September 10, 2025 • 36 mins
EHD can change everything in a matter of one outbreak. Deer disappear, patterns break down, and entire herds can be impacted. In this episode, Jake Hofer asks Steve Hanson, Don Higgins, Skip Sligh, Mark Kenyon, Jeff Sturgis, Thomas Mlsna, Bobby Kendall, and Bill Winke how they adjust when EHD hits their area. Can you still have a successful season when the deer population takes a hit? And what should you be looking for when the woods go quiet? The group shares their experiences with EHD outbreaks, how they adapt their expectations, scout differently, and shift their plans when the usual playbook no longer applies. If your hunting area got hammered by EHD, this episode offers clarity on what to do next.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
At this point, I would give up on the keeping
my pharma sanctuary. If you're only hunting one or two
bucks that you know are there and he might be dead,
it's worth the intrusion on the property to go in
search those areas out and see if he is dead.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
There's not a lot that you can do, to be honest.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
Welcome to Back forty.
Speaker 4 (00:16):
I'm Jake Hoefer, and we are diving into a topic
here that hopefully isn't top of mind for you right now.
But unfortunately, when we sketched out these questions, I had
a bad feeling that somewhere across the Midwest there would
be an EHD outbreak. And so if you're listening to
this from southern Ohio, this is hopefully some insight that's
going to help you develop a plan for this fault,
(00:37):
because unfortunately, EHD is a very real thing for a
lot of places throughout the country, and most of the
guests here today has had some experience with it, some
a lot more than others, and a lot less for
the for the fortunate guests here.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
But before we get into I.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
Want to say the Back forty podcast is brought to
you by land dot Com, the leading online real estate
marketplace to find your pert rural, recreational, agricultural, or hunting
properties here in the United States. Before we get into
the episode two, I want to give a real quick
cliff notes version of what EHD is in case you're
not familiar or maybe you're confused with what EHD is
(01:14):
versus CWD. I am not a biologist, so I'm just
going to give you an armchair quick rundown of EHD. Essentially,
it is a midge that lives in the cracks of
mud where there's a lot of changes in moisture or
if it's very dry mud bottom creeks are typically bad
ponds or an area where it could facilitate a lot
of the midge flies. And it's a viral infection that
when a deer gets bit by it, it essentially causes
(01:36):
a fever and the mortality rate can be very high.
Now in the South, this seems like there has been
more resistance of EHD built up, and so there's different
strains that can impact deer more severely.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
And that's the really quick version of it.
Speaker 4 (01:51):
If you want to learn more about it, I'm sure
there's more episodes about EHD and more depth or you
can google it, but I just wanted to make sure
that there's a clear distinct between CWD and EHD, because
I think for a lot of people they get them confused.
So EHD is a mid fly that bites of deers,
knows inside their nostril and causes a viral infection and
ultimately can can kill them all.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
So you've heard of rumors of EHD. What do you
do now? Is there anything that you can do? Is
there any silver linings?
Speaker 4 (02:19):
And to kick things off, we're gonna start with Steve Hanson,
who's in southern Iowa and unfortunately has experienced EHD over
the years, and here is his prescription to move forward
if you're experiencing this. Man, I've been looking forward to
season all year, and now it's been dry and I'm
(02:41):
hearing murmurs of EHD. I go out, My deer disappeared
and I want to say, my dear, but the bucks
that were in the area have disappeared. My area go
hammered by EHD.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
Now what, well, you might almost in that scenario, you
might you know, you may have to start from scratch,
and I'd probably move the cameras on the property that
was hit for EHD because there's no guarantee.
Speaker 5 (03:05):
That they are dead. So what I would do is, at.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
This point, I would give up on the keeping my
pharm a sanctuary, and I would spend a good amount
of time walking creeks, pond banks and truly try to
find the If you're only hunting one or two bucks
that you know are there and he might be dead,
it's worth the intrusion on the property to go in
search those areas out and see if he is dead.
(03:31):
Even if you need to contact a neighbor. And this
is where you know, having a good relationship with neighbors,
say hey, man, I'm not wanting to hunt or anything.
I smelled some dead deer in the creek. I can't
find him. Is it all right if I walk around
your pond?
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Is it you know?
Speaker 1 (03:44):
I'm just trying to decide if these deer are still
alive and get an idea of overall hurt health. Did
we lose twenty deer, did we lose two deer? Is
it a total wipeout?
Speaker 5 (03:54):
You know?
Speaker 1 (03:55):
So I would invest some time and energy doing that,
but I also would be starting look at what my
other options are for other places to hunt, because EHD
is very localized, like we've had terrible wipeouts on one
farm and five miles away nothing. So you know, if
you have other properties, at that point, I'd probably start looking, Hey,
(04:15):
what other options do I have? And then I always
whenever the HD topic comes up, I have to bring
this up because I've seen this happen so many times
and it's very detrimental to you know, the herd health.
I've seen a lot of people unfortunately, reset their expectations.
So all of a sudden, Oh, we had this one,
you know, one sixty that was six year old, but
(04:36):
he died of EHD. We had this other one seventy
that was probably five, but he's a shooter. But now
we're hunting these three and four year old one forties
because it's all we got left. Don't do that, you know,
that's that means your hunting's.
Speaker 5 (04:47):
Going to suck virtually forever.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
You're you're going to ruin it. You're in a new TB.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Yes, and exactly, you are going to perpetuate the cycle
of poor age structure. If you do that, Concentrate on
some cull bucks, do whatever you have to do on
other place, but try to leave you know, the hurt
is in its most vulnerable then, and it needs the
most help.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
Next up we have Bill Winky.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
Bill has unfortunately a lot of experience as well with EHD.
He has said in the past that his farm was
likely one of the best in the entire country. I
think it was twenty twelve until EHD came through and
really devastated the farm. He's got firsthand experience on what
this means if you are finding yourself in the same
exact situation. Here's Bill winking, I've been hearing rumors, I'm
(05:32):
smelling something kind of weird.
Speaker 3 (05:34):
My whole area, my whole farm just got hammered by EHD.
What do I do now?
Speaker 4 (05:40):
Whom?
Speaker 6 (05:42):
Yeah, the now, I've certainly had that happen where I've lost,
you know, a lot of my bucks in one year.
Probably has happened more than once. In my experience down
there on that southern Iowa farm, it seemed like about
every seven years we get it, you know, fairly significantly,
(06:03):
you know, and some years it'll be twenty percent, some
years it'd be you know, ten percent, some years it'd
be seventy percent. You just get you're just gonna get
it every every so often. So I've been through this cycle.
I think all you can do. I wouldn't go out
looking for them. If you're setting your cameras or you're
(06:25):
working the last bit of your food plot, you know,
preparation on the property, or mow and ditch or mow
and access routes or something like that, you're gonna you're
gonna smell some dead deer. It's worth probably then just
checking them out quick, you know, because you can tell
which way the wind is blow it and you're gonna
find them pretty fast. But I wouldn't scout the whole farm.
(06:47):
You see, if I can find that buck that I
was not laying dead, I'd let the cameras tell me that,
because you just run the risk of bumping too many deer.
You know, if you do a wholesale scouting missions to
see what's dead, uh, you don't have a whole lot
of options. And again we talked about it earlier in
this series about you know, do the Great hunters killed
(07:10):
deer every year? The great hunters have you plan B, C, D,
et cetera. So if you've got you know, a plan C,
now might be the time to pull it out. Let's
say maybe a hunt two or three states, and the
properties that you've got in some of these other areas
(07:33):
they weren't affected by the EHD. It might it might be,
you know, you run your cameras in the area where
you know that you lost some deer just to find
out what's left. But you might want to shift all
your thoughts and all your efforts to some of those
other areas because it really is well, it's simple now.
I mean, you're not going to kill him if he's
(07:54):
not there. So no, you don't want to be hunting
a deer that's already dead.
Speaker 7 (07:58):
If real quick on when your farm would get hit
every seven years roughly, there's some people that say, you know,
the survivors, you know, based off of all the social
pressure of other deer dying that you know, the year
after for a buck that did survive, maybe a four
year old buck. Uh, did you see that farm bounce
back or specific bucks that survive really explode?
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Is there any silver.
Speaker 7 (08:20):
Lining to when your farm got hit by the EHD
that you could glean?
Speaker 5 (08:27):
Now, there's not a there's not a.
