Ep. 936: What Would Terry Drury Do?

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
the White Tail Woods, presented by First Light, creating proven
versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First
Light Go Farther, stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on
the show, I am running Terry Drury through our what
would you do? Gauntlet, in which I will be asking
him to share with me exactly how he would handle
a series of different hypothetical, challenging hunting scenarios and circumstances.

(00:45):
All right, welcome back to the Wired to Hunt podcast,
brought to you by First Light and their Camel for
Conservation initiative. Today in the show, we are continuing are
what would you Do series, in which, as I just described,
we run a series of different hunting experts through a
whole bunch of different really challenging or tricky or confusing

(01:06):
hunting circumstances or scenarios to see how they would handle them,
what their thought process would be, how they would go
about making their decisions, how they would go about tackling
this tough deal. And our guest today is one of
the best of all time, Terry Drury, of Drury Outdoors.
Terry's been in the show many times before. He's a
great friend of the show, really good guy, terrific deer hunter,

(01:30):
but someone who has not yet been on the What
would You Do? Series? So he joined me today to
talk through a bunch of things that are mostly pertaining
to hunting. You know, private land or lightly pressured ground
or managed ground. We talk a little bit about some habitat,
but mostly it's patterning deer. Mostly it's you know, timing

(01:50):
your hunts, planning your hunts, you know, dealing with certain
circumstances when you're on standing you see a deer do this,
or you have a hunter on a neighboring property doing that.
A bunch of different questions along those lines, stuff that's
been super relevant to me when I'm hunting some of
my private permission places, like I've got an eighty acre
piece I have permission on, I've got another twenty acre

(02:11):
piece I've got permissioned on. I hunt another forty. So
a lot of the questions that I asked are scenarios
that would be relevant to me on a twenty or forty,
but Terry could also have relevance to it on a
one hundred acres or a four hundred acres, or whatever
your search situation might be. I think you'll be able
to take some of the things we learn here today
through Terry's stories and Terry's kind of thought process for

(02:34):
all of this and apply it to your own hunting situation.
So that's the plan. That's we're going to get to
here today. It's a great episode, it's a fun episode.
I don't want to belabor the point I think we
should get right to it. I will just give you
a couple quick reminders. Number One, we have the Back
forty podcast now. It is a limited run mini series

(02:55):
on the Wired Hunt Feed. Please check that out if
you haven't already. It features one question per episode answered
by eight different experts, is hosted by my buddy Ja Koefer.
I think you'll enjoy it if you haven't yet, so
check that out. It's on this same feed. Number two,
the Wired Hunt hat I'm wearing right now is still
for sale as far as I know, over on the

(03:16):
Mediator store, so check that out. I'm a big fan.
I appreciate all of you guys showing your support by
picking up one of these two and without any further ado,
how about we just get to the episode today. It's
a good one. Like I said, please enjoy my chat
for this what would you do Gauntlet with mister Terry
Drewy all right joining me again in the show is

(03:42):
mister Terry Drewy. Welcome back, Terry, Thank you. How are
things really good? I'm at that phase of the year.

Speaker 3 (03:50):
I imagine you're.

Speaker 2 (03:51):
Like you're like me in this case where I have
two things rising in parallel. One is that steady excitement
and anticipation of the season arriving very soon. But then
right in line with that is my panic about all
the things I need to get done before the season
gets here.

Speaker 3 (04:10):
That couldn't have been any better said, That's exactly what
we're doing right now. I know the season is going
to be long and it's somewhat arduous, so we're trying
to wind down and get all those things out of
the way that we know we're not going to have
time for once it starts September fifteenth in Missouri, our
archery season. So from that date forward till January fifteenth,

(04:32):
it's a grind and everything else gets put on hold,
if you.

Speaker 2 (04:35):
Will, yes, yes, so yeah, So that all being said, Terry,
I want to be respectful of your time and the
fact that you've got a lot going on. So today
we're just going to jump right into the main event, which,
as you know, as we talked about beforehand, is this

(04:56):
kind of what we call the what would you do? Gauntlet?
And I ran your brother through this a couple of
years ago, and I thought it would be interesting to
give you most of the same questions. So if folks wanted,
they can go back and listen to the episode with
Mark and then listen to the episode with you and
see how the two of you might do things the

(05:17):
same are different, So that might be a little interesting
side project for people to do. Some of the questions
are different, so they're not all gonna line up.

Speaker 3 (05:25):
For what it's worth, his scenarios are always right, just
so you know he's He's always right no matter what.

Speaker 2 (05:35):
I know. People like that, So so yeah, it might
be interesting to see that this first question is a
little bit different than one that I gave Mark. So
you've got a you've got open runway on this one
with nothing to compare against. But here's here's the scenario.
Tare Imagine that you just picked up a forty acre property,

(05:56):
and it's a square forty acres unimproved raw. It's mostly tillable,
with just two small fingers of cover extending out into
your forty acre field. Okay. The neighboring property, though, has
got a lot of cover, a lot of good things
going for it, and you imagine that that's probably where

(06:17):
a lot of these deer bedded. You have picked this
property up though, in late August, so you only have
a handful let's say, two weeks in August and two
weeks in September until your September fifteenth opening day there
in Missouri, So you've got one month. What would you
do in this four week window that we have before
the season opens to try to improve your chances of

(06:38):
getting a mature buck to come to your side of
the line and spend a little bit of time there
and imagine you know, yeah, I'll leave with that. What
would you do in this four weeks to try to
improve your scenario?

Speaker 4 (06:53):
So is this forty acres of tillable?

Speaker 3 (06:55):
Is it in the Midwest where it would be planted
in either corner beans by chance?

Speaker 2 (07:01):
Yes, so I'll say it's a Missouri and yes, it's
going to be corner beans right now, now.

Speaker 3 (07:05):
Okay, all right, if that's the case. If it is corn,
it automatically gives you a veil an apron that you
can slip into your spot undetected. And the first thing
I do, obviously is called the farmer. And you know,
if you're if if you if he has the piece,
it's the same farmer that's actually farming the tillable, then

(07:26):
you obviously you want to make you want to make
contact with him and find out if you can purchase
some of that standing crop. Whether it be beans or corn,
it doesn't matter. Corn gives you that veil or that
apron where you can slip in there without going detected.

Speaker 4 (07:41):
You know, you've got the wall of cover.

Speaker 3 (07:44):
I'd really be careful on wind direction, you know, depending
on how that forty acre lays, and then how those
two little bitty you know, patches a timber extend out
into that I'm assuming that's a ditch or some type
of revetment that's carrying the water. You know, they can't
plant it, obviously, but it's not uncommon for deer to
bed in there, even though the neighbor may have all

(08:06):
that betting if the food is right there, depending on
morning or evening. You know, you'd really really want to
be careful about sliding in there. I would use the
carn and if he would let you, if he would
let you take out one row, we do what we
call a guest row, where you can slide in and
around those corn fields without making any noise.

Speaker 4 (08:27):
If he'll let you take one row of carn.

Speaker 3 (08:29):
Out where you can slide in there without touching any
of the leaves which out without making any noise, and
get into a spot, I would place a blind out
in the middle of that field. Whether it be corn
or beans. Carn gives you a little more cover. Beans
will still do the same thing, and it's not uncommon
for deer to be bedded in the beans. When you
start getting to that latter part of the season, the
carn is turning, so they may or may not be

(08:51):
in there. Beans would still be green, so they could
be in there. So there's a little bit of a
different scenario between corn and beans, obviously, But I would
do whatever I could about buying a standing crop so
that once he comes in and he harvests the rest
of the carn or the rest of the beans, I'd
make dog unsure that I had my blind place, so

(09:13):
that depending on what the prevailing wind is for that
particular spot and how it lays. You know, you want
to be able to slide in there, you know, either
in a cover of darkness, which then you've got to
worry about sometimes bumping deer off the field if it's
already been harvested. But I would make sure that I
had a blind place over that food that I purchased.
I'd try and get a half acre or maybe an

(09:33):
acre if he would be willing to sell it. And
sometimes if it's tucked along the edge of the timber,
it's not that great anyway, meaning there's been a lot
of browse pressure. You know, the roots from the tree
line will suck some of that moisture out. So it's
always a little bit suspect as far as you know
what type of crop you're going to be buying. But
oftentimes they'll sell that crummy crop in lieu of their

(09:56):
best standing corner, their best standing beans. But that'd be
the first thing I do, is buy a standing crop,
and I would try and make sure that I could
slide in there and until he harvests. Now, once you
harvest that carn, then you're going to have an open
field behind you, so you'd be able to access it readily.
Same way with the beans. Once he harvests the beans,
you got an open field, you're gonna be able to
access readily. But that'd be that would be what I

(10:17):
would do, And i would sit it of a of
a morning with a setting moon and maybe catch them.
And I'm going to say setting moon where it might
be setting at eight a thirty nine, nine thirty. I'd
go in there at four or four thirty in the
morning and try and catch them nibbling just a little
bit before that moon sets and they go back to bed.

