especially as an archer. You don't get that many opportunities in a lifetime. And and uh and so to blow it, it's just just made my heart sink, you know. And then with the mule deer, I'll be honest with you. I shot that mule there. It's like September eight or ninth, something like that, and I didn't touch my bow again until that December. I didn't even pick my bow up again. I just stopped humming that fall. And I was just if you ask my wife, she'll tell you it was. It was really bad. Man. I still think about that mule there every single day. Every single day. It pops in my head. And so it's that's a tough thing to get over. You kind of have to get past it. You have to get over. If you do this long enough, a deer will even if you are you know, Levi Morrigan, a deer will move before your arrow gets there. I'll guarantee you Levi has lost a deer um. And and you know it's sometimes things happen. Your arrows hit twigs and and you know there's wind and this and that, So you know, it's everybody deals with it separately. Wounding deer. But you know, that's a tough one to get over. But if you wound one and you believe it's a mortal wound. To me, twenty four hours, twenty four hours, twenty four hours, twenty four hours. Some people say, oh my god, it's gonna rain or it's gonna snow. I don't care. Twenty four hours, you can do a good search. Wait, twenty four hours. Yeah, that's a tough one. That's that's something I always struggle with too. Like you mentioned in the situation, like if it's raining or snowing, you know, do you risk losing the blood trailer? Do you want to risk bumping the deer? And I think I've kind of settled on what you just said there too. I would rather make sure he's close to the last known location I weren't nowhere is at and done for sure, so that you can do a grid search or something. But I don't know where do you stand on that one? Dan, perfect example last year would have been my biggest buck to date. Well, I shot him quartering away pretty hard, quartering away. I felt the arrow was deep into his cavity. Um I hit him right behind the or a little bit behind the back leg, but at the angle it would have went into the chess cavity. It was right almost right at the last rib going into the chess cavity. Um. I saw him walk off very slow at with about just the fletchings and the tip hanging out of his uh, hanging out of the body, and um walked very slow away. I I went in probably two hours later, and I a grid searched over a two day period and didn't find him. So yeah, I that that right there is a definitely learning experience, And I agree with Donnie. Everybody just said it's a tough lesson to learn, but it sticks with you, I imagine, yeah, oh yeah, now something you said there, Donnie always back, but it stuck with me as you mentioned that, I think it was the day that you passed Steve the first time you said it was negative thirty degrees I think, or somewhere around there. Um. So I'm curious when it comes to handling weather conditions like that, whether be on a white tail hunt in North Dakota where it's freezing cold, or you're in the mountains chasing sheep. You know, how do you both mentally handle that kind of physical strain, and then you know what are you doing from a gear or physical perspective to be able to actually handle those kinds of conditions. Sure, um mentally is a big one, right if you UM, I've never experienced this myself because whenever I'm in sheep camp, I'm there by myself or whatever, and I think that you know it's it's um. You have to be mentally strong. Obviously, you have to prepare prior to the hunt, get yourself as physically fit as you can. But people talk about sheep shape. I don't know if white tail hunters unless they're paying attention amount hunting people say this term sheep shape. Why a percent believe that sheep shape lives between your ears? And you just have to have this perseverance. You don't have to climb the next mountain right now, you don't have to hike twelve miles right now. You just have to be willing to take one more step. And I think you need to have that mental fortitude of it's just one more step. I just have to take one more step and it's going to bring me closer to my goal. And no matter how hard you have to go. You just keep going a little bit of a time. You have to go at your pace. You have to do your thing. But if you keep taking one more step, you will achieve that goal. You will be in the hunt. And if the conditions are really difficult, like the day I passed, the was over thirty below and um, you know I got caught on a sheep hunt. You guys will see this two films from now when we hunt sheep and toke. I didn't even bring a jack on that hunt because it was in August sheep hunt and I had my system. I had a system that warranted me not bringing a jacket. So I did bring a jacket and we got cotton blizzards. Essentially the entire hunt we're in blizzards. And the gear. Gear is everything. So you okay, so you have to be physically fit, you have to have your mind right. But beyond that, if you have the wrong gear, um, not only are you gonna be miserable, but you're gonna be risking your life. And I've heard this numerous times. Guys, clients, they write these huge checks to go on cheap on sheep onus are not cheap and in three or four days into it, sometimes