Speaker 6 (08:29):
Silver lining the EHD if you were managing the property. Well,
the only silver lining might be if everything got out
of control, and you know your your browse was max
style you had. You know, deer were eating you out
of house and home, brows lines everywhere, no, you know,
high quality forage left in the woods. You know, it's
(08:54):
not a bad thing for you know, to hit the
reset button. But if you were doing a pretty good
job of managing that property, all you're doing is getting
set back. There's no positive becomes out of it. We
were That farm that I own in twenty eleven was awesome.
I can't even imagine better, honey. I've never heard people
(09:17):
talk about better honey, other than maybe inside of a
high fence, you know. But there was so many big
deer there. And then during September August September in twenty twelve,
we lost the most of our bucks. Well there you go.
I mean the place was teed up and it was
awesome and then it was bad. Never you know, there's
(09:38):
there's no silver lining there. That was just that was
just you know what what just happened here? And you
know they'll figure out someday how to manage that. But
that's I remember doctor James Kroll one time, you know, seminar,
(09:58):
he said, everybody worries about CWD and rightfully so you said,
but EHD wipes out way many times more deer throughout
the Midwest than CWD does. It's just that we don't
quite understand CWD that well, so we panic a little
bit more over it and don't really know the you know,
the dynamics of it or as EHD. We understand it,
(10:21):
but it doesn't change the fact that you go from
from ten to one as far as on a scale
of awesome in one year.
Speaker 3 (10:31):
That's tough. Next up, we have Jeff Sturgis. Jeff is
from Michigan.
Speaker 4 (10:35):
His hunted in Wisconsin and Minnesota primarily, and typically they
don't have as much EHD or as many issues with
this issue. But if he did face this, this is
exactly what he would do. And I think you're going
to pick up on a trend throughout this episode of
what you can do, what you can't do, and maybe
cut your losses. So here's Jeff Sturgis after he just
(10:57):
learned a bunch of deer gone missing due to VHD.
Speaker 8 (11:03):
We've been just where I'm at in southeast Minnesota where
just out of the historically we're just out of the
EHD range. It happened like three miles south of US.
So really, even in where I hunted in Wisconsin, it
was a mile self US. Wisconsin was a mile away
knocking on the door. I've been on properties where I've
seen seven dead bucks in velvet on a pond like
a skating pond here.
Speaker 5 (11:23):
In February at walking. They're under the ice. That looks creepy.
Speaker 8 (11:27):
Heard stories of you know, we've all heard stories dozens
of deer dead in the swamp out back.
Speaker 5 (11:32):
Someone put in air conditioning.
Speaker 8 (11:33):
I know one of my clients because they couldn't leave
their windows open because it kept blowing in during a
warm September. All these deer dead out of the swamp.
But anyways, it is a real problem. One of the
things that just before we start, I love water holes.
The reason, one of the reasons I love tank water
holes is because there's no mud surrounding a natural water hole.
Speaker 5 (11:52):
Then where the EHD propagates and lives.
Speaker 8 (11:55):
They live in that dry, cracking MUDs when you get
drought and that water keeps your seating in a water
hole that you've planned for deer and wildlife. All that
cracking mud around there, that's where that EHD image lives,
and that's where they propagate. So to me, we had
two water holes in the property that were nice, pretty
earth berms, not to mention they were in terrible locations.
(12:15):
Dount we knock those berms out, got rid of them,
and so we drained the water out, got rid of them.
They're just little room sized water holes because to me,
they're I don't like to use COVID terms, but they're
HD super spreaders.
Speaker 5 (12:29):
I mean, they invite every deer in the.
Speaker 8 (12:30):
Neighborhood into those water holes only be exposed to HD.
So I don't want those on my property, and so
that's why we use tanks. I'm not trying to sell
any tanks. We've tried. It's too hard. We didn't even
come out with a product just because rubber Maid does
it kind of cheap and they're two hundred and seventy
five bucks for three hundred gallon tank and they're twenty
five inches deep, sixty three by sixty nine inches, perfect size,
(12:53):
one hundred and fifty galanon rubber Maid is a nice
one two one hundred and ten galon.
Speaker 5 (12:58):
Off brand one from TSC is awesome. One to two
hundred hundred bucks.
Speaker 8 (13:01):
For those, but I love those perfect depth to size ratio,
not a lot of evaporation.
Speaker 5 (13:08):
So that's one way.
Speaker 8 (13:09):
The second way to me, there's five percent of the
neighborhood that attracts mature bucks during the daylight, only five percent,
because that's that perfect combination of great fall food.
Speaker 5 (13:23):
It could be your finding this.
Speaker 8 (13:24):
On public land and public land only thing is food
sources are always changing, so that those bucks aren't going
to be there from October to January where they might
be on your private land if you make the right
conditions and you keep food sources and good cover. Could
be marginal, food sources marginal, but if they're not under
pressured and they're consistent all year, then that's where the
(13:44):
mature bucks are going to be. How many times have
you seen mature bucks in a state park that's thirty
acres or neighborhood set aside that's ten acres.
Speaker 5 (13:52):
They're not there because of food plots, feeding.
Speaker 8 (13:55):
Anything, anybody's made any water holes, crated betting areas, they
haven't done anything to the land there, just because it's
marginal food, marginal cover, and it's unpressured.
Speaker 5 (14:03):
It's one area that they can find.
Speaker 8 (14:05):
So you look at that five percent, So I want
to be that property that whatever bucks are left in
the neighborhood. And I'm not sounds selfish, but you're just
trying to do a good job. In anything you do,
you try to do your best. So I want to
have that five percent property. I want to have the
property that diminishes the number of dozen fauns during the summertime.
(14:26):
I don't like a lot of summer food. I want
those dozen fauns to migrate onto the property during hunting
season October November because I have quality food. But I
don't want them there waiting like an army for my
fall food to arrive in August in September when I
plant those food plots. So I want to minimize the
number of fawns and doze on the property by even
We have a product that we plant, It's called rut
(14:48):
zone from our food pot Seat company. It has beans
in it, but we plant that July first or later
early July pre probably because I want those dozen fawns
to fawn somewhere else traditional fawning grounds. I want them
off the p property preferred, and.
Speaker 5 (15:02):
Then they'll come on later.
Speaker 8 (15:03):
But I don't want them there during July and August pounding.
Some of our fall foods, and that's one of them.
I want to plant beans later July first short short
day bean so that I can get.
Speaker 5 (15:13):
That to grow.
Speaker 8 (15:14):
So you minimize the number of dozen fonts, you maximize
the number of mature bucks in your property, which is
only five percent of the neighborhood during the daylight. And
that way you're I'm not saying your EHD proof in
your property, but what you're doing is giving yourself a
competitive advantage to actually be the property in the area
that's the influencer.
Speaker 5 (15:32):
And if you're in.
Speaker 8 (15:33):
A dry region and you don't have water holes that
are full of mud and receding cracked mud and drying mud,
then to me, that's one more way you protect those
mature box on your property. If they spend the majority
of their time on your property. Do you know at night,
most dear drink by eating green vegetation. So if they're
(15:55):
eating green vegetation all night because they're out in the
open aggfields, they don't need to take a drink of wie.
Speaker 5 (16:00):
They come back on your land during the daylight. You
don't have mud.
Speaker 8 (16:03):
Holes surrounded by a dry and crack and receding mud
that propagate the EHD midge in a lot of those ways,
just by housing those mature box during the daylight the most,
by being a five percent property, by reducing the number
or eliminating if you can waterhole or mudhole areas on
your property, then to me, you can have a fighting
(16:24):
chance against EHD.
Speaker 5 (16:26):
And again, I feel sorry for it if you guys,
if that.
Speaker 8 (16:28):
Happens, because I know I've been with clients almost in tears,
you know, where they've built deer herds for three or
four years and then just to have wiped out.
Speaker 5 (16:37):
And I haven't gone through.
Speaker 8 (16:38):
It personally, but I've personally experienced it with clients and
friends and it sucks, it really does. So those are
the few things that you can do to try to
me mitigate by EHD.
Speaker 7 (16:50):
What would you do if if you're Minnesota farm, you know,
if there's a lot of eggs in that basket and
I do not even want to say this, but it's
the question of what would happen and if hypothetically snap
your fingers, then you're like, oh my gosh, somehow we
did get hammered and I lost eighty percent of you know,
the age structure on this farm. What would you do
for the season other than cry, maybe.
Speaker 8 (17:14):
I try to identify that one mature black left that
I could hunt, and if that wasn't the case, you know,
then I would be happy to monitor the herd enjoy
taking care of the land. We have lots of pheasant
on our property. And I'm not saying that the pheasants,
(17:36):
the grouse and the rabbits and the birds, butterflies, bees
that we house on the property, our turkey nesting polt,
all our turkeys. I'm not saying that that would, you know,
take that sting away from losing that white tail herd.
