Ep. 52: DIY Elk Hunting Series: Rifle Elk Hunting PT1

Dirk had the great opportunity to sit down with "Stuck N the Rut" YouTuber Tom Schneider and talk about hunting elk with a rifle. This is part one of two episodes. In this episode, they break down how to find elk and how to hunt them during the first part of October.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:12):
Welcome back to another episode of Cutting the Distance podcast.
I'm your host Dirk Durham, and today I have a
special guest, really good friend, Tom Schneider. Tom and I
have kind of connected over social media over the last
few years. If you guys have been living under a
rock somewhere, you may not know who Tom Schneider is.

(00:32):
So Tom runs the Stuck in the Rut YouTube channel
and social media pages. Stuck in the Rut. They're based
in Idaho. They have a trophy room that I would
say would rival about anybody's I've ever seen. They have
a very special family. They're a hunting family that has
been super successful across all species of animals in Idaho,

(00:56):
big game species, whether you're talking about white tails, mule deer,
hell moose, and then Alaska as well. They have family
members in Alaska that invite them up and then they've
taken all sorts of beautiful animals in Alaska's harshest conditions
and they've documented all this on YouTube videos. If you haven't,
if you've never seen their YouTube channel, you got to

(01:17):
check it out. Stuck in the Rut. I just want
to say welcome Tom, thanks for coming on.

Speaker 2 (01:21):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:29):
I think people watch your videos and see what you
guys are doing, and they think, oh, man, all you
guys do is hunt all the time. You must be rich.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
Yeah, we just have this unlimited money, you know.

Speaker 1 (01:43):
Yeah, you know, but I'm here to say it. You know,
his family, they're normal people with normal incomes. But what
they do is they work a lot and bank money
and bake time to go hunting. So to talk about
you know what, what's what's work life look for?

Speaker 2 (02:01):
Well, you you've met my dad already.

Speaker 1 (02:03):
Yeah, your dad is one of the coolest guys I've
ever met. I just love old guys like that because
he doesn't seem old, but he's you know, his his
years and that he's been on earth is he's been
here a long time. But he's he's got a younger soul.
And and then he's he's a character.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
Oh, he's just a workaholic. And you know we I
think all of our family member, all the siblings, pretty
much picked that work ethic up from him. I was
telling you yesterday, not by choice, because that's just the
family we grew up in. Not throwing any family members
in a bus, but even my little we crack up
and make fun of it a little bit. My little

(02:42):
brother too, just at a young age, we just never
were like, man, he's he's the laziest one in the family.
He was never going to gain a work ethic. And man,
Surevor will outwork anybody out there. You know. It's just
really we just grew up in a really good family dynamic.
My dad's a workaholic. My mom works hard too. She

(03:02):
didn't start working until after you know, she was a
stay at home mom and as soon as we grew
up and got out of the house. Now she's working
full time as well. And yeah, you know, I think
dad just really got us into hunting at an early
age two. Again, you're he's hunted. You've hunted a lot
of the same hunting grounds he's hunted back in the eighties. Yeah,
and you know, and he got to see the Heyday

(03:25):
and some of the stories I didn't know or bs
or not where he's talking about, Oh I saw that
four hundred inch bowl, And I'm like, okay, Dad, Yeah
for him, But then you're show me that some of
those same areas, like hey, that it can happen. The
genetics are there. But unfortunately, as we as we consistently
talk about why you're here in the first place, too,

(03:46):
is that we're pursuing wolves because wolves have I don't
want to I'm not trying to exaggerate when I say this,
but they've ruined their lifestyle and and hunting and finding
the animals that we used to see, and you know,
I think those memories stay embedded in our minds of like, man,
you know, like I remember the days when I'd climb

(04:08):
up on this ridge and I'd have four bills bugling,
and you have the habitat, you got the feed, and
then all of a sudden, it's just like it's gone.
So I kind of got off topic there, but I
just I see that, and that's kind of why we
pursue wolves, and you know you're up here and that
we kind of did a couple of days of that
and at a blast. But yeah, going back to you know,

(04:30):
our family dynamic. I've been really fortunate to live in
a family where we get along for one, where we fight,
We have our moments where we fight. Me working together,
I still bounce between Travis and Dad. So Travis has
a construction business. He builds houses for a living. My
dad works in the woods between logging, between clearing land
for other property owners. So I guess it's tough to

(04:54):
really give myself a title. Like if you were to
ask me, Tom, what do you do for work? I've
really had a hard time i give myself a title
for that, Like I'm a contractor, i am a fort
I'm in forest management. It just really depends. Like some years,
I'm like, I'm done building. This year, I want to
switch back to doing some forest management. And I think

(05:15):
at the end goal is though, is to make enough
money so that we can hunt in the fall. And
that's my drive. Like I couldn't just for me, I
can't just I mean, I consider myself like a very
hard worker. But if I didn't have those passions and
hobbies to keep me going, I probably would just straight

(05:38):
up pick up a nine to five and just say,
you know what, screwed. I'm just gonna I'm just gonna
zombie it for the rest of my life. Get a
nine to five, you know, just to put food on
the table. But no, I have passions. I have well
I don't know if you call it a passion or
an obsession. I love to hunt. I'm just passionate about it.
And with the work that we do. It allows us

(06:01):
to take off time in the fall to hunt, and
then by the end of the fall that money gets
Well I was telling you about that, Mike, like towards
the very very end of the fall and you have
all these taxony bills. I'm like, ah, that is a
nice bowl, but I don't at this point, I'm strapped
on money. So about time December kicks in, I'm back
to have, you know, to make it up for lost

(06:23):
time and so but again, it's worth it, It's all
worth it.

Speaker 1 (06:28):
Yeah, that's awesome. Well you kind of said you got
we went sideways or got off track a little bit
about when we talk about wolves. But I think that
kind of segues in nice to what we're really going
to talk about today. And I wanted to pick your
brain on rifle hunting. You know, in Idaho, a lot
of the units it's in October ends about the first

(06:51):
part of November, and some years you may be lucky
enough to find a bullet bugles that first few days
of October season.

Speaker 2 (07:01):
Or not.

Speaker 1 (07:02):
And sometimes, especially with being Idaho is so forested, it's
really hard to find final if they're not being vocal
during rifle season, if if there's not. If they're not
an opening somewhere, then you have the big timber to
try to locate them in. And I just kind of
want to figure out what your process was. And I

(07:23):
know we've talked a lot this week about it, just
as you showed me the beautiful country here, but kind
of wonder listeners to kind of get a peek on
how you find elk in October, whether you know, maybe
do some calling and stuff, and then how it kind
of transpires from from there.

Speaker 2 (07:42):
Absolutely, And I can I switch this off to a
question to you. Yeah, so you you spent two full
two or three I'm trying to think now the days
are starting to blur.

Speaker 1 (07:54):
I think I've been here three days, three full.

Speaker 2 (07:56):
Days, that's right. So yeah, evening and stuff. So we've
you've walked around with me quite a bit. You've seen
what the terrain's like. What would you say your average
shooting lane is, like? How far of your shots do
you have?

Speaker 1 (08:09):
I feel like if if I were elk hunting and
would having an encounter, most of them would be up close,
very close, within fifty yards or less most of the time,
or super long distance like you know, six seven, eight hundred.

Speaker 2 (08:28):
Yards so that head into that base, and you and
I were at yesterday we actually had some long rune
shooting opportunities.

