Ep. 950: Back 40 - What Can You Do to Make the Next 25 Years of Deer Hunting Better? - Wired To Hunt Podcast

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
There's so much that one person can do. People discredit
themselves and they minimize the value they have so much.
One person can really change the course of things if
they're ambitious enough, if that's their calling.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
If you will, welcome to Back forty.

Speaker 3 (00:15):
I'm J Koefer, and this week we are diving into
a larger question about what can one single person do
to make the next twenty five years of hunting better
than the last. If you're listening to this, obviously you
want the world of white tal hunting to improve. And
so I asked all of the folks we've been talking
to for the last eight weeks this specific question, and

(00:35):
I'm hoping it sparks some inspiration and you'll pick up
a couple of things that will allow you to maybe
be a positive influence on the grander picture of white
tail hunting, something that we're all passionate about. If you're
listening to this podcast, as you know, Back forty is
brought to you by land dot com, the leading online
real estate marketplace to find your perfect rural, recreational, agricultural,

(00:56):
or hunting properties here in the US. Let's go ahead
and kick things off with Skip Sly on his perspective.
Skip has been one guy that has been very instrumental
of protecting Iowa, making it while remain one of the
best dates from just the simple back of keeping strong
legislation for residents. And I think that if Skip can
do it, and I know he would say this too,

(01:17):
you can do it. And here's what he has to say.
What can one hunter do to make the next twenty
five years of hunting better than the last? So not
collectively just one guy?

Speaker 1 (01:32):
Oh uh, there's so much that one person can do,
and there's so people discredit themselves and they minimize the
value they have so much that one person can really
change the course of things if they're ambitious enough, if

(01:53):
that's their calling, if you will, you know, I think
there's a few dynamics. Even at a basic level. Somebody's like, well, dude,
I'm not like crazy ambitious or I'm just the regular dude.
But that's all that. We're all just regular dudes. It's
just like, where do you want to fit into this? Well,
you know, let's just say that the milder ambitious type

(02:13):
that are guys that are like I just kind of
coast through life, which is fine. I'm not making a
job at all, but I just kind of you know,
I don't want to go to extremes. Well, a minor
impact would be like not cliche again, but like take
kids out, get some kids involved. We need more kids hunting,
We need more kids taking the sport up.

Speaker 2 (02:35):
And it sounds.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
Cliche to say that, but it's actually true. Well, I
don't want I wish there was less hunters. You don't
wish there was more less kids that had opportunity at
this Maybe you wish that there were less middle aged
knucklehead hunters that were just there to take that ruin
the resource that we're just idiots or disrespectful or that
kind of sour you on the sport because they are

(02:57):
idiots and there's you know, bad apples in every group.
But you don't want genuine kids with a passion for
the outdoors not to hunt. So at a basic level,
you can change that. You can impact, Like one person
could take you know, twenty kids out through the next
decade and make an impact on twenty kids' lives, which
they'll impact other people later. So there's one dynamic that

(03:20):
can change hunting. You know, getting involved in the regulations
could be as simple as who's doing anything for regulations
in my state, and you find out who that is,
how can I help? And I email into my legislator
because that makes a huge difference. I can actually speak
in public that I I'll go to a subcommittee meeting

(03:43):
at the capital of my state. I will show up.
And then you might be the case where you're like,
who's the group that does this for my state? Oh,
there isn't one. Well, you could be that person that
forms that. And the way you're going to form that
is be like, yeah, I do have six friends with
a common goal, and maybe one of them is that

(04:06):
super ambitious type and he'll kind of run with it
and he knows how to start a business, or he
knows how to you know, manage things and growth things,
or run an organization or get how to get a
group of people together that can get along with a
common goal and just support them or be involved.

Speaker 2 (04:23):
So so you could be the guy.

Speaker 1 (04:25):
That's just emailing your legislators and I'll take the time
to email all of them on these issues that come up,
keep up with the bills I've always been.

Speaker 2 (04:33):
I'll chime into Iowa like I'll pay attention.

Speaker 3 (04:36):
I'll send the emails out and I'm always shocked by
the amount of replies I actually get and like you
whoa you actually an assistant or whoever, someone actually read
my email because it wasn't just received.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
Thank you. Yes, that's always shocked me. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:49):
So so think about if anybody wanted to educate themselves
a little bit, think about what Iowa was doing to
defend against the special ene that want to exploit our resource,
they want to ruin it, that want to just kill
all the deer. We have groups and a growing army

(05:10):
of hunters who are like, no, this is wrong. You
aren't going to destroy or say you're not going to
exploit it for your little special interest or exploit it
or short term benefit so you can make a little money.
Not happening in our state. You want to do that
stuff in Illinois. That's that's how it's done there. It's
not happening in Iowa. So we're run by common sense

(05:31):
in Iowa. And if somebody says, well, I want to
take this to the most extreme ambitious level, run your
state like Iowa. Get it, get an organization in place,
you know, and it can't be one guy that but
you might be that one guy that forms the organization,
but that organization will start out with like, hey, you know,
I got twelve guys on board. One of them's good

(05:53):
talking to people, one of them's good with accounting, one
of them is a lawyer, one of them runs a business.
They all have these different skills and like and I
would be like that. Like I I try and take
on everything myself with whether it's the farm, and I
realize I can't.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
There's certain things I'm not good at.

Speaker 1 (06:08):
Know what you're not good at, And I have things
that I'm not good at, well, I know, like within
an organization, Like I know, I have kind of an
intense personality and I I you know, I might have
to even dial that back at times when I get
really fired up. But I want somebody a part of
the organization who's kind of like chill and like the

(06:31):
guy that can be like the calm rational and not
that I'm irrational, but you know, just different personalities. I
think diversity of personality is huge. And just realize with
any organization that people start, if it falls on one
guy's shoulders, it will not succeed because something could happen
to that one guy. You know, it could be anything

(06:52):
from that guy dies to he gets burnt out to, hey, dude,
I just had you know, my wife just had triplets,
and now i'm you know, I'm trying baseball or something,
and I'm just so busy. Life happens and people get busy.
So it has to be like at least twelve guys
that form this organization, and you know there and maybe
three of them like go mia for six months, and

(07:15):
you bring them back in and you constantly grow it.
So you're like, now there's not twelve, Now there's fifty,
and at least somebody's contributing at some level, and just
create an organization that can just mimic or rival all
the organizations that most people don't even understand exist in
your state to do everything against your resource, everything against

(07:38):
your regulations. I mean there is in your state. I
don't care who's lessening wherever they are. There is organizations,
lobbying groups, special interests, companies, manufacturers that have systems in
place to exploit your resource, to ruin it, to screw
up the regulations, or just to make just dumb choices
on regulations. And they need a counterway. And in most

(08:00):
of these states they've never had a counterweight. So if
you want to make the most difference, fix your own state,
form an organization.

Speaker 2 (08:08):
That's very simple.

Speaker 1 (08:09):
We're talking like, how much funding would we need if
we were really rocking in my state filling the blank.

Speaker 4 (08:17):
Illinois, Illinois?

Speaker 1 (08:18):
You would need more money because that system so corrupt
in Illinois. Really, you'd probably need like you need to
hire a lobbyists. You need to have dozens of guys
form a group and grow that group with membership, and
you'd need to have a budget of like maybe one
hundred thousand dollars a year. One hundred thousand dollars a year. Yeah,

(08:41):
most you guys in Illinois, I know a gazillion people
in Illinois are like, yeah, that new Playeri's fourth heater
was fifty grand. My hunting lease was seventy five dollars
an acre. Yeah, I spent eight grand on this hunting
ground right here.

Speaker 2 (08:56):
That is okay, there's.

