00:00:02 Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wire to Hunt podcast, your home for deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host, Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wire to Hunt Podcast. I'm your host, Mark Kenyan. This is episode number one three anton the show. Dan and I are recounting the highs and lows of our rut hunting vacations. One of us kills, one of us blows the best opportunity of the season, and we both share a lot of stories about the most exciting, stressful, maddening, thrilling, and ultimately marvelous times of year. All right, welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you by Sitka Gear and Um. I'm sitting in a hotel room right now, and sitting next to me in the other bed is uh Josh further Hillyard and U. We were trying to get him on the podcast with us, but he made things difficult, so it's just me and Dan. Um. But that will be the only disappointment in today's podcast episode, because otherwise, well that's not that's not true at all. Day. Actually, we're gonna have some amazing stories of good things and then some soul crushing stories of bad things. Today is today is h RUT hunting stories, just you and me recap on our RUT vacations and uh, I don't know, does that sound like something you're happy to talk about today? Dude, I'm ready to talk. I'm good at talking. You know that. You know, we're just talking about how you're also the brains of the operation too. Right now, A lot of people look at me and go, that guy is good at moving stuff or like loading trucks, and and what they don't know is the brains, you know, more brains. You're the You're the You're the guy. Yeah, you're you're the goat. What have you have you ever seen the show it's always studying Philadelphia? Oh yeah, I love it. I love it where they have the conversation about no no, no no man, I'm the wild I want to be the wild card. You're definitely Charlie in our group. I'm the guy who goes into the basement. Yeah, you have one job in the last beat rats, Yep, that's you. Oh man. So um, we we're gonna talk about the dear rut. Yea dear dear. That's right. I forgot what this podcast was about first. That's that's usually we talked about. Um okay, so so yeah, today, since you know we are everybody really is in the midst of marathon hunting right now. UM. Figured, rather than try to bring some guests on, we should just talk about what we've been doing, because I know both of us have been the woods a lot, um and we both have a lot of news to share. Um. But I don't know, do we want to start with the good news of the bad news? Dan? Well, I'll tell you what. I got a lot to say, So why don't why don't we start with you. I want to find out about this slipping through the fingers thing that you mentioned. And uh, let's let's talk about holy Field and your journey right now. But before we do that, let's take a quick break to thank our partners at Sitka Gear and Today, rather than sharing a sick story like we usually do, I actually just wanted to give you a heads up about a video I recently produced all about my own sick of gear white Tail system. I get dozens and dozens of emails and questions about, you know, what kind of sick of gear do you wear, which items do wear it, which times of year? Why do you like this piece? But not that piece, etcetera, etcetera. Um, so I finally put together idea that details all of that. So go to the Wired to Hunt YouTube page and you're gonna see there. Um within the Wired to Hunt weekly playlist, you're gonna see a video there that's titled reviewing my two thousand seventeen Sitka Gear white Tail system. And in that I go through all the pieces of clothing that I wear, why I wear them, why I like them, at what times of the year I wear what, and a bunch of stuff like that. So check out out to learn some more about what I'm wearing as far as sick of gear. And if you'd like to learn more about sick of gear for yourself, possibly try some yourself, you can go to Sitka gear dot com. And now let's get back to my story. So the story of holy Field and where I am right now. Um, last time we sat on the podcast, it was after the holy Field question mark incident. Remember that, ye yea, So I had continued hunting, you know after that date. I think that day was, um that was Halloween. I think that time we had the question mark incident. A couple of days later to three days later. Um, I've been I've been hunting, hadn't been seeing much, had started to see some younger bucks chasing around things like that. Um. But fast forward to I think it was November three, maybe the third, November four, and I went back to the same stand for the first time since I had been their Halloween to that stand again. And this is a morning hunt though, And around like nine thirty in the morning, I look across the food plot into this area of cover, the exact same place where I had seen holy Field on Halloween, where I thought i'd seen holy Field, and actually a tast step back. There's a longstanding joke with me and a couple of my friends that whenever I take a leak off the tree stand, it attracts deer. So you know the story of six Shooter. I was peeing and then he showed up and I shot him. Um. And then a few years later, I was filming further hunting in Ohio and he's just cracking up over here every time I say his name. Um, We're I was filming him and it was like the middle of the day. I'm like, hey, man, I gotta take a leak, so I'm probably gonna probably gonna have a big buck show up, and as I'm taking a leak off the tree stand, a big like hundred forty class eight pointer shows up. Um, well, that happened again. I'm taking a leak and I happened to look over my left shoulder and I see movement in the brush over there, and I'm like, holy crap, that's holy Field. Pulled up my buyos and he was basically in the same place he was Halloween, but this time he was heading the other direction. Um, and kind of I just got buyos on him confirmed, like yeah, for sure that's him. And then um, I'm reaching from my bow and grabbing my stuff and then he slips back in the cover. I tried grunt, I tried snort wee's, but I could never see him again. He just disappeared. So I've now seen him in the same spot twice and two hunts from this little area. So at midday I went back to my house. I got a tree standing sticks, and I decided to go in there and hang a stand, so it'd only be a move of like sixty yards just to the other side of this food plot. Um but um, but I went hung ay stand in there, and this is right on like very near the property line. So I just have a very small sliver of of of woods. It's a big chunk of timber. But I my property only goes into like very like twenty yards in the thirty yards in there. Um. But he had passed on my side of the line when he came through this two times. So I set up in there for the afternoon hunt. Um, it's gonna be a rainy day. So it started pouring rain and I was just underneath my tree umbrella trying to stay dry. And UM, long story short, on that sit, I noticed a doe coming across the field and she had that look about her, you know how that that is when she's kind of looking back over his shoulder, her tails flicking and stuff. And I gotta be a buck, Gotta be a buck. And then I pulled my binoculars kind of scanning from the dough back behind her, and then bam out of the tall grass, big rack and there's holy field. Yeah. And he comes out of this brush and then bounces towards her and then they run across the way into some more brush. So that was another quick encounter. UM. At that point, probably a hundred hundred yards maybe something like that, but again on the neighbors. Um and then they disappeared. So I'd seen him that morning, and then I saw him that night, but it was quick. Now um My hunted the rest of the night, pouring torrential rain. The next day was going to be like the mid sixties and thunderstorms all day. So I actually took that day off from hunting, the first day I took off after twelve straight days of hunting. Took a day off to deal with some stuff at home and just get caught up on some things that I had not been intending to figure if I have to take off a day, a day of crazy torrential downpours and thunder stores will be the day do it. So it took the day off. I think that was November five. So then November six comes back and I said, all right, I'm gonna go right back to that same stand. So I go back in that morning to the new standard hung and I don't know, an hour or two into sit, after seeing some young bucks bumping around and stuff, the same kind of thing happens. I see a doe coming across this sort of grassy brushy clearing, watching the dough boom, there's Holy Field again, but this time he's kind of hanging back. He's maybe fifty yards behind the dough, and the dough moves off and heads into the brush, and then he kind of just standing on the edge of this kind of brushy opening, looking around, and then he starts heading my direction. And this is the first time I got footage of him all year, the first time I actually had time to get the camera on him. So I got some pretty good footage of him coming across this opening, and he gets to within maybe seventy yards maybe um, and then he turns to head north. He kind of had been angling like he was gonna come my way, but he didn't. He turned and started heading directly away from me, sort of back towards the general area that Doe went. At that point, I grunted once to him. He stopped and looked right at me, look for a couple of seconds, and then turn and started walking and continue the way he went. So I'm like, all right, well, let me try snort weeds, and I snort wheezed. Once he turned, I'm trying to remember what he did. He either turned and looked at me for a half second or maybe he didn't turn at all. Um. All I remembered for sure is he bounced away. He bounded away from the snort. We's um, maybe like two three bounds, stopped turn and look back in my direction, and then turned back and then walked kind of rock slash jobs straight straightway into the cover and disappeared. So that was that morning. Man kind of bummed about that because I you know