But it be a focus of mine that I would
turn my attention to because we do that year round anyways.
(17:57):
You know, we spend so many hours on the property
because we are looking at turkey nesting areas, improving turkey population.
Speaker 5 (18:03):
We have lots of groups on the property, lots of pheasant.
Speaker 8 (18:06):
It just miles of peasant habitat edge and turkey nesting,
and so I would focus on that, and then I'd
look at trying to go north a little bit or
find areas core areas on public land where I could hunt,
and we hunt public land every year. Will be out
to Pennsylvania again, out in the hills out in the
Federal forest there that I've been going to since ninety three.
Speaker 5 (18:27):
I go back to.
Speaker 8 (18:27):
Michigan often, I think the last time was three years
ago to hunt public land, and so public.
Speaker 5 (18:33):
Land has always been in my roots.
Speaker 8 (18:34):
And I'd go find a non EHD exposed public land
to hunt somewhere because I gotta scratch that white till
itch and then at home I take care of the
critters and enjoy it.
Speaker 5 (18:45):
Yeah it sucked.
Speaker 8 (18:56):
Yeah, no one wants to think it would be horrible,
but you know, you know, you just try to turn
your focus on other things. And what I've tried to
do in life at the age of fifty five is
I hate this expression.
Speaker 5 (19:09):
It is what it is.
Speaker 8 (19:10):
But if you live a little bit by that looking
at like, you can't you can't control, you can't worry
about the things you can't change in life. If you
worry about things and you let them get you down,
including hunting, you can really drag you down into precious
So I'd prefer to focus on Yep, that happened. It
(19:30):
was bad, and this goes to life too. We can't
do anything about it. We'll make better decisions next time,
or we'll just you know, we'll deal with it and
you move on and stay positive.
Speaker 4 (19:45):
Next, we have Don Higgins, and his advice here is
very straightforward. And if you are in this scenario, or
maybe if you artists feeling not very confident going into
this season, I think Don's advice right here is going
to be a gentle nudge of him urgement. So here
we go. This is what Down's gonna do. If of
the deer just got wiped out to EHD, the midgefly
(20:07):
came in and caused havoc on his farm.
Speaker 9 (20:10):
Well, I'd let my trail cameras tell me the story.
Is your target buck really dead? Is there another target
buck that you'd want to go after that you're still
getting pictures of? If not, go somewhere else, I mean,
there's no sense in right and off your season. I mean,
the United States is a big country. I've never heard
of EHD wiping out the entire country. Go somewhere where
there's still deer. You may not get the hunted as often,
(20:33):
you may have to wait till weekends or your vacation
instead of hunting every evening, but still don't give up.
It goes back to the saying that I've I've repeated
many times, find a solution, don't make excuses, find solutions,
and there's always a solution.
Speaker 7 (20:51):
Do you think some guys, I mean, unfortunately areas get
hit by EHD and a common thing is houser season
hot even hunt got we got hit by eu H
And do you think it's just maybe they didn't really
want to hunt that bad.
Speaker 9 (21:04):
Well, I think it comes down to priorities and they
probably got something else they like to do at that
time of the year. I mean, I can't imagine they're
sitting home staring at the ceiling and they're probably into
football or something like that, and that takes their time.
For guys like me, there is no alternative. It's been
chasing big deer three hundred and sixty five days a year,
and it doesn't matter what month it is, I'm doing
(21:26):
something related to chasing big deer. And I totally get
it that not everybody is that serious about it. But
if your goal is to kill giants, it better be
pretty high on your priority list or it's not going
to happen at least consistently.
Speaker 4 (21:42):
Next up, we have Bobby Kendall. Bobby has a lot
of intel across the Midwest, and when you have a
lot of different places that you're in tune with, more
than likely one area may get snipped by EHD. Here
is his approach, And these are always usually based off
of rumors, and sometimes there's room of catastrophic devastation to
(22:02):
the white tailed deer herd, and sometimes maybe it's going
out of proportion. So here's Bobby Kendall on what his
perspective is when it comes to facing EHD.
Speaker 7 (22:11):
Head on my area that I this has been hammered
by EHD.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
My season's over.
Speaker 7 (22:15):
I'm gonna get eight more fantasy football teams because my
season's over.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
Is that is that the right approach? And where do
I start?
Speaker 5 (22:23):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (22:23):
This is this is your mindset.
Speaker 10 (22:25):
So like if EHD hits your farm and it's the
only place that you're hunting, yeah you're I mean ninety
percent chance that you're kind of screwed, you know, probably,
But this is where you know, a lot of these
conversations today have come back to good hunters. Great hunters.
You know, you have to get good at finding deer,
(22:48):
So you got to go out and find more places.
You can't just sit around and hope. And you know,
now I'll kind of talk about this from a different angle,
you know, deer strategy, and my opinion, it starts. A
lot of guys we deal with they haven't even bought
a farm yet. So those guys are it's really good
because you can have this conversation on the front end.
(23:09):
Deer strategy is not just this stuff, the food plot
and everything. It's your spread of farm. So a lot
of these guys are buying multiple farms, or they want
a four hundred acre farm or an eight hundred acre farm.
And part of your dear strategy is not pigeonholing yourself
into one, into a situation where you get wiped out
(23:32):
by EHD. So instead of buying a four hundred, maybe
buy two two hundreds. Maybe buy four to one hundreds
instead of buying one hundred, Maybe by two fifties. Instead
of leasing a two hundred, maybe you lease a fifty
to a one to fifty. The more pieces you can
have always, the better you're going to be off. You
have to have a great, big piece before it's like okay,
you know this makes sense. You are so much better
(23:54):
doing your part on fifty acres and sampling a thousand
or twelve hundred or eighteen hundred acres than you are
having eighteen hundred and sampling twenty four hundred. You know
what I mean. You can take that same thousand acres
in ten pieces and sample ten thousand acres. So getting
ahead of that problem. You know, that's all part of
(24:15):
your dear strategy game. And you know, so don't don't
get in a position where you're screwed because your farm
got wiped out by EHD.
Speaker 5 (24:23):
I guess what I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (24:24):
So go go knock on some doors.
Speaker 10 (24:25):
Go knock on some doors if you're in that situation,
and start trying to change course so it doesn't happen again.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
Yeah, because it does suck. There, you guys have it.
Speaker 7 (24:34):
Next, we have Thomas mills Now he's in Wisconsin, and
I think his approach here is going to be very
interesting on what to do if you're handcuffed to the
farm and is it worth paying attention?
Speaker 4 (24:46):
Is it worth picking up a different hobby this fall.
Here's what Thomas Millson has to say. All right, I've
been hearing rumors it's been really dry. I think I
smelled the dead deer. Sure enough, my whole farm was
hammered by EHD, What do I do now?
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Well, this year, you certainly don't have to worry about
it being dry if you're in the Midwest. But ESG
is a weird thing because it can be so isolated
in those pockets, and it happens a lot. Right Just
this last year, just south of here, a friend of
mine all their target books dead up by us. No
problem at all. There's not a lot that you can do,
(25:27):
to be honest. The first thing I'm gonna do is
a thorough examination of my farm, my property itself, and
figure out again is there anything that we can do
to get ahead of this problem in the future.
Speaker 5 (25:39):
And then the next thing.
Speaker 2 (25:40):
I'm gonna do is I'm gonna hunt. I'm gonna hunt
like normal. I'm gonna observe my property, I'm gonna observe
the habitat deer movement. I'm gonna act as if there's
a mature buck on the property as much as possible.
But I also might pick up an out of state hunt,
or maybe do something out west, or maybe do some
low impact dope control, depending on you know, the quality.
(26:01):
If I heard in general, obviously, if EHD just hit
you really hard and killed a lot dear, you probably
don't want to go and kill a bunch of does,
but if it just took out a few of your
older age class bucks, which tends to happen, right, We've
got a lot more sensitive vascular tissue on a buck
like that for those flies to bite, so that happens
quite a bit.
Speaker 3 (26:19):
But I'm going to just try to feel it out.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
And remember, every year's a building year on a property,
every year's building year.
Speaker 5 (26:27):
So again, this.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
Year somewhat of a bus Still a lot of things
that we can do to enjoy our time out there.
