August 6, 2025 • 53 mins
You’ve got the sign, the bedding, the movement, and the spot - but getting in clean feels impossible. In this episode, Jake Hofer asks Steve Hanson, Don Higgins, Skip Sligh, Mark Kenyon, Jeff Sturgis, Bobby Kendall, and Bill Winke how they approach high-value spots with tough access. Can you still hunt it without blowing it up? Or are you better off leaving it alone? The panel shares their real-world tactics, how they evaluate risk vs reward, and what it takes to turn a tricky spot into a killing setup. If you’ve ever had a stand that looks perfect on the map but feels impossible to hunt, this is one you won’t want to miss.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The best spot on your farm has bad access, then
it's not the best spot on your farm.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Welcome back to back forty podcast, brought to you by
Land dot com, the leading online real estate marketplace to
find your perfect rule recreational, agricultural or hunting properties here
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Speaker 3 (00:24):
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Speaker 2 (00:27):
Sign up for a chance to win today at themeaeater
dot com.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Backslash Back forty.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
And today we're diving into a topic that we've all
likely ran into at some point. And so this might
have been when you're summer scouting. Maybe it's from last year.
Maybe there's this a spot that comes to mind and
it has bad access. And so I wrangled up the
panel of experts Steve Hanson, Don Higgins, Bobby Kendall, Jeff Sturgis,
(00:53):
Skip Slide, Bill Winky, Thomas Milsna, and Mark Kenyon to
ask the question, the best botto my farm has bad access?
Should I hunt it? How do I hunt it? And
as you're listening, to this. You probably have a spot
like this in the back of your mind, So this
is going to help you evaluate the risk versus reward
for this upcoming season and get a couple different opinions
(01:15):
and see what expert on the panel fits your hunting
style the most. Because all these guys are really efficient
at deer hunting, but they all have their own take
on how to potentially hunt a spot like this or
maybe not hunt a spot like this. So without further ado,
let's get into the earning question and whitetail dilemma for
this week on back forty. First up, we have Thomas Milsna.
(01:42):
Thomas hunts a permission property, shared permission property, still very
active with strategizing, planning and proving a property. But here's
what he has to say on whether you should hunt
a spot with bad access even if it's really good.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
The best spot on your farm has bad access, it's
not the best spot on your farm, right, So there's
two ways to look at that. The best spot for
deer isn't always the best spot to hunt deer, and
understanding that is is what's going to determine your success
or destroy that spot and push that deer activity elsewhere,
(02:16):
potentially on the neighborhoods property. And I've made this mistake
a lot, a lot. You find a spot and you're like, yes,
this is it, right. You get that feeling that like
big buck Spidey sense hair and back of your neck raised.
As you walk into that spot. You can smell it.
You can almost like smell the buck, you know, you
must literally can't, yeah, exactly that musky smell. But you
(02:39):
have to understand first and foremost, I'm going to look
at what the wind direction is doing in a spot
like that, And you also have to look at it objectively,
because if you're there scouting that one moment in time,
that one set of conditions, it's going to be dramatically
different at four thirty pm when the shadows hit that hillside,
or at you know, five am, or whatever it might be.
(03:02):
So you have to think about it holistically from a
sense of like how things change, should up the day
and the greater landscape and how they air and all
that stuff is moving. And if you can put together
a really good plan, you know, in relation to where
deer coming from and where they're going and how to
get in and out of there, then then yes, you
can you can hunt it right, But if you can't,
(03:22):
then the next step is you need to look at
again where deer coming from, where they're going, and can
I intercept them coming to and from If you're in
hill country. A lot of your really awesome spots with
a lot of sign are oftentimes those thermal hubs. And
the reason deer love to be there is because they
can bet up above them smell everything coming up out
(03:44):
of them, and then they can drop down into them
and smell stuff coming out of them at the same time, right,
so they can they can understand that area. It makes
them feel really really comfortable.
Speaker 4 (03:53):
You know.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
It's usually in some type of security cover, either surrounded
by dense cover or into pag You know, topography is
the greatest form of cover. So the topography itself walls
off other sources of threats and that's where you know,
you can use that to your advantage, maybe to get
on the fringe, but you have to understand how the
error is moving in a spot like that, and if
you can't get in there, then you can't get in there.
(04:16):
And then that's where you know every year is building
here that mindset comes in.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Okay, this is a good spot. Maybe maybe if I
can't figure.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Out how to hunt it, I'm just gonna slip in
there and throw a camera and anticipate what's going on.
And then a tactic that I love to employ with
trail cameras is always strive to run your cameras in tandem.
You know, one camera might be like an inventory camera, right,
or it's over a gate or something like that. But
(04:44):
if you're truly trying to figure out deer movement or
pick apart a situation like this, get a camera in
there and have a camera or two bouncing around the
outside in areas that you are for sure able to
hunt because of consistent air movement, and then just cross
reference that information, you know, whether it's sell cams a
lot of times, and maybe this is why I don't
(05:05):
rely on cell cams very often, because a lot of
times those really good spots like that don't have very
good cell service. So that's something to think about too,
And then just let it soak. Hunt those fringes, but
hunt safe and smart. Just don't go in there all crazy,
because again, you just don't know. And if you do,
make sure you've got your milk weed and you're checking
the wind like crazy, so that if if you fail epically,
at least you learn from that situation. But it just
(05:27):
flat out not every good spot for deer is a
good spot to hunt, you know. And then when we
talk about every year is being a building year, where
it's going with that is a habitat. So if you
understand where deer are coming from, where they're going, how
can you either increase cover to get into that spot
or increase attraction somewhere else to pull dear out of
that spot in a more defined manner, right, So it's
(05:49):
more predictable and more huntable.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
So basically with that that in mind, for someone that
has this, almost every I mean there's farms that I
hunt that it's like, oh, I wish I could go
back there, but the accident is bad. And then there's
the challenge of risk first reward and then and that's
why I'm interviewing some of the best, most successful experts,
because there's a lot of people that would say, just
go in there and you've got to make it happen.
And there's probably scenarios where that makes sense.
Speaker 5 (06:13):
Though.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
Well, let me give you a perfect example of this.
The buck that I killed from the ground in his
bed a couple of years ago. That was one of
those spots. That is a fantastic spot. It holds deer,
tons of sign in there. It's a thermal hub. And
this is where I've made the mistakes before. I've went
in there many times. If I in fact thinking about
(06:34):
things that I've done in the past with what I
know now, like I've screwed that spot up so many
times just following sign, trying to hunt, playing the wind,
playing the thermals, thinking that I could out compete a
deer's nose in this type thermal hub like that. It's
just almost impossible. But there is in every single situation,
there is a time and a way to get in there.
(06:56):
Understanding that airflow, understanding and using cover, all of these
things come into play. Actually, I'll give you two examples. Actually,
the last two deer that I've killed were from the
ground in two spots like this, and it essentially was
me proving to myself this exact thing that I'm saying
is there is always a way to do it, but
sometimes it is so specific that you can't go in
(07:17):
there and pre hang a set. Sometimes you can't even
hang a set, which was my situation, right, Like, if
I get up in that elevation, now I don't have
a shot. If I get up in that elevation, now
deer can see me. I have to maintain cover the
whole time. If I go in to this tree stand
an hour before dark, the thermals are in the wrong direction.
So I need to come in ten minutes before dark.
You know, whatever time it is, however that works out.
(07:38):
But there is always a time and place. It just
might be more work or out of a lot of
people's comfort zones. And that's where the beauty or the
ability to modify your situation or improve your situation really
comes into play.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
So there you have it.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
That's what Thomas has to say when it comes to
this dilemma, and I think that potentially his strategy makes
a lot of sense. And we're going to get into
the next one with Bill Winki. I'd say Bill's a
pretty conservative hunter in a lot of ways, just based
off of listening to him and watching his content over
the years. And here's what he has to say on
whether it's worth the risk to go in and hunt
(08:12):
a spot with bad access.
Speaker 6 (08:14):
You know, I've come up with my own approach to
this now that I tell people this approach and they
laugh at me and they think I'm kidding, But you know,
really the deer hunting comes down to it's just a simple,
you know, game of cat and mouse. They can't know
(08:34):
that they're being hunted. Since they know they're being hunted,
then they're not going to move naturally. And as boat lenders,
we have to have natural movement because deer drives and
pushes and.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Stuff like that.
Speaker 6 (08:46):
They're not very effective for the boat owners. So we
need to move naturally in daylight so they can't know
that you're hunting them.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
That's the bottom line.
Speaker 6 (08:53):
So if they if you can't get in and out
of the spot, say you can get in, which you
can't get out without the beer, knowing, well, maybe you
can get a couple of hunts out of that burden.
Season you better be very sparing in when you play
those cards because you're only going to get a couple
of cracks before you've educated too many deer back there
(09:15):
and they start, you know, they lose that natural movement
that you need, or you can't hunt it at all
and just hunt the fringes of that area. Like let's
say you got this perfect funnel on a let's say
it's an eighty acre property and there's this perfect funnel,
and then if I can just sit there, I'm gonna
(09:35):
kill that buck. I'm happy. Well, you can kill that buck.
You're after a whole lot of places on that eighty
acre property. Don't get married to a spot that's not
easy to hunt, or it's not easy to hunt.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
Without being TechEd.
Speaker 6 (09:49):
But that way and the other approach, and this is
what I'm gonna play with a little bit more of
this year. You just stayed to stay in there, you know.
Then you know I did that one season on hunted
Buck for twelve days and never once slept in my
bed during those twelve days. It was either on the
(10:11):
ground at the base of the tree or in the
ground wide and I would go in and out and
do all by entry and exit when it was windy
during the middle of the day, because you can get
away with murder even going.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Into betting area windy.
Speaker 6 (10:25):
But when it's still, they see you easier, and they
definitely hear you, you know, because the wind is moving south,
you're moving the deer don't register movement as well. When
everything's moving, it's sort of like you know, like you
hear a whole like a background noise, you don't hear
sounds as well. They're the same way with move it's
(10:48):
pretty It was pretty amazing to me how little attention
they paid to what was going on around them when
it's windy. But anyway, the point is you could get
in and out when it's windy. But you know, let's
say it drops down and it's still in the evening.
At the end of the shooting time, we think, well
out and sneak my way out. Now you're not sneaking
out the same thing in the morning when you're trying
(11:10):
to go in it's bit calm and you're crunching your
way back in there. Yeah, you know, it's terrible every
day knows. So that's the other options. It's not as
it's not as far out there is what you think.
Because everybody has a spike cap out. I don't even
think twice, oh yeah, this's gonna spike you up on
that mountain over there. Well, they don't think twice. So
(11:33):
this is just spike cap the deer, and it works
really well. It seems, like I said, it seems pretty
foreign because people are used to doing it. But I
think you'd be surprised and how comfortable you can be
and how effective that is when you're not coming and
going all the time, and not only leaving set, but
(11:54):
all that noise that goes with it, especially when it's
calm out. So you know, the simple advice is just
don't hunt that spot. That's the simple advice. And then
they gave you a really long.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Two What if you had a counter So imagine there's
a stop watch going from the time you go in
and you're spike camping for white tails, and so that's
one version of the simulation, and you think you can,
you know, kill the buck you're after in three days,
so you know, seventy two hours, let's say, or you
have to stop watch when you're only hunting that deer
(12:28):
going in and out, and maybe it takes twelve sits,
fourteen sits. If you end up actually killing that deer,
what do you think would it be potentially more efficient?
Because obviously three days spike camping for white tails is
a major time commitment.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
But do you think it could be more efficient?
Speaker 6 (12:44):
I think if you catch the right day, like we
were talking, or accounts mentioned, or you only have a
certain number of opportunities there before you you've educated them,
and you know, again, it could come down to intel.
If you run a lot sell cameras, you could push
that information overload to the point where you only go
(13:05):
in there where you know the buckets that you know,
and you roll the dice with the risk saying, well,
it's you know, it's kind of like high risk, high reward.
You know, I hopefully can get in today, but the
risk is pretty high.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
At least educate some here.
Speaker 6 (13:22):
You could play in the game that way too, But again,
like I mentioned earlier, it's just me.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
It's my philosophy.
Speaker 6 (13:28):
I don't want to have all the information. I kind
of like being really surprised when not really surprised, but
like excited when the buck I'm putting shows up. I
don't want to get in that position. I think we've
got this.
Speaker 3 (13:39):
Conversation even before you and I work.