now that he he didn't like something that came from this direction. So I'm thinking of myself, well, it's probably unlikely that he's gonna come this way now today. UM. You know, he obviously does not react well to calling. I hoped that this year he might be even more you know, that type of grumpy old dominant buck that maybe would react to the right way to that, But he didn't. Um. You know, I tried calling to him a couple of days beforehand, and I couldn't see his reaction because he disappeared in the brush. UM. So I don't know how he reacted to it, but he definitely didn't come in. UM. And now this time I saw him kind of spook from him. And now when I look back to last year, UM, I tried calling to him at different times and and never had success either. So now I've kind of seen him ahead. Okay, he's just not he's been there's too many other hunters around it. He's here, he's heard too many things, he's had too many bad experiences. I think I just don't think that's gonna work on him. So I'm sitting there thinking about Okay, I got changing his up tonight, and then um, I happened to catch a little flicker off the discs pullt my buydose. There's a dough. I'm looking at the dough and she's like it's it's like eleven thirty or noon by now, and she's just kind of standing on the edge of this cover. And you know, I feel like whenever I see a dough that's not doing something on purpose, Like she's just kind of standing there awkwardly. Um, kind of just looking around but not moving, not feeding. It's just that look of that this kind of looks like a dough that's you know, with a buck. So I just started like meticulously scanning all all the brush around her. She's kind of standing the edge of I'm not sure what this is. It's maybe it's like a like a what do you call it ah shoot, Russian olive bush or something like that. Is that a thing could be something like that sounds good, it sound professional. Um So, she's standing by bush and and I'm scanning, scanning, scanning that, always seeing to see a little flash of light, and I focus in my eyes there and then I can pick out what looks like a curving hine. And the more I look at, I see a glimmer of white, and I see a flicker of an ear and then all of a sudden, like this, Like it's like you're looking at like one of those remember those books as a kid, these three D books where you look at this image and then if you stared at the right way, all of a sudden, this three D image appeared out of it. Oh yeah, that's kind of what this was like. You couldn't see anything, but if you stared at it long enough and you kind of start picking things out, all of a sudden, the silhouette of this rack appeared. Um and I realized that it was holy Field bettered there with this dough. This was about a hundred and fifty yards maybe, And um so he's bettered with his dough on a hundred fifty yards away, and I watched him for maybe two hours, um, there with the dough. Every once in a while, he'd stand up, he'd take a leak, he'd make a rub, he'd bed back down, he'd get up, he walked around in the circle, he'd bed back down. Um. It was just really cool to get to watch him in that kind of you know, setting, and see relaxed, completely relaxed, just better doing his thing. Um. And then I'm sitting there debating, Okay, what should I do tonight. Um. My thought process was, Okay, he's he's I think he's with this dough. He's gonna go wherever this dough takes him. Um. But based on the fact that he heard something over here this morning that he didn't like, I'm thinking it's pretty unlikely he's going to come this way. But I can see him right now, so I don't really want to leave when I can see him. But at the same time, I don't feel great about his chances of coming this way. Yeah. So I'm sitting there thinking about all this, and I'm thinking that most of the activity I've been seeing in the evenings had been moving off to the west. So man, I got the freaking hiccups. I always had the hiccups when we recorded podcast for some reason. I think it's nerves. You're still not used to this, that might be it. This is this is very nerve wracking for me. Um. So I'm thinking in my head, I think I want to move up to the far western stand up there where most of my encounters of them have been. But is that stupid to leave while I got eyes on him? Will end up help him make that decision because maybe one one thirty, um, he got up and walked away and went out of sight. Yeah, so at that point, okay, I can't see him anymore. I don't think there's a good chance of him coming over here because something spooked him. And I think there's a better chance that if that dough is gonna head in any given direction, I think she's going to head towards the west, because that seems to be where most of these deer transitioning out towards. So I sneak out of that stand, sneak up to the front of the property to get into the new tree stand, and within an hour of being in the new tree stand, I spot holy Field man um ketting this way, and now he's not with a dough though he seems to be back on the hunt, so he lost that dough or maybe maybe I don't know, maybe he wasn't even better with that dough. Maybe he had better down. I just happened to see her, and because I never saw her after, like I saw her and then I found him, and then I can never see her again. I just could see him for the to our period. Um. So I don't know what happened, but he was not with her anymore. Um. But now I see him chasing a dough and then this other really nice buck, um, this three and a half year old that I've been calling survivor um because I'm trying to will him to survive this year, like I'm trying to make it a self fulfilling prophecy. Um. He was chasing does and all these young bucks and they're all bumping around this cover. This is back in that same cover where I saw him all the time last year. Again, this is on the neighbors um, and I'm watching this happened, and then they disappear, and then it's getting I don't know, maybe it's an hour and a half four daylight, and some doughs are coming out, and I noticed three doughs walking in towards my stand, which is in this food plot, on the edge of this bedding edge of this bedding cover. And I'm watching three doughs coming in and like pressing myself again up against the tree, making sure that I'm as tight as as I possibly can stay hidden and um, and then I catch a glimpse behind him, and then out of the bra steps Holy Field, like sixty five yards away, heading right into the food plot. I'm like, holy crap, here he comes. There's there's does in front of him. He's gonna follow these doughs in and it's going to be the easy shot I've been hoping for. So I grabbed my range finder, make sure that's handy. I pulled my ball off the hangar. I'm getting already, and he's walking like he's gonna come in. And then just before he gets out of the cover, he stops and he turns like a hard right turn and cuts back into the cover and disappears into it and he ends up. I didn't know this at the time, but he ends up paralleling the food plot through the cover and it pops up. There's another opening. I saw him pop out and then it walks behind me sort of, but this is all neighbors property still, And then I watched him, you know, yards, kind of angling back and behind me, then cuts into this timber again and disappears. But I thought like, wow, this was really close. I got the pump. I was excited. Um. But again, he I think that those does just I think he was found his dose and then realized that they weren't in heat um, and then he moved on to go look for some others. Yeah, so you think, yeah, do you think that on your tree stand where you've been hunting, because you have limited tree stand locations on this property, right, so, and you're hunting a lot, do you think he's coming through your area after dark and he's he knows where your tree stand locations are at, and he just he avoids them, not necessarily avoids the whole property, but avoids your tree stand locations because he's got a whiff and he knows that something could be over there, so he's not gonna go check it out in daylight. Yeah. I've definitely thought that a lot and wondered about a lot um. I have this theory, and it's there's no scientific fact to back it up up. But I have this theory that deer, especially like mature bucks, well, mature deer can use their nose to tell time based off of the potency of the scent that they smell. And and that means like if they walk through an area and they get a real stiff you know, ship something's close, I gotta get out of here. Or if they catch this scent and they're like, Okay, well it's not very potent and I think it's been you know, two hours or whatever. They you know, they can't tell time, but you know it's not it's not a threat, you know what I mean? Yeah, exactly, so yeah, So do you I mean, do you think he's coming through after dark in somewhere in those locations? So I'm sure he does. I mean, I get I get pictures of him in these places. Um. And I definitely have thought many times like this buck knows that I'm hunting him, he knows where I hunt him at, and he's avoiding these araces. So I've tried to change things up more and more. Um, but I'm just very limited because I can't ever get eyes on him or see him except four on the edge of this bedding cover. And the only places I can hunt him are like a couple of trees. Literally, it's not even because again, um, the two spots up towards the front, there's literally only three trees I can hunt from there. Um, I've got trees, and I've got stands in two of them, and then the one of them is right smack down in the middle of those two. And um, would be tough to hunt with a given wind, because I can hunt one of these trees with a southerly wind, I can hunt one of these trees of the northerly wind. The other ones right in the middle. It kind of isn't good for any wind because too many deer come out above and below it. Um. So so I've yeah, I don't have a good solution at this point. You know. My my hope coming to the season was that I would stay out. You know, I didn't hunt it at all all October, um, And I my hope was that, Okay, if