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Wired To Hunt

The Wired To Hunt Podcast – Episode #63: How To Predict Deer Movement w/Mark Drury

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1h22m

Today on the show we’re exploring the mysterious world of predicting deer movement and joining us is Mark Drury of Drury Outdoors. This is one of our best episodes yet, so settle in and enjoy! To listen to the podcast,...

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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 Kenyon, and this is episode number sixty three Tay the show. We're exploring the mysterious world of predicting dear movement and joining us is Mark Dury of Dury Outdoors. Enjoy it. Now, before we kick things off, I have to give you a brief warning. After we record this interview with Mark, My co host Dan said, we have to give the listeners fair warning because their minds are about to be blown after listening to this. There really is just so much information you're about to hear. You really need a paper and pen to take notes. So take a second and go grab some stuff. Get ready, and here we go. All right, Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you by Sick of Gear, and today we've got an interview that I just can't wait to get to because our guest, Mark Jury is a man with some serious white tail insight. And if you're not familiar, and I'd be shocked if you're not. Mark Jury is the co host of a number of different hunting TV shows and DVDs produced by Dury Outdoors, and really of all the shows and DVDs out there in the hunting industry, that Duries are some of my very favorites. And a big part of this is because I really enjoyed the tidbits of insight that Mark and his brother Terry offer before heading out on each of their hunts regarding, you know, why they think a certain time or a certain area might be good for hunt. It's always really interesting, and I think it's this prediction of deer movement that I want to talk to Mark about today. So it's gonna be super interesting. I'm excited about it. But before we get to all that, my co host Dan and I need to hash a few things out. So Dan, I understand that you want to take me up on a bet. Oh, yes I do. I am. I'm game for it, but first you need to tell everybody what the bet is. Yeah. So, I don't even know how this camera came to be, but I was just thinking about trail camera pictures and how I'm excited to see my pictures from Ohio and put some cameras up in Iowa and all that, and I got to think, you know, there's a pretty good chance that I could have a good buck on camera, and I'm thinking I might be able to upstage my buddy in Iowa for once and maybe get a bigger buck on trail camera. So my bet to you that I sent via Twitter the other night was that I think that I will get a larger and we're I think we'll go by just gross score gross Booden Crockett score a higher scoring buck on trail camera this summer, then you will. I'm betting you that I will. Okay, and I accept that bet. Now are we talking this summer meaning August thirty one is when the summer officially ends, or if the picture is still in velvet? Or how are we what's the cut off date? That's a good question. Let's uh, let's say velvet velvet. Okay, the largest velvet buck and uh And I'm making I'm making this bet knowing full well I'm probably going to lose, but you gotta you gotta stud last year who has potential on your on your cameras. So although I probably will beat you, you have a good chance. I'm really making this bet out of like pure well not even that just like ridiculous optimism. And I'm hoping that by virtue of this bet, somehow we'll miraculously come to be. But it's it's definitely not gonna happen Michigan. I'll tell you what, Well, I hope it's. I hope it. I hope it happens for you. I really hope you win. Yeah, me too. Can I tell you about a little more news on trail camera front? Really fast? Yeah, one got hit by another tractor. No, okay, not much better than that. I had another friend go check my other camera I have on this one property and it was taking pictures. But all it took pictures of for eight weeks was doze and year and a half old bucks. Not a single good buck in Michigan. And that's in Michigan on the property that is a pretty good Michigan property. So you're only hope, as far as this bet is concerned, is your Ohio property. Yeah, or when I stopped in Iowa on the way home in early August, I'm going to put a camera up there, Okay, And uh so that that's total wild card. And I have no because I don't even know where I'm hunting yet. So it's gonna be just knocking on doors and hoping to get lucky. But so I will have a small chance in Iowa, hopefully, But really Ohio is where it's at, because you know, this year, I've got three bucks at least that I think should be around. They were around at the end of last season. Three bucks last year that would be should be over Boone and Crockett this year, so three over Booter. Yeah. Three. There should be three Booners that were on the property decent, but last year that I believe all three of them made it till the end of the season. So hopefully they'll be sticking around now. Not that they're actually, like you know, on my property all the time, but I had pictures of them throughout the year at different times, so nice lt Uh in velvet and in hard horn Um. One of the bucks, Junkyard, I only had trailtcarent pictures of him during the summer. I did not see him until January when I told you about this. You know, earlier in the year, when I was driving out of the property, he was in the field and I caught him in the headlights, and so that was the one time we saw him. Hard horned and then another one, the Beast. Never got pictures of him during the summer, but during the fall, I got a bunch of trail camera pictures of him during daylight and stuff on the property. He's he's a toad. And then Glenn. You know, we all know the story of Glenn. He I've seen him. I've got pictures in the summer and the fall all the time. So those are the boys I'm waiting for. Nice. Nice, I just had an idea popped into my head. Okay, the biggest buck on trail camera by the time we leave to go to Idaho, all right, and the winner of the bat this is just one option. The winner of the beat gets first stock. Mm hmm. I like it. I mean it just I guess it just depends that we haven't even talked about how we're gonna do all that, and even if we're gonna be sitting together and stalking the same deer and all that. Yeah, I mean that makes that brings a whole much different question. I like, it's an interesting idea. Maybe that's a secondary reward, and then we've gosally like more immediate Okay, what are you thinking? Like? All right, I would say if I win, I want two things? Can I ask for two things? You can ask for two things? Are they sexual in nature? Well, because because the answer then would be maybe the Yeah, we gotta change our our rating on iTunes now. No, they will not be anything inappropriate. All I want is, if I win, you have got to wear a Michigan State hat during the rut on film for at least two days. Oh and oh my god, and I want a six pack of some kind of beer? Am I choosing on our trip? What do you think? There's there's certain lines a man does not cross in Iowa, especially because we don't have any pro teams of any sort. So we're we're die hard, you know, either Iowa state or majority of us the good ones anyway, are Iowa Hawkeye fans. So, my lord, so I have to buy the hat? Are you gonna give it to me? I'll supply the head, okay, because I would say no if I had to buy it. Okay, And a six pack? Right? Okay, all right, I here's me reaching through our microphones and shaking your hand on this beat. Okay, Now let's hear about your end. If if you wink, I kind of like your bet. But because I like to speak what's on my mind. I'm thinking, if I win, I get to host and you are my co host, or one episode of the Wired to Hunt podcast, and if I can get a guest in my choice of my choice. M h, you bring that one. You're to bring that one wrestler on? Are you? Hey? Hey, don't talk down to Dan Gable. You can hear us right now talk Chuck Norris everything he knows. How about how about I agree you can host the podcast. We have to come to an agreeance on the on the guest. Okay, I'll agree to that. Okay, I'll agree to that. I like it. It can't be like Rick Flair. I just never know like you could. I just cannot imagine who you might bring on. Okay, So we can agree that I can host one show. We have to the guests cannot be a surprise and you have to agree to it. Uh, all right, I think that's I think that's pretty good. Way too much giggle at the beginning of this podcast, Dan, We've got a serious we've got a serious topic to talk about today. Though I know we've got we've got a good talk, a good conversation today, and this is yes, should not be taken lightly. No. No, that's why the beginning of this podcast is, you know, not going to be like the rest of the podcast. Return three sixty right now, and we're going to have on the show who many people referred to as the mad Scientist. Have you heard that one before? Dan the Man? I have not heard that he's a mad scientist. I've heard people call Mark the mad scientists because he's all about these details and looking at all these little tiny things, whether it be related to weather or barometer, where all these different little factors that might impact dear movement and utilize all that information to put together a perfect plan. And so that's really what I want to dig into with with Mark. I want to hear about all of his ideas and theories and opinions about how all these different factors and conditions might allow us to predict, you know, when and where Dear will be moving. So I'm pretty excited about it. What about you? I really think that Mark is gonna be This podcast is going to be a great follow up to last week's podcast because we talked a lot about high pressure gear hunting and how some of these factors play into that, and I think this is gonna be just further detail of of what a little bit of what we covered last week. Yeah, you're right, I think it's gonna be a nice compliment to that. Um So, I don't know. I think maybe we quit beating around the bush. We stopped give them like little girls over there over here, and we uh, we get Mark on the line to talk about some serious dear stuff. I agree, all right, let's get Mark on the line. All right, with us on the line now is Mark Drewy. Welcome the show. Mark, Hey, thanks for having me Mark. I appreciate it. Understan, we are you know, we're just talking about how excited we are to have you here with us, because, you know, meet in particular, I've been following