Ep. 77: Bear Grease [Render] - Bucks, Wild Hogs, Losing Fingers, and Three-Wheeler Wrecks

for me right here. I got lots of people here that uh, usually we have a group that's all the same, but during hunting season I usually do something a little different. This is this is one of those different ones, all right. So the only regular is Gary Believer knucom. Does anybody here know why he's his nickname is a believer? Absolutely

tell him? Tell him Scott. He believes in the black Panther. Hey, Steve meat Eater made a hat that's like a best selling hat, Like people wear this hat all over the country and it says believer and it has a black panther walking across the log with a moon behind it and it and it says on the Mediator website inspired by Gary knwcom. Yeah, so good to see you. Then, so everybody else. Every one of you have been on

the Bargeras podcast before, but never on a render. I don't think any of you ever been on a render. So to my left, my good buddy, Scott Brown. I talked about you all the time, Scott, do you hear do you hear murmurs of it? Every once in a while, Yeah, every once in a while. Now you mentioned me, So Scott, you're just a couple of years older than me. We didn't really know each other that well in high school.

Kind of. I knew of you. The first time that I consciously remember Scott meeting Scott was outside the walmart and we met up just like outside the walmart. It was dark, and you said, Clay, I'm hunting the buck that if I kill it, everybody's gonna know about it. I didn't take much of a deer back then, and like a hundred and fifty six inch buck on public

land with your both and everybody knew about it. And I was like, what this man says he does, but no, Scott and I I Scott went to the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. I moved to Fayetteville when you were like a senior in college, and so I was whatever

you are when you start freshman, I guess. And we worked together at Walmart and man, Andy, that's where I've felt like I got to know you because me and Scott talked NonStop about deer hunting, about black panther just jumped in my lap, and um no, I learned a ton about deer hunting from Scott Brown, no doubt. Good to have you, Scott. You were on the first Bargrease podcast too, was telling the story about the guy walking

in with a Bobcat picture, thinking it was a mountain lion. Think, yeah, yeah, that was perfect. That was two year left is my long time like since like grade school? Buddy, Randy long legged step good to be here. Yeah, man, So Randy's claimed to fame in the Bargrease world is that uh he told the story of the buck falling in the mind chef. Just think, Randy, if that hadn't happened to you, where would you be in life? Man? You know I

can butterfly effect. Take that back to you. Clay. I got my first job in high school because you quit and I took your job. Specifically, I went in applied and said, what are we talking I don't even I'm lost. I guess I quit and didn't give them pushing carts, and you told me at school, hey, I'm quitting that job. I was like, oh, I think I want that job. So I went apply and said, hey, I heard Clay's quitting. I want this job, and they gave it to me,

and I still worked there twenty five years later. So if it weren't for you, maybe none of that happens, and that deer didn't fall in my chap. Well, okay, I I didn't realize that you did that. Yeah, I pushed carts and that's yeah. I had two stints at Walmart. I guess everybody in Arkansas does you. Guys just stuck with it. Scott works at Walmart. Randy works at Walmart. Absolutely, man,

I was thinking. Randy and I, believe it or not, went to Boys State together, and if you know what Boys State is, I don't know if that's good or bad. I don't know if I'm proud of that or not proud of that. But me and Randy and room together there too, which is strange because usually they try to pair you up some I guess they figured we couldn't be paired with anybody else. I guess not good to see you, Randy. Randy's left skipping over dad, Steve, Eve Phillips, Steve.

As long as I remember being alive, I remember Steve Phillips being around somewhere. We went to church with the Phillips and I went to school with your kids. You were on the second Bear Grease podcast mouth calling. Yeah, man, give us your best mouth call, whether it's ol or crow? Can you do it on the spot. There you go, that's good. I want to hear about your hogg at some point. Let me let me introduce uh oh yeah, get this guy to get this guy to my left. Yeah,

and Steve's left is Andy Brown and Andy Man. I told you this when you were on the podcast the other day. You're your world famous man after the Louis Dell and Charlie Edwards. Who would have thought that no one Louis Dell and Charlie would get you so much credit in this world? Not surprising, not surprising at all. So Andy is Scott's dad. This is an eclectic group of hunters. And then also not in the not with

a headset on It's koy house. Steve Phillips grandson and I want to talk to koy after a while too. Tell us about that hog. Well, you know, it has a lot to do with my grandson. Here coy House, you know where I live, up behind the Old Boy Bowling Alley. I found some hog sign in there the other day, and so coy decided to put one of

the spike cameras up. And so he did, and all of a sudden we're at Friday night ball game and here comes a big old board at eight forty five in there, and he said he shows them to the picture, and I said, well, we're gonna get a chance to shoot that thing. So we don't get another picture of that until this morning. And we're laying there sleep and his grandma's got to go to work at seven o'clock.

Six o'clock, the door knocks and he opens the door and he said, hey, Paula, that hogs up her right now. And I said, Coyds, go back to bed, we'll get him another morning. Let us sleep. I didn't want to get up, and he just shut the door and walked out, and I thought, well, he's going back to bed in just a minute. He opens my door and he shoves his lab pup in my room. He said, what's the dog? And so he left and I told you his grandma said,

he's gonna kill that hole. I said, the wind's gonna blow down there and he's gonna smell him and run off. In about ten minutes, I heard I heard a shot and she said, you hear that and I said, yeah, Well, my cell phone goes off and he says the smoked him. And I said, well, come on back to us to drink some coffee, and you know, let him get daylight. He eat, he's flashlight on him. You know, private lags

anywhere anytime anything goes. So we go up there and he said, he run off in the thicket down below. I heard him crash. Well, we get in the side beside and right up on top the hill and I've bushhuged a big area around there, you know, for deer, got deer stands and everything, and he's laying dead right out in the middle of open So I just keep the tractor and go out there and hook on to him and raise him up and bring him back to the house about two hundred and fifty then and sending

five pound. Do you have some pretty good teeth? Yeah? I had some good, good touch on him. Yeah, you beout half as big as that when you're killing hard, about half as big as that one. I got hired that a total Indian and Tony Hooper they were there. I called him on the radio when I shot that hog. Guys walking and I jumped him out of his bed and I shot him. I called him on the radio. They said, was at chat shot and I said, yeah, I've killed a little ole hog. I said, I'm gonna

need Joll's help to help me drag him out. Well here they come over there and we walked off down to the woods and I was kind of back when they got up there in about fifty yards where they said, little hog nothing. We barely drug him up in the back of the truck. He probably was five hundred pounds. We took that thing camp hung it, dude up. I mean, it's a big and Tony out there skintting that hog. And I'm you, asked the boys. I'm a little weak stomach.

I mean I can, I can look at it, but if but if I if I smell it, I'm gone. I mean, you don't matter, it don't matter. It don't matter if it's a deer or hog. There's nothing worse than a gut shot deer in my opinion, with a full of acrons. I mean, it's awful. But anyway, we think that dude that and they're skinning that thing, and that dude he's got a little old kind of a growth pocket on it. Where was that? It's only his neck,

it's on his neck. We pulled that armor plate down, Old Tony ritsch up and he he kept that thing. When it did it is squirted stuff all up in his mouth, up on his cheek. It looked like it looked like dirt, dauber mud all up through there. I had me a complete runaway out there. I mean, oh stink, you can't even believe i'bout that thing. But that was a you had to head mounted on that dude. Yeah, yeah, he's in my closet. I had him mounting. Yeah, yeah, big hog, you know, and we're trying to get in.

He's supposed to be bringing a paper towel to wipe Tony's face, and we're telling don't open your mouth, and he's running backwards, you know, about to fall down, trying to throw up. And finally we get that in. No, Tony said, he could smell that on his upper lip for about a week. Is awful, man, There's been some pretty good hog encounters. You shot one time five hogs in the same day. Tell that story. Well, Clay was in uh high school and I found a bunch of hawks.

I put Clay on the only deer I could find in the area where we hunt. So I went into an area that I call hog bottom. I just reached. I knew the area, but this first time hoggs had been in it, and uh, I knew there's deer, I knew there were hawks, and so as I was going in, there's a cane brake all the way across this bottom, and all of a sudden, little pigs started coming out, you know, hundred pounders, and I started wrack whack. So

I had five or six eras. Every time I'd shoot one at squill and they would run across the creek up on a little rise on a flat. So all of a sudden, about the third hog, fourth hog, I hear a roar, a sound. You know I talked about that clicking buck. Well, I'm telling you this is a sound that I think you've gotta be a real serious hog hunter to have ever heard it. It was like a lion in Africa. I mean, it was a roller

and you've probably heard it had in your sky. Anyway, this sucker is coming off the mountain and he didn't like it that I'm shooting his little pigs. He's hearing, he's he squealing and running off, and he's off out of here, you know, just inside of here and something. So two three days later I talked to two big hog hunters, one from Oklahoma, one from Arkansas, and I said, what was that hog done? He said, he's got two purposes to breed and protect, and he was coming to

get you. You know, he was coming off that mountain to get you. So I got a tree behind me about this big that I see I can climb. I'm right there a creek, you know, about ten ft wide but real shallow, and then up a bank. So he comes down and he crosses that creek, and when he crosses that creek, he fills up the whole creek. I mean,

this sucker looked like a freight train. And so he jumps up and gets on one of these hog trails and he comes right straight to me on a hog trail, and I'm sitting there at full draw, and I'm thinking, if he comes to the edge of the creek, which was ten ft away, you know, I'm shooting. Well, he comes, and he's coming right to me. He probably doesn't he hadn't seen me. You know, they're pretty they're pretty blind. I think, I don't say, but I can see him

and that's all I needed. So when he got to the edge of the creek, I just touched off my release and hit him right square in the head. You couldn't shoot him anywhere else. His head was Yeah, his head was so big you couldn't see it looked like legs with a head. And uh So I shot him in my era as a luminum era, and it broke and I could see it spinning off and I saw him turn anyway. I had four or five dead pigs

over here in this guy that didn't hurt him. I mean, for years, I thought, one day, I'm gonna kill a hog down there that's got a big wasp broad head stuck in between forehead. But we never did. But but the next week I took Clay in there, and that's a story I probably told on this where he went in and and killed a pig, a hog and then all the little bitty pigs came in, and he had like thirty thirty little pigs, twenty little pigs around. I shot a I was sixteen. No, I wasn't sixteen. I

was fifteen because I couldn't drive yet. And I walked into hog bottom just where he had had all his pigs. And I hadn't been in there ten minutes. I mean, I I could know more. Here the gravel popping of Dad leaving me there, and I see a pig coming, just trotting down the bottom, and the first one gets past. Man, it's full grown hog. And I'm just sitting there, going, holy cow, I just saw hog. And I hadn't seen hogs before because the first time I encountered wild hogs.