Speaker 1 (08:33):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (08:33):
Yeah, it's funny because it's it's never anything really in
the middle though, it's he it's brush as all get out,
or be here above tree line, and you got some
shooting lanes and so yeah, I think it really starts
with especially with elk hunting. I think what really helped

(08:54):
us out was was watching elk throughout the entire year.
You've talked right from the beginning, you've talked about the
type of wildlife we have, right, I say, I I've
lived in a very very fortunate where I live in
the fact that we have a lot of different species
of animals. You know, some areas you hunt, it's just

(09:15):
it's an elk area. Some areas you hunt it's a
meal deer area. You know, this could be Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado. Right,
some areas it's just a moose area. We live in
one of these very interesting ecosystems where we have meal deer.
If you're at a certain elevation, you're a meal deer.
You're at a certain elevation, you're in white tails, good
white tails, elk wolf, unfortunately black bear. We have grizzlies.

(09:42):
We were we were falling grizzly.

Speaker 1 (09:44):
Track, arizzly grizzly track first day and Tom, look at this,
there's a big old bear track.

Speaker 2 (09:50):
Ready to run. A part of the call for wolves.
So mountain goats if you're if you just drive probably
about thirty minutes thirty minutes east of us, you're in
bighorn sheet. So we have a lot of animals, and
I'm sure there's a lot that I've missed that I've

(10:10):
oh yeah, then going to the Predator's mountain line, bobcat,
we do have a couple of links. I mean, again,
the list goes on. We have a variety of wildlife here.
And so now going back to the type of terrain
we're hunting, you know, it can be really challenging to
hunt this heavy timber country. But growing up and watching

(10:32):
the dynamic and all these animals and their behavior was
really helpful for us. Originally from the beginning, I felt
like there was a lot of elk. You and I've
talked about this where I felt like there was a
time where if you're just a hard hunter, you didn't
even have to know elk. If you're just a hard hunter,
you're going to come home with a good elk. But

(10:55):
now with the lack of elk that we have and
you don't have elk bugling like in the September season,
it could be really challenging and pulling an elk with
a rifle because the elk are so few and far between.
And the one thing that surprises me with a lot
of people is people are always asking where do you

(11:16):
hunt where? Or they see they see where my pickups
parked and they're like, oh, I know where you killed
that bowl, so now I know where to go to.
It's like, well, have fun. But if you don't know elk,
you're not going to know how to find them because
these pockets of elk, I mean, you've got thousands of
thousands of acres and you're trying to find one little
pocket of bulls like about your group of bowls in

(11:38):
the post rat season. And so you have to be
able to understand the behavior of elk and why they
do what they do. It's not where like, oh where
do I hunt? Where do I hunt? The question is
is why would I hunt there? If there's elk here?
You got to ask why You got to understand why
do elk do what they do. That's really what it

(11:58):
comes down to, right, Like, if you follow people, you're
going to get people. You want to follow me in
the woods, you're going to get me. If you stop
following me, stop following other people, don't you want to
find elk and get away from people exactly. And so
that's what you really need to do, right is to

(12:18):
focus on elk, learn about their habits and their behaviors,
and presume from there. And I will be honest and
saying that I prefer the archery season just the fact
that they're bugling. But sometimes as soon as the bugling
stops in October, everybody hangs up the bow and they're like,

(12:40):
I'm done for the year because I can't.

Speaker 1 (12:41):
Kill a post rut bowl.

Speaker 2 (12:43):
They don't realize that there is some really good opportunity
in killing a big bowl in the post rut season. Now,
Idaho has a lot of opportunity kill them in October.
There's places in Montana where the season's actually extended to November,
I mean, and then there's places like that in Idaho
too as well, and a lot of states too. There's

(13:03):
a lot of post rah opportunity with the rifle. But
the elk aren't talking. Sometimes talked about sometimes you get
a little a late rut and that's a game changer. Yeah,
so and then I know I'm just rattling on right now,
but it's just finding out whether they doing and why

(13:27):
are they're doing it. Weather can be an issue with that.
You have to think of an animal. We talked to
you and I both talked to before too. With every
species of animal, you have to find their groceries, you
have to find their shelter and safety. And those are
the three things that I mean just to lay down

(13:49):
a foundation for an elk hunter, mule deer hunter, wilf hunter, anything. Grocery,
shelter and safety is what is why an animal does
what they do and elk that that definition is different
than a meal deer, and elk's safety is different than
a meal deer, right, a meal deer, especially in an
area possibly you know, with long range shooting, I know,

(14:12):
I know a simelies don't hit the openings as much
as they used to. However, genetically they're designed to be
out an open country. That's they're they're able. You know,
at their long ears, they're able to pick up sound.
They're able to spot you along the ways away. When
I hunt Co Colorado bucks can spot me six seven
hundred yards away and move out of canyon. You know,
they're really good. They have really good ice height. An

(14:35):
elk's definition of safety is much different, and so so
you have to learn about that. You have to focus
on that in itself.

Speaker 1 (14:46):
So let's say it's opening day, Yeah, and you're out
there and you hear a bowl bugle. Oh, and I
hear a lot of folks tell me this story every year, Like, yeah, man,
I had a bowl bugling, and you know, I just
you know, I kind of got to a vantage point
and just kind of watched, and you know, and I
didn't really see the elk materialize, and you know, I

(15:09):
just they kind of slipped away from me, and darn it,
I didn't get an oak. What would you do if
you hear a bowl bugle in October?

Speaker 2 (15:21):
Great question, And I'm not going to answer this question directly,
but I'll say this that there's two different types of hunters.

Speaker 1 (15:30):
Right.

Speaker 2 (15:31):
There's those that are like really aggressive hunters. Those are regressive,
they just go and kill. There's the other hunters that
are too afraid to move in right, They're like, well,
if I move on, I'm gonna bump them, I'm gonna
scare them off. I try to find that balance. There's
a time, there's a window. You find this window of
opportunity and one and Travis is better. I mean, I

(15:54):
actually felt like I gained this technique for my brother
because my brother is he charges. He's like charge, you know.
I just imagine those war movies were like charge, you know,
and you got the guy with the horn, you know, Trav,
but charge out a bugle bowl. Yeah, And I learned
that from him. And if you have a bowl beegling,

(16:15):
and let's say you're in that timber like we were
talking about where you got those fifty yard shooting lanes,
then absolutely I would just go in there and charge.
Don't bugle, don't give out your location. You have a
rifle in your hand. It's different with the bow because
you have a lot of obstacles, right, you have to
get an archy range, you have to get him pass brush.
There's a lot of things that you know, so you're
going to try to call on that out. Don't try

(16:35):
to call on a bowl when you got a rifle
in your hand. This is just me. This is my technique. Right,
they're bugle and they're occupied. Just move in on them
and then just get a shot, get in it, getting close.
When you you start hitting that bubble and getting really close,
start slowing down, moving, you know, pull out your binos,

(16:55):
although sometimes you don't feel like in heavy timber country
you don't need binos. You do, you pick apart the timber.
Sometimes you just expect to see a full boone olk.
You're not going to expect to see that. You're looking
for an ear, You're looking for an eyeball. You're looking
for a rack. One of the biggest bulls. My brother
one of the biggest bulls, not the biggest bulll My
brother's killed the bull that he when he shot it,

(17:16):
all he saw was like an He knew it was
a big bull. But when he snuck up to it,
he saw an eyeball, and he saw like a part
of the rack where he only saw like two of
the front kickers. So he knew was a bull, but
he was unable to see in the entire rack. But
he was able to identify this is a bull, elk.
This is the herd bull, you know. And so that's

(17:38):
what you're looking for, right, But again it's finding that
window of opportunity to just charge in there and kill.
We've talked about where people don't know how to find
that balance. There's those who just they always charge in
on everything, where they're just like charge, charge, charge, and
they push the animals out of the canyon.

Speaker 1 (17:54):
Right.