Speaker 1 (08:59):
That amount of money, especially in Illinois. It's not a
huge sum. One hundred thousand bucks, a lot of members
and a lobbyist where all the money goes to fighting
the cause and stays in Illinois, and everybody donates their time,
but you work collectively could start to make a difference
in Illinois. You could actually fix that state with that

(09:19):
simple recipe. Put in a pot, Put twelve hardcore guys
with knowledge, passion, and skills, throw one hundred thousand dollars
with them. Hire the right lobbyists. Five years from now,
two years from now. I mean, you can start making progress.
But that system has been flushed down the toilet for
so long you're trying to reverse that. Right, it's not

(09:42):
going to happen overnight, and nothing's a guarantee, and human nature, like,
you can't get frustrated, you can't get give up. If
you have a dozen guys, you're not going to agree
on everything. You have to be mature enough to be like,
we don't agree on these things, that's fine. There's three
issues out of twenty we don't agree on, and some
one guy in the group might be like, well, if
you have that view, I'm out. You know, I'm gonna

(10:03):
take my ball and go home. You can't have guys
like that. You can't or you have to be mature
enough not to do that. And if you do that,
that's how these states will get fixed. And this is
happening in several states, and several of these states will
get fixed over time, like a small minority of them.
But you know, we're so many of these states are

(10:28):
going to have to hit rock bottom and you know,
just collapse in themselves.

Speaker 2 (10:36):
Before they improve.

Speaker 1 (10:38):
But there's some other ones that like, hey, the hunters
could grat could get it before it did hit rock
bottom and start to just counteract all the bad garbage
that's gone through their state for just decades and they
can turn it around. I mean, my my loose goal
if you will, if you're like, hey, you know ambitiously,
because I always think of things to the extremes, like nursery,

(11:00):
I do everything, everything's big, into the extreme, everything I do,
or I just don't take it on. But like, if
somebody's like, what do you want to do with hunting?
I want to make hunting better across the country. I
want it to be a better experience for kids, for
the next generation that come after me.

Speaker 2 (11:17):
That's my goal.

Speaker 1 (11:18):
I want to impact the hunting world, you know, until
my dying day. I want to get more kids involved.
I want to leave the hunting experience better than what
I found it better. And I have a real concern
that you know, in the last twenty years, we've gone
in the wrong direction in a lot of ways, in
a lot of ways, and I want to reverse that.

(11:39):
I want to see that reverse and you go. Anybody,
anybody might say, what's in it for you? What's your
motivation there? I want to give back. I want I
want kids to have great experiences. I think of the
kid that was me living in this in the city,
in a town with you know, I had a lot
of maniac friends that would probably that probably got into

(12:02):
bad stuff later, and all of a sudden, I'm like,
I found this little thing outside of town driving on
my bike of the outdoors and farms and nature and
then hunting, and I got into that and it was
amazing experience.

Speaker 2 (12:18):
And then my brothers the same thing.

Speaker 1 (12:19):
They got into it too, and we were all city
boys and nobody hunted, nobody in our family hunted, and
we found that and it's like, oh, it was amazing
and still like I mean, I can think about it,
it's like it's like yesterday. But the nostalgia of that,
like getting into the outdoors, and I still like it
to this day, like that, I still love being out
there like that. And how I want that.

Speaker 2 (12:38):
For the kids.

Speaker 1 (12:39):
They deserve that, the kids, especially they deserve a quality experience,
and they deserve for us hunters with some maturity who
understand these dynamics to fight for them, to leave this
a better space for them. When we know we're doing
these things that are some of the time, that are selfish,
that are ruining in the sports. Our duty to stop
all this crap that's going through and fix it for

(13:01):
these kids. It's our freaking duty. And I want to
see that and society will be better for it. These
kids will be better for it. And if somebody says,
like I said before, I'm going to repeat myself. But
if somebody says, well, I want there to be less hunters, Okay, fine,
the irresponsible, disrespectful hunters that are just there to take fine,
I could even maybe agree with that. I want less
of those, But I want more of these kids to

(13:23):
get out of maybe bad situations, have a good influence
in their life and have the experiences that I have.
And I don't want them to get into it now
where they're like it sucks so bad. I don't even
want to do this, Like, yeah, I tried that hunting thing.

Speaker 2 (13:36):
It sucks.

Speaker 5 (13:37):
It was lame.

Speaker 1 (13:39):
They just threw me on a corn pile and you know,
wait until the cell cam went off and I shot
it with my cross. But I'm not going to stick
with it. I want them to have a good quality experience.
But like, this was fun, this was challenging, it was hard,
but it was rewarding, and it was a good quality
system and I actually had access to good quality land.
All these dynamics want to leave this better for as.

Speaker 2 (14:01):
Next up we have Bill Winki.

Speaker 3 (14:02):
Bill has seen the sport of whitetail hunting change, or
I guess the world of whitetails change over the last
twenty five years. Here's what he has to say, as
just one guy that can improve it for the next
twenty five years, what can every hunter do to make
the next twenty five years of deer hunting better than
the last twenty five.

Speaker 6 (14:19):
You've got to lock up.

Speaker 7 (14:23):
The opportunities, you know, and that's you won't necessarily make
it better, but let's put it this way. You'll you'll
guarantee that you're still in the game. You need to
align yourself in some way with a landowner, whether that
means you are that landowner or you know. Usually what

(14:48):
I've found is that if you work besides somebody you
know consistently, they usually don't stab me in the back,
you know. So if you can find a relation ship
where you're helping somebody out and you're doing a lot
of work and they're giving you hunting access, you know
as a result of that, that's a pretty strong position.

(15:09):
If all you're doing is writing them a check. Not
that that doesn't, you know, make some difference. It's not
nearly the same. It's easy to on a business transaction
and say, well, you know, sorry, but this guy you
know who's going to write me a bigger check. So
you have to be a lot more actively involved and

(15:31):
say with maintaining the opportunities that you have, ideally you
would buy. I'm not a huge fan of leasing. It
just feels too temporary to me. You do a lot
of important work to build up the value of that property,
and then there's you know, unless you've got something written
into a contract, they could just lease it to somebody

(15:53):
for more that they could turn around and sell it
because now you've done all this work and you've proven
this track record or this piece of land.

Speaker 6 (16:01):
Doesn't mean everybody's going to do that.

Speaker 7 (16:02):
But that's the only downside I saw the biggest downside
I saw with leasing. I think I'd rather own something
and have permission through however method you can get it.
You know, like I said, working working for it, it
just seems.

Speaker 6 (16:20):
To pay off really well.

Speaker 7 (16:21):
And now you or you just got to get really
good at winning those states that have a lot of
public land. I mean, that's the other option too, is
you know the Western States. There's some really good hunting
in these Western states, and you know, you could become

(16:42):
an expert at that, and that would be that would
probably prove to be as usequal as anything else you
can do. But you can't assume. You can't assume status quo.
I guess that's the bottom line. Yeah, be looking forward
and saying this isn't if I don't own it, if
I don't control it, this is temporary. So I need

(17:04):
to do something in order to ensure the next twenty
five years.

Speaker 6 (17:11):
And you know that's why I started buying land. You know,
I didn't.

Speaker 7 (17:16):
I love land, you know, but I didn't buy it
because I thought it would be a great investment.

Speaker 6 (17:19):
I didn't. I didn't think it would. It turned out
that it was, but you know, I didn't.

Speaker 7 (17:25):
Think that it would be. I just wanted to know
I had a place to hunt. Yeah, and then it
just kind of led to a whole lifestyle after that
that you got to do something. You can't just sit
back and assume that it's going to work out, because
it won't, not even twenty five years.