Maybe I'll spend more time taking my kids hunting. Maybe
I'll try and get them on the DOS or some management, dear,
whatever it might be. But I'm also looking at that
property and going, okay, what is the cause of something
like this? You know, I think one of the big
things we like to blame ponds, water holes and stuff
(26:48):
like that, which is partially true, yes, but from a
holistic standpoint, we also need to look at what are
the natural predators of this midge that spreads the and
we don't provide very good habitat for those animals either. Birds, spiders,
dragonflies are probably the biggest predators of insects like that,
(27:11):
midges and also mosquitoes alike. Dragonflies need similar water. They
need open water. The stuff that we look at and
go that's stagnant water, that's a mosquito haven. Mosquitoes can
breed in you a thimble of water. Dragonflies need a
lot more water. And when you have a healthy habitat
for water water, predators like that, like the dragonflies, they'll
(27:34):
feed on the midge in the larval state, they'll feed
on mosquitos in the larval state in that water, and
then they'll also catch them out of the air. So
it's kind of kind of twofold there, right, But it
goes back to the habitat. If we have a lot
better native habitat that supports a lot of healthier insect
populations than we have the predatory insects in that ecosystem
that also feed on that midge, and that reduces all
(27:56):
that stuff. So a lot of these problems that we
face as deer hunters, we have created ourselves not just
as hunters but as humans and habitat loss and destruction
and pesticides and all these things that are killing all
the things out there, and then just a select handful
of these pests can survive these situations. And it also
goes back to healthier deer. You know, healthy food plots,
(28:17):
getting a lot of mineral content into the forage so
it's actually nutrient dense and not just this, you know,
a lush, green, empty calorie meal for them. We get
as much vitamins in there as possible. I run goats
in the woods, right, the best way to combat biting
insects on goats is to make sure that they have
access to minerals. Trace minerals all the time. When the
(28:40):
mineral content is up in their body, their blood changes.
It makes them a lot healthier. The same as true
for deer, and deer don't hit mineral licks all the time.
So having mineral licks out I think is also a
good idea where it's legal. But if it's not legal,
there then having really really high quality food plots and
really high quality native vegetation. So here we go all
(29:00):
the way back around. Native vegetation really good for the
insects that are going to kill the midges.
Speaker 5 (29:05):
Native vegetation, deep root.
Speaker 2 (29:07):
Systems, a lot of minerals, a lot of good protein,
creates a lot healthier animals and also doesn't concentrate them
so much in certain areas. That's going to be that
full circle, holistic approach to improving your property to combat EHD.
And we're also going to address those water sources too
and try to mitigate the muddy water sources like that too,
(29:27):
So it all goes hand in hand.
Speaker 4 (29:29):
Without further ado, we are going to close this out
with Mark Kenyon on his perspective on this specific topic.
Speaker 7 (29:36):
Here we go, right, I've been hearing rumors, mumbles. I
think my whole area is got wiped out by EHD.
It's September. My season is completely different than what I thought. Potentially,
what do I do well? Good news badness on the situation.
The bad news is that I probably have the worst
(29:59):
answer anyone today in today's episode because I've never personally
had to experience this. But that's also the good news.
I've never had a personal experience. Yes, so I've worried
about it, and in last year actually was maybe the
time in the last like fifteen years where I thought
this might have happened the most likely, And so I
have these questions and I was like, ooh, is this
(30:20):
what's going on? Is this why they all disappeared. Is
this what's happening? So I lived this a little bit
last year, but I've never had it actually confirmed and
really truly blow things up for me. So I think
that what I did last year is that I searched
and hoped him, prayed and kept hoping him, praying that
they were around somewhere that just de your behavior change
(30:42):
or pressure had changed, and something had pushed these bucks
out of their usual patterns. I definitely paid a lot
of extra attention to water when I was out hunting
during the season or doing some final prep work there
in the late August early September, because that's typically where
you're to find deer from EHD. They go to water,
(31:02):
So I was always watching for that. I was asking neighbors.
I was like, hey, are you finding dead deer? Have
you seen any sign of this? Are you're smelling anything funky?
Like I'm wondering if this is what's going on, So
just just allow the detective work to try to confirm.
That didn't end up turning anything out, And so I
think if there were rumors, that's what I would be
doing to try to confirm. If I was in a
(31:23):
situation where it is confirmed and I start finding dead
deer or I start hearing about it happening, and it
seems like the deer that I'm after that year, or
whatever mature bucks were around, or toast. I think, then
you've got two options. One of these options is hopefully
you are prepared for both these six I think the
key thing is this. I mentioned this on a different episode.
(31:46):
One of the most important things to consistent deer hunting
success is having a diversified portfolio. If you were dependent
on any one deer, or any one property or any
one area.
Speaker 3 (31:59):
You are putting your your house.
Speaker 7 (32:01):
Of cards is a serious risk because it could all
come tumbling down if you have one bad case of HD,
or if you have one neighbor who shoots the one
buck here after whatever. There's so many things can happen
if you are dependent on this one thing. So I
try to make sure that I have multiple areas that
can hunt, multiple properties that can hunt, multiple deer I
can hunt and or well, I guess, and public opportunities
(32:24):
as well. So having many private accesses is great. If
you have those opportunities, or if you own a farm
or multiple farms, whatever it is, whatever your circumstances are,
Supplementing that with public land is a great way to
have more options, so that if EHD does blow up
your core place, it's not like AH says, is over,
I'm doomed. It's okay. Pivot, what's Plan B, what's Plan C?
(32:47):
What's planned? And if you don't have a BC or D,
then it's you know, hitting the hitting the doors, you know,
hitting the road, knocking on doors, trying to get last
in the permission, talking to friends, talking to your network.
You know, it's amazing if you start asking about hunting opportunities,
and even today where there are so many people trying
(33:08):
to get access, there are still opportunities to get permission
in places if you ask enough, if you talk, if
you find creative ways to help people out, people will
help you back. So even in this case where your
property gets destroyed and there's maybe nothing you want to
hunt anymore, I certainly wouldn't want to hang it up
for the year. I would say, all right, well, now
(33:30):
what do I need to do.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
How do you make.
Speaker 7 (33:31):
Something out of the situation, and how do I find
like a silver lining to this? This is a great
opportunity to go and do that thing that you've always
thought someday I'll do it that brand new adventure, traveling
out of state to some new place, or learning a
piece of public land. You've always thought, man, that looks
pretty good. But I've always had this great farm hunt.
This is the year when you have ESG hit where
your planing a disappears. That's the year ticked flyer, Go
(33:54):
do something new, Go try a new technique, a new area,
learn some new lessons, because they have nothing to lose
and only new opportunities and learnings to gain. So I
would view EHD as an unfortunate pivot point that you
should try to make the best of. Yeah, I think
that's the best thing you can do. I mean, sitting
(34:16):
there and sulking for the whole year probably is doing
a human And you know, this is a more occurring issue,
and that's why this was a question that I asked
eight people, and everyone had a different level of experience
with EHD, and that the general consensus was.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
Move on.
Speaker 7 (34:34):
I mean, that's all you could probably do and obviously
verify that there was an issue, because EHD is always
a rumor. It's always oh so and so heard from
so and so that there was a bunch of dead deer,
and so that kind of perpetuates a lot of panic,
and maybe sometimes it's over sensationalized, and sometimes maybe it's
very accurate. And so I think you had to figure
out what that is, and that was the general consensus.
Speaker 3 (34:56):
So that's the HD.
Speaker 7 (34:58):
I hope everyone listening to this does not have to
experience this issue. And I hopefully this is a trend
that becomes less popular and occurs less often, but it's
something that's really real right now, and so that's why
we asked that. But next week we have a really
I guess, kind of somewhat philosophical question of how can
we make the next twenty five years of hunting beer
(35:18):
hunting better than the last twenty five And we have
a great variety of answers, and I hope you guys
tune in next week.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Obviously, it is.
Speaker 4 (35:25):
My wish here that no one has to experience this,
but it is an issue that is becoming.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
More and more prevalent.
Speaker 4 (35:31):
There's a lot of people that are hypothesizing different solutions
and trying to hopefully mitigate the problems with EHD, and
hopefully there's a solution in the future. There's obviously some
things that people talked about from a habitat perspective of
what you could potentially.
Speaker 3 (35:45):
Do, and this is the reality of the situation right now.
Speaker 4 (35:48):
Like I said in the very beginning, Ohio unfortunately is
facing this once again. There was parts of Illinois last
year that got hit and this seems like every single
year there's pocketed regions that get really hurt by EHD.
So hopefully this episode doesn't hit home. But unfortunately, if
you're in the Midwest, you can almost earmark this because
probably in the next few years, or the next five
(36:08):
years or ten years, this is something that you're unfortunately
likely going to face as things sit today.