Speaker 2 (17:56):
But I will say this that versus that those type
of people that do more charging versus the people that
are too afraid to move in, the guys that typically
charge in and just move into the canyon try to
get it done, those guys kill more they do. I
feel like one thing that we have I don't want
to say we've perfected, but we've perfected more than others

(18:18):
is the balance of that where we know when to
charge him and we know when than not to. But
if I have a bowl bugling and I have a
rifle in my hand, that is the perfect scenario. And
that doesn't happen every year. Sometimes they're not doing that
and you're timber pounding, or you're trying to catch them
in their feeding or betting areas, you know what I mean.

(18:38):
But if I had a bowl bugling, I'd say, depending
on the scenario, eighty percent of the time, I would
just move right in and them being quiet. If I'm
breaking a lot of branches, I have a cow, weal
cry to my mouth. Elk are loud animals. If any
of you have hunted elk in the woods, if you have,
even it could be a calend a calf, and it
sounds like a herd of elephants walking through the brush.

(19:01):
When you're walking in the brush, don't always think, oh shoot,
I mess up the hunt, like you're just another elk.
Bet out a couple of cow calls, and just keep
moving in. If you feel like you're out a point
to where they can hear you, you're not trying to again,
You're not trying to call them in. You're just trying
to cover up your sound right and getting in close
and getting a shot on this bowl.

Speaker 1 (19:33):
So I'm gonna boil that down a little bit. So
we hear this bowl bugling and I'm a few hundred
yards away, maybe across the big draw or whatever. So
immediately I'm like try to pinpoint where I hear the
sound come from, and then I'm gonna immediately go to
that bugle get and make sure I keep the wind
right and for the eighty to ninety percent of the

(19:58):
trip to that bull. I'm not gonna worry about being quiet.
I'm just gonna get there. I'm gonna move quickly. I'm
gonna snap some trip some some limbs and stuff. But
I'm just gonna I'm trying to cover the distance I
want to get over to there before that bowl leaves
the area. And then as I approach the area where
I think I'm getting very close, now I'm gonna slow
down a little bit and be a little more mindful

(20:19):
of my noise and then start working my way in.
But I'm not I'm not Elmer Fudd hunting. Like, I'm
not like taking one step, stopping for ten minutes and
then taking another step, kind of like still hunting. I'm
moving a little faster than that. I'm like, I'm moving slower,
more deliberate. I got my head on a swivel. I'm
using my optics to glass ahead to make sure I

(20:41):
don't get caught.

Speaker 2 (20:42):
Yeah, and when you the Elmer Thud hunting does happen
right when you get in that bubble. Right you're in
that bubble, you can hear the sticks popping around you.
You can smell them sometimes just melling them is enough,
Like you can sometimes smell before then you slow the
heck down, okay, and then and you're really the binos
are in your eyes and you're trying to just scan

(21:04):
the brush, like I said. Sometimes, like I know a
lot of guys that hunt heavy timbered country that just don't.
They don't pack binos. They don't. There's like, why do
I need them? I got my scope, you know, Honestly,
I like binos just because I got two eyes and
I could Sometimes it's great to use the scope to scan.
But a pair of binos, I got two eyes in them,

(21:25):
I can see a big I can see a lot more. Right,
So I'm looking for anything out of the ordinary. Sometimes
it will be tough in September because the brush is
turning yellow.

Speaker 1 (21:37):
Yeah, the same color of an elk.

Speaker 2 (21:38):
The same color of an elk. So, like I said,
so sometimes you're not even looking for the yellow body.
You're looking for an eyeball. You're looking for something out
of the ordinary.

Speaker 1 (21:45):
A nose, a nose, that shiny nose, or a flick
of an ear.

Speaker 2 (21:49):
Sometimes I've what I've seen was steam. So I've had that.
Where I'm walking, I smell elk I'm like, I feel
like I'm getting close, and all of a sudden, I
see steam, Like what's And I look with my binos
and it's steam coming out of the nostrils. Oh yeah,
I could see that because it's early morning, and I'm like, okay,
that's at I'm looking at milk nose right now. Then

(22:10):
you're like, there's an eyeball. They'll get the pedestal. Oh
there's it has antlers. You see part of a beam.
And It's the toughest thing about this type of hunting
is it's really tough to identify how big a bowl is. Now,
I've already identified that it's a shoot like you know
most states, it's like well Montana, it's brow tyn, it's

(22:32):
brow tiner bigger. So if I can identify that it
has browtyns in it's illegal bowl, I can shoot it. Right.
I don't know if it's It could be a rag bull,
it could be a three year old, it could be
a big mature monster bowl. That's just something you have
to make the choice of. And I've had multiple times
where I get where I would see a bowl that
has big fronts, I'm like, oh, that's a shooter bowl.

(22:55):
I'd chew and I'm like, oh, well it's a bowl,
you know, I'm happy with it, but I could have
swore it was bigger. Right, You know, you take those
quick shots because by that time, you know you expect it, oh,
wait for it to turn its head. By tims turn
its head. It's on the run. Yeah, and so then
you you just have to make a quick shot on that.

(23:16):
But I would rather shoot it while it's standing still.

Speaker 1 (23:19):
Right.

Speaker 2 (23:20):
But yeah, like we were talking about delmer thud thing
it's using. You know, it's you don't want to waste
your time in that long distance. Like, yeah, let's say
you heard that bowl beagle in three or four hundred
yards away, You're gonna waste her a lot of time
taking a couple of steps looking around right, charge in there,
getting close, then stop and start really slowing down on

(23:41):
your walking again. Sticks popping is not going to lun
them that much, right, Like they're they're ilk, they're loud animals.

Speaker 1 (23:48):
Yeah, and if you give an occasional cow call, we're
not saying blow your caw call the whole way there,
You're not just like if you make a loud stick break,
maybe one cow call, maybe two the worst ones.

Speaker 2 (23:58):
The worst thing to do is to giveaway or the cation, right, Yeah,
so you I mean, but at the same time, you
don't want to alarm them either. So yeah, like I said,
you want to cover your sound up. But at the
same time, if you cow call all the way in,
what you end up doing is you have a bunch
of eyes waiting for you to come in, right exactly.

Speaker 1 (24:17):
They hear you coming like, yeah, you're hey, who's this
out coming? This?

Speaker 2 (24:20):
They're making a scene. Yeah, And so you don't want
to make a scene.

Speaker 1 (24:23):
Yeah, you don't want to be out.

Speaker 2 (24:25):
You're just like you just want to be part of
the hurt getting close. And then when you're really close
to that, you do a couple of cow calls. You
already got cows all over the woods, right, and that
herd bowl, especially in the timber. He can't see all
his cows, So to him, he doesn't know any different.

Speaker 1 (24:38):
He don't He don't have a number either. He has
doesn't say, well, I have six cows and I see
six right here.

Speaker 2 (24:42):
Yeah, he has an idea, is like I think they're
out here, yeah, exactlymore. Now, the other thing we were
talking about though, too, is like let's say this is
the only time it'd be different. Well, let's say that
scenario is we hear a bowl beagling has crossed the canyon,
but there's a clear cut nearby, and I sound it
almost sounds like he's going to come out of that cut.

(25:03):
I might just sit there and wait, or above tree line.
Maybe I'm above tree line and I'm seeing the little
patches where i can shoot from. I feel very comfortable
shooting long range. In fact, sometimes I feel like my
shots are better at long range because you have the
time to make a proper shot. Those close strange shots
can sometimes be rushed and sometimes takes more than one bullet.