(10:38):
Would not be uncommon to see embedded in those ditches
that you talked about, those little bit of revetments. Beans
might be a little bit different there. I would want
a rising moon in the afternoon and evening, especially if
they're still green, right before they start to defoliate, so
you'd want to get in there early. But i'd want
to see when that moon is coming up in the
afternoon and evening at three, three alreaty four o'clock, I'd

(11:01):
want to be sitting there and try and catch them
coming in to get a little bit of a bite
on those green soy beans, so carn I'd be there
in the mornings.

Speaker 4 (11:09):
Beans, I'd probably be there in the evening.

Speaker 2 (11:13):
Now, what if I threw one more curveball in here
for you? And this might be a good thing in
your mind, this might be a bad thing. But let's
say that this place that you purchased was not already planted.
They left a fellow, so the previous owner did not
plant this year. So now when you pick up this farm,
now it's just a forty acre field of overgrown weeds.
How is your answer different.

Speaker 3 (11:35):
Substantially, but with the same frame of mind, I would
use all that overgrown cover as a bedroom.

Speaker 4 (11:45):
I probably wouldn't do a lot with that.

Speaker 3 (11:47):
I would maybe tuck some food plots, and I would
probably go with a green food source, either biologic radishes
or winter bulbs and sugar beets. I would try and
tuck it close to the timber. I would probably go
a little bit bigger rather than the corn and beans.
I would maybe go with an acre and a half
or two acres, something almost like a destination field, but
not quite, to try and suck more deer out out

(12:10):
of the neighbors cover that you were talking about, but
I would not be surprised that if you wouldn't be
holding several deer. If he left it follow and it
was grown up, I would expect to see a few
deer bedded out in there. And in the mornings that
could be a robber room, an absolute playground where you'd
want to where you'd maybe want to stay off of
that food a little bit and use it as an
observation spot. I would probably do a little bit of

(12:33):
observation first and watch where they're coming out, how they're
getting to and from. But they I could see them,
particularly during the rut in the first ten days of November,
I could see them running all over that standing field.
I would be tickled to death to have that scenario
in all reality. And then in the evenings i'd hunt
those green food sources a little bit closer to the timber.

Speaker 2 (12:55):
Sounds like you've got this is no challenge at all
for you, Terry. This is an easy, wonderful scenario. Sounds
like in your view, I love it. Well.

Speaker 4 (13:05):
I guess you mess up enough, you're bound to learn something.

Speaker 3 (13:08):
Over the years, we've screwed up every scenario possible.

Speaker 2 (13:13):
Right there with you, Okay, I want to pivot a
little bit, Terry. Let's let's put you back home on
one of your your main you know farms, the owner lease,
and imagine that you have a buck this year that
is truly top top tier for you. This is a
buck that would be, you know, right up in the
category of like the biggest year you've ever got to hunt.

(13:34):
So you're very excited about him, and you've done all
the all the homework leading up to opening day, got
your cameras, You've got your property laid out just perfect,
You've you've dotted your eyes and crossed your t's. You
have photos of him leading up to opening day. Let's
say maybe three out of six days he daylights leading
up to opening day. So things are looking very good.

(13:55):
But when you look at your five day forecast, the
first couple days of the season are very hot. Let's
say eighty degrees your first two to three days of
the season. What do you do. Do you hunt the
first couple of days regardless of that heat because all
the history of the last couple of days have been

(14:16):
so good, or are you going to wait and do
something different? What are you doing that scenariotire?

Speaker 3 (14:23):
Yeah, you just painted a picture of a deer that
we killed a couple of years ago, almost identical to
what you're saying. And because of his rack and because
of the close proximity to some public roads, some county roads,
I literally piled in after him and hunted the devil

(14:46):
out of him.

Speaker 4 (14:47):
I really did. And that's something we rarely do.

Speaker 3 (14:50):
Mark and I are really really weird about not over
hunting a spot because every time you go into that
spot and you and you have to leave the spot,
almost departures works worse than entrance because the deer on
the field and you got to clear the field, You've
laid down a cent trail. YadA, YadA, YadA. So we
absolutely hate over hunting a spot. But when you get

(15:12):
a record book type deer or the biggest deer you
ever have an opportunity at harvesting, you change your tactics
just a little bit. And there are several people in
the outdoor industry that have killed giants, and those guys
have one common denominator.

Speaker 4 (15:28):
They're all pretty aggressive.

Speaker 3 (15:31):
You know, they mash in Stan Potts, Jay Gregory, Mark Drury,
Lee Lakowski. You know those guys have been don Kisk.
Those guys have been killing giants for thirty years. And
that common denominator is they know when to mash in
and when not to. But they all mash in, they
all get in on them, and they.

Speaker 4 (15:50):
Get them dead.

Speaker 3 (15:51):
So I would get pretty aggressive, and I did that
with this particular deer. I hunted a spot over and
over and over. It was eighty five or ninety degrees.
We were inside of a blind because this is where
we were getting his picture.

Speaker 4 (16:06):
It was hot.

Speaker 3 (16:07):
It was a little bitty tiny water hole, and this
blind is not far from the water hole, and we
went the extra mile. We left the windows closed, so
it's one hundred and forty degrees inside this thing. We're
sweating like no tomorrow. We took a cooler with ice
in it and took some fans to try and pull

(16:28):
a little bit of cool air out of there, which
didn't work at all. It might have lowered the temperature
maybe two degrees. So we were literally miserable every day.
But we hunted him for eleven or twelve days, almost religiously,
out of that same spot.

Speaker 4 (16:44):
And we just don't do that, we never do that.

Speaker 3 (16:46):
But I mashed in there because we kept getting pictures
of him, and said if we continue playing this cat
and mouse game, We're going to get an opportunity. He
was such that we had one encounter with him in
eighty five or nine ninety yards, saw him another evening
at you out there at a distance.

Speaker 4 (17:04):
So we were in the roundhouse.

Speaker 3 (17:06):
We were close, but I mashed in and stayed in
on him and we finally killed him. And we just
normally don't do that. I'm one of those guys that
usually sits back and studies. I'll study him and go, Okay,
he's slipped up here, he's slipped up there.

Speaker 4 (17:19):
Here's where I can kill him.

Speaker 3 (17:21):
But we knew where he was going every day for
the most part because of our camera information. We were
using stealth cams. We were using one of those revolvers.
We had it in the middle of the water hole,
so we were getting pictures of him around all edges
and all that stuff of the water. And we said,
if we continue going back to this spot, we're going
to get a chance. And we did, and that's how
we killed him.

Speaker 2 (17:40):
Wow, what about this kind of makes me think of
another scenarre with a buck like this. Imagine that you
have a buck that you know made it through the
past season. You get a picture or two of him
throughout the summer that makes you realize, oh, yeah, he
made the big jump. He's going to be that kind
of deer that really I want to put all my

(18:01):
chips in on. But it's incredibly infrequent. He went from
being a homebody. In the past, let's say two three years,
you've seen this buck go from three to four to
five or four to five to six, whatever it is,
and he's always been all over your place. But this
year in the summer different than every other year. Now,
it's just like a couple signs of life. But then
ghost tone. What do you do leading into opening day? Different?

(18:26):
With that being the case, do you scramble things? Do
you change camera positions? Do you put on a full
blown offensive to find out where he is now? Or
are you still still going to hang back and wait
for opening day expecting him to come back to some
sense of normalcy.

Speaker 3 (18:44):
Yeah, that scenario is substantially different than the last one.
That this one would be we would be studying this
chess match is a lot different, and we really really
live and die by our camera information. So I would
go back last year's information, the year before that, and
maybe the year before that and find out where he

(19:06):
was at on October twenty seventh or October twenty eighth,
wherever those pictures popped up, whatever date they were, whether
it be November the eighth, you know, November seventeenth, you know.
And I would bank on going to that spot on
that day if I had the right wind, or I
would be in a close proximity, or I would hang

(19:26):
another set so that I could get in that roundhouse.
But I would be exactly one year later or two
years later, I would be in the exact same spot
where he was two years ago or the previous year.

Speaker 4 (19:38):
And we've We've killed a lot of deer doing that.

Speaker 3 (19:40):
I swear there are creatures a habit and you can't
believe that they even show up, but within a day
or so, they oftentimes will revisit that spot. So lack
of information is difficult. But if you've got a history
with him, then you're still in the game.

Speaker 4 (19:57):
You still have a chance.