Speaker 3 (36:13):
So that is it.
Speaker 4 (36:14):
We are closing out the back forty series here pretty soon.
We have one more episode that I hope you guys
will enjoy. It's a very overarching, big picture, more philosophical
question that I wanted to get perspective from all of
these guests.
Speaker 3 (36:27):
So that is it. We will see you next time.
See you
At this point, I would give up on the keeping
my pharma sanctuary. If you're only hunting one or two
bucks that you know are there and he might be dead,
it's worth the intrusion on the property to go in
search those areas out and see if he is dead.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
There's not a lot that you can do, to be honest.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
Welcome to Back forty.
Speaker 4 (00:16):
I'm Jake Hoefer, and we are diving into a topic
here that hopefully isn't top of mind for you right now.
But unfortunately, when we sketched out these questions, I had
a bad feeling that somewhere across the Midwest there would
be an EHD outbreak. And so if you're listening to
this from southern Ohio, this is hopefully some insight that's
going to help you develop a plan for this fault,
(00:37):
because unfortunately, EHD is a very real thing for a
lot of places throughout the country, and most of the
guests here today has had some experience with it, some
a lot more than others, and a lot less for
the for the fortunate guests here.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
But before we get into I.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
Want to say the Back forty podcast is brought to
you by land dot Com, the leading online real estate
marketplace to find your pert rural, recreational, agricultural, or hunting
properties here in the United States. Before we get into
the episode two, I want to give a real quick
cliff notes version of what EHD is in case you're
not familiar or maybe you're confused with what EHD is
(01:14):
versus CWD. I am not a biologist, so I'm just
going to give you an armchair quick rundown of EHD. Essentially,
it is a midge that lives in the cracks of
mud where there's a lot of changes in moisture or
if it's very dry mud bottom creeks are typically bad
ponds or an area where it could facilitate a lot
of the midge flies. And it's a viral infection that
when a deer gets bit by it, it essentially causes
(01:36):
a fever and the mortality rate can be very high.
Now in the South, this seems like there has been
more resistance of EHD built up, and so there's different
strains that can impact deer more severely.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
And that's the really quick version of it.
Speaker 4 (01:51):
If you want to learn more about it, I'm sure
there's more episodes about EHD and more depth or you
can google it, but I just wanted to make sure
that there's a clear distinct between CWD and EHD, because
I think for a lot of people they get them confused.
So EHD is a mid fly that bites of deers,
knows inside their nostril and causes a viral infection and
ultimately can can kill them all.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
So you've heard of rumors of EHD. What do you
do now? Is there anything that you can do? Is
there any silver linings?
Speaker 4 (02:19):
And to kick things off, we're gonna start with Steve Hanson,
who's in southern Iowa and unfortunately has experienced EHD over
the years, and here is his prescription to move forward
if you're experiencing this. Man, I've been looking forward to
season all year, and now it's been dry and I'm
(02:41):
hearing murmurs of EHD. I go out, My deer disappeared
and I want to say, my dear, but the bucks
that were in the area have disappeared. My area go
hammered by EHD.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
Now what, well, you might almost in that scenario, you
might you know, you may have to start from scratch,
and I'd probably move the cameras on the property that
was hit for EHD because there's no guarantee.
Speaker 5 (03:05):
That they are dead. So what I would do is, at.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
This point, I would give up on the keeping my
pharm a sanctuary, and I would spend a good amount
of time walking creeks, pond banks and truly try to
find the If you're only hunting one or two bucks
that you know are there and he might be dead,
it's worth the intrusion on the property to go in
search those areas out and see if he is dead.
(03:31):
Even if you need to contact a neighbor. And this
is where you know, having a good relationship with neighbors,
say hey, man, I'm not wanting to hunt or anything.
I smelled some dead deer in the creek. I can't
find him. Is it all right if I walk around
your pond?
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Is it you know?
Speaker 1 (03:44):
I'm just trying to decide if these deer are still
alive and get an idea of overall hurt health. Did
we lose twenty deer, did we lose two deer? Is
it a total wipeout?
Speaker 5 (03:54):
You know?
Speaker 1 (03:55):
So I would invest some time and energy doing that,
but I also would be starting look at what my
other options are for other places to hunt, because EHD
is very localized, like we've had terrible wipeouts on one
farm and five miles away nothing. So you know, if
you have other properties, at that point, I'd probably start looking, Hey,
(04:15):
what other options do I have? And then I always
whenever the HD topic comes up, I have to bring
this up because I've seen this happen so many times
and it's very detrimental to you know, the herd health.
I've seen a lot of people unfortunately, reset their expectations.
So all of a sudden, Oh, we had this one,
you know, one sixty that was six year old, but
(04:36):
he died of EHD. We had this other one seventy
that was probably five, but he's a shooter. But now
we're hunting these three and four year old one forties
because it's all we got left. Don't do that, you know,
that's that means your hunting's.
Speaker 5 (04:47):
Going to suck virtually forever.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
You're you're going to ruin it. You're in a new TB.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Yes, and exactly, you are going to perpetuate the cycle
of poor age structure. If you do that, Concentrate on
some cull bucks, do whatever you have to do on
other place, but try to leave you know, the hurt
is in its most vulnerable then, and it needs the
most help.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
Next up we have Bill Winky.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
Bill has unfortunately a lot of experience as well with EHD.
He has said in the past that his farm was
likely one of the best in the entire country. I
think it was twenty twelve until EHD came through and
really devastated the farm. He's got firsthand experience on what
this means if you are finding yourself in the same
exact situation. Here's Bill winking, I've been hearing rumors, I'm
(05:32):
smelling something kind of weird.
Speaker 3 (05:34):
My whole area, my whole farm just got hammered by EHD.
What do I do now?
Speaker 4 (05:40):
Whom?
Speaker 6 (05:42):
Yeah, the now, I've certainly had that happen where I've lost,
you know, a lot of my bucks in one year.
Probably has happened more than once. In my experience down
there on that southern Iowa farm, it seemed like about
every seven years we get it, you know, fairly significantly,
(06:03):
you know, and some years it'll be twenty percent, some
years it'd be you know, ten percent, some years it'd
be seventy percent. You just get you're just gonna get
it every every so often. So I've been through this cycle.
I think all you can do. I wouldn't go out
looking for them. If you're setting your cameras or you're
(06:25):
working the last bit of your food plot, you know,
preparation on the property, or mow and ditch or mow
and access routes or something like that, you're gonna you're
gonna smell some dead deer. It's worth probably then just
checking them out quick, you know, because you can tell
which way the wind is blow it and you're gonna
find them pretty fast. But I wouldn't scout the whole farm.
(06:47):
You see, if I can find that buck that I
was not laying dead, I'd let the cameras tell me that,
because you just run the risk of bumping too many deer.
You know, if you do a wholesale scouting missions to
see what's dead, uh, you don't have a whole lot
of options. And again we talked about it earlier in
this series about you know, do the Great hunters killed
(07:10):
deer every year? The great hunters have you plan B, C, D,
et cetera. So if you've got you know, a plan C,
now might be the time to pull it out. Let's
say maybe a hunt two or three states, and the
properties that you've got in some of these other areas
(07:33):
they weren't affected by the EHD. It might it might be,
you know, you run your cameras in the area where
you know that you lost some deer just to find
out what's left. But you might want to shift all
your thoughts and all your efforts to some of those
other areas because it really is well, it's simple now.
I mean, you're not going to kill him if he's
(07:54):
not there. So no, you don't want to be hunting
a deer that's already dead.
Speaker 7 (07:58):
If real quick on when your farm would get hit
every seven years roughly, there's some people that say, you know,
the survivors, you know, based off of all the social
pressure of other deer dying that you know, the year
after for a buck that did survive, maybe a four
year old buck. Uh, did you see that farm bounce
back or specific bucks that survive really explode?
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Is there any silver.
Speaker 7 (08:20):
Lining to when your farm got hit by the EHD
that you could glean?
Speaker 5 (08:27):
Now, there's not a there's not a.
Speaker 6 (08:29):
Silver lining the EHD if you were managing the property. Well,
the only silver lining might be if everything got out
of control, and you know your your browse was max
style you had. You know, deer were eating you out
of house and home, brows lines everywhere, no, you know,
high quality forage left in the woods. You know, it's
(08:54):
not a bad thing for you know, to hit the
reset button. But if you were doing a pretty good
job of managing that property, all you're doing is getting
set back. There's no positive becomes out of it. We
were That farm that I own in twenty eleven was awesome.