Speaker 6 (13:41):
I don't want to be in that position where I'm
disappointed it it doesn't show up. You know what I'm saying.
I want to just hunt and hunt and then be
excited when he does, rather than the opposite. And if
we have too much information available, because there's a balance,
you know, obviously, I need to know enough stuff not
wasting my time. But I don't want to know so
(14:02):
much that I feel like a god in corner just
doesn't feel the same to me. But it's not illegal,
so there's nothing wrong with it. It's just isn't my style.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
So that's all Bill has to say about that for now.
Now let's get into skips Lie on his take on
this same question and dilemma we've all faced. All right, there,
I was shed hunting. I remember last year. There's a
spot on my farm. It's absolutely tore up. There's trails everywhere,
there's scrapes, rubs. It just feels like the hair on
the back of your neck goes straight up and you
just feel like you can kill a giant buck there.
(14:34):
But the axis is really bad. How do I hunt it?
Should I hunt it?
Speaker 5 (14:41):
You should hunt it.
Speaker 4 (14:44):
I'm gonna guess most people listening to this, and maybe
I'll just make a assumption with you that you're a
rough hunter. I like hunting November, and that's how I
used to be when I was younger, especially, and when
I was younger, I didn't and have the ability to
be like I'm going to go put in a food
plot and hunt near your food plot, you know, and
(15:06):
even today I go sit way back in the timber.
Speaker 5 (15:08):
So I do this even to this day.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
So let's just put this in the rut hunting category,
or you know early rut with like, hey, late October,
he probably is there, and then in November he's starting
to get all over the place, but hopefully still in there.
So what I would do then is just I would
(15:30):
set up a few different spots in there and go
in like super super early in the morning where the
access isn't great, and I would just hunt a few
times strategically when the conditions are right, and I would
get in there super early, and if you have the energy.
This one's cliche, this one everybody's heard a million times.
But I would go in there super early, and I
(15:52):
would just sit there all day. If it's a giant
buck and the access isn't great, just sit there all
day and you know, is it Are you gonna shoot
that deer at noon? Probably not? But is there a chance? Yeah,
there's a real chance of doing it. So what's the
advantage of getting out of there? There isn't one. You're
(16:12):
just gonna screw it up even worse. So those spots.
I just the deep spots. I just go in there
very strategically. I don't go in there too often. I
try and have a little bit of variety, and then
I just go in there when it's just about right colder,
I know that you're moving well, you know, maybe there's
some mentel where I think that buck's in the area.
Speaker 5 (16:33):
I go there. I'll sit all day, and.
Speaker 4 (16:36):
If you screw something up, that's part of the game too,
you know, it's not nothing's a guarantee. And even even
stands that are bulletproof, you still can screw those up too.
So I would just go in there strategically, don't over
hunt it, sit all day, and you know, might work out,
it might not work out. And every hunter whose season
be like, yeah, I've had a lot of times it
(16:57):
did not work out. That's fine. That's what makes it fun.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
Yeah, because I feel oftentimes people are they're like, oh man,
you know what, I know, I shouldn't be back there,
but I do feel like that's my best opportunity. And
then I personally think a lot of people it's October
twelfth and not like when you're you said rut, And
so in most parts of the Midwest, it's not October twelfth.
(17:27):
They're like, oh, you know, October twelfth, I have to
go in there and try it. And then October eighteenth.
It rolls around. Do you think that's the wrong approach
or do you think that's no harm, no foul.
Speaker 4 (17:36):
You know, if I tried it, so this one's gonna
be a little bit different answer. But if I tried
that in Michigan, well, if I tried October twelve, it
would never.
Speaker 5 (17:45):
Work because those deer were still so freaked out.
Speaker 4 (17:47):
And nocturnal, and and then I had to reprogram my brain.
When I come to better states that weren't as pressured,
deer act actually acted a little bit natural. You could
actually do that in more so, it depends on the
state if you're if you're in an area and people
can't quite grasp, like things in Michigan might get just
absolutely pounded. But I've never seen that, so I don't
(18:08):
understand what he's saying. Well, there's Harry's that get just
unbelievable amount of pressure and it's like October you're almost
wasting your time.
Speaker 5 (18:15):
Well that's what I came from.
Speaker 4 (18:17):
And when I went to the Better States, where I'm
like you know, Iowa, Kansas, and Illinois even wherever. And
I'm like, well, I gotta wait till the rot to hunt.
Speaker 3 (18:27):
I just have to.
Speaker 4 (18:28):
Also, I'm like, wait, some of these deer moving in October,
they actually are I might be able to get in
there in a cold morning in October and shoot a
giant in October. Well that was foreign to me. I'm like, no,
that's not possible because I'm from Michigan. Well, I had
to reprogram my brain, so I think it's it's actually
possible if you if you're like, whoa, it's October twelve,
(18:50):
and these deer are not like intensely pressured, you could
go in there strategically if it was like a really
cold day, or you thought the movement would be really good.
The bear matt pressure went in and went in there
October twelve. Just don't go in there like three times
in a row or something. You know, it's kind of
common sense. You kind of know when you're over pressuring things.
You know, I think a good hunter knows when he's
(19:11):
over pressuring things. But on the flip side that you
get your guys who are so conservative that they don't
really they'll never go in there and that's just human nature.
How how much risk are you willing to take on things?
And I like that, especially with deer hunting. What's the downside?
The downside I don't get a deer, Okay, no big deal.
(19:32):
It's not like I'm like risking all the all of
my livelihood or betting my house at the casino against something.
Speaker 5 (19:38):
It's it's a deer. So that's why I like.
Speaker 4 (19:40):
I like putting a little bit of risk in there,
risk and reward, you know. But I just stay on
the fringe. I basically just hunt right by the road.
I won't even go into the farm. Yeah, okay, you're
not screwing anything up, but your chance for success is
so minimal too, So don't be that conservative again, kind
of a common I like a little bit of risks,
(20:03):
So I'd say, i'd say push in there at the
right times and just don't overdo it. And if you notice,
like I went in there five times and now I
don't see anything, you're probably screwing that spot up and
you need to rethink that.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
That's what Skip has to say.
Speaker 2 (20:16):
I think there's a misconception with a lot of these
folks that they maybe treat their farm really carefully. But
a lot of these guys started hunting on public or
permission all at one point, and then you know they
built up to where they own a farm and can
take a little bit different approach. But skip lets you
know on hey, if I was hunting eighty acres, forty acres,
whatever the case may be, that's the strategy I think
that's most relatable. Next up we have Don Higgins on
(20:38):
his answer to this question. Everyone talks about access, and
someone maybe got permission on a new farm, or maybe
they realize, hey, this access deal is actually really important,
and I feel the best spot on my farm where
I have the highest hods to kill buck has bad access.
Speaker 3 (20:57):
How do I hunt? Where do I start? Should I?
Speaker 5 (21:01):
Well? Should you? That's what the real question is.
Speaker 7 (21:05):
I've said for years stand without good access is not
a good stand. I don't care what kind of signs there,
what else is there. If you don't have good access,
you don't have a good stand. All other factors thrown
out the wind.
Speaker 5 (21:20):
It doesn't matter.
Speaker 7 (21:22):
It starts with good access. And I remember years ago
legendary bow hunter Roger Rothar said, whenever you hang a stand,
you should be able to instantly rattle off five or
six reasons why that stands there while you're putting it
in that tree. And at the time, you know, I
was just a young pop it didn't make too much
sense to me. It's like, well, you know, there's a
good tree, and twenty yards away there's a trail, so
(21:44):
that's why my stands here. Now it's way more than that,
and it starts with access. I put my stand in
this tree because I can access it across this open
field with a northwest wind straight in my face. That
same northwest wind is going to allow a buck to
walk past that tree and feel comfortable doing so. And
I plan to be here the first week of November
(22:05):
when the bucks are cruising. This is a spot that
aught a lot of cruising bucks should pass by. You know,
it's going to be better in the morning than the evening,
so I'm only going to hunt this spot in the morning.
In addition to all this, this giant oak tree right
in front of my stand tree is dropping acorns at
that time of the year. And you should be able
to just go on and on and on and make
(22:28):
a long list for why you put a stand in
a specific tree, But it all comes down to access.
If you don't have good access, it's not a good stand.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
So if you can come up with six reasons but
access is not.
Speaker 5 (22:39):
One of them, it's not a good stand. Don't hunt there.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
If you followed down for any period of time, you
probably could have guessed that was going to be his
answer to this question. And his farm is exceptionally well
set up. He's very conservative when it comes to hunting,
but very aggressive when it comes to managing habitat and
setting up a farm. So in that scenario, you can
get away with being really conservative because you've been able
to develop the farm really well or figure out a
(23:05):
way to stack the odds in your favor and make
it to where you don't have to hunt the quote
unquote best spot if it has bad access.
Speaker 3 (23:12):
Next up we have Steve Hanson. Here we go.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
The best botto of my farm I feel has bad
or not great access. Okay, how do I hunt that spot?
Speaker 8 (23:21):
Since you started off the conversation with it sounding like
it's more of a rout funnel type spot, so we're
going to be trying to access this location for a
rut hunt. What I'm gonna recommend is whatever path you
have that you think has the least amount of chances
of moving deer. But you're gonna have to go in
in the dark and come out in the dark. It's
(23:42):
gonna be all day sets. And then you're also going
to have to minimize the amount of trips that you
hunt it. Therefore, because every time you're hunting it, you're
using up some in potential, yeah, some potential. You know,
you're disrupting the flow of deer. So you want to
make sure you're hunting it on the peak prime days,
exactly right wind directions, not leaving anything to chance. And
(24:04):
once you use up one of your times of going
in there, you want to make the most of it
by sitting all day for sure, that'd be the biggest
thing that I could think, and going in extra early
coming out you do a lot less damage to the
you know, deer that are living on your farm, moving
in the dark, they're a different creature after dark. There
seemed more accepting of a little bit of intrusion. But
(24:26):
that's how I would manage that sort of of a situation.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
So that might mean taking the long way, taking the.
Speaker 8 (24:32):
Long way whatever it takes to do the minimum amount
of damage you can, and then staying you know the
greatest amount of time that you can to hunt that.
Speaker 3 (24:39):
How many chances do you think you may have?
Speaker 2 (24:42):
And I understand it's very situational, but you have decades
and decades of experience, You've helped a lot of people,
you know, maybe navigate this exact scenario. Like how many
tries do you think you get? And the reason I
ask is because there's probably going to be a cold
front October twelfth and maybe you really maybe that's not
quite the time for this imaginary spot, right, I would
(25:03):
say eight out of ten guys are going to go
hunt that spot on that time that's not quite ready
to do that.
Speaker 8 (25:08):
Sure, yeah, I would avoid that scenario. I would because
what you're going to do in that case, if it's
if it's a rut funnel and it's not that phase
of the rut, you're going to educate the local does
who's at whatever deer are using that place at that
time are going to become educated to it, and then
that's going to change how they're using that spot. So
I would avoid it until truly peaked days. How many
(25:29):
times you can hunt it, Like you said, every place
is different, but realistically three or four without too much,
I think, and you could still expect some you know,
you're doing a little bit of damage, but you should
get some success if you If in three or four
sits the place isn't working like you think it is,
it may not be the spot you think it is too.
(25:49):
You know, if you've given it the best days of
the year, gone in extra early, you know, three or
four times, you I would think you'd have an opportunity
or you know, see your target, bucker whatever. But if
it hasn't happened in three or four times, and I'd
reevaluate the whole situation.
Speaker 3 (26:05):
I think Steve's answer is really relatable.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Make the timing right, go in there, take a swing
or two, hope for the best. If it is truly
the best spot and it has all the terrain features
that make sense, go for the fences, give it a try.
And I think that's probably what most people would fall into.
But the key thing is being thoughtful and methodical when
you go in to the really good spot with really
bad access. Next up we have Jeff Sturgis. Jeff, I
(26:30):
would say, is a pretty conservative hunter. I'm also very
thoughtful with his access and everything else. So here's what
he has to share about it. Okay, the best spot
on my farm I postseason scattered it. I found this
awesome rut funnel. It's just tore up with sign and man,
I just feel like I need to hunt in there.
But access is so important. So the best spot on
(26:50):
my farm I feel has bad access. How do I
hunt this this area?