Speaker 2 (20:05):
So I've found myself in that scenario too, and I've
gone that same route you just described, where I've tried
to lean on historical patterns what he did the previous
year or the year before that. But what I have
found for the circumstances that then like turn me into
another bow is when the weather and wind conditions don't

(20:26):
match up with what he did. So I'm sitting there
trying to weigh Okay, what matters more the date on
the calendar the fact that last year and the year
before that he was very active from October twentieth to
twenty third. Okay, so that should tell me I should
be hunting him hard on October twentieth to twenty third.
But what if this year on that window, I have
really warm credit temperatures or I have like a funky

(20:48):
wind that we usually never have in that scenario, what's
more important to you that date on the calendar, looking
at the historical trend or the subpower weather conditions.

Speaker 3 (20:59):
Well, that's a coin toss, it really is, because typically
Mark and I live and die by wind, and if
we don't have the right wind, we just won't go
to a spot. Now, if we have a blind like
a hawk or a muddy that you can close it
up tight, you know, and we'll go in there. We'll
put extra extra seal around the door and extra seals

(21:19):
around the windows.

Speaker 4 (21:21):
And you know, we'll tighten them up.

Speaker 3 (21:23):
But because if he's been there a year in advance,
there's a really good chance you may get an eyeball
on him and seeing that year later. But the last
thing you want to do is bump him out of there,
so you you know, the wind particularly access if you
kind of got an idea where he's betting just a
little bit of an inkling, then you really got to

(21:43):
be careful about getting in there and not bumping him
out before you even get to your set, you know,
or your spot tree standard be tough. You know, if
you've got hot weather conditions and wind is wrong, you know,
then you're stuck out there and your scent might be
you know it depending on the thermals or what the
ten are doing, but temperaures thermost might be dropping down
to where he's bedded. So you know, that's a that's

(22:06):
a tough scenario. But we we typically live or die
by the wind, and I'd say we probably wait and
go a little later in the season when when the
conditions were right. We would probably say and I know
Mark would say, no, I'm not going to do that.
I'm not going to bump him and screw him up.
I'll wait for another opportunity. And unless we have a

(22:27):
blind in the right spot and we can close it up.
Mark does that all the time, where they lock in
there and it's one hundred and forty degrees inside, they're
sweating like you know, no tomorrow. So I've seen him
do that too, depends how big the deer is.

Speaker 2 (22:42):
You guys have really specialized, I think in a certain
way with making decisions around timing, you know, with with
determining whether now is the time to mash in or
if now's the time to hang back and be a
little bit careful. So I want to run a couple
mid October scenarios past you. I feel like from the
outset looking in, you guys have historically been very conservative

(23:03):
with that October lull mid October timeframe, but maybe in
more recent years a little bit more aggressive in certain scenarios.
So I want to toss two out there and see
what your thoughts would be. Number One, imagine it's mid October,
we'll say October fifteenth, and it is a great moon
for an evening hunt, but mild weather, warmish, mild weather

(23:26):
kind of subpar on that front. How would you approach
that hunt? How good of a stand would you hunt?
What's your what's your plan for that scenario? And for
people who maybe aren't familiar, could you also give us
a brief explanation of how you look at the moon
and what means a good moon versus a bad moon.

Speaker 3 (23:46):
Well, that that scenario, we've hunted that, you know, a
gazillion times that that perfect moon and have been you know, stemy,
you know, and not have not seen what we expected
to see because of the weather can do that you
just described. But in conversely, we've also seen giants that
get up on their feet even though it might be

(24:08):
eighty degrees and you're going, why are they out there?
You can't understand why they're in the middle of a
green beanfield or why they're out on a cloverfield and
it's eighty five degrees and.

Speaker 4 (24:17):
The flies they're all you know around them and all
that jazz.

Speaker 3 (24:20):
So there's a chance that you may see or kill
that the biggest year of your life if the moon
is right. And what do I mean when we're talking
about the correct moon that you're referring to When it
is rising in the afternoon and the moon's dislike the sun,
it rises in the east sets in the west, but
when it's rising in the afternoon and it coincides with

(24:42):
their normal feeding pattern. And I like to say that
if it's coming up about two or two thirty in
the afternoon, so that by four o'clock, you know, the
moon is already up in the sky. And I prefer
a waxing moon, where it's waxing full in lieu of
wane in little waning to where it's going to go
into dark of the moon. Dark of the moon for

(25:04):
us is dreadful. Full moon for us is money, always
has been, always will be. And I'm going to guess
at about eighty five to eighty seven percent of all
the bucks we've ever killed historically are in and around
the full moon, you know, within a number of days
waxing or waning. And that's data, that information is correct.

(25:26):
We watch it each and every year. How many of
them get killed in and around the full moon. Dark
of the moon is usually pretty bad for us, really
really poor. Is it the style that we hunt? Maybe,
you know, because we may not be in their bedroom
or something. A lot of times we're out on that
food source where they've got to get up on their
feet and they come to it. So I'm not saying
that you can't kill one dark of the moon, because
you certainly can, and we've done it, but we've just

(25:48):
had better success on waxing full moon or a waning
full moon. So I would love to see October fifteenth
a waxing waxing full within a day or two, rising
about two in the afternoon or two thirty, and even
though it's eighty or eighty five degrees, I'd probably still
hunt it, and I would try and get it on
a correct wind. You know, if I'm hunting a tree stand,

(26:10):
I want to be in a correct wind. If I'm
in a blind we're going to keep it closed up,
completely shut, and then sit over that food source with
the windows shut. A bad moon a little bit different
if it's if it's a waning moon or going to
dark of the moon, but it's still rising, because it
can still be rising at two or two thirty in
the afternoon, but it's a dark of the moon or

(26:30):
waning I probably would not I probably would not go
sit that food source.

Speaker 4 (26:36):
I would wait. I would wait till I have the
correct moon.

Speaker 2 (26:39):
So so to the first scenario, so so good moon,
bad weather, and let's imagine we have like four tiers
of stands of ambush locations. A tier you know maybe
if it's still numbers tier one, two, three, four. So
tier one is our absolute best spots for that particular
day and wind and on down. With that scenario, good moon,

(27:02):
bad weather, what tier location would you be picking with
that set of circumstances.

Speaker 3 (27:08):
I had picked two or three, I probably would not
go to my best spot, not yet, not until I
knew if that if you had given me the conditions
where the wind or the temperature was maybe ten degrees
below average, I'd have.

Speaker 4 (27:21):
Been at number one.

Speaker 3 (27:22):
I'd have been in my number one spot, but with
it being twenty or thirty degrees above average, yeah, maybe
even three or four.

Speaker 2 (27:29):
You know, let's flip flop it. So let's say lousy moon,
but slamming cold front, just the cold front of cold
fronts on October fifteenth, but the moon is dead wrong.
What's your thought process? What do you do in this scenario?
And then give me your tear.

Speaker 4 (27:48):
There too.

Speaker 3 (27:48):
I would probably switch up on the tier a little bit,
but you know, those those cold fronts, Mark and I
live and die by it. We always say the temperature
Trump's moon, and it does if you get the temperatures
and their ten or fifteen degrees below normal, and you've
got a major northwest coming in or a northeaster coming in.
Then I would I would set a food source and

(28:10):
I would hunt it. But because we're getting to be
such big babies, i'd be in a blind, I'd have
the window shut. We'd be comfortable. I wouldn't have to
worry about sweat running down my back, so you know,
we'd still be on a food source even though it's
a crappy moon with the temperatures, because temperatures do trump moon.

Speaker 2 (28:31):
Did you make a point to try to want to
hunt more from a tree stand last year or the
year before, Yes, I did.

Speaker 3 (28:38):
I did, and we get such feedback market that people said,
you're getting away from your roots and the way you
used to do it and all that. And I absolutely
love hunting out a tree stand, always have, always will.

Speaker 4 (28:50):
So we did do that, and I hunted it. I
had a pretty good deer.

Speaker 3 (28:54):
Hunted him forty seven or forty eight days out of
a tree, and I'll be damned, we went to a
blind one night. I killed him the first night I
sat there, no joke, killed him the first evening We
sat there, which tells you number one, that the blinds
are in the right spots. You know, we've got him
in the right spots, and the deer creatures a habit,
we kind of know where they're going to go. But

(29:15):
I intentionally hunted tree stands trying to kill him, and
I should have had him dead. I had him one morning,
which I love hunting mornings, and that's my perfect scenario
is hunting the morning, crystal clear twenty twenty five degrees
thermost going up a setting moon, and I had him
at twenty five yards and didn't get him dead. I
was on the wrong side of the tree, or he

(29:36):
was however you want to look at it. He was
wide open for the camera guy and he could have
killed him ten times over. But make a long story, shark,
I should have killed him that morning.

Speaker 2 (29:45):
And didn't, Heartbreaker, But you did. You did get it
done later, So.

Speaker 3 (29:49):
I did get it done. Yeah, the first night I
sat a blind the very first night we sat it
line and killed him.