I don't hunt this area at all until I going for the kill, you know, late October, then he hopefully won't avoid it, and the does won't avoid it, and I'll get the you know, he'll come in and that just didn't work out. He didn't he didn't come in at all, you know, during all of that period. But it doesn't sound like the deer are avoiding are avoiding it, right, So do you feel that the the your access is good, the and and that you're the pressure that you're putting on this property is uh, is still what you would consider low? Not after, not after what I've been doing here, not after this rup period. I mean I've just been going. I mean I kept as low as it possibly could until October, and at that point it was okay, now it's time to kill this buck. And so I was hunting. Ever, you know, it's go time. I told myself, I got to kill him at this time period, otherwise I probably won't get a chance. So I've been hunting him hard and trying to get in out as best as possible. But it's a tough place to hunt, it's tough ways to access because of how it's set up with all these fields and the out side. Um So, so now I know I've made an impact, um but I'm still I'm minimizing as much as possible. You know, I've I've created a path that I can get into sort of in the mornings to stay away from the fields. I get picked up in the evenings by my wife on a four wheeler or my pickup truck so that I'm not walking out instead she spooks them off. I think those things help me. Um. I mean it's it's definitely not as bad as it would be if I was walking in and out on my own. But I'm sure you know, after hunting, you know, what is it? Today's November eight or ninth, and I started hunting that property October, and I hunted it almost every day since. Um, trying to kill this stupid buck. Yeah, um, yeah, so so I've been trying to change things up though. So you know I hunted. I hung this new stand this summer to hunt with southerly winds, so I've never hunted there before. Um. I haven't seen him from that stand this year yet, but I saw him from it last year when I hung a hanging hunt there once. Um. And then, like I told you, after seeing him a couple of times, UM, I hung a new stand and then I saw him there a couple of times. From that. You know, I saw him when he betted and all that that was a new stand. Um. So where does it take us to take us to? So we were talking about there was the food plot night. He looked like he was coming in, but he didn't. He paralleled and then went to this other section that takes me to the next morning. So I've now seen him, um, two days in a row, morning and evening both UM. And now I'm thinking, okay, I've seen him five times in three sits. It's all in the same little tight area like a ten acre a little block. UM. But I didn't have a good wind direction to hunt. Well, basically there's no good morning stands around there either, um, because it's all field edge source of or not all a dudge but relatively open. But I had hung a new stand this summer UM, just for this kind of situation. Again, like I told you, I've got a little bit of timber on the far back side of this little core era of his. Um. I usually don't see him in there this time of year, UM, but I knew it was in that basic neck of the woods. Now this year I had been seeing him more. It's most of my encounters had been towards the back this year, unied compared to every other one. So I had this new stand hung back there. I thought, all right, I'm gonna go back in there, even though he's been up in the front, you know, last night, in the last two nights, I'm going to try here in the back. Maybe he'll cruise through here in the morning. Um. It's tucked in back behind this food plot, maybe like sixty yards into the timber from this food plot. And I've got dough betting areas on either side of me, one to the northeast, one to the southwest. Um, and I'm back in the timber there. I thought there's a decent chance I've seen something happen there. So this is uh, Tuesday morning, I think, Um, and I get in there. Good start in the morning, I see a survivor, my three and a half year old chasing? Does I see some two year olds chasing? Does year and a half holds all over the place? Does running around? It's going good until about nine o'clock. Um, and then nine o'clock it just shut off. Yeah, from nine to ten. From nine and ten it was really quiet, nothing going on. Um. From ten to eleven, really quiet, nothing going on. Um, But I'm sitting all day, and I should say that all these days I've been I've been hunting all day. Um, so it's like eleven o'clock and as any of us would do the middle of the day. Um, you know, I'm looking at my phone ever once in a while, and um, you know, I hadn't seen anything in two hours. I got my phone pulled up. I was reading a book actually, and you know, I look at my phone, look up, skin around, looked down at the phone for a few seconds, look up, scan around. Um. But I had stood up because you know, I've been sitting all morning and my legs need to stretch, so I was standing up. It's kind of light breeze. And then my head was right next to my ozonics unit because I was standing, so I'm facing one direction and because of that, I can't hear very much looking at my phone. Look up, look at my phone, look up, and I hear a twig snap behind me. I spin my head around to look, and there's a deer at twenty yards away. But right as I spin he turns and bounds away and starts running away. Yeah, he saw me move. When I spun around. He was at twenty yards And I look at this deer and I realized it was Holy Field, Holy sh it. I had holy feeled that twenty yards at eleven o'clock in the afternoon, beautiful, perfect shooting lane, wide open, and I was looking at my stupid phone and uh and he ran off and then he stopped like seventy yards away, turn and looked back at me and then started blowing and then just slowly walking away below in the whole way. And yeah, I I was just like crushed in that moment. Like he called further and said let's go to Ohio pretty close to it. Um. Yeah, man, I was so so so upset. You shouldn't be upset, because if you were sitting down and had your head up and was paying attention, dude, I have had dear literally make no noise in certain scenarios. I take it the ground was soft because it's been raining up there, and these deer can come up underneath your stand and you you can't even hear him. So it's not like you did anything wrong. No, I mean, well, I mean if I keep I mean, you know, I try not to play the what if game. But if I hadn't been on my phone and if I was just scanning like I'm usually doing, I would have seen him pop out of this cover behind me. I would have seen him just walking across this wide open timber, I mean, walking right towards me. Me. It's you know, yes, it was a little bit unlucky that that it happened to be the one time that I was standing up, not being able to hear anything with the unit next to my head and kind of soft ground and all these different things led to a situation like that. Um, but it was it was just that feeling. And I had already been, you know, how I've been, how I was last year, and how I am this year. This deer is kind of consumed everything. Um, I'm constantly thinking about I was telling further the other day, UM that I'm waking up in the middle of the night, like two or three in the morning, and I just wake up and it's like it's like, where am I gonna hunt? With a southeast wind? And then I'm like and then I'm just sitting there literally like I wake up out of nowhere. My alarm her wasn't going off, and it's not like cane at the phone and see what time it is. It's just wake up. What am I gonna do? Toda? Where am I gonna go what's he doing. I mean, it's become like, um, just kind of and so I've put in so much work, so much energy, so much time over these last few years, and there it was like I had my opportunity. It was right there. And because I'm an idiot and I was looking at my phone and not focusing, I let slip through my fingers and you know, I probably will never get another. I don't know about this, but you don't get very many second chances on a buck like that where I'm at um. So I had a mental breakdown at that moment. I kind of broke down, was really really upset, and then um and then you know, after like a half hour an hour of feeling sorry for myself and being piste off of the world, then I said, all right, well it is what it is. This is where you gotta, you know, show that this is where you got to kind of take that mental toughness and grit it out and pushed forward and move on and keep at it. So I knew he wasn't coming back to that tree stand that day, so I pulled down, moved back to another spot again, the same couple of spots I have that I can hunt up towards the front of the property, and um, not too long after there he is spotted at him again. Um, and he's chasing does running around and then eventually it looked like he locked onto a dough. And then for the rest of the evening, for another hour and a half two hours, I'd watched him just like stand next to a bush and then slowly walk around the bush and then stand by the bush and then walk then the dough would squirt out of there, and then he'd followed the dough another ten yards over. And that's what happened all night. He stayed back in that cover with that dough. Um, and that was that. That was That was yesterday and um and meanwhile my buddies further and Corey had gone down to Ohio and down. I was supposed to go down to Ohio with him, but I've been pushing it off, pushing it off, trying to kill holy Field, and I don't know, I just have been stressing. And then this happened and everything, and I was like, you know what, I just need to change of scenery. I've been hunting this spot too much, even though I'm seeing holy Field. I kind of just need to get away from it for a little bit. UM. So after the evening hunt last night, I drove down to Ohio and uh hunting here today and just kinda recentering myself. Yeah, dude, I don't know if you want to hear this or not, but I think you need to throw that buck a curveball. And I mean I mean something that is you don't plan it, you