And not two minutes later, here comes another one coming down the trail alone, black adult hog, and I just draw back and it gets out there. Take a good shot, just ten ring this hog. Dad's been gone ten minutes and it's you know, it's probably four in the afternoon, getting dark at seven thirty, and so the hog runs off well directly a minute after that pig comes by. Here comes twenty six. I'm not kidding, I counted every

one of them. They were, they were shots. They were all different sizes, they were like sixty pounders down to little bitty just hardly weaned piglets. And they just just paraded by me, following the two pigs I've just seen. And for some reason, I wasn't used to the wild hog world back then, and I just it was kind of like deer hunting. I felt like, I mean, I don't know that I consciously thought about regulations, but now I would have just kept slinging arrows at him, and

that's what he had done. But for some reason, I didn't shoot any more hogs so I could have anyway. They all run off in thirty minutes passes, and I decided I'm gonna trail this hog that I've shot. And I started trailing this hog, and I blood trailer I don't know a hundred yards, and all of those shots were gathered up around my dead hog. It was a big south and uh, and they wouldn't leave her. And finally I got tired of watching them, and I crawled up on my hands and knees to see how close

I could get to them, grunting. I was grunting like a pig and I'm serious. I got within five yards of the whole mass of them, and then why I scared him off and they all scattered, But they were I'm not sure that they weren't pretty fresh turned out. Back in those days people were turning hogs, and now they were black and wild as they could be. But you know, guys were catching. That was back when guys were catching hogs wherever and bringing them and turning them loose.

And uh, anyway, that was my hog story right after that until about the two you killed it. Only like Scott, Scott and Tim come in when we've had a boat camp for what twenty years probably they show up one even Captain. They've got a whole pickup bed full the hogs in a big eight point buck deer that covered it, filled the whole bed of the truck up. But telling that story about those two big hogs, Yeah, that's one

of the most memorable hunts I've ever been on. So Tim Clark, he you know, he's all he's friends with all of us here. We all know Tim. And we were at bow camp one week and Tim said, man, we gotta go find some deer. We we just hadn't found what we were looking for all week long. And um, so we let out and we go over to a couple of different ridges and we're walking on this first ridge and uh, we actually run into we actually run into a few hogs that day on the side of

a just kind of a hickory cedar thicket ridge. But we weren't hog hunting. We're trying to find some buck sign. You know, it's it's Halloween week. We're thinking, you know, we're looking for big bucks sign. And we kind of started back kind of well, it's hard to explain it. We're kind of headed back south where we had originally started and pulled in on a little ridge or or an old dim logging road kind of you can still make remnants of this old logging road outside this ridge.

And when you when we found it, there was probably every you know, fifty yards downe that road was a fresh scrape. Just I mean, it's just what kind of what we were looking for. And we found some white oak acres that were in there, and there wasn't white oaka acres just everywhere that year, and so you could tell the deer we're really in this area. Pretty strong good buck sign and all that. And when we saw that, we thought, don't wonder if the ridge on south of

here is like this one. I wonder if it made white oak acre. And so we we kind of went over the top of the ridge, cross the holler, pull back up and on the next ridge over there, and walked in on the side uh of just a kind of a mixture between white oak and red oaks on the side of this shridge. Pulled it on the side of that, and there's just acrons everywhere on the side

of the ridge. I mean, we just you know what it's like, and you just kind of just walk into a place and you know instantly when you walked in, this is a spot. And it wasn't just white oaks's red oaks. The leaves were just turned over and there where the deer had been, there was fresh buck sign. Uh, just everything that you need, the recipe, all the ingredients were there. So you could tell there was some hog sign in there too, and uh, but we were more

concerned about the buck sign, you know. And so we kind of marked a couple of trees and we decided that we'd give it a couple of days the air out because we've been stomping around and they're pretty good. And I'm weird about that, Like, if I'm in a place like, I want to leave it alone for a day or two kind of let things calm back down

and go back in fresh. And so a couple of days later we went back in there, and the way it was, Tim dropped me off on the ridge I was on, and then he went on over and pulled up over the top of the ridge to where he was on. So anyway, I get and we got this is back. Well, we had we had cell phones. I'm fairly positive, but you know, the cell service just was not this thing over there. And so we had these two way radios, and so I told Tim, I said,

and let's hunt until eleven or twelve o'clock. I said, if you shoot something, we were close enough in proximity that if he owed me, I could hear him out and I could do the same and he'd hear me. I said, if I shoot something, my ala, that'll be the signal. Turn the radio on, and you do the same. He says, all that sounds like a plan. So anyway, I climb up the tree and set set there. That

morning had been pretty quiet. It's probably nine o'clock in the morning, hadn't hadn't seen other than squirrels, I hadn't seen anything. And anyway, about nine o'clock I get the hearing something over the top of the ridge. I'm kind of over on the north break of this ridge where I can hear something over the south break of the ridge,

just making some noise over there. And I didn't know for sure what it was, and I just kept tuned in there, and just a little bit I looked at at the top of the ridge crested just I'm talking Volkswagen of a hall a monster. I mean, this thing walks over top the ridge. I can't believe it. I'm like, my goodness, that's the that's the biggest hog I've ever laid eyes on, I mean a monster. And his fate

would have it. He just comes right over the top of the ridge, walks right down there, right into the game trail that I'm set up on, turns west and here he comes, and it's twenty two yards out there, straight in front of me to this game trail, and I thought, man, if he gets to that game trail, I'm just gonna shoot him right there. And I really, again I premised this by saying I wasn't there on a hog gun, you know. I'm really sitting on some smoking hot Bucks shign, you know, and so I'm trying

to stay disciplined here. But this hog is the biggest one I've ever seen in my life, you know. So he left with no choice. Yeah, So he's coming down this trail and he walks out there at twenty two yards and I didn't even have to stop him. He just stopped on his own one like it was meant to be. And I'm at full draw by then, and I just bury one up behind the shoulder. I mean,

it just buries up to the fletching. He lets out a little squill and just takes off, kind of running back up the ridge, kind of going south west of me, and he takes about he runs about forty yards and just crashes over kicks about three times, and it's over and I can see him, you know, I'm I can see him on the ground from my tree, you know. And man, I'm pumped up. I've never killed one that big, you know. Normally what she kills them eighty to d and twenty pounders, you know, And I mean I was

just pumped. So I get another arrow knocked up my hang a bow up. I turn around there and I give it the whoa, you know. And in just a minute, I turned my radio on and just minute Tim comes on the radio and he says, how about it, Scott, And I said, yeah, you got me. He's like yeah, And I just go into this big as tim Son. I just shot the biggest hog that ever lived down here. He's like, are you serious. I was like, oh my gosh,

you just can't believe how big this hog is. He's like, man, that's awesome, he said, Man, I just had a lone dough walk by me. And I said, well, man, I'll get off here. I said, get ready, there'll be a buck along if she's by herself, you know. So I turn off my radio and I just took it back my backpack and I just settled in. I just sat up there. I'm you know, I'm gonna sit till eleven. I was gonna go ahead and set the morning, you know.

So anyway, about thirty minutes go by, and the only way I know how to explain it is to the east of me, it sounded like wind coming over the ridge, just this roar of noise, like leaves and wind like it was just crazy, just a roar coming, And I thought, what in the world is going on? And I got the watching out there east in the woods became alive

with hall there was there was like a tidal wave. Yeah, there was twenty hogs at least in a group, and they're all just scouring the side of this ridge for these acres, and they're all just in the feeding mode and they're just making more noise than you can imagine. So I got to look at those and I thought shooting that first dog was pretty fun, being funner to shoot another one, you know. So I look out there and I pick one out. There's a little light gray

hog and I've always described it. He was almost like a reverse Havelna. Where I have Alena is black with a white stripe. This one was like a really light gray with a black stripe, almost the same way I have Elena would be strike that. So it's pretty cool. I thought, you know, it's a cool looking pick. So I'm just gonna just zero. You had to just pick one. There was so many of them. You just had to

be like, pick the one you want. And so this hog just keeps coming and keeps coming and they're working their way. They're just they're just coming to me. In a few minutes, I'm gonna have twenty hogs all within bow range. I mean just a few minutes. And so I picked out this little gray hog and he just keeps coming, and I would say he was I don't think you would a wait, a hundred pounds, probably eighty

to a hundred pounds. And this little hog gets right in behind me, and I'm just about to draw my bow, and all of a sudden, these hogs just go to scattering, like what you described when you jumped up and hollered at those hogs and they scattered out. These hogs just also just kind of starts scattering and running, and right through the middle of them comes a hog that's a quarter bigger than the one I've already shot, and and and this, and the one you shot was the biggest

one in the world. The one I shot was the biggest one in the county Scott, Are you glad you didn't decide to get on the ground and grunt like a hog and trying to scare him. I went on my hands and knees trying to sneak up on him. So I see this hog, he just comes charging in, like just arging in, and these other hogs you can tell like give him a wide berth, you know. And when he comes to a stop trotting out there, he's fifteen yards underneath my tree and he sticks his nose

in the leaves and goes to pick up acorns. Well by then, man, I'm at full draw again, and I'm so high in this tree. I man, fifteen yards. It was almost felt almost like I was shooting straight down at him, you know. And when I touched the release, my arrow just twelve rings this thing and the top of the shoulder on its right side, and it buries up almost to the fletching. I mean, just just stuck

him perfect. When I shot him, he takes about two jumps kind of uphill and then just whips around and he is double mad, and he just he's just he's just kind of spinning circles, looking looking looking looking. He's just like he's he's looking for whatever. Whatever, Just bid him whatever, just at him. And I'm sitting there looking I shot. I used to shoot white, three white fletchings on my arrows because you could see him in flights

much better. I'm looking at these three white fletchings against this black hog body that is in a twelve ring spot on this hog, and he acts like he's not even shot. Hm. And I remember thinking, well, I can't shoot one better than that. Yeah, I mean, but I'm digging for another arrow, you know. I'm reaching around there and I'm trying to grab another arrow out of my quiver, and I get one, and he's still just kind of

standing there and he left. I just about I got an arrow knocked, and I'm I'm in the process of trying to get my release on the string, and he finally besides, he better get get gone. So he takes off, just charging up this ridge, just running straight up hills. You can. I'm talking to steep Ridge, just trotting up this ridge like there's nothing wrong with him whatsoever. And I'm watching this hog just run off out of my life forever. It looks like you know what I mean,

Like I was like, I can't believe it. And he's just a dead stride about twenty yards from him. He's just a dead trot And all of a sudden, it was just like you pulled the power cord on him and he was dead instantly, he just comes to a sliding halt up there and never wiggled again. It was all she wrote. So of course, you know, I'm about ready to jump out the tree. I'm so excited, you know. So I grabbed my radio. I'm digging it out, you know, I'm excited. And about that time Tim comes on the

radio was like, how about it, Scott? I was like, and I started, Tim, You're not gonna believe what just happened, son. I just shot. I shot an absolute tank of a hog, bigger than the first one I shot. And I go on and I go on for two or three minutes on the radio without taking a breath hardly, you know. So anyway, I finally get done telling my whole story on the radio and I take my thumb off the button and Tim goes, man, that's awesome. I just shot

a big buck. And I'm like, and I thought I heard what I heard, you know, And I was like, come back, did you just say you shot a big buck? He's like ten four. I just shot a big buck over here. And of course I'm like, man, this is the most awesome day. We can't believe it, you know, So lock to cut the story down, Tim just he's not sure. He's pretty sure he made a good hit. But you know how you are when you don't see the arrow hit the deer, and you all got this

doubt in your mind. And the longer you said, the more you doubt it, and all this other stuff. So Tim come and got me later, and I said, Man, if you're worried about your hit, let's got plenty of work to do. Let's get these hogs out and uh we'll go and get yours. Uh we'll get It'll give it some time, you know. So anyway, long story short, he had hit that dear perfect. He ran maybe seventy five yards. He just didn't see him go down. You know.