Speaker 2 (29:55):
It was It was funny though, because I saw that
that episode and I noticed I was like, what feels different.
I was like, oh, wow, it's it's because there's all
these tree stand shots and it was great. It was
great to see you in the woods. It was great
to see in the tempera.

Speaker 3 (30:07):
I love that and we're going to do it again
this year.

Speaker 4 (30:09):
Yeah. Forrest and I are both big tree stand guys.

Speaker 3 (30:12):
I love. As matter of fact, it's a hell a
lot easier to kill a deer out of a tree than.

Speaker 4 (30:17):
It is out of a blind.

Speaker 3 (30:18):
All these windows, right, they can say anything they want to,
but what can go wrong will go wrong. When you're
hunting out of a blind. It's like having a straight
jacket on. Now with a gun or a crossbow, yeah,
that's a little bit different. But boy, when you're hunting,
hunting with a bow ar tree tackle, I'm telling you,
it's not easy.

Speaker 4 (30:35):
So I would much rather hunt out a tree.

Speaker 2 (30:38):
It's just it feels claustrophobic in those blinds. Sometimes when
you're in a stand and you can just look around
and you see everything, that's that freedom is pretty nice.

Speaker 3 (30:46):
That range of motion, you know, being able to swing
is just oh yeah, you know, I call it into
your hand and away from your hand. Forrest is right handed,
I'm left handed, Mark's right handed, Matt's right handed.

Speaker 4 (30:57):
So we set our sets differently.

Speaker 3 (30:59):
For a lefty than we do righty and bull riders
talk about it all the time, into your hand or
away from your hand. If you're going into your hand,
I can swing right almost completely behind me, but I
can't swing left, and vice versa. For a right hander,
there's just the opposite. So we we hang our sets
with that in mind, so that we can go into
our hand, meaning I could I can turn this on

(31:21):
the stand, yeah you know, and shoot that way. But
I can also turn this way and literally almost shoot
behind you. So we set them accordingly for that, depending
on the trail or the food plot or whatever we're
setting over.

Speaker 2 (31:32):
Makes sense, all right, This is a little bit of
a shift away from what we've been talking about, but
maybe not entirely, because this is in addition to moon
and temperature, you guys have broken up. Actually, all of
these things are all in line with your themes now
that I think about it. You you've talked about the
different phases of the season, right, and you guys have

(31:54):
done a great job teaching a lot of folks about
how the season might be broken up into these micro chunks.

Speaker 3 (31:59):
Right.

Speaker 2 (31:59):
You talked about your thirteen different phases. Let's consider a
scenario in which your expected phases possibly get scrambled. So
let's imagine you're out on a hunt. We'll say, let's
say that your brother invites you to hunt up in Iowa.
And yeah, and it's somewhere between October fifteenth and October

(32:22):
twenty first, okay, okay, and you're sitting on stand and
this is an evening hunt, and you see a dough
just getting dogged by bucks. And it's not just the
year and a half old bucks like you see a
year and a half old like they do in two
year old. But then you see a legit, you know,
five year old on his feet really getting after it,

(32:43):
chasing this dough. So we'll say, over the course of
an hour and a half, you see five different bucks
come following that trail, and one of them was like
a four or five year old type buck. But it's
October sixteenth or seventeenth or eighteenth in this scenario, what
do you do? Do you hunt like it's October fifteenth

(33:03):
or seventeenth or eighteenth like you typically would, or is
your scenario? Is your strategy going to change because of
this early running type indication that you're seeing.

Speaker 4 (33:14):
Well, historically, each and every year, October yields some really
really big deer, and it's not uncommon for I think
a dough or two, depending on the moon phase, to
come into Estras a little bit early. And if she's
got four or five different bucks that might be sniffing

(33:35):
around or pushing around, nudging her around, there is a
chance that she might pop early and come into Estras.
So I would probably go back and hunt that. I'd
hunt that scenario pretty hard.

Speaker 3 (33:47):
If I saw her and it looked like she was
getting ready to come in, I would probably hunt that
and hunt that and hunt that pretty aggressively. Because each
and every year you see these guys killing these one
eighties and one nineties, and you go.

Speaker 4 (33:59):
Damn, how do they do that? Well, that can happen
that scenario.

Speaker 3 (34:02):
We've seen it happen in years past, where dough it
just takes one and sometimes that first available Estras dough
will always have a giant they sniff them out before
all the young bucks do. Now, there's a big difference
between a year and a half nudging her and two
year old nudging her, because the bucks are always ready.
The moment they drop that velvet, they're ready to go.

(34:23):
The difference is the does are not, so you kind
of got a look at the moon phase. When did
it wax full? It's not uncommon if it waxes in
and around the tent, you know, then seven to ten
days after that first waxing full, there'll be some does
that pop. It's just not a lot, but it's a few.
But when it does, boy, it creates a frenzy around them.

(34:43):
So I would hunt that pretty hard.

Speaker 2 (34:45):
And would you just go right back to that same
place that you saw them, or would you hunt in
some different spot knowing what you know in some other.

Speaker 3 (34:54):
Way that time of the year, she's not traveling real far.
My guess is she's a bed to food is probably
fairly close there. Usually there's a mass crop in and
around that time of year, which screws everything up because
they're all over in the timber. But let's say, for example,
that you have a terrible mass crop that year and
all of a sudden, you know, either the soybeans or

(35:16):
a green food source, whether it be clover or you know,
biologic radishes, winter bulb of sugar beets, And if she's
on that pretty heavy, I'd go right back to that
spot where she's frequenting, you know, and try and catch
her coming back to food.

Speaker 2 (35:28):
Yep, yep. Okay, let's go advance the calendar ten days
or so. Let's say it's October twenty eighth, and you're
hunting your main farm, one of your main farms, where
you have a just a really dialed setup. You've got
your food plot architecture, you've got either a stand or
a B line set up just so on this inside

(35:49):
corner maybe, and you've got a fake scrape tree out there,
and everything's dialed really nicely for this location. You're sitting
there hunting and you see three different bucks out of range,
all doing basically the same thing. So we'll say they're
ninety five yards from you, but they all go passing

(36:12):
through this other you know, this other corner off in
the distance. Three bucks all doing the same thing. One
of them is a four year old. Let's say, what
do you do based on that intel? Do you stick
it out where you're at because it's so well built
and you believe that you know things are going to
go your way eventually and they're going to come your way,
or would you say there's something going on over there,

(36:34):
I need to, you know, make a move, make a change, adjust.

Speaker 4 (36:40):
I would I'd stay where I'm at.

Speaker 3 (36:42):
I'd hold pat because we've had such history with ours,
particularly if it's on one of our main farms, We've
had such history with those spots, and you know at
that at that time, if even if it is a
four year old, let's say it's a five year old
that walk through there, I probably wouldn't adjust. I'd stay
where I'm at, and on the fact that we're going
to catch a maturityer going if it's an inside corner

(37:04):
or an outside corner, or a fringe, you know, let's
say it's corn to beans or corn to green, green
to grain, I would probably stay there and just say
historically we've had too good luck here, We're not going
to change.

Speaker 2 (37:16):
Is your answer different if this is not one of
your main farms, and instead this is a new farm,
this is a new place you picked up, it's the lease,
first year hunting it. You still have a really good
dialed spot you think you're in, but you don't have
years and years worth of worth of intel. Does that
change things or no.

Speaker 3 (37:33):
That does change things because we've been in the wrong
spot a lot, So then I might mash in or
I might wait until I saw enough traffic there, enough
history there, and then I would probably make the move.
But I probably wouldn't do it on just one one
case or one scenario. I would look at it, maybe
an entire season and maybe two seasons before I finally

(37:55):
made the move. And that's you know, there's a lot
of guys that are pretty agressive that would mashed in
day one and killed a deer there. I'm a little
bit different. I'll stay back and watch and watch and
watch and study and log it all away, and then
when I make the move, I know it's the right move.
So I may wait two seasons. And we've done that. Hell,
we've had farms where we've moved stuff three years later,

(38:16):
four years later and said, you know what, we should
have done this two years ago.

Speaker 2 (38:19):
Yeah, I've been there too. All Right, I'm gonna throw
out a snare that's close to home because it's one
that happened to me recently, and I'm curious how you
would tackle this one. Let's say your main hunting spot
had two legit shooter bucks that you had multiple years

(38:40):
of history, three years of history of both of these bucks,
but they are the only two bucks you were interested
in shooting, and they have been, you know, all through summer,
very consistent. You're seeing them over and over. Like I said,
you have three years of past history. Both of these
bucks have been homebodies. Okay, season opens and they disappear.

