Ep. 927: Burning Questions About Hunting and Managing Your Own Back 40 with Jake Hofer

This week on the show I'm joined by Jake Hofer to preview our brand new podcast mini-series, Back 40, and answer some of the most pressing questions that hunters face when hunting and managing their own Back 40's.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
the whitetail woods, presented by First Light, creating proven versatile
hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First Light
Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Welcome to the.

Speaker 3 (00:20):
Wired to Hunt Podcast. This week on the show, I'm
joined by Jake Coper, the host of our brand new
soon to launch podcast mini series, The Back forty Podcast,
and today we are going to be previewing that show
and answering some of the most important pressing questions that
you and I are likely to face in the coming

(00:41):
months as we take on the challenge of hunting and
managing our own back forties. All right, welcome back to
the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you by First
Light and their Camo for Conservation Initiative. Today the show,

(01:01):
I am joined by Jake Hoefer, and as you just heard,
he is joining us here in Wired to Hunt with
a brand new podcast mini series. And so today in
the show, when Jake joins me, we're gonna be talking
about what this new show is. We're calling it the
Back forty Podcast. We're gonna preview what you can expect
in the coming weeks on this new show, and then

(01:23):
we're also going to preview the actual content of that show,
as Jake is going to have to run through some
of the very same questions that our future podcast guests
will as well. Now real quick, if you're not familiar
with Jake, what I want you to know is this,
he's one of the best podcast hosts out there. He
has hosted in the past the Exodus Trail Camera radio podcast.

(01:46):
Now he has his own Whitetail podcast show. He was
a co owner or Exodus Trail Cameras. He also hosts
the Land podcast and now also owns the Whitetail Master
Academy I believe it's called Sorry. Jake and just a
tremendous thinker within the white tail space. A great question asker,

(02:09):
a great uh. He's really good at getting folks to
explain exactly what it is that we as hunters need
when we're trying to learn from these folks. And so
because of that, when I found out that Jake might
be available for some collaborations, I jumped really quickly to
try to bring him on board here to Wire to Hunt.
So there's gonna be a lot more of Jake to
come this fall. I'm excited about some other projects we've

(02:31):
got going on. But today, like I said, we're going
to hear from Jake on this new show. We're going
to learn about what the new show is going to
be about, and then we're going to be answering some
of the most pressing questions that you are likely to
have if you hunt, you know, any kind of private land.
This show is mostly private land focused. We're going to
be talking about some management questions. We're gonna be talking

(02:54):
about some hunting questions when you kind of have some
control over the property. But there is some stuff that's
relevant regardless. But again, we're really looking at this idea
of what are the major questions that you or I
have when it comes to tackling challenges on our own
back forty whether that's forty acres or four acres or
four hundred acres, whatever it is, those are the kinds

(03:15):
of things we're trying to tackle with this show, and
I will let Jake explain it here in a second.
I don't think we need to be rambling on any further,
but stay tuned for some great information today for habitat
related ideas, management related ideas, hunting small properties and much
much more. And you're going to hear about the back
forty podcast, which I think you guys are going to
really enjoy once you find out the wide breadth of

(03:39):
experts that we have a part of this and the
different types of topics we'll be covering as well. So,
without any further ado, let's get to it with Jake Coefert.
All right, joining me back on the show is Jay
koefer Welcome back, Jack.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
Hey, it's good to be back. A lot of talk
about here.

Speaker 3 (04:03):
Yeah, you're back in a different capacity today. Yeah, this
is a different kind of appearance on the Wired Hunt
podcast because you are appearing today as a guest on
the podcast, you will be appearing next week as a
host of a Wired Hunt network podcast. So, so congratulations
on the new show coming out.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
Yeah, I'm super excited.

Speaker 4 (04:26):
I you know, we had brainstormed of what can we
do that would be really fun and exciting, and I
feel like we came up with the format and style
that was a lot of work, to tell you the truth,
When you come up with an idea and you say
this is what we'll do, way more work than some
of the other ways to produce a podcast. So I
hope people appreciate this format because there's a a lot
of work, but it was a lot of fun.

Speaker 3 (04:47):
Yeah, so you are part way through the recording process
so far, how would you say it is going to
this point?

Speaker 2 (04:54):
It's going really good.

Speaker 4 (04:55):
So we've done six of eight and the it's been
it's been really because I have thankfully had the opportunity
to interview all these people before. So these are people
that I'm already familiar with, and I know how some
of them think already, and so had I had some
preconceived notions of how they would answer some of these questions,
and I have been shocked on a handful of them.

(05:17):
And it's all rooted around the white tail questions and
dilemmas everyone has, no matter how many years you've been
doing it or if you're brand new, or whatever the
case may be. These are issues that we all face.
And you know, these guys find success, you know a lot,
and they also have built careers around land and they

(05:38):
have cumulatively. I'd be scared to know how much whitetail
habitat they have impacted in a positive way. I would
say it would be tens of if not fifty tens
of thousands of acres or fifties thousands of acres would
be my guest, So it was it's really cool.

Speaker 5 (05:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (05:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:55):
So so I guess before we get into all of that,
because I want to hear a little bit about what
the process has been like. I want to discuss some
of the thought that went behind both, you know, how
we came up with this idea and format together, but
then also how you came up with the questions and
what that's been like in the field a little bit.

Speaker 2 (06:13):
And then to preview for folks.

Speaker 3 (06:15):
I'm going to ask your questions to you, yeah, to
get your take on these things before we get to
the real show next week. But really quick for people
that are, you know, jumping in here before the show
is actually out there to the world. What is the
format for this new show going to be? What's each
episode going to be comprised of?

Speaker 2 (06:36):
Give me the Bitch?

Speaker 4 (06:37):
Yeah, So basically it's one question and eight answers, And
so what that means is we scheduled these questions to
be timely based off of the excitement and anticipation of
the season and some of the pitfall some of the
dilemmas that we all face and so I wanted to
find eight experts with a ton of experience that have
faced a lot of different issues, a lot of different problems,

(07:00):
are questions that they've been asked a million times over
the years, and really get folks from Iowa, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois,
you know, a big part of the whitetail population, and
that way there's variety in some of the answers where
they're not all from Iowa, they're not all from Illinois,
and people can listen to different ideas from different areas.

(07:20):
And that's how we came up with it because these
are burning questions we all have where you just have
I don't think anxiety is the right way to say,
but this excitement and uncertainty because you.

Speaker 2 (07:33):
Want the season to go. Well, you've been you've been
waiting all year, like you want this season to be
your best. Everyone wants their their next season to be
their best, and this is hopefully going to help. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (07:41):
Well, you know, I think what makes I guess the
way that we kind of came to this, you and
I as we were talking about this, is that originally
the idea was, Okay, we want a a podcast series
that's primarily focused on folks working their own grounds, some
private land, maybe some management, maybe just by permission. But
you know, Tone does a great job with some of

(08:01):
our public land focused stuff. We want to have something
that was a little bit more focused on the guy
or girl who's you know, working on their own back
forty or they're back four hundred or the back four
whatever it is. And when we kind of struck on
this idea of like, oh, the back forty, kind of
like the show, the television YouTube show that I did
a few years ago, and when I started that project,

(08:22):
the back forty, You walk out there on your property
when you kick off this thing, when you buy it
or when you lease it, or when you get access
whatever it is, and you find yourself sometimes daunted or
maybe you like go into tons of excitement and think
you know it all. And then as soon as you
get started and you're like, oh, wow, what about this
or what about this?