(25:25):
I'm going to just kind of responding to haters that
have never hunted Timmer country. Some people are like, oh,
you should only shoot an animal with one bullet. I
think that's actually in the opposite like and somewhat disrespectful,
because no matter how good of a shot you think
you are, you wound. You may wound a bowl elk.
How many guys do you know have shot an elk

(25:48):
and they had a second chance on shooting it, but're like, no,
that first shot was good, and they track a bloodshel
for miles they had a chance to put that bowl down.
They had a second opportunity, and they didn't take it.
For me, it's like some people are like, oh, we
don't want to waste meat. It's like I've put, you know,
in some scenarios, I've put fortified bullets in a bowl

(26:09):
elk and I've wasted probably a quarter pound of meat.
If you're shooting lungs, there's not meat, there's not much there. Right,
You're fine, just put you want to anchor them down
and it could be all lung shots, right, you know
what I mean. Right, but you want to make sure
you anchor that bowl down.

Speaker 1 (26:27):
Yeah. I've always said, you know, if the bowl is
still standing or moving, keep shooting, Yeah, till they fall,
and then as you approach, be ready to shoot again.

Speaker 2 (26:37):
Exactly.

Speaker 1 (26:37):
I wanted to touch on something real quick for you.
Talked about using your binoculars to scan instead of your scope,
and I think that's really smart and it's really safe,
especially if if you're not familiar with how the difference
between a real elk bugle and maybe a hunter's bugle.
So it's super important to make sure you're being safe

(26:59):
by using yourars. I've had people scope me before I'll.

Speaker 2 (27:03):
Be it's the scariest thing.

Speaker 1 (27:04):
It's a scarce thing. I'll look up and I see
a dude up on the ridge and he's pointing his
rifle at me, and I immediately hit the dirt. I mean,
you scare the crap out of people when you do that.
But I knows. I mean, you can buy binoculars for
them a hundred bucks to two thousand dollars, right, there's
a binocular for everyone, everyone's price range, get them, use them,

(27:27):
be safe, don't scare the crap out of people, or
maybe even take a shot and shoot a person. You know,
be aware of what you're shooting.

Speaker 2 (27:35):
You have to know your target. Another thing that bothers
me to know when is when people's like and it's
a lot with wolves more than anything is people are
a little bit more trigger happy with wolves. Right, So
you hear wolves, how and you see the brush moving,
people want to just pull the trigger.

Speaker 1 (27:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (27:50):
I've had guys say I just blaze the brush just
started shooting. Now I'm just like, well are you doing?

Speaker 1 (27:56):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (27:57):
Like, what if that was me trying to hold on
in a wolf pack?

Speaker 1 (28:01):
Like that?

Speaker 2 (28:02):
Is stupid? Always know your target, but it doesn't take,
like I said, with ELK, doesn't take much. It could
be heavy timber, but you can already identify. You see
an eyeball, you see a nose, you see the you
see the rack. It's you may not see the entire
ELK image, but you've already identified what you're shooting at.
You already identify. Like I said, if it's Montana and
it's brow tyne only, don't just shoot a big yellow body.

(28:24):
You have to identify, Okay, I see brow tines on
the bowl. At least. I don't know if it's a
fie point. I don't know if it's a ten point,
I don't know it's if it has kickers like a
big red stack. I don't know what that is. But
I've at least identified that it's the legal ELK and
I could shoot it. There's no reason you should be
shooting at things you can't see and then going back

(28:45):
to the long range, I feel a lot more than
this is Again, this is so controversial, and I don't
know why I feel more comfortable taking a long range
shot at six hundred yards than taking a close up shot.
I feel like my shots are a lot more. There
are a lot more thought through. I'm a lot more stable.
I have time to calm my heart down. I can
make a very very good shot at six hundred yards.

(29:08):
My odds and killing a bull at six hundred yards
comfortably with one shot are much higher than a close
up shot. But you just can't help it when you're
in tavy timber country, right, You like you have to
take those shots. Some guys are better at others and
taking those quick rush shots. I give credit to my
big brother Travis. He can I've told you some of

(29:30):
his shots that I've watched. I'm just like, wow, that
was pretty impressive. But you know we've I think we've
all had misses too, right, right, you kill you hunt
enough animals, eventually a miss happens. Sure, But hunting timber
country is a challenging himself. But people are really intimidated
by it and avoid it. And but if you learn

(29:55):
how to do it, you can you can get away
from a lot of people. In fact, there's still areas
I hunt to this day where I'm the only boot
tracks in the mountain and this is public land. Do
your cell ones?

Speaker 1 (30:07):
You know what I mean? Right?

Speaker 2 (30:08):
And just people are intimidated by even the grizzly bears. Right,
how many people that I know are like, I'm not
hunting that there's grizzly bears in there, especially if you're
hunting that those areas where you have all this close
range shot. Everybody's afraid of bump in a grizzly. Just
get good life insurance, you know, for your life.

Speaker 1 (30:24):
Set your family up so they won't struggle with.

Speaker 2 (30:28):
Exactly because we're all going to die someday. I don't
you know, there's no reason that we're Like I used
to really worry about hunting Grizzly country, you know, you
were you were kind of talking about like are you
kind of worried about para con. I'm like, huh, I
got good life in Turails.

Speaker 1 (30:45):
It'll be fine.

Speaker 2 (30:46):
He'll be okay. But I've yet to I mean, our
knock on wood. I'm the only family member that well,
me and my mom both, I guess. But my mom
doesn't spend a lot of time hunting. But I myself,
I am the only familymembo that hasn't been charged by
grizzly So I hope to keep that record.

Speaker 1 (31:04):
Yeah, it's a game of odds.

Speaker 2 (31:07):
That's a game of odds.

Speaker 1 (31:08):
I think as many times you're out there, it's eventually
gonna happen.

Speaker 2 (31:12):
Yeah. I will say this. The first time Travis ever
got charged by a grizzly, it was an inland grizzy
in Alaska. He came home and he took every single
sling off our guns. You probably notice that I don't
have a single sling on a gun. Yeah, Trev took
all those things off the guns. He said, you don't
want to. He's like, if I had a sling on
my gun and goes on my shoulder, I'd be dead.

Speaker 1 (31:33):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (31:34):
So you did that to every single gun.

Speaker 1 (31:36):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (31:37):
But you know, sometimes when I can try to hike
to the meal your elevation, my gun is my pack.
But you want to be packing heat somewhere. If it's
a little pistol or something, you got to have protection.
Right in Canada, unfortunately they don't allow pistols, so everybody
has to pack pepper spray. It's not my recommendation. If
you got a pistol, it's nice, but it's something right.

(31:58):
Pepper spray is another thing. But again, I know sometimes
I get off tangent. But with the going back to
long range shooting, I do prefer it if I have
a chance and if I see it, if I see
the scenario, I'm like, hey, I think I can get
this bull out in and opening, I'm gonna shoot. But
if not, I'm just going to charge right in right
vel Awesome.

Speaker 1 (32:18):
I love that. Now I'm going to talk a little
bit more about this long range shooting. To do this
accurately and to do it consistently, and to do it ethically.
You're not just taking your rifle with just your normal
everyday rifle and be like, well, I think he's about
six hundred yard. Yeah, I got my range for six

(32:38):
hundred yards. I'm gonna aim three feet over he's back,
because you know, I kind of looked at the ballistic
chart one time, and I think that should drop that
bullet right into where I need to aim. You're not
doing that, Like, how how does one like make those
ethical and accurate long range shots?