(39:02):
You get sign of life pictures of one of them twice,
once in late October, once in early November. But that's it.
So you know months of the season. More than a
month of the season has gone by. Now mostly they
have disappeared, but you have this glimmer of hope that
they might be alive because you've gotten these couple little

(39:23):
random dots. I guess it's sort of similar to the
first question I asked you about summer bucks. But how
would you tackle this scenario in which it feels like
at times you are hunting an animal that might not
even exist anymore, But at other times you're thinking, well,
any day now, because he's still out there somewhere. What happened?

(39:43):
I don't know what happened? So many question marks? What
do you do with that circumstance?

Speaker 4 (39:49):
Did you have history with him the previous year.

Speaker 2 (39:52):
Three years of history with them being homebodies in season,
so they are all during the season. Okay, but this
year they go disappear.

Speaker 3 (40:00):
Pile in on the one that you the one that
showed back up. You know, if you've got history with
him and you've had some camera camera information, particularly that
camera data, boy, I would I would try and really
really mash in on him. He's there, he might just
be moving, you know, very very small circle. If he's
gotten a little bit older, his you know, his home
core might have got just shrunk down a little bit.

(40:22):
But I would mash in on him at that point. Yeah,
particularly that time of year, because all it takes is
just one one moment in time. If you if you
kind of had an idea where he was betting, that
would help, yeah, so that you're not putting your wind
out over the top of him, you know.

Speaker 4 (40:39):
But I would, I'd get pretty aggressive with him.

Speaker 2 (40:41):
At what point do you ever pull the plug on
a dear and like.

Speaker 3 (40:45):
Just totally find out the find Yeah.

Speaker 2 (40:49):
Some of my question though, is like a situation where you,
let's say you never get that proof of life picture
where he's always been there and now they're gone, Like
how long does it take you to not see a
buck to be like, okay, he must be dead because
I always find myself battling with this one.

Speaker 4 (41:06):
That happens to us more often than not.

Speaker 3 (41:10):
I can't tell you how many deer have disappeared and
we don't know. Did coyotes drag him down, did a
neighbor kill him? Do they get poached? Do they just
travel five miles seven miles away? Did another deer run
them out? Push them out? You know those four year olds.
If you've got a lot of four year olds on
your farm, or even three year olds for that matter,
they'll push deer out.

Speaker 4 (41:28):
So that happens very very often.

Speaker 3 (41:31):
And years ago I would give them a little more time.
But now, because of all the cameras that we run
and the camera information, if you don't have him one season,
or he falls off one season, and then you don't
have him the next, I as much as write them
off and say they're just they're not coming back.

Speaker 4 (41:51):
They're just not Now.

Speaker 3 (41:53):
It's not uncommon for all of a sudden them to
pop up somewhere out of the clear blue sky. But
that's a rare that's a rare event for them to
show up at age nine or ten or something. It
just rarely happens. Depending on the side of the parcel
you're hunting. You know, let's say it's one hundred acres,
you know, a pretty good chance a neighbor shot him,

(42:13):
or maybe even four or five neighbors over and you
don't get to hear about it. That's that's pretty typical.
But I anymore, I give up on him a little,
a little quicker than I used to. I always had
that hope, But we had a giant deer that disappeared
on us. And still that one hurt. Still don't know
what happened to him, Never hurt him dead, never found him, walked, walked,

(42:35):
walked trying to find him, you know, never found him,
and he just disappeared. I still don't know what happened
to him. He was a giant, giant, big, big so
but you got it at some point, And and my
farm manager and I talk about it all the time
we go. You know, we'd sure like to know what
happened to him. You just want to know what happened.
Did did somebody kill him, did they get hit on
the road, did he get poached?

Speaker 4 (42:55):
Even if he got poached, I'd at least.

Speaker 3 (42:57):
Like to know what happened to him.

Speaker 2 (42:58):
Just yeah, yeah, with the with the deer I was mentioning.
In my scenario, I kept on holding on hope and
like thinking, like, all right, it's just you know, the
cameras aren't telling me the whole story. So he historically
he's been in here. So I kind of did what

(43:18):
you said, I was mashing. I kept on, you know,
hunting his historic time frames and pushed into like where
he would be at, where the dough should be, and
and just never never showed back up. And one of
the two I ended up finding out did get killed.
So I have confirmation that one got killed first week
of the season, so that explains why he disappeared off
the map. But the second buck, I still have no idea.

(43:39):
No neighbors have told me what happened. Uh so I
don't know. Probably probably dead, but who knows.

Speaker 3 (43:48):
Well, it's gut ranching because you just don't know. So
there's always there. You do, always hold out that hope,
but at some point you go, well, I got to
move on.

Speaker 4 (43:56):
I just gotta I gotta, I gotta re you know.

Speaker 3 (43:58):
Reevaluate and and concentrate on another deer or another area
or something.

Speaker 4 (44:02):
How big a parcel was that mark?

Speaker 2 (44:04):
This is eighty five acres Yeah.

Speaker 3 (44:07):
Yeah, there's no telling how far he roamed or who
might have got him.

Speaker 4 (44:11):
Yeah. Hard, hard to hard to manage eighty five.

Speaker 3 (44:15):
You got to be really, really really careful on eighty
five so that you don't we Mark and I talk
about it all the time about king of intrusion. There's
a lot of guys that intrude and run the deer
out that they're hunting, and then you know they say, well,
deer cast was incorrect or this was wrong. Well, sure,
you just got to be those those smaller tracks. You
have to be extremely extremely careful. They're very sensitive and

(44:40):
in and out and you better have a really really
good access in and access out so you don't do
much damage.

Speaker 4 (44:45):
That's hard, That's hard.

Speaker 3 (44:47):
It's a tough that's a tough hunt, especially on a
big dude, because you know, you want to go in
there and you want to pile in on him, and uh,
you know, wind may not always be right for you.

Speaker 2 (44:55):
Just walking on eggshells. Yeah. So here's here's kind of
the flip side, which is, rather than having a deer
that you have not seen and are wondering where he is,
let's imagine a scenario where you have a buck that
you've been seeing all over the place. You've been playing
cat and mouse with them all October. I'm going to

(45:15):
put you back at home in Missouri. Now take it back.
Let's imagine you're on Do you still have a lease
in Illinois?

Speaker 3 (45:22):
Yes, you just painted a scenario that we had a
deer exactly like that.

Speaker 2 (45:26):
Okay, So imagine we're on the farm and he's been
shown up on camera. You've had some sightings. You've been
bouncing back and forth cat and mouse, like he's there,
you're almost there, you're here, he's just back where you were,
back and forth, back and forth. But you've been using
recent intel, you've been using past history with him to
try to kill him on a bed to feed pattern

(45:47):
early in the season. And then it gets into late
October and you're still tightening into like those zones near
his bedding areas, let's say, hypothetically and food of course.
But now November arrives, and there's some part of November,
whether it's November one or the fourth, or everybody says
something different, but that you pick the date when in

(46:08):
your mind things switch and all of a sudden, like
the rut is on. Do you how do you change
your strategy even though you're still after this one buck.
At what point do you switch from like hunting that
buck to hunting the doze, or to hunting a standard
rut feeding or sorry, a rut, you know, funnel location
or something like that. What do you do in that?

(46:30):
I guess what I'm trying to say is what do
you do when the cat and mouse game switches from
the standard October cat and mouse to the rut?

Speaker 4 (46:38):
Which is a great scenario.

Speaker 3 (46:39):
You just painted a really really good scenario for a
a lot of hunters, and concentrating or putting your efforts
on where the does are going to be is pretty
important at that time of the year. Illinois usually pops
and I'm going to say like a light switch event
the week prior to their firearm season when they're fire

(47:00):
season kicks in that week or ten days prior to that,
and you may sit there for two or three days
and not see squat and then all of a sudden,
it's a light switch event and there's bucks just going
all over the place. So you first and foremost, you
gotta hunt it daily just to make sure that you
catch it. And we had a buck exactly like what
you described had picture after picture after picture hunting him

(47:23):
three or four years Forrest ended up killing.

Speaker 4 (47:27):
It was during muzzle order season.

Speaker 3 (47:28):
It wasn't during this period that you're talking about, but
my god, he drove.

Speaker 4 (47:31):
Us absolutely insane.

Speaker 3 (47:33):
We had conversation after conversation after conversation with one buck
in mine. We put all of our eggs in that basket,
and we just could not catch up with him.

Speaker 4 (47:43):
He was he was big.

Speaker 3 (47:45):
He ended up scoring I think one eighty seven or something.
But we literally he would We would track our cameras
the next day or that night early morning at four
thirty four o'clock, we'd be up looking. He'd go two
and a half miles and hit seven or eight cameras
in one night, Helen, in four or five hours. He
was just he was on his horse and constantly moving,

(48:06):
and no matter where we sat, we were always in
the wrong spot.

Speaker 4 (48:09):
Always we we.