your DVDs for a long time now, and I've always been intrigued by some of the things that go into your thought process before you go out hunting. And so that's really what I wanted to drill into today was was what it is you're thinking about before you go out and hunt and what allows you to to some degree, predicted deer movement. But really quickly before we get into the good stuff, you know, I don't think there's many people who aren't familiar with who you are in Jury Outdoors, but just for a few that maybe are, could you give us just a little bit of background about maybe how you and your brother came to start Drewy Outdoors and how this all came to be where we are now. That we started Drowing Outdoors in and we went out and bought a video camera together. I didn't have enough money to buy it. I came to Terry and I said, man, I need some help with this new little project here. I need to have the money though, and he said, sure, man, sounds good. So we bought a camera half and half and Dury Outdoors was born. And in fact, back in that early days, we were going to call it D and D Outdoors. At the same time, I was working and calling for, working for and calling for a well pretty must with pretty much game call, and UH talked to Will and tolding what we were getting any dude. He goes, don't call it then D Outdoors. He goes, man, make sure you use your name, and I said, okay, we'll do it. So we actually had to check credit and everything else. So we changed it from D and D Outdoors to Dury Outdoors on on wheels the advice, So that was some very good advice early on in the process. But we started back in and we started doing Turkey videos and back then everything was VHS. We did about six or seven of those, and then we did White Tales, and then eventually we evolved in the TVDS and then we started doing television. So it's been one long, slow evolution through twenty seven years and it got us to where we're at today. And we're so thankful we started back when we did, because I think it would be challenging to be in this industry without having a history that we have behind us. Yeah, you guys definitely do have, um, quite a leg up on a lot of guys now today since you have that history and that experience, and you've really helped grow this media industry into what it is now too, you know in a lot of ways. Um, that's pretty neat. I'm excited that you guys have continued to do what you do and that you keep innovating. I've always been impressed by the fact that your your production work on the on the films and the DVDs continues to improve. And now you guys have the streaming videos available online, which is nice for those of us who just you know, want to grab it on the go on our laptops and stuff. So it's been neat to see that evolution continue. Now, what I think all of us really want to talk about, though, is we want to pick your brain, Mark, Um. I don't know where he heard it. Maybe it was from Terry or Matter, someone who had referred to you as the mad scientist, and we were really hoping that you the mad scientists, can help us understand a lot of things about dear behavior because, as you know, and Dan knows, they can trick us up a lot, and they can be hard to understand at times, and sometimes we probably think they're smarter than they are. But there are certain factors and conditions and patterns that I think that we can start to understand and using our you know, using our favor and we hunt. And so what I first I'm curious about, Mark, is when you are deciding to go out to hunt, you know it's in the morning or the evening, before an evening, sitting you're sitting there in your home, what is your thought process before going out on a given hunt? What are the things you're thinking through and the factors that you're considering when choosing where and went hunt. Well, those those very greatly based on the time of the year. It's one of the reasons we did the show Tarteam where we broke down the entire white tail season as it as it is here in the Midwest. It starts September fifteeth and Missouri and October one in the Isle and Illinois. That we wanted to break it down because I thought process changes drastically depending on what stays the white coats. And then and we sat down and looked at the full season and we broke it down day by day when we thought there were light switch events to where the deer changed in their behaviors and in their patterns and so on so forth. And when we got downe at that breaking the entire season down, we came up with thirteen different phases and you know what, that'd be a pretty cool show. So it really depends on the time of the year. The basic you know, the once over each and every single day, and it's generally two or three days out out in front. I'm looking at weather predictors more than anything else, and I'm gonna look at I'm gonna look at the highs as they compare to the advertise that time of the year, I'm gonna look at wind speed, I'm gonna look at wind direction and more anything, more than anything else, I'm going to look at their metric pressure. In my opinion, the number one predictor of deer movement, regardless of the phase of the season, is the thearometric pressure. Those are the things that I look at the most on any given hunt. Now, depending on what fade it is, there are other things that I look into, uh, and that varies. It was literally day by day, so it's hard to break it all down and one one answer. Frankly, yeah, Well that's perfect though, because you just gave me the the fuel I need for the next twenty questions I think I have because I want details on all these things. And the last factor you mentioned, bare metric pressure. That's one of those factors that I think confused a lot of people. We hear about it a lot, but I don't know if many folks, or maybe even I don't fully understand the effect. Can you walk us through in detail why you think that pressure change effects deer? And then what do we need to know as hunters? What are the changes we need to be looking for and how should that translate into when we hunt. Well, it's something I started starting really intensely, probably I don't know, maybe ten twelve years ago. Like you know, there are always the bumper days where you would see so many deer and uh it's off and correlated with super super high pressure where those were the best days, you know. So I was like, man, big high pressure day, Let's get out there. And then I started studying it and breaking it down day by day, looking at the barometric pressure as it pertained to what I saw that day in the field, and a few things started to ring truth. If it depends a little bit on what is standard pressure given that time of the year. In other words, high pressure during the early part of the season, like say from September fifteen to outgo fifteen might be just above thirty point one or thirty point zero zero. However, doing the latter part, when the atmosphere is cooling down and you know, you get high pressure readings up above thirty point three. At thirty point four, high pressure is defined differently. You know, thirty point one at the front end of the season is high. At thirty point one at the end of the season is just about average to below average pressure. So it's relative to the time of the year. First of all, as Earth's atmosphere cools as we head into the winter, the higher the pressure, the better the movement. You know, I saw last year pressure readings at thirty point six one day. I think I saw thirty point seven if I recall, And there were probably if I recall, there were there four different days where we set record high pressures for the date period last fall over and all over and above all last two thousand and four team was the highest pressure qualite ever sence and to be a move like crazy. So the best day to hunt high pressure is the first day it hits, and the movement will diminish every day there after that, but they will still move very well provided that it stays higher relative to the to the date range that you're talking about. In other words, that September and the predictor shows thirty point one on the opening day, and it's on the rise, and it goes up to about thirty point two, and it levels out for a day or two, and then all of a sudden it drops. Those first first three days where it's fairly high, they're gonna move fairly well. And then when it drops back off, you can almost bank on the fact that that movement's going to slow that and you can just about ride it down and that that movement just follows that that pressure. Much like the stock market kicker goes up and down. The deer movement follows that pressure just the same way. Wow, And is that typically based on a weather pattern or um like a cold front coming through where the pressure changes like that? Sure, you can look at the map and look where all that. You know, you can think about watching the weather as a kid. You know it's different now because everybody gets the weather from their hand held device where But as a kid remembered watching the big weather map and they have the big els and gages all over the place. Off, if you can find a map that shows you that, Now, follow those ages when they come through. Man, that's when the pressure is on the rise and rising. And generally, yes, it does often follow a culture often. Now does you said a high relatively high is one that high movements can be happening, But does that mean that the increase in movement is going to happen as the pressure starts rising? So maybe you have a super high day on Friday, but Wednesday and Thursday it's it's rising. Are those days going to be still pretty good too? Or is it really once it peaks, that's your best and then just declines from there. It's a lot of that's going to depend on wind speed and sun I hate clouds regardless of the time of the year. I don't like them at any time throughout the ball. It seems to sub blue deer, even on high pressure days. It'll make a move later. It makes them a little bit more lethargic. I love sunny days. I love wind speeds from anywhere from about ten to fifteen if I had an optimum wind speed. I hate wind speeds that are really really low, even on high pressure. If you get windspeed that are like five mile an hour below, it seems to put the deer in a different demeanor that they are often often more relaxed on a higher wind speed day than they are on a low wind speed day. I still don't know why that is, but they are totally wicked out when that wind speed is is the low five molt just totally nervous. Uh you get uh really it's like eight or nine mile up to about thirteen to fifteen, and they're so relaxed they don't raise their head. They're coming out feeding and it's