Speaker 2 (32:59):
It really and I'm not trying to because the one
thing my dad always says, you can't buy yourself an ELK,
but to an extent, you've got to have the proper
equipment right right, you got to pay for it. You're
not going to cheap out on a long range gun,
right you've got to have to have a really good
long range rifle. For us, we've originally started with gun Works,
and gun Works has taught us a lot about long

(33:20):
range shooting. You know, before Travis started off with these
charts where he'd print off the ballistics and he'd have
the radicals inside the scope, which are just if anyone
doesn't know what a radical is, it's the hash marks
inside the scope. Lot people don't know what that's for
those are trying to explain this the best way possible,
maybe you can even explain it better. The hash marks

(33:42):
in the scope. It really depends, but most of those
are measured in MA, which is minutes of angle. And
what minutes of angle is it's a minute, and it
depends how much you doe. So like let's say i
dial my scope into where it's zeroed. I'm hitting the
bullseye at one hundred yards. One hundred yards one one

(34:03):
hash mark should be one minute, and then beyond that
the range it's different, correct, and so you have to
it's a little bit of a learning curve. But after
you learn these things, then you know, okay, with this
animal is at six hundred yards, I need to be
shooting for this, but there's a lot of obstacles and

(34:27):
now you know before back in the day when you
need those charts, there was a lot of mistakes that
would happen, for example the barometric pressure, which is another
thing I can get into, like for example, the temperature.
You know, there was a white This is when like
it's good with anything, like people getting the archy. Hunting

(34:48):
mistakes happen right there was a white tail buck. This
was the first year Travis was ever hunting. It was
negative thirteen degrees. Travis had this gun dialed in when
it was like probably forty degrees in October. So now
he has a buck it's negative thirteen. He's made the
shot multiple times. Monster whitetail about twenty five inches wide.

(35:11):
He shot right over its back. He didn't know why
at the time. That the temperature change is also has
a lot to do with it too. Gunworks has created
a system inside the rangefinder that does all the calculations
for you. Where really it I don't want to say

(35:31):
I'm a dummy, but it it takes a lot of
the homework out of out of your shooting practices. You
don't have to be a mathematician, you don't figure it out. Yeah,
let the range finder and the equipment do that for you.
I can put my mom on a on a rifle
and she can drop a white She did this, like
there's a nice white tail buck. And I had her

(35:51):
sit on the gun and she dropped it six hundred
yards And it was really the equipment. If I would
have given her a fixed scope that I picked up
the gun's story. Now, well, your range is pretty much
two hundred yards if that you know. So it really
does have to do with your equipment and what you're shooting.
And every time I start thinking that I know what
I'm doing with long range, I sit down with some

(36:14):
of the guys that run the gunworks operation and they
start talking about all the variables that could happen in
a shot. It's over my head, right it is. But
I'll say this that at long range shooting, usually if
I range the animal and I shoot, I'll never it

(36:35):
should never be above or below the animal the shot.
Usually the real obstacle is the wind.

Speaker 1 (36:41):
Right.

Speaker 2 (36:41):
The wind is really what makes it so tough to
make those shots At six hundred yards. The wind doesn't
do a whole lot, but when you start getting farther
and farther out there, then the wind has a lot
to do with your shots. So anyone that's getting a
long range or is his first time shooter, always be
aware of the wind. That's the biggest, biggest thing that's
going to mess you up on long range. If you have,

(37:02):
like I said, the same system like we have, or
you got a built in radical, or you have the
turrets on top where you dial it the rangefinder, you
plug in the system pretty much the profile of your
gun in there. So you know. So gunworks they had
a they a had the BR four monocular that they had,

(37:25):
but now they just created a binocular the Revic binos,
and now you can plug in the system in there too,
which is really nice. So now rather than carrying a
monocular and a pair of binos, now I just have
a pair of binos that does all the homework for me.
So now I got my binos that I can timber
pound with and pick apart the terrain. Or if I

(37:47):
have a long range shot, I ranged the binoculars that
tells me exactly what the dial from my MA and
you just dial and shoot. But you also have to
be aware of your wind.

Speaker 1 (38:12):
Long range shooters that are comfortable accurate with their shots.
That's they don't just buy a gun by them loaded
up and head to the woods when you know, they
spend some time behind the gun, right, You have to
undertand like you're talking about the wind, learning how to
cope with wind conditions, and no one if it's too

(38:34):
there's too much wind or not, you know, or if
it's good and you can send it, or it's like, okay,
there's a little bit of wind and I can compensate.
You don't learn that just by not practicing. You have
to practice with your gun. You have to spend some
time understanding how that wind affects it. You know, whether
let's say the wind's blowing on your side of the

(38:55):
ridge this way, it could be blowing a different opposite
way over there, you know, and identifying wind currents and
all that. I mean, we could go down a rabbit
hole for a couple hours on just wind in itself.
But I'm just trying. The point I'm trying to make
is you have to spend that time with your gun
to understand it and become a proficient shooter and then

(39:16):
understanding how to execute a perfect shot. I could get
on a rifle and shoot at a at a distant target,
and I could probably hit okay, by somebody who is
who has been practicing and using the right techniques and
body postures to shoot, is going to outshoot me in

(39:37):
it every day because they execute the shot so much differently.
So there's a lot to it. It's not just holding
the gun up and looking through a crosshairs and squeezing
the trigger off. There's a lot of best practices while
doing that to execute that shot as perfectly as possible
so you get those those really good hits at distance.

(39:57):
So yeah, and.

Speaker 2 (39:59):
I'm going to compare it to our tree hunt to
just because I do. We do a lot of archery hunt.
People see a long range shot, it's like, oh, you
should try to do with the bow. Well, watch our videos.
We do a lot of archery hunting. The one thing
I'll say with archery, it's the same thing. If all
you do you sit at a target and you sit
in your bow and you take it to the woods.
I mean, I can't tell you. You know, I know

(40:22):
people that seem to like wound a lot of animals
at the bone and narrow and they're just not practicing
right that all they're doing is sit at a target,
they dial their bone and it's like, oh, I got
my twenty thirty forty fifty dial, Okay, I'm good for
hunt season. Yeah, you haven't practiced shooting. No, Like you're
just dialed your bow in and then you hang it
on the shelf and you wipe the dust offf and
ready to go hunt. Same thing with the rifle. I

(40:43):
feel like a lot of people they zeroed it in
at the target range and then they put it in
the gun, saye like, all right, when hunt season comes,
I'm gonna go shoot. I can't. I mean, it cracks
me up. And again I'm not trying to make fun
of people, but I'll see I'll drive down the mountain,
I'll see some guy shooting beer cans with his rifle.
Just make sure his gun is on. He shooting twenty

(41:05):
five yards and then he's about ready to go l
cut and it's like like this guy's going to be
in the woods with me. You know, like go to
a big grun range and practice, you know, get your
hundred yards dialed or if you want it at two
hundred yards whatever you prefer, get it dialed in, zero
it in and then go from there you have to practice.

(41:27):
You know, the guys that I see that actually do
really good with archery, or the guys that attend these
archery shoots, right, I think it really does challenge you.
I really love doing archery shoots because I go and
I was like, wow, Like it gives me confidence. I'm
shooting downhills, I'm shooting uphills. It's good to practice that
if you have a range where you can practice. Okay,
because downhill shots are different than shooting uphill. Practice all

(41:49):
those angles. Practicef you're doing long range practice, shooting in
the wind, don't shoot like I'm only going to shoot
on a calm day and then all of a sudden
you have a fifteen million hour wind and then you
know what I mean. If for me, when I make
a shot, I have to be comfortable shooting. There is
no and I think everybody tries to ReadWrite what ethics are? Right, right,

(42:14):
Everybody's like, this is what ethics are. The ethic is
if it's over this range, you should not shoot. That
is not There's no written rule in what's ethical and
what's not and how far are you shooting the animal?

Speaker 1 (42:28):
Right?