just do it. And I'm talking about sitting in a fence row on the ground or like where he is all the time that's not in your stand And it's one of those things where it's almost like you have to have a conversation with yourself that's am I am I willing to bust this buck off my property with such an aggressive move or I could? You know, I call these you know, I call him like hunts. Sometimes I go in and there's a chance it works, or there's a chance I get busted based off the wind, you know, a real hard quartering wind or an access route or you know, all these things that we try to be so fragile with um that go into the strategy of hunting these deer. It's you know, it's time to take a risk on on one of those factors and throw a curveball at him and make him like I didn't expect that at all, because I think, I think this buck has with the one up on you right now from where where you are sitting on your farm. I mean definitely at the front of the food or the front of the property. Yes, like I basically and I basically know that. I'm just leaning on the fact that one of these days, maybe I'll get lucky enough that he's with a hot dough that he just can't leave like he did that one time last year. Um. But towards the back, I mean, yeah, I've got a little a few more options. He just doesn't come back there very often. Um. But you know where I had my shot opportunity was from a stand that I had never hunted. Well, I hunted it one other time this year. So the second time I hunted that stand and he passed by, and then he passed by another spot on my property twice that I had never hunted. It was about sixty yards away from a stand ahead, but not shootable from there. Um. So when I get back from Ohio, I'm just gonna stay down here for another day or two. Um, So I'll be back to Michigan here soon and I'll have a handful of days before gun season. I am going to just try some different stuff because at this point, you know, I've seen him a half million times. I know where I can sit and I can see him probably, but I don't really care about seeing him anymore. I just want to shoot him now, UM, So the point might as well try something that. Like you said, it's either gonna not work at all, I'm not gonna see him at all, or I could spook dear, or maybe it could be the switch up that that will work. So I'm gonna focus a little more on the back of the property in the mornings. Um. I've got two other stands in the back of these betting ears that I have not hunted at all this year. I haven't had a wind that I could hunt him with, um, but I think I will have those winds coming up, So I'm gonna try Here's a here's a random question for you. Are there other bow hunters in your area right now? Yes? How close to you? Ah, I don't know. I know there's one other property that has a crossbow hunter that's uh probably hunting weekends right now. That's I mean, it's right next to the property, but from like the core area that I see holy Field all the time, you know, a couple of hundred three hundred yards from there, there's another small property that butts up to his little core area that I think has two different guys. The bow hunted, and I think that they might be hunting now. Um. And then there's do you do you think that you know, you've mentioned this before, You've mentioned that rattling doesn't work in Michigan, right, Um, And you try, you know, you do your grunning and your snore wheezing, but you don't rattle because it just I don't know whether it's a negative it has a negative connotation to these bucks, it scares him or whatever. But I think if you next time you see him alone by himself, I think it'd be worth a try. Dude, I don't know. I mean, at this point, do you really think it's camp? Uh? What we're gonna say, sir, I was gonna say, do you really think I mean, he just busted you in the tree stand? Yeah? Right, and he's still in the area. That's like he saw you visually and he potentially busted you sent wise, maybe right, he didn't. He didn't win me. He just saw me. He did he did win you, but he did see you. Okay, that's good. So just rattling in general. I don't think if you have the wind right, I don't think it's going to hurt anything. I think I tend to agree. Now, it's at least at this point, like I've already I've already made an impact, like, yeah, there's not much to lose now. So I rattled to him once last year and he ran away from it. So that's why I've been so hesitant to do it. Um, but did see the dominant buck on the property? He has to be. I mean I've never I haven't seen any other buck that's anything older than three and a half. Um, there's one three and a half year old, there's a couple two and a half year olds, there's seventeen thousand year and a half olds, um, and there's him. So you would think he's the dominant buck. But he does not. I mean, he has not shown any kind of positive reaction to any kind of call. Um so decoy, question mark, same kind of thing. There's just there's so many doughs. I'll see thirty thirty doughs a night. You know, I just think that it would just be them blowing at it all night. Yeah, but you know, who knows, Maybe maybe it's worth trying something crazy because you know gun season is coming up soon and at that point all bets are off. Um. Now here's Here's the other thing. Though, if he can make it through guns season, I feel like I have a very very good chance of killing him in these usual places that I hunt him. Because despite the fact that I hunt him in these places often, like more than I wish I would. Um. Now, I haven't done it as much this year. Like last year, I hunted these couple stands a bunch because I kept seeing him, so I kept hunting him. But this year I've I've had more stands hung for different situations. So I've only hunted the front stand um three times, which is you know, you don't want hunt much more in that, And I hunted the back plot stand twice. Um, So I've still kept it, you know, a lot less than past. But um, what I'm trying to say is that in the late season, he throws caution to the wind when going to these food sources that I've got planted there. Um, both years two thousand fifteen and two thousand sixteen, I have like ten to fifteen days during the month of December that he visits those locations during daylight hours. Um, So if I can make him, if I can, if he can make it through guns season, and if I don't spook him at all during that time period, I could let him you know, established re established a sanctuary there. I do think I've got a very good chance of killing him once we get into December, and I can do like get back to that drone strike approach and just wait till the right conditions go in there once and hopefully kill him. Um. But but I also at this point, you know, you just don't know if I'll make it through gun season. So I'm kind of throwing caution to the wind right now because I need to try to kill him before you know, there's sixty guys in my little neck of the woods versus you know, twelve or thirteen or whatever. So yeah, yeah, so I don't know. Man, it was, um it was very disheartening to have had that opportunity right there and screw it up. But I'm going to keep at it and we'll just see what happens. So absolutely absolutely, man, that's a that's that's like the most frustrating part. Right. I've had a couple bucks in my lifetime that I've chased like you're chasing. Uh, And it is, man, it can be frustrated when you think you're doing everything right and then it's like you miss an opportunity or you feel like you're one step behind the entire time. Yeah, that's hunting, all right, that's absolutely hunting. So the good thing is though every once in a while, all the hard work and time and energy, it pays off. And I hear, did that happen for you? Yeah? I tell you what man, I I told me about your cation. But before that, real quick note, we're going to hear from our partners at White Tailed Properties this week. With White Tail Properties, we are joined by Gabe A. Dare, a land specialist out of southern Iowa, and Gabe is gonna be telling us about what the primary factors are that make for quality hunting ground. You know, there's a couple that stick out, I guess the most. Um, I want to be neighborhood. I think you gotta have You've got to have the structure around you. Um, I've even seen, you know, in my line of work, I've seen any enormous farms struggle, you know, And I say enormous, I'm talking thousand, fifteen hundred, two thousand makers farms struggle. If you don't have structure around you, like mind, neighbors, you know, on the same program or at least close to the same program. Everybody's gonna have their differences, of course, but you know, um, I think you've got to have, you know, the right people around you to really get deer to that up or age class. And so I think that's first and foremost, and then that kind of lead into the second one, where you know, depending on what you're after, Um, you've got to be in the right area as far as genetics, you've gotta be weren't big deer at you know, if if if you're an area where your your your goal is to shoot hundred fifty five year old buck, obviously there's a lot more places that a guy can get into something like that. But you know, definitely the second one be if you're after top top end. If you know, if everybody's wanting to shoot bunting Crockett type animals or even that that new pinnacle that I deal with more and more every day is two hunder. You know, I hear about it, deal with it, and see it way more. Um, you know, you've got to be where of those animals even have a chance to be. And so you know the two things I would say, and obviously neighborhood structure around your property, and then your property has gotta be in an area where it's gonna where it's gonna produce or have at least have a chance to produce what you're wanting to harvest. If you'd like to learn more and to see the properties that Gabe currently has listed for sale, visit white tail properties dot com. Backslash A dare that's a d A I R dude. I've had an amazing rutcation. Um. I got into town Friday night. Uh after Uh let see, I packed my stuff up, I got into