the optimum day. Is there a wind speed that you that you will say, all right, that's just too much. It's probably kicking up around thirty before she gets too much. It's I think that's a bit of a misnomer. I think very selemn have. I've seen high winds keep them down. Now they will go down intopography. So when I get the high winds, I go down, I go somewhere in those lower cracks. That's something we noticed there's two decades. They'll probably the higher the wind, the lower the topography. You must sit those high ridges sometimes uh hey, they're rough on you and be they're rough on the deer. They just they they'll do whatever they can to stay out of the wind. H So another thing with wind for you that I've noticed um in addition to the um speed of the wind, I've heard before you mentioned the fact that you like certain changes in wind direction. I think I heard you say once before numerous times before that you like the first south wind after a lout of north. Is that accurate? And if not, can you share with us what types of direction changes help. It's a higher percent accurate, particularly when the temperature differential from the average of that period is drastic. In other words, if the average high for that time of the year is fifty and you have days that are in the twenties, you know if it's a departure by thirty degrees that is not normal to them, and that that will actually lock them up sometimes even with high pressure. But look out that first south wind, the first David. It warms up and often is accompanying the highest of pressure because at the back end of that high and it will kick from the north back down of the south. If you have two or three northerly days in that first south day, that high pressure day, look out. It is one of the best triggers for day activity that there is in watch the world. Yes, I just love all these little I don't think many people take notice of these things. And I keep on hearing you and Terry mentioned it, and I'm glad to hear a little more detail because I always been kind of fascinated by the wanda. I'd better understand it. Are there any other wind direction triggers other than that first south absolutely, you know. I think what I always look for is change in the wind direction. And one of the most drastic is when there's a bunch of north and it switches to south because that often times the company is the highest pressure as well. At any time there's a change, I like it. I like the first east, I like the first west. I like the first north. I like the first south. And if if you look at your wind predictor, and you look at it over a long duration, so you're going on a four or five day hunt, and you got all south, chances are the movement's going to be fair to pour. However, if you've got to change each and every day that a cup that is also accompanied by high pressure, they're probably gonna see some pretty good dear movement, especially if it's sunny, if that makes sense. So I like change in wind direction. Always love change in direction. The worst case scenario is dale air consistent air patterns that don't change. Pressure hits thirty point zero and stays there even worse twenty nine point nine and stays there for four days. For the south wind, I mean, the movement will just diminish day by day by day. It'll get later. Add clouds to that it makes it worse. Um And and keep in mind, I'm trying to predict dear movement in general, but more importantly the cool buck movement. So I'm dealing with trends and tendencies that give me just a little bit of an edge to actually go out and see it. Deer that's four and a half were older. You can go out just about any day and see those and fawn. But I'm talking about triggers that make the toure bucks move and move here and daylight. If you watch your trail photos, then you can go through a camera and go through a thousand photos and every one day, man, there was big bucks on their feet everywhere. Start correlating that back to the weather on that particular day in your area, and you'll start to see trends that developed through time. And it's taken us years to kind of study this stuff, but there are definitely triggers that have more mature bucks on their feet. Again, it's it's trends and its tendencies. It's not a fool proof method, but it sure does help slant the odds in your favor of scoring or seeing deer on their feet. Yeah, And I think that that's kind of the fun of it too, is just trying to put those chess pieces in the right places and figure out hall these little, different, little triggers might add up to getting that four and half year old or five and a half yearl to finally move a little bit before dark um. And one of those factors that I know you can and I certainly do too. And we kind of danced around and talked about in relation to a lot of these things, but it's just temperature. Can you talk to us a little bit about, you know, all the different actors related to temperature that you take into account when thinking through these different triggers. Well, I mean there their system and their coats are made for cooler weather once you get into the fall of the year, and once that winter coat comes on, by and large, they're ready for winter. And one thing that is going to absolutely positively subdue deer movement are warm temperatures. You can just thank god it man. I absolutely dread seeing a warming trend with with warm temperatures that stick around for a week. I mean, you can literally steal the right away with a warm mid November or a warm early November. You have to look at the average temperature for the range, and if the average highs are normally fifty and you're looking at sixty five or seventy, you could just about that that deer moment is going to come down to screeching hall if it's hotter than that yet, don't even waste your time. I mean, it's the lead. Anything can happen and you can go out and succeed that man. Warm tempus are just a kiss of death for dear movement. They just absolutely are. And you've got to have cold temperatures. And what I like to look at is what's the average temperature for the range, and I like to see the temperature the daytime hens at that or below. If they're ten to fifteen below average, you're generally going to see fairly good movement. I love it when it's just below average. If it gets too far below average, it can actually subdue them just a little bit, depending on the time of the year or what phase you're in. But when he gets too cold and brutally cold, that can actually subdue them just a little bit, particularly in the earlier part of the season. Did you did you find that to be true this past season? In the Midwest and we had a really cold November. Oh yeah, absolutely, yeah, we cold November and it moved like crazy, and maybe it was coupled with high pressure. Uh. The other thing that they're awesome at doing is adjusting acclimating. You know, like if if there's a big cold threat coming in and it's say it's been sixty for the past ten days and it's gonna drop off with highs in the thirties, that first cold day, they may not move as well, but by day two, three, or four, they've acclimated and they'll move like crazy if if it's high pressure. So is that your you know, I'm curious about your typical predictions related when the front hits. Are you usually seeing that you see the best movement the day after, day after, the day after, and in a couple of days after that. I've always heard and I've seen to some degree, it seems like there seems to be some increased movement just before the front hits too. But what do you see being the most common reaction? Generally, there's so many variables. It's hard to predict how much wind speeds with that front, how big was to drop the temperature, what was the change in pressure, all those things come into it. Uh, every front is not created equal. Some of them don't create any dear movement whatsoever. Those weak fronts, Uh, they generally don't don't really do a lot. But those big fronts, you can bet they're gonna do a lot. And generally day one, two or three that it's it's gonna they're gonna move the most. And that depends on wind speed and pressure and cloud cover all through those variables will dictate which day is the best. Austin, I find minutes day two when the wind drops just a little bit. From that, you know, if the northerly comes in, it's for the first day. The second day, when it's like twelve or fifteen, the cloud front is through, and you know you're just gonna move better that day on day two than then on day one because the pressure is offten a little bit higher on day two as well. But it can depend when the front hits. If it hits during the middle of the night, that's drastically different than if it hits at noon. All that stuff comes into place, so you just have to watch it and see how it affects your your dear heard, I like a front that happens sometime in the middle of the day, so that the afternoon movement is quite good. We are best in and around our food plots, and I like fronts that makes them move to the feed um. One thing is for sure, morning movement is always better the first morning of the front, regardless of wendsky, the first day that it comes through that first door, they will move better that morning than any other morning. Interesting, that makes sense. Now, when you said you'd like a front that hits in the middle of the day, you're I think, if I understood correctly, your reasoning is that if it hits during the middle of the day, they're going to trigger right away that evening. And then if there's a front that hits rather instead overnight, it's more likely going to trigger in the morning. And you're just saying that you would rather have that first hit during your evening hunt. Is that right? I will, Yeah, that's my preference. I mean, I'll take it whenn and get it. I love front um, but I'll take it when I can get it. Okay. Now, I want to go off on a brief tangent here um because Dan and I over the past weeks and really the last year or two we've been doing this. We have an ongoing debate about morning hunts, and we asked this to our guests last week and now you just briefly mentioned this and it made me think about it. So I want to get your opinion real fast. Um, hunting mornings in October in general, is that something you would be for or against? I will hunt every first morning of the front and none of the others until the latter part of October. Then I will hunt every morning until about Thanksgiving? Okay? And can you so, can you explain to us why you don't hunt all those other mornings in October. A lack of movement and spoken deer getting into their bedroom. They're not moving very far for the most part. It's an