Ep. 687: What Would Mark Kenyon Do?

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, real quick, guys, Before we get into the show,
I want to give you a warning. My guest's hosts
this week take us in some different directions than usual,
so I want to give you a heads up. This
one's a little less family safe than some of our
usual episodes. I want to give you a fair warning.
Maybe throw some ear muffs on or tune into a

(00:20):
different show. Thanks, Sol, Here we go.

Speaker 2 (00:24):
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
the White Tail Woods, presented by First Light, creating proven
versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First
Light Go farther, stay longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.

Speaker 1 (00:42):
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Podcast. This week on
the show, roles are being reversed and I am being
put through the what would you do? Gauntlet, breaking down
exactly how I'd handle the most challenging deer hunting scenarios.
The guest's host Tony and Dan Kin dream of All right,

(01:06):
welcome to the wiretong podcast, brought to you by First Light,
and today we have got a very special episode. We
are finishing up our what would you do? Series, but
we're doing it in wildly different fashion. I guess you
could say, because we're gonna flip the script and I

(01:27):
am going to go from the host to instead the guest,
and we will talk about what I would do in
different hypothetical scenarios. And to do that, there was only
two people I could possibly bring on that could carry
that weight, that could handle that burden well, and that
would be my two right hand men here on the

(01:50):
Wiretome Podcast. Over the years, we've got the og Dan Johnson,
mister nine Fingers himself back on the show, and then
we've got Tony Spacener Peterson who is going to be
here to help us as well. So Dan and Tony welcome,
Welcome to the show, and thank you for doing this.

Speaker 3 (02:07):
Thanks Mary, appreciate it. Mark. That was a wonderful introduction.
Now I'm really looking forward to this.

Speaker 1 (02:16):
I'm just going to say in the outset for everyone listening,
like anything that Tony and Dan bring up, it's likely false.
Any ship they talk is likely unsubstantiated. But I am
prepared to be uh, just battered with with negativity and
bs from these two. So that's uh, that's what's on

(02:40):
the menu. And I will say one thing if we
have time, and I think we'll figure out a way
to have time for this. I also want to end
the show by doing our little goals, Hopes and hit
lists segment that we usually do an episode, talking through
what our plans are for the season, what our personal
goals are. I just want to set ourselves up for
the hunting seasons kicking off here, you know, for all

(03:01):
of us here pretty darn soon. So that'll be how
we wrap it up. But with that said, I'm going
to hand the reins over to you too. I don't
know what kind of plan you have in place. I
give you free reign to do what you want. All
you need to do is ask me hypothetical deer hunting
scenarios and let me answer. And with those guardrails in place,

(03:22):
I now give you my baby and I will let
you take it where you please.

Speaker 3 (03:27):
So, Dan, do you want me to kick this one off?

Speaker 4 (03:30):
Yeah? But I have to say something real quick before
before you ask the first legit question, and that is
I really hope that this conversation today and the questions
that we are about to ask Mark really help Hunters
this upcoming season. Through Mark's answers, I feel like we're
going to be able to give some really good insight

(03:52):
into helping others attain their goals.

Speaker 1 (03:56):
That was way too serious.

Speaker 3 (03:57):
Yeah, it was.

Speaker 1 (04:01):
It seems like there's a butt coming, Dan.

Speaker 3 (04:04):
I think there is a huge butt coming, a huge one.

Speaker 4 (04:10):
Like I'll be honest, Mark, you should have never asked
us to do this.

Speaker 1 (04:17):
Uh, well made my own bed.

Speaker 3 (04:21):
Yeah, buddy, the microphone is yours. So first off, just
to piggyback on that, Dan, this is I do actually
think this is cool, Mark, because normally there's like an
expert hunter that you're asking questions too, and this should
be This is sort of like Steph Curry sitting in
the broadcast, but with calling a game while some random

(04:42):
dudes play basketball on the court.

Speaker 1 (04:46):
Honest people, people would love to watch that.

Speaker 3 (04:50):
They would honestly, this is This is going to be
the most relatable one ever because you're you're always talking
to people who are so accomplished, and now this is
going to be like, you know, amateur Hour. Actually, Mark,
I do have some serious questions for you. Good and
I want I want to kick one off. Okay, you're ready,

(05:12):
I'm ready. So let's say it's two weeks before the
Michigan opener and you lose all of your sweet easy
spots in southern Michigan, they're gone. They're like Mark, you're out. Whatever.
The only choice you have, for whatever reason is to
go bowhunt public land in the up for the first

(05:32):
few days of the season. What's your first move? First
move right off the bat.

Speaker 1 (05:37):
The very first move would be probably to pull up
maps and look at what's up there in the up
and look for clearcuts on public land. I think that'd
be my starting point. I try to you know, everything
is pretty remote up there, so I wouldn't be too
terribly worried about, you know, escaping hunting pressure. There's not

(05:58):
a lot of hunting pressure up there. There's tons and
tons and tons of public land. I think the the
more rare thing would be food, So I'd be looking
for clearcuts or big public land that's next to some ag,
which there's a few little spots where there might be
some ag up there, but yeah, that'd be my number
one thing, like trying to find a place I could

(06:19):
find a rare food source on this big public land,
which would probably be clearcuts. That'd be my first starting
point with my e scouting, and once I found something
like that, then that would dial me in to say, Okay,
that's these would be some starting points that I'll go
and check out.

Speaker 3 (06:33):
So okay, but you have a giant area to work with,
do you do anything and go? I might stay here
or I know about this area, because when you say
that that's that that would be almost like step two
for a lot of people. They'd have to be like,
which part am I going to? Would you have an
inclination to be like I'm in a camp or I'm
gonna find a place with a motel first and a

(06:54):
proximity thing.

Speaker 1 (06:56):
Yeah, good question. So I would not have any kind
of would camp is what I would most certainly do,
And I would not have a preference as far as region,
because you're right, it is a huge area. I guess
the one thing maybe I would do, I know a
couple people up there. I might ask a couple of

(07:18):
the kind of light contacts I have if there's any
kind of local intel as far as region to focus on.
But honestly, I mean I would probably you know, as
I think to this, I probably if I don't need
to drive thirteen hours, i'd rather not, so I'd probably
look at the more eastern part of the up But
I would you know. Other than that, I would probably
just pull up the maps and just start looking and

(07:40):
just see, like, what region of this large region has
a lot of clear cuts that are in that like
three to five year you know age maybe and just
start circling a bunch and I found a region where
there's a lot of that. I basically what I'm looking
for here is a region of this big woods country
where there's been a lot of cutting in recent years.
And so that might be one hundred square mile area,

(08:01):
that might be a ten square mile area. I don't know,
But that would just be that first thing. And once
I have that first thing, then I would start, you know,
looking more seriously, Okay, like what's where do I want
to camp? Where are the places that I think deserve
some more time? And then I might start talking to locals.
I might you know, you know, in that kind of situation,
there might be some folks at a local sporting good

(08:22):
store or you know, maybe I would further drill into
my personal network and try to see, like, hey, do
you know anything about this area, just to build a
little bit of you know, a little bit of an
understanding of what I'm getting myself into up there. But
that would be you know step step one and a half.

Speaker 4 (08:41):
Dan, all right, mark your main This one focuses on
your main Michigan hunting property that you've been hunting for
several years. And Uh, through our conversation that we've had,
through all of the podcasts that we've done, it sounds
like you attack it early right to try to catch
that that bed to food pattern before it really changes,

(09:05):
and then you go through a pretty long period of
laying off of it until the rut starts to hit.
So my question is, is you go through that period,
that early season period chasing some maybe some of the
deer on your property, but then through trail camera data,
an absolute giant shows up that you have no history with.

(09:30):
You've already put in the you know, you've already done
the pressure for the initial early season hunts. What are
your what's your next move on this once in a
lifetime buck.

Speaker 1 (09:42):
Yeah, so you're right. I usually hit the first like
three days of the season in that local spot pretty hard.
That's when I say hard, I mean I'd hunt some
relatively invasive locations, but I know there's like a high
odds chance of seeing one of my target bucks those
first three days. But if an new buck shows up
after that, typically I've got a set of trial cameras

(10:05):
out that cover the places that I know historically are
are kind of concentrations or funnels of deer activity that'll
pick up anything going on. So I probably would not
move cameras from those core historical locations. But if I
found out that this new buck showed up on the
south side, let's say I would probably pick a day

(10:28):
and you know, add more cameras to that area. First off,
So if I'm zeroing in on the south side, let's
hypothetically say, you know, right now I've got one camera
on the south side, I might add a couple more
in different you know, exit points out of that general
betting area. This this main spot that we're talking about,
you know, has basically two betting two betting regions in it,

(10:52):
and so I kind of know there's either deer on
the north side or on the south side. They're coming
from one of these zones. So you know, whichever zone
he's in, I would add add some cameras there. That's
gonna give me a little bit of that uh you know,
photo intel. And then you know we're talking about being
in middle you know, or early October. Still I don't
know anything about him. I would probably do some like

(11:14):
observation sits would be the next thing I would do.
Either there's a couple spots where I can just glass,
like from the road, so I would do some glassing
for sure, no doubt about that. But then you know,
if we've got you know, some hunts or some days
where the weather's not great, but I'm still trying to
learn a little bit, that would That would be when
I would go hunt a tree where I can get

(11:35):
into one of these fence rows pretty far from the
bedding area still, but I can get a view. And
then you know, if hopefully between those three things then
observation sit are two, sitting on the hills and glassing
a couple of times, and then trail camp pictures, hopefully
I'll kind of figure out, all right, you know, he's
definitely in the south side. He definitely likes to do
a couple of things. Maybe that gives me some information.