Those hogs and that buck filled up back of a truck. Yeah, hey, we we had in that bucks. It was a dandy, I mean, like right at pope and young class eight point nice, just a really nice buck at the time. I want to say that was for sure, probably the biggest buck at the time Tim had ever killed with a bow. I mean, it was a it was a good deer. It was a good day hunt, but it was an awesome day hunt. Started out as a deer hunt,

turned into a hog hunt. But ended as a deer hunt. Randy, this would be a good time to clear up the roar in your story that we never got to. So Randy told the story on the first White Tail Stories podcast about buck following a mine shaft and you you talked about a roar, which now we're talking about hall roars, fair roars, but it was the buck. It was a buck roar, and I had never really heard one before. I had heard him grunt, and I've heard all kinds

of stuff, dear, blow at you. But when he made that noise, it made the hair on my next stand up, I was It woke me up. I was like, oh my gosh, what was that. But at the time I still didn't know it was a buck because I didn't think they can make that noise. Um. But you know, once all that transpires, like it had to be that buck, and talking with Scott about it, you know, he explained buck roar and all that kind of stuff, and I've heard him like on YouTube videos and stuff like that's

exactly what it is. And I think on that podcast or maybe the next one that he was brought up on one of the stories a buck roar and they played it and I was like, oh, yeah, that's exactly what it was. Uh. Did you like how Phil the meat eater sound guy put an actual like lion roar. I didn't have time to tell Phil, hey, you didn't have to do that, but uh, because because the way I think he heard the story was that like. So

it was like, well, to trim the story down. What I left out was you know, I mentioned how out of shape I was, but I contemplated just sitting on the ground. I was so tired. But when I sit down above that trail, I look right beside me and there was a big old pile of bear scat, and I thought, okay, I'm not sitting So you had reason

to think there was because there was bear sign. And when I climbed up in the tree, as it started getting daylight, down below me, I could see something really dark and I first was like, that's not a bearret to move by now, And then I was like, is it a whole the bears? You know? And come to find out, it was the opening of that my shaft. I just didn't know what it was. So, you know, as as it's getting daylight, I'm looking down there and I'm trying to figure out what that is? So how

far was the mind shaft from? Probably about thirty yards? It wasn't that far. It wasn't that far. But the way it's cut, I mean, it was so steep you could tell something was there, but you couldn't tell what it was. Yeah. Um, Scott sent me a picture today of the buck in the mind shaft. I'm gonna put that on my Instagram at some point. Yeah. I posted the actual buck on my Instagram after the thing came out, just so anybody looked at it and see how because he was a good sized buck. I mean, it's the

biggest buck I've ever killed. Uh. And then add some water on him. We can count that water weight right lifting him up out of the hole. He was heavy. Yeah. Now, Andy, were you with your grandson when he killed the big I mean I know you weren't sitting with him. But the big deer there was a big deer killed two days ago Scott's sons. Yeah, Yeah, that was That was a heck of a deer, big deer. Yeah, how big was it? Scott? This is your son? Was it Blake? Yep?

Sun Blake. Huh, it's his biggest buck ever he's ever killed. It's gonna the deer is gonna be right out a hundred and thirty eight point. Yeah, so public land land, dear, yeah, good dear, and all you're looking for on public land over there where we were running for sure. Yeah. He calls me up Friday night and he says, Paul, you're hunting the Morrow. And I said yeah. He said, you here if I go with you? And I said I no, I don't care if you go. He said, where are

we going? I said, I don't know. We're gonna go down south. I said, we'll dump you out down or somewhere, you know. Anyway we go down and of course what he what? He shows up, and I gotta say this. Of course I'm a stickler about this. I said, be at my house at four thirty. And he was at my house at four thirty. So that was a plus. And and then he gets out, get start. It's good starting. But then things kind of went downhill a little bit. He he uh. He said, well, you're all gonna hunt

all day and I said, well, I don't know. He said, well, you know, if you're gonna hut all day, I'm gonna take my own rig because I need to come in and I said, so there's already stipulations on his up, so we give him. You can imagine this what we did to him going down that morning, and we we kind of wrote him pretty hard and anyway, went down and it put him in the tree, and and uh,

Kevin Spurgeon, he was something with us. And so I don't we dun't took Blake down to the tree and put him up to our diet and put him up my tree. But showed him the tree and I went. Dump Kevin off and I went and we were gonna hunt till eleven o'clock. And uh, we'll explain why you chose that spot. Well, the reason when we chose that spot was Cole had about I spent a month ago, probably the first first weekend of both season, eighth of October,

was it. Anyway, he had hunted that sand and and he had three bucks coming on him that morning, including this deer. Uh, and it just wore him out at twelve yards. And you know when the when the buck come in, Cole says, there's no way this deer can get away from me. I'm i gonna kill him. You know. He said there was a time or two that he could have shot him through a little bit of stuff, and he said, why why would I want to do that. He's gonna give me a broadside shot at twelve yards.

And he said about that time that deer kind of turned and one of them bucks he run it. One of those bucks and a buck run off, and he chased him up the ridge and walked out of his life. Never even got a shot at him. And so Cole kept telling us, somebody needs gonna hunt this deer. Said, he's a bruiser. He's a big buck, he said, he said, in fact, he said, probably the biggest buck I would have ever killed, if I would have killed him. And so anyway, so Kevin and I before Blackie call, we

were gonna go hunt. And I was gonna hunt that stand, and Kevin was gonna go y. And so I told Blake, he really owes me a bunch now that I put him in my stand. But anyway, there was no grounds rinkage on that one. And I called cold and I said, well, you didn't have the big guy on him, because I mean he was a big buck. Something. Men's time is eleven and a quarter g two beams. I mean, that's that's good main beams so many here, you know, big buck dere but he so when I went to pick

Kevin up, Uh, Kevin's nonchalant. Of course, I didn't have any service where I was at. Everybody Scott and Blake and Kevin had been talking and anyway, I went to the one of my stuff in the back of the truck and Kevin says, when we need to make some room. And I said, what are you talking about? I said, did Black kill that big buck? He said, he sure did. And so we take off and go over there at noon. But then when I come over the hill, old Blake's

up give me the fifth book. You know, he calls his dad and Scott says, he couldn't even get it out, Dad, Dad, I just killed the biggest buck of my life. You know. He was some kind of tour But you know what, that's what it's all about. That's that's and we talked about this all the time, and it's not about you. Really, I get as much and Scott had. We had this conversation this week, and it's like Gary talked talking about

taking you down where the deer were. That's the way we operate, you know, It's not about me going to the best spot. It's about I think anybody's separate hunting with me would say I'm gonna give you the best spot. Mh. I'm not. I'm not greedy when it comes to that. I can vouch for that because um, by no means the greatest hunter. I hunted with you in high school, Clay, when I think neither one of us were killing deer. Um, you moved up with them and start killing deer and

then they Scott moves back to Mina. That's when I hook up with them and I start killing deer. But I've been to camp with these guys and it is an art form. You guys have it mapped out. Y'all have probably twenty stands based on the wind, and you sit around the camp the night before and figure out who's going where, and it's a it's a whole strategy, and I mean it's very productive. So well, I'd rather see you know, I mean, I get it's much thrilled

out of somebody else getting a thrill. I'm not. I'm not a loner when it comes to deer hunting, our turkey hunting. I like companionship. I like people to gig and I hope we get into some of the gigging on some of steps. There's some highlights with him, But I tell you it's all about companionship and and uh, you know, Scott Steve grew up with my kids and treated him like his own. And he's he's walked thousands of miles behind me over the years. I mean, great friendship.

Even before that we played little legue baseball together. That's how far we go back. That's a lot, that's a lot of years. And uh, but I think hunting is about making somebody happy. You know, it's not and it's not about being especially anymore. I mean it's I like, kill buck deer as by anybody, but Blake, when that boy killed that there, that's what it's really all about. It's kind of like when when Ronella lets you shoot

the moose. You know, that's that's shows you kind of up made me think a whole lot of him when I and I think Gary May pointed that out and in one of the podcasts about that shows you what kind of guy he is when he lets you shoot the moose that he's always wanted to shoot. So but so we give we give Blake a hard time. We told him that. You know, by looking at it, I thought he ought to give it at least another year.

He shouldn't have shot it. Yeah, you know, it's probably been a whole lot bigger little thing, you know, but it was truly. When you kill a buck like that, it's a whole different They're a whole different category than a two and a half or three and a half year old deer. They're just they're just big. I was excited to see it, Scott message me the other day. Yeah, I sent it. In fact, Dad and Kevin had not even come out to Bloke yet when I sent you

the picture. Yeah, yeah, I was working. I wasn't even hunting Blake. Of course, Blake calls me. I picked up the phone. I see it's him. When he calls me from the woods, I know something's happened, you know. So I picked up the phone and I can't even understand what he's saying. He says something like, you know, just now, I just shot. I can't even understand him, and I was like, are you sure you made a good hit? Like, let's slow down for a second. Are sure he made

a good hit. He's like, oh, I've already seen him he's already he's on the ground, you know, I mean, he'd already found him and everything. Yeah, And anyway, I said, well you got a picture. No, I was like, Blake, take a picture of him, you know, like, give me, give me something to go off of. I'm living my life through you today. So he, uh, he takes a picture of it. Since it I think the first picture I sent to you is just a deer laying on the ground. Yeah, and you can tell it was big,

but you couldn't really tell that much. You were one of the first three people. I think I sent the picture too. Yeah. Oh, Blake Brown just gets down and reloading, gives you another down. You get up, Hey, he just give him another to the shoulder. Lay it there. That was funny, Steve. You've been hunting with Andy, you twenty

plus years. Yeah, yeah, I mean, in fact, how old were you were you about Blake stage when you killed that big buck down off on the back side of the mountain and I came to you and you said, how we're gonna get that buck out of here, and nice shoulder packed him just like you were talking about that. Yeah, I'm not sure how old I was, because Cole killed

went on the same morning. If you'll remember, he was about twenty one or twenty two, I want to and if Cole was ten, i'd have been twenty when that happened. And we were down to bottom and I went off down off the middle mountain down to him, down to the bottom Scott to kill the big old buck. And he should, man, how we're gonna get this bug out of here? And I said, I'll show you. We're gonna

get out here. And I just threaded him down and tied it together and I just bent down and he helped me, and I got him on my back and I said, there you carry a gun. I'm talking. It's straight up. And I said him to take my time and he'll day. I went right up that mountain, grabbing tree to tree and carried his buck out of the mountain for nice. You know what, I was thinking the whole time as the best plan we come up with.