I can't even imagine better, honey. I've never heard people
(09:17):
talk about better honey, other than maybe inside of a
high fence, you know. But there was so many big
deer there. And then during September August September in twenty twelve,
we lost the most of our bucks. Well there you go.
I mean the place was teed up and it was
awesome and then it was bad. Never you know, there's
(09:38):
there's no silver lining there. That was just that was
just you know what what just happened here? And you
know they'll figure out someday how to manage that. But
that's I remember doctor James Kroll one time, you know, seminar,
(09:58):
he said, everybody worries about CWD and rightfully so you said,
but EHD wipes out way many times more deer throughout
the Midwest than CWD does. It's just that we don't
quite understand CWD that well, so we panic a little
bit more over it and don't really know the you know,
the dynamics of it or as EHD. We understand it,
(10:21):
but it doesn't change the fact that you go from
from ten to one as far as on a scale
of awesome in one year.
Speaker 3 (10:31):
That's tough. Next up, we have Jeff Sturgis. Jeff is
from Michigan.
Speaker 4 (10:35):
His hunted in Wisconsin and Minnesota primarily, and typically they
don't have as much EHD or as many issues with
this issue. But if he did face this, this is
exactly what he would do. And I think you're going
to pick up on a trend throughout this episode of
what you can do, what you can't do, and maybe
cut your losses. So here's Jeff Sturgis after he just
(10:57):
learned a bunch of deer gone missing due to VHD.
Speaker 8 (11:03):
We've been just where I'm at in southeast Minnesota where
just out of the historically we're just out of the
EHD range. It happened like three miles south of US.
So really, even in where I hunted in Wisconsin, it
was a mile self US. Wisconsin was a mile away
knocking on the door. I've been on properties where I've
seen seven dead bucks in velvet on a pond like
a skating pond here.
Speaker 5 (11:23):
In February at walking. They're under the ice. That looks creepy.
Speaker 8 (11:27):
Heard stories of you know, we've all heard stories dozens
of deer dead in the swamp out back.
Speaker 5 (11:32):
Someone put in air conditioning.
Speaker 8 (11:33):
I know one of my clients because they couldn't leave
their windows open because it kept blowing in during a
warm September. All these deer dead out of the swamp.
But anyways, it is a real problem. One of the
things that just before we start, I love water holes.
The reason, one of the reasons I love tank water
holes is because there's no mud surrounding a natural water hole.
Speaker 5 (11:52):
Then where the EHD propagates and lives.
Speaker 8 (11:55):
They live in that dry, cracking MUDs when you get
drought and that water keeps your seating in a water
hole that you've planned for deer and wildlife. All that
cracking mud around there, that's where that EHD image lives,
and that's where they propagate. So to me, we had
two water holes in the property that were nice, pretty
earth berms, not to mention they were in terrible locations.
(12:15):
Dount we knock those berms out, got rid of them,
and so we drained the water out, got rid of them.
They're just little room sized water holes because to me,
they're I don't like to use COVID terms, but they're
HD super spreaders.
Speaker 5 (12:29):
I mean, they invite every deer in the.
Speaker 8 (12:30):
Neighborhood into those water holes only be exposed to HD.
So I don't want those on my property, and so
that's why we use tanks. I'm not trying to sell
any tanks. We've tried. It's too hard. We didn't even
come out with a product just because rubber Maid does
it kind of cheap and they're two hundred and seventy
five bucks for three hundred gallon tank and they're twenty
five inches deep, sixty three by sixty nine inches, perfect size,
(12:53):
one hundred and fifty galanon rubber Maid is a nice
one two one hundred and ten galon.
Speaker 5 (12:58):
Off brand one from TSC is awesome. One to two
hundred hundred bucks.
Speaker 8 (13:01):
For those, but I love those perfect depth to size ratio,
not a lot of evaporation.
Speaker 5 (13:08):
So that's one way.
Speaker 8 (13:09):
The second way to me, there's five percent of the
neighborhood that attracts mature bucks during the daylight, only five percent,
because that's that perfect combination of great fall food.
Speaker 5 (13:23):
It could be your finding this.
Speaker 8 (13:24):
On public land and public land only thing is food
sources are always changing, so that those bucks aren't going
to be there from October to January where they might
be on your private land if you make the right
conditions and you keep food sources and good cover. Could
be marginal, food sources marginal, but if they're not under
pressured and they're consistent all year, then that's where the
(13:44):
mature bucks are going to be. How many times have
you seen mature bucks in a state park that's thirty
acres or neighborhood set aside that's ten acres.
Speaker 5 (13:52):
They're not there because of food plots, feeding.
Speaker 8 (13:55):
Anything, anybody's made any water holes, crated betting areas, they
haven't done anything to the land there, just because it's
marginal food, marginal cover, and it's unpressured.
Speaker 5 (14:03):
It's one area that they can find.
Speaker 8 (14:05):
So you look at that five percent, So I want
to be that property that whatever bucks are left in
the neighborhood. And I'm not sounds selfish, but you're just
trying to do a good job. In anything you do,
you try to do your best. So I want to
have that five percent property. I want to have the
property that diminishes the number of dozen fauns during the summertime.
(14:26):
I don't like a lot of summer food. I want
those dozen fauns to migrate onto the property during hunting
season October November because I have quality food. But I
don't want them there waiting like an army for my
fall food to arrive in August in September when I
plant those food plots. So I want to minimize the
number of fawns and doze on the property by even
We have a product that we plant, It's called rut
(14:48):
zone from our food pot Seat company. It has beans
in it, but we plant that July first or later
early July pre probably because I want those dozen fawns
to fawn somewhere else traditional fawning grounds. I want them
off the p property preferred, and.
Speaker 5 (15:02):
Then they'll come on later.
Speaker 8 (15:03):
But I don't want them there during July and August pounding.
Some of our fall foods, and that's one of them.
I want to plant beans later July first short short
day bean so that I can get.
Speaker 5 (15:13):
That to grow.
Speaker 8 (15:14):
So you minimize the number of dozen fonts, you maximize
the number of mature bucks in your property, which is
only five percent of the neighborhood during the daylight. And
that way you're I'm not saying your EHD proof in
your property, but what you're doing is giving yourself a
competitive advantage to actually be the property in the area
that's the influencer.
Speaker 5 (15:32):
And if you're in.
Speaker 8 (15:33):
A dry region and you don't have water holes that
are full of mud and receding cracked mud and drying mud,
then to me, that's one more way you protect those
mature box on your property. If they spend the majority
of their time on your property. Do you know at night,
most dear drink by eating green vegetation. So if they're
(15:55):
eating green vegetation all night because they're out in the
open aggfields, they don't need to take a drink of wie.
Speaker 5 (16:00):
They come back on your land during the daylight. You
don't have mud.
Speaker 8 (16:03):
Holes surrounded by a dry and crack and receding mud
that propagate the EHD midge in a lot of those ways,
just by housing those mature box during the daylight the most,
by being a five percent property, by reducing the number
or eliminating if you can waterhole or mudhole areas on
your property, then to me, you can have a fighting
(16:24):
chance against EHD.
Speaker 5 (16:26):
And again, I feel sorry for it if you guys,
if that.
Speaker 8 (16:28):
Happens, because I know I've been with clients almost in tears,
you know, where they've built deer herds for three or
four years and then just to have wiped out.
Speaker 5 (16:37):
And I haven't gone through.
Speaker 8 (16:38):
It personally, but I've personally experienced it with clients and
friends and it sucks, it really does. So those are
the few things that you can do to try to
me mitigate by EHD.
Speaker 7 (16:50):
What would you do if if you're Minnesota farm, you know,
if there's a lot of eggs in that basket and
I do not even want to say this, but it's
the question of what would happen and if hypothetically snap
your fingers, then you're like, oh my gosh, somehow we
did get hammered and I lost eighty percent of you know,
the age structure on this farm. What would you do
for the season other than cry, maybe.
Speaker 8 (17:14):
I try to identify that one mature black left that
I could hunt, and if that wasn't the case, you know,
then I would be happy to monitor the herd enjoy
taking care of the land. We have lots of pheasant
on our property. And I'm not saying that the pheasants,
(17:36):
the grouse and the rabbits and the birds, butterflies, bees
that we house on the property, our turkey nesting polt,
all our turkeys. I'm not saying that that would, you know,
take that sting away from losing that white tail herd.
But it be a focus of mine that I would
turn my attention to because we do that year round anyways.
(17:57):
You know, we spend so many hours on the property
because we are looking at turkey nesting areas, improving turkey population.
Speaker 5 (18:03):
We have lots of groups on the property, lots of pheasant.