(11:58):
Then I'm just gonna wait for good conditions to take
a strike at them. I used to do what you mentioned,
which was I would hunt the first few days and
then I basically not touch this farm again. Till the
end of October or November. I've gotten more and more
confident in taking you know, some strikes in the middle

(12:18):
of October. Now, I've just seen enough times to know
that like these bucks, you know, they still move in
October no matter what, Right, So there are opportunities. There's
days when you can go in there and get a
crack at a mature buck, even in southern Michigan on
October thirteenth. So if we get a good front that
comes through, those will be days that I will absolutely

(12:41):
go in there and hunt close to that bedroom. So
these betting areas, they're both pretty big. I mean when
I say pretty big, we're talking like a five to
ten acre area for either one of those. I kind
of know now after you know, hunting here for a
decade plus those main exit and entry those exit routes

(13:03):
out of the betting year typically are. So I would
have a good starting point at least for you know,
where I would go in for a hanging hunt, and
that would be you know that that'd be the beginning
that that kind of intel collection. And then once the
good weather's there, So I'm looking for that you know,
ten to twenty degree temperature drop kind of front that
comes through, whether that's October twelfth, or if that doesn't

(13:26):
happen till the twenty fourth, then I'll wait till the
twenty fourth or whatever it is. But I'm not gonna
hunt tight to that betting area for a deer like
that until you have the good weather, because there are,
like there are a lot of different hunters hunting all
around here, and so you know, if I hunt a
bunch on the credit days when it would be really

(13:46):
hard to see this deer, you know, he'll very quickly.
What I've seen with these deer in the past, very quickly,
you know, they'll spend less time on my property in
the daylight and more time on the neighbors. And there's
some good hunters on the neighbors now, and they'll take
it avantage of that. So I'm happy to hunt in
the middle of October now, But it's got to be
the right conditions in this situation, and this farm, the

(14:07):
way it sets up, does not set up very well
for morning hunts really anytime of the year. So I
probably would not do a morning hunt until later in October,
even though I know you could pull it off if
had better access. I just don't have a good way
to get into these bedrooms without having to take a
pretty significant risk in covering open terrain. So what I

(14:30):
do now when the you know, late October does arrive
and I start hunting mornings here, I've started using an
e bike and that I feel like I can get
away with a little bit more, but that's still, you know,
it's still some kind of impact. So I would wait
until you know, the twenty fifth through the thirty first,
somewhere in that ballpark would be when I would start,

(14:50):
you know, crashing into the bedroom and hunting back in there,
trying to get ahead of them and catch them coming back.
And there's a few places that I have prepared for
those types of hunts that I would then, depending on
what I've learned so far, hunt those places too.

Speaker 3 (15:05):
Well.

Speaker 4 (15:06):
Here here's I want to ask you another question to like,
another question is this is this is again a once
in a lifetime deer. And it sounds to me that
even when it's a once in a lifetime deer and
you're not familiar with him and he randomly shows up
on trail camera, that you're still going to be conservative

(15:27):
to your approach in this farm at this farm relatively.

Speaker 1 (15:30):
I mean, I'm just I'm not gonna be I'm not
gonna go stupid like just because there's a two hundred
inch deer or something. That doesn't mean I'm gonna throw
away everything I've learned, you know. And so what I've
learned is, you know, it's not worth again. This is
like I've got like thirty five acres of huntable ground
to work with here. The rest is like fields, maybe

(15:51):
forty acres of hunible ground. So it's like I've got
two precious little bedding areas that I have to like nurture,
you know, no matter what. And so if this big
old buck has showed up there, you could very easily
mess it up and he's off to some you know,
even if he just bumps out of that a little bit,
you know, I can't hunt him. So I'm not going

(16:12):
to do something crazy.

Speaker 3 (16:13):
But I know.

Speaker 1 (16:14):
What I do know, though, is if you are careful
with this property and you don't muck it up, these
deer can survive and stay around. Like there's enough good
cover that if I don't push deer off this property,
I'll have opportunities at them throughout the entire hunting season. Often,
like I've killed a lot of deer in that post
gun season late season time here. This historically really really

(16:36):
hard for people in Michigan, and I've uniquely been able
to keep deer around. But it's because I'm pretty darn
targeted with how and when I strike, and I feel
confident that you know, that would be the way to go,
even if this is a once in a lifetime deer.
I'm not going to go just plunge into his bedding
area and hunting there on hot days every night in

(16:56):
October and screw it all up just because he's big
and it's eccet fair enough.

Speaker 3 (17:02):
I get you where you needed to go, Dan, Yes, sir,
did make you Tony. You need a little more caffeine.

Speaker 1 (17:09):
I feel like Tony's judgy. You're judging me over there
for some reason. What the hell is your problem?

Speaker 3 (17:14):
No, buddy, there's a very safe Mark Kenyan answer. I
was hoping you were going to say you'd abandon everything
and just Bond's eye in there and go wild card
and kill that sucker from the ground. But you know
it's not your style. It's okay, buddy, I have one
kind of a playoff of that. So you kind of
kind of laid out how cautious you are and in

(17:36):
protecting those little betting areas and stuff. So it's October
tenth and you just know, you know, the lull is
in full swing in Michigan. Your cameras are dead, You're
not seeing any deer in the fields, and you're just like,
I'm going to take off a little time, earn some
brownie points at home, play this safe, like you just said.
But all of a sudden, somebody puts a gun to

(17:57):
your head and they say you've got to kill a
three and a half year old plus before the week
is out.

Speaker 1 (18:03):
What do you do on that same property?

Speaker 3 (18:06):
Yep?

Speaker 1 (18:07):
Yeah, So in that case, I would, you know, go
in for an evening hunt between I would get as
tight to one of those betting areas as I possibly could.
So what I would do is, you know, looking at
the wind direction, see when I could get a wind
direction that would kind of cut across the south side

(18:27):
of that north betting ara or across the north side
of the South betting area. Hopefully it's going to be westerly,
and I would head in, you know, based on what
camera or observation Debt has told me hopefully I will
tell you which food source they're kind of triggering on
a little bit more, or which one has got you know,
a three and a half year old or a four
and a half year old that's that's coming through that
area a little bit more often, even if it's after daylight,

(18:51):
I would pick whichever one seems to have the best
chance of, you know, catching one moving that direction. So
let's just say it's the north betting for a change
of pace. And so this north betting area, there's there's
a big crop field in the middle between these two
betting areas, and this year it's corn. And then I've
got a little tiny food plot up on that north

(19:11):
side of the cornfield, and then the betting area is there.
And so in this case, I would slip in there
with a west wind that would blow my wind right
in between those two betting areas and crossed. I'd get
in there, and then I would slip in hopefully it's
a windy day or something so I can get in close,
and I would come up and get you know, there's

(19:32):
actually some spots where I just know like deer bed
in this let's say three ish acre thicket of like
autumolive and buckthorn and tall grass and stuff. But I
have got a pretty clear understanding of how they navigate
through this terrain to get to one of those two
food sources. And so I would just get really really close,

(19:56):
I mean within eyesight of the betting are for sure,
and there with my saddle and get up there on
one of those main travel quarters. So there's like a
transition area that goes from that, like three acre betting thicket,
and there's, like I said, a couple of different ways
that could go. So based on the wind, I'd pick
whichever way the wind would work. I'm not you know,

(20:16):
I don't need these these bucks, especially a three year
old buck, will come to these food sources not depending
on wind. Like they don't need a wind in their
face to go down there. So I would pick a
wind that's safer for me, because I still believe that
these three year olds will move down there, and yeah,
get up in a saddle, and yeah if I if

(20:39):
I can't wait for the good weather, I'm just gonna
get in there and take as many stabs as I can. Probably,
you know, would pick whichever betting area to start with
based on observation. Or trail cameras like I mentioned. But
if I hunt that first one the first two nights
and don't see anything, it's not happening. I'll bounce down
to the southern betting area and try the same thing
down there, and hopefully one those I will see something

(21:01):
or get a piece of intel that helps me kind
of narrow down, you know, if I need to tweak
my setup a little bit. But I think I think
you could certainly do that August tenth through the fifteenth
without a doubt, even if the weather's bad. If the
weather's great, if I do get a front that comes
through during that week, then even better, and then I

(21:22):
would probably go in for a morning hunt too if
I get a front, so I would do evenings on
the lousy days. And if we've got a front that
pushes in let's say a few days into that hunt,
then I will probably you know, set up in a
location the previous evening that would work for the following
morning hunt too, and hope to catch this buck or
one of these bucks coming back into that bedroom. But

(21:46):
this is it's you know, there's not a big mass impact.
There are some oaks, but that's never been the kind
of place where you can really count on an oak
tree or two really pulling them. So it's it's it's
really going to be knowing like they're coming to, you know,
one of these two crop fields and they're exiting either
gonna go to the neighbors or they're gonna go my way.
And it's a little bit of a crapshoot on that front.

(22:08):
So just don't get boogered, like, don't let them onto
you as much as possible and get tight to that bedroom.
And I think you know i'd get one to come.

Speaker 3 (22:17):
Through, so you you would consider hunting mornings.

Speaker 1 (22:19):
Then yeah, but only when I if I have that
front during that time period. So if it's October fifteenth,
there is a.

Speaker 3 (22:26):
Place onto your head. You gotta blow your brains out
right on those books on the bookshelf behind you. If
you don't do this and you're gonna maybe hunt mornings.

Speaker 1 (22:37):
Yeah, I don't let me take that back. If we
get to the end of the week and it hasn't
worked out for me, then I would, you know, if
it's the last two or three days, then then yeah,
I guess there's a gun to my head and I'll
take more risks. Even then but I want at least
the first like three nights unfed up. I want those first,

(22:57):
like three really good nights before I mess it up again.
Like another tricky thing about this property is this very
high deer density, like really high deer density. So getting
in and out unscathed and having a hunt whether you
don't booker things up is you know, more the exception
than the rule. So you just have to Like, I know,
you guys like to give me a hard time about

(23:18):
being conservative on this one, but uh but if you're not,
you're gonna you're gonna mess it up. And I found that,
you know, if I found the good balancing act. I
think between aggressive and the right kind of ways at
the right times, but not so much that the fifty
deer that I run around know what's going on right away.

Speaker 4 (23:38):
Dan, there you go, I mean, and answer my question.
I got what I wanted out of him.

Speaker 3 (23:44):
I got.

Speaker 4 (23:45):
I got to answer that I wanted out of my question. No, No,
out of the where all this came from? Right, Like, No,
I know he he's obviously approaching it, and I can understand.
I mean, I think the limited access alone on that piece, right,
it's only from one direction, right, you can only access

(24:07):
that farm and uh, correct me if I'm wrong, you
have to go through a majority of egg or flat
ground with no cover even to just get into it.

Speaker 3 (24:18):
Right, So the morning hunts would.

Speaker 4 (24:20):
Would potentially be difficult to go into knowing that deer
are edge creatures and they're probably out in those fields
and food plots before the uh you know, in the dark,
So it would be it would be tough.