We stayed in the night before up there what we call the Parker Place, and we were all is blue coal that I mean, it was cold, but he's all laying there and they're sleeping bags, and all of a sudden we heard out there the you know what, you know, get a little closer, and I'm not kidding you. There was an armadilla. Well you know it was thought it was a black panther. It cub between the tents, didn't. I mean, we've just been there, remember, you know, armandals

can't see very well. Yeah, and he got running by and he just square centers and ice chest and Steve goes. He goes at Arbydale's wondered that here launy one of the greatest stories though about Stevens. One night we've we've been hunting that on the lake and and it was me and Scott and Tim and we didn't get out the way after dark and you got to load the boat and get everything go on. And we're coming up the highway and all of a sudden we get service.

And Stevens called Scott ten times. She's called me half a dozen times. There's voicemail after voicemail, there's mis calls, there's text messages. Somebody's dying smail. I mean, what can I say? But anyway, Steve shot a buck and and uh, he's uh, he's needs to help finding he's a man. There's a there's a ton of blood. So here we are. It's it's nine thirty, nine thirty, ten o'clock till after dark. Yeah, I mean it's anyway, Scott tell the story that I'll

get in there here to minute. Well, when I when I listened to the voicemail, Steve, he says, Scott, Hey, he said, I'm over here, Aaron stand. It's a stand location we have over here. To Aaron stand, he said, I've just shot a big buck over here. He said, I mean I'm big. And he said, he said, I've got good blood, but I've lost it. I've lost the blood. Can y'all bring the dog over here? And it just so happened that year we had a dog in camp that could trail blood trail And so I hang up

the phone. I let you know I'm done with a voicemail. I look over her dad and said, well, boys are not just begun. It's long as rose deal. Let me let me just put this. It's one of those Andy Brown says we're going on a wildcat van in him and I. In the hunting years we've hunted together, we have been on a mini wild cat. Man, I'm going wildcat. That's what wait that we called a wildcat. And he said, well, boys, were going wild if that means we may be out

all night. Night. So we get to camp, we load the dog, drive up there there and stand Steve. He's he's pasting the hole in the ground, he says, boys, he said, I've got He said, I've got great blood. I mean great blood, and uh, he said, but it just goes off down a little kind of a little holler, and you come up with the hollar, it just quits. And of course we're thinking, well, maybe maybe he just made a turn or you know how they can do it. Yeah,

I said, well you hit him good. Steve says, man, I had it right behind the shoulder when I shot. And I said, well, well, heck, if he's bleeding that good chopped on the shoulder. He't far, you know. So we walked down there and Steve takes us out to where this deer standing when he shot him, and he's not. He has not over exaggerated the blood trail. It is a fantastic blood trail, one of those you can see, Steve,

he just poured out. I mean you can see it in the flashlight way up in front of you, you know, I mean, just a great blood trail. And I remember looking I'd look at Steve. I said, Steve, this dere ain't going nowhere blaeding like this. And Steve says, well, Scott, I'm telling you, he goes up here and he quits. Of course, we got this dog with us. Of course it's on the blood. We don't need the dog yet because you can see the blood plenty well enough. But

this dog is trying to pull his collar off. He's wanting to get going, you know. And Tim has him on on a leash and we go down there and just like Steve said, across the little holler just quits. No more blood, and we all just kind of assumed he turned down hill. You know, deer shot good generally doesn't gonna go down here. There's exceptions every rule, because I've seen him go up hill, we all probably have.

But this we just felt like this deer probably turned downhill, so the dog was feeling the same way the dog turned downhill. We just assumed that the dog was right, and off down the mountain we go. And you know, even th though the dog you feel like it's on the deer, you're still wanting a spot of blood for affirmation, you know, And we're all kind of trying to just find a spot of blood. We don't find anything. We finally get down in the bottom this ridge goes down.

It hits kind of a cane bottom, and we got down in that bottom. The dog kind of turned east up the bottom there, and when he did, I just looked down on the ground and there was a spot of blood and I said, all right, we're for sure on him. I mean, there's blood right here. And by the time I said that, the dog just turns and goes right back up the ridge. We just came off, just a little bit further east from where we came off.

He goes right back up. And I remember us all looking at each other going this that, and good, like he doesn't need to turn up hill, you know what I mean. We just felt like if the deer was hurt bad, he wouldn't have turned the hill. That steep

of a hill. The dog just keeps going up the hill, keeps going up the hill, and Tim, you know, he's got flashlights and a minute he's out of side up there, and we're kind of standing down there at the bottom where this bucket turned up, or we thought he turned up, and we're sitting there talking and I just walked out there about ten or fifteen yards from I tell you

what I was doing. We will We got off down there is just buck scrape under every bush now, and I thought, boys, we found the hotspot right here, you know. And so I'm walking around down they're just kind of looking survey and the buck sign. And about that time I find some blood uh north, not up going up the ridge, but actually away from the ridge North. I said, guys, there's blood right here. I don't think that dog's on the right deer. And anyway, I think the dog realized

that too. He got up there little ways and just kind of was done with it and what it was. He got on a perfectly healthy deer in the process of all. So Tim comes back down the ridge with this dog and we walk out there and get him on this blood that I've found, and it's back on again, the dogs on him again. And here we go across this cane bottom, or it's only about fifty or sixty yards out there until it hits creek, a big creek, like a swimming hole kind of creek, you know what

I mean. Creek, And uh, we go out there and and this cane bottom just goes out there, and when it hits the creek bank, it's on it's on the channel side of this creek, meaning it's just a bluff off to the water, probably a three and a half foot four ft drop off into a big hole of water that runs back west a hundred yards back west. And uh, we said, well, across the creek right here, and so you can't cross right there, it's way it's over your head. Be So we thought, well, we'll go

down creek, We'll crossing the shoal. We do that. We come back up straight across from where some of us stayed, where last blood was, so we knew where to try to pick up the blood on the opposite side of the creek. We get down there, no blood trip, none whatsoever. We we scour the bank, We exhaust all efforts trying. The dogs not interested. You can just tell something happened, well common sense of to you, Well, maybe the deers in the creek. So we start looking. We're shining creek.

We're walking up down the creek bank and anyway, Steve gets away from me. He gets down there down creek, probably down creek, downstream, about seventy five yards or so, and Steve goes, hey, Scott, come here, what is this over here? So I walked down there. Steve stand on the banks. What's that right over there? And I shined my light. We've got pretty good lights. I'm shining on

this stuff. It's just a something like a To me, it almost looked like just a piece of wood floating or like under the surface, maybe just just barely sticking out of surfaces creek kind of on another bank over there. I said, well, I don't know, Steve, you think that's him? I was like, ah, I don't know. Anyway, Tim comes over there. We say, Tim, is that what do you think that is? Oh? Tim? He looks it over and as boys, that's him. And I need no more than

said that, And Steve is running down the creek. Should we let's Steve take it from here back to the show. Steve goes, leaves me and Tim standing area, and they got the light on him. Yeah, we're holding a light on him. Dad. We tell Dad, we said, Dad, dere's gonna be west of head. Dad. He works his way down the bank until he gets over there and Dad confirms it. He looks down and he goes, yeah, boys, there's our deer. That's him. And anyway, Steve he down

in heast, crossed the creek. Steve's built this deer up. You know, he's a big buck. He's this that biggest buck he's ever shot with his bow. I mean, he told us all stuff. And he and Dad's Dad's looking at the Dad's looking at this buck. You know, he can seem good. We can't see him. Dad's looking straight down at him almost, and it's four ft drop off off off the bluff into this whole water that's over

your head deep. So Dad just kind of standing there looking at him, you know, and Steve says, and you see him. He said, Now, Steve, he said, Now, I could be wrong, but I don't think that thing's got but spok on one side. Yeah. Ch So Steve finally gets around Bill's off of that creek. I mean, he just he just hops for the water right there, and it's it's cold. I mean it's you know, it's thirty degrees and it's nearly midnight. I just bail off in there too, and when I do, it's deeper than I thought.

I'm up and I get my breath, you know, and I'm right there with that buck, and I look up and then I said, how we gonna get him out here? Will I take my belt off? I take my belt. I take my belt off, and I wrapped him around that deer's horns and I hand him then the belt and while he's pulling, I'm shoving. And we shoved this buck out on the bank up there. Well, I you know, I had to climb out of there four foot up,

you know. And I get up and by the time I get up there and he's looking him over deep. We're shoot that thing and he's looking I said, I think its aiming right behind his sho older. Well, there ain't no hole behind his shoulder, okay, And I've had the best hit I ever had. I'm gonna tell you boys right now, if you want to kill one dead like that, the shoot him in the for more artery. But I had got both of them in double double. No, I's wainting that old blood. Well, he said, well, we're

gonna drag him. I ain't taking him out here. I said, what do you mean, I said, to see about the big book, you're killing you. I ain't taking him out he said, I'll never hear the end of Scott Brown. And he said he will never let me live this down. And the reason that is let me just right. Okay, that's not the first one I shot like that was part two. That was a part two Part two. The first one I did like that down there on the

hunting deal. We had another wildcat venture about midnight down there, and I had we had drove down that afternoon and Wayne pet and I had saw the biggest buck I've ever seen in Haward County. I'm I'm not joking. Hugh's probably a one sixty inch buck had a drop time. We rushed back to camp get stands. I come back and I put it in the oak tree that the deer was feeding under with a dope for the exactly

right there right there in knee tree. Yeah, and I'm grunting there right it dark, and all of a sudden I hear crash pum pop coming up the hill to me, you know, and I think, oh boy, here's of course, my left leg was quiver and you know as much as these guys, Okay, I just started both hunt and you know how that shakes get with the left leg. Eight wouldn't settle down. Well, finally it got settled down. While I look and here come a nice eight point. Well I just drawed back shoot him, and sure enough

I didn't hear where I supposed to. I him back there like that. Well, we foinally got him. I brought that. I brought that, and we got Well, we get back to camp and Scott he puts in on me. Now, Steve flying the world. He got a target and he said, a target up back there. Well, I was just stacking the marge in there at twenty thirty yards with a target. Well, let's hold on out of this. I put the target at about twelve yards and that's how far the deer was.