town, and um, the family was in town. I mean they came for Friday night, which was cool, and uh Saturday morning. Uh see. Like so I just I'll just kind of run you through these last five days or whatever, however many days day one Friday night, you know, and man, we've been having a ton of east winds and I never planned for east winds this time of year, right, so I had no stands hung for an east And so I'm just like, Okay, if I can't get into this betting area that I want to get into, I'm going to set up down from it. Um, and this this feel that this would have been the closest I hunted to a field edge all year, right. I was like fifty yards off this field edge, and so I could see into it. So I run a gun down in here. My wind is blowing almost straight east down into this creek, and I'm just set up in a good spot ready to start seeing movement, you know like this, Uh, make the observation and then possibly move in. And so that night I get in getting this, you know, get stand set up, and instantly I start seeing does you know and young bucks running around chasing each other. You know, you know the young bucks are chasing. Had a really good eight pointer come up, I'd say, like, oh he was. He was a two year old with a good rack eight pointer. I'd I'd put him at about one eight pointer and pretty cool. Um, he walked by a couple of does, walked by some button bucks, walked by, you know, I was like, well, maybe this isn't gonna turn out to be an observation set. You know, they're coming off the bottom of this creek and they're working my way. You know, my wind was blown into the creek, but they were coming up the creek, you know, like paralleling my wind, which was awesome. And I thought, well, geez man, something. You know a lot of these deer bet in these creek right, you know, the these timber thickets right on on there. And I got the food source here, so maybe I'm actually in a good spot. Well, I see a handful of deer, and then all all of a sudden, I see this big buck in the field with his nose to the ground, and I pick up the horns because he was traveling like he was going somewhere right nose to the ground. Sniff and sniff, and I cracked the antler. I wait for him to get into the timber. I put the antlers together, crack him hard, do this like one minute rattling sequence, throw it out and he is dead sprinting. I mean, he is hauling ass right to me. And he comes to the corner fifty yards away and there's no shot there. Uh, And I but what that does. It gives me an opportunity to put my binoculars on him and check to see if he's mature. He's a three year old, I'd say, I'd say one fifty give or take five inches on each side. Okay, So he ends up coming through and he's twelve yards in front of me for I even I don't even know how for how many minutes. Uh, he just was milling around looking for this fight A couple a couple of does we're coming up? So then he ended up turning around chasing him. So I ended up passing this fifty in ten pointer really good. It was just a combination of I got the opportunity and the reason I'm saying this is kind of foreshadowing for the ending of this my rutcation. But I got the opportunity to observe him. I got the opportunity to look at, you know, his body. The body said, he's three years old. He's not a shooter in that department. He's got a great rack, but he's just not what I'm looking for. On day one of my of my vacation, So had that encounter, you know, more deer come in and out, and then some coyotes come up behind me and they blow the field out, which was great because it was right at last light, and it gave me the opportunity to walk in through the middle of the field back to my truck. Saturday morning, I decided, you know what, my family's here. I'm gonna sleep in and I'm gonna hang with the family until they leave, and then I'm gonna go out for that evening hunt on Saturday night. So Saturday night, uh so I played with the kids for a while, play with the family. Um, they leave, I get ready. So I go to the timber pretty early, and for some reason, I said, I got this northeast wind, and I said, you know what, I'm gonna give this wind a shot in my best area, and I need basically a straight west wind. For typically I hunted on a straight west wind. Um, And I said, you know what, I think I've never tested this before, but I think that I'm gonna go in to this this tree stand that I have in there, and I'm gonna let the wind and I'm gonna check the wind to see what it does. I have a feeling that it's gonna go down the timber line just a bit where these deer come from. But I think as this creek kind of curves away, that that crick is gonna suck all the wind in and blow the wind down the creek. And sure enough I was dropping those, you know, I got into my tree stand, got set up, I had my access route. Was a little risky getting in because if there was deer bedded in this thicket along the creek, my wind walking in would have went through it. You know. I spray myself down with nose jammer, you know, So I feel that if they're exposed to that scent, whether it's the no nose jammer or me or a combination of it, for a very short period of time, they tolerate it, as opposed to you know, if I was just standing there all night and let my wind blow in there, you know what I mean. So I think they tolerated it for very short periods of time. I ended up bumping two doughs on the this point across the creek from me on a different farm, but you know, it's real close. The property borders the creek, and so my wind does exactly what I thought it was gonna do. It went down just the ways. But then it dropped hard into the creek and it just blew out the back of the creek down to the property. So none of my wind was going anywhere where deer were walking unless down wind they crossed the creek somewhere, you know what I mean. So I'm sitting there, I see a you know, like a couple small tens come through, a couple of small eights, you know, some two year olds basically or walking through. Um it's getting oh man, it's getting like four o'clock. Now, this is before, you don't know, Yeah, this is before the time changed. Saturday night would have been the time changed, so maybe it was five. But I'm sitting there and I hear a a branch crack behind me, and I turned around and it's another big buck. I got trail camera pictures of him. He's a ten with split brows. He's gonna probably be in the low one fifties as well. Uh, just out to his ears, ten pointer, decent mass, and he comes within eight yards in my stand. And the third day, third big plus buck. This is second day, second yeah, second day, And because I hunted, my first day was Friday, right, and so I'm I'm just going, oh man, I don't like, I don't want my season to be over right now. I don't want it to be over. And I think he's a three year old, you know, and you have these moments where if you like, if you have to question it or talk yourself into something, then I don't think it's a a good idea to shoot it, right. I want to shoot it because I want to shoot it, not because I'm talking myself into it to it. So all these things were running through my head. I was like, you know what, I'm gonna let him go. So I let him go, right I I'll let him go. And so I'm saying in there and I look, and this is probably ten fifty minutes after this buck leaves. I turn and I look in the field and it's one of my hitlisters at about a hundred and fifty yards giver take and he he's in the field, head down, and I put my bindoes up. I'm like, who is that? Who is that? He puts his head up, kind of looks scans the area, and I instantly know what bucket is. I picked the antlers up and I just go boom as loud as I could. I mean, you rattle so hard that you can smell the antlers, you know, those kind of those kind of rattling sequences where you can smell the heat coming off from the friction. And he turns his body and he starts walking real slow right towards me. And I'm like, holy sh it, this is I'm I'm going to rattle in a mature buck like that was the thought that crossed my mind. So he just a hears behind some trees. I can't see him. This is thirty like thirty minutes goes by, and he's closer, but he's taking his time and feeding, right. So he gets to the corner of this field and he starts to basically eat. So I throw out a snort wheeze at him, you know, and he pops his head up and he looks in and he like his ears don't go back, but he kind of it's almost like he's throwing his shoulders up, like he's getting piste, and like, who is in who's in there? I know, I beat everybody's ass in there. I who's trying to, you know, challenge me? He he like kind of walks in this big circle, but he I don't know. You ever see him moose, You know they they walk with that big you know, that big antler's way. Yeah, yeah, he's doing he's doing that out in the field to some other little bucks, like showing him his antlers. It almost looked like he's showing him talking about yeah yeah, yeah yeah. So this buck is doing that out there, and the other bucks are kind of working their way away from like Okay, this guy means business. And then I do this g running sequence like another bucks tending a grunt, you know, tending a dough, and they're like brack brack, you know yea, And he he looks in almost like he knows he's gonna go in there and do whatever he wants to anyway, So he's going to continue eating ten minutes past of him eating at Oh, I'm gonna say, inside a hundred yards somewhere between eighty and a hundred yards. And he drops into this real thick stuff. I'm I'm hunting some edge, uh, and it kind of opens up in front of me. This is that's where all the sign is. But it gets real thick. Remember we talked about my property that they logged it a couple of years ago, and now it's just thick and nasty back there. It's beautiful, and so he goes in there and disappears, and I'm like, where the hell did he go? Well, out of there pops another dough and a young buck chasing her right, and he pops out again in the field right, and he's running down, or he's not running. He just steps out. The other butt chases this dough away. The dough is running away, and he lets this