Speaker 2 (08:42):
Or what about this?

Speaker 3 (08:43):
And you start getting questioned after question after question that
starts stacking up. And when you reach out to a
friend or you look online for podcasts or YouTube video, like.

Speaker 2 (08:54):
What do I do about this thing? What do I
do if my food plot sucks? Whatever?

Speaker 3 (08:57):
It is you're gonna get a million different answers right.
And that is also a thing that I know you've
seen as a podcast host right over my twelve whatever
however many years has been that I've been doing the
Wired Hunt podcast, one thing that has stood out time
and time again is that there is no one single
way to do this anything right. It's so funny though

(09:19):
every almost every diehard deer hunter you talk to is
very confident that their approach is the right way. They're
always like, this is the way to do it. But
then I listen to ten different guys and they all
say different things. And what I think is unique about
this format and what I think will be really useful
here is that we are acknowledging the fact that there

(09:41):
are many different ideas, many different ways to do this stuff.
And what you do in each twenty these episodes is
that we tackle one topic, one question. You present these
eight different perspectives. They might be wildly different, they might
have a lot in common. And then what I love
is that you know your plan is to do a
little bit of synthesizing yourself and kind of saying like,

(10:03):
here's how I'm thinking this through, or here's how I'm
talking here's how I'm going to deal with this myself,
or here's what I think about X and Y, and
maybe even I don't know how you're going to tackle this,
but maybe there'll even be some part parts and some questions. Really,
I don't know how to make sense of these four
totally disparate different ideas here, and I think that's kind

(10:23):
of cool that we're going to kind of work through
that together in each one of these episodes as we
learn from all these different people with different sets of
experience from different parts of the country, and I think
we're all going to be able to learn a lot
because of that. So I love the way this is
coming together. I love the format. I think there's you know,
right now, we're doing an eight episode mini series run.

Speaker 2 (10:46):
I'm hopeful that we're able to do more of.

Speaker 3 (10:47):
These in the future because there's many, many, many more
burning questions that we that we should cover in the future. So, yeah,
who all do you have included in this run of
the series.

Speaker 4 (10:59):
So when I was putting this list together, like I said,
I've been able to interview just about everyone that I
would love to have interviewed with, and I've got to
know a lot of these guys, and so I recorded
with Steve Hanson from Iowa. He is a really you know,
fun history I always joke that I think he's helped
more people kill their best dear than just about anyone

(11:22):
he was. He was in the outfitting business, and he's
just helped a lot of people. He works on a
ton of farms. He's a licensed agent and has worked
on a ton of habitat projects a ton, and so
I brought in Steve Hanson on this. Another one is
Don Higgins. I think he I think he should and
will go down as one of the most impactful white
tail land managers of our generation. I think his track

(11:45):
record is really interesting, and also I think his approach
is different in a lot of ways too, with where
he's at regionally, and some of the strategies I think
are a little bit unique too, So I wanted to
get his perspective.

Speaker 2 (11:59):
Another one's Bobby Kendall. He's from New York originally.

Speaker 4 (12:02):
He does a lot of like very massive overhauls on projects.
He's on many many farms and sees many different things.
But he seems to have a bag of tricks that
he likes to stick to. So I wanted to bring
in his perspective of working on a lot of farms
all at once. The next person is Jeff Sturgis. I've
known Jeff for a super long time, have a lot
of respect for him, and he's helped a lot of

(12:24):
people identify issues with their farm, some different strategies and
different philosophies.

Speaker 2 (12:31):
Next is Skipsly.

Speaker 4 (12:32):
I've got to know Skip over the years, and I
think he has he has a ton of experience of
looking at habitat and white tail hunting through a lot
of different lenses, from starting with a small farm to
managing a much larger farm today and what are the
problems and challenges with that. Another one's Bill Winki. Everyone
knows who Bill is. That was a very fun conversation.
And then we had Thomas Milsna, who I have a

(12:55):
lot of respect for. He's from Wisconsin. I think he
set the county record twice for archery. You know, a
really really great deer hunter and a very thoughtful individual
when it comes to the landscape and very analytical when
it comes to deer hunting. And so I just wrapped
up the conversation with him and that was excellent. And
then I'm gonna be asking you a bunch of questions too,
with back forty experience and also a lot of knowledge

(13:18):
in the brain and getting your hands dirty on different projects.
So that's the roundabout list and kind of the elevator
pitch of why I picked who I did, And I
don't think I could have came.

Speaker 2 (13:27):
Up with a better list. It's such a good list.
It's people that.

Speaker 3 (13:32):
I have had previous conversations with as well and always
walk away from those learning something new, feeling inspired. And
I love the idea of getting them all together, and
we're going to get some really interesting angles on all
these different things. And I think if you have four
acres or forty acres or four hundred or seventy five

(13:54):
or whatever, or if you've knocked on the door and
got permission on a few kinds of places, I think
there's going to be a lot here put into action
in the future. So before we get into these questions
which I'm going to run by you, force you to
run your own gauntlet, just in case people have not
heard you on this show in the past, or if

(14:15):
they haven't heard your own podcasts. I do want to
just peel back the onion a little bit and just
get a quick sense of why this set of topics.
Why a podcast about land management and hunting your own
ground and improving your own ground. Why does that get

(14:36):
you up in the morning. Why is this something that
you have ended up building your whole life around. You
could have done a lot of things, Jake, You're smart, dude.

Speaker 2 (14:45):
Why are you doing this? What's so special about this
thing for you? Yeah?

Speaker 4 (14:50):
I mean I grew up in a pretty heavily white
tail household. We had a small deer farm when I
was growing up, So you really I took for granted
of growing up in that type of environment where I
got to watch bucks grow velvet every single year, I
got to see when they would drop their antlers.

Speaker 2 (15:09):
I was blessed enough to have some really.

Speaker 4 (15:11):
Great farms that I could just run around all over
as a kid, and so I just I've just always
really enjoyed white tails. I've always enjoyed learning. I feel
that there's so much that you can learn from other people,
and there's so many ways to find success, and that's
always motivated me to learn from others. And then as
far as another interesting thing, so my dad used to

(15:35):
car antlers of wood. I have those big, big sheds
behind me were carved out of wood, and there's a
funny story behind that. But like growing up and having
the only roadkill, getting Frankenstein in the basement.

Speaker 2 (15:46):
Out of wood, it's such a weird thing.

Speaker 4 (15:49):
And then when I look back, I was like, that
is so strange, but it definitely for me in a
lot of ways of who I am today. And you know,
I had the opportunity to record with some of these
folks a lot over the years and get to know
them and become friends, and so it's just been a
culmination of a lot of great things. And I dreamed
of owning a piece of ground myself ever since I

(16:09):
was a kid, and I bought that farm. It's like,
so before that, I was so interested in, Okay, how
do you hunt permission? How do you how are you
effective on small parcels? And then I bought a back
forty forty acres and exactly like you said, all these
new questions I didn't know really existed or I didn't
care enough about hit me like a ton of bricks.
And it's like I have so much to learn so

(16:31):
fast so I can start making a positive impact.

Speaker 3 (16:34):
Yeah, you have talked to most of the guests so
far for this series, would you say that there is
more agreement on these topics or more disagreement than you expected.