And I said, Steve, try to miss that target as bad as you missed that deer. That's tough to do. He's trying to diagnose. Yeah, he's diagnosing tendons on the back hind quarters and telling us he shot it. And I told him my head to live. So now he's out here showing me, trying to tell me what I'm doing wrong. And he said, I just can't fig your sat And so when now back to part two, I shot this book and that happened again. That's a second dear I'd killed. Since that happened. We get back to

camp and he's sitting around. He said, I gotta figures out. I think I know what you're doing. I said, well, I'd like you tell me what I'm doing, because that ain't where I'm aiming going, he said. He said, because he's given me this. He said, Now in your mind, when the deer comes up, he said, you need to anchor the same spot. You need to visualize if you're leaning out, you're up thirty foot in the tree. Don't just sticky, bow down, lean out, you know. He and

I've got all this going through my mind. You know, I'm thinking all these things. God, I picture him as the bo gay, you know. So I'm doing all these things, but I'm not hitting the deer where I plan to. He's figured it out, he says, I know what you're doing. I said, well, what is it? He said, When you hit that release, you're jerking your head up to see where there's going. That's exactly what I was doing. I'm jerk instead of this letting my air do it the

very next deer. Ill I have not shot another deer like that. I have killed deer now, chole Wood. So you're diagnosed, diagnosed, But to watch him y'all just had to be here if this was live TV, to watch him describe to mehow I was doing it. You know, this hilarious. But you know we're with hunting. B if you didn't have walkat ventures, I mean, I have more fun. We have more fun doing crazy stuff. Then you know, it's not about like Andy said, it's not about killing

the deer or you know, turkey hunting. I've called this boy right here. I've called all his turkeys but one up and the one I didn't call up for him his his grandmother was in the hospital having a heartcast and fixing to go back. And he's calling me on the phone telling me about this turkey and you don't where to go get to kill it. And I'm on the phone with him and tell him while he's in the woods and I'm talking whispering to him, and he

goes up and kills the turkey. So that's not you know Gary was talking about, not about the clicking deer clicking. One night, I was hunting over in the lake and Steve was hunting a little notch and I was hunting.

It's just a long ridge that I hunt over there. Anyway, I was up in my big old pine tree, and I was high, and uh, i'd been there all evening starting to get dark, and so I started taking my stuff off to get down, and all of a sudden I heard a deer go to bow and right off down the lake from me, and uh, anyway, I thought wind was coming right up the leg to me. I

wasn't winded me. And about that time I could hear a deer coming just in a run, just running right up but not really running hard, but just dumpty thumpty thump cum come right under me and stopped. I was up. I was really too high because I had a little bit of canopy under me. And uh, I was sitting there and miron that deer. In fact, I was gonna I didn't. It didn't really matter to me whether there's a buck or though. I was gonna shoot it, if

you know. And about that time I just heard the steer coming thump thump, come, just coming right up the ridge. That dude gets right out there I'm talking about, just just right there. And now it's late and that dude goes just like that. Yeah, And of course my hat was standing about that. I old man, I never heard what do that before. I'm just that clicking, you know.

And when I seen him, he walked out and he had his tailed up, had his nose on the ground, and I could see horns, and I just pulled in the middle of him. It's his lady Bavitt. Well, I heard it hit him, so I shooting down and I get down there. Of course I've hit him back. I hit him too far back. I got on the air and so I just stuck at dude in the ground. I just walked out quite a way. He's in there. So I went back and Stephen shot one. And and that's another story. Scott to come over there to try

to help find Steve's in the ryde. Know when you when the coat coat can run thirty three miles. Now I can't run thirty four, but he can run thirty I can. But anyway, Uh, they come over. We looked for Steve. Did five Steve. So we went in there, and back in those days we used to get stuff called blue Star, but it was blue Star, and we took that with us on ever hunt, and I don't know how many hunts that saved us, because that deer we went back to where it was. The deer had

good blood going downhill. When he turned uphill, when he turned up, it is quit. And Scott said, of course we had a body gotta shake it up. And little tablet turn all yours and turn all your lights off, and said turned lights off. And of course he sprayed like that, and what what had happened? We had never he just turned he done ninety there, turned double back and he went right off. I'm telling you, just the steepest,

just straight down, right down a little old holler. And anyway, we tracked him off down there to the creek, tracked him across the creek and he got up there. And when he crossed the creek. Uh, we didn't go far out there until he had laid down, found it where he had laid. But when he got up, he kind of walked on in towards the ridge and we kind of lost him in anyway, Um, finally we did it again and he had turned down an old road run right along the edge of the ridge, and he went

what would you say, a hundred yards down there. Probably he went all the way to the water and turned around and come back. He was actually laying face us, and I mean he he hadn't been dead long, he was still and we just rolled him up. We gutted him, rolled him back in the lake, tied him to a stump, and the next morning we drove in put a boat into the lake and drove in there with a boat and coming got him. But that was another wildcat, miserable we found him. But that bull Star was good stuff.

That was a big point clicking. But but but Scott as we said, how big he is? I I don't know he's legal. I couldn't tell you it's one seventy or or basketade. But he's a you know when he when he went to clicking, I'm a shooting. Uh. Um. I've got to ask you guys, so of all the stories that you've heard on these two podcasts, and I'll say

I've had incredible feedback on these two podcasts. You know, It's kind of hard to rate feedback from me because I hear a lot of stuff from different people, and we do so much, so much variety between like doing Frontiersman or or highlighting somebody for you know, dry ground mountain lion hunting in Arizona, like this style of podcasts that we just did, this this collection of stories. Um,

I had people just loved it. I got really a lot of great feedback, and I'm always shocked any time I asked someone, I say, what was your favorite story? Just random friend? They surprised me every time because in my mind I'm thinking, Oh, it's for sure gonna be this, and they'll tell me this other story. But uh, Branny, what what was? What was your favorite story you heard? Can't pick your own, I'm not I'm not kissing your story. Your story was many people's favorite, the mind shaft buck

unique and you told it well too. What's what's awesome about that story? Then I'll move on to your question? Here? Is that again? I didn't. I grew up in a house with my dad worked for the Fourth Service for thirty seven years. He didn't one go in the woods on his days off. He knew her all the deer, all the turkey and all that was, but he had no interest in going on his day off. So I didn't grow up that way. So it wasn't until my

thirties really that I really start hunting. And it was working with Scott and talking to Andy and Steve Um, learning about wind and food and you know where to get and it's I mean it was instant. I mean I picked up a bow. Scott told me how to shoot a bow. I was seeing keep your head down on the peep side my first season bow. Honey, I'm seeing mature bucks, which is just unheard of. But you know,

it just couldn't quite get it all put together. Um. So that hunt worked out well because I was able to on the spot, assess the situation, figure out, you know, what the plan was, where to get and all that kind of stuff. So, um, I wrote some notes from from the podcast last week, and uh, I did. I did my homework conn those points with me if you

take notes on podcast. So uh, James Lawrence said something about the number eleven caps from the muzzleloader, and I have a disdain for those things, like I hate on bad. The very next year, or the year after I killed that mind chef Buck, I scouted a newer and I did it on my own this time. This is the first time I'm going on public land. I'm scouting out an area for myself. I find the spot. I'm on the other side of that mountain so that deer cannot

fall in a hole. And I just I planned it out, and you know, like this this is gonna this is gonna be good. I see a buck that rivals that buck or maybe bigger, and don't tell these guys about it. He's leaving. Uh, he's leaving me. Steve probably knows exactly where I'm at, but Uh, he's leaving. And I got one shot and it was probably a little too far and I missed. But when the smoke cleared, that dude had ran all the way up underneath my stand. And

I'd learned a lesson the year four. Start reloading. As soon as soon as you shoot, start reloading. So I am reloading and I can't get that number eleven cap you know. I think I dropped one, and then I'm trying to get the other one, and I'm trying to hold it together because this buck is like, I'm kind of up a little ridge. But he is right. If I had a bow, i'd kill him. I mean, he was right there, and as soon as I'm starting to

get that in, he's gone. And never never got the second shot off because I couldn't get that number eleven. So I can relate to that story there. I can also relate to uh Janice's story because he's forty three and he just killed his first buck with a bow too, So there's hope for me. I've killed plenty of those, you know, out of a stand with the bow, but I've yet, I've yet to kill a good buck or

a buck with with a bow. So um, I thought that was pretty awesome because, hey, you actually teed me up to do something I meant to do at the very beginning. Everybody and their brother. Everybody and their brother has told me that Joannice got the date wrong. Does

y'all any of y'all catch that? Huh not? Oh? Like ten thousand people message Jannice he got his years wrong, and he said that he killed the buck in in November, only October two, right now, So anyway, okay, for the record, everyone, thank you for letting me know that you honest got

the date wrong. Story deserves some embellishment. Yeah, yeah, he uh, he was telling it was a combination of like two years and he's kind of going back and forth, and he told the story from the perspective of being and so anyway, so as great of a hundred as he is to know that he's still got thinks he's checking off the box. Gives everybody hope. You know that you're gonna be able to do it, but not not to

kiss up. Or you have three stories, but my favorite, and I listened to it twice and and I've played it for people, was your story, uh with Harvey. The way you told that story and the way it went back and forth. And I love the deck diconomy of you have all the data he gets in the tree the first time, you know, And that's just the way it works. So I've actually quit putting corn and hanging cameras and all that because it'll just make you sick. I had a I had a buck. I named him Tebow,

just like you named him moose. He had fifteen points on him. Um, this is the first year I'm really bow hunting, and we corned. I had so many big bucks on this piece of property. I was getting hunt and that one came in and it I had one evening where I had been in the stand, I had bucks around me. I just couldn't quite get a shot off because I didn't they didn't quite come in my shooting lanes. And I just an awesome not hunting. And it got dark and I'm close to the train tracks.