Speaker 3 (48:10):
Would be here, he'd be there. We'd be there, he'd
be here. It was just the scenario you painted, and
we could not catch up with him. And then finally
one morning we had a really really cold, frosty morning
with a moon that was hanging in the sky. It
wasn't setting yet, and I went on a gut and
we had some we had purchased some soybeans from the farmer,

(48:31):
and I said, let's let's go to those. Let's go
to those beans. We had just gotten his picture the
night before. I said, let's go back. Let's slip in
there early and maybe we'll get an eyeball on him.
And lo and behold, we did. We finally got to
catch up with him. He nibbled around on some beans,
but the does were there, to your point, there were
seven eight nine does that were on this field, the
eating and you know, nibbling on these beans. But we

(48:54):
had that moon still in the sky, it hadn't set yet,
had a cold, frosty morning, and they were nibbling just
a little bit before they went back to bed. And
that's what the moon will do for you when it's
the right moon. It holds them up there just a
little bit longer before they go back to bed, because
oftentimes you look at your cameras five am, five point fifteen,
five twenty five point thirty, they're head into bed. Well,

(49:14):
when a moon's right and we've got cold temperatures, the
scenario was just perfect, and we just happen to make
the right gut call that morning.

Speaker 4 (49:22):
But that scenario you just describe is one of the toughest.
It really is.

Speaker 3 (49:27):
But concentrating on dose is really a good way to
play that game because you're going to go where they go,
and there's still gonna be some bucks nudging around that
period in November. So I would not be afraid to
set a food source of a morning with the moon
hanging in the sky.

Speaker 2 (49:43):
Okay, imagine this same situation, the same buck here after
you keep on chasing them around, but you're being smart
about it. We get to the night before gun season,
the day before gun season, when you might think, or
at least when I look at when gun season opens
here in Michigan, at least I I look at that
as like a light switch event where everything's going to change.

(50:03):
I've always thought that last day before the gun season
is like different kind of day. What do you do
on that day before gun season when you're still trying
to kill that one buck you've been after all year
and hasn't happened yet. What do you do on that day?
And what's different if anything?

Speaker 3 (50:18):
Well, believe it or not, because firearm season is opening
and it is a reshuffling of the deck, if you will.
Once those once the Orange Army comes out, everything's off
the table. It all goes out the door, or all
that studying and chess match and all that changes. But
you know, we're to the point now we're fearful of
running or pushing a deer out, so we may lay

(50:40):
back and not hunting. You know, if we got intel
on him and he's as a homeboy, rather than shove
him out on the farm, we may lay back and
just say hope, like hell, he stays, and we may
pull the reins in a little bit on him and say,
you know what, let's just stay out of that area
and gamble. Maybe he'll stay here, you know, if there's

(51:01):
enough you know, extracurricular activity going on on the borders,
on the fence lines and all that jazz, maybe he'll
he'll stay in here. So I'd probably like a dummy,
I'd probably not not go hunting.

Speaker 4 (51:12):
I wouldn't go after him.

Speaker 2 (51:13):
What so is is that?

Speaker 3 (51:16):
Is that?

Speaker 2 (51:16):
Like is that the one day rule? Or is there
a certain window before gun season when you're like, ah,
we're gonna give it three days or two days, or
like when do you start trying to preserve the sanctity
of a sanctuary like that.

Speaker 3 (51:28):
Well, because they're moving quite a bit at that period,
I would I'd probably limit that to maybe two days
maybe you know where, I'd let him alone and hope,
like hell, they stay. Yeah, we had a deer a
couple of years ago this year, was a four and
a half year old, one hundred and seventy nine inch
four year old. The only reason I know the neighbor
shot him an opening day of firearm season. Wow, And

(51:49):
we were trying treating him with kit gloves. We were
staying out of an area, hoping that he would stay
on the farm. But he didn't. And the moment I
heard the shot, the very moment, I go, well, he
just killed him. It was yeah, one hundred and seventy
nine inch four year old. We thought he might blow
into a two hundred, you know.

Speaker 4 (52:07):
Thought. Yeah, so it happens us just like everybody else.

Speaker 2 (52:11):
Yeah, it sure does. Okay, here's another one that happens
to everyone that none of us are happy about. It's
November fifth, sixth and seventh, fifth is and seventh. Great days.
We've been looking forward to them all year, except the
forecast says seventy four seventy six seventy one warm days

(52:33):
on our typically terrific days, what do you do.

Speaker 3 (52:39):
Drink? Yeah, it's dreadful, Mark, We've been through those period
and it's absolutely dreadful.

Speaker 4 (52:47):
You're thinking you're going to see him.

Speaker 3 (52:49):
You wait, you hope, you pray, and you're sitting there,
sitting there, and they just don't show up. They lay.
All of that happens at night, you know, so much
of it. When the weather and temperatures are blow average,
it is exposed and you see it all. When the
temperatures are ten fifteen degrees above average, it happens at night.
They're moving slow or not moving at all, and all

(53:11):
of that red activity that you're referring to is just
it's it goes unnoticed because you're not able to see
it. It happens at night. You see some on the cameras,
but it's we still go out, you know, we may
go out a little later or whatever, but we still
go out. And it's usually first hour, at last hour
when it's warm like that, particularly first hour in the mornings,
if it's that warm, you might catch one going back

(53:32):
to bed if the moon was right, you know.

Speaker 4 (53:34):
But man, I hate those I hate that scenario.

Speaker 2 (53:38):
Do you still hunt? You know, I feel like at
least a lot of folks will look at those dates
and say, oh, yes, time for like tier one locations.
But do you still hunt tier one locations with those temperatures.

Speaker 4 (53:54):
But during those dates?

Speaker 3 (53:55):
Yes?

Speaker 4 (53:55):
Probably?

Speaker 3 (53:56):
Yeah. The bad part is you know you're doing damage
one in and damage coming out. That's the part that
just kills you. So you may only do it once
or twice and then you're either gonna regret it or
you're gonna be happy you did it. But chances are
you're gonna regret it if temperaures are wrong. But you know,
if you catch one first hour, then I would, you know,
I go in in the dark and I would sit there,

(54:18):
and you may catch one first.

Speaker 4 (54:19):
Hour, then you're happy you did it. But I'd probably.

Speaker 3 (54:22):
Hunt that Tier one on those days six, seven, eight, Yeah,
I would.

Speaker 2 (54:26):
Okay, all right, here's here's a tricky one that kind
of goes back to the snare we were talking about
in Illinois where you've got this buck that's been quite visible,
You've been hunting them all over, you know him well,
but can't get him killed. You have a neighbor who
you've got a good relationship with and you guys have
open communication. He starts texting you and telling you like, hey,

(54:50):
I saw that buck. I got pictures of that buck,
saw him again, got pictures of him again. All of
a sudden, he's seeing and getting sightings of that buck
a bunch. Does that change how you haunt him at all?
What do you do in that scenario?

Speaker 4 (55:04):
Yes, it does.

Speaker 3 (55:05):
Yeah, yeah, we would. We'd creep I'll be honest, we
should creep in a little.

Speaker 4 (55:10):
Yeah, we would.

Speaker 3 (55:12):
You know, if I've got to set on that particular
area of the farm, depending on north, south east west,
I would, yeah, we'd.

Speaker 4 (55:19):
We'd mash in a little bit further or closer.

Speaker 3 (55:21):
To wherever I had wherever I was set up, whether
it be a tree stand or a blind, I would
get just a little bit closer to that area because
he more than likely is with a dough or on
another dough at that period, and wherever that do is at,
I'm going to try and get close to where I
think she may show up, you know, either in a
green food source or an acorn flat or some type

(55:43):
of structure or bed.

Speaker 4 (55:45):
But I'm gonna get a little bit closer.

Speaker 3 (55:47):
You bet, if he's nice enough to let me know
that I'm going to be nice enough to try and accommodate.

Speaker 2 (55:54):
Yeah, Now do you ever worry like if you know so?
A slight variation on that, What if you know that
you have a neighbor that's after the same buck you're after,
so you know that there's competition for this buck and
he's going to be getting pressured from elsewhere. So in
those scenarios, I sometimes find myself wrestling with Okay, I

(56:16):
should be more aggressive because this other guy's going to
kill him if I don't, so I better swing for
the fences. Or I should be more conservative because I'm
gonna let that guy over pressure things and I will
have I will be careful, and my place will be
the safe place that buck ends up after he screws
it up. What do you do when you know that
situation is going on?