Speaker 3 (24:36):
So but let me ask you this though, Mark, because
you said it was corn this year, doesn't that change
your access options in the morning or not? Good question, Tony,
Thanks buddy.

Speaker 1 (24:47):
If the corn is standing, it does make access, you know,
easier in that there's not big, wide open fields, but
there's still going to be a pile of deer out
on the edges of the fields and feeding all around.
Like even on what years in this excuse and state corn,
there's gonna be deer blowing without a doubt if I
were going in there for a morning hunt, and I know,
like in November, with a standing corn, even whether I

(25:09):
walk through the middle of the field or if I
follow the fence row, you just can't get through this
area without deer knowing what's up. So I'm just careful
about when I do that, and the risk or the
reward has to outweigh the risk for me to do that.
Knowing that every one of those is like a high
impact situation, I have the I have a What I

(25:31):
uniquely have is because this area is close enough to
where I live that I can get a friend or
family member to help me on the evenings. I get
I get out of jail free card for the evening
hunts because as often as possible, I'll have someone drive
out with the ATV or the truck or something and
pick me up for those evening hunts on this property.

(25:52):
And so I can get away with a lot more
because my evening access, despite that tough situation we just
talked about, my evening exit is much slower impact. So
knowing that I lean that direction.

Speaker 3 (26:06):
All right, buddy, Dan Tony, I think it's your turn
to ask a question. Oh you do all right? I
think I got a good one here for you. Mark. So, Mark,
you're hunting Ohio on Halloween. It is it's go time, right,
Weather's perfect sign everywhere, and you're set up in just

(26:26):
a banging spot and you hear a grunt close by
and You're like, oh, this is gonna be good, big
deep grunt, and soon one hundred and eighty inch non
typical chases a dobe beneath your stand, right, I mean mega, giant, right, mega?
He stops at twenty yards. He stops at twenty yards.
You totally whiff right over his back. But he doesn't

(26:50):
know what's going on. He's all keyed up, right, So
you get another arrow knocked up with again. This happens
until you're a quivering mess, you're ont arrows, and he
trots away unscathed. Do you tell anyone? Or do you
take that to your grave?

Speaker 1 (27:11):
Oh?

Speaker 3 (27:11):
Man?

Speaker 1 (27:12):
Yeah, great, great scenario here to plant into my mind
heading to the season. Oh, I sure as hell hope
that never happens. I have never let me think this through.
I've never gotten more than one shot a deer that
I've missed. I've missed deer, but I've never gotten a
second shot and missed again. So knock on wood, don't.

(27:35):
I don't have this in my quiver of experiences yet,
but I probably would tell. I have told about every
single one of my misses except for one in the
last fifteen years, So there's only one miss that I
kept to myself in the last fifteen years, and I
think I ended up talking about that like a couple
of years ago. So it's all out there, and I

(27:57):
guess people have seen and heard about all my lumps.
So to this point, if I were to miss a
one eighty a bunch of times, that probably wouldn't make
people feel any worse about me. They already know I'm
a knucklehead and I make a lot of mistakes, So
I would probably tell the story. I would just really
hope I would get redemption in the in the near future.
It would hurt me to tell the story, and I'd

(28:19):
be really upset about it in the following minutes, but
I would.

Speaker 3 (28:25):
Okay, I have to. You would you would put you'd
come out with it, you'd you'd be honest about it,
all right. I think let's let's take that scenario. Let's
say you empty that quiver on that one eighty, miss
him every time you climb down from your tree after
he runs away, and you're picking up your arrows and
a two hundred and seven inch typical runs in this
This is the hottest dough in Michigan or Ohio.

Speaker 1 (28:48):
Sorry, that's a heck of a property too.

Speaker 3 (28:50):
Yeah, so you've got a handful of arrows, and you know,
and that buck is just chasing that dough around you
in circles. It's like a freaking cartoon out there. And
and you empty that quiver again again. Yeah, okay, you
miss him again with all your arrows, and on your
last shot you just hail marry him, and you miss him,
but you hit a little tiny spike in the antlers

(29:12):
behind him. Everybody runs off and you've you've peed yourself
a little bit. The whole thing is is real rough.
Now do you tell this story? Do you not your grave?

Speaker 1 (29:25):
I think I quit deer hunting, and it's it's suicide
watch for a few weeks after that point. All right,
all right that would be the end. Wow, I love it. Well,
I don't like the negativity here, but.

Speaker 4 (29:40):
Well, hey, I tell you what, Mark, if you liked
that question, you're gonna love this one. You spent and

(30:01):
right you get a call from Steve Ranella. Steve Vanella
says Mark, once in a lifetime Alaska hunting opportunity with
your bow. We're gonna go do it, and we're going
to go do it big. But you got to be
gone for potentially two to three weeks. All right, that's
a long time being away from the family. All right,

(30:21):
So you get back, let's say right around the twentieth
of September, you go back to you know, Dad, You
go back to hunting Michigan. You know, the opener comes.
You start hunting Michigan, maybe some other places. And it's
mid October, maybe a little later in October, and you're

(30:43):
in good news. Your wife tells you that you're expecting
a third child. So and so, oh man, everything's everything's
going great, everything's going great. You're excited. So one night
you're out with your boy, your wife's in the house,
you're out with your voice, and you're shooting in the backyard,

(31:04):
getting your reps in for this season, and all of
a sudden it pops into your head. Man, the dates
just don't add up.

Speaker 1 (31:12):
I was in.

Speaker 3 (31:14):
I was in Alaska. Okay, wait up.

Speaker 4 (31:21):
And so so, all of a sudden, all of a sudden,
in your brain, you're thinking about this, and you acquire
target panic in the middle of the season. And that's
the question if you if you were to acquire target
panic in the middle of the season, what steps are
you taking to get.

Speaker 1 (31:39):
Out of that.

Speaker 3 (31:40):
Oh gosh, never mind that your wife's carrying somebody else's baby.
How do you deal with the target panic.

Speaker 1 (31:49):
Yeah, we got a lot of things to address.

Speaker 3 (31:52):
Here, but let's get the important stuff talked about.

Speaker 1 (31:58):
Gotta get that target bucks though, So in this scenario,
I think the biggest thing I would do if I
pick up a bad case of target panic in the
middle of the season, would you know a number one
get back to the basics. So like just get back
to like probably doing like blind bail type shooting, just

(32:21):
feeling comfortable getting a surprise release. Again, I've had some
times where I'll realize, like I'm holding my release wrong,
or you know, with an index finger release, you know
where you grip onto the trigger, if it's tighter or looser,
you can kind of loosen that up. And they'll be
different things like little weird form things and stuff that
can throw off your form and your surprise release. So

(32:44):
I just make sure, like make sure there's nothing like
that that has somehow slipped into my process that's triggered
my issue. But as soon as like I've got that
figured out, and I maybe would have a friend come
over just someone like watch me. Just make sure that
not some weird subconscious thing that's going on that I'm
just you know, I'm so stressed. I'm so focused on
these outside things that I'm just like, you know, not

(33:06):
paying attention to. As long as that's checked out and
not happening, would go back to just like getting a
bunch of reps in at close range and just feel
really comfortable at shooting, and then I would just try
to get a kill or two under my belt. I
would go to dough hunting. I would start doll hunting,
and I'd have a very low maximum range. I would
tell myself, all right, man, twenty yards and in and

(33:28):
I'd go somewhere where there's a lot of dos, a
high target opportunity, and just try to kill some doughs
and get that kind of out of the way, like
just get the monkey off my back again in a
situation that's like really hard not to mess up, hopefully,
and that would be that'd be step. I think that'd
be the first thing I do. So I would go back,
just make sure that my form and like everything's okay.

(33:49):
I'd shoot a ton at close range and just try
to rebuild confidence, and then I would really get the
confidence again by getting in there in the field and
killing some does. And I think every time you do
that that takes, you know, several layers of whatever that
target panic issue could be off the table and then
we would have some serious talks my wife and I.

Speaker 3 (34:11):
Good answer after the season.

Speaker 1 (34:15):
After the shooting, after the shooting, yep.

Speaker 4 (34:20):
Feel good about that, Dan, that's I mean, yeah, I
mean I think that acquiring target panic in the middle
of the season would absolutely suck.

Speaker 1 (34:28):
The would Yeah, and the other thing too.

Speaker 3 (34:32):
Yeah, both of them? Yeah, pretty rough? Yeah? Really?

Speaker 1 (34:36):
Yeah, like going, So this is basically like a This
is basically a series of worst case scenarios. Usually I
give my guests like challenging. You guys are giving worst
case scenarios, which is great. I'm up for the challenge.

Speaker 4 (34:49):
You have to be able to overcome, right, Yes, got
to be able to overcome man.

Speaker 3 (34:55):
But on the on a serious note, have you had
a vasectomy yet? Mark?

Speaker 1 (35:00):
Yeah? Man, I did.

Speaker 4 (35:02):
Well.

Speaker 3 (35:02):
We don't have to worry about like pregnancy scares.

Speaker 1 (35:05):
Right, hopefully I hear they go bad though, like you
can have a mishap still, So fingers crossed.

Speaker 3 (35:15):
Not only that, but also his wife's pregnant, so it
doesn't matter anyway, she got it some exactly can't. You
can't get double pregnant, so I mean, it depends how
you look at it, because my wife got double pregnant once.

Speaker 1 (35:29):
Yeah, that's a good point. You're still dealing with the
after effects now.

Speaker 3 (35:34):
Yeah, I didn't abandon my family. I guess still raising
my kids. Mark.

Speaker 1 (35:40):
Well, yeah, I'm glad for you.

Speaker 3 (35:43):
Yeah, all right, what's next? All right, Well, I'm gonna
skip a couple because I have one that sort of
plays off of what Dan just asks you. Oh jeez,
all right, well you know marital issues. Oh all right, Marcus,
It's November fifth, and you've been getting after it all season.
I mean, you've been pushing it right to the edge

(36:05):
with the whole family thing, and you know, after you
trout fished all summer long and ignored your family and everything,
like it's really it's really adding up at home. So
you come home one day November fifth, and missus Kenyon
it's obviously pretty pissed at you, and she says things
like you're an absentee father who only cares about deer.

(36:26):
I never really loved you, like, you know, pretty harsh stuff, right,
So you decide all right, half a week, I have
a rut cation, but I probably shouldn't do all days
sits because she's kind of ticked at you. You can
either only hunt mornings or evenings. What are you choosing why?
Great question?