Speaker 4 (16:48):
There's been a lot more agreement than I what I
would have anticipated. I would say a general consensus would
be about eighty percent agreement so far. Like per question,
everyone had a little bit of a new twist, and
the best part of this format was they all shared
their own nuanced take about each one of them, and

(17:10):
so everyone has a different way to your point of
finding success, and they all almost all of them at
some point gave a nuance of their approach and philosophy
behind it, and you're like, okay, yeah, that is the
task and this is how you go about it in
your unique way. And so I felt energized at the
end of each of those questions with I need to

(17:32):
remember that this year. You know, I've recorded with a
bunch of these people and I know that, but it's like, oh, yeah,
I didn't really I knew that, but I didn't really
consider that, or I forgot it, or it didn't hit
me like that before. So I would say overall, a
general consensus is there's been a lot of agreement overall.

Speaker 3 (17:48):
Right, Very interesting. Okay, So what I want to do
is walk through each one of the questions that you
put together for this series, And as a reminder for folks,
each one of these questions will be an entire episode
coming up, So I'd love to get a little bit
of background on these questions. So why why you think

(18:08):
this is an important question? Why you chose this for
an episode? And then i'd i'd love to get your
actual take, your personal take on this stuff.

Speaker 2 (18:17):
Does that sound good? Sounds great? Let's do it all right?

Speaker 3 (18:21):
And I am working off of kind of your rough
list that you sent me, so if I butcher the
question somehow, feel free to correct me. But I think
I've got the list right here. So it is the
order you sent me is the order of the episodes
will be in.

Speaker 2 (18:35):
Is that right? Yep? Yep?

Speaker 3 (18:37):
Okay, So the first episode that folks will see is
going to be tackling a question somewhere along the lines
of I haven't put my trail cameras out for my
summer or fall scouting yet, So where do I start?

Speaker 4 (18:51):
Yeah, you want to know the reason why I came
up with that question to start off here?

Speaker 1 (18:55):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (18:55):
Yeah, yeah?

Speaker 3 (18:55):
Why?

Speaker 2 (18:56):
Why is that the first episode.

Speaker 3 (18:57):
Why is that the question that people will be getting
an answer to at the end of July this year.

Speaker 4 (19:01):
Yeah, people are busy in the summer, and you ask
anyone that's a die hard, why two hundred how are
things going on behind every one of them?

Speaker 2 (19:09):
Behind? No one ever says I'm right on track and
everything's going great. Never hear that one.

Speaker 4 (19:14):
And so that's if folks that haven't put out their cameras,
I wanted them to know, are they truly behind the
eight ball?

Speaker 2 (19:22):
And then number two.

Speaker 4 (19:24):
Maybe there's some ways you're running your cameras on your
farms now that you should do different this year. And
so that's the root of the question of you haven't
put them out yet, so where do I start? And
so that gets information out of these guests on this
is exactly how they're going about putting their cameras. Are
they hanging them super deep and betting? Are they tearing

(19:45):
through the whole farm and taking notes again? Are they,
you know, going around the fringes. Are they trying to
key in on an early season opportunity? Are they trying
to monitor a rough funnel throughout the rest of the summer.
And so that was the root of the question because everyone,
just about everyone uses cameras and a lot of people
rely on the information that it's provided, and not by

(20:06):
not having cameras out yet, they probably have some some
fomo and so this is either to calm them or
get them fired up.

Speaker 2 (20:14):
So that's to see what the answers are.

Speaker 5 (20:15):
Now.

Speaker 3 (20:26):
If someone were to listen to that episode in October first,
or god forbid, November first, and they're thinking, I don't
have my cameras out yet, are they going to still
be able to get something from these answers? Is there
going to be something that can be applied no matter
what kind of time of year you end up being
in that position.

Speaker 4 (20:46):
Yeah, I would say absolutely, there'll be certainly some key
pieces of information, whether you listen to that to the
end of July or mid August or September or October
and gosh, hopefully not November, but you're really busy, that's
but yeah, it kind of breaks down a lot of
their thought processes of where they're putting them and why
and what's the information they're trying to gather, which seems simple,

(21:09):
but it's a little more complicated when you're you're let
free on the farm to try to go get that information.

Speaker 3 (21:15):
And you're right, it's like a simple concept, simple question.
But again, what I think is going to make this
really really interesting is hearing from these eight different people
all about how they're thinking through their camera placement and
what goals they're going to have and what they're going
to do with it. I'm very excited for that. So
what about for you? Where would you suggest? Where would

(21:38):
you start if you were in this situation right now?
What would you suggest to someone if they're jumping into
kind of late summer? All right, got to get these
cameras out. What can I achieve?

Speaker 2 (21:46):
What can I do?

Speaker 4 (21:48):
Yeah, I mean, to be completely honest, I'm just like
everyone else.

Speaker 2 (21:51):
I'm a little behind right now.

Speaker 4 (21:53):
So I'm going to be deploying cameras and on some
places I want to, And I think for me, the
most important thing is if you had the ability to
run cameras on that farm the year before, and maybe
you had some summer intel or maybe you know there's
some areas where there's good inventory spots of the farm.
Maybe it's a maybe it's alfalfa, Maybe it's an edge
of a cornfield that meets another field. You know places

(22:15):
you necessarily might not hunt, but you want to get
proof of life. You want to know if the deer
you're dreaming about is still alive. And so a lot
of those locations is based off of previous year's experience.
Maybe throw out a few floater cameras in an area
that has some sort of green food source for the
summer period, understanding that they're likely going to shift unless
you have a big farm. But if you're hunting, you know,

(22:37):
a forty acre piece, a sixty acre piece, you're hopefully
going to get more bucks throughout the fall. And this
question leads into another question later on where people you
know start to potentially panic based off of they put
the cameras out. So that's where I'm going to start.
And then even in some more sensitive areas, I am
trying to be really organized when I go in. Like

(22:57):
if I get a free Saturday, I'm gonna try to
knock out absolutely everything for that Saturday. I'm going to
put a camera up with a solar panel. I'm going
to make sure I'm using either lithium batteries or a
lithium or chargeable pack where I can I know the
spot's going to be good.

Speaker 2 (23:11):
For the rut.

Speaker 4 (23:12):
I'm going to go in there and let it just
start doing this thing, and hopefully I get a picture
or two of the deer that will be utilizing that
area in the rut. So that that's my personal strategy.
I've been better at getting pictures of deer than killing them.
So that's that that model does work to some degree
most that's the case for most people, by the way,
That's why we brought an eight expert. So yeah, so

(23:35):
what about if you were asked this question on October first,
Let's say someone just got or let's say you just
get access to a new property October first. The season's
starting today, but now you've got this brand new hundred
acres you can hunt.

Speaker 2 (23:49):
How does your answer change?