So as soon as that Steve's taking note over here was train track and property, like he's he's gonna figure me out here. Uh, but the train goes through, So I use that as a cover sound to climb out of the stand at dark. And as soon as I get down, there's t bow and my bow is hanging from the string and like there's no way I'm gonna get all together. And of course he's with two other bucks. Since I think it was an early hunting season that year, so you can still get on those summer bucks, and

they were gone. And then I heard a story later and somebody described that buck to a t and killed it. You couldn't find it and couldn't find it, so he's he has not been found. Never saw him again. Next year, same thing, big buck on there, he's a he's a probably a twelve point. Got him on camera, getting on the corner like okay, I'm gonna get this buck, and

then Scott sends me a picture. We keep bringing up Tim Clark a lot, but Tim had somebody that showed him this deer they hit with their car on the highway and it was just the deer's head like flies, and I'm like, that's my buck. So it's like you know, you know, you just can't. You just can't. The best thing and I wish I had said it real clearly on the moose story, is it really was pretty cool that a hunter that knew what he was doing, even though it was his first hunt on that property and

put an awesome shot on it. I mean, so many deer, just like what you said, get hit by a car or just disappear and you just lose track of them. I was so grateful, I really was that that big deer that I was able to track it down and it was killed by a hunter. That's a good way for an old buck to die. Is it the hands of a seasoned hunter or or a young hunt? Just just a legal hunting experience for somebody. Absolutely, And to hear him, you know how, remember me was that ten

years later get emotional about it? Just means that man that worked out the way it's supposed to. Yeah, you know, I can confirm the night the evening that moose was shot, you called me and you said, hey, man, I got some news for you. And I was like, oh yeah, and I remember exactly what you said. You said, moose is dead. And when you said that, I thought, holy cow, you finally got killed, and before I could even think that, you went, yeah, a guy on the neighboring property killed him.

And I remember being sick for you, Like I was just sitting there thinking, because you'd sent me pictures that deer for four years in a row and told me all this stuff, and I can remember thinking how sick you must have been. But I remember you telling me that you weren't as upset about it. You were just

glad it was over. I remember you saying, I'm just glad it's over, Like there was a sense of relief that you didn't have to spend another minute trying to figure out where to shoot that deer or whatever it consumed you for about four years. That's a good point that I kind of that's become so normal to me, that feeling it was almost relief that that deer was killed.

And then ten years later and I can kind of talk about this now, I had another big deer in the same area that I was hunting, exact same scenario, and uh almost dreaded it. And it was a big deer too, I mean a big deer, like hundred and seventy inch type deer, and I had shot at the deer the year before, when it was like a one fifty muzzloader misfired. There was at thirty five yards. I mean just dead. I mean, this deer is walking up.

I've got a muzzloader in my hand. I'm like about the text of Taxidermist, you know, and uh, I shoot that muzzloader and it just fizzles. The deer lives. The next year, the deer is a hunt. I mean, no doubt, hundred and seventy inch deer. And I'm certain that deer is dead too. But when when all that was going down, ten years later, another big buck there, I was almost like, I don't want to do this again. I got one out that the been hunting for. This will be the

fourth year. But you you wait, like Randy was saying about the cameras, you look and you look, and you look, and you don't get him. You don't get him. You thinks something's happened to him, and you wonder, and you wonder and wondering. All of a sudden, you get this picture. And he showed me a picture that was him last year. But this one here is the same. Deer may find him here and it's scrolling through his photos here, this is this is the way it goes. I was just there,

we'll go head him. But I had him the day before season two years ago, had a daylight picture of him and unbelievable. That's the way he goes. Anyway, you'll go ahead and talking short to a minute. But anyway, if you just had just you just don't know. And this year he's not showed up like he was last year. He didn't show up too late, got him two different times. Um, right here he is four last giant eight points he's got I'd say that g two right, there's fifteen inches long.

I mean it's it's it's huge monster. But you know we've talked about that, Scott and I. You don't really know where he stays. You know, he shows up that two or three years ago. We had him a lot at night. But those guys don't get that big. But being stupid, they know how to survive. Um. I was just about to ask the Believer what his favorite story was, and he took a bride of Brownie. Of all the stories, which one stood out to you? Not your favorite? It's

hard people asking about my favorite. There's all these stories are different. Like Andy his second story he told wasn't even the story that was gonna be on the podcast. I just liked it. So it's hard to compare like Andy telling about his little story admit, you know, shorter in time story to a big thirty minute story that we told. So favorite story is the wrong way to say it. What stories stood out to you, Dad? Well, the I just listened to the last, you know, I

listened to both of them. But when I'm thinking of the second podcast where Andy told his and you're You're Buck wouldn't in that, I was really impressed with thrill kills, you know. I mean he dispensed some information that of course, the way I hunt, I couldn't. I couldn't do that. I mean, you know, it just takes too much time and patience. But you could tell that guy knows what the heck he's doing. I'm telling you he is a

thinking hunter. That was in my notes and story. But yeah, you know, I like the way he told the story. I like everything about that story, but I like the knowledge that was behind how he hunts. You know, he took two guys put their stories to get, you know, how to hunt, and then applied it. And uh so you know, you're trying to learn how to hunt, and you go out on your own, monkey around. Are you pick up a book or get with guys like Scott and Andy or Clay and you learned every But he

he put two really great hunters together. How they did it, put it together and made it well. He gave some good Uh that Brad Herndon. He talked about how and his takeaway was Herndon says, all the signs down low, but hunt up high in the gaps and saddles in mountain country, daily country, even if there's not signing the gap, so they're gonna end up up there. It was good. And then the other guy was talking about thermal's wind and thermals and you know, he he was able to

put it all together. Uh, your story was probably the most intriguing. But I appreciated thrillt Kill story a bunch, uh just because of a surprise ending. Man. Uh, I'm a sucker for a surprise ending finding. About ten years later, I thought that's pretty good. Yeah, it was. Unfortunately, I don't I don't. I don't like not finding a deer. I mean, I'm not you know, I've passed on a whole lot of deer, you know, just because you know, I don't I don't like not finding one, but it

just happens. And uh, you know, liver shot, dear, it's not gonna go three or four hundred yards, but sometimes it's pretty difficult. It's kind of difficult to find them when they just stopped bleeding. Dave any of them stand out to you? Yeah, I was gonna tell the truth there. If man, you've been hunting a lot longer than the bowl and I have. But if you need me to teach you that shot where you can get a lot of blood and get them do one of I'll teach

you that shot that I've got. You know, you need to know how to do that. You need to Randy from the spot in the wrong spot. Man, we hit them, we just have to chase, you know. But I liked that, you know, I liked that number second podcast. And what I liked about it you had four stories where they didn't get bucks and four stories where they did get bucks, and and what I got about all that like Andy's Andy story. I really liked that story. That we all

have hunter had hunters have been there. I don't know of a one of us that hadn't lost the buck or you know, had these kind of shots you know, or whatever, you know, and for him to find that sheds. You know, my son in law, he of years back. He didn't hunt much, but he he killed a one sixty eight inch buck and made a good shot on it, but couldn't find it. And it took him a week going back out and hunting and going back out and hunting it until he took his wife, my daughter. They

he found it. He saw some crows and buzzards and went up on top of the mountain and he found that buck and it's mounted in his house right now. The codies had already eat it, eat the hide off of it. But he got the he got the deer, he got the horns. So that this shows you, you know, if you kill something big like that, the persistency to stay after it to try to find it. But I know we've all been there, we've all been in that situation. So it was really interesting that podcast Cody's ran up

there at thirty three. Yeah, they probably did. No can't stop real quick or that thing you know you're just running right over. I'm gonna tell you it's real funny. Andy story and of course Andy and Scott and his a couple years older Scott. But I've been around Andy ever since he was a little boy. Anyway, worked with

his dad for several years. Gary and anyway, we were we were camped down at uh uh fault in Spring Schoolhouse down south to six and uh back in those days we was hunting with J. C. McMillan and Larry and all that bunch, and there was a whole bo dawn trees. And but anyway, we're gonna make a deer drive one day and j C. Instead of happened stance, he said, well, now somebody needs to get down that swag you know, down there, and then somebody down there at the dead end on the road, and somebody down

on the creek. Anyway, so he said, uh, he said to Gary and Andy. Andy was about probably, and he said, why don't you take Indy and you all go Donner and get on the creek and where you had to park to go to the creeks A long ways And I had just bought me I'll tell you how long ago. It was nineteen probably nineteen eighty six, So ain'tybody probably been tenorally at that time? I had a brand new nine five Susuki three. It's a three liard I mean,

had the guns scabbard on it in the racks. I mean it was it was a hot dog, I said, Gary, I said it said, of y'all having to walk all the way down there, I said, why don't you take that three wheeler? He said, you don't care, Well, he never rode a three wheeler in his life. I said, no,

just hop on that. So they off of it and he gets behind and they got their guns laid out, and we take off down this this warehousing road and they're in front and me and Doug Blair, one of James is a good buddies just right behind him in his suburban. Anyway, Gary's going down through there and he gets gets a looking over his left shoulder, you know.

Well it gets to getting over in the ditch like that. Well, instead of him leaning this way, you know, you gotta lean opposite on those to get him to turn, he gives her this right here. And when he did that, ain bit it is, it slammed into the bank of the road and it was just three wheeler Gary Andy, three whitler, Gary going right down the bar ditch and

that three wheel was just all over them down through there. Well, when the dust satellite jump out and I rund And and Warehouse were lucky to cut the road dishes pretty deep there, and I grabbed in and said you okay. He said, yeah, where's Dad. I look back up the road and all you can see is with the knees back to his boots out of the pine thicket. Where else we wound up haul at him to the hospital. He broke five ribs. Smith the whole week laid up

in the in the bed. But I mean, so anyway about Tuesday, I go in there to check on Gary. This is Saturday. And Gary says, ay, if you seen my shotgun? My shotgun? And I said, last time I seen it, Gary, I laid it up on laid it up on the bank of the road there where we had to wreck. He said, well, I ain't got it. I drive all the way back down there, you know, thirty five miles or forty and there that shotgun is laying right where I left it. And that's before all

the gated roads. People would but that shotgun had never been moved in three days. Nobody had been through there. But he never put a scratch on the wady, but it's sure Besty's daddy yet. Oh wow, that's why I ran. I know you wanted Scott to tell a story for it, and he didn't get you one in. But I'm I'm done for him to tell one of his buckstories if you have time for it. Which one he knows which one it is. Let me tell you my favorite story

though out of the last episode. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we're we're uh, we've been going an hour and a half, so we're we're gonna winder down a little bit, but I want My next question was gonna be you, what was your favorite one? So listen to all of them for different All of us has our favorite for different reasons. But I like most Shepherd's story the best. And the

reason I do because I've never met Most Shepherd. But I feel like I know the guy just through you and through the magazine and and now through Bear Grease and all that. I feel like, you know, I've met the guy before it I never have. But I think it's interesting because mos accomplished deer hunter. I mean, the guy has killed some big bucks. He's I mean, he's a real deal in my opinion, just listening to the guy talk, you can tell you yeah, he's the real deal.