afternoon game. I mean their afternoon is it's like our morning. You know that they've been bed at all day. That's when they get up and by early morning they're going back to bed. The first morning the front is awesome. Regardless of what the date is in October, it is amazing that first north northerly morning. I don't care if it's October two or fifty thre in the middle of the low. That morning will be phenomenal guaranteed. Yeah, that's good. That's good to know. I think it continues to evolve me and Dan's thoughts and opinions on this to hearing these different perspectives, and that makes a lot of sense. Waiting for the fronts. I tend to do that a lot when it comes to even the evening hunts, and it makes sense that those morning hunts could really still be great even early on with that, right, and that FIRS morning is awesome, It's just awesome, and they're they're in a good mood, they're moving around, and the only know what happens is to stay on the feed later, right, So they're late coming back to bed. And now this is provided you're in the right spot. You know, you can go google any hunt by hunting the wrong place at the wrong time. It's all about trying to get the right place at the right time. But generally they're on the food later and then they're going to be later coming back to bed, so therefore you're gonna see daylight activity, whereas most mornings without that front, they're at bed are already betted by the time and stay break. That's my experience. And in October yeah, so on on that particular instance, are you gonna be hunting near the betting area where they're coming back, or are you're gonna be hunting some kind of transition or pinch point to catch them coming back to their bed. Depends on the mash corop that year. If there's a mash crop, I'm gonna be somewhere on an on an oak plat, or somewhere where there's acorns because they're phenomenal throughout October on the coal fronts. If there's not much of a mash crop, I'm probably going to be not far off of a food plot in a known betting area because they're just not moving very far off where their their primary food sources. What about specifically a morning hunt, That's what I was talking about. Okay, I got you. That's that's exactly what in the morning. That's where I would go in October for those types of hunts. How early are you gonna be getting into your stands in the morning? Did I lose you? Hello? Can you hear Mark? Oh? There you are? Okay, yep. It was just curious for those morning hunts in October, how early are you trying to get into your stand in the morning, fairly early. It's a thirty minutes before the first thought of like I that's they're just not far and not moving very far. So you better use the cover of darkness. And if you're, if you're, you get away with so much more during the cover of darkness than you do even at the first hint of light. It's so much easier to blow deer out at the first hint of light. Then when it's black dark. Did you ever notice that, Like, if you go in your stand it's black dark, one might bounce thirty or forty yards, but yet when it gets light, you still see that deer, whereas if you're climbing up and there's a little light, you're gonna blow and plumb out of the country. I love black dark during October. Yeah, definitely much safer approach that way. That's for sure, much safer, and it's more important than than during the rut. Now I got a question for you. You just brought it up, um in one of your last comments about the October law. All right, so what we've talked about so far, you know, the barometric pressure, the consistent winds, the first change in the wind direction, the cooler temperatures. Am I to assume that your definition of the October law is the opposite of all those Well, October law, it's also what I call the October swell. There's a defined period or a defined phase in the middle part of October where they come out of their seating pattern that they're into heavily from you know, from the time they dropped the velvet until about October the chance through the fourteenth That varies year to year when they go into the law, but from then till about October there is a definitely subdued movement period there in October, unless it's a major cold front. You have to have cold to have a decent day, in my opinion. So in those situations where you do get you know, I'm gonna continue to drill on these examples. Let's say now we're in that dreaded quote unquote October law. You do get that front. Is that just a situation where you're going to move into one of your would you move into one of your better stands at that point, or even though you have a front, you're still gonna wait till a better time period maybe later in the year. No, I'll go into it and you have to recognize what's happening during the swell. I said, they go into it looking one way and they come out looking another. I mean that is the build up, that's the testosterone going from ground zero up to where it peaks to where all the daylight activity happens there during seeking phase of the pre route there in late October. That that period when you do get a cold front, that's when you look back historically at your pictures and you go, where was I getting daylight activity or where was it getting a certain Bucks picture a lot during this date range. Chances are it's in and around the scrape. We always transition all of our cameras off of travel or food during the greater pasture sphase. When we go into the October law, that's the time we transition every camera we have the scrapes because scrapes are going to absolutely light up during that phase. And you you can go with the middle part of October. In fact, it is the best time to hunt scrapes is during the law, but you need a cold front to actually get one on speed movie. And so now that you brought trail cameras, can you give us a little bit more detail in regards to how you are specifically using trail cameras to add another piece to this puzzle as you're trying to predict when and where you need to be. I would love to hear your you know, trull camera one on one in regards to how you use them. Well, it's to me, it's the biggest evolution and the biggest reason that Terry and I are able to have the theories we have. Uh, it's based on the data we learned, not from our observations in the field. I mean, that's a big part of it, but it's the data that we take when we're interpreting all the movement patterns within the trail photos. As we watch a card, and he and I are the same way. I won't look at a card unless it is picture by picture. I will not put them all up on the screen and just pick out the bucks. I sit there and look at the days come and go. I have a program from our comics called Buck You and I sit there and I watched the whole card, and I watch every day and boom when I see those days where they move, I look at what happened to the barre metric pressure. I look at the sunlight. I look at the daytime high as the windspeed from that day. So I'm correlating the weather not only the information to tell them that the picture that a lot of these cameras will give you, but I'm also watching my computer at the same time to see what event happened that day. By doing that each and every year, you can learn when you're going to move the following year. And consequently, when I'm scouting a particular area with a camera, I'm more often scouting for next year than i am for this year, because more often than not, when you sit down and look at a card, you're the information you garnered from that card is too late. You can just about write that down like what you saw already happened. That doesn't mean it's about to happen because they're about to switch patterns and go do something else. Is much better to look at data data and realize that you're looking at something that's going to help you in the future as opposed to help you currently. It's a great point. So are you so? I think you mentioned this, but are you You know when you're shifting into a new phase, like you mentioned our front hits, you're going back there and sorting through old photos to try to understand what the deer will generally do in that type of situation. Absolutely, I'm looking at a particular buck what he did on that day. I mean, you can absolutely murder him by watching that. It's amazing how habitual they are, not only in their patterns, their bedrooms, the scraps they hit, the direction of travel, everything about that deer. You can learn a deer. It's one of the reasons you get better and better at hunting a deer provided him with mats alive. If you get history on him for two or three years, you can kill that deer by the time he's five or six. Yeah. I love the sounds of that because I've got a couple of bucks like that that I know pretty well. And uh, finally getting to the point where I have that history with him to uh to close the deal hopefully so that those previous year's pictures. I killed dude this past year, but in a pincher creek, and I had a great photo library, and from three and a half through five and a half, I studied every single picture I had of that deer over and over and over and over, looking for one little one little uh, what are you gonna say, crevice or one little hitch is getting up one way that I might be able to kill him. And I finally found a camera where I was getting so many daylight, said him each and every year in and around Halloween. Sure enough, that needed a north wind. I got a north wind on the thirties the thirty first went in there and spent the entire day in the tree, with the exception of about an hour and a half, and watched that deer the entire day. He literally didn't leave that bedroom. And I finally arrowed in that afternoon at like two or two thirty or something. I mean it was. It was worked to perfection. Is there anything more rewarding as a deer hunter than to find something like that, go in on that hunch and have it actually work out? Nothing? Because more often than not you don't right, you know, And it's uh more often than night you're you're batting about fifty you know. And in uh major leagues what it was at Ted Williams said, you know, two thirds of the time you fail well in deer hunting, My goodness, of the time you fail when you're hunt mature deer. It might be higher than that. I mean, it's it's impossible to see him mature buck honest feed and get an arrow through. And it's not impossible, but it's improbable. It's very difficult to get him a true buck and bow range, particularly one that you set out to kill. They are almost impossible. Yeah, and that's what keeps us uh dreaming bottom every night. And that's for sure. So are you, yes, man, are you keeping a log like um of