Speaker 3 (17:40):
Yeah, what with the farm you've been working on recently
and doing a lot of a lot of heavy lifting,
a lot of heavy projects. What is the motivation for
that looking decades away rather than you know, next season,
because you're doing a lot of projects that take a
long time to have, you know, major responses or positive returns.

Speaker 6 (18:01):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (18:02):
For me, the fun on this farm is, uh, there
weren't that many deer to start with, you know. So
it's the first time I've ever owned land where there
weren't very many deer on it. So I thought I
can take this thing from scratch and do it right
where it's just not a constant war. I'm trying to
get my numbers down every year, you know. I saw,
you know, I need to keep the foot my foot

(18:24):
on the brake. But that's not the number one management goal,
whereas almost everything else I've owned, it seems like the
number one management goal is killing up those over here.

Speaker 6 (18:34):
But you know, now I can do the habitat first,
you know where gosh, the deer that.

Speaker 7 (18:42):
Are on my farm now, I mean, they don't hardly
come out of the woods because the habitat is so
good and there's.

Speaker 6 (18:48):
So much food in the timber that they're just completely different.
They act completely different from deer that I've bunted in
the past that are more stressed.

Speaker 7 (18:58):
Because there's a lot of deer, you're competing more and
you've got to be the first one to get to
the clover or whatever. These dear don't have any of
that urgency. As a result, they're a little bit tougher
to hunt. But they're just maybe not temper to hunt.
They're just different. It's it's a different style of hunting
them what I'm used to because I'm used to deer
that are more on your stress or you can get
them out of the open and keep your impact really

(19:20):
low because you're just coming and going in open areas.
These dear don't do that. I don't come out. But
the whole thing is like, Okay, if we do this perfectly.
I remember reading doctor Brentwood's book a long time ago.
I've got it in the bookshelf here I s happened,
I think goes white Tail Management one oh one or
something like that, and he said that if you want

(19:40):
to grow the very biggest possible bucks, you've got to
have a lower density and you've got to have the
highest possible plane of forage, lowest stress possible. So I thought, Okay,
here's my chance. You know, on this farm, I have
the opportunity to see what can be done because most

(20:01):
of the people who are killing really big deer that
you know, have farms of one deer on and you know,
I could we could go through the list and yeah,
they're killing big deer, but it'd be fun to know
what those deer would look like if there wasn't that competition.

Speaker 6 (20:17):
You know, what is possible. And I'm a few years
away from knowing.

Speaker 7 (20:21):
That, because we're just starting to get those age classes
filled now. But I think that's that's probably my number
one reason for it. I want to see, you know,
before I die, what's possible. It'll be nice if the
neighborhood was you know, if I controlled more, because you're
still going to get some attrition, you know, from the

(20:42):
deer leaveing and getting killed someplace else. But at least
I can find out on a propert size that I.

Speaker 6 (20:48):
Have what can be done. Because this is the perfect
setup right now. I mean, it's never going to get better,
you know.

Speaker 7 (20:56):
As far as like the density, you know what I control,
the type of train that I've got, the amount of
food that I've got, you know, what is possible? I
guess is the question. And you know, I might be
humbled by it, and I become to a conclusion that
you know that sothern I have a farm with too
many deer on was better, you know, But it'd be

(21:16):
fun to find out this is going to be This
will be the perfect fo when I'm that that's I guess.
That's what I'm saying, is as perfect as one man
can make it.

Speaker 3 (21:25):
Yeah, yeah, well that'll be fun. When do you feel
that you get to do a check in to know
if you did the right.

Speaker 7 (21:29):
Thing five years in So this is year four, okay,
you know, I think it takes five years. So next year,
after next season, that's when you know, I have a
really good feel for how effective this was. It continues
to get better. You know, we didn't show all the
ship and outmuchs that we found, you know, there's you

(21:52):
just don't necessarily want to draw a lot of attention,
you know, But it's every year it's seemed better, you know.
It's just a question of how much better can it get.
And we'll start to see that in two more seasons
after the this is twenty twenty five, after the twenty
twenty six season, check in with me again, and then
I'll be able to tell you whether this worked or

(22:14):
didn't work.

Speaker 3 (22:15):
Yeah, I think if it does work, I think you'll
challenge a lot of philosophies of and also and also
provide a lot more patience for people who want instant
return of or like instant gratification of we did this.
One season later, it's forty percent better, And maybe there's

(22:36):
projects like that. But also, you know, if it was
a two out of ten from when he started, and
five years later it's an eight and a half or nine,
it'll be really interesting see what the perception of that is.

Speaker 6 (22:47):
Well, and that's kind of what I may look forward.

Speaker 7 (22:49):
It's kind of funny too, because in the process of
doing that, everybody kind of rates you off, you know,
because you're just not killing lots of big dear anymore,
and people are thinking I'll kind of lost his time.
Sure he doesn't know what he's doing or whatever, and
there's some of that, but I'm getting older, might touch
fin there's more to it than that. This is uh,
there's a method to the madness, you know, And someday

(23:13):
we'll know. I'll either be you know, smiling, you know,
off into the sunset, or everybody be laughing at me
as I go off into the sunset. But one way
it'll be kind of a cool experitedness to see what's possible.

Speaker 3 (23:27):
Next up we have Thomas Milsner. Thomas is very in
tune of trying to do what's best by the land,
and his perspective is a little bit more focused on that. So,
without further ado, here's what Thomas Millsna.

Speaker 2 (23:38):
Has to say.

Speaker 3 (23:39):
As one guy, one guy listening to this, you as
one guy, me as one guy, what can every hunter
do to make the next twenty five years of deer
hunting better than the last twenty five?

Speaker 8 (23:52):
Both there's so much, but to focus your attention on
the concert aspect. I think it's the absolute most important,
and by that don't buy into the gimmick side of
the industry. Right the hunting and white tail industry is

(24:13):
a fantastic thing, but it's also consuming itself in regards
to focusing too much on this one resource without understanding
the consequences that these other resources are facing. So we
focus on the conservation side of things, focus on that
holistic approach, Right, what can I do to improve this

(24:35):
habitat to make things better for all of these things,
You're gonna have significantly better deer hunting and ensure that
it sticks around. But right now we focus too much
on the deer, then all these other things start to
fade away, and pretty soon all we're going to have
is deer and we're ultimately gonna have to farm them
because we have to provide them with every element that

(24:55):
they need to survive just to keep them going. And
that's not how I want to deer hunt, right, I
want that nature experience. So I think everyone's going to
be a little bit different. I'm sure with the questions
that you get, but are the responses that you get.
But for me, the best thing that we can do
to ensure deer hunting is around for the foreseeable future
wherever really is what we want. Right, But right now,

(25:16):
we need to focus on the immediate problems we face, yeah, exactly,
and make it better than the last twenty five, which
I think we absolutely can do. Is we need to
focus on the habitat and these ecosystems that actually produce
a deer, and also focus on quality over quantity. Right again,
we're not farmers, we're not livestock producers. If I'm a

(25:39):
live stock producer, I'm trying really hard to grow the
biggest animal that I can in the shortest amount of time.
I still want that animal to be healthy, and I
still want my practices that I follow to be good
for the land to ensure that I can run that
animal on the land year in and year out for
as long as possible. It's kind of the same thing,
except we're not trying to make money off of it.
We're trying to build experiences, right, We're trying to recreate

(26:02):
with the situation. So we really need to focus on
the resource itself and what it provides to us and
keep that resource happy, keep those ecosystems happy and healthy
so that it can keep providing that resource to us,
which is the recreation, the food, those experiences, all those
memories that come with it.