Speaker 4 (23:50):
If that's the case, I'm going to be excited to
start because there's nothing more fun than knowing trying to
figure out what's out there. So my biggest thing would
be I live in farm country, Illinois, so a lot
of these parcels maybe have a parcel like that I'm
as picturing is I don't know, twenty or thirty percent
timber and the rest of its open fields, and so
depending on the type of crop, I'm probably gonna walk

(24:11):
all the edges of all the fields try to figure
out where there's different you know, maybe there's a creek
system there and you can get an idea where there
might be some funneling going on. The other thing would
be looking for scrapes on the edge of these fields
to put up a camera for inventory. That would be
I would bring a weed whacker and some handsaw and

(24:33):
a backpack full of cameras and I'm going to do
a big loop and then I'm gonna look at the
map online and see if there's any terrain features that
are going to be really exciting to inventory and try
to be as efficient as possible. What has been interesting
throughout these conversations is there's some people that would say
they would go in and cover every inch of it
while they're already in their October one, and some of

(24:54):
them would just go on the fringes and just like, hey,
I just want to know they're there, and I'm going
to put the game plan, put a bank game plan
together kind of on the fly, and I probably fall
on more of the side if I'm going to go
try to cover as much as possible, to learn as
much and the other thing too, is a lot of
these guys, some of them are most of them are
hunting a specific buck too, and then there's some that

(25:15):
are hunting, you know, maybe three or four mature bucks,
and I would be in the category of hunting, you know,
a amature buck, not a single single deer. And so
if I bump one off, hopefully there's still you know,
two other ones that I have an opportunity yet. Yeah, okay,
next question, the best spot on my farm has bad access.

Speaker 3 (25:38):
How do I hunt it this year? So background on
the question, and then what would you do?

Speaker 4 (25:45):
The amount of times I've heard people say, oh, there's
a sweet spot, it's so cool. I found it when
I was shed hunting. I found it. I remember from
the year before. I walked in there scouting in November
and this reeked a buck and it was just a
big buck oasis. And then they usually follow up with
I can't get back there. I don't think I can
get back there. I don't know if I should get

(26:05):
back there. And that's every every almost everyone I talked
to has said something to that degree. And so that
was the root of the question of Okay, these guys
are very successful, do they go in to hunt that area.
Do they go in to hunt the spot where you
have to walk through ninety percent of the farm and
scare three different dough family groups for the hail mary

(26:27):
shot to hunt whatever feature that makes that spot so special.
And the answers may surprise folks, they may not, but
that that was the root of the question, because I
guarantee there's been a spot that you know that you
could think of right now, like I wish I could
hunt that, and maybe you did hunt it, or maybe
you didn't hunt it, and so sure, that's the that's

(26:48):
the challenge these that's a white tail dilemma.

Speaker 2 (26:50):
Every hunter has spaced, every single one.

Speaker 3 (26:52):
Yes, I know what Don Higgins answered, yep, yep, Okay,
So it's your take, my take, and it's the worst
answer in the world of podcast.

Speaker 4 (27:04):
It depends. But I'll give you an example. There was
last year where I shot my archery buck. The access
was not very good, but I hunted at one time
and I shot a buck.

Speaker 2 (27:13):
So in that scenario worked. There's been times where I've
tried that.

Speaker 4 (27:17):
And it feels more like I'm pounding my head against
the wall of this spot is so good, why is
it not working? And I forget about the deer I
scared on the way in and the way out. I
forget about the deer that I heard snorting because the
wind wasn't great. Because maybe it is an awesome spot,
but there's not a good place to blow my scent.
And so going into this season a slightly more wise,

(27:39):
I would be on the side of how can I
still hunt that movement or hunt that feature, but maybe
it's one hundred and fifty yards away versus the spot.
I just got off the phone with a friend and
he's new farm. It was just perfect, And I brought
this up that I've launched in the series and he's like, man,
that one spot, you know, down to the bottom you

(28:00):
got to walk through everything, Like, man, that spot looks awesome,
but I just don't know how to hunt it. And
I was like, well, you have to listen to a
new episode of a new show that's coming out soon.

Speaker 3 (28:07):
Stay tuned.

Speaker 2 (28:08):
That's right. So it's a question that we all.

Speaker 3 (28:10):
Battle, Yeah, and you're right, there's no one single answer
to it, and so much of hunting, so much of
a lot of these decisions and these questions, like even
back to like the trial camera question, you brought up.
Do you go in on October first and cover it
all so you learn everything at once, or do you
stand the fringes and be careful. It all comes down
like risk and reward. Yep, you're balancing what's the possible

(28:34):
positive outcome of this pressure I'm going to put on
in one way or another, and then what's the negative
ramifications what's the possible risk here? And then those two
levels are constantly changing, depending on time of year, depending
on how your property lays out, depending on how much
access you have, depending on how many other people are

(28:55):
hunting in. All of that is like the sliding scale
that you can constantly have to be, you know, adjusting
the weight of each one of these variables and trying
to understand I'm not sure with the right metaphor here
if the metaphor is like a scale with weights or
if with.

Speaker 2 (29:09):
The multiplier with the multiplier, Yeah, yeah, exactly, that's it.

Speaker 3 (29:12):
So uh yeah, it's it's one of the most frustrating
slash fascinating aspects of deer hunting. Seriously.

Speaker 2 (29:23):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (29:24):
Yeah, there's more questions than answers a lot of times,
or maybe not, maybe that maybe there would be more
answers in questions, because I think that's I would say
there's more answers than questions.

Speaker 2 (29:34):
That would be the more correct way to say it.

Speaker 3 (29:37):
Right, because everyone's got their own take on every one
of these questions. Yeah, okay, so some of your questions,
some of our episodes are a little bit more high
level as well. You've got some that are pretty tactical,
and then you've got some that kind of zoom out
to the thirty thousand foot overview almost like more thematic,
And this next one's one of those.

Speaker 2 (29:57):
This question, this episode.

Speaker 3 (29:59):
Will be asking about what the biggest mistake is that
people make that's keeping hunters from going from being good
to being great. So, what's what's creating this divide between
a whole bunch of good and then just a handful
of great hunters? What are the mistakes there?

Speaker 2 (30:17):
How did that come to be?

Speaker 3 (30:18):
How have you been framing that up for these guests?
And then what do you think?

Speaker 2 (30:22):
Yeah, so the root of the question everyone wants.

Speaker 4 (30:26):
I would feel if you've listened to deer hunting podcasts
you want to get better, you wouldn't be listening to
anything and trying to self educate if you didn't want
to get better, and so I think good to great
is objective, right, Maybe a great hunter means something to
me than what it does to you. And that's part
of the you know, having a subjective question like that,
because it creates an open opportunity for the guests to like,

(30:49):
what is a good hunter?

Speaker 2 (30:49):
What is a great hunter?

Speaker 4 (30:50):
But I think most people there are serious hunters with
all the tools and information that are available, are good.
And I think that there's some things like what are
the these guys doing differently that makes them great?

Speaker 2 (31:03):
Because they are great?

Speaker 4 (31:04):
I mean, their track record is you know, they're doing
a lot of the things that we all aspire to do,
and a lot of them are later in their hunting
careers where they've gone through the trials and tribulations to
be good to great. So that was the basis of
the question, and the answers were kind of all over
the place. Ironically, they were kind of all over the place.

Speaker 2 (31:24):
I thought.

Speaker 4 (31:25):
I thought a lot of the questions, I thought the
most common answer would be you gotta stop shooting good bucks.

Speaker 2 (31:31):
That did come up. But the other theme I had
noticed was effort.

Speaker 4 (31:38):
It's effort, yeah, having you know, whether that's multiple spots
knocking on more doors having planned a B C, D,
E f G.

Speaker 2 (31:46):
Because we've talked about this on like buying land.