even one or two days into it, the clients give in and they say, you know what, I'm here, I climbed the mountain. I'm proud of myself. I'm ready to go home. And the guides and the outfitters trying to talk them out of it because they know once they're home and in they're warm, cozy bed, they're gonna regret it. But um, guys do throw in the towel, and it's because they're mentally not prepared or they brought the wrong gear. So your system is everything, and and um, I've worn it all. I've worn everything out there right now, and right now I'm wearing coo you gear. I worse Sitka for a very long time. Sicken makes very good system. Um who makes a system that's quite a bit better than Sitcas in my opinion, and and and kind of by fact, if if you ask me and and and I also who you I think makes one of the better white tail deer hunting systems out there, even though he focuses on mount hunting. I think his gear is very very good for white tail deer hunting. But it's you know, it's not bringing anything cotton it's bringing wool socks and wool underwear, and wool t shirts and wool undergarments, wool middle garments, bringing a down series so that you can insulate, and then bringing a nice outer series, and then and then rain gear. And it's these systems that allow you to adapt from you know, you kind of have to. You know, the marino next to your skin is pulling all your moisture way, and it's getting all that stuff away from your skin so your body can still thermal regulate. The down is basically like you know, it's almost like you're hiking sleeping that you eat that in your bag. You use it almost like a mobile sleeping bag when you're sitting glassing or you get caught a storm. And then your rain gear. It's basically like your mobile tent. You know, you have your tent back down on the mountain or in the ravine when you're climbing or whatever. You get kind a storm, you put your rain gear on. And I've been caught. I got caught. I just wrote about it, but I got caught several years ago in the Chugats Mountains. Body of mine and I we killed the big doll sheep and we wanted to do it in kind of two trips and just enjoy the days of hiking. So one day we hiked all the meat, the cape and the horns out and the day that we hiked it all out of the seventies some degrees and Sonny was beautiful. We both were really light tanks, really light fleeces. But the next day we had to go in and a storm was bruined and some other sheep hunters even stopped us at the trail and they said, hey, where are your head and we told them and they said, man, it's a blizzard going on right there, right now. And we looked we could see the path that we needed to head to, and we saw it looked a little stormy. We're like, it didn't look bad. Well. We both almost lost our lives that day because we're wearing the wrong gear. If we had the right gear in our packs, if we had the right gear on us, it would have been just a cold, miserable day. But you know, that's where the mental fortitude comes in. The mental fortitude comes in when you're safe and you're somewhat comfortable, and you can keep pushing the stupidity and the arians that we went through that day. You know, we almost lost our lives because we thought, you know, we were tough enough that we didn't need that extra gear. We would just muscle through it and get to the tent. And I was really bad, yike, you know What's I to a much lesser degree, but I've definitely dealt with these types of gear decisions on different backpacking trips in the mountains and things like that, And it's such a tough It's a fine line you have to walk right between making sure you have the right gear but also maybe not weighing yourself down in different ways. It's always that choice, um, And then lots of times you don't ever learn that less until you learned the hard way. So but I think you're absolutely right, Absolutely you're you're right. But you can you can bring the right system. Um. You know, I could talk about this until I'm blow in the face. You can bring the right system and have a very very light backpack. This last November, I spent a month on Kodiak Island bull hunting brown bears and Sitka blacktailed deer, and I basically packed as though I was going on in August sheep hunt, and I was completely fine, and we were in anybody who knows anything about Kodiak Island, it is even when it's nice out, the humidity is really high, soool, it's just zapping the energy from your body. And I'm telling you, the gear that I had this very light, very easy to carry, but I was toasty, warm and safe and all elements from blizzard to you know, full on you know, winter storm and it was pretty crazy. Wow. You know, it's great that the gear now has advanced how much over the last five to ten years, to the point where now people are talking about this having a good layering system, you know, as you mentioned, and for me this a gagearling layering system has been awesome and it sounds like cool you has a great system, and others are coming out too. So it's nice to see that the hunting industry is is picking this up and you know, applying the technologies that used to be just in the mountain world now to the hunting world. So it's it's good to see that. But absolutely related to what you just mentioned, you know, Kodiak Island hunting spots