Speaker 1 (36:47):
Great question. Yeah, I'm going with mornings for that time period,
and hopefully I can push it into the middle of
the day a little bit. Give me that you know,
first six hours of the day or whatever it is.
I think there's a couple of things going for you.
I do think just during the rut time period, you

(37:09):
have a longer duration of deer being on their feet.
Now that's not always the case, like sometimes the deer
on their feet early in the afternoon. But I would
just say, if I had to average, go pick the
average time period, I'd say, like, maybe you've got even
on a good weather day, you know, there might be
bucks moving all morning into the middle of the day,
but then almost always there's a little bit of a

(37:31):
lull in that, like I don't know, you know, two
o'clock to four o'clock or somewhere in that ballpark. So
if you did just the evening hunts, all you have
is that, you know, two to five thirty or two
to six or three to six or whatever it is.
And then if you throw in warm weather, then it's
even worse. So if you've got a warm weather stretch
during November, your mornings are likely still cool, so that's

(37:52):
always gonna be the coolest part of the day. I
think you've got those bucks on their feet more. They're
checking all those betting areas, they're doing their cruising thing.
I just think those mornings are dynamite. And then add
on top of that the likely like you can't go
wrong with the weather in the mornings at least during
that time period. Almost that would without a doubt be

(38:13):
the decision I'd make for sure.

Speaker 3 (38:15):
Huh yep, Yeah, I think you know. I was thinking
about this when I wrote it, because I I would
you know, probably five years ago I would have one
said mornings without question. And I think about it a
little more because I have some pretty good rut hunts
in the afternoon in the evening. But I still think
I lean toward your answer, like I think that you

(38:35):
just got to take that sunrise to noon shift if
you get it.

Speaker 1 (38:40):
Yeah, and yeah, I mean evenings could be great too.
I'd like to both.

Speaker 3 (38:44):
But uh, you screw that up. Yeah, that's why she's
pregnant with another man's baby.

Speaker 4 (38:50):
Fat fact. Yeah, yeah, dude, that that question is a
no brainer for me. Like I don't even need to
think about it.

Speaker 1 (39:02):
It's mornings, yeah, can't be all right?

Speaker 3 (39:06):
Let me ask both of you guys then, would would
your answer change at all if you couldn't hunt private
land and you had to hunt public no, knowing that
everybody's going to be thinking the same way as you,
like I gotta get out there in the mornings, does
it change at all? No?

Speaker 1 (39:25):
Really, yeah, because I think like, yeah, everyone's everyone knows
they want to go out in the mornings, But I
think that doesn't mean they're not going to hunt the
evenings too, Like everyone's gonna want to hunt the evenings
as well. And it might you might say that there's
a little bit more pressure in the evenings on public
land even at that time period, I think, because there'll
be a few people that maybe can't I mean, I
don't know, but there's some folks that can get out

(39:47):
for an evening hunt, you know, after work, that can't
hunt that morning stretch because they have to go to work.
So during that weekday period, you might have actually a
little bit less in the morning, despite the fact conditions
are better. I just think, you know, the only thing
that you'd have going for you with the evening hunt
is you could like scout your way in, you know,
to hunt places in the middle of the day, and

(40:09):
then you just have to do that in the post
hunt situation. Now, in this situation, so I can hunt
the mornings and then if I need to relocate, if
I need to do something new, that's gonna happen after
the hunt, and I'll set up for the next morning.

Speaker 3 (40:21):
Can I'm gonna piggyback off of that for a second?
One consideration I would have. This is totally situational, totally anecdotal,
but I feel like people are way more likely to
walk in on you in the morning than in the evening,
So I always look at it and listen. I'll hunt
the mornings every time too. But on public land it

(40:42):
feels like if people show up in the dark, they're
just going in. But you know, if you show up
at like two o'clock in the afternoon or whatever, there's
a guy parked at this trailhead or this spot, you
might go on to the next spot. So I think
there's a little advantage there.

Speaker 1 (40:56):
Yeah, that's an interesting point. I mean I could see that.

Speaker 3 (41:00):
I got Dan. All right, next question mark Kenyon.

Speaker 4 (41:04):
Okay, rut vacation really, any vacation really, any time of year.
You can you can throw in whatever you want here,
but it's public land. It's an out of state hunt.

Speaker 3 (41:18):
All right.

Speaker 4 (41:19):
You've done your your e scouting. Maybe you even went
there and you found some old sign. Maybe you had
the opportunity to do some boots on the ground scouting.
You find the sign, maybe you have a good idea
of where you're going to go. You get there and
you start to hunt, and you're not seeing the movement
that you want. You're not seeing the quality of deer

(41:42):
that you want, so forth and so on. When do
you abandon Plan A and go.

Speaker 3 (41:48):
To Plan B.

Speaker 1 (41:51):
Yeah, so relatively quickly, definitely after day two. You know,
I think day one, i'd, you know, go into somewhere
where I've have some intel on, whether it be through
scouting or whatever. I'm going into a spot for a
reason day one. If I see like nothing that first day,
I'll push in further on day two, get more aggressive

(42:13):
with wherever whatever the feature is that I'm hunting or
the betting area or the foods or whatever it is,
I'll push in more on day two. If I still
by day two, you know, if coming up blank, if
there's an opportunity to get even more, I'll just basically
get more and more and more aggressive through day one
through three, let's say. And if still at that point,

(42:36):
like I'm not seeing any strong options, like there's no
way to push in further, there's no other back door
to check, then yeah. I mean, if it's a week
long trip, you know, by day three and a half
or something, I'm probably really seriously considering, you know, is
there a brand new place I need to be checking out,
like what's going on here that I don't know about?
And or do I just need to very quickly start

(42:56):
checking off other options. So even by you know, let's
say I hunt those first two days, you know that
third day I might go and drive around morning number
three and go scout from the road a couple of spots,
or if not that, then definitely middle of the day
I'm out walking other places and figuring out what other
options do I have. I had this exact scenario last

(43:19):
year in Idaho, and you know, I thought going into it.
We had a great game plan, and you know, Day
one went to one of those spots that I thought
should be a kill spot and there was crickets. And
then so day two I pushed in further crickets. I
think day three I made one really like hard, hard pushing,
and when that didn't come up, then I was like, okay, well,
now you know I went through Plan A. My Plan

(43:43):
B was to push further push through that plan. See
it was even deeper now, like I've seen everything this
thing has got to offer, and it's not offering anything
right now because if it seemed to be hunting pressure
that was there before me. So yeah, then we just
started scouting brand new places and just doing a shotgun
approach and trying to figure out, like where is there
a concentration of deer that have not been pressured? And

(44:04):
so I walked a ton of properties we observed scouted
into hunting locations, and it was just about trying to
figure anything out. I don't want to waste time in
a no man's land. So I've gotten to the point
where I will very quickly burn through things if there's
not anything that's giving me the warm fuzzies.

Speaker 4 (44:23):
Okay, now, Dan, Yeah, I like it, But I have
a kind of a side question that goes along with it.

Speaker 3 (44:29):
Just popped into my head.

Speaker 4 (44:32):
You are you've you've invested a lot of time into
this public peace. All right, We're coming up on the
end of your vacation. You saw a buck, right and
we have a scenario now where it's a shooter, it's
a target animal. You've made an adjustment. Maybe you took
your mobile setup in the dark, you moved it to

(44:55):
where you saw this deer, and and it's all prepped
ready to go, high confidence level for the morning. You
get to the parking area, you start to walk and
there is another hunter between where you are and where
you need to go. Are you walking through their setup

(45:18):
to get to your setup?

Speaker 1 (45:24):
I would think about the impact of that person on
the deer I'm trying to kill. So if I think
that that buck will not do the thing I wanted
him to do because of where this hunter is, that
might cause me to go on a different location. Like

(45:45):
if it's if there's one way he could get into
his bedroom, and now this hunter is right there and
his wind's going to blow to that deer. I just
don't see any way this could work out, then I
will probably just turn around and go somewhere else entirely
if I don't think that this hunter will mess it up,
If I think this buck is going to approach from
some different direction and the wind won't be blown there,

(46:07):
or if if I'm deep enough in there that it
won't be impacting it, no matter what, I would continue
on to where I'm going to hunt. I would try
to skirt him, like, I would give him as much
courtesy space as I possibly could so he doesn't feel
like I'm walking, you know, right through his stuff and
messing up his hunt. So I'd probably back out a
little bit so I'm out of site or whatever, and

(46:27):
then make an end around to get to where I
want to hunt and hopefully, you know, preserve his mourning,
but still put myself in a position I don't think
that having someone there likely would mess up the entire thing.
And if I feel super confident, it's my last day
and this is really all I have to work with,
and it's basically like take a flyer with zero intel,

(46:50):
or hunt the place I'm really confident in and hope
that the buck just doesn't come through that fifteen degree window.
That this other hunter is impacting. I would do that,
I think, unless like I just know, like, man, he
absolutely bugger this whole thing up, because like he's sitting
over the only creek crossing where that buck was likely
to come through, and his wind's blown right back to
where I was sitting, where the blind would be, and

(47:11):
or where the betting area would be, and that kind
of thing.

Speaker 3 (47:15):
All right, fair enough, that's a good answer. All right, buddy, thanks,
I have one more serious one for you, Mark, so
I need you to breakle up here, all right. I actually,
technically I have three more serious ones. You're on stand
October twenty fifth, Big buck state, Illinois, Iowa, somewhere it's

(47:39):
you know, it's one of those states, Kansas, and you
see a stud one hundred and sixty inches just awesome deer.
He's kind of cruising through, checking stuff, making scrapes whatever.
But he's You're, like his trajectory, he's not coming in,
so you got to do something about it. So you
grun at him, no response, barely picks his head up.
Then you're like, I gotta I gotta ramp this up.

(48:00):
Snort wheeze at him, and he stops, looks around doesn't
look at you, but looks around, and then he turns
around and sort of does that trot walk away where
it's kind of I'm spooked, but I'm not, you know,
full on spook, like you know, halfway he's getting out
of there. But it's like, all right, what's going on here?
You're not sure what happened the snortweeze, did it whatever?

(48:24):
Do you keep hunting that deer in the next couple
of days, or do you go, you know what, he
spooked just enough where I'm gonna give that area a
little rest and go somewhere else.