Speaker 3 (26:21):
Do you think the importance of private land ties into
the success of the next twenty five years of hunting
because you mentioned handling the habitat and where most activity
for habitat work, good, bad, and different is on private
land one percent.

Speaker 8 (26:39):
I've said this before, actually, I think I said it
on the Wired to Hunt podcasts one time that I truly,
truly believe that land owning hunters, all hunters, but especially
the land owning hunters, have the ability to make a massive, massive,
positive impact in the environmental side of things. Literally think

(27:00):
that they could have the impact that'll save the planet.

Speaker 2 (27:03):
I mean when you take all the private.

Speaker 8 (27:05):
Land and the fact that we have control over that
might not always have the time or the money, but
at least you can stop things from happening, stop habitat loss,
stop development in those areas as much as possible, right
slow play, so, you know, slow this down so we
can turn the ship around. Right now, we're just constantly
trading out native habitat for invasive habitat, altered low production habitat,

(27:30):
whether it's you know, a wood lot that gets logged
and regenerates. All invasives because of a lack of management
and lack of fire, a lack of animals whatever it
might be. Or it's a prairie that gets turned into
a farm field and now it's just monocropped in a cycle,
which you know, maybe it's providing food during part of
the year but not a whole lot the rest of
the year. Or maybe it's an area you know, mixed

(27:53):
habitat doesn't matter, that's now cleared and there's a housing
development or one house with a lawn. You know, that's
a it's a big thing. It goes full circle. You know,
if you're a hunter and you're truly a conservationist and
you've got a five acre lawn at your house, you're
maybe part of the problem more than part of the solution.

Speaker 4 (28:12):
You know.

Speaker 8 (28:12):
It's different if you know, you're the attraction of the
neighborhood and all the kids are coming down and playing ball, Like,
I don't want to take that away from you by
any means. But if you literally just have a lawn
because you like looking at a mode bond, you can
put that back into habitat which is going to provide
refugea or refuge for all sorts of beneficial animals, you know,
depending on the scale, depending on the location. Maybe it's

(28:32):
just insects. Maybe it's insects and birds. Maybe it's more dear,
you know, whatever it might be. But looking at it
that way, where can I improve? Wherever I can improve,
I should improve as much as possible. And doing so,
you know that that gives us the option. Private landowners
absolutely have the ability to make a massive positive impact
if we take a step back and look at things

(28:53):
for what they are. On the other side of things,
public land is extremely important too, you know, so we
definitely need to ban together and fight the fights and
legislation and the people that are trying to take our
resources and turn them into a monetary gain for them
somewhere down the line. Sell us out right, we need
to stick together on that side of things. But you know,

(29:16):
I talk about goals all the time with all my clients, right,
and we talked about goals and becoming a great hunter
versus a good hunter.

Speaker 4 (29:23):
And if you really really.

Speaker 8 (29:24):
Are passionate about hunting and conservation, no matter what situation
you're in, a goal of yours should be to own
a piece of land that you can manage and improve
and create that refugee for wildlife in these native ecosystems.
And if hunting is your motivator for that, that's great,
But we can't lose focus on that resource as a

(29:46):
whole just because we want to kill a deer. You know,
we buy this property and put in all these soybeans
and whatnot and kind of neglect the other half of
it or whatever it might be. We're not really doing
the resource a service, just kind of providing a buffet
for farm animal, you know, scenario type like that. So
we're losing sight on that. But the big picture, we

(30:08):
got a band together. We got to protect the land
that we have and whether it's private or public, and
then we got to work towards improving it and manage
it for the foreseeable future.

Speaker 3 (30:17):
Rolling in right into our next guest, we have Jeff Sturgis.
Let's just go right into it right now. Okay, you're
just one guy. You're just a guy listening to this.
What can every hunter do to make the next twenty
five years of deer hunting better than the last twenty
five years?

Speaker 9 (30:34):
No, you could say, never get into uh rots, there's
a in never get into rots are so broad you know,
you're I'll give you a couple a couple of pointers
that to me that are so important, and this has
been proven to me over and over again. Let's say

(30:54):
in Minnesota, and I'm just gonna go off the top
of my head, we can shoot two to three bucks
a year in Minnesota depending on the tags in southeast
Minnesota and a cut in a CWD area. And I
want to say, in the last five seasons, I think
I've shot seven bucks six bucks.

Speaker 5 (31:14):
I have not shot one of.

Speaker 9 (31:14):
Them from the same stand. Had a history for twelve
years in Wisconsin out of property, and in that twelve
years shot seventeen bucks out of fourteen different stands. I
haven't added up the stats for the one in between
that I had for another eleven twelve years, whatever it was,

(31:37):
but similar statistics. Your favorite stand should be the next
stand you shoot a buck out of, not the last
stand hold no favorites. Has been many favorite stands that
I have not hunted the next year that I shot
a monster out of than the year before, because the
signs were not there that immature buck was in that area.

(31:58):
To hunt that it's one big thing. Always move, always change,
always be a part of the same structure overall of
your hunt planet. It might be that you're still hunting
the same area on public land, the same noll's, the
same benches, the same points. But you can't just go
in and say I'm gonna hunt the same oak tree
every single year and expect success. It's not going to
work those mature bucks that will work every three or

(32:22):
four five years. But I want it to work every
single year times one and a half. You know, I
want to experience more than one hundred percent success every
year if I have two tags. So that's one thing.
The other thing is you can kill them from the couch.
More time in the woods does not equal more hunting.
In fact, I would say I average a mature buck

(32:43):
every six sis somewhere in there, five to seven somewhere
around there. And so by being patient, and I'm not
saying being patient, November sixth is my favorite day to hunt.
So I'm gonna hunt November six in the middle of
my property every year. That's not being patient. That's just
waiting till a certain day. That's being stuck in a rut.
Why are you going into that stand in November six

(33:04):
What conditions led you to that? Why what pattern is
that as a buck showing that's there? That's not what
I'm saying I'm saying that it's September seventeenth, that your opener,
it's eighty five degrees. You have a buck pattern, you
know by summer scouting cameras, visual binoculars, sitting on a
fence row, watching that this buck is coming out to

(33:27):
a specific food source. Every single afternoon it's eighty five degrees,
thirty mile an hour winds. That is not the day
to go sit on that stand. Likely he might not
move because of the winds. He might not move because
of the heat. However, two days later, the high is
going to be sixty seven. There's a major storm coming
through that night the next day. I'm going to wait
those two days and I'm going to go in and hunt.

(33:48):
That's what I mean by being patient. Is doesn't mean
that you're waiting til November fifth. It means that when
the conditions are right, you're not sitting on the couch.
You're going in, but you're sitting on the couch the
rest of the time. You're making wise decisions, and you
could be making wise decisions all hunting season long. That
might mean that you choose a Friday on a three
day weekend instead of a Monday to hunt. If your

(34:09):
boss will let you do that. That might mean that
you choose a Sunday evening to sit in your favorite
stand instead of a Friday night, because you don't want
to bugger that stand up in poor conditions on a
Friday night, So you know, exercising those patients. I love
to hunt by the weather and choosing that time and
really point in methodically having a reason why am I

(34:32):
sitting here?

Speaker 5 (34:33):
I want several reasons.

Speaker 9 (34:34):
Why not just because this is my favorite tree. I
want because this is the time of year. When bucks
move from point A to point B, they're probably on
this food source nearby. He's probably in that betting area
over there, because my neighbors have been three four hundred
yards away spooking out their property and when they.

Speaker 6 (34:50):
Do that, buck moves into this spot.