Speaker 8 (18:06):
It just miles of peasant habitat edge and turkey nesting,
and so I would focus on that, and then I'd
look at trying to go north a little bit or
find areas core areas on public land where I could hunt,
and we hunt public land every year. Will be out
to Pennsylvania again, out in the hills out in the
Federal forest there that I've been going to since ninety three.
Speaker 5 (18:27):
I go back to.
Speaker 8 (18:27):
Michigan often, I think the last time was three years
ago to hunt public land, and so public.
Speaker 5 (18:33):
Land has always been in my roots.
Speaker 8 (18:34):
And I'd go find a non EHD exposed public land
to hunt somewhere because I gotta scratch that white till
itch and then at home I take care of the
critters and enjoy it.
Speaker 5 (18:45):
Yeah it sucked.
Speaker 8 (18:56):
Yeah, no one wants to think it would be horrible,
but you know, you know, you just try to turn
your focus on other things. And what I've tried to
do in life at the age of fifty five is
I hate this expression.
Speaker 5 (19:09):
It is what it is.
Speaker 8 (19:10):
But if you live a little bit by that looking
at like, you can't you can't control, you can't worry
about the things you can't change in life. If you
worry about things and you let them get you down,
including hunting, you can really drag you down into precious
So I'd prefer to focus on Yep, that happened. It
(19:30):
was bad, and this goes to life too. We can't
do anything about it. We'll make better decisions next time,
or we'll just you know, we'll deal with it and
you move on and stay positive.
Speaker 4 (19:45):
Next, we have Don Higgins, and his advice here is
very straightforward. And if you are in this scenario, or
maybe if you artists feeling not very confident going into
this season, I think Don's advice right here is going
to be a gentle nudge of him urgement. So here
we go. This is what Down's gonna do. If of
the deer just got wiped out to EHD, the midgefly
(20:07):
came in and caused havoc on his farm.
Speaker 9 (20:10):
Well, I'd let my trail cameras tell me the story.
Is your target buck really dead? Is there another target
buck that you'd want to go after that you're still
getting pictures of? If not, go somewhere else, I mean,
there's no sense in right and off your season. I mean,
the United States is a big country. I've never heard
of EHD wiping out the entire country. Go somewhere where
there's still deer. You may not get the hunted as often,
(20:33):
you may have to wait till weekends or your vacation
instead of hunting every evening, but still don't give up.
It goes back to the saying that I've I've repeated
many times, find a solution, don't make excuses, find solutions,
and there's always a solution.
Speaker 7 (20:51):
Do you think some guys, I mean, unfortunately areas get
hit by EHD and a common thing is houser season
hot even hunt got we got hit by eu H
And do you think it's just maybe they didn't really
want to hunt that bad.
Speaker 9 (21:04):
Well, I think it comes down to priorities and they
probably got something else they like to do at that
time of the year. I mean, I can't imagine they're
sitting home staring at the ceiling and they're probably into
football or something like that, and that takes their time.
For guys like me, there is no alternative. It's been
chasing big deer three hundred and sixty five days a year,
and it doesn't matter what month it is, I'm doing
(21:26):
something related to chasing big deer. And I totally get
it that not everybody is that serious about it. But
if your goal is to kill giants, it better be
pretty high on your priority list or it's not going
to happen at least consistently.
Speaker 4 (21:42):
Next up, we have Bobby Kendall. Bobby has a lot
of intel across the Midwest, and when you have a
lot of different places that you're in tune with, more
than likely one area may get snipped by EHD. Here
is his approach, And these are always usually based off
of rumors, and sometimes there's room of catastrophic devastation to
(22:02):
the white tailed deer herd, and sometimes maybe it's going
out of proportion. So here's Bobby Kendall on what his
perspective is when it comes to facing EHD.
Speaker 7 (22:11):
Head on my area that I this has been hammered
by EHD.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
My season's over.
Speaker 7 (22:15):
I'm gonna get eight more fantasy football teams because my
season's over.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
Is that is that the right approach? And where do
I start?
Speaker 5 (22:23):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (22:23):
This is this is your mindset.
Speaker 10 (22:25):
So like if EHD hits your farm and it's the
only place that you're hunting, yeah you're I mean ninety
percent chance that you're kind of screwed, you know, probably,
But this is where you know, a lot of these
conversations today have come back to good hunters. Great hunters.
You know, you have to get good at finding deer,
(22:48):
So you got to go out and find more places.
You can't just sit around and hope. And you know,
now I'll kind of talk about this from a different angle,
you know, deer strategy, and my opinion, it starts. A
lot of guys we deal with they haven't even bought
a farm yet. So those guys are it's really good
because you can have this conversation on the front end.
(23:09):
Deer strategy is not just this stuff, the food plot
and everything. It's your spread of farm. So a lot
of these guys are buying multiple farms, or they want
a four hundred acre farm or an eight hundred acre farm.
And part of your dear strategy is not pigeonholing yourself
into one, into a situation where you get wiped out
(23:32):
by EHD. So instead of buying a four hundred, maybe
buy two two hundreds. Maybe buy four to one hundreds
instead of buying one hundred, Maybe by two fifties. Instead
of leasing a two hundred, maybe you lease a fifty
to a one to fifty. The more pieces you can
have always, the better you're going to be off. You
have to have a great, big piece before it's like okay,
you know this makes sense. You are so much better
(23:54):
doing your part on fifty acres and sampling a thousand
or twelve hundred or eighteen hundred acres than you are
having eighteen hundred and sampling twenty four hundred. You know
what I mean. You can take that same thousand acres
in ten pieces and sample ten thousand acres. So getting
ahead of that problem. You know, that's all part of
(24:15):
your dear strategy game. And you know, so don't don't
get in a position where you're screwed because your farm
got wiped out by EHD.
Speaker 5 (24:23):
I guess what I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (24:24):
So go go knock on some doors.
Speaker 10 (24:25):
Go knock on some doors if you're in that situation,
and start trying to change course so it doesn't happen again.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
Yeah, because it does suck. There, you guys have it.
Speaker 7 (24:34):
Next, we have Thomas mills Now he's in Wisconsin, and
I think his approach here is going to be very
interesting on what to do if you're handcuffed to the
farm and is it worth paying attention?
Speaker 4 (24:46):
Is it worth picking up a different hobby this fall.
Here's what Thomas Millson has to say. All right, I've
been hearing rumors it's been really dry. I think I
smelled the dead deer. Sure enough, my whole farm was
hammered by EHD, What do I do now?
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Well, this year, you certainly don't have to worry about
it being dry if you're in the Midwest. But ESG
is a weird thing because it can be so isolated
in those pockets, and it happens a lot. Right Just
this last year, just south of here, a friend of
mine all their target books dead up by us. No
problem at all. There's not a lot that you can do,
(25:27):
to be honest. The first thing I'm gonna do is
a thorough examination of my farm, my property itself, and
figure out again is there anything that we can do
to get ahead of this problem in the future.
Speaker 5 (25:39):
And then the next thing.
Speaker 2 (25:40):
I'm gonna do is I'm gonna hunt. I'm gonna hunt
like normal. I'm gonna observe my property, I'm gonna observe
the habitat deer movement. I'm gonna act as if there's
a mature buck on the property as much as possible.
But I also might pick up an out of state hunt,
or maybe do something out west, or maybe do some
low impact dope control, depending on you know, the quality.
(26:01):
If I heard in general, obviously, if EHD just hit
you really hard and killed a lot dear, you probably
don't want to go and kill a bunch of does,
but if it just took out a few of your
older age class bucks, which tends to happen, right, We've
got a lot more sensitive vascular tissue on a buck
like that for those flies to bite, so that happens
quite a bit.
Speaker 3 (26:19):
But I'm going to just try to feel it out.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
And remember, every year's a building year on a property,
every year's building year.
Speaker 5 (26:27):
So again, this.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
Year somewhat of a bus Still a lot of things
that we can do to enjoy our time out there.