Speaker 1 (48:33):
Interesting scenario. I would still hunt him. I think that
in a especially like I'm hunting out of state. This
isn't like my local turf that I know super well.
I'm likely on a shorter time period. Man. Getting eyes
on a buck of that, you know, getting eyes on
a target buck is such a huge piece of data,

(48:53):
like you can't afford not to take advantage of that.
So I would definitely still hunt that buck. I would
not likely hunting from the same tree. I would probably
make an adjustment based on what I saw, so hopefully
I learned something about where he's coming from, about where
he's going. Hopefully I can make some assumptions about what
he's doing. So hopefully I learned, like, Okay, I bet

(49:14):
you he's coming from this betting area, and I bet
you he's going to that food source. And so if
I was trying to call to him, he must have
been out of range. Right, So now I'm gonna say,
all right, well, I'm just gonna move into range of
where his path of travel what I think it is,
and if it's you know, October twenty fifth, he's still
on his you know, core kind of bed to feed

(49:34):
tight pattern, but he's now probably just wanting to check
out some does a little bit more. So I'm gonna
get right up in there, probably a little bit closer
to where I think he was betted, and hope to
intercept him coming out of that betting area. And just
you know, I'm going to be far enough away from
where I was hunting the previous day that I'm not
going to be worried about him, you know, skirting that

(49:55):
because if he skirts that area, he will likely stay
closer to where I am now. And that's that's what
I would do, right on, all.

Speaker 4 (50:05):
Right, So I have two more questions, all right. One
of them is a curveball question. But and it it
kind of play well, they kind of play into each other,
but they kind of don't as well. So I'll give
you the serious one.

Speaker 3 (50:21):
First.

Speaker 4 (50:22):
You decide to go on an out of state hunt,
let's say out west, and we're talking in the car,
nineteen hours whatever. We're hunting elk, mule deer, some different species.
A lot of time and travel invested into this hunt,
and dollars, okay, and so. But you're going out there

(50:42):
with a partner. Your partner is a weak link, all right.
He's slow, he's fat, he's preventing you from getting to
where you need to go. He's unenthusiastic if he doesn't
take scent seriously, like he's just he's ruining this experience
for you.

Speaker 1 (51:02):
Is this you?

Speaker 3 (51:04):
It could have been? It could be could be.

Speaker 1 (51:09):
How long to do the question?

Speaker 4 (51:12):
How long until you leave his ass at the truck
and you go make moves on your own.

Speaker 1 (51:20):
I'm not gonna leave him at the truck, but uh,
but I will, you know, if ever he's like, I
certainly will not stop for him. So I've had situations
where I've been on Western hunts with buddies and they're like,
you know, you know it's raining or snowy, or you know,
it's not gonna be very good. I'm just gonna stay

(51:41):
back at camp. That's like I'm leaving him in camp
for surely, I'm not gonna let him pull me down
with him. And then if I'm out like hiking around
the mountains chasing elk or deer, whatever it is, and
if there's a situation like you gotta get you gotta
get up the mountain to get ahead of the elk
or something, and if the buddy just can't keep up
and it's day four or five or whatever, you know,

(52:03):
at some point, I'll probably be like, hey, man, do
you mind if I just take a swing at this
guy and I'll meet you back here, you know, in
a couple hours, and and hopefully that'd be you know,
the situation. If the guy's like at risk of dying
or something and like he's like struggling that kind of way,
I'm not gonna leave someone who I don't think can survive.
But assuming it's just like good but assuming, but assuming

(52:29):
like he can handle his own for a little bit,
I'll just be like, hey, I think it just makes
more sense was to split up. I'll hunt high, you
can hunt low, and uh, you know, will make it work.
I'm not going to ruin a friendship over it, but
I think you can navigate that situation with tact and
uh and still be able to hunt hard without you know,

(52:51):
messing up the whole thing.

Speaker 3 (52:53):
Good. I really really like how you had to explain
that would be the dying friend to maybe a company
him with you.

Speaker 1 (53:02):
I got to make sure him very clear with you too.

Speaker 3 (53:04):
You're a man of character, Kenyon.

Speaker 1 (53:07):
I like to set a very low bar for myself,
but then really lead into it.

Speaker 3 (53:11):
There you go. Listen, if he's circling the drain, I'm
gonna stick around.

Speaker 1 (53:16):
Yeah, you can saint me.

Speaker 4 (53:19):
Now, all right, but I'm but I'm sure as ship
not gonna call a helicopter evac because it will ruin
the hunt.

Speaker 1 (53:27):
Yeah, you're not gonna do that.

Speaker 3 (53:31):
He's still breathing.

Speaker 1 (53:31):
But but but what I hike with him back to
the truck and go to town to pick up a
new tent so he can stay dry. Yes, I would
do that for.

Speaker 4 (53:40):
Him, yep, and waste the whole afternoon hunt with closing
the dryer, putting closing the.

Speaker 1 (53:45):
Dryer made for one of the best stories ever.

Speaker 3 (53:50):
Yep, yeah, I love it. I'll never forget it me neither.
All Right, Dan, you feel good about that? I felt.
I feel real good about it. All right, Well, I
kind of. I kind of have a somewhat of a
parallel scenario for you there, all right, Kenya. So Mark
Zuckerberg oh wakes up one day and he's pissed for

(54:14):
some reason. Maybe it's because of the haircut, maybe it's because
he's a little too reptilian. Anyway, grumpy Zuck decides he's
sick of people. He's sick of people posting pictures of
themselves with fish, and he decides to implement a rule
for Instagram and Facebook where all users only get one

(54:36):
fish pick per year. How big of a trout does
it have to be before you burn up your one chance?

Speaker 1 (54:45):
Great, great question. I'm gonna save it for a twenty
inch plus cutthroat trout.

Speaker 3 (54:53):
Twenty Yeah.

Speaker 1 (54:54):
I want a big, pretty cutthroat with a gold and
pink sides. And uh, that's that's a fish worth showing off.
Only caught three of those in my life.

Speaker 3 (55:07):
Okay, that's what I was gonna ask. What I've never
I'm not real familiar with cuddies, so a twenty is
like a real hard to attain length.

Speaker 1 (55:17):
Yep, twenty would be like the equivalent of at least
a boon and crocket, like a boon and crocket, like
a net booner. I would say, would be a twenty
inch cutthroat, and I would call it a twenty inch
cutthroat would be the equivalent to like a two foot
brown trout something like that. So I'd never caught one
in all my years fishing out west until last year.

(55:37):
And last year I kind of went to a shangra
last spot and caught two, but prior to that, never
even saw one that big. So that'd be a special one.

Speaker 3 (55:49):
So you wouldn't use that fish picture like if your
kid's caught a cool one, you'd be like, no, this
is for me.

Speaker 4 (55:54):
Hell Now, I was just gonna ask that same question.
You a bitch, Mark, You don't even love your kids?

Speaker 3 (56:06):
Are you kidding me?

Speaker 1 (56:09):
No?

Speaker 3 (56:09):
The kids, Dan, This is a guy who left his
buddy to die exactly. So yeah, the real Mark Kenyon exposed.

Speaker 1 (56:17):
Yeah, I'm having a tough time that my wife's pregnant
with someone else's child. I have target panic. This has
been a very bad year.

Speaker 3 (56:24):
Hey, Dan, does your wife watch those murder mysteries? Because
I feel like clips of this are going to end
up on a dateline at some point exactly exactly, Yeah,
what's that?

Speaker 4 (56:36):
What's that guy's name? Who does the creepy voice? Where
is like Psyche gets excited about in Spencer Newhart?

Speaker 1 (56:48):
That would work?

Speaker 3 (56:50):
Is a Spence?

Speaker 1 (56:51):
It could be he'd be perfect.

Speaker 4 (56:54):
Small town Michigan. Anyway, Uh, Mark, are you ready for
a curve ball question?

Speaker 1 (57:01):
Yeah, let's do it.

Speaker 3 (57:02):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (57:03):
Ultimately, it's about late season hunting, all right. So it's
been a long season. You've been doing a lot of
filming with a brand new camera guy who's really ambitious.
He's really he really wants to make a mark so
he can work for me, eatther Man. He found his

(57:24):
dream job and he wants to be very successful at it.
You get back from several weeks of hunting and your
wife is moving some of your stuff around and she
finds a small packet of meth amphetamines.

Speaker 3 (57:40):
And she then she says yeah, she says, hey, I.

Speaker 4 (57:46):
Can't trust you anymore, and she decides to leave you
and take the children. Well throughout the rest of the season.
You go through you go through a divorce, okay, and
you lose you You only get your children like every
other week, right, So it's every other week they come
to you, they go to your wife, and so it

(58:08):
just so happens that they go to your wife on
a huge cold front coming through Michigan and you have
a standing bean plot or corn plot and the deer
are hammering it. How do you approach that scenario while
your kids are with your wife?

Speaker 3 (58:27):
That's what.

Speaker 1 (58:31):
Wow, Well, it's a lot to process. This would be
the worst year ever for sure. So I'm sure I'm
in a very very bad place mentally. But I would
look at this moment where the kids are away as
a little bit of an opportunity to get some mental

(58:52):
R and R I suppose. So, yeah, big cold front
coming through, and I, you know, don't have the kids.
I'm hunting. If I did have the kids, If I
did have the kids and the cold front was coming,
I'd still be hunting. Not just kidding.

Speaker 3 (59:11):
You boys.

Speaker 1 (59:11):
Wait in the truck. I'll be back in a couple hours.

Speaker 3 (59:16):
No.