Speaker 4 (31:50):
One of the mistakes I think people make is they
buy a farm and they just hunt it to death,
and I think that's like part of being from good
to great. So it was a very fun question because
everyone wants to find success and what are these guys
doing that are making them great? So that was rude
and that was one of the themes that I picked
up that I thought was pretty interesting.

Speaker 3 (32:10):
I think that this one might be one of the
more interesting episodes, even though it's one of the most
open ending questions, or maybe because it's one of the
most open ending questions, people are going to take in
many different directions, but all of them coming from such
a strong background themselves. So I'm intrigued. What is what's
your angle on this one, Jake, What do you think

(32:32):
is the key?

Speaker 2 (32:33):
Oh?

Speaker 4 (32:34):
Man, I think it's I think a lot of it
comes out of effort, I really do. I think there's
in the world we live you can go after and
get whatever you want with the right amount of effort
and looping in the right people to learn the right
things and I feel that people who I feel like
it's easy to fall into a rut like, hey, these

(32:54):
are the two farms I hunt, and whatever is there
is what I'm gonna hunt. But I aspired a chase
X caliber of deer and maybe that area just doesn't
produce it, and so you might be great for the area.
But maybe that measurement of great is internally and more
self fulfilling, because I think that's probably what it is.
I think a lot of these people, although they've made
a career with white teal hunting, they're truly passionate and

(33:15):
ate up about getting better every year and learning.

Speaker 2 (33:19):
And it's not it's not vanity.

Speaker 4 (33:20):
I think that that's something that a lot of people
misunderstand with like people that are that have a reputation
for killing big deer. I really think ninety nine percent
of those people they do not do it for vanity.
They do it because they are addicted to learning, addicted
to hunting big deer, and uh, I think there's nothing
wrong with that.

Speaker 2 (33:38):
I can't argue with that.

Speaker 3 (33:41):
I keep on finding myself wanting to jump in with
my takes on these, but then I catch myself because
I'm just a wait, yeah, and do one of these myself.

Speaker 2 (33:49):
So's I keep on having to bite my tongue.

Speaker 3 (33:51):
It's very difficult for me to do that. Jake.

Speaker 4 (33:54):
Yeah, you're gonna get you get all the you got
all the questions in advance, and we get to discuss
the reason why you have a leg up.

Speaker 2 (33:59):
So I do.

Speaker 3 (34:00):
This is true, but I don't think it's gonna make
my answers any better than these other guys, So that's
for sure. Okay, next one, and this is one that
again we've all been in this bucket or in this
boat before. I can't find a buck to hunt, now what?
And I think this is a question that would work

(34:21):
on August first, or October first or November first. I've
had that happen every single one of those dates. So
tell me about the question.

Speaker 4 (34:31):
Yeah, So I think as anticipation builds, so this is
going to go live around mid August, and that's where
the deer basically done growing and buddies are sending you
pictures of giant deer they have in velvet, and you're
just feeling like a loser if you're like, I can't
find anything to hunt. I have my cameras out, I've
done everything I could, and there's a level of panic,
and I think it's probably self imposed panic for everyone.

(34:56):
And so I wanted to get an idea of are
you screwed? Or should you be optimistic? Should you be
searching high and low to maybe find a deer that
would get you excited to hunt. And so that was
the basis of the question. And I've talked to people,
you know, like, hey, i' was receiving I got nothing

(35:16):
to hunt, And the point is like, well, if you're
that guy and you say it like e or should
you be e or or should you be super excited?

Speaker 2 (35:24):
So that was the basis of the question.

Speaker 3 (35:28):
Did you get the answers you expected on that one?

Speaker 2 (35:30):
A little bit of a mix. This one was a
little bit of a mix. I think.

Speaker 4 (35:35):
You know, people talk about the shift from summer to
fall ranges, and that was something that we did cover
a lot. And there was some specific details too of
some of the in some of these areas of how
far maybe that shift is because you hear a shift,
does that mean five.

Speaker 2 (35:49):
Miles or does that mean one mile?

Speaker 4 (35:51):
Or what habitat type to what summer habitat to fall
habitat And that episode, I'm really excited about because I
think there were some things that I got reassurance from me.
I'm run a cameras right now, I don't have there's
a farm, right don't have a mature buck on camera
right now, And then I'm a little nervous, But hey,
I don't have to be unless you listen to the
episode and come up with some other reasons.

Speaker 2 (36:11):
But I think, no matter when it is, I.

Speaker 4 (36:14):
Think there's to your point if you could listen that
a variety at different times and give some tangible strategy
to try to find something to hunt.

Speaker 2 (36:24):
So that's and the other thing too. One of the
common things themes was finding one is usually the hardest part,
so you gotta work really hard.

Speaker 3 (36:33):
Yeah, what's what's the way that you deal with this?
How do you think about this when you find yourself
in that in that camp?

Speaker 4 (36:42):
I don't panic, I think, and I used to because
I've had the ability to run a lot of cameras
on a lot of different farms, and so I just
had noticed that some farms would have a lot of
self summer velvet bucks, and I was super excited. And
then after a few hard frost, the habitat type changes,
they all disappear and it's like, oh, that wasn't really great.
And then there's other farms where I'm I'm I'm most

(37:05):
excited about what shows up in October because usually they stick.

Speaker 2 (37:07):
Around and those are the deer that you're gonna have
an opportunity to hunt.

Speaker 4 (37:10):
And so I do not panic, and usually I have
to tell you know, friends or people that reach out
like I don't have anything on Campwait, it's gonna get better,
especially if the habitat is a good fall habitat and
or there's crop rotations. And that's a huge thing in
farm country where a ditch out in the middle of
nowhere that has standing crops all the way around it

(37:31):
and there's food, maybe a creek runs through, Like, there's
a lot of resources for a deer to hang out there.
You take out a lot of the the site barrier
of crops, that whole that whole ditch is gonna hunt
a lot different. Now a buck may push it, or
a domemat, a buck may push a dough out there,
and that could still be a great a great spot.
But everything changes, and so you just gotta you gotta
be aware of that and be optimistic, but don't.

Speaker 2 (37:53):
Be lackadaizable would be my my take on it.

Speaker 3 (37:56):
Well, yeah, and that brings me to like the next
situation though, is like are there situations when you should
be worried or when you should be like, oh, there's
not a buck here. I'm interested in hunting, and now
I do need to like go to Plan B, Plant C,
Plan D and find one. Did did Did some of
the guests kind of go that direction with it?

Speaker 2 (38:15):
Yeah? Yeah, oh yeah, we got Thomas Mills.

Speaker 4 (38:17):
I answered that question in a really fun way to
where a point of like, hey, if that is you, yeah,
you should feel you should panic. And it's very specific,
and so I'm gonna have to leave a cliffhanger on that.
I feel like a guy that's trying to sell a
book but not talk about the book, and like you
have to buy the book to hear it.

Speaker 2 (38:33):
So I apologize for that, and I don't know where
the line is.

Speaker 3 (38:38):
Well, we're always walking on the line here on the show.
All right, Well, I hope that I'm not in that
boat this year. I was in that boat last year
a lot of it and never did find a deer
that I was too terribly into.

Speaker 2 (38:51):
Well, I guess that's not true. I found.

Speaker 3 (38:53):
There was one dear I was after, and you know
about it because I killed it right after I told
you I was gonna yep. But then in my other
main area that was a doozy.