wind directions and and like or or a map or or some kind of personal data gathering system that you've made up over the years to allow you to go back and say, Okay, last year, I am on this stand, I had this wind, and my trail camera showed this and and anything like that. Uh know. What I always do is cross reference my pictures and the trends that I see within the pictures on certain days to the weather history. I use WonderGround dot com and it's uh w u n d e r g R o U n D dot com. And I can take a look at a certain day on WonderGround dot com and it will give me everything you want to know about that day. So I don't write it down because it's all on the computer, and the rest the information that I need is all on the cameras that give me, you know, I'll give me the date, the time, the moon phase, the temperature. All that data is right there with a picture with the commings. Nice. So you mentioned that you're using trail cameras primarily to look back in previous years to then try to predict what may happen now. But is there any situation where you will use recent trail camera information to inform a hunt this season? And what would that specific situation? The longer phases, Yes, the longer phases where they get into a habitual pattern and they stay there. Like the first phase there we call it a new beginning September five through September their dynamite. Then, because the bucks are doing the same thing every night, you can use summer observation or summer pictures to go and kill a deer. The same holds true for the next phase, greener Pastures, which is like September all the way until the start of the low, which is you know, eleven twelve October somewhere in that varies by year. Those two phases. If you can find a bug, you killing based on using your pictures, provided that you don't goof up and run him out of there. It is. It's a nightmare when you got a buck on our early season food pattern and you bump him. I move on to the next book. I just I just have had bad luck. If I'm on a mature dere and and I goof him up, he's something's going to change. So I switched to option number two. You got to make sure your ingress and egress is perfect. It's one of the reasons we don't hunt mornings early part of the season. We never hunt them unless it's a major culfa. And then even then, if I'm on a buck, I'm probably gonna go hunt somewhere else and take a flyer on some other buck and wait till that afternoon to go in and hunting. If I know he's coming to a food block, I just don't want to run him out because my odds are so much higher in the evening. So what about then checking trail cameras at that time of year. How are you able to do that or do you do that all during that time of the year in some way to minimize the chance of booking him. I check him as if I'm going in to hunt it, you know, like I'll do it midday on the right wind um, dressed in full sent for of gear, and I'll sneak in slow like I'm stocking a meal deer in his bed, grab the card, switch it out and get out. And you just can't help them. They're not far. That's the thing early part of the And that's the other thing. When you set your camera up, you gotta think ahead and go, Okay, can I get to this camera and check it without bumping a single deer. Those spots are hard to find, but when you find them, their magic. Yeah. So we heard another guest we had from Southern Iowa UM a while back, had mentioned a totally different theory to checking his cameras, and it was kind of surprising to me and Dan, but there's there's something to be said, and I'm curious your opinion on it. His theory was that if you go in there enough consistently every week you go check that camera in the middle of the summer in September and October and November, and if you do it enough, they develop some type of habituation to it, and don't associate that with danger because They're used to the same thing happening over and over. Can you see that working. I don't do it enough to prove or disprove that theory. Um, I need you know. I just kind of depend on what I do, which is checked and very irregularly, and try to do it on the right wind in the middle part of the day. And I have pretty good luck doing that. My gut tells me that. My gut tells me I would not do that. I mean, just based on what I know about deer and bumping him and so and so forth. There, I guess I'm too scared to try that, you know that Just I don't know that. It seems like it goes back to my comment while ago, Man, if you bump them a true buck, you're on it's it's not good. In the early part of the season, I can tell you that it is not good, regardless of the reason why you bumped him. Yeah, there's a theory out there, um that has been popularized to some to recall the bumping dump where you if you purposely or maybe even accidentally, bump one of the deer you're after, and you know you bumped him, and you sell her he was bedded. The idea is to go right in there. We saw bedded and hunted, and sometimes you might catch them coming back to bed. Have you ever thought about that, try that or heard about that and seeing that to be something that's worth trying if in the worst case scenario you do spook your tiger buck, Yeah, it's generally by mistake, right, you know, I'm never trying to do the technique. But if I've done that, I have indeed had decent luck going back in there and seeing that, Dear, if not that year, perhaps the following year. That's one of those things that you always like store that stuff away on your file cabinet in your head. Man, I bumped this gear on a certain gay range, and do it better down this crevice or up on that point. Those things can help you in the future. All right, now, before we move on to my next question for Mark, we need to pause briefly for quickware from our partners at sick of Gear, and today in our conversation with sick of product category leader Dennis Suck, we're going to step away from actually talking about SIKA instead just learn a little bit about the importance of certain aspects of our hunting clothing in particular. I asked Dennis about bass layers and why they're so important for white tail hunters. Here's Dennis, and it's one of those things that I, you know, I think really amongst white tail hunters is widely sometimes misunderstood and why would I need it? And you know, it really comes down to staying constable, staying warm, you know, and if you think about staying comfortable, staying warm, you know that base layers your first line of defense. It's the first it's the first thing that touches your skin. And you know, when you're walking into the stand or you're doing different things, you know, moisture builds up and you need to make sure that you're doing everything you can to take that moisture off your skin. And why is that? I mean, so you know, moisture does the things. It's actually a conductive robber, so it steals your heat and pulls it into those wet areas the longer you allow it to be there, you know, So having that base layer pull that out and move it up into your system so that it can be evaporated and out and out and away from you, um absolutely will change your comfort. And you may not know why you're cold sitting a stand. You may be shivering wondering. Um. A lot of times it's because of this this this theory, and cottons and some other things just don't have the ability to dry the way that they need to dry, or move moisture the way they need to move it. So that said, then what makes a good base layer A good base layer or something that has a very good wicking capability, So something that's going to pull it off your skin. I think if you're a white tailor, I'm gonna tell you that it needs some level of send control because that's absolutely harboring and growing um smelly things, you know. Um, So I think it's it's a little bit of those, and I think dry time. UM. A base layer can also be very instillative. Is which gets into the difference of a synthetic and it maybe a marino. So sometimes you know, you may be okay with a slower drying base layer, but the warmth of the weight of a marino may be worth it. Or maybe earlier in the season where I can't really tolerate, you know, I don't want that wet thing on me forever, and I want a synthetic it's going to drive much faster. So there you have it, and if you're in the market for new base layers, you might just want to check out what SKA has to offer. And now back to the show you definitely, so I want to shift back to our kind of going through factor by factor because there's one big one. It's kind of the ELpH in the room for a lot of people that there's a lot of questions, a lot of theories about, and that is how the moon impacts dear movement and specifically moon phases and then moon rising and setting times. I would love to hear your thoughts on how those two things impact dear movement and how you use that to play your owns. Absolutely, my favorite time of each month, regardless of the deer season, if it's September, December, it doesn't matter, is the full moon the seven days that preceded, in the seven days that following. My least favorite time and the time that I see the least gear is in and around the dark of the moon. And that flies in the face of a lot of what I read and say. But we have the history and the and the you know, the dear to show it. Um I can't tell you how many times we've killed the deer in and around that full moon. I mean it just to me whether Trump's moon. However, moon can access weather. Uh. If you've got the right weather and you've got a full moon, chances are you're gonna see a lot of deer on their feet. I like afternoon hunting as I lead into the day of the full moon. If you watch the full the day it's full, say it's full the tenth. If you look at the seventh, eighth, ninth, and tenth, or even back the fifth or six, the moon will be rising in the afternoon, and it's going to rise about forty five minutes later every single day, So your afternoon movement is going to be the earliest on about the fifth or six, About the seventh or eighth, that's gonna be perfect. And by the time that's full on the tenth, it's gonna be just about dwindling down. The moon's gonna rise just at the last thirty minutes of daylight that full moon day. Oftentimes, the best daylight activities will switch over to mornings as the moon is setting. If you look at the three or four or five days that follow the full moon take. In other words, the eleven twelve, those are the those are the days where it is visibly going to be setting in this guy, and you can see it from your stand I love morning hunting in and around that falling moon right after the full moon, and again it falls light or forty five minutes every day. So to make sure