like that are Alaska, different areas in Alaska. For an audience here, that's listening today that's mostly white tail hunters. I imagine you would recommend or I guess my question is, would you recommend to these white tail hunters to ever try to go out west or up north on one of these mountain hunts? And if so, you know, what's your pitch? What's your pitch to a white tail hunter? Or try something new out in a different, bigger woolrior wilderness. Um, it's, first of all, it's a must, I mean a must. It's not even should you or shouldn't you? And I and I have a dear friend of mine that I hunt deer with and he has only ever hunted white tail deer. He has zero interest in hunt anything else. I try to talk him into it all the time and he has never budged. But in my opinion, it's an absolute moss that you need to at least branch out and go hunt cariboo or and not mule there. I'm not talking about going on a mule there on. That's that's I mean, it's definitely different, but it's still too similar in my eyes. Um, you know, maybe a high country amount mule there hunt something like that, but going out and doing a caribou hunt or an Elk on something like that, I think is it's just really going to broaden your horizons. You know, there's there's all these scoring organizations, and there's and category organizations like the Super Slam, and they have you know, the Super Slam, and they have the Grand Slam of sheet, they have the Super excuse me, the Super Ten. All these organizations and all some guys think and maybe sometimes some hunters approach it as a checklist and they just go around and and other hunters see this and they say, I don't want to be a checklist hunter. But the way I look at these groups, the Super Slam, the Grand Slam, the Super Ten, because these organizations kind of force you into going on different hunts, learning about different animals, seeing different habitats, and going through completely different experiences. You know, for a white tail hunter to go hunt moose or to go hunt black bears or um, you know, Rocky Mountain Elk, something like that, it's completely out of their comfort zone. It's a whole new set of skills. You're seeing a whole new group of animals, and you can't you can't sit in your chair at home and say I never I never really want to hunt an elk. You know, I never really want to do I never really want to hunt a caribou. You have to go there and see these animals and experience the hunt, experience the mountains, experienced the mornings and the evenings and the calls, and you have to experience it all. Then once you're an area, maybe it's still not your cup of tea, but I would venture, I would venture a guest that you'd get pretty addicted. Yeah, yeah, I just experienced a little this to myself last year when I went on my first Eltcome and uh, to your point, it's something that you really don't know until you try it. And I'm so glad I did because or maybe I'm not glad, but because I know I'm gonna be running out there every September now to the mountains and spending money to go on these trips. But it's it's incredible, amazing experience. And I know, Dan, you're you're gonna try some different type of hunting this fall too, for Meal. They're so I'm excited excited for you on that front too. Oh yeah, I'm I just put my vacation days in today at work and although it's uh, although it's gonna be flat land. The area that I'm hunting has no trees in it. It's in the sand hills, so it's gonna be spotting stock. And I'm expecting to fail. But um, you know, the next year or the next time I go out there, I'll be uh more educated on on what I need to do to be to be better, for sure, So I'm sure you'll be successful. You'll be successful. Just go slow, man, Just go slow. Bed those guys down and go slow and quiet, Just slow and quiet, and you'll you'd be amazing. Get into eight nineteen yards on those guys, don't don't worry about it. Just go slow and be quiet. That's uh. That seems to be the consistent theme for for what I'm hearing from the other people that I've asked as well. So I'm pumped, man, and I can't wait. I'm excited for you to It's important. I really think. Um, like you said you want alcoming last year night, you want to go every year. I just if you're a hunter, I think you owe it to yourself. You don't owe it to anyone else. You don't own it to open young or blood and crocket or a grand slam or anyone else. You don't owe it to anyone. But I think it'd be a travesty if you went through your entire career of hunting and not not experiencing the mountains or not experiencing the other wildlife. I just I think there'd be a travesty. So, so, Donnie, for someone who's listening right now, and you have given them the kick in the butt, they need to head out west, or head to the mountains, or head to Alaska wherever it might be, and chase something different. For that white tail hunter, what is your if you could give them one single piece of advice to leave them with here today to go on the new adventure, what would it be? Oh? Man? Um, well, everything is possible, right, you can you can do UM. You know, you have to be honest with yourself and what you're capable of doing. And you have to be honest with yourself what your budget is. Of course, UM, we're all limited by budget. We're all limited