Speaker 9 (34:52):
He's moving through this funnel location because it's too steep
on either side. There's a water source over there. I
defined that line and move meant either by pressure, by
habitat provement, or I've recognized it on publicly and for
several different indicators. And then oh, by the way, the
conditions of the weather, the wind, extremities of temperature.

Speaker 5 (35:12):
Are on my side. And then I go in for
that set.

Speaker 9 (35:15):
That would be if you can adhere to some of
those things going forward, make them a better twenty five
oh much better.

Speaker 3 (35:22):
Next we have Steve Hanson, and I think his answer
was probably the only one that brought up this take,
And so here we go, how can one guy make
the next twenty five years of white tail hunting better?

Speaker 2 (35:32):
With Steve Hanson, you.

Speaker 10 (35:34):
Know, I would say, you know, number one, try to
bring somebody new into the sport. You know, that's that's
going to help everybody. If you have a nephew, a cousin,
you know, even somebody else, you know, maybe mentor someone
on a on a youth hunt, that would be the
you know, that would that would make the overall hunting
community better. If you're asking what could somebody specifically do

(35:57):
to make their next twenty five years better, I'm gonna
say the same thing I've answered on some of our
other discussions. It's, you know, up your game, you know,
don't settle for young deer, truly, learn to judge deer, pass,
dear up, and spend a lot of time improving the habitat.

Speaker 2 (36:16):
Improving the habitat.

Speaker 10 (36:17):
Will yield rewards right away and for the next twenty
five years. And you know, not everybody can go in
and TSI eighty ac ors or something like that. But
if you identify a need on a farm, even if
it's a place you have permission, Hey, ask the landowner.
You know that old fence that the deer keep getting
tangled up in and dying and stuff. We find them
every year. Yeah, can I tear that fence out? I'll

(36:39):
spend a couple of saturdays doing something like that, you know,
something like that to give back to the herd. We'll
pay dividends to you in the future.

Speaker 3 (36:47):
Rolling into the next guest, we have Bobby Kendall, and
let's just get right into it.

Speaker 2 (36:51):
Here's what Bobby has to say.

Speaker 3 (36:53):
What's one thing an individual can do to make the
next twenty five years a deer hunting better twenty five.

Speaker 11 (37:00):
Ye, so you know the elephant in the room. I
hunt a lot of private ground and that is a
game changer. You know, when you own the ground and
you can make the decisions, you have to be able
to do that. So maybe my story can be a
motivation to somebody watching.

Speaker 5 (37:19):
So I'm thirty nine. I've used to play music for
a living.

Speaker 11 (37:23):
I dropped out of pharmacy school to come to the
Midwest and guide hunters. When I was nineteen to try
and figure out what I want to do with my life.
I was reading Rich Dad, Poor Dad books, and I
figured out how to buy an apartment building, and I
use out a apartment house, and I.

Speaker 5 (37:37):
Used that equity to buy another one.

Speaker 11 (37:39):
And then I got in a position where I didn't
have to get a real job because I was just
like surviving barely. But on that so I was able
to make some moves, and eventually, when I was twenty two,
I bought a twenty acre piece and it was a stretch,
you know, I just did it, and I was like, well,
maybe if I do like it with the house stuff
and I like set it up, I could sell it.

Speaker 5 (38:01):
And so fast forward. That was when I was twenty two.

Speaker 11 (38:02):
I'm thirty nine now and I've bought and sold several
hundred farms, and I've got to hunt some of the
sweetest farms there is anywhere. And so I guess my
point is with that, like I was playing music in
bars and guiding for a couple hundred dollars a week,
and I made some decisions and I changed my course

(38:25):
and so like, there's three type of people that are
gonna listen to this, and and one is gonna be like,
it must be nice.

Speaker 5 (38:31):
You know, I can't do this. One is gonna be like,
he's right, I did it. You know.

Speaker 11 (38:35):
I've watched so many people accidentally create wealth buying hunting farms,
and other people are going, I can't believe what they're
paying to shoot a deer, And I'm like, can you
believe what they're paying for bitcoin? What is bitcoin? Well,
that's what hunting ground has become. It's become an asset class.
It doesn't matter. It's not about the value of shooting deer.

(38:58):
It's an asset class. And there's only so much of it,
and the demand is getting greater and it's going up
in value. So I've watched so many people accidentally create wealth,
like change their lives by buying hunting ground. So I
would say, get motivated, figure it out. Whether it's this
year or next year or the next year. Maybe it's

(39:19):
five acres in suburban area that somebody had overlooked, and and.

Speaker 5 (39:24):
You got to get in the game.

Speaker 11 (39:25):
So, like I had a mentor I met when I
was playing music at one of these places, a hunting
lodge or whatever. And he's a big developer in Huntsville, Alabama,
and he was my mentor, and he kept saying, you
got to get in the game, you got to get
in the game. I'm like, well, how do I get Well,
I finally just got in the game. So that would
be my advice is just go for it. Understand, there's

(39:46):
bad debt like a credit card, and there's good debt
like a bank. Figure out where you're comfortable. It's probably
gonna work out. Its land. We've had all this crazy
stuff going in the world on in the world over
however many years, and this land doesn't hiccup, you know,
especially here in Illinois. It's just so good and it
can be life changed, not just about deer, honey.

Speaker 5 (40:07):
So get in the game.

Speaker 11 (40:09):
Figure out a plan, one year, five year plan to
get your first piece of ground.

Speaker 5 (40:15):
Control that thing.

Speaker 11 (40:16):
I would rather control twenty five acres and make the
calls than a thousand acres with a group of guys,
even if they're friends, and not have full control over
making the decisions, because it's little decisions that break you.

Speaker 5 (40:30):
So that's what I'd say. I mean, you know, get
in the game by ground.

Speaker 2 (40:36):
Next we have Don Higgins.

Speaker 3 (40:38):
I think Don is the oldest of the guest here,
so he has the most insight, the most wisdom on
his perspective, and maybe everyone doesn't agree with it, but
this is his take on how the next twenty five
years of white tail hunting can be better.

Speaker 2 (40:50):
As just one guy doing their own thing.

Speaker 12 (40:52):
Here we go, well, on a personal level, they need
to buy land. There's no doubt about it that good
hunty in the future, and we're probably already there is
going to be tied to land ownership.

Speaker 4 (41:05):
You're either going to own it or you're not going
to hunt.

Speaker 12 (41:08):
And I think even leases are extremely difficult to find
today and very expensive. It's easier to find a place
to buy than it is to lease a good a
good property. Now they the drawback is that good property
has become more and more expensive over time, and it becomes.

Speaker 4 (41:23):
Harder and harder.

Speaker 12 (41:26):
For the average person to purchase a property just for hunting.
I totally get that, but on a personal level, you
need to be doing everything you can to acquire property
today because in the future it's going to become more
and more critical if you want to be a hunter
from a whole I don't hate to call it industry,
but let's just say hunting community wide answer to this question.

Speaker 4 (41:51):
We need to be more involved with our game agencies.

Speaker 12 (41:54):
And I don't know that that's even possible, But these
game agencies have become so political that I think in
a lot of cases, the hunter's opinions, the hunter's desires
are not even considered.

Speaker 4 (42:07):
That there's other.

Speaker 12 (42:10):
Groups whose input is a whole lot stronger than the
deer hunter, and one of those is a farmer. In Illinois,
the Farm Bureau is the most powerful lobby in the state.
I think that the hunters and the farmers need to
get together and find solutions to some of these deer
management issues. You know, the farmers they want every deer

(42:31):
dead during the growing season, but then in the fall
they want to lease out their hunting land to whoever,
including non residents, without any sort of government oversight. But
yet then in the summer they want that government to
provide them these deuisance tags they can go out there
and indiscriminately shoot deer on nuisance permits. I think the

(42:52):
solution there, and I'm not pointing the finger at farmers.
I'm not pointing the finger at deer hunters. What I'm
saying is the farmers and the deer hunters need to
come together. They need to work together to find solutions
that's good for both parties, and I think it's possible.
I think to this point, farmers and hunters on the
political side of the spectrum anyway, i've kind of been

(43:12):
at odds.