I'm following here, it's because of the fact there's the full moon that also coincides within these rising and setting times of the moon. That would be happening during the prime hunting hours, right. Is what I've always heard is that you want that moon. You know, in the evenings, you'd like it rising early while you're actually out there, and then the mornings you'd like to still see it setting during daylight. Is that right? Right? And that occurs the four or five six days prior to the day of full and then the four or five or six days that follow the date of the full moon. If you look at what day at full and back up a week, your afternoons are going to be better. If you look at the week that follows the date of the full moon, your mornings are going to tend to be better. Whether we'll trump all of that however, the moon can accent weather and make it even better. Interesting this stuff, this is something that I've released just are going to pay attention to the last couple of years. And it's like you mentioned, I think it's it's it's an accent factor. It seems to be one of those things that if you're looking for that little extra edge, it might be one of those things that gets the big boy in his feet ten minutes earlier, which you know in this case, it's a trend or a tendency. It's just one little thing that gets you want to speak just a few minutes earlier. Yeah, So, speaking of the moon, I know, Dan, I think you had something that you wanted to ask Mark about in relation to the moon. Did you still want to dive into that. No, actually he just covered it. Oh he did well, perfect. Well. What about how the moon may or may not affect the rut? What are your thoughts on that, because that's one of those big theories out there where people say that, In my opinion, the rut happens at the exact same time each and every fall. That's why we came up with our thirteen phases. What part of it is exposed is based on when the full moon hits within that month, based on daylight activity. In other words, if you watch ten Novembers in a row, you'll be like, well, wait a minute, I saw him at the early part of November this year. I saw him in the middle of this year. They didn't move till late and then boom on back to the early part. And and it's happening at the same time because the bonds hit the ground every year at the same time. But the moon, in my opinion, exposes the daylight portion of it differently each year, depending on how the moon falls. That's why you see the variants in ruts that are intense versus not. If it exposes the chasing in the in the seeking phase, you go, oh, man, it was an awesome rut. However, if the moon exposes the lockdown, you go, oh, this is a terrible rut. That's to me, that's the difference. And it's that simple. I loved last year's moon. I absolutely hate the one that's coming up and fall of fifteen. I think it's going to be a very tough, trickly rut because I don't like where the moon falls. Can you explain? Can you explain that when is that moon that you're referencing falling and why is that? Why is a I believe it's full around the twenty six, which means you're gonna have great afternoon activity the latter part of September. You're gonna have great activity leading into the chasing phase there in late October. However, just after that, when you get into November's moon, if it's full, I believe it's the twenty seven, though don't know which. You know, if you look at afternoons leading into that full moon, it's horrible. The dark of the moon happens fourteen days prior to that. Well, that takes you back to the twelfth and that's prime time, and that's when I see the least deer on their feet during day light hours, and I can that's my thoughts. Historically, during the dark of the moon, you see the least amount of deer activity during daylight hours. So it's almost reversed out in my opinion. It's like it's the worst place it could be in the month of November for a great daylight rut. Right, And so you said the dark of the moon is gonna be around the twelfth, he said, it will be fourteen days prior to because its twenty eight day cycle, so it'll be about fourteen days prior to the full it'll be dark, and it'll be dark for you know, ten days in there, you know a third of the month. Remember dark mon look predominantly dark. So in that situation, is that going to change how you would hunt that phase of the year or you still just going to grind it out how you normally would just expecting to see a little I'm still going to grind it out because to me, they're still doing the same thing. You're in and year out, So I'm still going to do the same tactic. It's it's why we did thirteen. I'm gonna do the exact same thing that I do every year, but I'm going to know that I really need a weather front to make these dear move and I'm going to make sure I don't miss any of those weather fronts because they're going to be so vital to seeing daylight activity so vital. I just really disliked this year's moon. It's similar to what we had to take a couple or three years ago, and the rut was just atrocious. Add to that, E H. D. And it was like the worst threat ever, the worst road I've ever seen was it followed twelve or followed thirteen. Yeah, I think you're bumming a lot of us out. Mark. Well, you know, you've gotta be smart about it. You've got to really look at your weather and you gotta look and make sure you maximize your time out throwing those weather fronts. You're still gonna have great activity from the fifth through the ninth. I mean, that's good every year, right, but it might only be the first hour in the last hour of the day as opposed to you know, the first three hours in the last three hours. It's it's that type of drastic difference. So would you almost recommend someone who had limited vacation time to maybe pay more attention to the last week in October as opposed to the second week in November. I like that last week in October. Could they're not with those yet? And I think that is a huge difference when you're trying to kill. And again, everything I get back to is talking about killing a mature dear. If I was just going on an outfitted hunt and I wanted to see the most dear and have the best chance of seeing a buck, I would book either from the fifth through the tenth of November or in my opinion, those are the best and highest rates of buck activity during daylight hours, because that just precedes peak of Vestris and it just follows peak of Vestris. Those two periods, in my opinion, you're in and you're out are the best to bank on. And if I had to bank on one where you could hunt all day and see day your activity all day, it'd be from the Fife in November to about the nineteenth of November. Of the nineteenth, if I had to just write it down, those would be the dates. But if you get a warm trend either during either of those, it's going to subdue it and just kill your vacation. M Yeah, the dreaded rut vacation with a warm front Dallas killer. Man. You know, that's why that's why guys go to outfitters and they go along to ever go back. But you know it wasn't the outfitter or wasn't the weather. You know, the week before everybody killed. This week one out of ten killed. I mean it happens all the time. It's weather related, man, weather, Trump's everything. They are a weather. Uh, induced movement animal. I mean it's all about that weather front. Yeah, that's the truth. I guess you know. This has been fascinating. And the one thing that we've kind of talked about interspersed throughout all these different factors is the time of the year. And you mentioned your show thirteen and the fact that you guys broke down the year into thirteen different phases. Could you, you know, briefly walk us through what those phases are. We've touched on a few of them, but could you walk us through what those phases are that you guys believe are you know, distinct and maybe give us a quick like you're one main thing to note about each one of those phases, it's that possible hold on here. I can't do it off the top. I give you my favorite hold on down there. Let me get to this moment. The first dase is September the fifteenth, and let's just coincide with one of the very season September, and that's the phase we call the new beginning. Uh. It's if you're on one, there's a good chance you're gonna kill them. If you get a weather front. It's all about its source that time and year it's all about trail pictures in your summer observation, etcetera, etcetera. I love that phase. I also love the phase that follows it, which is greener pastor September through October. The twelve. To me, greener pastors is one of the best phases to kill him the tur buck because there's a defoliation that goes on during this phase throughout the Midwest. And I'm only talking in terms of the hunting that I've observed here in Missouri, Isowa, Illinois, and Kansas, and those beans that were planted back in May and June eventually turned from green to brown and defoliate. There is a major switch within the herd to go to the next green food source. And if you've got that green food source close to where you've seen the tur buck all summer, you're gonna go through what I call green and green transfer. There's a good chance he's going to transfer from that green bean field into your green plot. The difference is the bean field might have been forty acres and your green field might be one to three acres, a much smaller target area to try and kill that dear. That phase, to me is one of the best of the whole year. Um October three, we'll talk about the October Law tough phase overall, and you gotta have a cold front and mornings can be quite good. We key in on scrapes with our cameras and with our hunting tactics. We're going to key in on scrapes in a round that October Law with filthy good beer during that period, because they're still on food source and they're not moving very far. But you gotta have a weather front in order to do pre luck. October and November the one to me, this phase is all about killing the oldest, biggest deer in the herd. If you can find him, especially with those historical pictures like we were talking about, you can get on and kill that particular dear. This sphase why because it's one of the few phases where that really old hear is actually on his feet. He's looking for the first available dough to give the first hint of estus. And I don't know that they're really ready to bread yet during this phase, but he's certainly ready to start tending her. They maye ten seven and days before he breathes it, but she can bet one thing that oldest sucking Hurts is going to be the first one to find, the one that's selling the best. I love that page for a