by what we could do. UM. And so you know, obviously you can put your mind to it, you can do anything. But if you you know, really find out where your interests lie and find out what you want to do. Do you want to go on a guided hunt? You want to do something self guided if you're looking for, like if I was going to coach somebody into going on their first big adventure, they want to do something on their own. There are a few books that you can read, um, you know, entitled things like hunt Alaska on your own. Uh, you know, Haunt Alaska now on your own. There's there's a few books out there that kind of lay everything out. And and now that's how I started hunting because I couldn't afford guided hunts at all when I first started going to Alaska, which was my freshman year of college, and so I started going on a self kind of caribou hunts. So I did as much research as I could. I got the best backpacking equipment that I could afford at the time, and I just slowly started building up, building up all my gear and and then bettering my gear. But I would literally fly up to the Arctic Circle in Alaska. I have a pilot, fly me out there and drop me off all by myself, and I get after it. But you know, I just did my research. I prepared myself with the best gear I could, and I kind of went out and now if you have a few extra dollars in the bank and you can do this guided, I think that's even better. Um. But yeah, I think a first step for a lot of guys would be, you know, a western black bear hunt, on elk hunt, on a caribou hunt up nor something like that would be you know, the first kind of baby steps. But you can definitely can do this stuff. You definitely can do it. You can do it on your own. It sounds really scary maybe at first, but um, there's a lot of information out there and if you and if you're smart about it, something that's definitely attainable. Great great words of advice, I think, um a lot of it. Like you said, it's just you know, finally believing that you can do it, making that decision and then putting in all of the work and preparation to make sure that you take advantage of that opportunity as best as possible. And that's all you can do. So I love it. Now. Now, Dan, we're getting close here on time here, but do you have any final question for Donning before we wrap things up. I mean, it sounds to me like you've hunted a lot of animals you've had a ton of experiences, um, more than the typical, you know, more than myself, who I've only hunted turkey and white tails. That's all I've hunted in my entire life. And I'm now starting to branch out into other you know, other hunts and whatnot. But and we know that not all game is the same. You have to take different strategies to hunt different animals in different locations. But is there a common strategy thread or some kind of tactic that can can go to hunting all wild game? Yoh, yes, absolutely, um. And and it's it's and I'll say this, it's it's first of all, it's going to where you know the animals are right. So many people, Um, I used to I used to goose hunt with a guy that never set up his decoys and fields where geese would land, and he never killed geese in occasionally was good hung with that just to here's a nice guy and he's super nice. Whenever I want to kill geese, the first thing I did is leave that guy behind. And it's kind of the same thing. If you want to kill a big meal there, you have to go to where they live and you have to find the animals. You have to find the habit to have find the animals. But number one, um, you know, kind of how we go about everything is to stay back, find the very best habitat stay back, you let your binoculars in your spotting scope tell you a story. Don't burn your calorie spreading your scent all over the place and burning your calories up. The same thing with white tiling, right, we use trail cameras. You know, you don't go out to your white soul property tonight and walk every square inch it and be like, yeah, I didn't even see a deer. I didn't even I saw a much of deer time, but I didn't even see a deer. Yeah, buddy, because they're all long gone. So it's the same thing. It's using your glass from afar. Let the animals tell you the story. Wastch them even for like one of my very favorite things to do, if I'm on a sheep hunt or a bear hunt or something like that, I love to get there two or three days before the season, find the animal that I really want to focus on, and hunt because that usually seems what happened. What happens to me is I've picked an animal and that's when I go after and try to pattern of same thing with white cells. Like you know, the trail cameras become arcanoculars if you want. There are a few places like the Milk River and a few other places where you can sit back and glass to bean field and start watching trails and things like that. But stay out of there. Hunt small, aren't be quiet and um, and I think you know you'll start to find a lot of success. It's um. It's when I first started doing spot in stock with mule deer. I tried to make the stock as fast as possible because I was so worried that they were gonna leave, that they were going to move. And when I started slowing down, I couldn't believe even where areas where there was very little cover, I could not believe how close I could get to these