Speaker 4 (43:13):
They've wanted different things.

Speaker 12 (43:16):
I've been on different sides of various issues, and I
think that if they came together and each side was
able to hear the other side out and come to
a better understanding of the other side's position, I think
that the deer hunters and farmers could sit together at
a table and come up with some common.

Speaker 4 (43:34):
Sense solutions that benefits everyone.

Speaker 12 (43:37):
I don't know if that's possible in today's political climate,
especially in a state like Illinois with our dirty, corrupt politics,
But if it's ever going to happen in Illinois, it's
got to happen hand in hand with the Farm Bureau.
The Farm Bureau gets on board with some solutions, then
I think it could be pushed through the legislature. But

(43:59):
without the farm Bureau support, I don't think good deer
management practices are ever going to have.

Speaker 2 (44:09):
Do you think good deer management practices are.

Speaker 3 (44:12):
A large enough group for people that care, because you
see people debate about man if Illinois went to one
buck state, Illinois doesn't have to go to a one
buck state. You just shoot one buck, I'm still going
to shoot two. That's an argument that I have actually
seen Forbatam, unfortunately on Facebook. But the thought process, or
my question is the people that really want best for

(44:35):
the resource, best for the opportunity. It's the industry and
the white tail commercialization is based off of big deer,
it's not off of immature deer. But there's also a
larger group of hunters, not as serious, that don't care
about that. And so how do you within You have
the farmers and hunters, but then you break down the

(44:55):
hunting side and it's fragmented, pretty drastic.

Speaker 4 (45:00):
And that's the whole problem.

Speaker 12 (45:02):
I mean, there's been groups in the past in Illinois
tried to represent the hunters, tried to bring them all
together and represent them all, and it's been impossible. I've
been a part of a couple of those groups and
been some very serious deer hunters, very well intentioned deer
hunters on board as well. But as soon as you

(45:22):
throw an idea out to the public, I don't care
how good the idea is. You could throw out the
idea that you found the cure for cancer, and somebody's
gonna hate it. The drug company's going to hate it
because now you just took away their opportunity to make
a profit from treating cancer. And it's the same way
with deer hunting. It doesn't matter what idea you throw
out to the deer hunting community, there's going to be

(45:45):
a sizable percentage against that, whatever that idea is, and
that keeps us divided. And the only reason that our
deer herd has fallen apart in this state and in
other states is because the deer hunters have been so divided.
If you go to Ohio and look at the topic
of baiting deer, you know they're allowed to put bait

(46:05):
piles out throughout season. There's that faction of deer hunters
that are totally for it, and there's a total another
group that's totally against it. And as long as those
two groups are divided, they're never going to come to
a consensus. And I think the issue that I've seen
in Illinois is the people that are the loudest when

(46:28):
an idea is presented. Are the people that do the least.
They do nothing but get on social media and complain
about another group, another hunting group. And all the DNR
has to do to the legislators is say, look, these guys,
here's our side of the issue, and we got all
these guys supporting our side exactly. And so they've always

(46:52):
no matter which side they take, they've always got a
sizeable group on their side. And hunters have always been divided,
always going to be divided. There's no way to unite them,
absolutely no way. The only way to address this situation
is for the serious hunters who care about the resource.
And too many deer hunters don't care about the resource.

(47:12):
All they care about is their own personal situation. You know,
I don't have a place to hunt, blah blah blah.
I want to shoot deer with the bazookah. So let's
make that legal, no matter what it does to the resource.

Speaker 4 (47:24):
That's what's ruined this resource.

Speaker 12 (47:26):
And we need to bring the hunters and the farmers together,
get the Farm Bureau behind us, and then we could
institute some positive change.

Speaker 3 (47:35):
So what would you say to the person that says
I love deer hunting, but I'll never spend money to
buy a piece of ground to hunt deer. I'm going
to hunt public, I'm going to hunt permission. The day
I have to pay the hunt is the day I
stop hunting.

Speaker 12 (47:47):
I've heard that before, Yeah, I have too, And I
got news for those folks. The day's coming where they're
not going to be hunting, like it or not. Hunting
is becoming a rich man's sport in this country, and
I don't don't like it personally because I was once
that kid that didn't have two nickels to rub together.
I'm the kid that and not just a kid. This

(48:09):
was into my adult years. I couldn't afford the cheapest lease.
I couldn't afford one hundred dollars a year for a lease.
You know, I grew up My wife and I when
we were first married, even we had our electricity shut off.

Speaker 4 (48:24):
Numerous times.

Speaker 12 (48:25):
I've documented that or told that story on podcasts and seminars,
and so I understand the plight of the guy in
that situation. I don't want hunting to become a rich
man's sport because if it was a rich man's sport
when I was young, I would never have been able
to partake in it, So I don't ever.

Speaker 4 (48:44):
Want that to happen. But that's the road we're headed on.

Speaker 12 (48:48):
It's already there to some degree, but it's only going
to get worse. It's going to get to the point
where you own land or you don't hunt. I think
even the leasing thing, more and more ground that would
be east is being bought up by deer hunters to manage.
And I've said it before, you know, a big reason

(49:08):
for that is because of the management on the state
wide level. The state has done such a poor job
managing for quality. They manage for numbers. They don't manage
for quality they want to. And I was actually sit
in on a meeting where a DNR rep was there,
and he specifically said, the way we manage is we
see are herd at a certain number early in the fall,

(49:30):
after the doze have had their fawns and raised them
in the summer. We want to bring that number down
to this number, and we don't care how it's done.
We don't care if they're shot with guns or bows
or hit by cars, or we don't care. We want
this number to become this number, and we don't care
which deer gets shot. We don't care if they shoot
all dose or all bucks, or we don't care if

(49:52):
they shoot fallns. We just want this number to become
this number. And that's a terrible way to manage a resource,
a big game herd. Yeah, and no matter if we're
talking deer, big horned sheep, that's a terrible way to
manage a big game herd. And that's exactly what's being done.
And you know, it wouldn't take that many regulation changes

(50:15):
to make Illinois the best, the best state in the
whole country for deer.

Speaker 4 (50:21):
Once again, we were there. We were there.

Speaker 12 (50:23):
We blew Iowa away at one point, and we could
get back there and it doesn't take much. And the
thing that the state doesn't realize, the legislature doesn't realize,
is that the value in our deer herd is not
by the numbers of deer we have. People aren't coming
here to hunt Illinois because we have lots of deer coming.

(50:45):
They're coming here because of the size of the bucks
that we used to have.

Speaker 4 (50:48):
Illinois is living on its past reputation.

Speaker 12 (50:51):
Hunters are coming to Illinois because of what Illinois was
twenty thirty years ago and we're living on our past reputation.
Those of us serious about it and who live here
know that it gets worse every year. This year is
worse than it was last year. Last year was worse
than the year before. We're on a downhill slide and
it's not turning around. I hate to say it, it's

(51:15):
not turning around.

Speaker 2 (51:16):
What can one person do? What can one guy do?