Speaker 3 (56:37):
And I've heard and seen that situation from Mark and
Matt myself over and over and over again, and for
the most part, we're going to probably be a little
less intrusive generally speaking, we're going to try not to
push the buck out of our area. But if that
guy see anyone in the regular it depends on what

(56:58):
kind of hunter he is too, is a good hunter,
is he an average hunter? Or is he a poor hunter.
If he's a poor hunter, we're gonna let him push
the deer to us. If he's an average hunter, we're
gonna still bank on letting him push the deer to us,
because if this is a seven or eight year old deer,
you know, he's he might have to be a pretty
good hunter. If it's firearm season, it's one thing. But
if he's trying to do it with a bow, then

(57:19):
we're gonna go. You know what, We're gonna bank on
the fact where we're gonna We're gonna see if the
deer come to us.

Speaker 2 (57:24):
What about this one? What if your neighbor is world class,
and your neighbor has just as good of habitat, just
as good as food plots, just as many trail cameras,
and is filming it all too, and you're both after
a two hundred plus inch buck, How does that change
things at all?

Speaker 3 (57:46):
Man? You just you just described Lee Lakowski, Stan Potts,
Don Kiskey. Yeah, there's a pile of those guys out there,
those really really good hunters. Yeah. Then then out of
courtesy and respect, I'd probably I probably stay where we're

(58:07):
at if it, you know, because what happens I see
this time and time again. Everybody gets their turn, if
you will. You know, one guy may kill one one year,
one guy may kill a giant the next year, the
following year. It kind of it kind of mother nature
has a way of humbling you and equaling the playing field,
if you will. And those guys are so good, those
those few guys I just name, they're so good at

(58:29):
it that I would probably be happy for those guys
because we have all been we've all grown up together,
We've all done it for so long, you know, thirty
five forty years of doing this stuff. I'd love to
see stan Potts kill a giant because he just he
goes off into orbit like a rocket. So and we
love Stanley a lot Lee. You know, we've been buddies

(58:49):
with Lee and Tiff for a long time. You know,
I love watching them kill big deer, So out of
respect and out of courtesy, I'd say that we would probably,
you know, say, you know what, we're gonna We're gonna
play our game. You're gonna do your thing. Whoever you know,
whoever kills it good for them.

Speaker 2 (59:04):
Yeah, I've always wondered, I know of certain I know
I know of this scenario in other places, and I've
always wondered where, you know, is there a cat and
mouse gang going on not only between the deer and
the hunters, but also between the two other hunters, where
you know, one guy's thinking, all right, well, I know
they've got a lot of greens planted, so I'm going
to plant more grains. Or I know that they've got

(59:25):
you know, this thing going on, so I'm going to
do the opposite, or I'm going to lean in, you know,
or I know this person's tendencies are to do this
kind of hunt, so I'm going to gear my property
towards taking advantage of that. I've always wondered if that
ever happens. Without divulging names of people I know like this,
I've always been curious, Well.

Speaker 3 (59:44):
My my moral high bar might be higher than someone else's,
let's say, but I have such utmost respect for those
names that I mentioned that I would be happy for
them if they killed a one eighty or one ninety.
I really would. I love all to death, and I
would hope they would be the same way with us,
but not everybody's like that. You know, there are other

(01:00:05):
people out there that may not feel the same way
I do about that. But I have got a lot
of respect for all of those people, all of everybody
that's in the outdoor industry that tries to get it
on camera, and you know, you're successful sometimes and unsuccessful
more often than not.

Speaker 4 (01:00:22):
So I just have a really really high regard for
everybody that does it.

Speaker 3 (01:00:26):
And I would bow out or not bow out, but
I would hope that I could get the opportunity and
be able to close the deal. The difference between a
good season and a great season is killing what you
shoot at. So that's about ninety nine percent of the
battle too. But if someone else killed it, I'd be
happy for him.

Speaker 2 (01:00:43):
Okay, Moving on November tenth, you're hunting out there on
a favorite spot of yours and you see a shooter
buck come in following a doll and they lock up
at one hundred yards from your stand. There's two hours
of daylight left, and this buck is locked on a
dough at uh yeah, one hundred yards away. What do
you what do you do in that scenario? And they're

(01:01:06):
not moving like they're locked down not moving.

Speaker 3 (01:01:08):
Yeah, sit tight, and I would not change my set.
I wouldn't change my strategy. I wouldn't change my plan
because it's just as easy for him to bump her
and nudge her, and all of a sudden she comes
darting at you at twenty yards, So I would I'd
hold pat right there.

Speaker 4 (01:01:25):
I wouldn't move.

Speaker 3 (01:01:25):
I'd i'd let the I'd let it play out. And
if I didn't kill him one night, I'd be back
there the next night. If he's locked onto her, I'd
be back there. As a matter of fact, I might
be back there. I'd be back somewhere else the next morning,
close to the bedroom. If he's locked onto her, and
if I didn't see him, then I'd go back to
the same spot that evening. If she's coming to a
clover field or biologic green food source or something, I'd

(01:01:46):
be back there the same the next night, because she
is just as apt to go right past your stand
at twenty five yards.

Speaker 2 (01:01:53):
Will you let's let's uhl slight variation. Imagine that that
buck is locked on the dome, but there's slowly moving
towards the food but out of range. Okay, and will
you throw a call out. Ever, will you try to
do anything to influence that movement or are you gonna
lay off and just hope that she brings him.

Speaker 3 (01:02:12):
Yeah, November the tenth, I'd probably tipic the antlers a
little bit, maybe grun at him pretty aggressively, snortweeze or something,
just to try and turn him. If he's if he's
got an eyesight of her, if he's got a line
of sight and he can see her, then he might
try you. But if she's out of range or something,
he's not gonna leave her. If he's locked on, you

(01:02:33):
can throw all everything with the kitchen sink at him,
chances are he won't leave her.

Speaker 4 (01:02:38):
There's something about them.

Speaker 3 (01:02:40):
Keeping keeping an eyeball on turkey, same way they got
to have an eyeball on him. But if he's real,
real mature, and he's real aggressive, then I would I
would try him. I would see what kind of body
posture he had. I'd tickle him first, and if he
snaps around and he acts like he's gonna play the game, yeah,
then I'd get a little more aggressive with him.

Speaker 2 (01:02:57):
Okay, another rutal. You're in a zone where it's it's
obviously on fire and as you've seen, like the rut
can be on in one place and dead in another. Right,
it could be three hundred yards apart, and it could
be a totally different experience. But let's say today you
picked the spot and happen to be where it's at.
There's a hot dough, there's some bucks running all over.

(01:03:19):
But it's about ten am on November fourth. We'll say,
in this rut, you know, just mania and your target
buck comes down wind smells you, spooks out of there,
but there's deer everywhere, it's on fire. Still, what do

(01:03:41):
you do?

Speaker 3 (01:03:43):
I would sit tight on November fourth. I'd sit tight
even though he he caught us and boogered on us
there too, it's still that's a little early. But he
could easily pick up a dough or a dough it's
still dragging dragging by. If they're nudge and doze around,
and there's bucks just going haywire in there, there's a
really good chance that she could easily dog right past

(01:04:06):
your spot, or any other dough could dog past your spot,
and a buck being right behind her. So and November
fourth is just a touch on the early side where
they may not be an estress yet, which is the
reason they're dogging the hell out of them. So then
I definitely would stay where I'm at. I would stay pat.

Speaker 2 (01:04:26):
Okay, let's let's i'm thinking through here, how far I
want to go into the future. Let's let's zoom to
the end of the year. Let's say it's late season
and you have had a dreadful spell of weather where
you have been waiting for that cold front, that snow

(01:04:48):
something to really get a crack at the buck that
you've been after. But you can see the end of
the season now in the fourteen day forecasts, and you
can see that you will not get that weather pattern
you've been hoping for before the end of the year.
But you've been waiting to try to get your last
chance at this big buck here after. Now that you

(01:05:08):
know you will not get that wonderful set of weather
conditions at least, how would you approach that last week
or two of the late season knowing that you're not
going to get that special set of circumstances.

Speaker 3 (01:05:22):
It's amazing because it sounds like you've been hunting with
us scenario you just described. I can't tell you how
many times that's happened. Where we're sitting over standing corn,
standing beans, and then we got crappy weather and they're
not coming to a food source. They just simply aren't
eating it. So I still hunt it. I still go there.

(01:05:43):
We hope that, you know, the food will suck them
in there, and it's an attracting obviously that you know.
But when it's a scenario like you just painted, where
the weather's warm, there is no need to feed, and
they'll wait until the weather does change to where they do.
You know, they do finally get it in February or March,
and then all of a sudden they're all on food.
But I'll still hunt it. We're still gonna go. We're

(01:06:05):
gonna sit there, we're gonna have our head in our hands,
we're gonna be pissed off, you know, and we'll be
bitching about the weather.

Speaker 2 (01:06:12):
Uh huh.

Speaker 3 (01:06:12):
And but we're and then we go home and we're
and we're gonna go.

Speaker 4 (01:06:15):
We never saw a thing.