really mature dear October the page hold on October or no, the November put the page still. The next one would be November the second, about November the fifth, And for one reason, I can't find that that page, so I don't know what we named it. No, no, I lost that page pre law. And then we get I think waiting on the front. I forget the name of it, but it's like November the first or second, or about November five, And to me, that's kind of in between. If you did the weather side, it kicks them up early. If you don't, there's a little bit of a November law. In my opinion, during the stage. I've had some great early November, and I've had some dreadful early November, where you sent this thing is never going to start. You get this excitement of the flurry of prelock and late October, and then you hit the first five days of November and it's like, what happened? Where'd they all go? And then you just go into a little bit of the law and they're all of a sudden about the sixth, seventh, eighth, or ninth, Buddy Stady bar the door. That's one of my favorite, the end of of opportunity, and it's one that you just can't miss. I like to sit all day every day, you know, the sixth through the ninth of November, you just can't miss it. Uh. You go into November level to the fifteen, and that's lockdown all of a sudden, every go and herd or the bulk of the doze or in astris. If you look at the phase that perceived that it's a bell curve and they're starting to go into astros and there's a lot of flurry and buck activities, a lot of bucks looking for the first available dough that they're not quite with them yet. You get into the letter through the fifteenth, there's does that are in vestres everywhere. When the does come in heat, they often don't move anymore, and all of the buck star are following them or just standing there staring at them. One hot dog and five or six bucks locked down on it, and there's a lot of them do that three or four days. The phase that follows that, the sixteenth to the Ninekee desperately seeking is the bottom end of that bell curve and boom, they've had them. They went them back and they lost that extras there there with, and that phase is one of the best, especially for midday activity. I love nine bill eleven and I love like one to four o'clock or in that particular phase, then you get into green revisited. The latter part of November, November to December the fifth, bucks the really really maturans or start coming back to the green fields looking for bellos because that's where they're going. And a lot of the bucks are starting back to those green fields because that the period where you're having faust morning and night and they're starting to break those green fields down. The power, the bility goes through the roofs and there's a lot of deer of visiting those green fields. We've took a lot of big bucks during that phase. December six to December the eighth, there's another little bit of a miniature well it's uh, it's tough. During this particular phase. We call it waiting on the front. If you catch the front, it kicks them into their late season seed patterns and we have a really good periodment If you weren't the best overall movement in December December night to one, it's called feedback. Awesome, awesome, good bucks out early, mature, you understanding the afternoon and sure very early then December twenty second to January, slowly but surely the day about activity starts to slow down and you again need a front. But that's when you get some of the most drastic weather the winter, and if you get back, you can kill a bit buck if you're are And that's very similar to the first phase because it's all about food. They're not betted, very far from it. Awesome, I uh, I think that was super helpful for a lot of people. I think because trying to understand how to hunt or how to focus your hunting efforts through the throughout the course of the whole season can be a little bit intimidating, I think for some guys. So I like the idea of breaking it down that way to kind of simplify it and offer, you know, some some key things to think about during each part of the year. Um And made some great points. There's something you mentioned though you triggered a memory of source. I feel like I remember hearing um you in the past, having talked about certain factors push them to green food sources, certain factors or times of the year push them to grain, So like soybeans or corner something like that. Is that something that you have a theory on. Yeah, depending on the phase early in decision, Um, it's all about green, especially after the beans defoli It's all about green. But if you get a drastic cold front early start of the season, to switch the green very quick on you. That's kind of a general rule of thumb. The warmer it is go to green. The colder it is go to grain. Um. I love like November for green because they come back to it so readily. However, if you get snowfall and it covers it, that can sometimes make that a challenge. The colder, the weather head to the green. Warm and the weather head to the green. There you go. That's an easy one to remember. Yep. We killed way kill on January eleventh or twelfth, if sometimes very late for the very season last year, and we were on a winner. Bolts are sure to be stilled, and we were lucky and getting snowfall during a lot of part of the season or nothing that accumulated. And I'm telling you, those green fields were ridiculous during that particular part of the up in year. Man, they were back on green and in reality they were eating the balls that the green fields had had created. It was a winner bolts that should have been filled by biologic And I mean it was just thirty fifty year and nine. He killed five and a half riled ag that drive it went board just beautiful Missouri eight point. That's awesome. I gotta love those late season hunts over some type of brassica and things like you mentioned there. That is a dynamite place to be at that time of year. So yeah, depending on what kind of gun pressure they went through, how much pressure they went through general, you know, we called December deer sammers. You get cold frusts and you've got food. It's it's the easiest time to go kill a nice gear of deer in general, because they're all stocked into the same food source, you know. Yeah, especially when you have the best food or the only food left at that point too. Yeah. So Dan, do you have any final question or questions for Mark before we wrap this up, because we're coming up on time. You know, I think that today we have been We've gotten more information in such a small amount of time that I think our listeners are going to be happy with with what we what, what we've got to work, what what we're going to give them. I'll just put it to you that way. Yeah, I have I have my own notes in front of me, like, okay, high pressure plus fifteen mile winds plus first change in the wind direction plus cool temperatures equals boone and Crockett buck right, So they're gonna they're gonna turn it off and go man, that's exfusing, right exactly, you know, and I don't. I try not to be confusing, but it's not a simple equation. It's just not There's so many factors go into each and every hunt, and you just have to pay so much attention to I mean, what phasees you're in, where they better, what food source it is, the windspeed, the wind directions that they aren't that your pressure, the cloud cover. I mean even I just forget some days to look at every single aspect and I'll look at pressure and Winsbey and I'll tell late oh man, we're gonna see you to night. And then we get out there and we have clouds all I mean, we don't see a deer, and I'll be like, oh, I forgot to look at cloud cover. I mean that's that's a deal breakup for deer movement. In my opinion, I don't like CARDI Days at all. Yeah, I think, um, I think, like like Dan said, an overwhelming but fascinating amount of information. This is exactly what I was hoping for. Um. And that's why I really love hunting mature bucks is because of the fact that there are so many different things. There's so many pieces to this puzzle, and it just requires this tremendous attention to detail and proble problem solving essentially. And uh, it's just it gets me. It gets me right right down there, and I can't stop thinking about this stuff. So I'm going to take all this to heart. Like Dan said, I'm gonna be taking a lot of notes when I listen to this again. Um, I got one. You know what it's like, guys, one At one point I'm not thinking, I'm sorry to interrupt you. It is very it's very similar to baseball in the evolution that baseball has gone through since they've been a money ball out the Oaklands and the whole sabermetric side of the game where they try to predict tendencies and trends for players for years to come based on previous results. It's very similar to that. In deer hunting. It's just taking every single thing that you can analyze and analyzing it about deer in general, are a specific deer, and then predicting future movement based on the information that you have. It's very similar to that. Yeah, it's a great it's a great point. And similarly it can get people pre worked up and diving into that. And there there might be I mean there is. I've certainly experienced it a slight danger of getting two in the details sometimes in overthinking things maybe, but it's hard to fare out where that fine line is. I imagine it really is, you know. And I think if someone studied us as you know, an individual person and what we did on a daily basis, I would bet you there are patterns that we have based on weather. I would almost bet you, Matt, and learn that we're not too different from the deer. I'd be pretty fascinating. Danny want to take a well, I'll tell you what I am gonna do is when my wife uh starts complaining to me about Hey, you've been in from the computer for four hours looking at trail camera pictures and then um, you know, looking at the dates and then looking at the weather. I'm gonna blame Mark Drury for that. And you might get a call from my wife. I'll just give her trail. I'll just give her Tracy is dumber and they can talk. You will feel better about you after talking Tracy. There's something about commiserating in that way. So, because Tracy and I've been married for six and it's really about thirteen, because six months of the year she didn't loses me. I'm just I'm just off the grid sitting there staring at his computer somewhere. I think I think all of our our wives can probably relate to that to a degree. So I've got one final question for Mark. This has been awesome. We've talked a lot about. You know, how are you using this information to