Speaker 2 (42:29):
What's ethical is where you feel comfortable shooting. How far
do you feel comfortable shooting? Some some people may only feel
comfortable shooting forty yards with a bow. Some guys they
can droll bulls at eighty yards all day long. Now,
if they have a bull elk that's eighty yards, I'm
not gonna I'm not going to be upset if I
see them take a shot like that, because I know

(42:50):
they're comfortable at doing it right. It's the same with
the rifle, Like if there's guys that suck at shooting
over five hundred yards, they shouldn't be shooting that range. No, absolutely,
But if you're if these are guys that are at
the range and they're shooting thousand yards all day long,
and then they have an animal at seven fifty eight
hundred yards, by all means take the shot right you
feel comfortable shooting, do it. There's very very few times

(43:14):
in my life that I've taken a thousand yard shot
on an elk. Actually only one time, and I wasn't
planning on it. It was either it was a it
was a scenario thing. It's like, okay, like should I
try to get close to the bull or should I
shoot from here?

Speaker 1 (43:29):
You know?

Speaker 2 (43:29):
And Travis and I were just kind of talking with
amongst each other, like, just take a rest and see
how you feel. I rested on the ground. If I
didn't feel comfortable, I wasn't going to take the shot.
The bull was raking a tree. He was completely occupied.
I rested, and I told Travis, I'm like, I am
so still like I am rock solid. So Trav like, well,

(43:52):
if you feel comfortable, there is no wind at all
that's going to disturb the bullet. You know, we probably
I said that range a lot. You should take the shot.
This bull's breaking a tree. He's not going to walk
out of the screen. So the other step I'd like
to do, too, is you don't want to do this

(44:14):
with bow. You never want to drive fire bow, but
it is okay to drive fire a rifle, right, So
take the bullet out, Just shoot it a couple times.

Speaker 1 (44:23):
Try and make to snap two empty dry fire shots.

Speaker 2 (44:27):
Yeah, a couple of dry fire shots until you feel comfortable.
I've done this with friends that have never shot a
long range before, where they're shooting like or like, I'll
tell you about my friend who had a mountain goat tag.
I was telling you about that. He was the last
mountain goat tag of this area. Never show a long
range gun. Before we get to the mountain go at

(44:47):
four hundred yards, I said, hey, how do you feel
that shooting? He's like, I'm actually a sucky shot. And
I'm like, at first, my heart's thinking like oh no,
oh no, this is gonna be bad. But four hundred
yards is a cheap is a easy shot with this
gun that I had. So I'm like, all right, let's
do some practice trigger pulls. So we took the bullets out,
and the goat's not going anywhere. He's on the hill side,

(45:09):
you know. So I'm like, all right, pull the trigger.
See how you feel he shoots? You know, he shoots,
he it clicks right, no bullet in there. I was like, okay,
how do you feel? He said. I closed my eyes.
I was like, do it again. He did it again. Click.
It's like, how that feel better? Like, do it again.
We did it like five or six times. By the

(45:30):
sixth time, I was like, how do you feel? Like
that goat would have been dead? I was like, pens
thrown around, thrown around. He drilled that goat. So sometimes
it calms the nerves too. Yeah, whatever it takes to
calm the nerves you have. What's great with long range
you have the time. When I edit a video, I

(45:50):
try to make it entertaining. But if if you're actually
to watch the whole video, we're sitting there twenty to
thirty minutes on an animal to where it stands at
the perfect time, is not going to walk out because
that bullet takes time to get to the animal. The
animals walking and you're shooting a long range, it can
you can go from being a perfect shot to a wound.

Speaker 1 (46:08):
Right.

Speaker 2 (46:09):
You want to find where the animals occupied. Is it eating?
Is it laying down something that like I said, the
bullouk for me it was raking a tree. He was
raking a tree, completely occupied. I sent it shot it
drilled him right behind the shoulder. So something that occupies
him is another thing. You take your time. You have

(46:29):
all the time in the world. If it's a rushot,
if it's an animal walking out of a clearing and
it's eight hundred yards, you just don't shoot right. It's time.
You're going to have to move in close to get
a shot on him. So there's a lot of obstacles
with long range shooting, but it's it's We've talked about
this before. It takes practice and it takes time. The
one thing I really like with gun Works is a

(46:51):
simplify it for the average person in the sense of,
like they do the reloads for you too. You know,
someone who works a lot, Sometimes a person doesn't have
time to do reloads. And what reloads are is you're
pretty much you're assembling for someone who's never done it
or know what that is. You're assembling the brass, the gunpowder,

(47:13):
and the bullet yourself, right. And there's a lot.

Speaker 1 (47:17):
Of technique and technical work there too to be identified
and executed to have a really good round to shoot.

Speaker 2 (47:26):
It is, and I'll be honest and saying that you'll
always get a more accurate load with a reload than
any other way. However, there is some good factory loads
out there. There is some and gun Works they've kind
of perfected in their own way where they have found
that if they do it this way with this caliber,
it works well, and so they can they can produce

(47:47):
it to where they can get it to you and
you don't have to do those reloads. And so I
have a Gunworks round where I didn't have to reload
those and I'm tinging thousand yard plates all day right
with that? And and so if you don't have the time,
like I said, some people just work. They don't have
the time to sit there and take a full day

(48:09):
off to try to figure out what load your gun takes.
Well that's another option for you is to go through them.
And again, I'm not trying to be like an you know,
like by gun Works, but I'm trying to be a commercial.
I'm not trying to be a commercial. I'm just saying
that you use, that's what I use. And I've we've
been using gun Works on and off for years, you know.

(48:29):
So we went with Gunworks originally and then we tried
some other stuff and we came back the gun Works
just because we know how they work, and we they're
very innovative. We really like what they do. And and
you what did you think of the gun? So you
you for a couple of days we've I've had you.
You're holding a couple of different my guns, and you

(48:50):
held the seventh psalm last night from gun Works. What
was your opinion on that?

Speaker 1 (48:56):
Guy? Well, we're walking along, You're like, what do you
think of that gun? I said, this is my new
favorite gun, Like, I need one.

Speaker 2 (49:02):
Of these things. What was What was it that you
liked about that sound?

Speaker 1 (49:06):
It's compact, it's light. I don't like a big, long,
heavy rifle. A rifle with a barrel that's twenty eight
inches long, thirty inches long, that's that's just it's hard
to maneuver, especially in the kind of country I hunt,
and in the kind of country you hunt, you know,
big timber. It's just hard to pack around a big,
heavy gun through the woods constantly. This thing was light.

(49:30):
It pointed really easily and quickly, you know, when you
shoulder it. I was on target right away. And then
if you're packing a gun without a sling all day long,
your arms get fatigue.

Speaker 2 (49:44):
Yeah, imagine a fifteen pound gun in your arms.

Speaker 1 (49:46):
Oh no way, how did just said?

Speaker 2 (49:47):
Tom?

Speaker 1 (49:48):
No, I'll use my knife. Yeah, I'm gonna kill this
ball with a knife. I'm not going to pack that gun. Yeah.
So I loved it. It was a really really lightweight,
compact gun.

Speaker 2 (49:59):
So, and yes, I will agree in the sense that, like,
you know, heavier guns, longer barrels, it seems to they
say more accuracy. But you know you're asking me, like, well,
how far is this gun get out to. You know,
it's a light gun. It's an eighteen inch barrel. I'm like,
I was. I smoked my meaee at eighty last year,
one shot. Then my friend I gave him the gun.

(50:21):
It was like I think it was either eight forty
eight sixty and he shot his mealy with it. Yeah,
And I was like, that's a trading accurate gun. And
that thing is just it's nothing. It feels like a
toy gun.

Speaker 1 (50:32):
Yeah, it does feel like a toy gun.