And he could have picked any story to tell, any story to tell, but it's the one he didn't get that he told. And this guy has killed some state class I mean for the state of Arkansas as good as they get bucks. And he tells the story of a deer that he didn't get. And I sat there when I listened to his story, I thought, you know, isn't that true? When I sit and think about dear stories to tell, most of the time, it's the one that I almost got but didn't get. Something went wrong,

something went south, you said earlier. I had the taxidermist on speed dial fixed to call him. And then it just falls apart underneath you. And then I thought, what was interesting about mo? He seen that dear a couple of times prior to the encounter he had where he could have killed him. But from that point on he never saw him again. It was like that was it. Its the end of story. You get one chance and you never hear see the deer ever again. And isn't

that true? I mean, that's so I think about all the big bucks I never got. I never saw him at one time. That was it. It wasn't like I had more than one chance or anything. It was a one time deal. Didn't make it happen, And now you live with that for the rest of your life. I mean, that's there's a pain in that, but that's the stories worth telling most of the time. What what not to do or what went wrong? Or you learn a whole lot more from those hunts then you do the ones

where you actually shoot something. Yeah, I feel like, yeah, hey, I've got a story. I don't want to put you on the spot. Andy, if you don't want to tell it, would you tell us what happened to your finger? Well? It was it was October of two thousand. No, that's not right. It was October of nineteen seven. I think, Um, a friend of mine, that's when we first. I just got into bo hunting Scott. In fact, Scott was both

hunting before I was by Uh. But anyway, he had found some deer sign over on board Camp Creek and uh, I'm gonna have to beat it out again. Yeah, you can't give your spots over on the creek over over over east of town. There's a hundred board Camp creeks.

But anyway, we had went over there one evening and uh uh, I got up a tree stand and that's back and I had a shot a high country sniper bowl at the time, shot about two ten and had lim aluminum mares that you had to have somebody caring for you if you had more and three or four you know, the little big airs. But anyway, I sat there and stand and and and back in those days, I was fighting me and God was fighting and this is this is kind of a neat story, but it's

it is a it's a good story. Um. I said, Lord, if you just let me shoot a deer today, I promise you I'll be in church in the morning, okay. And so son's going down here a little well, yeah, I hear a little snip snap, and I look and here comes this year lynn coming to my stand and it comes in behind me. And of course I still do a lot of things wrong in the tree, Sam,

but I he saw me in it. It run out the top of the regiment over there, a broadside, and I said, you know what, I'm not gonna let you get away from me about me slinging air at you. And uh, anyway, I cut drive shot under it and he'd run out the ridge, and I thought, well, that's it. In a minute, I looked over there and here comes that steer back. And so the deer comes back to my era, sniffs the era, and comes right into the

tree stand and I shoot the deer. Okay, I mean, got a picture of it with my farm bureaupe with my ring on. Okay. So we get over to my friend's house. We skinned the deer. He said, you know, really I ought to go back up and hunt that buck in the morning. And he's got the wood store up, and so I did. I went with him. We get over there, the winds blown, we get up into the saddle. Um, there's deer in my stand. When we get there, deer's

blowing out, going everywhere. And so at that time I was hunting a portable tree standing with the screwing steps and uh, anyway, I had a Fannie pack at the time, and so I crawled up in the tree and I'm sitting there and in the tree thinking I really don't need to be here. I need to be done. I need to be a church. Yet a deal had a deal and so uh the guy with Arkansas Democratic come out the week before with a story about tree stand accidents, and I was sitting there smoking all that over, and

at the time I just I wore a belt. The boys have since got the hardest put over, but I just wore a belt around me. But anyway, I was sitting there, and about about nine o'clock, I thought, I want to get down and just go look and see if I can find some more sun. So I dropped my bow out of my stand, put all the stuff in my Fannie pack, and I've got it run in

front of me. So I started down to stand, and when I get down to the bottom step, I was I set the stand kind of on the upside of the saddle, and I set my first step pretty high. M hm. So when I got down to the last step, when I put my left foot down to get the ground, I couldn't reach it. I was tiptoin well. I still had my my hand up on the third step. So I thought, we'll all this hop off. So how high are you off the ground? Foot maybe off the ground?

And you got your left hand. I got my right hand on the on the screw and step and my my this this one here, and I just stepped off this one on my left foot trying to get to the ground. And so when I hopped off, it was just it's just like you hit me with a ballpen hammer in the funny bone. And I knew I had really messed up something that had happened. I just grabbed my hand and I run about thirty yards up the ridge,

and I thought I had broke my finger. When I opened up my hand to my bone is still attached with the nail, and all my finger is bawled up in the bomb pomp of my head, all the all the meat and my ring. It's caught my ring. My ring is hanging from my tending And so I shut my hand back like that right quick, and I thought that it can't be right. And I opened and of course I don't know bone as bone white as is white. But it was so dramatic. It didn't even bleed. It

wasn't even hardy bleeding. It just looked like you just took it, took my finger and just put it right back over the bone. So anyway, I went back to the tree and got my bow down and took a shirt off and wrapped my hand up and hard at wrain and he come down there and he said, what did you do kill another tear? And I said, no, I've hurt myself. And anyway, I showed it to him, and of course I had my face paint on, you know, and brought me into the yard room and um a

j cold. My preacher at that time met me at the e er. Tina had called him and he, I mean, of course he had no sympathy for me. Whatso everybody shouldn't have. He said, look here, son, what where should we should have been this morning? You know? Yeah? Yeah, call me out. But anyway, doctor they sent the doctor in and he told me, he said, you know, there might be a chance they could put it back, but you'd always have a stiff finger. And I said, no, you just take that dude off, and so they did.

And so that's where he's I walked around with three fingers and I said all this to say this, if you tell God you're gonna do something, you need better keep your word. Mhm. Lesson learned, because as soon as it happened, I had no idea. I mean I had there was no question in my mind. Why did he let just happen to me? So that's the story, and spitting tobacco and leaving your finger in the wood me because I thought they could slide that dude right back

on there up there too. I came in see it. Yeah, I came in the emerging room there and they had him back there, and I went in and it's just like your skin of uh coons tail and he I went over and looked at it and this he thought they shou gonna be able to put it back on sword on and that doctor was there and so the bone was fine, the bones still had the fingernail attached to your skin. All the meat right off this in

his hand and he said, noping. So I stewed it there with him when he took that off, had to eat or do you know what I sit there? He's got like a big old pair of dog tonail clippers. Well that uh you know. The silicone rings are a big deal these days, and Andy, I think about you all the time because I usually wear a wedding ring. I actually don't have it on tonight because I took it off last night and said it buy my computer and forgot to put it on this morning. But I'm

gonna get a silicone ring. Well, to lose a finger, that's a good one to lose. But you know there's a purpose for that that. I say this jokelly, but there's a lot of truth to this. You don't take change in that hand if you do, and it's his ring finger on the right side. And there's not a morning that goes by in the world that I don't drop the soap that hand right there. I have to pick out up a time or everybody. So there is a purpose for that. And he'll tell you that for years,

he'd say, my fingers eating, he's not there. It's just like you've got a stiff. Wow. That's wild. Well that's really interesting, and that's what a story man. Yeah. Yeah, I think there's a scripture that says better to not make a vow to God than to make one and not keep it. Yeah, well that's good man. I wasn't looking for a spiritual lesson. Boom, we got one that'll work for me. Hey, we've been going for Wow. Now, thank you guys so much for coming and being part

of this. We didn't even get to talk to Hey, give that headset Toki for just second. Sorry, coy. I always have big plans. So this is ky house, um Steve's grandson. I went to school with Ki's dad and Koi's mom. Ki, you killed that big hog the other day. You don't have to tell me this whole story again. But yeah, that was this morning. I did. I did. It was this morning. Um, now what do you what are you doing these days? Um? Well, I was going to college. Um got hurt. It's a long playing snack

injury over at Washtap Baptist. And so now I'm back here and I'm running my own uh forestry, mulchen land, clearing all that kind of stuff, doing all that and so enjoying that. And then um, Friday nights, I do the radio here. So for the football team. You announced for the football to Okay, so I enjoy that. Cool. Now how old are you? I'm nine team, nineteen years old? You in your your big hunter killed a bunch of turkeys and you're telling my dad about a big buck

you let slip through your fingers this year. I did, And I will tell if you don't mind it to a little quick story. So in that same spot last year, first buck I killed with the bow, first buck. It would be it would be a year ago this coming weekend, coming from college, all the guys were down there at camp Harriett County. I didn't have time to run down there. I called Paula. I said, what do you think I should go in the morning, said, I don't even know where to go. He said, go up there and getting

that gap. I'm not gonna name where some of the guys in here, no exactly where it's at. So he said, go up there and getting that gap. You've been up there before. You know there's deer sign. So I climbed. I got up there, and you know there's an old staining in the tree up there. Climb in it, get set in. It's breaking light, cold, good, perfect morning, have a just like a one or two mile an hour north wind. Well. I had seen some buck sign in the road walking in. So I got up there, dug in.

I ain't seen a deer. It's like thirty nine o'clock. Ain't seen a deer. And I said, I you know, I started, well, this is pitiful. You know, you kind of get you kind of get upset at yourself. I said, I'm just gonna grunt and I gonna and I'm I'm tired. I'm one of those people. Paula. I'll probably tell you because he's hunted close to me, can hear me? I like to get vocals sometimes, and sometimes I I like to know it. Hey, if there's a big buck in the area, I want Yeah, he's gonna know I'm here.

Sometimes just tell him sometimes. So I let out the biggest right is on a grunt. And I sitting there about two or three minutes, and I see this tree just going crazy. And I said, well, that's just a squirrel jumping back and forth. Well it keeps doing it, and so I get down and literally, I have my harness on. I stretched my harness, which you know probably wouldn't say all the way down. I grab a hold and I looked down and this is I mean good size bug hunting twenty five inch buck eight point and

he's shaking this, I mean just treager. He just shake it. And I said, oh my gosh, you know about that time, I get really wound up, bad, bad, bad, bad like it. It's like your grandpa, Oh yeah, high perventilating like I just turkey hunting's bad too. So anyways, so I grunt at him again. About that time he turns and he comes straight to me and he's just but but, and I said, he's gutting back at Oh yeah, big time,

big time. Well, he stopped and he starts making a scrape about fifty yards out there right behind, so I can't get a good shot. And I said, oh my gosh. You know, by the time I'm getting answer, it's it's going longer. I'm getting answer. Well, I grunt again and I snort weez at him all but he was mad. He was mad. I'm waiting for this to be a two inch deer. I know. Hey. Well, he tries to go around me and get wind of me, and I was grunting and he was. He was still going behind me.