Speaker 9 (26:56):
What's the bad access? Thanks ends on so this I'll
give you an example. Last year, Buck, I took over
a water hole. It's right along the back corner of
a field, the neighbors field that is full of deer
all night. It's a hidden corner from the road. It's
crazy because you drive by and people always think, like,
even with food plots, it's got to be this three
(27:19):
acre field. You got to make it in like quarter
acre half acre section, screen it off and all these deer.
Speaker 5 (27:24):
Can use it.
Speaker 9 (27:24):
Then, But how many times have you found a hidden
corner and a giant agg field and all the deer
there and like three or four acres Because it's the
one year that's the most important, and they don't mind
being on top of each other in a food source
like that as long as they're hidden. And so that's
kind of taught me a lot to even sectioning off
food plots. I think it's a.
Speaker 5 (27:41):
Little bit overrated.
Speaker 9 (27:42):
But in that area, if you walk into that stand location,
that's a beautiful rough funnel. It's a line will switch
grass on the outside. You go only about ten yards
into the woods and then you look down at a
bench system and then it drops off super steep from there.
It's like a bow tie. Everything comes into that funnel.
We have a water hole there which enhances the movement.
You don't create movement with the waterhole. You complement the
(28:03):
movement and make it a little bit better. It's like
a sweetener. But in that area, if I walk in
the morning, great rot funnel. If I walk there in
the morning, I'm going to spook deer. They're going to
be out in those fields and I'll likely ruin my
set before it even gets daylight. If I try to
go in there at three in the afternoon, it's getting
dark at six thirty. Then if I get out, I've
(28:23):
spoke in the stand.
Speaker 3 (28:24):
It's a one and done.
Speaker 5 (28:25):
I'm ruining the whole area.
Speaker 9 (28:26):
So what I choose to do in a spot like that,
it's a post day break stand entrance, you're taking bad
access post daybreak stand entrance, you wait until the field clears.
You sit from three four hundred yards away, have a
little no I can sneak up, look over the coast
is clear, and then you walk straight into that stand location.
It's only ten yards off the woods. I'm only exposing
myself ten yards in that spot. It's a real narrow constriction.
(28:49):
Deer have to be right on top of me if
I walk in. I went in I think at seven
thirty last year, approximately half hour forty minutes after daylight,
and then shot them at eleven thirty. That and I
had to get out probably, you know, in that day
if it was getting dark at five thirty, I pro
I would have had to get out by two two
thirty because I don't want deer starting to get behind
me or my winds blown back out into the field.
(29:12):
That's one example. If you're on private land and you
have poor access, a lot of times that poor access
is determined by food source location. You're having to walk
through a food source location to get back to a
betting area. So you do that in the morning, you
spook them out. And I keep saying betting area. You
keep saying, you said rut funnel I'm thinking, I'm getting
to the backside of a betting area, wait for that
mature buck to come back that I'm targeting, And so
(29:34):
I look at like, for one, you go way around
that food source. We've had times where it's literally we're
on forty acres, it goes up four hundred and fifty
feet in elevation, and we're taking thirty seven minutes to
get to a stand if we take one one minute
break in thirty six minutes if you don't take a break,
but it's thirty six minutes uphill all the way around,
so that we're going all the way around the food,
(29:55):
get on top of the food three hundred and fifty
yards away and hundreds of feet in elevation above the food,
so you can wait for those deer to get back.
If you take the easier route, go through the food,
and it's a lot easier. We could take our we
could take a eat bike, we'd take our quiet cat
right up through there, right up the gut. But we
would we wouldn't we wouldn't have a hunt that morning.
Speaker 10 (30:13):
And so.
Speaker 9 (30:15):
Another another case, you might have food on private land
that's just ruining your hunt. I'd rather take that food
out and have good access so that I can get
to the backside of a bedding area and a rout
funnel stand like that, then have that food source and
not be able to get to that stand location because
every time I go in and out, I'm going to
blow that food out.
Speaker 5 (30:33):
And then that.
Speaker 9 (30:34):
Also means when we're getting into some of those stands,
one way, we're going out the food way, so we're
coming out at eleven o'clock through the food, or we
went way around that food at six am to get
into the stand before that time. You always have to
think about too, we're the deer down wind of your stand.
You know a lot of times people say, well forty
five minutes is that magic time to get in your
(30:56):
stand in the morning, an hour before daylight? Well, what
if the deer going through a horse pasture before, you know,
pre dawn, and they could go through that horse pasture
pre dawn. It's open, it's a it's a shortcut for
them to get to their bedding area, but they would
never go through that horse passure, open area or open
woods during daylight, especially a mature bock. So I don't
(31:18):
want to sit there for an hour blowing my scent
into that open area. I want to get there just
in time, and so I'm getting there just when it's
gray light, use a little bit of darkness to get
into my stand, and then I'm really only exposing my
wind in that area for five ten minutes before it
gets daylight, and I'm really limiting the amount of deer
that might get down wind to me before daylight. And
then there's some of those stands where it's just a
(31:39):
steep rock drop off, there's no deer, it's a lake,
it's a house or something you're blowing you're sent into
and you can get in there an hour early, get
in there really early. So then a lot of times,
you know, manipulation of the habitat, walking way around all
those are you know, parts of it. But at the
same time, using the timing of when to get into
a stand, whether that be a post daybreak just in
(32:02):
time or an hour before to get into a stand
to help with your access is really something needs to
be considered too.
Speaker 2 (32:11):
Is there a part on your farm that you wish
you could hunt, but you just say, well, the axis
isn't good enough, I can't hunt there.
Speaker 9 (32:18):
There's a lot of places like that we have you know.
I'll give you example that we hunted fourteen years in
Wisconsin and the stand location our property thirteen years get
mixed up time flies two properties two thousand and two
over there, but it was about thirty acres woods, and
there's a core area of about fifteen to eighteen acres
(32:40):
right in the middle of it that we could just
never go into. Could never even consider going into the
food plots there. We had three quarters of acre food plots.
Could never sit on them with a boat because they're
too big, they're too exposed, couldn't get in or out
without spoken deer, so we couldn't hunt on it. The
majority of my food plots in Minnesota on our farm,
we cannot hunt with a bow because we can't hunt
(33:02):
them without spooking deer.
Speaker 3 (33:04):
There is one.
Speaker 9 (33:05):
Hundred and forty acre area with field on the outside
about one hundred and ten acres of woods in the middle.
We bought the land in June of twenty twenty, and
I did not step foot other than a vehicle ride
with the real estate agent in April to look at
the inside of the property on three or four trails.
I didn't step foot in about one hundred acres out
(33:28):
of that one hundred and forty acres until after the
season in January, because I couldn't hunt it anyways. Because
I got in there, I just spoked deer. It was
in the center. It goes down in if I'm in there,
the wind's swirling. Now we since identified points that are
down there, and we can manipulate the wind a little bit,
or use wind in the morning to come down one
(33:50):
channel and go up another channel. That's an entirely different
topic of hunting hills and thermals. But even then there's
still that core area of probably eighty out of that
original one hundred acres we couldn't hunt. That we can't hunt,
and I'm okay with that. It's just kind of like
you just write it off. We've worked on the habitat
in there, and we've built bedding areas. I expect as
(34:11):
long as they can hold that deer in there during
the daylight, then we have a really good chance of
shooting that buck during the season. So and that goes
for a public land too. You don't want to identify
the best spot in the woods to hold mature box
to actually hunt. You want to identify those areas that
can be protected so you can hunt around them and
(34:34):
then being methodical and precise, take that buck to the
very high percentage of the time a year after year
that's in that spot because you preserve it. It's not
a woman dumb.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Once again, I think you can draw a parallel of
someone that's able to really design a parcel to have
it hunt really effectively. These folks are not going in
and hunting these spots, but if you fall into that category.
Speaker 3 (35:03):
You have the ability to do that.
Speaker 2 (35:04):
Keep that in mind for this upcoming season of how
can I potentially make that best spot maybe a little
more accessible, How can I duplicate it? What can I
do to make it better? And that's what I got
from Jeff. Next up, we have Bobby Kendall. He hunts
a lot of different farms and has a lot of
projects going on at all different times, and so a
lot of times he's hunting on the fly and it's
maybe not a fully developed farm, maybe it's under construction,
(35:27):
if that makes sense. And so here's what he has
to say about the dilemma we all face as deer hunters.
Let's say someone says, man, I was shed hunting. I
remember from the last season there was this spot. The
axis is bad. I'm gonna bust your coming in and out.
There's not really a good spot for me to shoot
my win with a low probability of getting busted.
Speaker 3 (35:48):
How do I hunt this spot? Or should I hunt
this spot?
Speaker 5 (35:51):
All right?
Speaker 11 (35:51):
So it kind of depends on it's situational, like the
time of year. So like in October, everything is always
risk reward. Is it worth the risk to go in
here to hunt?
Speaker 5 (36:00):
All right? So last year we did a series.
Speaker 11 (36:03):
On an undeveloped and versus developed farm, and the undeveloped
farm on the big start contrast is the access is
the nearest good because you're not creating perfect access. So
in October what it looks like is, you know, you
have to you have to pick your days. And for me,
those days are what I call magic X day. It's
a day where the pressure is rising and cloud covers falling,
(36:26):
humidity's falling, temperatures falling, and the perfect days that you
know the Brona crosses like thirty point two by the
evening sit So those are the days I'm looking for,
and I'm only going in when risk reward tips and
it's worth the risk to go in because I have
a high chance of seeing him that night. So October
pick the night's high pressure fronts the day the first
(36:47):
day of the high pressure. Now in November, you know
it kind of it gets more forgiving, so you can
get a little bit more aggressive. Plus you're hunting different
type spots on that particular farm. I didn't start hunting
that deer until November, and he was way back in
the back of the farm. I had to literally go
through like four or five bean fields in order to
get back where he was he was at, and I
(37:10):
had a really good funnel rough funnel stand back there,
but the access I know I was going to blow
the whole farm up going back there. So what my
strategy was was wait till eight thirty nine in the morning,
come up here, glass my way back to the stand,
and hunt these inside corner funnels. Because inside corner funnels
are awesome because your wind is always good for you,
(37:33):
and it's also generally good for the deer because you're
on the down wind side of the cover and it's
a funnel. So I was hunting these inside corners because
the access is so good to the inside corner. So
maybe you don't go to your best spot yet because
the access is better than these inside corners. And then
you hunt toll like two thirty three o'clock in the afternoon,
and from you know, the fourth or fifth to the thirteenth,
(37:54):
the deer were after the big mature one. I would
rather hunt that time period anyway. And so then you're
in the farm and you're out of the farm on
a knee bike. Maybe you're not leaving scent and so
you're you're hedging that pressure. And then maybe when things
are just the electricity goes off and you're just the light.
I mean, you're just like it's on fire. That's when
(38:14):
you can dive into those spots and it's like you almost.
Speaker 3 (38:19):
Can do no wrong.
Speaker 11 (38:19):
I mean, I remember a deer coming down winding me
at one o'clock in the afternoon one year, big mature
deer looked up at me, smelled me, took off, and
I killed him in the same spot the next night.
Like so you know, it's like at a certain point,
that's when you die. It's like a it's like a
it's like a laddering up. It's like a risk reward,
(38:41):
and the further we get into the chaos, it starts
tipping and you just gotta be able to gauge when
to when to throttle her up and take a risk.
And for me, a lot of times, like opening day
one season, I'm like, this is ground zero. I'm gonna
be in a tree somewhere. I don't even know what tree.
I'm gonna go in there in the dark and a
climber and I'm gonna be perched. Yeah, that would be
like the ultimate, like because that's when I get the
(39:04):
gun in the hand and all of a sudden, the
risk reward.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
And there's so many tangibles happen on you know, any
opening firearm day right right across the country. Two questions,
how many Magic X days? Because I think when people
hear this, it's going to be October seventeenth and the
temperature drop ten degrees and it's you know, maybe all
the conditions are right, and they're like, man, Bobby said,
risk for's reward, I'm feeling good. So when does the
(39:27):
gun go off? Where You're like, Okay, this is not
a great spot. I'm probably gonna get three to four
cracks at this spot with this particular deer I'm hunting,
Like when does when does that go off?
Speaker 11 (39:36):
So that risk reward is ever so slightly going like
this as we get through October, because in my opinion,
there's three things that affect a deer to move in daylight.
The big deer we're after in October, and you know,
one of those is moon phase. I'm a big moon
phase guy, and like that week leading up to the
full moon, especially in October. So like on a year
(39:58):
that the full moon happens early and that that wadd's
already been blown. So it's like, Okay, I don't have
that in my bag of tricks forward, so maybe I
get a little more aggressive.