Speaker 2 (50:34):
It's yeah, sup lightly And I got it built like
that for purpose, just for the sense of like, you know,
I hunt in the best both worlds of hunting, the
timber country and the open country. That was probably one
of my you know, originally when we first got in
the long range, we were packing those heavy guns around
in the timber. Yeah, and then you have this big
scope where it's like five and a half power by

(50:55):
you know, twenty two or twenty three power that you're
in those five and a half power and you know,
when you see that elk in the timber and it's
point blank, you pull up and you're like you're seeing
hair and you're like got to try to find the
kill zone. But I like, you know, for me, in
scope choice, if you're so, if you're in the market
of buying a scope, it's like, Okay, what can I
buy for the best of both worlds? I like a

(51:15):
scope that at least three power three power, I can
shoot really good at that close range. I like three power,
and then I try to get the farthest power possible
that Leopold I have. It's a it's a three. It's
a three by eighteen.

Speaker 1 (51:30):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:31):
Yeah, and you shoot Leopold too, right, yep? Yeah, And
what's your opinion on that?

Speaker 1 (51:36):
Yeah, I'm the same of the same thoughts, especially for
new shooters if you haven't shot rifles a lot. In
in heavy timber conditions or even sometimes open open countries,
like a new hunter, sometimes it's really hard to acquire
the target, right, So having that three power, you're not

(51:57):
looking at hair right, you're look you you look through
the site picture and it's like, okay, I see you know,
pretty wide view. Oh there's a there's a deer. Okay,
I see it. Now it's easier to acquire your target.
I guess they should say a little easier with that
lower power, especially in big timber exactly.

Speaker 2 (52:16):
And the also too you want to do is you
always even if that long range and you're zoomed up.
I'm just throwing this out there. Anytime you make a shot,
zoom back down really quick, because what happens is you
shoot an animal. Like I said, you zoomed up. It's
great because you can see detail. The downside of being
zoomed up, it's harder to find your target. Right, the
more zoomed up you're, the harder to find your target.

(52:36):
So people shoot then they're like they need to make
another shots, Like I can't find the animal as soon
as we shoot. The first thing we try to do
is they get back on the animals you don't see
it zoomed down, find them again. And if you have
time to zoom up due if not ranging, make a
shot zoomed down. If you're zoo the farther you zoom down,
the quicker is to find the target.

Speaker 1 (52:58):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (52:58):
The end of story.

Speaker 1 (52:59):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (53:00):
So that's just happy. You have to get yourself into
these habits can be done. You could train yourself with
these habits now before you end up in the woods.
When you have a scenario, you have a bowl of
a lifetime. You mess up and you're like, oh, shoot,
I could have would I should have? Could have? You know,
you should have figured that you should have done all

(53:21):
that practicing before you ended up in the woods. Have
your equipment so again. And I also brought up a
story yesterday about a really good friend of mine I
went to high school with, and I saw his success
change from when he was in high school to now
now time. What's different now because before you were struggling
with killing stuff, Now you're you're whacking and stacking. What

(53:42):
is it you doing now that you weren't before? He says, Tom,
I'm put putting in the time. And I'm like, that's
really like the biggest foundation for hunters is putting in
the time. You need to put in not just the
time in hunting your animals, but the time and knowing
your equipment and shooting it. I said, I know really
good hunters, So it's fice. It goes both ways. I

(54:04):
know guys that are really skilled shots, but they suck
at hunting. I know guys that are really good at
finding animals, but they suck at shooting. Yeah, and you
gotta you gotta prefect both. That's what's going to make
you the ultimate killer.

Speaker 1 (54:17):
There's no there's no cheating it. There's no short cuts. Yeah,
I mean I think there's some shortcuts, as in you
can learn from other people and maybe be mentored or
take some courses, learn these things and then but you
have to put them in practice. You can't just be like, oh, yeah,
they told me this and then think you're going to
go out and accomplish it. I mean, you still have

(54:37):
to put put in the time. You have to put
in the time scouting, you have to put in the
time hiking, you have to put the time shooting. And
I love this part. You were talking earlier about shooting
your bow in your backyard, and this relates exactly with
with rifles too. Everyone is a pro and they're about

(54:59):
own backyard. Everyone probably shoots really good at the range
right that you have a nice solid rest, you can
calm yourself, you can shoot very accurately. It's like, man,
my gun is awesome. Man at one hundred yards or
two hundred ards wherever, however far the range is, it's
a it's a set distance, it's never changing. It's a

(55:21):
very comfortable place to shoot. Now you go to total
archery challenge with your bow in your backyard. Oh, I
drill hundred yards targets all day. You go to the
Total Archery Challenge, it is a whole different world. So
you have to really temper your expectations of what you're
what you think your your maximum shot distance is, whether

(55:45):
it's archery or rifle. So when you get to and
you put yourself in these situations like, oh yeah, I
can hit I can hit an elk at of eighty
yards because I do a hundred in my backyard. Well,
you go to the total Total Archery Challenge and you
have to shoot at a thirteen degree downhill angle and
all of a sudden, your arrow don't even hit the

(56:05):
elk or it hits it in the butt. Right, hold
on from everything from shot execution to maybe you don't
have your third access dialed on your site right same
with rifle, Like I know, I've got good friends that
do a lot of long range shooting. Once they got there, Okay,

(56:26):
I'm on paper, everything's dial and my gun is grouping.
I know it's accurate. Now. They don't sit there at
the range and just pound targets at the range all
the time. What they do is they go out in
the field and they go to areas it would be
similar to where they're hunting, and they're starting to make
those same shots that would be similar to what you
would make in real world conditions. They find a big

(56:47):
rock bluff, you know, maybe they're taking a very vertical
shot up or down a long distance. It's windy, it's
a big canyon, there's different wind currents from one side
to the other. Now they're testing. They think they know
about shooting long distance, and it's very surprising. It's like, wow,
I can hit really good at the range, but I

(57:10):
need to make I need to do some work out
here in the field. So you understand how to hold
for wind, you know, or dial for win, and you
start understanding your limitations. You start understanding, you know, your
rifles performance, how just laying differently, squeezing differently, holding the
gun differently affects your shot so dramatic compared to sitting

(57:32):
on a bench.

Speaker 2 (57:34):
Exactly. And you've brought something up really important too. So
when we anytime, so for example, we got a hunt
that come you know, if we were hunting Wyoming, that
train is so different. You're in higher elevation, different altitude,
different barometic pressure, everything there's a lot of things that
go into by going into a new area. Right, we

(57:56):
like to pop a rock before the hunt starts over there.
We're like, we're in a new area. Let's see how
we're shooting. Yeah, see if the gun's on. If it's not,
then we have to figure something mouse out before the
season starts. We like to go into a hunt a
couple of days early. Now, are we doing it in
area we're gonna hunt? No? Are doing anrew where other
people are camp. No, We're really careful where we do

(58:17):
that at. And we want to make sure that. We
just want to make sure that when we hunt the animal,
want to hit it now. Can mistake still happen? Absolutely?
And the one thing that I want to bring up
to is, let's say you do wound an animal and
you can't find it. Don't let that and don't let

(58:38):
that each you apart to where you put your gun
in the safe and you never want to touch it again.
I've seen the same thing with bow hunters. Some guys
like they wound an animal and they can't find it.
They did the scourage, they feel really bad about the
yelk and they hang up their bone. They said, I'm
never going to go our chan again. That just felt
too bad to wound an animal. You know, do I
feel bad when that happens. Absolutely, I get sick to

(58:59):
my staf But I think important. It's the most important
thing is to get back on the horse and just
you should just learn from that. Like, Okay, that sucked.
I don't want to do that again. What can I
do to make myself a better shot?

Speaker 1 (59:14):
What went wrong?

Speaker 2 (59:14):
Well?

Speaker 1 (59:15):
How do I fix it?