Speaker 4 (39:01):
But did you find anything that throughout the fall that
showed up.

Speaker 3 (39:06):
No, not that I really wanted to hunt.

Speaker 2 (39:08):
You have to learn it.

Speaker 3 (39:09):
And yeah, there's been two. There have been two, you know,
bucks that I was hoping to hunt that year in
this other area, and they both one of them disappeared early,
really early. One of them disappeared early October. And then
one of them, one of those deer got killed by
someone else, I found out later. And then one of
those deer showed up randomly for like three four days
in November and then disappeared again.

Speaker 2 (39:30):
And it was only at night.

Speaker 3 (39:32):
And he went from being a homebody for three years
to being a ghost at five. And uh, I don't
I don't know, I mean, any idea if he's around anymore.
Probably not.

Speaker 4 (39:42):
So we had to listen to that episode. You'll you'll
feel energized and discouraged at the same time.

Speaker 3 (39:47):
Yes, I plan on it all right, next episode, next question,
And this is another one we kind of alluded to earlier.
This is you said, this gets you excited. It gets
me very excited too. This is one of my absolute
favorite things. I just got access to a new farm.
What should I do now? That's the best walk in
a new farm. The excitement, the optimism so so great.

Speaker 4 (40:10):
Yeah, the root of that question is a lot of
times people, you know, maybe maybe as season approaches, they
get a little bit more aggressive. Maybe they decide to
buy a farm. Maybe they decide to you know, at
least pops up and they scoop it up. Maybe they
get permission. And the reason I asked this question too,
it's around August twenty fifth, and so you can't do
all these big awesome projects that everyone talks about. Go

(40:32):
do a you know, a ten acre TSI cut, or
doze in a new road, or you know, carve out
this new giant food plot. So you the question is
rooted in the idea of you kind of have to
play the cards that you're dealt right now. And so
that was an interesting caveat to the question to where
once again there's kind of a variance of answers. There

(40:53):
was I would say a general consensus amongst all of them,
but it's a super exciting time. But you have to
be thoughtful one methodical, and these guys are all thoughtful
and methodical. So that's why I felt like it was
a perfect question for him.

Speaker 3 (41:15):
Now, you know, I could see there being two angles
on this. There could be some guys who it all
depends on the time of the year, but in this time,
with at least the episode dropping, you know, at the
end of the summer, maybe some folks would be like, Okay,
I just got asks to the farm. It's too late
to do anything. It's just how do I hunt it
as it is right now? And then I could see
maybe some people would still be like, hey, it's there's

(41:38):
still time to do something, and maybe they would aggressively
try to make one last minute change of some kind
or something. Did you get people with both of those
two different ideas or is everyone like hands off, it's
too late, or what was the any consensus on that front?

Speaker 4 (41:54):
It was more conservative than what I had initially anticipated.
And that was the fun because I had some Like
I said, I had some guesses how some of the
like a lot of the people have interviewed multiple times,
so I kind.

Speaker 2 (42:04):
Of think I think I know how they think.

Speaker 4 (42:06):
But they do, but I don't clearly, and the general
consensus was being pretty conservative and very thoughtful with what
do you do now? And that episode should be pretty
interesting for folks because inherently, even even some of their answers,
I feel if you were the guy that fell behind

(42:27):
throughout the summer, that it's that a lot of the
philosophy is very applicable.

Speaker 2 (42:33):
To that to that individual as well.

Speaker 3 (42:35):
Yeah, okay, Jake, you just got access to a new
farm at the end of August or early September, and
we'll say you're in Illinois, so your season opens in
one month's time.

Speaker 2 (42:46):
What do you do? I'm hanging.

Speaker 4 (42:50):
My ideal situation is I'm going to have a full
free day dark to dark, ideally no interruptions throughout the day,
and I'm going to have as many cameras as I
think i'm going to need. I'm going to bring as
many prehan sets as I think I'm going to need,
and I just go through about my day and try
to use whatever whitetail knowledge is in my brain to

(43:11):
read and anticipate what is going to go on. In
a perfect world, if there was an area where I
could still get in some food, I would probably like
to do that, but I don't necessarily think I would
unless I felt very very confident of this is where
it needs to go and this is the reason behind it,
because that's a pretty big decision to bring in equipment
and do that. But I'm just going to go in

(43:32):
and hang a lot of cameras and hang a lot
of stands if it makes sense. If there's only like
two good spots that make sense where I can blow
my scent and have good access, and I'm only going
to hang two sets, but then I'm going to hang
multiple cameras to get tell that's my plan.

Speaker 3 (43:49):
And you said earlier when we were talking about cameras
that you would error.

Speaker 2 (43:54):
I think you said this.

Speaker 3 (43:54):
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think you said
that you would be more of the kind of person
who would walk like every square inch to figure it
out versus stand on the outskirts.

Speaker 2 (44:02):
Is that true?

Speaker 4 (44:03):
Yeah, I would say for sure, because there's not a
lot of big farms here, so it doesn't take very
long to cover forty acres or fifty acres. I mean,
if I fell into a dream scenario where it's you know,
a thousand acres, no no way or even or even
two hundred, I think I probably wouldn't, but a forty
to twenty, a fifty, probably an eighty. I'm probably going
to cover not a thousand percent of it, but there's

(44:25):
many of the arteries of the farm that I can.

Speaker 3 (44:29):
Yeah, here's the next one. And this one gives me
heartburn just saying it. I imagine there will be people that
will get heartburn just a clicking play on that podcast,
because if they are clicking play on that podcast, they're
doing it because they have they're either experiencing this right
now or have in the past, or anticipating this possibly

(44:51):
happening to them in the short term, which is, uh,
my food plots look like crap. Now what So you've
got a failed food plot. We've all been there, very distressing,
especially if it's getting late into the year. If it's
like a fall food plot, you just playing in August
or something, and now it's September and it's looking bad.

(45:13):
I feel like I'm there too often. I never like it.
What tell me about the question? Give me some thoughts.

Speaker 4 (45:19):
Everyone everyone always has very high expectations for food plots,
and they see it on Instagram or a magazine where
it's just you know, looks perfect, and everyone's no matter
how good the food pot looks, they always wish it
could look a little bit better more than likely, And
a lot of people put a lot of stock into
food plots too, So that was part of the root
of the question of if your food plot looks like crap,

(45:41):
is your season bust or is it you know, is
this something truly distressed about? And some of those guests
dove into that naturally, and it's been really dry the
last handful of falls. So most fall food plots have
not done well based off of your planting method and
everything else too. So what are some what are some
under what are some commonalities of why your food plot

(46:05):
is failing as well? If it fails every single year,
what are you doing? Are you not addressing the soil?
Maybe you need to consider a perennial instead of a
fall food plot. So those are all things that most
people plant food plots. Most people wish they look better,
everyone wishes they didn't fail, and everyone's been in that boat.

Speaker 2 (46:23):
So that was the root of the question.

Speaker 3 (46:25):
Yeah, I feel like I have followed the Jeff's Sturgist
method of dealing with food plot failure. A lot, and
have also reached out to them many summers early falls,
like Jeff, what about now?

Speaker 2 (46:38):
What about this situation? What do I do?

Speaker 3 (46:40):
Given this? So I'm sure they have something great to
say on this one too.