Maybe I'll spend more time taking my kids hunting. Maybe
I'll try and get them on the DOS or some management, dear,
whatever it might be. But I'm also looking at that
property and going, okay, what is the cause of something
like this? You know, I think one of the big
things we like to blame ponds, water holes and stuff
(26:48):
like that, which is partially true, yes, but from a
holistic standpoint, we also need to look at what are
the natural predators of this midge that spreads the and
we don't provide very good habitat for those animals either. Birds, spiders,
dragonflies are probably the biggest predators of insects like that,
(27:11):
midges and also mosquitoes alike. Dragonflies need similar water. They
need open water. The stuff that we look at and
go that's stagnant water, that's a mosquito haven. Mosquitoes can
breed in you a thimble of water. Dragonflies need a
lot more water. And when you have a healthy habitat
for water water, predators like that, like the dragonflies, they'll
(27:34):
feed on the midge in the larval state, they'll feed
on mosquitos in the larval state in that water, and
then they'll also catch them out of the air. So
it's kind of kind of twofold there, right, But it
goes back to the habitat. If we have a lot
better native habitat that supports a lot of healthier insect
populations than we have the predatory insects in that ecosystem
that also feed on that midge, and that reduces all
(27:56):
that stuff. So a lot of these problems that we
face as deer hunters, we have created ourselves not just
as hunters but as humans and habitat loss and destruction
and pesticides and all these things that are killing all
the things out there, and then just a select handful
of these pests can survive these situations. And it also
goes back to healthier deer. You know, healthy food plots,
(28:17):
getting a lot of mineral content into the forage so
it's actually nutrient dense and not just this, you know,
a lush, green, empty calorie meal for them. We get
as much vitamins in there as possible. I run goats
in the woods, right, the best way to combat biting
insects on goats is to make sure that they have
access to minerals. Trace minerals all the time. When the
(28:40):
mineral content is up in their body, their blood changes.
It makes them a lot healthier. The same as true
for deer, and deer don't hit mineral licks all the time.
So having mineral licks out I think is also a
good idea where it's legal. But if it's not legal,
there then having really really high quality food plots and
really high quality native vegetation. So here we go all
(29:00):
the way back around. Native vegetation really good for the
insects that are going to kill the midges.
Speaker 5 (29:05):
Native vegetation, deep root.
Speaker 2 (29:07):
Systems, a lot of minerals, a lot of good protein,
creates a lot healthier animals and also doesn't concentrate them
so much in certain areas. That's going to be that
full circle, holistic approach to improving your property to combat EHD.
And we're also going to address those water sources too
and try to mitigate the muddy water sources like that too,
(29:27):
So it all goes hand in hand.
Speaker 4 (29:29):
Without further ado, we are going to close this out
with Mark Kenyon on his perspective on this specific topic.
Speaker 7 (29:36):
Here we go, right, I've been hearing rumors, mumbles. I
think my whole area is got wiped out by EHD.
It's September. My season is completely different than what I thought. Potentially,
what do I do well? Good news badness on the situation.
The bad news is that I probably have the worst
(29:59):
answer anyone today in today's episode because I've never personally
had to experience this. But that's also the good news.
I've never had a personal experience. Yes, so I've worried
about it, and in last year actually was maybe the
time in the last like fifteen years where I thought
this might have happened the most likely, And so I
have these questions and I was like, ooh, is this
(30:20):
what's going on? Is this why they all disappeared. Is
this what's happening? So I lived this a little bit
last year, but I've never had it actually confirmed and
really truly blow things up for me. So I think
that what I did last year is that I searched
and hoped him, prayed and kept hoping him, praying that
they were around somewhere that just de your behavior change
(30:42):
or pressure had changed, and something had pushed these bucks
out of their usual patterns. I definitely paid a lot
of extra attention to water when I was out hunting
during the season or doing some final prep work there
in the late August early September, because that's typically where
you're to find deer from EHD. They go to water,
(31:02):
So I was always watching for that. I was asking neighbors.
I was like, hey, are you finding dead deer? Have
you seen any sign of this? Are you're smelling anything funky?
Like I'm wondering if this is what's going on, So
just just allow the detective work to try to confirm.
That didn't end up turning anything out, And so I
think if there were rumors, that's what I would be
doing to try to confirm. If I was in a
(31:23):
situation where it is confirmed and I start finding dead
deer or I start hearing about it happening, and it
seems like the deer that I'm after that year, or
whatever mature bucks were around, or toast. I think, then
you've got two options. One of these options is hopefully
you are prepared for both these six I think the
key thing is this. I mentioned this on a different episode.
(31:46):
One of the most important things to consistent deer hunting
success is having a diversified portfolio. If you were dependent
on any one deer, or any one property or any
one area.
Speaker 3 (31:59):
You are putting your your house.
Speaker 7 (32:01):
Of cards is a serious risk because it could all
come tumbling down if you have one bad case of HD,
or if you have one neighbor who shoots the one
buck here after whatever. There's so many things can happen
if you are dependent on this one thing. So I
try to make sure that I have multiple areas that
can hunt, multiple properties that can hunt, multiple deer I
can hunt and or well, I guess, and public opportunities
(32:24):
as well. So having many private accesses is great. If
you have those opportunities, or if you own a farm
or multiple farms, whatever it is, whatever your circumstances are,
Supplementing that with public land is a great way to
have more options, so that if EHD does blow up
your core place, it's not like AH says, is over,
I'm doomed. It's okay. Pivot, what's Plan B, what's Plan C?
(32:47):
What's planned? And if you don't have a BC or D,
then it's you know, hitting the hitting the doors, you know,
hitting the road, knocking on doors, trying to get last
in the permission, talking to friends, talking to your network.
You know, it's amazing if you start asking about hunting opportunities,
and even today where there are so many people trying
(33:08):
to get access, there are still opportunities to get permission
in places if you ask enough, if you talk, if
you find creative ways to help people out, people will
help you back. So even in this case where your
property gets destroyed and there's maybe nothing you want to
hunt anymore, I certainly wouldn't want to hang it up
for the year. I would say, all right, well, now
(33:30):
what do I need to do.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
How do you make.
Speaker 7 (33:31):
Something out of the situation, and how do I find
like a silver lining to this? This is a great
opportunity to go and do that thing that you've always
thought someday I'll do it that brand new adventure, traveling
out of state to some new place, or learning a
piece of public land. You've always thought, man, that looks
pretty good. But I've always had this great farm hunt.
This is the year when you have ESG hit where
your planing a disappears. That's the year ticked flyer, Go
(33:54):
do something new, Go try a new technique, a new area,
learn some new lessons, because they have nothing to lose
and only new opportunities and learnings to gain. So I
would view EHD as an unfortunate pivot point that you
should try to make the best of. Yeah, I think
that's the best thing you can do. I mean, sitting
(34:16):
there and sulking for the whole year probably is doing
a human And you know, this is a more occurring issue,
and that's why this was a question that I asked
eight people, and everyone had a different level of experience
with EHD, and that the general consensus was.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
Move on.
Speaker 7 (34:34):
I mean, that's all you could probably do and obviously
verify that there was an issue, because EHD is always
a rumor. It's always oh so and so heard from
so and so that there was a bunch of dead deer,
and so that kind of perpetuates a lot of panic,
and maybe sometimes it's over sensationalized, and sometimes maybe it's
very accurate. And so I think you had to figure
out what that is, and that was the general consensus.
Speaker 3 (34:56):
So that's the HD.
Speaker 7 (34:58):
I hope everyone listening to this does not have to
experience this issue. And I hopefully this is a trend
that becomes less popular and occurs less often, but it's
something that's really real right now, and so that's why
we asked that. But next week we have a really
I guess, kind of somewhat philosophical question of how can
we make the next twenty five years of hunting beer
(35:18):
hunting better than the last twenty five And we have
a great variety of answers, and I hope you guys
tune in next week.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Obviously, it is.
Speaker 4 (35:25):
My wish here that no one has to experience this,
but it is an issue that is becoming.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
More and more prevalent.
Speaker 4 (35:31):
There's a lot of people that are hypothesizing different solutions
and trying to hopefully mitigate the problems with EHD, and
hopefully there's a solution in the future. There's obviously some
things that people talked about from a habitat perspective of
what you could potentially.
Speaker 3 (35:45):
Do, and this is the reality of the situation right now.
Speaker 4 (35:48):
Like I said in the very beginning, Ohio unfortunately is
facing this once again. There was parts of Illinois last
year that got hit and this seems like every single
year there's pocketed regions that get really hurt by EHD.
So hopefully this episode doesn't hit home. But unfortunately, if
you're in the Midwest, you can almost earmark this because
probably in the next few years, or the next five
(36:08):
years or ten years, this is something that you're unfortunately
likely going to face as things sit today.
Speaker 3 (36:13):
So that is it.
Speaker 4 (36:14):
We are closing out the back forty series here pretty soon.
We have one more episode that I hope you guys
will enjoy. It's a very overarching, big picture, more philosophical
question that I wanted to get perspective from all of
these guests.
Speaker 3 (36:27):
So that is it. We will see you next time.
See you
Host
Mark Kenyon
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