Speaker 12 (51:19):
Oh, one guy can't do much, But I guess it
starts with one person. One person needs to organize, and
one person needs to get the Farm Bureau. And since
they represent the farmers, they need to get the Farm
Bureau at a table with a couple of deer hunters
that totally understand deer management, not some guy that's looking

(51:39):
to shoot more deer. Not some guy that's looking to
legalize another weapon because he likes some you know, crazy
strange weapon that shouldn't even be legal if you look
at it. Only what have they done in the past
twenty years. They've legalized crossbows. First it was just for disabled,
and then they made it what it was only a
half for a certain time, and then I think it

(52:04):
was what you had to be sixty years or older
and you could use a cross and it was just
a way to get their foot in the door. They
knew all along what they was going to do, but
they didn't want to do it all at once. They
wanted to do it a little bit of time so
that we got to we didn't scream too loud. Yeah,
And so then they made the crossbow legal during the

(52:25):
entire archery season, and that was the last straw. And
I've said it before, I'm not against crossbows. I think
they ought to have their own season. I don't think
they should be used during the full archery season. That's
where the management of the resource comes in. And you
can look at the firearms side. You know, they've started
allowing rifles to be used during the Illinois firearm season,

(52:46):
which was not used before. They've expanded seasons, They've created
all these extra seasons, so the last weekend of the
of the season, you know, if you've got any leftover tag,
you can go out and shoot dose. I think we
just about any weapon you can use, guns or bows
or whatever, and it's all about killing more with more

(53:07):
different weapons. And there's never been anything to address the
biological side to keep those sex ratios, the buckdough ratios
in line, there's never been anything to improve the aide
structure of the herd. All the regulation changes have been
about killing more, kill, kill, kill, and indiscriminately. It doesn't

(53:27):
matter which year you kill, kill, kill kill. That's been
the management philosophy of the Illinois DNR for the past
thirty years. And again I keep repeating myself, but we've
got to get the Farm Bureau and the deer hunters
sitting at the same table to come up with solutions
that benefit both sides of that table. And when we

(53:48):
do that, we can all start moving forward.

Speaker 3 (53:51):
You mentioned you've never killed more than two bucks in
a year, probably best for the resource. So do you
think every hunter could not think selfishly about themselves but
think what can they do best for the resource?

Speaker 4 (54:04):
Well?

Speaker 12 (54:05):
I think that asking every deer hunter to do what's
right for the resource is a big ass that's never
going to happen. And I don't think I'm not being
pessimistic here, I'm being realistic. Based on my observations from
the last forty eight years. I think deer hunters as
a whole are a very selfish lot. All they care

(54:25):
about themselves. Do I have a place to hunt? They
don't care about their kids and their grandkids that aren't
even born yet. Do I have a place to hunt
this season? They don't care about the management of the
deer herd.

Speaker 4 (54:37):
You can't even get guys to let young bucks go.

Speaker 12 (54:39):
They will shoot a young buck year after year, cut
the antlers off and throw them out in the garage,
and in the dog ends up running off with them
and chewing them up. Why couldn't they let that deer
go and shoot a dough to get the buck dough
ratio more in line. The average deer hunter does not
care about the proper management of the resource. And I
hate to say it, but it's the true.

Speaker 2 (55:00):
And last, but not least. We have Mark Kenyon.

Speaker 3 (55:03):
Mark has been very instrumental of trying to be a
voice in the world of conservation. And here's what he
has to say.

Speaker 2 (55:10):
Here we go.

Speaker 3 (55:11):
You me one guy listening to this podcast. What can
one person do to make the next twenty five years
of deer hunting better than the last twenty five years.

Speaker 13 (55:24):
That's a big question.

Speaker 14 (55:28):
There are so many different specifics to this, but I
think the generality, like the big picture answer that I
would give is to zoom out beyond the self. But
take ownership as an individual. So by that, I mean,

(55:49):
I think if we want to make the next twenty
five years of deer hunting better than the last, it's
going to require I'll speak for myself rather than telling
anyone else what they should do.

Speaker 13 (55:59):
I think that for me to do that, I.

Speaker 14 (56:02):
Need to stop thinking about just what would make my
deer hunting better and instead think about what I could
do to make everyone's deer hunting better and the situation
better as a whole. By that, I mean one of
the actions that I can take as an individual that
will make sure that we have the opportunity to hunt,
the right to hunt, and the resources to do so. So,

(56:25):
how do we make sure that there are thriving wildlife
populations and there are healthy habitats in open space and
access to them. And I think it's about having that
view beyond you. It's about having a long term view.
It's about thinking about not just again what's going to
impact me, but how does this impact to my kids
and their friends and the rest of that next generation.

(56:47):
And so there's a couple different ways to do this,
and the key thing is like taking ownership, I think,
I think hoping and wishing somebody else will do.

Speaker 13 (56:54):
It is a recipe for nothing happening.

Speaker 14 (56:58):
Complaining on social media, talking about how politicians suck all
the time, like all of that stuff by itself not
gonna achieve anything. Complaining about the DNA R not gonna
achieve anything. So my approach is twofold one. I'm gonna
do real dirt on the hands, action to make tangible,
real impact on the ground, on the landscape in any

(57:21):
way I can so. On the properties that I have
influence over and manage, I'm gonna do whatever I can
to improve the landscape for all wildlife. I think it's
really important for me personally to remember that you can't
look at the natural world.

Speaker 13 (57:35):
As like a species by species thing. What impacts do
you like?

Speaker 14 (57:39):
Maybe deer we're most excited about, But deer are tied
to vegetation, which are tied to bugs, which are tied
to birds, which are tied to small mammals, which are
tied to dirt, which are tied.

Speaker 13 (57:52):
To all of these different things.

Speaker 14 (57:52):
You know, there's this famous quote from I think John
Murra says something like pull out any one thread in
the world and you'll find it connected to everything else. Truly,
everything out there is intertwined, and so I personally am trying.

Speaker 13 (58:05):
To zoom out when I look at.

Speaker 14 (58:07):
The landscapes that I influence over and try to make
improvements and to make land management decisions that are good
not just for well I kill at one point fifty,
but are like, Hey, what's the best thing for all
of the wildlife hut here? What's the best thing for
the health of this native ecosystem? So how can I
make decisions when I'm trying to improve the timber or
improve the food, or improve early secessional habitat, so that

(58:29):
I do something that improves my deer hunting opportunities, but
it's also good for up the birds, and it's also
good for songbirds and the insects and butterflies and everything
else out here, because if you do that, you have
all of these trickle down effects that are much more
long lasting. If you're helping everything, it's going to come
back and help your deer hunting, it's going to come
back and help your deer, turkeys, et cetera. So I'm

(58:51):
going to do anything I can on the lands that
I managed to make tangible, real impact.

Speaker 13 (58:56):
Right now, I'm going to go and.

Speaker 14 (58:57):
Also do the same things where possible on the publicans
because public land access is incredibly important, not just for
me personally, but also for the future of hunting because
access is getting harder and harder. New hunters increasingly need
public land to get started. If we don't have quality
public land and healthy habitat out there, those new hunters
aren't going to stick with it. They're not going to

(59:18):
get involved in this thing. They're not going to care
about this thing, They're not going to advocate for this thing.
So I'm volunteering on public lands to try to improve access, opportunity,
habitat out there as well. It's all connected again, right,
there's spillover from private land to public land, from public
land to private land. It's important to remember that wildlife
is a public resource right, so whether it's whoever's property

(59:41):
is on, it is a public resource managed in the
trust of the public for us. It's managed by the
state for us the people. So I'm doing what I.

Speaker 13 (59:51):
Can in the tangible reu way.

Speaker 14 (59:53):
On top of that, I am also trying to be
educated and active when it comes to advocating things at
the high level because there's like stuff.

Speaker 13 (01:00:01):
We can do as individuals on the ground.