Speaker 4 (46:44):
Yeah, there was a lot of really good answers for this,
and a lot of the answers were very very common
on the strategy, the seed type, maybe the rates, and
some of them dive into maybe, you know, why why
did it fail? Was it because of weather? Is it
because of a different reason.

Speaker 3 (47:01):
Because you were a horrible farmer?

Speaker 2 (47:04):
Yeah? Yeah, right, maybe that is the case.

Speaker 3 (47:07):
It's probably the case for most of us being amateur
ad hoc farmers for a few weeks a year. Yep,
all right, Well what about you if you've got a
fouled food plot?

Speaker 2 (47:18):
How do you tackle it?

Speaker 3 (47:19):
Or what would you suggest to someone who's in that
in that situation.

Speaker 4 (47:22):
I I've had, I'll say this, I've been able to
run a drill from a county NRCS office and so
that has really.

Speaker 2 (47:31):
Helped keep moisture in the soil.

Speaker 4 (47:34):
And before I did that, i'd work the dirt and
you know, like the classic steps that we all kind
of grew up on. I would have more failures with that,
and since using a drill, I've had a lot better
luck of retaining soil moisture and keeping something on the
on the in the plots year round and not letting
weeds take over. So that's been something that thankfully I
haven't had a major failure the last couple of years.

(47:55):
Prior to that same thing, Jeff sturgis cereal box of
you know all these different you know, oh, it's right,
you know, all these different things that is going to
green up and grow really fast.

Speaker 2 (48:05):
And so.

Speaker 4 (48:07):
That's been my I hope I don't have to do
that this year, but I could. You know, it's it's
weather dependent, and I have paid way more attention to
getting actual soil samples. Like before, for three or four
years ago, I never got a soil sample that's like, oh,
you know, if this is dirt, it should grow whatever
I want. And so I've been educated more on that,
and so it's a moving spectrum, and I think that

(48:28):
question will be helpful for everyone bait, you know, even
if you're just starting out or if you've done food
pods for twenty years. I feel like there's some things
in there that will be helpful for everyone, which I'm
really happy with how that episode is turning out great.

Speaker 3 (48:45):
Speaking of heartburn, next question, my whole area got hammered
by e HD.

Speaker 2 (48:52):
Now what h.

Speaker 4 (48:56):
Yeah, that that was a hard question to ask some
of these people because they had experienced that. When I
when I asked Bill yesterday, I was like, I promise
I did not ask. I did not formulate this question
to cause pain for you. But the reason being is,
unfortunately there's parts of the country that are seeing more

(49:17):
EHD cases than you know, Southern Iowad, Northern Missouri has
you know, been kind of the epicenter of a lot
of EHDU outbreaks over recent years, but there's been cases
in Ohio, other states, Indiana, and so the question is, unfortunately,
you may have to face this in a five year period,
a ten year period. And I wanted to talk to
people that have experienced it, or have consulted on farms

(49:39):
or been on farms that you got decimated, and what
do you do and what's what's the recourse? Is there
a silver lining to this? I feel like there's a
lot of different perceptions of EHD, and these people are
super serious about white tails and they want the white
tail her to do well, and so I feel like
a lot of them are self educated. Are they have

(50:00):
a doctorate an EHD? No, but probably pretty close. So
I wanted to I wanted to dive into all this because, unfortunately,
we all may have to face it in some capacity.

Speaker 3 (50:11):
Did you did you run them through the key filter?
They shouldn't be allowed to answer that question until they
can tell you what the acronym e h D stands for.
Oh yeah, I could say it, but I would mispronounce
it epizootic epozootic camorrhagic disease.

Speaker 2 (50:29):
That sounds right. You might have missed a letter, or
maybe you nailed it. I don't know.

Speaker 3 (50:34):
I might have missed a letter too, but I'm pretty
sure that I said, So, what what do you do?

Speaker 2 (50:42):
What?

Speaker 3 (50:42):
What would you say to someone who's in that situation?
Have you been in this situation yourself?

Speaker 4 (50:47):
Thankfully this past year there was some e HD cases
uh near where I was at. There was unfortunately, fortunately
not wiped out by any means, so that that was
a bonus. I have never had a face ah, true
catastrophic EHD wipe out because I had a lot of
different areas and that's this seems like it doesn't wipe
out a whole county.

Speaker 2 (51:07):
It wipes out different pockets.

Speaker 4 (51:09):
And so it's a little bit moralizing when you're excited
about a deer and you maybe watched throughout the summer,
you knew them from the year before, and then you
know there's this massive dry spell or you start hearing
about oh, so and so found fifteen deer dead and
blah blah river and it starts to linger in the
back of your mind of well did he he is
not on camera?

Speaker 2 (51:28):
Is he dead? And it's not fun. But everyone has
faced the thought process.

Speaker 4 (51:34):
Of did that deer die of EHD in the last
two weeks, the last month. And I framed that question
in a way it was not necessarily confirmed too, because
I feel like EHD is always a rumor.

Speaker 2 (51:49):
It's always in the rumor mill. It's always a rumor mill.

Speaker 4 (51:51):
It's never I found fifteen, it's so and so heard
from so and so that so and so.

Speaker 2 (51:55):
Found, you know, fifty deer.

Speaker 4 (51:57):
So I framed it as it's rumors, it's I've heard
hearsay and yeah, but thank gosh, I have not had
to experience that. But some of those questions, some of
the answers were probably what you could expect, pack up
and go somewhere else, because that's you can't magically make
them appear if they're dead.

Speaker 3 (52:14):
Yeah, yeah, which is true if you get hit really bad.
But I feel like there's a silver lining sometimes. But
I'll save my I'll save my answer on that. Again,
I need to shut up and stop talking. Okay, ehd
let's move on from that one. Here's another one of
those like higher level thematic kind of ones. What can

(52:38):
hunters do now to make sure that the next twenty
five years of deer hunting are better than the last
twenty five? And when I read this question, I kind
of was not confused, but I was curious from like
what angle people would approach this. Would they be looking
at this, like, how do I make my next twenty
five years better like individually versus the last twenty five

(53:00):
five years? Or how do I make sure that like
deer hunting in general for everyone is better for the
next twenty five years. Did you have a specific one
of those that you were thinking when you wrote this,
or were you kind of knowing that it could go
either way and you wanted that to be the case.

Speaker 4 (53:15):
I was trying to leave it open ended because I
wanted to see and this is how I asked the question.
Almost every time, you or me, or anyone listening to
this wants to make the next twenty five years of
deer hunting better than their last. And a lot of
the answers were individual based, because I've framed it as

(53:37):
you know, you as an individual, you're only one guy,
and you know, can one guy create enough impact to
make it better for everyone?

Speaker 2 (53:44):
And maybe that was some of the answers.

Speaker 4 (53:46):
But I purposely left it to where you could look
at it holistically or individually, because why two hunting is
extremely selfish endeavor for a lot of these A lot
of these guys, I would say, I feel like they
would probably describe themselves in some way as a loner
or someone that enjoys hunting by themselves, or you know,
they they don't have a camp and they bring in,

(54:06):
you know, ten of their high school buddies and you know,
ten of their friends, and they just go about it
like all these guys are very methodical and work really
hard for their for their own goals and satisfaction. So
there are some really interesting answers on a holistic approach
and how one person can make an impact for many people.
And then there was some that if you want to

(54:29):
have the next twenty five years be better than the last,
you are going to have to make some specific things happen.