young buck like he knew she wasn't ready to breed yet. Maybe that that was my assumption. Well, this big buck comes back into the timber right where he left and then disappears for fifteen minutes. I hear a branch break in the creek behind me and there's a dough and I look further down the creek and there he is, and he's coming right at me with this dough. And we go through this the dough. I'm speeding this up, but the dough walks into the shooting lane, walks by it down into the creek, and he does the same thing. And he stops to smell where she's at and I draw back anchor pin on, let the pull the trigger. And I'm just like, you know, it's like when these guys shoot the three pointers and they know it's in. They just turned around and walk away. That's how I felt. Did you turn around and walk away mid shot? Yeah? I looked. I looked back at the camera that wasn't there, and I was like, like, nailed it, you know, like I was. Yeah, I was that confident that that this buck was gonna get hit by my arrow like I was. I was just I knew it. How far was it? It was twenty eight yards yards completely broadside down in a creek. And and then in that moment, it's I mean we're talking. In the matter of a second, I'm I go from confident to what the hell just happened? Because not now I don't see my knock leaving, I see my broad head, and then my arrow turned sideways. I glanced a very very small branch that was in the way that I couldn't even see until I'm like, what the hell happened? So I picked up binoculars up and I see this. I mean, it's the tiniest, littlest branch there, and my arrow hit it and just like started tail spinning, and this buck pops up on top of the creek. And now he's at forty and I'm just like, you know, what the hell, and I launched I launched another arrow, and I rushed the shot and everything, and uh it was not I should have never taken it, but it was a complete miss right shanked shanked that shot, um. And I kind of went through in that in that twenty four hours, I went through what you went through, like, oh my god, I just missed the biggest buck in my life, or you know, like it wasn't necessarily my fault, but it was my fault because I didn't you know, I didn't see the twig. I should have seen the twig. I didn't see the twig. The twig affected the shot, you know. And I got a hundred fifty hundred sixty class five year old eight pointer that is gone right. And he showed up on trail cameras the next couple of days. But I mean I was let's say, the next day he showed up, I was back in that same tree stand to the south because I had a like it was a southeast wind, so the wind was blowing right into where he would have been coming from. So I couldn't. I can't hunt that, you know, that's just that's just dumb you can't take a risk like that. So I bounced that that. You see, that was Saturday night. Sunday morning. I get up and I go to a completely different part of the farm and I sit there. See today is Tuesday, right, we're recording this on a Tuesday Wednesday. Today's Wednesday. So I'm trying to think of what I did. But for Friday, see Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Friday, Saturday, Sunday, I saw shooters the entire time. Um uh. Let see Sunday morning, I get into the timber. Is it Sunday morning, Yeah, Sunday morning. I get into the timber, and it is perfect. You know. I set this tree stand up in a pinch point, money winds blown exactly. It's doing exactly what I wanted it to do. And the deer are starting to move through this pinch point like a couple of does, two young bucks. And all of a sudden, I catch some movement out of my left eye and there is another shooter. Oh my god, man, a nine pointer. I'm gonna say, one sixty nine point wide, huge eight nine point And I'm just like, where where are you hunting? Are you hunting an aisle or something. Yeah, I don't know, like the farm was just loaded this year. You know, every once in a while you'll get that in here here where I live, and I guess anyway, but uh, you know, like I turned around and he's got his nose to the ground. He's looking so I'm like, okay, braraprap, and he keeps walking rap and he puts his head up looks my way. But he must have been on a dough that I didn't see. I throw the antlers together and rattle it. I'm like, he's just gonna come over. I just know it. And then boom in the timbers gun goes off. Somebody shot a single shot in that, and I'm just like, oh my god ruined. You know, Like then the movement just shut off. Right. This is one of those stands that you know, you wanted me to sit all day long to try to try to see what movement was coming in between ten and two o'clock. And I wanted to do it, but you know, I can't do that when guns are going on? Can I can? I positive story here? Really quick? Okay? Go for just a brief interlude about that very topic. I just want to mention my holy field shot opportunity eleven o'clock. Our buddy, our mutual friend, Dustin, he killed a bucket to twenty in the afternoon a couple of days ago, and we just pulled trail camera cards in Ohio and two different shooters on trail camera at twelve thirty in the afternoon and one thirty in the afternoon. So just to reminder for everyone out there, midday six can be really good this time of year. That's all. Sorry, continue, No, no, you're good man, You're good. That's a great point. Great point, except I hunt eight. Hunting mid day, yeah, I can't say I enjoy it either. But so so then Saturday I went, or let's see, Sunday night, after I've seen that shooter had the wrong wind, you know, I wanted to get back down where I was getting all these trail camera pictures of the other bigger bucks, you know, to try to get in on him again. Sat in the same two stands, and I think that the my my access and hunting there was starting to affect the uh, maybe some of the deer movement a little bit. I mean, I still saw some great deer. The dos were still there on Sunday evening, uh. And then Monday, Monday morning, I went back down there. And then uh, Tuesday or Monday night, I went back down there, and I bumped walking in to this one stand. I bumped literally thirteen doughs out of their beds walking to the stand. And I'm just like, well, the bucks don't have any reason to be here, now, you know what I mean, like unless they're cruising, you know, I and I don't. I didn't even see what blew out of the back end of this this betting area. But you know, so Monday was over. Tuesday morning, I was back in that same spot, hoping that, you know, that they had filtered in. Sure enough, they came in. You know, I had a hot hot dog getting chased by um two two year olds pretty heavily, and they were all over the place, right, So I had, you know, like three or four bucks came through before seven o'clock and then boom, neighboring property gun goes off. I just like, are you kidding me? Like, I just want to know what what these guys were killing? You know what they're killing with these guns? Yeah, exactly, raccoon was in the barn, you know, like whatever, But okay, So anyway, Uh, you know, so I'm having one hell of a rut already. I'm seeing great deer movement, I'm seeing great sign My trail cameras are consistently showing these deer um. But I think I would think I'm putting too much pressure on the property. So I thought to myself, you know what, what the hell I want to go to this new piece of property that I acquired. I didn't hunt any of it, you know, I didn't hunt. I've been hunting on it twice. But it was like on the very north end of the farm and just easy access. And it was in early October when I when I hunted those and I think, I told you I saw like a decent a decent buck at dark. I really couldn't tell what he was. I was assuming I was, you know, I really couldn't tell what he was. So I said, you know what, And long story short, here's another interlude to that story. I was told I was the only bow hunter on there, all right. I go down in there on my second hunt and I see a trail camera in a tree stand, so I, you know, I obviously report that back to the Lando and I said, hey, man, I there's another tree stand. He's like, I'm calling the d n R. They're gonna get this guy for truspassing whatever whatever. So he goes, I want you to go down there, take that tree stand down, and take that camer down and bring it back to the tree or to the house. I'm just like, oh, man, I don't want to get involved in this, but if the land owner wants me to do it, I guess I'll do it. I go down there and there's a guy sitting in the tree stand, so I go, come here. I say, come here. So he gets down and I and he I go. I go. I don't want to get into any drama, but who are you? And he's like, my name is so and so and I've been hunting here nine years, And I go nine years. This guy doesn't even know who you are. That's awesome. So so he's like, well, so the guy that I communicate with is the son in law to the property owner. The property owner is in a hospital because he broke his hip right and he's getting rehabbed out. So so he's, uh, he's telling me that he's been hunting here for nine years, Like okay, I don't care, Like I I got shipped to do. I'll just go hunt on the different part of the farm. Whatever. It's good. It's a decent farm. So so that that happened so last night, you know, I'm like, screw it. I don't have any I have nothing to go on other than what I've learned over the years. Right read sign, play the wind, play terrain. Right. So I part my truck. I'm loaded up running gun style, you know, we've done it a hundred times. And I'm walking in facing the you know, face to the wind, and the property lays kind of like a upside down l with a thick part of the bottom l um, you know how it's there's so there's a corner in there. Right in that corner is a very narrow logging trail or like just enough for an a TV. And then two it drops down into a ravine and that ravine is just very thick, you know, like one of those things that if someone you get, you let the new guy shed hunt that part of the farm because he's gonna be on his hands and knees, you know. So I'm walking in. I'm following these fence lines, you know, and every overhanging