Speaker 2 (59:16):
Yeah? How do I fix that? And then move forward?
That's what makes a good hunter. You can look at it.
I don't care how good of a shot you are.
Look at every hunter that you know. It could be
on Instagram, it could be YouTubers. Everybody at one point
makes mistakes. I will laugh in someone's face if they
said they killed twenty bullok and they've never wounded an elk,
I will laugh in their face because I know it's

(59:37):
not true. Every person has made a mistake at one
point in their life. And you know it's just the
question is is how many? How many of those animals
you killed were killed successfully? You know what I mean?
Mistakes do happen. You just got to move forward and
make sure it doesn't happen again. You always focus on that. Yeah,

(59:58):
so and I'm all about that, all about just like
being a better hunter. Yeah, And look, even I could
this year if I feel like I'm the best shooter
in the world, I don't hang up the gun because
you can get out of practice pretty quick too. I've
noticed that with archery hunt too. If I like skip
a year, it's like, Okay, I've been shooting every day
with my bow. I feel really good. And the next

(01:00:19):
year I'm like, oh, yeah, I know what I'm doing.
Then you don't. I don't shoot my boat for a
bird time. It could be four or six months, and
I take it to the archery shoot. All of a sudden,
I pick up bad habits. I'm like, why am I
not hitting the targets. I'm like, oh yeah, I'm like
I'm shooting my trigger rock, you know what I mean.
And the one thing I noticed, and again I'm kind
of getting off topic, but I was noticing something this spring.

(01:00:41):
I was like, you know, I was a little out
of practice. My bow got stolen last fall, and so
then I went a few months without a bow. I
got a brand new bow, got a new release. In
this spring. I was doing an archery shoot. I was
all over the place the first four targets, and I'm like,
what am I doing wrong? All a sudden, I just
started paying attention to my trigger pulling. I realized that
I wasn't my finger wasn't even on the trigger. By

(01:01:01):
the time, I would be like this far off away
from the trigger, like just like a quarter inch. And
then I'd hit my trigger right when I felt like
my creussers are.

Speaker 1 (01:01:10):
On, you're just punching it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:11):
Just I was punching it. And as soon as like, Okay,
chill the freak out, Tom, keep your finger on that
trigger and just pull slowly, you know, And then I
started doing that and big change, Like my then I
was hitting where I needed to, you know, on the
targets throughout the course. I'm not a professional archer, but

(01:01:32):
I can kill the target, you know what I mean.
That's my goal is to kill the target. Right I'm
not I'm not a ten X shooter, but I'm always
trying to kill the target. That's kind of how I
do that. But just going back to shooting, like just
because you feel like you're a good shot now because
you've been practicing, doesn't mean to hang up the gun.
Just consistently shoot same thing. With long range, you can

(01:01:52):
easily get out of practice rush shots. People just it's
good to have a second guy. It's fine versa. Sometimes
Travis is there with me and I'm like, I'm getting antsy.
I want to shoot this this bowl elk and he's
at eight hundred yards and I feel like he's getting away.
Child's like, calm down, Calm down, you're too wiggly. I
see you shaking. Calm down, you know, like like Adam

(01:02:14):
on his sheet this this year or last fall. I
was like, Adam, I see your heartbeat through your shirt,
Like you need to calm down at him. So it's
good to have extra people there too, to be there
to help you out. Because long there's a lot that
does go into long range shot and and so that's
another like if you were to long range shoot, I

(01:02:37):
feel more comfortable to taking farther shots if I had
somebody next to me, right, Like, there's some shots I
won't take. I'm like, if I had somebody next to me,
i'd take it. But means I don't to spot my shot.
I'm not going to risk the shot. I'll just getting closer.

Speaker 1 (01:02:51):
That makes sense, Yeah, absolutely well. I love it well man,
Thanks Tom, I appreciate you coming on. We're hitting an
hour here and we don't typically like to go any
further than that. I feel like we could. I honestly
feel like we could talk all day about what you have.
But we've been hunting for three and a half days together,
and we've talked NonStop, like two schoolgirls about elk hunting, this,

(01:03:16):
elk cutting, that, mule deer hunting, wolf hunting. Like we've
covered the gamut of every kind of hunting that you guys,
you and your family have done, and we're still talking
about new stuff today. Like we haven't talked about this
stuff much.

Speaker 2 (01:03:30):
Well, And I see you're passionate about oh cutting too,
because it's like, you know, because you're running a Phillips
game calls and stuff, and sometimes you think as somebody
hunts an animals so much, it's like, ah, yeah, it's
just another elk. But you're when I hear you talk
about elk, it's it. I can see. It's your life
and your blood, Like, yeah, that's all that's on your mind.
You're just like you're telling me stories, just stories after

(01:03:50):
story after story of all these elk experiences you have
and some are big bulls and some some bulls are
like average bulls. Yeah, but like some of those bulls
like that you've killed that were average are sometimes, like
I say, like I could tell like that was more
of a memorable experience than some of the bigger bulls
that you killed, Yeah, just because. And I think that's
really neat to see your passion and elk hunting and

(01:04:11):
and that you know, it's like it shows me that
you really love what you do.

Speaker 1 (01:04:17):
Yeah, And I'd like to say the same thing about
you too, is like your enthusiasm in which you talk
about your stories and you tell all about all these
different experiences you've had. And then I see your trophy room,
which I don't know if you can hang another set
of elkhorns or deer horns on the wall here, but
this isn't all of them.

Speaker 2 (01:04:37):
I mean.

Speaker 1 (01:04:37):
Then then this is your this is your dad's house
in the in in his in his downstairs trophy room.
Then he's got like a workshop area and the walls
are covered with antlers in there, and I know you
and your brothers all have antlers at your house's it's incredible.
And then when you you talk and you show me

(01:04:57):
to the places you hunt. Like you take one look
at this country and you immediately, in my mind says,
there's nobody that's going to kill anything here unless you
are one hundred percent committed and passionate about climbing up
through these nasty, thick forests, you know, up these steep

(01:05:22):
slopes to the higher elevation, or just you know, punching
through timber whatever. It takes a lot of dedication. And
I feel like sometimes people see success and they don't
understand the work that that goes behind that success. And
I and I and I and I know this firsthand,
but spending this time with you this week just really

(01:05:44):
reinforces that. It's like, I think you and your family
are incredible people. Besides just the hunting accomplishments, your family
is just amazing.

Speaker 2 (01:05:56):
You know.

Speaker 1 (01:05:56):
I've enjoyed so much, you know, spending my time here
visiting with them, and only got to see you know,
part of your family. I haven't even got to, you know,
spending time with your other brothers. Yeah, so I look
forward to that at some point too.

Speaker 2 (01:06:07):
Yeah, Yeah, absolutely, Yeah, most everybody's working. I guess Travis
is sheep hunting right now. And yeah, and everybody's kind
of like gone doing other things right now, but trying
to get ready for Archie Elk season.

Speaker 1 (01:06:20):
I guess, yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. Well, this this episode
I kind of messed up, but I didn't read any
any listener questions. Okay, but I'm just gonna throw this
out there for for some of the next episodes. If
you guys have any questions you want to hear me

(01:06:41):
or my guests answer, email us at CTD at Phelps
Gamecalls dot com and give us your question, or better yet,
I have a super secret phone number you can call
in and you can leave a message. You leave a
detailed message, it can't be over three minutes. And then
that mess ask the question. Ask your question about whatever

(01:07:03):
it is, whether it's calling or hunting tips or whatever,
any kind of big game animals or predators, and we'll
do our best to answer that that question, and that
super secret phone number is to zero eight two one
seven seven zero one, and leave that message, keep it
under three minutes, and we'll zero the best. So anyway,

(01:07:26):
thanks again, Tom, It's been a pleasure, and look forward
to our new next adventure together in the near future.

Speaker 2 (01:07:32):
Absolutely, thank you.