Speaker 1 (59:16):
So okay, So in a situation a big coal front
coming in, I mean I think what I'd be doing
is hopefully leading into that front. I would like to
have some information about what they're doing on that standing
bean plot, so I would be if I could watch
it from afar, I would definitely be doing that as
many nights as I could leading into that front. So
late season, I'm just even more picky, like we talked about,

(59:39):
So I'm probably hunting the evenings and I want to
hunt them, you know, with like a very targeted assassin
like approach. So I want to see what these deer
are doing. I want to see where the bucks are
coming into the field, even if it's just younger bucks.
I want to know where that's happening. Hopefully some camera
and tell tells me like, Okay, yeah, this bedding area

(01:00:00):
or whatever is where the buck you're after is, or
some bucks that you might be interested in shooting are at.
And then I'm waiting for that front to hit. I'll
hunt that evening before the front. Let's say this is
late December. I'll be hunting hopefully the evening before and
then the couple evenings afterwards, and hopefully I don't need
to do a whole bunch of hunts because you know,
it's a kind of situation where you've got a hunt

(01:00:21):
or two before they might catch on to you hunting
that kind of situation, and I would be hunting in
between that bedding area heading to that beanfield. You know,
hopefully from what I saw, I've got a good idea
of where I need to start and hunt, you know,
a well planned hanging hunt set. And if I don't

(01:00:43):
have my location right that first night, I'll you know,
make an adjustment for the second night. Hopefully I've got
a situation. I don't know what property this is, but
you have to have some kind of good exit plan
with that kind of situation. You know, beanfield in December,
there's going to be a bunch of deer on there
with a cold front. So if I have to walk
out through that beanfield, well then you know it's game

(01:01:04):
over probably if you're trying to kill an older deer.
So I would either you know, hopefully have a buddy
or somebody who would come drive out there, or maybe
there's like a ditch or a creek or something that
I can sneak away out the backside to and use
that to exit. If there's nothing like that, I'll just
hunt further and further away from the food and try

(01:01:26):
to make sure that I'll give myself an opportunity to hunt,
you know, more than just one night without the whole
thing blown up in my face. You know, that would
be of course, wind direction is going to dictate where
I would hunt, but let's hope that this sets up
well for a north or northwest wind, which will probably
come with that cold front. And yeah, I mean that

(01:01:48):
first really cold, wicked day will be you know, a
great chance for that whatever bucks in the area to
come out hit the food, and I just need to
be set up in the right place to get a shot.
Would not push super close to the betting area in
that situation, so hopefully I can hunt low impact for
that evening set up. Those late season hunts are really

(01:02:09):
hard to move around quietly to not be seen without
spooking deer, and if you spook a couple dos, you know,
there's oftentimes that ripple effect where they'll spook back and
then that'll you know, make everything come out later in
the evening. So I would not ideally like to have
to push really deep in there. I would hope for
good access or a friend to help me out so

(01:02:29):
I could hunt pretty close to the food and not
need to risk spooking things as I go into set up.
So perfect situation would be like maybe there's a little
creek or something that runs along the north edge of
this beanfield, let's say, and they're betting north of that,
I would hopefully have watched a couple times from afar
or I know the area, or pictures or something has

(01:02:51):
told me, you know, they come through this corner or whatever.
But maybe there's also like a creek cross in, like
a favorite creek crossing something like that that helps me
narrow down where to set up along the edge of
the inside of that food source, that transition area, so
that I'm not just blindly picking somewhere on the field,
but I'm situating myself in a place that I know
there's a high chance that deer will funnel through this

(01:03:11):
as they enter the food source. And ideally we'll set
up with that wind. Let's say it's a northwest wind,
hopefully cutting off to the side of the field, so
that I can hunt these deer coming out to the
north in the west of me while my wind, my
wind blows to the south and the east of me.
And I've got that creek crossing upwind of me, So

(01:03:32):
that's going to hopefully funnel you know, concentrate a little
bit more of that activity within bow range, and you know,
hopefully there's a couple of trails or my observation showed
me that too. So those types of things make me
feel really good going into that hunt.

Speaker 4 (01:03:49):
Okay, I want to ask a spinoff question of that,
and that is throughout the course of a year, early season,
mid season, you can you can break it really down
however you want. October, November, December, pre pre rep post
rut however you know, however you want to do it.
What is your definition of a cold front and how

(01:04:13):
much or how big of a cold front does it
need to be for you to get excited enough to hunt.

Speaker 1 (01:04:21):
So usually ten degrees or more is like that threshold
that I look at as something I'm like particularly excited about.
If there's a front that comes through with precipitation and
a bear metric pressure change but not a huge temperature,
let's say like eight degrees or seven degrees, but a
rainstorm came through. Now it's seven degrees cooler, and now

(01:04:43):
it's high pressure on the backside. Like I would still
be excited about that, even though it's less than ten,
but usually that ten degrees are more from the daytime highs.
Would be something that like, I'm looking for on the
weather forecast and will have me interested regardless of the
time of year.

Speaker 3 (01:05:13):
So, Dan, if that was a curveball, I don't even
know what you call this one. Oh geez, this is
this is the last one I got for you. Mark,
I'm gonna have to get you, gotta use your imagination here,
but I'm gonna I'm gonna take you around a little
bit and I'm gonna I'm gonna bring it home, buddy.
So you ready, all right? Picture this. You're standing in

(01:05:34):
a very specific spot. Shotgun in your hand. Okay, it
contains just one slug. You've got one shot. Okay. You
look to your left and you see your favorite little
botique bookstore in Bozeman, just teeming with flat brim hipsters.

(01:05:56):
You know, your people covered in them, just got a
new ship into awesome books about you know, how to
be a better person, some bullshit like that. Yeah, I'm okay.
So so you see that and you're like, oh man,
And then you look to your right and it is
just this field, this beautiful field full of pollinators. I

(01:06:17):
mean the density of pollinators in there. You've never seen it.
You're like your wildest dreams.

Speaker 1 (01:06:23):
Oh man.

Speaker 3 (01:06:24):
Then two dudes walk on the scene and they both
have lit Molotov cocktails in their hands. One's gonna chuck
it right through the window of that bookstore, burn the
whole place down. The people are gonna live. It's gonna
burn the bookstore down. The other guy's gonna chuck it
right into that field and burn up all those pollinators.
Who do you shoot? Who do you spare? You got

(01:06:47):
one shot, buddy?

Speaker 4 (01:06:49):
Wow?

Speaker 1 (01:06:49):
Yeah, man, Easy decision, easy decision. I'm shooting the guys
that are going to torch the bookshop because that stuff's
much harder to replace. That's gonna cost a lot of money.
There's life's impacted, and it's going to ruin the day
for all those flat brim wearing great people. They probably
like to fish too, and I don't want anything to

(01:07:11):
happen to my fishing brothers and sisters on the flip side.

Speaker 3 (01:07:13):
But if you take them out, though, you have more
room on the stream to yourself.

Speaker 1 (01:07:18):
Well, you said that none of them die, so they're
all going to be a fishing.

Speaker 3 (01:07:21):
No matter what, they're gonna get slightly injured and miss
just the best fishing part of the season.

Speaker 1 (01:07:26):
Regardless. Regardless of that, I'm gonna burn the pollinators because
that'll probably end up being better for that field anyways.
To give it a good burn, to reset it. It's
going to add nutrients to the soil. Everything will regrow,
but maybe even better for the next season. So it's
a long term play, but it will preserve the integrity

(01:07:48):
of our bookstore and our reading public while also putting
things in a better place for the pollinators in years
to come. Good enough, well done, gentlemen, you guys, any
more for you? Dan?

Speaker 4 (01:08:03):
I mean I could sit here all day long and
do this all right, but I feel like I want
to get into the rapid.

Speaker 3 (01:08:12):
Fire questions the there you go? Where we just go?
Where we go, unless unless you want me to ask more.
It's up to you.

Speaker 1 (01:08:19):
No, I feel good. I mean, if you guys think
I made it through the gauntlet, if you guys are
satisfied with my performance here, then yes, I'm ready for
the rapid fire.

Speaker 3 (01:08:29):
Got Tony, how are you guys?

Speaker 1 (01:08:32):
How are you guys handling this?

Speaker 3 (01:08:34):
I don't know know, I was just told that we
were going to skip it, but uh, I was kind
of hoping you just gloss right over it and we
go on to something else. But we could do it.
I'll take one, you take the other one. Dan, we'll
go back and fill with you.

Speaker 4 (01:08:52):
Let's let's do it. Let's do it as quick as possible.
I want what I'm really hoping for here. And this
is kind of a note to whoever's this. I would
really like us to focus on answers that might get
him in trouble or be really controversial, so then they
have clips to throw which would actually question like people

(01:09:14):
would start to question his integrity.

Speaker 1 (01:09:16):
Yeah, this is gonna go well, all.

Speaker 3 (01:09:19):
Right, well, why don't you start it off? Dan here?

Speaker 4 (01:09:23):
Okay, Well, I'm just going to start out easy, okay,
all right, Tony?

Speaker 3 (01:09:29):
Are you ready? I am all right?

Speaker 4 (01:09:33):
Rapid fire starting now? Typical or non typical white tails?

Speaker 1 (01:09:40):
Non typical?

Speaker 3 (01:09:42):
Okay, Tony. So I have to confess I didn't come
up with anything for this.

Speaker 1 (01:09:48):
Geez, Tony, what a darrel?

Speaker 3 (01:09:52):
And part of it, I'm not going to explain that anyway.

Speaker 4 (01:09:57):
Dan.

Speaker 3 (01:09:57):
You can just handle this part.

Speaker 1 (01:10:03):
Dan's the responsible one in the group.

Speaker 4 (01:10:07):
Doubt it okay. Okay, mechanicals are fixed blade all season long.
You have to you can only have one mechanical or.

Speaker 1 (01:10:17):
Fixed blade mechanical okay, pre Rut or post rap pre
rup pre Rut.

Speaker 4 (01:10:29):
Alaska or Montana, Alaska, Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings.

Speaker 1 (01:10:38):
Uh, Lord of the Rings?

Speaker 4 (01:10:41):
Okay, all right, that's that because if you said Harry Potter,
I was going to just unleash on you and call
you a nerd.

Speaker 3 (01:10:49):
Okay, because I watch did you see the look in
his eyes?

Speaker 4 (01:10:54):
Though?

Speaker 3 (01:10:55):
I think he wanted to answer Harry.

Speaker 4 (01:10:56):
I know he did. I think the truth out of him.

Speaker 3 (01:11:00):
H Yeah. I think I think he I think he's like,
I'm gonna play those cool because I know everybody wants
Lord of the Rings. But in his I think in
his heart he was like Harry Potter.

Speaker 1 (01:11:12):
I I I enjoyed Harry Potter, but but no Lord
of the Rings, man that takes the kick.

Speaker 3 (01:11:17):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (01:11:18):
You've been to a lot of national park's favorite National
park to go visit?