tree and I'm not exaggerating here. Every overhanging tree on this field had a scrape in it, and it looked like they were fresh, right, I mean, just like it's tore up from scrapes, you know, not huge rubs, but you know, there was little rubs all along the field. So I'm like, man, something's working in here. You know, who knows what it is. So I gotta find a way that my wind is not going to blow into this logging trail, but I can still hunt the top of this ridge. Because my goal was to set up in a tree to where I was close enough to the thick stuff, you know, hunting that edge. At the same time, I wanted to be looking into the valley to observe any motion on the opposite side of the ridge. You know. That was that was because this ridge ran the entire length of the farm, so I wanted to make it an observation set. But I wanted to do it in a way that if a deer did come by through this stick stuff, because you know, deer don't typically work their way. You know, they're not walking on the top of the ridge right there, down off the edge, you know, so they can smell everything. But It was hard for me to hunt hunt that because I wanted to. I wanted my wind to not blow right down that edge. So if something did decide to um hunt on the two you know, walk on the two track, that my wind really wasn't um I'm gonna blow down there. So I came off just a bit and it was one of those fifty hunts where I felt if something was gonna come and the wind shifted just a bit, I was screwed. But luckily it held true and it blew out into this field, into the CRP field, and um uh stayed there the entire night, so I was cut. It was it was literally like a forty ft difference where my uh, you know, my wind trackers went when I was, you know, testing my wind. And sure enough, man, I stood up in this tree and immediately start seeing deer. It was like as soon as I clamped in, brought my bow up and hung it up, deer started moving. I saw before the buck that I ended up shooting, I saw five bucks, all within shooting range, working this ridge, and I'm just like, wow, this and this is what I'm really proud of. I'm proud of the fact that I read sign I read terrain, and I played the wind aggressively, and it allowed me to set up to catch deer movement and not get busted. That's an accomplishment for anybody. I don't care how season do you are or inexperienced you are. If you can do those three things and get close to deer, you're doing something right as far as far as a strategy standpoint. You know, now, shooting a deer is a whole different story if you but if you can do those things, you're gonna get close to two deer. Well after these bucks work through two doughs out of nowhere, there's no there's no real egg. This is all timber like there's I think on the neighboring farm there might be some food plots, but I couldn't see any through my binoculars. It looked like they just had a huge disk up field, like they harvested it and then overturned it. Overturned it, so there's nothing for them to eat. So but there's plenty, you know, there's plenty of stuff in the timber to eat. And two does come out of this bottom ridge or where the ridge kind of keeps going comes up over top. Did exactly what I thought they were gonna do, drop off the ridge just a little bit as to not like skyline themselves else. And they were working the thick stuff through, and they worked by me, and they were just like they were in front of me eating on a bush for like, man ten minutes, fifteen minutes, and all of a sudden, the dope popped her head up and looks down the ridge, and I couldn't see what she was looking at right away, and she she puts her head up, and then all of a sudden, I hear like a like some heavy movement coming through the timber, and she kind of notices something was coming at her and drops down. And I'm like, okay, there's a buck coming. And the three of those bucks had worked their way up that way, and I thought, well, maybe one of them is coming back. So I put my binos up and I see movement, but I could only see from half of the deer up, so I can't see its legs. I can't see its whole body. Um, I can see part of its head and ant or something like, because it's real thick, right. I look up and I'm like, oh my god, that and it's all I never saw this deer head on. I saw him broadside only, and I'm like, that is a big buck like the mass on his ties, and he just looked huge. And then he starts working his way. I kind of lost him, but I knew he was coming. And then he intercepted those dos and those does went up the ridge and he turned around. He followed those does up the ridge and I'm like, well, I have no idea what this buckets. I need to get a better look at him. So I I literally did this rap. That was it, and he stopped and I could see his antlers swing around and look back at me in in my general direction, and I saw him lick his lips like, you know, like you know how these deers get excited and they're drooling and they're just like, he licks his lips and he turns around, he comes to investigate, and he is he just I can't get a good look on him, you know, like the other two dear I passed this week. I was able to put my binoculars on him. I was able to get a good look at him, and I was able to say, you know what that is a that is not a shooter. I'm going to pass right. I couldn't do this with this book because he was in such thick cover. And then he's getting close, so I'm just like, oh man, I got I gotta, I gotta make a decision here, and I couldn't. I couldn't tell, so I, you know, I picked my bow up. I got ready to draw back. He's coming into an opening that's about twenty yards away. But that opening is just it's like a stretch where I just got lucky, I guess, And and there was a shooting lane kind of naturally there, and it was thick. It was thick, and it's kind of antlers popped out, and I'm like, okay, that's a that's a big buck. I draw back, and all of a sudden he steps out and he's our my my anchor point. I didn't really check his body like I probably should. He the massive broadside from you know, in the Antler department. And you know, it was one of these decisions that I had to make in that one small opening that I had, and it was shoot him or lose him right. And I shot him right, and I drilled him and he he takes like he go. I hear the I hear the and I hear this, all this air come out of him, like he just got punched in the gut. And I'm just like, son of a bitch, like I just got shot him. And it was a little back, but it wasn't it didn't seem too far back. And and I'm just like, oh my god, I got shot him. But he didn't run, so he he he kind of walked off very slow, about fifteen twenty yards and he stood there all haunched up, and I put my bot my like, I put my binos back on him and not really like judging his body because of my adrenaline was pumping. But I was looking at his rack, like, dude, that's a decent rack. That's a good rack. Um, you know that is a good rack. And you know, I just was like I was happy, right, I'm just like, oh my god, I just did it. You know, I got that. I got that post shot pump, I was like, and I started freaking out. You know, I'm that guy who gets emotional when when I harvest an animal. But I wasn't like a sure yet. And because he's sitting there and he's going and I didn't see any blood coming out of him, right, because I didn't hit long, I didn't hit heart. I was back behind the diaphragm on the shot um and he was kind of stretched out when I shot him. So when I shot him and he started walking, that skin came back from what it looked like over the whole in his in his ribs, and he he wasn't bleeding very well because that it was so far back, and that's what made me think I guts. So he walks, he starts to make this half loop, and so I get another air already. I'm like, oh, home, he might come back around and I'm gonna shoot him again. He's kind of coming up from behind me now, and then he gets that wide his tail starts going. I'm like, oh, that's not a good sign to him, right, And then he starts getting wide legs right when they're they're laid where he's trying to get a bigger basse under him, and then he starts taking Then he then he starts losing his balance and I'm like, dude, he is toast. He's toast, and he starts then he gets back up again and I'm like, oh, what happened? Like he's getting like then he postures up and he's he looks fine. And then that was it. He he took this, he took these three wobbly steps, he laid down, put his head down, and then from the time I shot him to the time he expired was probably three minutes, uh three or four minutes. And I'm just like, oh my god, I just shot the one of like the biggest buck of my life, right, and I was pumped. I called my called my wife, I called my stepdad, I called my buddy Ben, and I was just like, oh, you know, I was texting people. I was like, oh, ship, this is awesome. This is awesome, you know, like I'm happy, I'm excited, and I'm dude, I'm still excited. And I feel that there's a butt coming though. What a but well, you're building this all up like I was. I was, I was, but and I am I am, I am so and I'm sure this has happened to a lot of people. I get down out of my tree stand and I walk over to the deer and I look at it and I'm like, mm hmm. You know that people used the term ground shrinkage, right, this deer was not what I thought it was. Now, don't confuse that for me being unhappy with this. Don't confuse that with me being um like, oh, you know, like I don't know, I only shoot big bucks, you know, like that kind of ship. Don't get, don't get. Don't get a negative kind of connotation with that. This buck was not what I thought it was. But I am happy. I am thankful. I am like, I'm pumped. I'm still pumped that I shot this, dear. It's just not it's just not what I thought it was when it was coming through the thick timber. Right, I'm not trying to make excuses for it. I'm jacked. I'm happy. You know, I gotta I gotta buck at the taxidermist. I have a you know, a freezer full of meat coming. Everything that I did and this is and like I said to you, I'm very proud of this fact. I was able to run and gun, read sign