He was gonna win me. And I let out a big grunt and he turned and come right back down to the heill in front of me. And he went down there about forty five yards. I arranged you, and I thought he's gonna come up to me more so I get a good shot. Well, he stops and he starts making a scrape. I said, man, I think I guess I want to shoot this buck about that time. I don't know if any of the other guys in

here have ever seen it or not. That buck snort wheezed is one of the coolest things I've ever seen. But it's like they hunch up and then they let out that well, he starts making a scrape. Long story short, I pull back forty five yards, I shoot him, and it actually hits his shoulder and goes up and hits a spine, and so he just drops right there like a tone of bricks and as the first buck I killed with the boss. So he gave you the whole

gamut of vocalization. Brown. You brown boys are running second to this kid, right, But I am the first person that did get a phone call? Is this man right here? And I called him five times because he wouldn't answer. If you know anything, I like to call until I get an answer because I'm pumped up and tell you my story. Yeah, what a great story. That's good. I've got to tell this story. Clay. Okay, this is the

longest beggary shred. You may not want to put this in for your own uh you don't want to shame yourself or whatever. But there's a story. Yeah, everybody needs about this, you know, just get just give the semi condensed version. All right, Well, you know everybody, Clay Clay start out shooting compound bows all this stuff, and he decided that wasn't challenging enough at some point in his life, and so he went shooting a piece of wood with a string tied to it, trid archeries all that, and

that wasn't that's too technologically advanced. And so this year he started shooting homemade broadheads out of rock and other stuff. And so Clay going deep human on us. He's going backwards, you know what I mean, Like where everybody else is like acceptance of technology, Clay is fighting against technology for him,

and he's going backwards. But what a lot of people don't know is Clay was doing that a long time ago, because before before fulsome points and spears and all that, you had to just catch it with your bare hands and eat it, right. I mean, that's that's the most primitive thing you can do, is just go catch it with your bare hands. Right. Well, I've seen him in action,

or at least i've seen him attempted in action. And uh Now, seriously, though, Clay and I went to college together from northwest Arkansas, and the weather up there is a lot different than it is here. It's only a hundred and what probably thirty miles, but it's like you're in a whole another part of the country. Uh, the elevation is a bit higher, but we get lost. Snow went up there absolutely. So I was out of college. You were, you were married, You're probably still in college.

I'm guessing you and Misty were I think your prey grove at the time. And Clay, we we get about a six inch snow north Starksa. Clay calls. He says, hey, man, let's go hunting. Let's let's go to this management area that's kind of outside of town here, and let's go get in the stand. You think we'd kill some deer up there, And I said, man, I think we can. I think we can hunt the edge of these This management area had these planted food plots, green as they'd be,

you know, just gorgeous places. I thought that we go up there and hunt those food plots. One of us get shot at a deer. Clay's like, man, I got a buddy named Josh Barger wants to go with us. You don't care if he goes. I say, heck no, more of the merrier and better chances of shooting something. So Clay has this old jeep, the jeep chair held jeep cherit thin of thingfu only burnt to the ground or something. Don there caught fire or something. No, no,

it wasn't that one. Not that it did catch on fire one time, but it didn't burn it the ground. I drove it the years after that, ye burn it half burnt to the ground. Anyway, we we load up and we go to this management area, and really it seems like I remember right when we're driving through that thing. We're putting the first tracks on the ground, and that thing, I don't think anybody had driven through it. I mean nobody had been out. It's January, probably late January, and

it is cold. I remember it being like once it isn't the teens when we got up there, and so you and Josh had this idea they're gonna go hunt the edge of these food plots and closer were you gonna get. And I said, you know, I know this game trail that I hunt there in the fall that is headed to one of these food plots. I think I'll just hunt that. And when I tell you it's right on the side the road. It is literally fifty yards from the main road, but you can't see it.

You can't see where the spot is it's real steep off the side the road there. It's on the way in there. Clay just dumps me out, and him and Josh they go on. And so I get up in a tree, and evening goes along long, and I'm not seeing anything well right at dark, I looked down this trail and here comes a whole bunch of does and year ones. And that's just what I'm looking for. I mean, I'm just looking for some meat, you know. So here

comes I pick out this lead though. She comes down the trail just like I've just like I imagined it was gonna happen. I come to full draw. Dough walks out there, maybe twenty yards, probably not even twenty yards. I shoot, and when I shoot, I don't know what happens. I don't know. I couldn't tell you what happens. I know I had every bit of clothes I owned on. I know I was just overdressed because it's cold. I

don't know if my strain, my sleever, what. But I shot this dear about four or five inches further back than what I wanted. I'd liver shot her, I thought I did. That's what the arrow looked like to me when I shot her. Well, she just wheels out of there and runs back down the trail the way she came in. Steve doesn't have his head sat and Steve, but you gotta stand up for your grandpa. You gotta say, see, I tell you that, yeah, shooting in the wrong spot.

So anyway, what I what my eyes saw was that I shot the deer a little too far back, I thought. So I sat till dark and I get down and I walk out there. My arrow looks great, and there's lots of blood. Of course, it's snow on the ground, so you can just you know what I mean. You don't have to look for it. It's just it's just on the snow. You can sit it real good. So I walked back out to the road and I wait around, and it's a while before Josh and Clay come by.

And when they pull up, they have seen, if memory serves me correct, together saw like fifty deer between the two of you. Well, and plus what I saw, I saw a thirty three deer from the stand that day. And then Josh saw like in the teens, I want to say, and I saw five. I think it's altogether it was over fifty deer we saw from the stand one evening and they're going on on about it, and I said, boys, i've only seen five, but I did shoot one. Man Josh didn't get one. Nope, they didn't

shoot one. But they've seen a bunch. I said, oh, I've shot one, clays like you did. And I said, yeah, said I don't know that I hit her all that great. I'm not real sure. Here's my arrow. We looked at the arrow Clays like, man, arrow looks good. You know, we're all we're we're feeling like maybe it's better than

I thought. So it's been a couple of hours probably since I shot her, and so we elect to go down and just kind of get on the blood and see what the blood looks like, how good the blood trailers. So we get down there in the snow and we walked down through there and we don't walk very far. I want to say, we walk about forty yards maybe fifty. And it's dark. It's real dark. We've all got I

don't think we had headlines back then. We just had these old you know, the best flashlight you could buy that would fit in your pocket, you know what I mean. Like it wasn't real great flashlights. But we're going out there and we shine up the trail there where this blood trail is going, and there's a set of eyes sitting there looking at us in the dark. And Clay goes, there she is right there. She ain't dead, and I'm like, man, dang it, no, she's not. What do you want to do?

We sit there for a minute. Clay goes, I'll tell you what we're gonna do. And I said, well, we're gonna do. He goes, We're just gonna take off and just jump on that bit. And I said really, and Clay He's like, yeah, man, let's just let's just bull rush her. She was right there, and I'm like, we're gonna let this stair get away. I'm like, man, I don't know about all that. I've never done this before, you know. And I said, Clay, man, wherever you think.

He's like, man on the count of three, let's just go jump on her. And I said, all right, So we won to threat and we take off. Clay's in the lead, Josh right behind him, and me right behind Josh, and we're running through the snow in the middle of the night. I mean, it's not the middle of night. It's probably m We're running out there there, it's dark. We're crashing off down through there, and the deer just

just runs off. I mean just you know, like the deer's like you idiots, you know, and just takes off and runs off the end of this ridge. And Clay and Josh right after, I mean, like like dogs on a rabbit. And I realized right quick that this was a bad plan, and so I just pulled up there and let them go. And I'm watching them guys run out of sight down this in the light. All you can see is is like lights bouncing off down through

there in the light. We're about to catch it. And I sitting there looking at that, and I just looked toward in my left and there's my deer laying there. So anyway, I yelled, no, of course, they're in the they're in the heated race. Man. They don't even hear me. So they finally they realized they got enough stamming at the brother's dear dad and man, sorry, dude, they're down the butt of this ridge. I said, I said play and he's like yeah, and I said, man, the deer's

right here. So anyway, they turned around you're not that she didn't go. Yeah, it was a great It was a great shot. The shot was better than what I thought it was. Anyway, she didn't go anywhere. I mean, she was dead within thirty seconds and me shooting her. I'm sure this happen. H play catching animals. You know he caught that turkey that time. He's chasing alive, dear, not even shot. Well, we're riding four wheelers and I got this high performance deal and plays plays driving it

as fast as it'll go. And uh I topped the hill on a little slow four wheeler and looked down and the four wheelers looked like he'd been in a round. I was, I was. I was in front of Dad riding his real fast Yamaha three for the Banshee. Yeah. Yeah, all the slow four wheelers are in the back. Me and brother in law, we're running slow. I topped the hill and there's my clay baby down there with fenders laying in the road. Man, I'm thinking he's he could

be dead, you know. So I'm rushed down here, jump off, I'll get the looking for and he's about twenty yards away in a creek with the dough And when this pocket knife, and boy, he's got that sucker. He finally cuts her throat and we water up, put her on the back of the fourth Winter and take her to a buddy Mine's house and drop it off. But we're shocking. There was a little more to this. No, I was I was riding. I really don't know how fast I was going. I was going fast, I mean I wanted

I said fifty miles an hour. Maybe I wasn't going that fast fast. And I never saw the deer. I just felt something just slam into me in the four wheeler. And this is what's fortunate about it is that she didn't get caught up, like I didn't hit her in the front. If I had hit her in the front, she'd got underneath me done like Andy and Gary. But they but the fourther it felt like it just scooted

over two ft. It just bam hit me, and it just and I just skid on the brakes and I turned around and there's this dough flopping around on the road and their fenders slam all over. And the only thing I knew to do was killer was to go after and so we did. Hey, what was what was really strange about that? Is probably a month before that, I was on the same benchie and I was running it as hard as you can run out of a trail,

at least fifty five maybe more. And a deer jumps out right smack dab in front of my stinking four wheeler and it it looked like a cardboard box here and it comes out in my right tire hits it and it slings to me like this my tire, my wheel into the tire. I'm running down your knee into the tire like I'm not just about off. And you know, I'm I'm saying, okay, this is my first big wreck.

I'm gonna lay down and roll, and all of a sudden, going sevent I'm just gonna lay down a roll in the ground, I said, Lord, if you get me up, all of a sudden, this thing just hops back and drops into a soft ditch, slows down. Everything's cool. The guy I'm riding with finally catches up, and you know, we came home two weeks later, which is which is wild that you didn't just ars hole in my gene. Anyway, they have it all right together. Yeah, all these you know,

all these deers are riding. We get we get too deer there and yeah a month, well, we've had lots of surprise endings on this one. These were good editions. Thank you guys so much. I really appreciate it, enjoyed it, yea. And all the stories that you guys and other people told, we're really really great. And I meant what I said. I think these stories we take it for granted because it's what we do all the time. I mean, that's what all right are. These stories are are really deeply

meaningful to us as humans. That's what I was trying to say in these things, even dear stories, even funny stories there there, they're significant. And uh, yeah, so I appreciate it, guys. Glad to thank for haavens. Yeah, man, keep the will places wild, Keep the wilds.