Speaker 3 (40:08):
But if the full moon is on October twenty.
Speaker 11 (40:10):
Ninth, and you have that window lining up with the other,
with the other, the second of the three, which is
date phase or mindset, all the same thing. It's the
mindset of the deer date phase mindset. The end of October,
his mindset is more rambunctious. He's more wound up now,
he's starting to sniff like so you if you can,
(40:33):
if it's later in the month, you can get more aggressive.
You know, if you get that full moon at the
end of the month and you have that to look
forward to, maybe you get less aggressive, not as quick
because you have such a powerful thing coming up. And
then obviously the third part of that so date phase,
mindset moon. The third part is the environmental. That's the
part you can't predict. That's what you're just talking about
(40:54):
with the magic X days. But it's just there is
no hard rights and wrongs. It's kind of a but
it's always is it worth it? Yet if your guts
like probably about if you're walking in the stand, you're like,
I shouldn't be doing this, which I still do this.
Sometimes you just got it.
Speaker 3 (41:14):
It's just it's just not worth it.
Speaker 5 (41:15):
Because October is a gift.
Speaker 11 (41:17):
It's a glass house that you can you can change
his habits and and you have this nice it's the
longest period of time that you have in the season
to play the game doing what he's doing, and so
you can be very very precise and wait, you know,
you get in November and all that changes. But a
(41:38):
lot of times, like when I'm going into the season,
I'm always trying to be in front of the deer, right,
So like a lot of times when I'm going into
the season, I already know when that full moon is,
so I'm thinking about that and and I'm so I'm
kind of like, Okay, that's this is my week. And
as we start coming into that, now, every high pressure
front from day one through is going to be awesome. Unpressured,
(42:02):
the deer you're after should be on his feet somewhere
in daylight. I mean they don't. They don't generally, unpressure
just just lay through that. I mean it, they just
get rambunctious and they they have to go and tear
stuff up in marked territory. And so, you know, just
being ahead of the deer's mindset risk, risk, risk versus reward.
Speaker 5 (42:26):
Trying to think like a deer. And uh, it changed.
Every year is a little different.
Speaker 11 (42:30):
But if you get if you get the perfect front
in in that five day window leading up to the
full moon, it's the most magical day of the year.
I mean, I go to the stand like this. I mean,
you know, it's just it's it's it's just the most
powerful day of this season. It's a blue it's a
it's a morning that starts out gloomy. It even depends
(42:52):
on how that front hits, Like if the front hits
at night, it's not as if the if the morning
is gloomy and stagnant and in a little warmer and
then you feel that wind hit and it kind of.
Speaker 5 (43:04):
Looks like this where the sky starts.
Speaker 11 (43:06):
Breaking up and the air is drying and cooling, and
by prime time it's gin clear and it's dead calm,
and it's cold and crisp. It's fire like I'm going
I'm sitting there like this, you know, because it's it's
the best day of the season. And it only if
you can line that up in that week leading up
(43:26):
the full moon. It's the best day of the season,
you know, to get on a deer, to kill a
deer that you're on that you know what he's doing.
Speaker 3 (43:33):
There, you have it.
Speaker 2 (43:33):
That's what Bobby thinks on this burning question. And last,
but not least, we have Mark Kenyon on his perspective
of risk for reward. Consuming some of Mark's content over
the year. Seems like he's gotten more aggressive with his
game plan and here's what he has to say.
Speaker 3 (43:48):
Okay, this past spring, you're a shed hunting.
Speaker 2 (43:52):
Maybe you ended up in the sanctuary on your farm
or the very very back part, and you're like, man,
this is awesome. There's all this great sign, all these
trails converge as a betting area.
Speaker 3 (44:03):
Just right over this direction. The axis is really bad.
It's bad.
Speaker 2 (44:07):
You're gonna scared deer coming in, scared deer coming out.
How and should you hunt the best spot on the
farm with bad access?
Speaker 10 (44:16):
Yeah, I've had this, you know, I've come across myself
plenty of times too, and so I've wrestled with it
a lot, and what I have kind of settled on
is that, you know, the best best spot is a
place that has everything going for plus good access. So
this place is never going to be like a ten
(44:36):
out of ten. It's going to be like an eight
out of ten because it's great, but you can't get
it at all. That's that the reality of a lot
of these kinds of places that are like a core
habitat feature with all this movement coming into it, like naturally,
those places just always tend to be and hard to
get two spots. So this is a pretty common thing,
(44:56):
and I think that my view you is that they
are still worth hunting because they if it's that good,
if it's that much of a hub, there are moments
when the reward outweighs the risk. And that's like every
single time you look at a stand site or an
ambush location. There's always these two sides of the scale.
(45:17):
It's like, what's the potential for reward, what's the potential
for risk? Like what's going to be the I'm going
to burn some powder ons, I'm going to damage things
by going in. There's also the chance that this could happen.
And so I think when you find a location like that,
you really need to think long and hard about when
is the best of the best moment for this place,
(45:38):
Like why is this place great?
Speaker 3 (45:39):
What makes it great?
Speaker 10 (45:41):
And what's the type of year that makes it great,
And what's the set of conditions that will make this
like the best of the best time to hunt the
best of best place?
Speaker 3 (45:48):
That's number one, and then number two.
Speaker 10 (45:51):
I'm also thinking, Okay, I know I've got bad access,
but what set of circumstances or situation would give me
the least bad access on the stage. So maybe so
I'll give you an example. I have a place like
this that is like smack down in the middle of
like some of the best cover in one of the
farms I hunt, And it's a place that I've been
able to see because I've never I've infrequently gone into
(46:14):
the core of this but I can oftentimes see into
this brushy, nasty stuff, and so I can see like
year after a year after year.
Speaker 3 (46:20):
Man, this is where they're always coming through.
Speaker 10 (46:23):
Like there's always every time there's a good buckham after
he's always coming through in and out, in and out
of this. But like, no matter how you go about
trying to get in there or to sit in there,
deer gonna win you. There's so many deer there are
on all sides in you. Any way you try to
access it, you're going to have to go through bedding
cover or trying to get out. There's food on all
sides too, So there's no good way to get in it,
(46:44):
and there's no really good way to hunt it without
it being like you're on edge. But the least bad
would be if you had like a due east or
a do west wind. There's like a it's there's a
ditch and so there's a couple of trees. You could
hunt right on this ditch, and if you can run
your way right along that ditch, you would minimize your
wind issues. If you could walk in that ditch in
(47:07):
the morning and right alongside of it super early, you
can minimize the access issues.
Speaker 3 (47:12):
But you're definitely gonna blow some stuff up.
Speaker 10 (47:14):
So you're saying, Okay, I'm gonna I know I'm gonna
cast some damage here, but I'm gonna pick the days
when I've got the best chance of getting away with
a little bit of it. And then also I'm choosing
that day when, like everything else is perfect. So for
this location, it's like this spot the best, the best
of the best day would be during peak of road activity,
when there is a great cold front that comes through
(47:37):
and that's like a wet or windy day, So I
could slip in there and at least not make a
ton of noise. If I could get that set of
conditions with that correct wind, it would be worth the
risk on that day. But there's like two days maybe
if I one or two days and that's it. Yeah,
And if I go in there, I take my swing
(47:57):
like I'm swinging for the fences, and if it doesn't
work out, well, I just I know I've burned this
place out a bit, and so I know, hey, yeah,
it's going to be a week or two or something
before that area is really going to be hot again.
But it could be worthwhile. So I think that at
least in the places that I hunt. I don't hunt
big farms. I don't own big farms. I don't hunt
Niola or Illinois or Ohio like most of the time.
(48:20):
So when I think about this question, I'm thinking about
this like at home in Michigan, Michigan, and if you
want to kill a mature buck, oftentimes it has to
be in a place like that because those mature bucks
so rarely come out on the edges, so rarely spent
time in the open.
Speaker 3 (48:36):
We'really easy to.
Speaker 10 (48:36):
Access places, and I think, to be clear, like this
is like my answer is the way it is because
I'm primarily hunting in like high pressure areas, relatively small farms.
Speaker 3 (48:48):
I'm thinking Michigan when I answer this question right.
Speaker 10 (48:51):
It might be different if I've got hundreds and hundreds
of acres in Iowa or Illinois or.
Speaker 3 (48:55):
Nebraska or wherever. But you know where I'm at in Michigan.
It's all small.
Speaker 10 (49:00):
You know, it's forties and sixties and twenties, and there's
sixty other guys in my square mile, and you're just
not going to get a mature buck moving out in
the easy stuff and the open stuff on the edges.
Ninety nine percent of the time. So if ever you
want to get a chance that one to five year
old that's in your square mile, probably have to go
into these like core places.
Speaker 3 (49:22):
And so I'm willing to take a.
Speaker 10 (49:24):
Big swing at those core places a few times when
the time's right, because if I don't, I'll probably never
get a chance of that too. And so you have
to take calculated risks. It's just about being smart when.
Speaker 3 (49:34):
You do so.
Speaker 2 (49:35):
Throughout the last ten years, when you've you've done that strategy,
how many times does it typically work? And then does
it feel are you nervous going into that or it's like, hey,
this is whatever happens happens. Yeah, and I know I'm
having some risk, but man, I'm putting myself in what
I feel the best spot.
Speaker 10 (49:52):
Yeah, I would say still most of the time it
doesn't work. But you know, you know, I can think
of the last handful of the years, a couple of
times it's worked. Yeah, that's the specific place I'm talking about,
this exact location. I took one of these big swings
and my target buck walked by it ten yards, but
it was like ten yard ten minutes before shooting it,
so I could see him. But I couldn't shoot him,
and I was like, oh it worked, Yeah, came ten
(50:13):
minutes too early. So it's always calculated risk. Sometimes it's worthwhile.
But I will say, like I am still always nervous
in those moments. You just walk around eggshells. You're like, ah,
this is this could be a disaster. But I think
I've gotten to the point where I go into it
knowing that and I kind of have a certain like
resignation to Okay, this is gonna be like super fun
(50:37):
or might blow up, and I just need to be
okay with that today and then like give it up
and like be.
Speaker 3 (50:41):
Okay with whatever happens. Whatever happens happens.
Speaker 10 (50:44):
And if you go into it with that attitude, I
think it's it's okay. And I will tell you, the
more you do this and the more you kind of
come to to see the results, the more I've become
comfortable with that, because you know, while deer survival machines
they're also not genius, you can sometimes get away with
(51:05):
more than you think, and so being willing to take
those swings and be aggressive with the right times is
worth the occasional total disaster because you can recover sometimes
faster than you might think too.
Speaker 2 (51:18):
Yeah, this was probably the widest variety of answers on
this question throughout this series, and I think if someone
listening to this, they need to figure out who's hunting
style resonates the most with me. I think all the
answers were right in their own hunting style setups. You know,
the list goes on, but I think if you're listening
(51:38):
to this, man, I feel a little confused after listening
to this episode, think of each guest and what models
how you hunt and and your goals and everything else,
because a lot of the guys they're hunting one specific
buck that is it, and so their answers were quite
a bit different. The other thing that people really need
to listen is when they said they would go into
(52:01):
this area, and that's probably one of the most important
things when it comes with the variety of answers for
this episode. But at the end of the day, everyone
has a spot like this in the back of their mind,
and that's why I asked this question. And usually to
your point, it is in relation to some sort of
terrain to where maybe you can figure out a way
to stack the deck just a little bit in your
favor by utilizing the train to have your scent go
(52:24):
in a certain direction or maybe from an access standpoint,
but definitely it can't be your favorite spot that you
have twenty times a year. That was very very clear
throughout this episode. So I hope everyone really enjoyed this episode.
Next week, we have another burning question that's probably crossed
our minds at some point, and it's what's keeping Maybe
you're having a good year, a good year, good year,
and you just want to be great, You want to
(52:44):
get to the next level, and you want to learn
how are these guys finding more and more success seemingly
year after year, And so we're going to figure out
if there's any trends or anything that you can address
this upcoming season.
Speaker 3 (52:54):
All right, there, you guys have it.
Speaker 2 (52:56):
I hope you enjoyed this week's episode of Back forty
dive into all the questions we've all had at some point,
and I hope that you have a little better game
plan on the spot that came to mind when we
started this episode of that really great spot with bad access,
and maybe you're equipped to make a better game plan
after hearing from eight different folks, you can find one
that is relatable to you and your strategy, what you
(53:18):
have access to, and hopefully you have a little bit
better opportunity in that spot if you decide to hunt it.