and and be successful on a first time in and I've never done that before. Right, that's awesome. And this buck, this buck is awesome. Awesome characteristics his his dude, I I honestly think, in my opinion, he is a three year old. He could possibly be a two year old. I'm not joking. Yes, dude, his body is very small really yeah, yep, yep. But he had a very deceiving rat coming through the timber, and I think that played a role in me shooting him thinking because his body was so small and I was comparing him to a dough you know, that's the only thing that really was around at the time the last year I saw. You know, I'm not. I'm not. I don't want to make excuses because the buck does not deserve that, but well, I just want to I just it was not what I thought I shot. I thought I shot something bigger. It looked bigger coming through the timber. That doesn't mean ship. I mean, yeah, that's a good little awesome. It's a really good looking and the antlers don't mean shit. The memory I have will have of this is will last forever. Yeah. And the knowledge that I gained through how do your travel through the timber on this farm and how I set up on it will be something that I'm going to do again next season when I go to hunt this farm. It sounds like an awesome hunt. It was. It was money and it's it's always good. You know. I don't know how you are, but do you ever, I find myself questioning everything I do. I overthink, I overthink, I overthink what if should I hunt this dand now should I hunt this Dand yep, I know you're guilty of it too. And it was good to go in and basically driving down to my main farm, I was like, you know, what's screwed. I'm going to this new farm tonight. I'm gonna run and gun. I don't I don't care, I'm gonna I'm gonna go. I'm gonna do what we all want to do. Just read the sign, play the wind, play the terrain. And I did it and it worked, and I'm I was so happy, like I'm happy that, you know, and I'm happy that now I gotta go hang with my kids for a while, right. So it just this was an absolutely awesome vocation. Man, just the deer that I saw, the deer that I you know, passed. I mean a lot of it also had to do with on my other farm. I had trail camera pictures of all these deer. I knew who these deer were, right, I said, oh, well, yeah, I know him. I know he's a three year old because I've looked at a thousand pictures of him on this other on this other farm. I didn't have any trail camera intel, so I didn't know anybody, right, So you mix that with what all happened, and it's just like, uh, oh, well it's not what I thought it was. But that's okay, you know something. These things happen for a reason. And um again, I just want to reiterate, I'm not disappointed in any way with uh, with the outcome of this. I'm very happy, very happy. I'm happy for you, dude. It sounds like just a really a really incredible week. And to have an end like that, even though maybe it wasn't quite as older as big as you thought, I think to your point, you put together an awesome hunt. You you you achieved you know, the goal of that night, which was to do all those things you mentioned, going to a new spot, figure it out, be within range of deer, and I'll tell you what or some of the people out there would probably give their left arm to ever shoot a deer like that. So you're doing all right, I'd say, you are doing all I can tell you that there's at least one person here in this hotel room. His name rhymes with burder and he would shoot that buck all day. So so now now here, here's something you gotta think about. Okay. Is I I ate Chinese tonight? Okay, okay, the fortune cookie in my Chinese food tonight says a secret adventure is in store for you. Okay, that's exciting. Yeah. So here's here's what I think needs to happen. I think on your way to North Dakota, you need to pick me up. If I know when you're texting me that, I wish we could do that. I hope we could do that. But this dear holy Field has got me locked down. Oh buddy, but buddy, kill him and then let's go. Man if I can, if I can make it there still, I would love to swing through. I want to pick you up. I'm right on the way, man, I'm right on the way. You are too, man, It would be awesome. Yeah, it's a bummer the way things are going. I don't I don't know if I'm gonna get to use that tag at all. I wasted two hours or whatever it was, not even get to hunt the state once. But that was kind of you roll the dice when you when you playing all these things like that, right, yep, you do. And especially when you go into a season focus so much on one single deer yea and uh and yeah, live and learn and you've got to roll the punches and play the cards even dealt right, right. So I just I just want to say one more thing to everybody who's listening out there. You know, we get on we got on Instagram, we get on Facebook, and we see all these giant deer getting killed and it's hard not to say, oh, man, I really wish I had that. I really I want to do that. I want to you know, I want to kill a big buck. Ignore that. You have to hunt your hunt, and you have to hunt whatever however style you see fit um, whether that's don't know. There's so many different ways to hunt. But what I'm getting at is, don't compare this your style and your dear to anybody else's because they don't hunt the same as you. You don't hunt the same as them. Uh, different states, different rules, different you know, there's so many other things that are out there, and it takes away from the true meaning of the hunt and actually in honoring the animal as well. So don't get caught up in the bullshit. I guess is what I'm getting at it. I think you need to shoot dear more often, Dan, because like you are on your game, You're in your a game tonight. You've got a level of energy and you've got some great points tonight. Like you are, You're you're in it tonight, Dan. I like it. I feel like i feel like I'm out of it. I feel like I'm not like you've brought. You brought the energy tonight. So thank you for doing that. Dan. You're you're keeping the podcast to float today. You've got some good stuff. I'm here just barely keeping my eyes open and thinking where am I going to sit tomorrow? But yeah, I think you make a really a really good point. I think it's really easy to get. And heck, I'm guilty but sometimes too, even though I tell myself in the moment, don't do this, don't let it affect you. But sometimes when when things aren't going your way and you pull it Facebook and see ten people you know all killed Giant Bucks, it can be a little bit demoralizing at times, and you just gotta fight that and you gotta to your point, enjoy it, focus on your hunt, what you're doing, and that's what I've been trying to do, especially after what happened the other day when I blew my opportunity and I was kind of beating myself up. Right after that, I kind of realized, you know what, this whole year, you've been so focused on just killing this deer. Which yes, I'm very goal oriented. I like to achieve my goals. I like to work towards challenging goals. That's great and good. But when that starts to just cause you endless stress and take the fun out of it and all that kind of stuff, and I tend to have it I am. I am susceptible to this a lot because of how goal oriented I'm I can every year I'm getting too stressed about something and I always have to end up reminding myself to like chill out, enjoy it, you know, and just take a deep breath. This isn't life or death, um. And so that's kind of what I'm trying to do now, you know. That's why I decided to go to Ohio. I want to, you know, go to go to a new spot for a little bit of hang out with my buddies down here, just have a little fun for a little bit because to be honest, I don't know how much fun I was having the last week and a half. Um, I was more just it was more like, I don't know, I was just caught up in like the mission of it, and I was like focused on every little thing I did wrong or every little thing I needed to do. And um, sometimes you gets to say, you know what, I'm hunting because I enjoy hunting. Let's enjoy it. So so I think that's that's something we can all try to do this year. This time of year can get stressful because you know, everyone, you know, we kind of think that the rut is when you get I get done. If I don't get it done now, if I don't kill buck now, I'm not going to kill one, and um, you know what, just enjoy it. It's a great time of year. Enjoy that time. Don't let it be all about if you kill or not. Actually enjoy the experience in the process. So that's what I'm gonna try to do these next few days. We'll see what happens lately. Absolutely, because you're gonna blank and it's over. That's true. It's very true, and we wait all year for it, so I might as well have fun while it's here. So absolutely well, I think on that note, man, we should shut it down because it's ten third at night and I gotta wake up in like four hours to head back to a tree stand. My question real quick before we leave is are you in a hotel with one bet or two beds? For you guys, We're in a hotel with two beds, okay, we do. We do have some separation. You guys put all your gear on one bed and then you share, you too, share. Of course, I thought that goes up. That goes up being said, Oh man, Josh further Hilliard is is very much a part of this podcast episode, even though we didn't let him actually talk. I'll tell you what if if there's one person I would ever want to spoon with in a hotel bedroom, it would be old Josh Further I could. He's just over here just shaking his head. And that is how we ended, and that is how we ended. So let's shut this one down. All you guys out there hunting, good luck, and so with that we will wrap this episode up before we go. The big thank you to our partners at Sitka Gear. Yetie Cooler's Matthew's Archery, Mayven Optics, the white Tail Institute of North America, Trophy Ridge and hunt ter maps, and finally, of course, thank you all for listening, thanks for being here with us. Like I said a second ago, good luck in the tree and until next time, stay wired to hunt the County Group of brother Both to Pat Tota,