Speaker 3 (01:06:16):
We didn't see it, dear, or we saw two doughs,
or we saw a spike in a dough, and so
I'm still gonna hunt it. But uh, that scenario is
a bad one.

Speaker 2 (01:06:26):
And so you would still hunt the same kind of spots.
You would not change the kinds of spots, correct.

Speaker 4 (01:06:33):
I would.

Speaker 3 (01:06:33):
Yeah. By then, you know, we're we're strictly concentrated on
food pretty much. And I would stay concentrated on food
because at that time they're still bedded close. You know,
even though the weather's warm, they're still bedded nearby. It's
food bed bed to feed. You know that that range
shrinks that time of year. So I'd still hunt that
food source. And you never know, I mean, they can

(01:06:54):
always just stand up out of their bed. They come,
nibble for a little while, and then go lay back down,
So I would still sit that spot.

Speaker 2 (01:07:02):
Last set of questions rapid fire. So it's gonna be
a either or answer. I'll give you two options and
you pick. We're gonna go through this really quick, and
then I've got one last tough scenario for you, and
this will Yeah, We'll just we'll go with this. What
matters more to deer movement? The moon or barometric pressure?

Speaker 4 (01:07:23):
Parametric pressure?

Speaker 2 (01:07:24):
Would you take a fifty yard shot at a white
tail wave your bow? Yes?

Speaker 3 (01:07:28):
Or no? Not anymore? No?

Speaker 2 (01:07:31):
If you could only have one of these tools for
the rest of your hunts, which would it be a
set of rattling antlers or a grunt.

Speaker 4 (01:07:38):
Tube rattling antlers.

Speaker 2 (01:07:43):
If you had well, this one might be too easy
for expandable or fixed play broadhead.

Speaker 4 (01:07:51):
Expandable.

Speaker 2 (01:07:52):
Yeah, should you stop? Yeah? That was gonna say very
specific options. What you would choose Should you stop a
buck with some kind of sound before shooting it? This
is with a bow? Yes or no?

Speaker 4 (01:08:03):
Absolutely? Yes?

Speaker 2 (01:08:06):
Okay, I am in control of hunting privileges across the nation.
Let's say hypothetically, and I'm going to take away your
hunting license for any state in the country for the
rest of your life unless you can kill a five
year old buck this year. Okay, If you kill a
five year a buck this year, you get to keep

(01:08:27):
on hunting as always. If you don't, that's your last season.
The hitch is that you only get one day to
do it and one stand or blind location to do
it from. I would like I'd like you to pick
the date on the calendar that you choose for this hunt,
and then I would like you to paint me a
picture of the spot you would choose exactly. This could

(01:08:49):
be a real life location that you think would give
you the best chance, or you can just paint a hypothetical,
but give me the best date to kill this five
year old buck in a very high stake situation, and
then exactly what a setup you would have.

Speaker 3 (01:09:03):
Well, that's that's a toughie. That's a tough question because
we've got so many spots. But I'd go on camera
information and our history from last year, and as we
talked about earlier, we sat in tree stands over and
over and over and over last year, and I had
a five year old buck that was walking under us
every morning, and we passed him every morning. I'd go

(01:09:24):
back to that same spot. We call it it's logging
road too. It's in the middle of my farm, smack
dab in the center. It's a lot of white oaks
in and around there. It'd be November the tenth. It
would be twenty five degrees, you know, thirty point three
four barometer thirty point three five and rising. I'd have

(01:09:45):
a southwesterly wind eight to ten mile an hour.

Speaker 4 (01:09:53):
We'd get in there.

Speaker 3 (01:09:55):
Plenty early, and I would just lock in and sit there,
and he's going to walk under and I'm gonna drill
him in about seventeen yards.

Speaker 4 (01:10:02):
He's gonna die on camera.

Speaker 2 (01:10:03):
I love it, and then you can hunt the rest
of your day as a happy man. I have faith, Terry.
I do believe you would get it done. I do
believe it.

Speaker 3 (01:10:12):
Fortunately, last year he was about one twenty. This year
he's going to be about one to twenty five.

Speaker 2 (01:10:18):
Well, can't you can't eat can't eat antlers? You can
eat age, I guess because you just there's some more
meat on the bone. So there's always that.

Speaker 4 (01:10:29):
Well, and we like to try and give him a chance.

Speaker 3 (01:10:32):
If he's gonna blow, we think maybe he'll do it
at six, or maybe he'll do it at seven, So
we give him an opportunity. But if but if I'm
going to lose a license or keep a lifetime license,
I'm gonna go ahead and take him.

Speaker 2 (01:10:42):
Hey, I'm right there with you, Terry. What what can
folks look forward to this coming season when it comes
to what you guys have in the works. Is there
any new projects, anything new with the deer Cast app
anything that people should be keeping an eye o for.

Speaker 4 (01:10:57):
You know, deer Cast.

Speaker 3 (01:10:58):
Has been really a uh what would you call the
labor of love. We have absolutely poured a heart and
souls into it. We've got thirteen influencers in the algorithm
that we feel like we've tweaked it and tweaked it
and tweaked it to where it's pretty dog on accurate
barring no outside intrusion. You know, somebody on a four

(01:11:19):
wheel or a coyote running through a guy mending fence,
somebody cutting wood that can alter deer movement very very easily.
But if they're undisturbed, the Deer cast app is extremely
accurate and on point as far as the predictive models
as to when a white tail is going to get
up on their feet and move during daylight hours, and
we would we'd take it, take it to the bank

(01:11:40):
because it's worked for us extremely well. We're continuing to
improve that, you know, with the tracking features and with
the rain stations and all the way points, and there's
just a wide array of things that are that are
within that. Uh, you know, the daily the daily journal
that's in there each and every day. We've got a
writers that write stories that are always interesting. People can

(01:12:04):
send their information in their pictures in We love seeing
what other people are killing throughout the country and when
they're killing it. That's a great, great way to key
in on when of what's happening when you start seeing
those big giants fall and you're seeing pictures on deer Cast,
pretty good chance you could say, oh, I need to
be there right now. It also gives you a fifteen
day predictive model where you can say, you know what,

(01:12:24):
I need to take two or three days of vacation,
So you can look at it ahead of time and
say that, man, there's a good or a great you know,
in and around this particular period, so you can kind
of plan your vacation out a little bit ahead of time.
But deer Cast the predictive model changes as the weather changes.
So if it goes from a great to a poor,
that's not our fault. That just meant that god God's

(01:12:47):
sense of poor weather that you described while ago, you know,
a really really poor scenario, bad barometer, bad wind, you know,
high temperatures and they're just not moving. So with that,
we're still working on all the television shows and still
doing a lot of stuff on YouTube. Our YouTube channel's
just been going off the charts, big numbers, and we
still love doing it. I mean Mark and I both

(01:13:09):
Matt Taylor, we're just ate up with it. And White
Tails have been our thing for a long long time,
from early childhood on. Mark and I are just absolutely
enamored with him. He always says they're playing chess, we're
playing checkers, and he's not wrong. We're students of the game,
and we'll continue to learn and.

Speaker 4 (01:13:27):
Hope that we can help somebody else.

Speaker 3 (01:13:29):
That's what we've all always been about, is sharing information
and hoping that somebody else can kill a big deer
because of what we're sharing.

Speaker 2 (01:13:36):
Well, you guys have certainly lived up to that goal.
You've helped a lot of folks out, myself included. So
thank you. Thank you for that, Terry, and thanks with
us Chet as always, I've really enjoyed him.

Speaker 3 (01:13:49):
I loved it too. Thank you for those scenarios. Those
sounded like they were coming from an extremely, extremely professional hunter.

Speaker 2 (01:13:57):
Well, we're someone who's screwed up a lot, and it's
still trying to figure out how to learn from those mistakes.
So somewhere between, maybe let's chat again soon, Terry.

Speaker 3 (01:14:08):
All right, thank you, Mark.

Speaker 2 (01:14:09):
I enjoyed it, buddy, all right, and that's going to
do it for us today. Thank you all for joining
me for today's episode. Really enjoy my chat with Terry.
Please go and subscribe to the Jury Outdoors YouTube channel.
They've got their one hundred percent While podcast, which actually
helped them start maybe like eight nine years ago. We
co hosted it for a year or two. Matt and

(01:14:30):
crew continue to do a great job over there, so
check that out. Check off the Deercast app, the you know, Mark, Terry,
Matt Taylor. They're all doing great work. I appreciate them,
have enjoyed so much of their content over the years,
so check it out, give them some love, and until
next time, thank you for tuning into this podcast, and
stay wired to Hunt

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

Host

Mark Kenyon

Popular Podcasts

On Purpose with Jay Shetty

Stuff You Should Know

The Joe Rogan Experience

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Ep. 936: What Would Terry Drury Do?