Next week we have the next burning question and it
is what is the biggest mistake hunters make from being
good to great? So you can start brainstorming now and
we'll see you next week on back forwarding.
The best spot on your farm has bad access, then
it's not the best spot on your farm.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Welcome back to back forty podcast, brought to you by
Land dot com, the leading online real estate marketplace to
find your perfect rule recreational, agricultural or hunting properties here
in the US. And there's still some time to go
to the meat eater dot com backslash back forty for
a chance to win a white deal kit worth one
thousand dollars.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
The contest ends August twelfth, so don't wait.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Sign up for a chance to win today at themeaeater
dot com.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Backslash Back forty.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
And today we're diving into a topic that we've all
likely ran into at some point. And so this might
have been when you're summer scouting. Maybe it's from last year.
Maybe there's this a spot that comes to mind and
it has bad access. And so I wrangled up the
panel of experts Steve Hanson, Don Higgins, Bobby Kendall, Jeff Sturgis,
(00:53):
Skip Slide, Bill Winky, Thomas Milsna, and Mark Kenyon to
ask the question, the best botto my farm has bad access?
Should I hunt it? How do I hunt it? And
as you're listening, to this. You probably have a spot
like this in the back of your mind, So this
is going to help you evaluate the risk versus reward
for this upcoming season and get a couple different opinions
(01:15):
and see what expert on the panel fits your hunting
style the most. Because all these guys are really efficient
at deer hunting, but they all have their own take
on how to potentially hunt a spot like this or
maybe not hunt a spot like this. So without further ado,
let's get into the earning question and whitetail dilemma for
this week on back forty. First up, we have Thomas Milsna.
(01:42):
Thomas hunts a permission property, shared permission property, still very
active with strategizing, planning and proving a property. But here's
what he has to say on whether you should hunt
a spot with bad access even if it's really good.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
The best spot on your farm has bad access, it's
not the best spot on your farm, right, So there's
two ways to look at that. The best spot for
deer isn't always the best spot to hunt deer, and
understanding that is is what's going to determine your success
or destroy that spot and push that deer activity elsewhere,
(02:16):
potentially on the neighborhoods property. And I've made this mistake
a lot, a lot. You find a spot and you're like, yes,
this is it, right. You get that feeling that like
big buck Spidey sense hair and back of your neck raised.
As you walk into that spot. You can smell it.
You can almost like smell the buck, you know, you
must literally can't, yeah, exactly that musky smell. But you
(02:39):
have to understand first and foremost, I'm going to look
at what the wind direction is doing in a spot
like that, And you also have to look at it objectively,
because if you're there scouting that one moment in time,
that one set of conditions, it's going to be dramatically
different at four thirty pm when the shadows hit that hillside,
or at you know, five am, or whatever it might be.
(03:02):
So you have to think about it holistically from a
sense of like how things change, should up the day
and the greater landscape and how they air and all
that stuff is moving. And if you can put together
a really good plan, you know, in relation to where
deer coming from and where they're going and how to
get in and out of there, then then yes, you
can you can hunt it right, But if you can't,
(03:22):
then the next step is you need to look at
again where deer coming from, where they're going, and can
I intercept them coming to and from If you're in
hill country. A lot of your really awesome spots with
a lot of sign are oftentimes those thermal hubs. And
the reason deer love to be there is because they
can bet up above them smell everything coming up out
(03:44):
of them, and then they can drop down into them
and smell stuff coming out of them at the same time, right,
so they can they can understand that area. It makes
them feel really really comfortable.
Speaker 4 (03:53):
You know.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
It's usually in some type of security cover, either surrounded
by dense cover or into pag You know, topography is
the greatest form of cover. So the topography itself walls
off other sources of threats and that's where you know,
you can use that to your advantage, maybe to get
on the fringe, but you have to understand how the
error is moving in a spot like that, and if
you can't get in there, then you can't get in there.
(04:16):
And then that's where you know every year is building
here that mindset comes in.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Okay, this is a good spot. Maybe maybe if I
can't figure.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Out how to hunt it, I'm just gonna slip in
there and throw a camera and anticipate what's going on.
And then a tactic that I love to employ with
trail cameras is always strive to run your cameras in tandem.
You know, one camera might be like an inventory camera, right,
or it's over a gate or something like that. But
(04:44):
if you're truly trying to figure out deer movement or
pick apart a situation like this, get a camera in
there and have a camera or two bouncing around the
outside in areas that you are for sure able to
hunt because of consistent air movement, and then just cross
reference that information, you know, whether it's sell cams a
lot of times, and maybe this is why I don't
(05:05):
rely on cell cams very often, because a lot of
times those really good spots like that don't have very
good cell service. So that's something to think about too,
And then just let it soak. Hunt those fringes, but
hunt safe and smart. Just don't go in there all crazy,
because again, you just don't know. And if you do,
make sure you've got your milk weed and you're checking
the wind like crazy, so that if if you fail epically,
at least you learn from that situation. But it just
(05:27):
flat out not every good spot for deer is a
good spot to hunt, you know. And then when we
talk about every year is being a building year, where
it's going with that is a habitat. So if you
understand where deer are coming from, where they're going, how
can you either increase cover to get into that spot
or increase attraction somewhere else to pull dear out of
that spot in a more defined manner, right, So it's
(05:49):
more predictable and more huntable.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
So basically with that that in mind, for someone that
has this, almost every I mean there's farms that I
hunt that it's like, oh, I wish I could go
back there, but the accident is bad. And then there's
the challenge of risk first reward and then and that's
why I'm interviewing some of the best, most successful experts,
because there's a lot of people that would say, just
go in there and you've got to make it happen.
And there's probably scenarios where that makes sense.
Speaker 5 (06:13):
Though.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
Well, let me give you a perfect example of this.
The buck that I killed from the ground in his
bed a couple of years ago. That was one of
those spots. That is a fantastic spot. It holds deer,
tons of sign in there. It's a thermal hub. And
this is where I've made the mistakes before. I've went
in there many times. If I in fact thinking about
(06:34):
things that I've done in the past with what I
know now, like I've screwed that spot up so many
times just following sign, trying to hunt, playing the wind,
playing the thermals, thinking that I could out compete a
deer's nose in this type thermal hub like that. It's
just almost impossible. But there is in every single situation,
there is a time and a way to get in there.
(06:56):
Understanding that airflow, understanding and using cover, all of these
things come into play. Actually, I'll give you two examples. Actually,
the last two deer that I've killed were from the
ground in two spots like this, and it essentially was
me proving to myself this exact thing that I'm saying
is there is always a way to do it, but
sometimes it is so specific that you can't go in
(07:17):
there and pre hang a set. Sometimes you can't even
hang a set, which was my situation, right, Like, if
I get up in that elevation, now I don't have
a shot. If I get up in that elevation, now
deer can see me. I have to maintain cover the
whole time. If I go in to this tree stand
an hour before dark, the thermals are in the wrong direction.
So I need to come in ten minutes before dark.
You know, whatever time it is, however that works out.
(07:38):
But there is always a time and place. It just
might be more work or out of a lot of
people's comfort zones. And that's where the beauty or the
ability to modify your situation or improve your situation really
comes into play.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
So there you have it.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
That's what Thomas has to say when it comes to
this dilemma, and I think that potentially his strategy makes
a lot of sense. And we're going to get into
the next one with Bill Winki. I'd say Bill's a
pretty conservative hunter in a lot of ways, just based
off of listening to him and watching his content over
the years. And here's what he has to say on
whether it's worth the risk to go in and hunt
(08:12):
a spot with bad access.
Speaker 6 (08:14):
You know, I've come up with my own approach to
this now that I tell people this approach and they
laugh at me and they think I'm kidding, But you know,
really the deer hunting comes down to it's just a simple,
you know, game of cat and mouse. They can't know
(08:34):
that they're being hunted. Since they know they're being hunted,
then they're not going to move naturally. And as boat lenders,
we have to have natural movement because deer drives and
pushes and.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Stuff like that.
Speaker 6 (08:46):
They're not very effective for the boat owners. So we
need to move naturally in daylight so they can't know
that you're hunting them.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
That's the bottom line.
Speaker 6 (08:53):
So if they if you can't get in and out
of the spot, say you can get in, which you
can't get out without the beer, knowing, well, maybe you
can get a couple of hunts out of that burden.
Season you better be very sparing in when you play
those cards because you're only going to get a couple
of cracks before you've educated too many deer back there
(09:15):
and they start, you know, they lose that natural movement
that you need, or you can't hunt it at all
and just hunt the fringes of that area. Like let's
say you got this perfect funnel on a let's say
it's an eighty acre property and there's this perfect funnel,
and then if I can just sit there, I'm gonna
(09:35):
kill that buck. I'm happy. Well, you can kill that buck.
You're after a whole lot of places on that eighty
acre property. Don't get married to a spot that's not
easy to hunt, or it's not easy to hunt.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
Without being TechEd.
Speaker 6 (09:49):
But that way and the other approach, and this is
what I'm gonna play with a little bit more of
this year. You just stayed to stay in there, you know.
Then you know I did that one season on hunted
Buck for twelve days and never once slept in my
bed during those twelve days. It was either on the
(10:11):
ground at the base of the tree or in the
ground wide and I would go in and out and
do all by entry and exit when it was windy
during the middle of the day, because you can get
away with murder even going.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Into betting area windy.
Speaker 6 (10:25):
But when it's still, they see you easier, and they
definitely hear you, you know, because the wind is moving south,
you're moving the deer don't register movement as well. When
everything's moving, it's sort of like you know, like you
hear a whole like a background noise, you don't hear
sounds as well. They're the same way with move it's
(10:48):
pretty It was pretty amazing to me how little attention
they paid to what was going on around them when
it's windy. But anyway, the point is you could get
in and out when it's windy. But you know, let's
say it drops down and it's still in the evening.
At the end of the shooting time, we think, well
out and sneak my way out. Now you're not sneaking
out the same thing in the morning when you're trying
(11:10):
to go in it's bit calm and you're crunching your
way back in there. Yeah, you know, it's terrible every
day knows. So that's the other options. It's not as
it's not as far out there is what you think.
Because everybody has a spike cap out. I don't even
think twice, oh yeah, this's gonna spike you up on
that mountain over there. Well, they don't think twice. So
(11:33):
this is just spike cap the deer, and it works
really well. It seems, like I said, it seems pretty
foreign because people are used to doing it. But I
think you'd be surprised and how comfortable you can be
and how effective that is when you're not coming and
going all the time, and not only leaving set, but
(11:54):
all that noise that goes with it, especially when it's
calm out. So you know, the simple advice is just
don't hunt that spot. That's the simple advice. And then
they gave you a really long.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Two What if you had a counter So imagine there's
a stop watch going from the time you go in
and you're spike camping for white tails, and so that's
one version of the simulation, and you think you can,
you know, kill the buck you're after in three days,
so you know, seventy two hours, let's say, or you
have to stop watch when you're only hunting that deer
(12:28):
going in and out, and maybe it takes twelve sits,
fourteen sits. If you end up actually killing that deer,
what do you think would it be potentially more efficient?
Because obviously three days spike camping for white tails is
a major time commitment.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
But do you think it could be more efficient?
Speaker 6 (12:44):
I think if you catch the right day, like we
were talking, or accounts mentioned, or you only have a
certain number of opportunities there before you you've educated them,
and you know, again, it could come down to intel.
If you run a lot sell cameras, you could push
that information overload to the point where you only go
(13:05):
in there where you know the buckets that you know,
and you roll the dice with the risk saying, well,
it's you know, it's kind of like high risk, high reward.
You know, I hopefully can get in today, but the
risk is pretty high.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
At least educate some here.
Speaker 6 (13:22):
You could play in the game that way too, But again,
like I mentioned earlier, it's just me.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
It's my philosophy.
Speaker 6 (13:28):
I don't want to have all the information. I kind
of like being really surprised when not really surprised, but
like excited when the buck I'm putting shows up. I
don't want to get in that position. I think we've
got this.
Speaker 3 (13:39):
Conversation even before you and I work.
Speaker 6 (13:41):
I don't want to be in that position where I'm
disappointed it it doesn't show up. You know what I'm saying.