predict movement of deer in general and then of a specific deer. And I'm curious, coming into the two thousand fifteen season, is there any one special deer that's on your mind? They're hoping to catch us here the loan tent, yep, yep. If he's there. He's in trouble. What's my opinion, what's his story? Uh, he is seven and a half this year, and I've got as much history on him as any deer that I've ever had. Um, I feel like we can. I feel like we can take that deer this year, provided we get the weather front. I think he's callable. I've only seen twice in my ear. However, I really haven't hunted in and around his core as much as I'm going to this year. But you know, I just have a good feeling about the loan tan him and Temptation. Both of them are are probably in trouble if we get the right weather. That's my gut. If they're there, if there's still a lot. So often, uh, through the years, I'll target a certain deer and by the time kind of figuring out something else killed him at the e h D or a car or a poacher's bullet, or they'll disperse. I've lost so many deer through the years right when I thought I could go kill them. So I probably just jinxed myself on both of those here. But I've got a great history on both and if if they're alive and president accounted for, will be will certainly be in the game on on both of them a multitude of times. That's awesome. Well, I I hope that I'll be seeing on the Jury Outdoor Journal a picture with you in the Loan ten come up here soon. So for anyone that wants more information about your DVDs, your TV shows, all the things that you guys are going and doing, where can they go online to find all that? Mark You can check us out at Drey Outdoors dot com. One of the easiest ways to communicate with us is that Drewy Outdoors on Facebook or Instagram, UM or Twitter. When we're very active within all the social um avenues and you know, we're communicating with about six or seven or thousand people a day, so we'll post a lot of stuff up. We're gonna be following the rut this year through the thirteen phases or the full deer season, I should say. So that's the best way to follow us is Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. Probably Alrea go on to our journal, man, there's gonna be our journal is gonna be a whole new vast experiences coming fall each each year that gets killed throughout the fall goes on the Drewy Outdoors Journal at drew outdoors dot com. And then once you get in there, you're gonna have a whole new visual experience. Once you get into the journal, it's gonna be cool. We're working on it right now. It will release in September. Once the animals start hit the journal. Very cool. That's been one of those things that I've always followed, and it's it's been neat to be able to see I can almost predict when things are gonna start really start hopping by me in Michigan, Ohio based on when the deer start following in your journal over in Iowa or Kansas and Missouri, because you guys are usually a day or two ahead of us with weather fronts and things, so I can kind of start to see one is are gonna hit. So I've always enjoyed checking it out, and I'd recommend anyone listening to do the same. Um. I will make sure helps everybody the teast of us, but the people that are west of us going what happened, they're a little behind. We'll make sure to link to all that on the blog post for this podcast, and everyone listening if you're not already highly recommend checking out Mark's DVD's TV shows, the website. It's all great stuff. You guys are really doing some of the best work in the business. Marks, So thanks for doing what you're doing, and thanks so much for joining us on the podcast. Hey Man, thank you so much for having man. I really enjoyed it. Thank God. All right, good luck this season. Okay, good luck y'all. Thank you. Wow. At what do you think about that? Dan? There's a lot to take in there, I tell you what, I'm my mind, my mind and brain is full of information right now, because you know, we've talked about this several times before about out maybe trying to over analyze things. But I think what we're doing, you know, as far as what stand to hunt on, what wind direction, and you know, and all these things that we've just you know, these categories that we've kind of discussed today, and I really think that we're doing it wrong. Our our focus should be on the little things instead of one big picture. I really like I'm to the point now where I'm thinking I'm going to change my the date the dates of my vacation to the second and third week in November instead, based on kind of what he said, and how what we've learned this, you know, these past four or five podcasts with the guests, and you know the moon phase and um, the fetal cycle and and all these things that it's just it, it's this is opening my brain up to a new way of thinking on how to hunt these animals. Yeah, and that's that's why I love this. I mean, this is it's it can be confusing, it can be enlightening, it can be fascinating, it can be frustrating. It's so many different things, but it's it's addicting in the end, that's what it is. And uh I I love the detail that Mark can go into on these specific different types of factors and the trends and the patterns that he's seen. And of course, you know these things might be different in different areas, and each one of us are on our own unique situations. So you know, as we've talked about before, it's all about taking all these different ideas that Mark just shared with us, and that all our past podcast guests have shared with us, taking all those different little pieces, applying them to our situation and our circumstances and where we hunt, how we hunt, and figure out how we can incorporate some of these maybe some of these things work with us, some of them don't, and then we find what's the right fit for us personally. And I think that's that's kind of the journey and the evolution that every single one of us as a deer hunter has to go through. And um, I think you and me, you know, we're right in the middle of our own evolution. I'm sure many of our listeners are too. And that's an exciting place to be, right exactly. And it's almost like this podcast in particular, need needed, needs to come with like a warning at the beginning, because it is gonna make me at work tomorrow when I should be working. Uh, look at look at forecasts in moon phases and pressures, and like tonight, after I get off the phone with you and after the kids are in bed, I'm gonna come back down here. I'm gonna look at my trail camera dates, and I'm gonna go back to that WonderGround dot com website that he mentioned to look up old historical weather data. I mean, who does that, Yeah, it's it's you know. I don't want to pat myself on the back at all, but I have been starting to do that, and it's fascinating what you can see. UM. And another thing, Um, you know, there are a couple of different tools out there that make this a little bit easier, UM, Trail camera management tools. And now we're starting to come out with some functionality like this. So UM, the big three out there are hunt Soft, deer Lab, and Hunt Force. If you google any one of those three, they all have varying different features. And I've tried all three of them to some degree. Um, they've all got kind of cool things. They've all got some things I wish you could be improved. But they allow you to upload trail camera pictures and then they then associate They pull in the weather and the wind direction in the moon phase, and some of them even the barometric pressure, so they tack that onto each one of those photos. And then they can even in some of them deer Lab and hunt Soft, at least I know for sure you can tag individual bucks. So then you can start saying, Okay, I've got three years worth of photos of job Breaker, and now in this little tool, I can say, okay, filter everything by job Breaker, and then it's gonna show me actually patterns over hundreds of photos and sightings. Wowe of his movement during daylight happened with the southwest wind. And wow, you know, nine out of every ten encounters I had happened with high pressure or something like that. And you can start to see these things with these tools, whether you do it with an online tool or if you do it manually, you know, looking at the historic weather. I think this is something that if you're serious about hunting mature deer, especially specific dear, this is something you should be doing. The law of averages. Yeah, yeah, try to try to figure out a few things and identify some trends and patterns and apply it to your future hunts and eventually typically they returned to the norm right in some to some degree. So so yeah, I love this stuff. Science. Yep. Science. I never got too much into it in high school or before, but now I'm now I'm into it. So I oh, I think we've got a lot of late nights of staring at pictures and thinking to do well, especially like I cannot wait to check my trail cameras this weekend. It's I am, I'm like watering at the mouth. So I'm jealous. I've got one more month. We better end this podcast now because your wife wants to go fishing and my wife wants me to be a father. So I'm sorry, mine sounds a little bit better at the moment. Yeah, you're right, you're right, all right, Well, yeah, we should shove this down. This has been This has been a lot of great stuff. So I hope everyone listening that you enjoyed this and that you were able to take as much from it as me and Dan definitely have. If you did enjoy the show. If you haven't yet, we would love for you to give us a review, a rating review on iTunes. Just give us your honest opinion whatever it is. We'd love to hear. Uh. It's really quick to do. It takes like less than a minute, but it's super helpful for us to understand, you know, how we're doing, and also for new people trying to, you know, figure out is this a podcast worth listening to? The check out those reviews, So thanks in advance if you can do that. Speaking of thanks, we of course need to thank our partners who helped make this podcast possible, so big thank you too. Sick A Gear, Trophy, Ridge Bear Archery, Redneck Blinds, Hunter, a maps Osonics, Carbon Express Lacrosse Boots in the white Tail Institute of North America. Thank you, thank you, and finally, thank you to all of you for joining us today, for for sitting through sixty three of these episodes me and Dan John about deer and listening and questioning all these great white tail hunters and hopefully learning a thing or two with us as well. So thanks for being here with us, having an awesome week. Until next time, stay Wired to Hunt.

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