deer by just moving when they weren't looking, and just taking my time. And I I arrowed a stone sheep several years ago in BC, and it took me about eleven hours to get in the position on the stone sheep, and I basically belly crawled, either on my belly or slightly on my back, crawled in the position and I ended up arrowing this stone sheep at forty nine yards down in the alders at the bottom of the mountain, and it took me forever to get there, but I knew if I just took my time, I could get into those alders with him, pick my spot and kill and and that's what happened. And and I just think, if you stay back, use your glasses, and then when you go in, you going smart, slow and quiet um, you can really you can really become a really good predator if you if you follow those steps. I think I'll tell you what I think that there's a lot of listeners right now who have got a sore hand because of how many notes they're taking from this conversation. Donnie, You've given some incredible advice, some awesome stories, and I can honestly say that of all of our podcast interviews we've done, this is probably my favorite, and we're very close to it. This is this has been great. So thanks, I appreciate it. Yeah, thank you. And you know, for everyone out there listening, you know, first off, you know, what should they be looking forward to seeing from you in the coming months or year maybe, And then where can they see this stuff? And what should where this should go to get more information? Yeah, absolutely, you can. You can see you can purchase The River's Divine right now on Donnie Vincent dot com. Um, we have a film right now that's out in TV and cruising through the theaters called Terra Nova Three Days on the Islands Hunt where we hunt for woodland caribou. It's really fantastic film. Um. We're just wrapping up a film right now on an Arctic grizzly bear hunt that we did, um two years ago. And uh and then after that we have Adult Sheep one coming out entitled Tope, and so those will be coming out, will be on TV, they'll be touring in theaters, and they'll and they'll eventually turn into DVDs that will be for sale on dying this and dot com. But we're on Facebook and all the normal places. I don't I don't live a virtual life that much, but the guys that I work with do that stuff. So um. But yeah, well we're just gonna keep filming, We're gonna keep telling stories, We're gonna keep pushing the envelope and and uh, yeah, there's there's a lot of really cool work coming down for our listeners. For our listeners out there, what are what TV station? Per se are are your show is going to be on right now? They air on a Sportsman's channel. A lot of guys look on there and they look for upside of the TV show where not a TV show. They just play our films as feature presentations, usually on you know, a Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday night, something like that at seven pm, and they'll they'll just air them as one off shows. So you're not gonna be able to find a quote unquote TV show on there. But as we finished films, we give them the Sportsman's channel and those guys air them and and then like I said, they also tour in theaters and there's also some other stuff that are that's coming up. But yeah, that's apologizes to thank you for that. But yes, it's on the Sportsman's channel right now. Okay, perfect. Well, I hope you keep doing this for a long time, Donne, because you're doing some great work and you're telling some damn good stories and I enjoy them, and I know many many other people are, so thank you again for joining us. This has been absolutely terrific, no worries, and I really appreciate you guys have and I know you have a lot of really cool people who take from and I'm I'm humbled that you could kind of to talk to me, so I appreciate it. Thank you. You are very welcome. Hopefully we can chat with you against soon. Dannie, all right, you guys have a great day. Thank you. All Right, Well, that is going to wrap things up for us here on the Weird Hunt podcast. And I hope you enjoyed that conversation with Donnie as much as I did. I thought he just had some really great thoughts and advice to share and I probably could have kept talking for two or three hours, but of course you couldn't do that. But like I mentioned, I would love to have him on the show again, and hopefully you guys with too. That said, as always, if you did enjoy the show, we would really appreciate if you could leave a rating or review on iTunes. It takes a quick second, but it really helps us out, so thank you in advance for doing that if you can. Speaking of thanks, we also like to thank our excellent partners who helped make this show possible. So big thanks to Sick Gear, Trophy, Ridge Bear, Archery, Redneck Blinds, Carbon Express Arrows, Lacrosse Boots, Big and J. Longridge Attractants, and the White Tail Institute of North America. Also be sure to visit wird hunt dot com slash episode eighteen to view the show notes from today's episode, and that's what will include links such as links to Donnie's films, his website, Facebook page, and things along those lines. Finally, thank you to you, Thank you weird Hunt Nation for everything you do and for taking the time to join us. Until next time, have a great week, and as always, stay weired Hunt.