Speaker 1 (01:11:23):
Mm hmm grand tee ton all right, all right, bucket
list animals that you have not already shot, give me
five five uh moose yep yep. Okay uh moose, pronghorn

(01:11:48):
sheep killed, big horn sheep someday, black bear, and heck,
a mountain go would be awesome. I don't see it
in my future, but i'd be sweet.

Speaker 3 (01:12:04):
Okay. Do you do you see a big horn seep
in your future? No?

Speaker 4 (01:12:08):
Not.

Speaker 1 (01:12:08):
I don't see a big horn sheep in my future either.
I think I think, yeah, I think a black bears possible,
prong horns possible in a moose. You know, if if
really I get lucky and my dreams come true, a
moose is maybe in the in the running someday, but
the other two probably not.

Speaker 4 (01:12:23):
Okay, favorite favorite favorites out of state hunt archery season?
What's your favorite state to hunt.

Speaker 3 (01:12:36):
Out of state?

Speaker 1 (01:12:37):
I'll just say I like the Great Plains, any one
of the Great Plains states. I really enjoyed that area.

Speaker 4 (01:12:43):
Okay, I mean from here on out it just gets
real vulgar. So I didn't know, are we done with
the rapid questions or do you just want me keep going?

Speaker 1 (01:12:54):
Maybe? Maybe maybe we should be done with the rapid
fire questions now?

Speaker 3 (01:12:59):
Okay?

Speaker 4 (01:13:00):
Oh here, one one more, one more, one more? Do
you bring an extra bow on your out of state hunts?
In case your regular bow gets damaged.

Speaker 1 (01:13:13):
Uh. No, I have done it a few times. A
few times have done it, but usually don't.

Speaker 3 (01:13:22):
Do you Do you know why you don't? Mark?

Speaker 1 (01:13:24):
Do you?

Speaker 3 (01:13:25):
Yeah? Do you know why you don't?

Speaker 1 (01:13:27):
Why is that tony?

Speaker 3 (01:13:28):
Because you've never needed one yet?

Speaker 1 (01:13:31):
True?

Speaker 3 (01:13:32):
True? If you get out there and you need one.
I mean part of it so, and I'm being totally
honest here, or serious, part of it is you have
extra everything. If you have an extra bow, you know,
and if you're out spotting and stocking or something and
you break like a quiver connection, you're like, oh that,
you don't think that's that big of a deal, but

(01:13:53):
it is. And so having a bat not only if
your bow something happens, you get tossed off a horse
or whatever, but you just have all those parts and
everything to work with. It's it's not a bad idea.

Speaker 1 (01:14:04):
No, I mean, I certainly is a good idea if
you can swing it space wise. Well do I survive?
Did I make it? Do we do it?

Speaker 3 (01:14:12):
I think so? I think so?

Speaker 1 (01:14:15):
Well you guys, You guys exceeded my expectations when it
came to creativity and curveball. So well done, gentlemen, and
I thoroughly enjoyed that, So thank you.

Speaker 3 (01:14:31):
I can't wait till next time.

Speaker 1 (01:14:33):
Yeah, next time you're gonna be the you know, you're
gonna be the guest next time, and I'm gonna come
at you with the same level of malice that you
brought to the table here today. So I realized I
was maybe not malice, but you really you really spent
a lot of time imagining horrible situations for my life,
and and for that I owe you.

Speaker 3 (01:14:56):
Those are just those are just called educated guesses. Mark,
right right, I have a question the odds. I don't
want to end quite yet.

Speaker 4 (01:15:04):
I want to ask you, out of all the guests
that you've had on this show, and obviously you can't
answer me or Tony as as answers, but out of
out of all the guests that you've had on this show,
that you who are some of the people that you
respect the most?

Speaker 1 (01:15:26):
Oh, I mean I think there's maybe you put him
on a pedestal. Yeah, So like there's a lot that
I really enjoy. They've all been great, but I guess
you know one guy who I just always always enjoy
talking to and is always like a standout is Mark Dury.

(01:15:46):
I feel like I really appreciate his analytical approach and
thought process, so like whenever we talk, we're like speaking
the same language when it comes like nerding out on
some of the details and stuff. So I always appreciate that,
and I just think he's like one of the very
very best communicators about this stuff. So even though like
the way I hunt is not very much like the
way he hunts, even though his situation is very different

(01:16:08):
than mine and then different than a lot of ours, right,
I still feel like he's always got something useful to share.
I feel like there's things I've learned from him that
can even be applied to public land hunts and things
like that, just because he's a very good communicator and
he understands deer and you just have to adjust his
suggestions based on the level of pressure that your dear
hair have or what the you know, scenario is that

(01:16:29):
you hunting. But he's just a guy like I really
enjoy talking with and geeking out on that stuff with.
So he's one who comes to mind right out the gate. Yeah,
that'll be my first just the first thing that came
to mind to be Mark.

Speaker 3 (01:16:45):
I feel like you were angling for a job there
a little bit.

Speaker 1 (01:16:50):
I hope, I hope I'm not. I hope I'm not
in need for that.

Speaker 4 (01:16:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:16:56):
And uh, you know another Andy, like we all we
love Andy May He's another one of those guys who
he's an og. He's very, very very knowledgeable, another really
good communicator and definitely someone I look at as one
of the best deer hunters I know, while also not
being a jerk and being like a humble, good guy
to talk to. So, you know, if if Mark is

(01:17:17):
like your private land managed guy, and I was, if
I was going to pick someone who's more like the
di y or public, maybe Andy would be the guy
on the other side that I would put up in
my top two at least first first thoughts.

Speaker 3 (01:17:31):
Yeah, that's a good answer.

Speaker 4 (01:17:34):
Do you feel that we could use the Wired to
Hunt platform to ask the same exact questions that we
asked you today to those guys? Uh?

Speaker 1 (01:17:51):
No, okay, I think uh, I.

Speaker 4 (01:17:54):
Just wanted I was curious, you know, brainstorman I had
an idea.

Speaker 1 (01:17:58):
You're an idea guy, and I appreciated.

Speaker 3 (01:18:01):
I'm the wildcard. The wildcard.

Speaker 1 (01:18:03):
You are the wildcard. That's it. That's just makes you wonderful. Well,
if nothing else. I think people laugh today, which is
the best medicine we could ever ask for. So good
stuff on that front. Real quick, Do you guys have
a few more minutes to talk through our goals and plans?

Speaker 3 (01:18:22):
Yep?

Speaker 1 (01:18:22):
All right, Dan, Do you want to lead us off
with a quick rundown of what your hunt plans are
this year and your goals maybe hopes, however you want
to frame it?

Speaker 3 (01:18:33):
Yep, okay, real quick.

Speaker 4 (01:18:36):
Just got finally just got trail cameras up last two
weeks and my number one target buck on my main
farm showed back up.

Speaker 3 (01:18:46):
So he is alive.

Speaker 4 (01:18:48):
He's not showing up on camera a regularly regularly, but
he's alive, and based off of historic knowledge, I know
the the route that he's running, and so I'm feeling
really good about attacking him come that prerect timeframe.

Speaker 3 (01:19:09):
And so.

Speaker 4 (01:19:11):
New farm that's been really active with they've been mowing
and bailing hay right now, so I'm getting a lot
of that on trail cameras. But once they get that
Hey out of there, I feel like the cameras are
going to start opening up and I'm going to get
a good idea of what's running around on the main farm.
Last year, there were some absolute studs on that farm.

(01:19:32):
So I'm looking forward to seeing that. I have an
out of state hunt to South Dakota where I'm going
to go all in on mule deer until I don't
go all in on mule deer and I find myself
hunting white beast. So I got that's planned for mid
to late October as well, and then depending on if

(01:19:54):
and when I take out in Iowa, I might be
hopping up to some public in Wiscon in Minnesota or
potentially Oklahoma, depending on if and when nice.

Speaker 1 (01:20:07):
So, other than killing your target buck, is there any
like top goal or two within that? Or are you
not really focusing on the target buck? You watch shoot
any four year old? What's your what are you chasing
specifically this year?

Speaker 3 (01:20:20):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (01:20:21):
So you know it's mature, right, it's whatever the top
tier buck in on the on said farms are right,
And so I don't get too terribly fired up on
velvet pictures because we all know the velvet comes off,
there's redistribution of deer and sometimes they stick around, sometimes

(01:20:41):
they don't, or sometimes they disappear and then come back
in that late October timeframe and so I don't. I
like to I like to know that certain deer exists
and are in the area. But from a strategy standpoint,
these pictures don't mean too much right now, and so
I will when I do my card pull, like at

(01:21:02):
the end of October, I'll get a better idea of
what deer running through the area, and then I'll make
a strategy at that point.

Speaker 1 (01:21:12):
Sweet, what about you, Tony oh Man.

Speaker 3 (01:21:15):
I have a lot of goals this year. First and foremost,
my daughter drew a bear tag in Wisconsin. So I'm
driving over there baiting bears, and I have some absolute
toads coming in. I have a bear tag too, but
I don't care. I'll hunt them some. But I want
to get her a bear. And I was kind of

(01:21:36):
before I started bating, I was like, whatever, whatever, legal
bear is great. But I've got a couple bears coming
in that are like four hundred ish four hundred plus
maybe live weight, And so now I'm kind of like, man,
do we really put in some time to try to
get her a big, big bear? So I'm working on that.
I want to get the girls both Bucks. They've never

(01:21:57):
gotten Bucks in the same year, and so I'm working
on that too, and I have a couple of deer
that are they I think they're going to stick to
what they're doing for that opener in Wisconsin over there.
And then I last time you and I talked, Mark,
you were talking about a new spot you had, and
I told you that I had. You know, I flew
really close to the sun and I thought I was

(01:22:18):
losing this this property by my house. Well I got
on that place. The guy called me up. He's like,
we're gonna hang some stands. What are we doing? And
so I've got that place set up and a couple
of cameras in there, and I don't want to curse
it yet, but it is the pictures I'm getting. Just
the amount of deer in there is so awesome. And

(01:22:41):
I haven't got any big, big deer in there, but
there's a couple that are like one thirty to one
fifty class that are They're not real consistent yet, but
I think they will be a little bit later. So
it's like it's one of those things that almost never
ever happens to you, you know, especially where I live,
where it's like you Now you get a place to
hunt that's seven eight minutes from your house and it

(01:23:02):
has quality and quantity, and so I'm I'm working on
that and just trying to figure out what I'm gonna
do with my Minnesota tag there, because that is I'm
so excited to hunt a new spot that I don't
have to drive two hours to go get to, you know,
and then you know, I've got a Oklahoma hunt, in

(01:23:23):
a North Dakota and something else, I think, but all
white tails just just I just want to spend my
time this season with the girls doing cool stuff and
then hunt some new places and hunt some places.