I want to just hunt and hunt and then be
excited when he does, rather than the opposite. And if
we have too much information available, because there's a balance,
you know, obviously, I need to know enough stuff not
wasting my time. But I don't want to know so
(14:02):
much that I feel like a god in corner just
doesn't feel the same to me. But it's not illegal,
so there's nothing wrong with it. It's just isn't my style.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
So that's all Bill has to say about that for now.
Now let's get into skips Lie on his take on
this same question and dilemma we've all faced. All right, there,
I was shed hunting. I remember last year. There's a
spot on my farm. It's absolutely tore up. There's trails everywhere,
there's scrapes, rubs. It just feels like the hair on
the back of your neck goes straight up and you
just feel like you can kill a giant buck there.
(14:34):
But the axis is really bad. How do I hunt it?
Should I hunt it?
Speaker 5 (14:41):
You should hunt it.
Speaker 4 (14:44):
I'm gonna guess most people listening to this, and maybe
I'll just make a assumption with you that you're a
rough hunter. I like hunting November, and that's how I
used to be when I was younger, especially, and when
I was younger, I didn't and have the ability to
be like I'm going to go put in a food
plot and hunt near your food plot, you know, and
(15:06):
even today I go sit way back in the timber.
Speaker 5 (15:08):
So I do this even to this day.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
So let's just put this in the rut hunting category,
or you know early rut with like, hey, late October,
he probably is there, and then in November he's starting
to get all over the place, but hopefully still in there.
So what I would do then is just I would
(15:30):
set up a few different spots in there and go
in like super super early in the morning where the
access isn't great, and I would just hunt a few
times strategically when the conditions are right, and I would
get in there super early, and if you have the energy.
This one's cliche, this one everybody's heard a million times.
But I would go in there super early, and I
(15:52):
would just sit there all day. If it's a giant
buck and the access isn't great, just sit there all
day and you know, is it Are you gonna shoot
that deer at noon? Probably not? But is there a chance? Yeah,
there's a real chance of doing it. So what's the
advantage of getting out of there? There isn't one. You're
(16:12):
just gonna screw it up even worse. So those spots.
I just the deep spots. I just go in there
very strategically. I don't go in there too often. I
try and have a little bit of variety, and then
I just go in there when it's just about right colder,
I know that you're moving well, you know, maybe there's
some mentel where I think that buck's in the area.
Speaker 5 (16:33):
I go there. I'll sit all day, and.
Speaker 4 (16:36):
If you screw something up, that's part of the game too,
you know, it's not nothing's a guarantee. And even even
stands that are bulletproof, you still can screw those up too.
So I would just go in there strategically, don't over
hunt it, sit all day, and you know, might work out,
it might not work out. And every hunter whose season
be like, yeah, I've had a lot of times it
(16:57):
did not work out. That's fine. That's what makes it fun.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
Yeah, because I feel oftentimes people are they're like, oh man,
you know what, I know, I shouldn't be back there,
but I do feel like that's my best opportunity. And
then I personally think a lot of people it's October
twelfth and not like when you're you said rut, And
so in most parts of the Midwest, it's not October twelfth.
(17:27):
They're like, oh, you know, October twelfth, I have to
go in there and try it. And then October eighteenth.
It rolls around. Do you think that's the wrong approach
or do you think that's no harm, no foul.
Speaker 4 (17:36):
You know, if I tried it, so this one's gonna
be a little bit different answer. But if I tried
that in Michigan, well, if I tried October twelve, it
would never.
Speaker 5 (17:45):
Work because those deer were still so freaked out.
Speaker 4 (17:47):
And nocturnal, and and then I had to reprogram my brain.
When I come to better states that weren't as pressured,
deer act actually acted a little bit natural. You could
actually do that in more so, it depends on the
state if you're if you're in an area and people
can't quite grasp, like things in Michigan might get just
absolutely pounded. But I've never seen that, so I don't
(18:08):
understand what he's saying. Well, there's Harry's that get just
unbelievable amount of pressure and it's like October you're almost
wasting your time.
Speaker 5 (18:15):
Well that's what I came from.
Speaker 4 (18:17):
And when I went to the Better States, where I'm
like you know, Iowa, Kansas, and Illinois even wherever. And
I'm like, well, I gotta wait till the rot to hunt.
Speaker 3 (18:27):
I just have to.
Speaker 4 (18:28):
Also, I'm like, wait, some of these deer moving in October,
they actually are I might be able to get in
there in a cold morning in October and shoot a
giant in October. Well that was foreign to me. I'm like, no,
that's not possible because I'm from Michigan. Well, I had
to reprogram my brain, so I think it's it's actually
possible if you if you're like, whoa, it's October twelve,
(18:50):
and these deer are not like intensely pressured, you could
go in there strategically if it was like a really
cold day, or you thought the movement would be really good.
The bear matt pressure went in and went in there
October twelve. Just don't go in there like three times
in a row or something. You know, it's kind of
common sense. You kind of know when you're over pressuring things.
You know, I think a good hunter knows when he's
(19:11):
over pressuring things. But on the flip side that you
get your guys who are so conservative that they don't
really they'll never go in there and that's just human nature.
How how much risk are you willing to take on things?
And I like that, especially with deer hunting. What's the downside?
The downside I don't get a deer, Okay, no big deal.
(19:32):
It's not like I'm like risking all the all of
my livelihood or betting my house at the casino against something.
Speaker 5 (19:38):
It's it's a deer. So that's why I like.
Speaker 4 (19:40):
I like putting a little bit of risk in there,
risk and reward, you know. But I just stay on
the fringe. I basically just hunt right by the road.
I won't even go into the farm. Yeah, okay, you're
not screwing anything up, but your chance for success is
so minimal too, So don't be that conservative again, kind
of a common I like a little bit of risks,
(20:03):
So I'd say, i'd say push in there at the
right times and just don't overdo it. And if you notice,
like I went in there five times and now I
don't see anything, you're probably screwing that spot up and
you need to rethink that.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
That's what Skip has to say.
Speaker 2 (20:16):
I think there's a misconception with a lot of these
folks that they maybe treat their farm really carefully. But
a lot of these guys started hunting on public or
permission all at one point, and then you know they
built up to where they own a farm and can
take a little bit different approach. But skip lets you
know on hey, if I was hunting eighty acres, forty acres,
whatever the case may be, that's the strategy I think
that's most relatable. Next up we have Don Higgins on
(20:38):
his answer to this question. Everyone talks about access, and
someone maybe got permission on a new farm, or maybe
they realize, hey, this access deal is actually really important,
and I feel the best spot on my farm where
I have the highest hods to kill buck has bad access.
Speaker 3 (20:57):
How do I hunt? Where do I start? Should I?
Speaker 5 (21:01):
Well? Should you? That's what the real question is.
Speaker 7 (21:05):
I've said for years stand without good access is not
a good stand. I don't care what kind of signs there,
what else is there. If you don't have good access,
you don't have a good stand. All other factors thrown
out the wind.
Speaker 5 (21:20):
It doesn't matter.
Speaker 7 (21:22):
It starts with good access. And I remember years ago
legendary bow hunter Roger Rothar said, whenever you hang a stand,
you should be able to instantly rattle off five or
six reasons why that stands there while you're putting it
in that tree. And at the time, you know, I
was just a young pop it didn't make too much
sense to me. It's like, well, you know, there's a
good tree, and twenty yards away there's a trail, so
(21:44):
that's why my stands here. Now it's way more than that,
and it starts with access. I put my stand in
this tree because I can access it across this open
field with a northwest wind straight in my face. That
same northwest wind is going to allow a buck to
walk past that tree and feel comfortable doing so. And
I plan to be here the first week of November
(22:05):
when the bucks are cruising. This is a spot that
aught a lot of cruising bucks should pass by. You know,
it's going to be better in the morning than the evening,
so I'm only going to hunt this spot in the morning.
In addition to all this, this giant oak tree right
in front of my stand tree is dropping acorns at
that time of the year. And you should be able
to just go on and on and on and make
(22:28):
a long list for why you put a stand in
a specific tree, But it all comes down to access.
If you don't have good access, it's not a good stand.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
So if you can come up with six reasons but
access is not.
Speaker 5 (22:39):
One of them, it's not a good stand. Don't hunt there.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
If you followed down for any period of time, you
probably could have guessed that was going to be his
answer to this question. And his farm is exceptionally well
set up. He's very conservative when it comes to hunting,
but very aggressive when it comes to managing habitat and
setting up a farm. So in that scenario, you can
get away with being really conservative because you've been able
to develop the farm really well or figure out a
(23:05):
way to stack the odds in your favor and make
it to where you don't have to hunt the quote
unquote best spot if it has bad access.
Speaker 3 (23:12):
Next up we have Steve Hanson. Here we go.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
The best botto of my farm I feel has bad
or not great access. Okay, how do I hunt that spot?
Speaker 8 (23:21):
Since you started off the conversation with it sounding like
it's more of a rout funnel type spot, so we're
going to be trying to access this location for a
rut hunt. What I'm gonna recommend is whatever path you
have that you think has the least amount of chances
of moving deer. But you're gonna have to go in
in the dark and come out in the dark. It's
(23:42):
gonna be all day sets. And then you're also going
to have to minimize the amount of trips that you
hunt it. Therefore, because every time you're hunting it, you're
using up some in potential, yeah, some potential. You know,
you're disrupting the flow of deer. So you want to
make sure you're hunting it on the peak prime days,
exactly right wind directions, not leaving anything to chance. And
(24:04):
once you use up one of your times of going
in there, you want to make the most of it
by sitting all day for sure, that'd be the biggest
thing that I could think, and going in extra early
coming out you do a lot less damage to the
you know, deer that are living on your farm, moving
in the dark, they're a different creature after dark. There
seemed more accepting of a little bit of intrusion. But
(24:26):
that's how I would manage that sort of of a situation.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
So that might mean taking the long way, taking the.
Speaker 8 (24:32):
Long way whatever it takes to do the minimum amount
of damage you can, and then staying you know the
greatest amount of time that you can to hunt that.
Speaker 3 (24:39):
How many chances do you think you may have?
Speaker 2 (24:42):
And I understand it's very situational, but you have decades
and decades of experience, You've helped a lot of people,
you know, maybe navigate this exact scenario. Like how many
tries do you think you get? And the reason I
ask is because there's probably going to be a cold
front October twelfth and maybe you really maybe that's not
quite the time for this imaginary spot, right, I would
(25:03):
say eight out of ten guys are going to go
hunt that spot on that time that's not quite ready
to do that.
Speaker 8 (25:08):
Sure, yeah, I would avoid that scenario. I would because
what you're going to do in that case, if it's
if it's a rut funnel and it's not that phase
of the rut, you're going to educate the local does
who's at whatever deer are using that place at that
time are going to become educated to it, and then
that's going to change how they're using that spot. So
I would avoid it until truly peaked days. How many
(25:29):
times you can hunt it, Like you said, every place
is different, but realistically three or four without too much,
I think, and you could still expect some you know,
you're doing a little bit of damage, but you should
get some success if you If in three or four
sits the place isn't working like you think it is,
it may not be the spot you think it is too.
(25:49):
You know, if you've given it the best days of
the year, gone in extra early, you know, three or
four times, you I would think you'd have an opportunity
or you know, see your target, bucker whatever. But if
it hasn't happened in three or four times, and I'd
reevaluate the whole situation.
Speaker 3 (26:05):
I think Steve's answer is really relatable.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Make the timing right, go in there, take a swing
or two, hope for the best. If it is truly
the best spot and it has all the terrain features
that make sense, go for the fences, give it a try.
And I think that's probably what most people would fall into.
But the key thing is being thoughtful and methodical when
you go in to the really good spot with really
bad access. Next up we have Jeff Sturgis. Jeff, I
(26:30):
would say, is a pretty conservative hunter. I'm also very
thoughtful with his access and everything else. So here's what
he has to share about it. Okay, the best spot
on my farm I postseason scattered it. I found this
awesome rut funnel. It's just tore up with sign and man,
I just feel like I need to hunt in there.
But access is so important. So the best spot on
(26:50):
my farm I feel has bad access. How do I
hunt this this area?
Speaker 9 (26:56):
What's the bad access? Thanks ends on so this I'll
give you an example. Last year, Buck, I took over
a water hole. It's right along the back corner of
a field, the neighbors field that is full of deer
all night. It's a hidden corner from the road. It's
crazy because you drive by and people always think, like,
even with food plots, it's got to be this three
(27:19):
acre field. You got to make it in like quarter
acre half acre section, screen it off and all these deer.
Speaker 5 (27:24):
Can use it.