Speaker 3 (54:36):
Interesting, Well, Jake, what about you, How how do you
think a hunter now can make the next twenty five
years better?

Speaker 4 (54:46):
I think it's I think you're going to have to
work really hard. I think you're going to have to
lock up some form of private property so you can
make posit sive impacts on the landscape and also hopefully
inspire others to do the same. I truly feel that

(55:06):
some of the best habitat managers and people that are
ate up with white tails take such good care of
the ground and inspire others to do the same. You
look at this craze of managing timber properly. No one
used to be excited about that, and so you look
at that. You can't do that on public ground. You
can't create you know, they do it on a large scale,

(55:29):
but like as an individual, you can't do that. I
can't go take a chanceaw and go do ts I
on a piece of public So I think that.

Speaker 2 (55:35):
You could, you just might get you might get serious trouble.

Speaker 4 (55:38):
Yeah, so that's kind of my thought process, and I
do think.

Speaker 2 (55:44):
We always look back.

Speaker 4 (55:47):
Part of the reason I asked that question too, is
people romanticize over a nostalgia, and so everyone says that
you know the path, it is just the good old days.
We're going to say that in twenty five years, right,
And so that was another of the question of I
knew everyone would romanticize. No one said, well, out the
last twenty five years have actually been pretty dang good,
and I don't think we had to do anything better.

(56:08):
So that was another like kind of thought process behind
the question. But yeah, I don't I don't have a
great answer because I think it's it's loaded. I mean,
that is a loaded question, and I I got more
enjoyment asking it than I did answering it.

Speaker 2 (56:21):
I'll tell you that.

Speaker 3 (56:25):
So final question is are we are you doing the
bonus episode final question or no? Was that the last
episode or is there a ninth episode that we.

Speaker 4 (56:35):
Got to figure that out? Yeah, so I would say
there's eight for sure, and we're going to figure out
what we're gonna do with the alternate the alternate question.

Speaker 3 (56:42):
Do you want to answer the alternate or do you
want to hould off on that as a secret.

Speaker 4 (56:49):
I mean, we could tease real quick, we go over
real quick, okay, and maybe people will pipe in and
tell whether they or not or whether or not they want.

Speaker 2 (56:55):
You to do that one, although I might be too
late that.

Speaker 3 (57:00):
So this is this is an interesting one because I
think this question gets to maybe how each one of
these hunters defines success or how we define success. I
think that's what this question gets at. Maybe at least
that's the way I look at it. But the question
is this, do great hunters really shoot a buck every year?

Speaker 4 (57:22):
The root of that question is everyone goes into season
with really high expectations and goals, and everyone wants to
fill their buck tag, right, That's why you do all
the work year round. And some of these hunters, you know,
like the follow up question asked a lot of times
out of the last ten years, how many years did
you not shoot a buck? And there was actually a

(57:44):
common percentage to where it was like, Okay, these are
some of the best hunters for this percent of years.

Speaker 2 (57:52):
Either their target buck their.

Speaker 4 (57:53):
Hunting died you know from EHD, neighbor shot them, disappeared,
or they couldn't find a deer that made them happy,
or you know, the list kind of goes on, but
there was a certain percentage that seemed to follow amongst
those hunters. But none of them, now there was another
really good answer within that of the answer was bluntly yes.

(58:15):
And the reason being is just because you can't find
a high scoring deer, maybe there's a mature buck that
you could, you know, help ensure got shot, which I
thought was a really interesting perspective. But none of them said, like, yeah,
every great hunter shoots a buck no matter what, and
they just lower their goals until they magically, you know,
come across the deer so they can say they shot

(58:35):
a buck for the last fifty years, fifty years that
that did.

Speaker 2 (58:38):
That was not the answer. Yeah, what's your answer.

Speaker 4 (58:42):
I wouldn't say every single year, but I would say
when they said the percentage that was kind of the
thought process of it was about eighty percent, about eighty percent,
ninety percent, one was seventy percent. So you know, ten
out of ten years the only eat attack three times.

Speaker 2 (58:58):
And I would say that's probably accurate, I really do.

Speaker 4 (59:01):
And but you know, because the reason I think is
that high too for a lot of those people, because
they put so much work and they have option ABC, D,
E FG, And you know, I think that's a something
that I'm consciously trying to do every single year to
have a lot of different options because crazy things happen.
You can lose permission, something crazy happens, and so when

(59:24):
you have all your season riding into one plan, that's scary.

Speaker 2 (59:29):
Bet, it's a scary disaster. Yes, yes, yeah, that's the truth.

Speaker 3 (59:34):
I know how that feels sometimes. Well, what is there
anything else that you want folks to know about this
series coming up? That they should be thinking about, that
they should be looking forward to, that they should.

Speaker 2 (59:50):
Be anxious about.

Speaker 3 (59:54):
What should they what's the last thing that folks should
be living here today with knowing about what's to come.

Speaker 4 (01:00:00):
They're going to have a weekly eight person panel of
coaches to lead them along in the excitement of season.
So each of these are thematically following the excitement of
the season. Different opportunities of you know, windows of opportunity
prior to season, and whether you've been hunting for a
super long time or you're new, this is going to

(01:00:22):
be your weekly check in to get expert advice on
one topic and dive not super deep into it, but
get the quick and dirty with some nuance for every
single topic.

Speaker 2 (01:00:33):
So I'm really excited about it.

Speaker 4 (01:00:36):
And you know, I I with just some of the
conversation and they're like, man, that's a really good idea.

Speaker 2 (01:00:41):
I'm excited. I'm excited to see how this turns out.

Speaker 4 (01:00:43):
So I'd love to hear people's feedback because I think,
you know, most podcasts just like this one. You know,
it's just you and I talking, and so I think
there's this a lot of information and perspectives and a
short amount of time to you know, get refined and
relate to one of the eight people, four of the
eight people, or you think all eight of them are crazy.

Speaker 2 (01:01:00):
That's gonna be up to you.

Speaker 3 (01:01:02):
Well, I think one way or another, it's gonna be fascinating.
I'm very excited about it. I'm glad it's come together,
and I appreciate you putting in the time and effort
to bring this to Fruition. So thank you for that. Yeah,
I appreciate the opportunity absolutely. All right, man, Well, I'm
excited to tune in. You and I are gonna be
doing some stuff together next week, which I'm excited about,

(01:01:23):
and recording my version of this or my part of
this series. So looking forward to seeing you soon and
making all.

Speaker 2 (01:01:29):
That happen awesome.

Speaker 3 (01:01:30):
Thank you so much for having me on here, all right,
and that's gonna do it today. I appreciate you joining us.
Please tune in next week for the first episode of
the Back forty podcast and every week for the next
eight weeks. I'm sure you guys are gonna enjoy this one.
We get some really interesting insights as you heard here

(01:01:50):
with Jake kind of previewing things. I can't wait to
tune into the full shows myself, so stay tuned for that.
Stay tuned for future episodes of Wired Hunt, of course,
the Foundations podcast excuse me, the Foundations Podcast with Tony.
We've got a new season of ret Fresh Radio coming
up here soon too, as we mentioned, and it's gonna
be a great fall. So until then, stick around for

(01:02:12):
the next week's podcast. Thanks for being a part of
this and stay wired to Hunt.