Speaker 1 (01:23:35):
I want to what's the deal with that new property?
Is that sounds like the landowner is a hunter too?
Is he? Are you guys both hunting it? Or is he?
What's the deal?

Speaker 3 (01:23:46):
So this is a guy, a very typical kind of
Upper Midwestern dude who's rifle hunted. You know, they have
the family cabin, the deer shack, the whole thing. He's
he started bow hunting very recently, I think in the
life last couple of years, never killed a deer with
the bow. I honestly don't know for sure if he's
killed one with a rifle. And so he's real green,

(01:24:10):
and so I should have said this, like, part of
my goal is to get that dude his first deer,
and you know, he'll get his chances. I think he
shot at one buck with a bow one time walking
around a couple of years ago. But he's just he's
going out there with me, hanging stands like he's he's
not really familiar with our process at all, you know, lifelines,

(01:24:31):
the whole thing, cameras, putting up blinds, brushing them in.
So that's actually been pretty fun because he's just like
a sponge. He's like he's there to learn the only
thing that worries me about it. And you know how
this goes, right, You get permission, you do all this work,
and then you start getting pictures of big bucks, and

(01:24:52):
I'm just I don't want him to be like, I
don't think I want this dude in here hunting these
big bucks. You know, they're on my land, right, You're like,
it's the one danger, but I don't. I don't think
that's gonna happen. But it really you know the last
time we talked about this, I was like I'd kind
of resigned myself that this was gone. I'm not this
this spot's and no go and now you know, I'm

(01:25:13):
I'm set up in there, and the amount of deer
and I'll say this too, the thing I'm learning in there,
and I don't I don't really know what's going on.
But when I walked through there with him, I found
an apple tree that he didn't know was there. And
I'm telling you, whatever this apple tree is doing, if
you could bottle that up and sell it to other hunters,
it is unreal. And there's there's wild plums, there's acorns dropping,

(01:25:36):
there's other apple trees. It's not like there's an absence
of soft and hard masks or destination food in the area.
But I put a camera up on that tree just
to see the amount of deer, turkeys, raccoons, gray fox, coyotes,
like everything comes in there and checks for those apples,
and it's all day long, like it's you know, we've

(01:25:58):
had this weather lately where it's like, you know, ninety
seven degrees and one hundred percent humidity, and you're like,
there's nothing, nothing should be moving. And I'm getting pictures
of bucks at like one in the afternoon. They must
just get up out of their bed and they're like,
I'm gonna go see if any apples fell and these
are good deer and you know, doze and scrapper bucks
and stuff, and it's like, I don't. It's just opening

(01:26:21):
my eyes to that reality. They're like, man, if there's
a food source like that, a very specific thing that
they are into, they're checking it because there's just competition there.
So they're checking it all day long. It's so cool.

Speaker 1 (01:26:34):
So opening day setup, I think that's the spot.

Speaker 3 (01:26:39):
Well, I can't. So this is how you know, Okay,
this is dumb thing to complain about. I have to
film in southeastern Minnesota for the first four days of
the season, so I have I have other stuff set
up down there. There's some pretty good bucks down there.
Then I have to go pick up my daughter and
we're filming the first five days of the bear season.

(01:27:02):
Then I come home for a day and I gotta
fly to Bozeman now in the end of September, and
so for the first essentially fifteen days of the season,
I can't hunt this new place. But the owner. I
talked to the landowner. I was like, you, dude, you
need to get out there, and he's like, I'm gonna
wait for you because he doesn't he's never butchered one
on his own, like he's not real confident in the process.

(01:27:25):
So I was like, well, if you want to wait
for me to get there, not going ahead of time,
that's great. So no, it'll be probably in October, right
around the beginning of October when I get to hunt
there for the first time.

Speaker 1 (01:27:37):
Man, you just got to make sure this guy never
discovers the Wired to Hunt podcast, because if he realizes
that he can get all the learning he needs from you,
but doesn't need you hunting the property with it, he
can just listen to on the podcast, you're screwed.

Speaker 3 (01:27:50):
I'm I don't get the impression this guy is gonna
be subscribing to Wired a hundred times soon.

Speaker 1 (01:27:57):
Let's just get it that way, man, that sounds good.
So on my side, I take off for a Wisconsin
and Minnesota fishing hunting trip combo in mid September, so
that one would be like any deer would be a
good deer, So that'll be kind of fun. And then

(01:28:19):
when October hits be targeting the local Michigan spots. I've got,
you know, as we talked about a few weeks ago, Tony,
I've got a new property. I've picked up access to
that I'm pretty excited about. I have went out and
did all the scouting we talked about. I've got a
bunch of cameras out there, and there's a lot of deer.
There's bucks. There's not the age class buck that I

(01:28:40):
thought there was going to be. There's like a lot
of two year olds and three year olds and maybe
there's been like two bucks that maybe or four, So
we'll see. You know, stuff's obviously gonna change once September hits.
So I've i've I'm hoping kind of my feel on
the properties that really sets up more for a fall
range this year. In particular, there's beans and open canopy

(01:29:04):
woods and stuff on a lot of the neighboring property,
but the property itself that I can hunt is corn
and like thicker than thick stuff. So that's the kind
of thing that they're not necessarily going to be in
super heavy in the summer, but I'm sure in the
fall they will be. So I'm counting on hopefully something
moving in that I'll be really excited about. But either way,

(01:29:25):
I think we'll have some fun. And as far as
goals in Michigan, I do have like a number one
target buck on my main farm, which is the buck
I call the wide nine. And this is a deer
that has been around the longest of any deer I've
ever followed. This would be the fourth year that I've
been able to see him because as a two year

(01:29:45):
old he stood out because he was a really wide
nine pointer as a two year old, and then he's
just basically been the same thing, but a little bit
bigger every single year. So he's five and a half
year this year and the only five and a half
year old I know of in that area, so he'll
be number one. There's a second buck that my son
named Bulldozer. He's a pretty cool nine pointer as well.

(01:30:09):
They're both decent. He's a four year old. So there'll
be something in southern Michigan between that and the new farm.
And then a big thing is up in our Northern
Michigan deer camp. We've got a bunch of work we've
been doing up there. We've never had that set up
as well as it is now, and I've got a
five day trip planned up there in October with my
dad where the goal is just to help him kill

(01:30:30):
a deer up there. So that's something I'm very excited
about because I'll have a good excuse to be able
to spend extra time up there, and it's work and
can spend some time with my dad, And so we
put in We had some help come in the spring
and we carved in like a little microfood plot in
our big mature woods, and then two other like betting
pockets in there, and then we expanded the one little

(01:30:51):
eighth acre food plot we had into like an acre.
So last week we went in there and we set
up four blinds in spots for my day for different
wind directions and stuff. We planted, fertilized and lined to
the food plots, got four scrape trees up, four sets
of trial cameras, and then when all that was done,
I was feeling great. We found out that one of

(01:31:12):
our neighbors, who was a non hunter, planted like an
acre and a half of corn on the edge of
our property that he just put up there because he
wants the deer to have something to eat and there's
not agg in the area. So it was already gonna
be a huge deal for us to have an acre
food plot in the middle of this big swampy woods country.
And now there's that back in the cover, and then
an acre of corn just on the other side, so

(01:31:35):
we all of a sudden like went from zero high
quality food to now a ton of it relative to
the area. So I'm I'm like over the moon excited
about what happens up there, both for my dad, but
then in gun season when I go back, you know,
i'd certainly shoot something if I could get a half
decent buck up there too. So goals are, hopefully kill
the wide nine or mature buck down in one of

(01:31:57):
the southern places. Hopefully get my dad a deer up camp.
I'm going back to Nebraska for a week in November,
so I would love to kill a better buck even there.
I'm gonna be a little bit more picky in Nebraska
this year, just because I want to spend more time there.
Like I killed the deer the first day last year,
and it's so much fun that I just want to
be there longer. So excited about that one. And then

(01:32:20):
I want a one hundred in control shot this year,
like I've I think both of you know. Last year,
you know, again, I was redeveloping my shooting process and
just trying to get better, more in control and stuff
and last year, I did better, but I'd say like
all my shots, like the best I ever did was
like maybe like a B or B plus on you know,
going through my entire process, not skipping any steps, not

(01:32:42):
rushing at all, I did better, but I still know,
like the very final thing, it was still like, you know,
muscle memory taken over a little bit. I want to
have one shot at least where it's like, man, that
was perfect. I want a perfect shot this year, so
I'm working towards that. And and then I just want
to keep the fun that I had last year, like

(01:33:03):
continue to just focus on enjoying it, continue to stop
worrying about all the outside noise, and just like keep
the good vibes going, which a lot of that too,
is like spending more time with friends and family during
hunting season, which I'm gonna try to do this year.
And yeah, that's my plan. So it'll be September when
this one goes out, or at least the last day

(01:33:24):
of bat August. So basically the fall begins now and
we're off to the races. So best of luck, gentlemen, Best.

Speaker 3 (01:33:32):
Of luck, same to you guys, you too, buddy, hey.

Speaker 1 (01:33:35):
And thank you, thank you, both for doing this. This
is fun. It's a good excuse to laugh a lot,
catch up a little, and embarrass me. So thank you.

Speaker 3 (01:33:45):
Mission complete, Yeah, buddy, mission.

Speaker 1 (01:33:48):
Complete, and that is a wrap. Thank you all for
joining us for this one. It was different. I guess
you could say to say the least Tony and Dan
and really gave. I don't know through miss some curveballs.
Took this in a different direction than I was planning.
But you never know what's gonna happen with those two.

(01:34:08):
Hopefully you still learn a few things there in between
them insulting my pride, my marriage, and who knows what else.
But try to be a good sport, try to have
a good time, and that we did so thanks for
being a part of it. Appreciate you being a part
of this community. Hunting season is here or just about
for some of you in certain states, so if you

(01:34:28):
are hitting those early season dates with the bow, I'm
wishing you the best of luck, have fun out there,
keep your priorities straight, enjoy yourself, be safe, and until
next time, stay wired to hunt.

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Host

Mark Kenyon

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