Speaker 14 (01:00:03):
But then there's also decisions made by the federal government
or the state government or the state while you know
fishing game agencies or the different land management agencies.

Speaker 13 (01:00:12):
There's all these.

Speaker 14 (01:00:13):
Different groups that manage our resources, whether it be our
public wildlife resource or be public lands or even you
know these agencies that help incentivize and manage private land
conservation right, farm bill stuff, all that. So, all of
those things have a huge impact on our hunting opportunities,

(01:00:33):
on habitat quality, on the future of wildlife, deer, all
these different things. And it's easy to think that that
is all outside of our control and just all dealt
with by some boogeyman in Washington, d C. And maybe
that's the case sometimes, But if you are not participating
in that process, you're just as much kind of at
fault as anyone out.

Speaker 13 (01:00:54):
There who is making the decisions.

Speaker 14 (01:00:55):
If you are standing outside of me and completely and
ignoring it or pretending it's not happening, or not in
some ways speaking up about it, how can you complain
about so? I think just as important as like working
the ground, yourself is working whatever they out but working
you're working.

Speaker 13 (01:01:12):
The grounds in the clouds.

Speaker 14 (01:01:13):
I don't know the ground in the clouds, like advocacy,
calling your elected officials, going to Natural Resource Commission meetings
of your state, speaking to your state game agency, making
sure that they understand what's happening in your neck of
the woods, or understanding the needs and desires or challenges
of the boat wunting community or the waterfowl community, or

(01:01:34):
what's going on in the turkeys, or you know, engagement, advocacy,
having a voice. All that stuff really really matters in
the hunting and fishing community. When we all kind of
recognize issues and we stand up and speak out together,
we really can change things. But most of the time
our community is so focused on just doing our own

(01:01:55):
thing that we generally don't get involve in that. And
that's a mistake for the future because in the future
there's there's so many other pressures. There's so many other
things going on right now that impact hunting and fishing
in the outdoors and deer, but are being decided on
by people who have no connection to it. They really
don't care about it because they're worried about totally different things.

(01:02:16):
They have other priorities, perspectives. It's like a foreign concept
to them. We are the folks who understand it, who
live it, who really deeply care about it. But we're
a small slice of the population, you know, four percent
or something like that. So if we don't make a
concerted effort to be really active and really engaged, you know,
this stuff will just be completely off the radar of

(01:02:37):
the people who are ninety six percent of the nation
and very easily could vote against us or just do
something out of total disregard that has huge ramifications for
the next twenty five years.

Speaker 13 (01:02:47):
So we got to do the work on the ground.

Speaker 14 (01:02:50):
We've got to do the work in the halls and
the capitals and at the you know, the Zoom meeting,
commission meeting, whatever it is. Like, we need to be
active across If we do that, if we go maybe
the biggest thing here is this. I think for a
long time, hunters and anglers have thought, you know, by

(01:03:10):
the license. I did my part. Now I want to
go do my thing, have fun. That used to be
enough to check the boxes like I'm a hunter, I'm
a conservationist.

Speaker 13 (01:03:17):
I bought my license. I've made that contribution.

Speaker 14 (01:03:19):
I don't think that's gonna be enough if we want
to keep this stuff around for the next twenty five years.
I think also when you say, Okay, I'm a hunter
and I want to go kill deer, whether or not
we want this to be the case, is kind of
the reality moving forward. You also are going to have
to become an advocate, whether that be with your hands
or with your voice. We have to work for these

(01:03:40):
things if we want the next twenty five years to
be better, because there's so many other things that are
coming at us that are trying to take that away,
whether it be a tax on the rights to hunt,
or just all these pressures on land and habitat disappearing,
or the many of the things that are impacting wildlife
disease go on all so we cimainly have to be

(01:04:01):
engaged if we want to keep this wrong.

Speaker 3 (01:04:03):
I think that's a sobering response there and should be
something for everyone to have a planet attack as one person,
because I think that collectively there's a lot of impact
that can be done. And I think that there's obviously
some division and some different styles of hunting and what
people think, but I think overall we all want the
resource to be better.

Speaker 2 (01:04:21):
I think everyone wants that, and so that's the roadmap.

Speaker 3 (01:04:25):
That we get pointed in the right direction, and that
concludes the back forty mini series. And so I appreciate
the opportunity. I've really enjoyed diving into all these questions
with so many people I have so much respect for,
and getting to learn firsthand and catching up with all
those different folks. So I appreciate the opportunity, and I
hope everyone really enjoyed it. And there's so many more

(01:04:46):
now what's white till the lemmas? And so many other
questions that happened every single day throughout the whole year.

Speaker 2 (01:04:53):
So I just want to say thank you.

Speaker 13 (01:04:54):
Hey, you're welcome. I appreciate you spearheading this.

Speaker 14 (01:04:56):
I'm so excited to go back and listen to everybody
else's answers, and I think this is going to be
a format that folks are really going to learn from.

Speaker 13 (01:05:04):
And there's a lot more Jake.

Speaker 2 (01:05:06):
We'll see and we'll see what happens.

Speaker 14 (01:05:07):
Yeah, speaking of hopefully folks you are not sick of
hearing Jake, because there's more of Jake to come this year.

Speaker 13 (01:05:13):
I'm wired to hunt.

Speaker 14 (01:05:15):
Hopefully you're aware of our rough Fresh radio mini series,
in which we get in season reports from deer hunters
all across the country on what's happening out there every
single week, and this year, Jake, you are hosting rough Fresh.
I'm excited about that. Thanks for taking up the mantle. Yeah,
are you ready for that?

Speaker 2 (01:05:33):
I'm ready or not? Here I come.

Speaker 3 (01:05:35):
I think it's a great format and it's fun to
hear what's happening all across the country, and I think
there's a lot of value for people to get a
really concise idea of Okay, this guy from Michigan. I'm
from Michigan. This is what his plan is for the
next couple of days. This is what he's anticipating. This
is what he saw two days ago, and I'm hunting tomorrow.
I think there's a lot of value and it's going
to be fun. I live in my own little echo

(01:05:56):
chamber with my own friends, and you know this, doing
my own rough Fresh and where I'm at, and it'll
be fun to expand that and learn more from a
lot of different people. So I'm really looking forward to it.
And the fall is gonna fly by, and I'm really excited.

Speaker 13 (01:06:08):
Yeah.

Speaker 14 (01:06:08):
So that's gonna be every Wednesday basically from here on
out through the end of the season Rough Fresh Radio
with Jake Hofer.

Speaker 2 (01:06:15):
There you guys have it.

Speaker 3 (01:06:16):
I hope you enjoyed the Back forty series. I really
appreciated all the guests that took the time to answer
each and every question.

Speaker 2 (01:06:23):
Here.

Speaker 3 (01:06:23):
We had the bonus episode on the white Tail podcast
that is Live that was back when we launched this series,
and it's been a lot of fun. I hope you
guys have got some key pieces of insight as we
roll into the season. Each week was developed to have
an approach that likely everyone is facing to some capacity.

Speaker 2 (01:06:38):
Maybe it's the field, food plots.

Speaker 3 (01:06:39):
We still haven't had much rain, Maybe you've got access
to a new area. All these different things and different
challenges we face as we build up to the season.
I hope everyone got one or two things that they
can keep in the back of their mind to have
a better White Tail season this upcoming year. And next
week we're gonna be kicking off Retfresh and so I
just want to say thank you to everyone that tuned
in on the Back forty series and we'll see it

All Episodes

Ep. 950: Back 40 - What Can You Do to Make the Next 25 Years of Deer Hunting Better?

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. 950: Back 40 - What Can You Do to Make the Next 25 Years of Deer Hunting Better?