Speaker 9 (27:24):
Then, But how many times have you found a hidden
corner and a giant agg field and all the deer
there and like three or four acres Because it's the
one year that's the most important, and they don't mind
being on top of each other in a food source
like that as long as they're hidden. And so that's
kind of taught me a lot to even sectioning off
food plots. I think it's a.
Speaker 5 (27:41):
Little bit overrated.
Speaker 9 (27:42):
But in that area, if you walk into that stand location,
that's a beautiful rough funnel. It's a line will switch
grass on the outside. You go only about ten yards
into the woods and then you look down at a
bench system and then it drops off super steep from there.
It's like a bow tie. Everything comes into that funnel.
We have a water hole there which enhances the movement.
You don't create movement with the waterhole. You complement the
(28:03):
movement and make it a little bit better. It's like
a sweetener. But in that area, if I walk in
the morning, great rot funnel. If I walk there in
the morning, I'm going to spook deer. They're going to
be out in those fields and I'll likely ruin my
set before it even gets daylight. If I try to
go in there at three in the afternoon, it's getting
dark at six thirty. Then if I get out, I've
(28:23):
spoke in the stand.
Speaker 3 (28:24):
It's a one and done.
Speaker 5 (28:25):
I'm ruining the whole area.
Speaker 9 (28:26):
So what I choose to do in a spot like that,
it's a post day break stand entrance, you're taking bad
access post daybreak stand entrance, you wait until the field clears.
You sit from three four hundred yards away, have a
little no I can sneak up, look over the coast
is clear, and then you walk straight into that stand location.
It's only ten yards off the woods. I'm only exposing
myself ten yards in that spot. It's a real narrow constriction.
(28:49):
Deer have to be right on top of me if
I walk in. I went in I think at seven
thirty last year, approximately half hour forty minutes after daylight,
and then shot them at eleven thirty. That and I
had to get out probably, you know, in that day
if it was getting dark at five thirty, I pro
I would have had to get out by two two
thirty because I don't want deer starting to get behind
me or my winds blown back out into the field.
(29:12):
That's one example. If you're on private land and you
have poor access, a lot of times that poor access
is determined by food source location. You're having to walk
through a food source location to get back to a
betting area. So you do that in the morning, you
spook them out. And I keep saying betting area. You
keep saying, you said rut funnel I'm thinking, I'm getting
to the backside of a betting area, wait for that
mature buck to come back that I'm targeting, And so
(29:34):
I look at like, for one, you go way around
that food source. We've had times where it's literally we're
on forty acres, it goes up four hundred and fifty
feet in elevation, and we're taking thirty seven minutes to
get to a stand if we take one one minute
break in thirty six minutes if you don't take a break,
but it's thirty six minutes uphill all the way around,
so that we're going all the way around the food,
(29:55):
get on top of the food three hundred and fifty
yards away and hundreds of feet in elevation above the food,
so you can wait for those deer to get back.
If you take the easier route, go through the food,
and it's a lot easier. We could take our we
could take a eat bike, we'd take our quiet cat
right up through there, right up the gut. But we
would we wouldn't we wouldn't have a hunt that morning.
Speaker 10 (30:13):
And so.
Speaker 9 (30:15):
Another another case, you might have food on private land
that's just ruining your hunt. I'd rather take that food
out and have good access so that I can get
to the backside of a bedding area and a rout
funnel stand like that, then have that food source and
not be able to get to that stand location because
every time I go in and out, I'm going to
blow that food out.
Speaker 5 (30:33):
And then that.
Speaker 9 (30:34):
Also means when we're getting into some of those stands,
one way, we're going out the food way, so we're
coming out at eleven o'clock through the food, or we
went way around that food at six am to get
into the stand before that time. You always have to
think about too, we're the deer down wind of your stand.
You know a lot of times people say, well forty
five minutes is that magic time to get in your
(30:56):
stand in the morning, an hour before daylight? Well, what
if the deer going through a horse pasture before, you know,
pre dawn, and they could go through that horse pasture
pre dawn. It's open, it's a it's a shortcut for
them to get to their bedding area, but they would
never go through that horse passure, open area or open
woods during daylight, especially a mature bock. So I don't
(31:18):
want to sit there for an hour blowing my scent
into that open area. I want to get there just
in time, and so I'm getting there just when it's
gray light, use a little bit of darkness to get
into my stand, and then I'm really only exposing my
wind in that area for five ten minutes before it
gets daylight, and I'm really limiting the amount of deer
that might get down wind to me before daylight. And
then there's some of those stands where it's just a
(31:39):
steep rock drop off, there's no deer, it's a lake,
it's a house or something you're blowing you're sent into
and you can get in there an hour early, get
in there really early. So then a lot of times,
you know, manipulation of the habitat, walking way around all
those are you know, parts of it. But at the
same time, using the timing of when to get into
a stand, whether that be a post daybreak just in
(32:02):
time or an hour before to get into a stand
to help with your access is really something needs to
be considered too.
Speaker 2 (32:11):
Is there a part on your farm that you wish
you could hunt, but you just say, well, the axis
isn't good enough, I can't hunt there.
Speaker 9 (32:18):
There's a lot of places like that we have you know.
I'll give you example that we hunted fourteen years in
Wisconsin and the stand location our property thirteen years get
mixed up time flies two properties two thousand and two
over there, but it was about thirty acres woods, and
there's a core area of about fifteen to eighteen acres
(32:40):
right in the middle of it that we could just
never go into. Could never even consider going into the
food plots there. We had three quarters of acre food plots.
Could never sit on them with a boat because they're
too big, they're too exposed, couldn't get in or out
without spoken deer, so we couldn't hunt on it. The
majority of my food plots in Minnesota on our farm,
we cannot hunt with a bow because we can't hunt
(33:02):
them without spooking deer.
Speaker 3 (33:04):
There is one.
Speaker 9 (33:05):
Hundred and forty acre area with field on the outside
about one hundred and ten acres of woods in the middle.
We bought the land in June of twenty twenty, and
I did not step foot other than a vehicle ride
with the real estate agent in April to look at
the inside of the property on three or four trails.
I didn't step foot in about one hundred acres out
(33:28):
of that one hundred and forty acres until after the
season in January, because I couldn't hunt it anyways. Because
I got in there, I just spoked deer. It was
in the center. It goes down in if I'm in there,
the wind's swirling. Now we since identified points that are
down there, and we can manipulate the wind a little bit,
or use wind in the morning to come down one
(33:50):
channel and go up another channel. That's an entirely different
topic of hunting hills and thermals. But even then there's
still that core area of probably eighty out of that
original one hundred acres we couldn't hunt. That we can't hunt,
and I'm okay with that. It's just kind of like
you just write it off. We've worked on the habitat
in there, and we've built bedding areas. I expect as
(34:11):
long as they can hold that deer in there during
the daylight, then we have a really good chance of
shooting that buck during the season. So and that goes
for a public land too. You don't want to identify
the best spot in the woods to hold mature box
to actually hunt. You want to identify those areas that
can be protected so you can hunt around them and
(34:34):
then being methodical and precise, take that buck to the
very high percentage of the time a year after year
that's in that spot because you preserve it. It's not
a woman dumb.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Once again, I think you can draw a parallel of
someone that's able to really design a parcel to have
it hunt really effectively. These folks are not going in
and hunting these spots, but if you fall into that category.
Speaker 3 (35:03):
You have the ability to do that.
Speaker 2 (35:04):
Keep that in mind for this upcoming season of how
can I potentially make that best spot maybe a little
more accessible, How can I duplicate it? What can I
do to make it better? And that's what I got
from Jeff. Next up, we have Bobby Kendall. He hunts
a lot of different farms and has a lot of
projects going on at all different times, and so a
lot of times he's hunting on the fly and it's
maybe not a fully developed farm, maybe it's under construction,
(35:27):
if that makes sense. And so here's what he has
to say about the dilemma we all face as deer hunters.
Let's say someone says, man, I was shed hunting. I
remember from the last season there was this spot. The
axis is bad. I'm gonna bust your coming in and out.
There's not really a good spot for me to shoot
my win with a low probability of getting busted.
Speaker 3 (35:48):
How do I hunt this spot? Or should I hunt
this spot?
Speaker 5 (35:51):
All right?
Speaker 11 (35:51):
So it kind of depends on it's situational, like the
time of year. So like in October, everything is always
risk reward. Is it worth the risk to go in
here to hunt?
Speaker 5 (36:00):
All right? So last year we did a series.
Speaker 11 (36:03):
On an undeveloped and versus developed farm, and the undeveloped
farm on the big start contrast is the access is
the nearest good because you're not creating perfect access. So
in October what it looks like is, you know, you
have to you have to pick your days. And for me,
those days are what I call magic X day. It's
a day where the pressure is rising and cloud covers falling,
(36:26):
humidity's falling, temperatures falling, and the perfect days that you
know the Brona crosses like thirty point two by the
evening sit So those are the days I'm looking for,
and I'm only going in when risk reward tips and
it's worth the risk to go in because I have
a high chance of seeing him that night. So October
pick the night's high pressure fronts the day the first
(36:47):
day of the high pressure. Now in November, you know
it kind of it gets more forgiving, so you can
get a little bit more aggressive. Plus you're hunting different
type spots on that particular farm. I didn't start hunting
that deer until November, and he was way back in
the back of the farm. I had to literally go
through like four or five bean fields in order to
get back where he was he was at, and I
(37:10):
had a really good funnel rough funnel stand back there,
but the access I know I was going to blow
the whole farm up going back there. So what my
strategy was was wait till eight thirty nine in the morning,
come up here, glass my way back to the stand,
and hunt these inside corner funnels. Because inside corner funnels
are awesome because your wind is always good for you,
(37:33):
and it's also generally good for the deer because you're
on the down wind side of the cover and it's
a funnel. So I was hunting these inside corners because
the access is so good to the inside corner. So
maybe you don't go to your best spot yet because
the access is better than these inside corners. And then
you hunt toll like two thirty three o'clock in the afternoon,
and from you know, the fourth or fifth to the thirteenth,
(37:54):
the deer were after the big mature one. I would
rather hunt that time period anyway. And so then you're
in the farm and you're out of the farm on
a knee bike. Maybe you're not leaving scent and so
you're you're hedging that pressure. And then maybe when things
are just the electricity goes off and you're just the light.
I mean, you're just like it's on fire. That's when
(38:14):
you can dive into those spots and it's like you almost.
Speaker 3 (38:19):
Can do no wrong.
Speaker 11 (38:19):
I mean, I remember a deer coming down winding me
at one o'clock in the afternoon one year, big mature
deer looked up at me, smelled me, took off, and
I killed him in the same spot the next night.
Like so you know, it's like at a certain point,
that's when you die. It's like a it's like a
it's like a laddering up. It's like a risk reward,
(38:41):
and the further we get into the chaos, it starts
tipping and you just gotta be able to gauge when
to when to throttle her up and take a risk.
And for me, a lot of times, like opening day
one season, I'm like, this is ground zero. I'm gonna
be in a tree somewhere. I don't even know what tree.
I'm gonna go in there in the dark and a
climber and I'm gonna be perched. Yeah, that would be
like the ultimate, like because that's when I get the
(39:04):
gun in the hand and all of a sudden, the
risk reward.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
And there's so many tangibles happen on you know, any
opening firearm day right right across the country. Two questions,
how many Magic X days? Because I think when people
hear this, it's going to be October seventeenth and the
temperature drop ten degrees and it's you know, maybe all
the conditions are right, and they're like, man, Bobby said,
risk for's reward, I'm feeling good. So when does the
(39:27):
gun go off? Where You're like, Okay, this is not
a great spot. I'm probably gonna get three to four
cracks at this spot with this particular deer I'm hunting,
Like when does when does that go off?
Speaker 11 (39:36):
So that risk reward is ever so slightly going like
this as we get through October, because in my opinion,
there's three things that affect a deer to move in daylight.
The big deer we're after in October, and you know,
one of those is moon phase. I'm a big moon
phase guy, and like that week leading up to the
full moon, especially in October. So like on a year
(39:58):
that the full moon happens early and that that wadd's
already been blown. So it's like, Okay, I don't have
that in my bag of tricks forward, so maybe I
get a little more aggressive.
Speaker 3 (40:08):
But if the full moon is on October twenty.
Speaker 11 (40:10):
Ninth, and you have that window lining up with the other,
with the other, the second of the three, which is
date phase or mindset, all the same thing. It's the
mindset of the deer date phase mindset. The end of October,
his mindset is more rambunctious. He's more wound up now,
he's starting to sniff like so you if you can,
(40:33):
if it's later in the month, you can get more aggressive.
You know, if you get that full moon at the
end of the month and you have that to look
forward to, maybe you get less aggressive, not as quick
because you have such a powerful thing coming up. And
then obviously the third part of that so date phase,
mindset moon. The third part is the environmental. That's the
part you can't predict. That's what you're just talking about
(40:54):
with the magic X days. But it's just there is
no hard rights and wrongs. It's kind of a but
it's always is it worth it? Yet if your guts
like probably about if you're walking in the stand, you're like,
I shouldn't be doing this, which I still do this.
Sometimes you just got it.
Speaker 3 (41:14):
It's just it's just not worth it.
Speaker 5 (41:15):
Because October is a gift.
Speaker 11 (41:17):
It's a glass house that you can you can change
his habits and and you have this nice it's the
longest period of time that you have in the season
to play the game doing what he's doing, and so
you can be very very precise and wait, you know,
you get in November and all that changes. But a
(41:38):
lot of times, like when I'm going into the season,
I'm always trying to be in front of the deer, right,
So like a lot of times when I'm going into
the season, I already know when that full moon is,
so I'm thinking about that and and I'm so I'm
kind of like, Okay, that's this is my week. And
as we start coming into that, now, every high pressure
front from day one through is going to be awesome. Unpressured,
(42:02):
the deer you're after should be on his feet somewhere
in daylight. I mean they don't. They don't generally, unpressure
just just lay through that. I mean it, they just
get rambunctious and they they have to go and tear
stuff up in marked territory. And so, you know, just
being ahead of the deer's mindset risk, risk, risk versus reward.
Speaker 5 (42:26):
Trying to think like a deer. And uh, it changed.
Every year is a little different.
Speaker 11 (42:30):
But if you get if you get the perfect front
in in that five day window leading up to the
full moon, it's the most magical day of the year.
I mean, I go to the stand like this. I mean,
you know, it's just it's it's it's just the most
powerful day of this season. It's a blue it's a
it's a morning that starts out gloomy. It even depends
(42:52):
on how that front hits, Like if the front hits
at night, it's not as if the if the morning
is gloomy and stagnant and in a little warmer and
then you feel that wind hit and it kind of.
Speaker 5 (43:04):
Looks like this where the sky starts.
Speaker 11 (43:06):
Breaking up and the air is drying and cooling, and
by prime time it's gin clear and it's dead calm,
and it's cold and crisp. It's fire like I'm going
I'm sitting there like this, you know, because it's it's
the best day of the season. And it only if
you can line that up in that week leading up
(43:26):
the full moon. It's the best day of the season,
you know, to get on a deer, to kill a
deer that you're on that you know what he's doing.
Speaker 3 (43:33):
There, you have it.
Speaker 2 (43:33):
That's what Bobby thinks on this burning question. And last,
but not least, we have Mark Kenyon on his perspective
of risk for reward. Consuming some of Mark's content over
the year. Seems like he's gotten more aggressive with his
game plan and here's what he has to say.
Speaker 3 (43:48):
Okay, this past spring, you're a shed hunting.
Speaker 2 (43:52):
Maybe you ended up in the sanctuary on your farm
or the very very back part, and you're like, man,
this is awesome. There's all this great sign, all these
trails converge as a betting area.
Speaker 3 (44:03):
Just right over this direction. The axis is really bad.
It's bad.
Speaker 2 (44:07):
You're gonna scared deer coming in, scared deer coming out.
How and should you hunt the best spot on the
farm with bad access?
Speaker 10 (44:16):
Yeah, I've had this, you know, I've come across myself
plenty of times too, and so I've wrestled with it
a lot, and what I have kind of settled on
is that, you know, the best best spot is a
place that has everything going for plus good access. So
this place is never going to be like a ten
(44:36):
out of ten. It's going to be like an eight
out of ten because it's great, but you can't get
it at all. That's that the reality of a lot
of these kinds of places that are like a core
habitat feature with all this movement coming into it, like naturally,
those places just always tend to be and hard to
get two spots. So this is a pretty common thing,
(44:56):
and I think that my view you is that they
are still worth hunting because they if it's that good,
if it's that much of a hub, there are moments
when the reward outweighs the risk. And that's like every
single time you look at a stand site or an
ambush location. There's always these two sides of the scale.
(45:17):
It's like, what's the potential for reward, what's the potential
for risk? Like what's going to be the I'm going
to burn some powder ons, I'm going to damage things
by going in. There's also the chance that this could happen.
And so I think when you find a location like that,
you really need to think long and hard about when
is the best of the best moment for this place,
(45:38):
Like why is this place great?
Speaker 3 (45:39):
What makes it great?
Speaker 10 (45:41):
And what's the type of year that makes it great,
And what's the set of conditions that will make this
like the best of the best time to hunt the
best of best place?
Speaker 3 (45:48):
That's number one, and then number two.
Speaker 10 (45:51):
I'm also thinking, Okay, I know I've got bad access,
but what set of circumstances or situation would give me
the least bad access on the stage. So maybe so
I'll give you an example. I have a place like
this that is like smack down in the middle of
like some of the best cover in one of the
farms I hunt, And it's a place that I've been
able to see because I've never I've infrequently gone into
(46:14):
the core of this but I can oftentimes see into
this brushy, nasty stuff, and so I can see like
year after a year after year.
Speaker 3 (46:20):
Man, this is where they're always coming through.
Speaker 10 (46:23):
Like there's always every time there's a good buckham after
he's always coming through in and out, in and out
of this. But like, no matter how you go about
trying to get in there or to sit in there,
deer gonna win you. There's so many deer there are
on all sides in you. Any way you try to
access it, you're going to have to go through bedding
cover or trying to get out. There's food on all
sides too, So there's no good way to get in it,
(46:44):
and there's no really good way to hunt it without
it being like you're on edge. But the least bad
would be if you had like a due east or
a do west wind. There's like a it's there's a
ditch and so there's a couple of trees. You could
hunt right on this ditch, and if you can run
your way right along that ditch, you would minimize your
wind issues. If you could walk in that ditch in
(47:07):
the morning and right alongside of it super early, you
can minimize the access issues.
Speaker 3 (47:12):
But you're definitely gonna blow some stuff up.
Speaker 10 (47:14):
So you're saying, Okay, I'm gonna I know I'm gonna
cast some damage here, but I'm gonna pick the days
when I've got the best chance of getting away with
a little bit of it. And then also I'm choosing
that day when, like everything else is perfect. So for
this location, it's like this spot the best, the best
of the best day would be during peak of road activity,
when there is a great cold front that comes through
(47:37):
and that's like a wet or windy day, So I
could slip in there and at least not make a
ton of noise. If I could get that set of
conditions with that correct wind, it would be worth the
risk on that day. But there's like two days maybe
if I one or two days and that's it. Yeah,
And if I go in there, I take my swing
(47:57):
like I'm swinging for the fences, and if it doesn't
work out, well, I just I know I've burned this
place out a bit, and so I know, hey, yeah,
it's going to be a week or two or something
before that area is really going to be hot again.
But it could be worthwhile. So I think that at
least in the places that I hunt. I don't hunt
big farms. I don't own big farms. I don't hunt
Niola or Illinois or Ohio like most of the time.
(48:20):
So when I think about this question, I'm thinking about
this like at home in Michigan, Michigan, and if you
want to kill a mature buck, oftentimes it has to
be in a place like that because those mature bucks
so rarely come out on the edges, so rarely spent
time in the open.
Speaker 3 (48:36):
We'really easy to.
Speaker 10 (48:36):
Access places, and I think, to be clear, like this
is like my answer is the way it is because
I'm primarily hunting in like high pressure areas, relatively small farms.
Speaker 3 (48:48):
I'm thinking Michigan when I answer this question right.
Speaker 10 (48:51):
It might be different if I've got hundreds and hundreds
of acres in Iowa or Illinois or.
Speaker 3 (48:55):
Nebraska or wherever. But you know where I'm at in Michigan.
It's all small.
Speaker 10 (49:00):
You know, it's forties and sixties and twenties, and there's
sixty other guys in my square mile, and you're just
not going to get a mature buck moving out in
the easy stuff and the open stuff on the edges.
Ninety nine percent of the time. So if ever you
want to get a chance that one to five year
old that's in your square mile, probably have to go
into these like core places.
Speaker 3 (49:22):
And so I'm willing to take a.
Speaker 10 (49:24):
Big swing at those core places a few times when
the time's right, because if I don't, I'll probably never
get a chance of that too. And so you have
to take calculated risks. It's just about being smart when.
Speaker 3 (49:34):
You do so.
Speaker 2 (49:35):
Throughout the last ten years, when you've you've done that strategy,
how many times does it typically work? And then does
it feel are you nervous going into that or it's like, hey,
this is whatever happens happens. Yeah, and I know I'm
having some risk, but man, I'm putting myself in what
I feel the best spot.
Speaker 10 (49:52):
Yeah, I would say still most of the time it
doesn't work. But you know, you know, I can think
of the last handful of the years, a couple of
times it's worked. Yeah, that's the specific place I'm talking about,
this exact location. I took one of these big swings
and my target buck walked by it ten yards, but
it was like ten yard ten minutes before shooting it,
so I could see him. But I couldn't shoot him,
and I was like, oh it worked, Yeah, came ten
(50:13):
minutes too early. So it's always calculated risk. Sometimes it's worthwhile.
But I will say, like I am still always nervous
in those moments. You just walk around eggshells. You're like, ah,
this is this could be a disaster. But I think
I've gotten to the point where I go into it
knowing that and I kind of have a certain like
resignation to Okay, this is gonna be like super fun
(50:37):
or might blow up, and I just need to be
okay with that today and then like give it up
and like be.
Speaker 3 (50:41):
Okay with whatever happens. Whatever happens happens.
Speaker 10 (50:44):
And if you go into it with that attitude, I
think it's it's okay. And I will tell you, the
more you do this and the more you kind of
come to to see the results, the more I've become
comfortable with that, because you know, while deer survival machines
they're also not genius, you can sometimes get away with
(51:05):
more than you think, and so being willing to take
those swings and be aggressive with the right times is
worth the occasional total disaster because you can recover sometimes
faster than you might think too.
Speaker 2 (51:18):
Yeah, this was probably the widest variety of answers on
this question throughout this series, and I think if someone
listening to this, they need to figure out who's hunting
style resonates the most with me. I think all the
answers were right in their own hunting style setups. You know,
the list goes on, but I think if you're listening
(51:38):
to this, man, I feel a little confused after listening
to this episode, think of each guest and what models
how you hunt and and your goals and everything else,
because a lot of the guys they're hunting one specific
buck that is it, and so their answers were quite
a bit different. The other thing that people really need
to listen is when they said they would go into
(52:01):
this area, and that's probably one of the most important
things when it comes with the variety of answers for
this episode. But at the end of the day, everyone
has a spot like this in the back of their mind,
and that's why I asked this question. And usually to
your point, it is in relation to some sort of
terrain to where maybe you can figure out a way
to stack the deck just a little bit in your
favor by utilizing the train to have your scent go
(52:24):
in a certain direction or maybe from an access standpoint,
but definitely it can't be your favorite spot that you
have twenty times a year. That was very very clear
throughout this episode. So I hope everyone really enjoyed this episode.
Next week, we have another burning question that's probably crossed
our minds at some point, and it's what's keeping Maybe
you're having a good year, a good year, good year,
and you just want to be great, You want to
(52:44):
get to the next level, and you want to learn
how are these guys finding more and more success seemingly
year after year, And so we're going to figure out
if there's any trends or anything that you can address
this upcoming season.
Speaker 3 (52:54):
All right, there, you guys have it.
Speaker 2 (52:56):
I hope you enjoyed this week's episode of Back forty
dive into all the questions we've all had at some point,
and I hope that you have a little better game
plan on the spot that came to mind when we
started this episode of that really great spot with bad access,
and maybe you're equipped to make a better game plan
after hearing from eight different folks, you can find one
that is relatable to you and your strategy, what you
(53:18):
have access to, and hopefully you have a little bit
better opportunity in that spot if you decide to hunt it.
Next week we have the next burning question and it
is what is the biggest mistake hunters make from being
good to great? So you can start brainstorming now and
we'll see you next week on back forwarding.
Host
Mark Kenyon
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