Welcome back to another episode of Cutting the Distance. We are back at one of my what's become one of my favorite hunts. We are hunting whitetail here in Kansas with our good buddy Randy Mulligan and Brock Shelton. Welcome to the show, guys.
Glad to be here.
Thanks, thanks for having us.
Yeah, it's uh, it's always a great time. You always. I've told this joke a bunch. I always thought I was gonna white til hunt when I got old and couldn't meal deer hunter, elk hunt anymore. But this is truly turned into one of my favorite hunts of the year. We get to come out here, sit in a tree, watch, uh, you know, God's green earth wake up and birds chirp and turkeys do their thing, white tail rut and it's it's been a blast. And can't thank you guys enough
for everything. You guys do. You know year around, you know, make sure the white tail hunting is good.
Well, you kind of hit it rough this year with a you're pretty much locked down first, you know, the first two days, I think you saw a lot of rutting and running, and then the last couple of days it's been a little bit slower just because they've been locked down.
Yeah, yeah, it's uh so, Kansas in general has been you know, you guys have had what two or three years of what you guys would consider drought, let's.
Say three years brouh yea, yeah, I would say three. We've been below average the last three years.
So you know, since we've been coming here, you know, since you gave us the invite, graciously gave us the invite a couple of years ago to come out here and start deer hunting, we've kind of deer hunted to that drought. And you know, there's still been good bucks around, great bucks round. This year, you guys finally got a bunch of spring rain, maybe too much rain at times,
but seem to have some some good horn growth. And you know, as we were watching you know, pictures and trail cams, it seemed like you guys had some you know, really good good dear maybe more good deer you know around this year than than normal.
I think we had to really struggled this year if we wouldn't have got the rain we did in the spring. And we've gotten a few inches here in the last couple of weeks it's helped a lot. I'll be honest with you. I didn't know if we were going to get a fall plot up, but we got about five inches in the last fifteen days. And I know, looking at brocks plots in mind, they're all greening up. So we're pretty excited about that.
Yeah, and that also helped put a little water in the creeks for the deer chasing. Does they can stop by the creeks, get a drink and helps everything.
Water is the key, I mean it really is for us. And again when you have a three year drought, it makes it tough. I mean we've been putting water in buckets and everything else to try to make sure they have water.
I know the stand I hunted out of this year that I've hunted quite a bit, that little creek that was behind me is flowing full. You know where years past there's maybe some puddles on the corner. It's good also for summer water. It helps prevent you know, the CWD and all the things they can get from all happen to you know, concentrate it water sources. Right, So did you guys, were you guys able to avoid you know about that, or did it still kind of get some of your deer this summer as well.
You know, I've not seen I know, I've heard of a few dead deer. I know last year, last summer, all the farmers, including myself Brock, we all did We had our ponds dug out. I've been here twenty years and this pond behind our house I've never seen dry, and it was dry last year. So we brought in you know guys to dig these ponds out, and now they're all full. But we've got a couple of spring ponds here close, and I think we've got a little lake over here about a mile to the north of us.
So we've been fortunate right in this area. But I know a few areas. I've heard one guy you know, found ten or twelve dead deer in this field, and so it's tough, but it's tough a lot of places.
You know, What do you guys brought, what do you see guys seeing on your properties? Just overall deer numbers, are they increase in the holding steady declining a little bit?
I would say currently they're probably holding steady, if anything, maybe a little bit of decline. But water is the key, and I think a lot of people don't realize that until you go through like what we have the last three years, and then it's like we'd been fortunate with timely rains, and the timeliness is probably important because we were we had way too much rain, probably in the springs washing out. They had replant milo and then it was almost like a spickett turned off our summer turn dry.
Creeks dried up, and farmers were worried about you know, hey, we're going to have water to get through the winter, you know. And then fortunately, like Rainy said, we've had probably five inches in the last fifteen to twenty days, and we put seed in the ground for fall food plots, and nothing you can do then, but wait, you know, like we may be having stands over dirt piles, dirt fields.
I replanted my plots twice, you know, it came in and duraled, put them in early, hoping we'd get a rain. You know, I jokingly you always say any of us can be a weather person. You just got to be fifty percent right, and most of the jobs you can't do that. But I drilled all of ours three days before. We had a one hundred percent chance of rain we got zero and so you know, a month later, with no rain, we drilled again. But I noticed this week ours is looking pretty good.
Yeah, very excited. We got some what inch inch and a half. They're our second and third day of the hunt. You know that that night helped out, and it looks like you guys are going to get another inch or two tonight as well.
Tonight they're calling from one to two.
So is that going to be enough to finish off your guys's you know, your your fall food plots and get those to finish off or your winter crew.
Should go ahead and get those were playing in mostly grain crops and a few turn ups and stuff. It should go ahead and get those finished out and then hopefully we get some cooler weather. We've been as you know, we've been having some warm weather and that doesn't help with the movement during daylight hours. So yeah, that's what I was gonna go to next. The turn ups need some frost.
It's been warm and the wind hasn't been quite right.
You know.
I know I'm learning, but it sounds like from you know, the three years I've been here, you guys want those north winds, those colder winds, and we have We've had what half a day on this week trip with some north and everything else has either been out of the
south or the southeast. It seemed like, and you know, you guys primarily, I mean there are some you know, Randy's got a ton of sets here, so we usually can get up in a tree and uh, but you know, a lot of the better sets are you know, the majority of your guys is you know, setups are for north wind.
I always say, you've heard me say over and over weather, Trump's everything. And uh, two years ago, you're up here and uh, you and I almost froze death in the stand on you know, November thirteenth or something. It was twenty degrees. And you know, in Kansas, I always hear people say, well, the wind's blowing a deer. If the deer doesn't eat and the wind up here, they're gonna
starve because it's always gonna blow. But you know, it's it's November the seventeenth, and I think we've had too small frost and normally this time of year rock and ore, you know, hoping it's thirty degrees and and uh so you you guys, you were fortunate you killed a good deer yep, and uh, first day, but we've just it's been in sixties is sixties, and now we've got the full moon, which I like the full moon. I've always
enjoyed hunting the full moon. Uh, but the weather trumps at all and we've just had some warm weather, so I know it's been tough for Dirk this week.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that warm weather. Yeah, just it just seems to kind of slow them down, you know, later movement and then that moon we noticed, you know, we had some other buddies and you know some of your buddies in camp. Brian, you know, he was sitting i would say more midday than we were at times, and he was seeing some good movement from that full moon. You know, midday on these warm days, it's kind of some you know, different different patterns and different movement.
But well, the guys that hunt here, like Brian and myself Brock, if on a full moon like this type of full moon, I'd rather hunt at October full moon. But this full moon you'll see us setting in the middle of the day. You know, Brian probably didn't even get out there till nine o'clock in the morning, you know, knowing they're gonna move there in today, and and and
but again. You watch the moon, you watch the weather again. Brock, I think is gonna take a couple of days off next week because he's finally gonna get fifty and thirties at nine North kill a big deer. He'll kill a big deer next week. I'm betting on it.
And that's one of the I mean, we talk about it a lot, and we're coming out here, we're traveling halfway across the country. You get, you know, you don't have the luxury of sitting out you know, even Randy, you know, being you know, traveling to his hunting grounds. It's like when you hear you gotta hunt where Brock, you're living on his place. He's like, I'm not gonna get up in there. I'm not even gonna risk the window.
I'm not going to waste my time. And so you're waiting for the opportunity coming next week.
And I'm one of these guys. I don't want to mess it up and run the deer off, boogriam out and not see him again. So a lot of times it's better for me to wait until all the conditions are in my favor.
We do not hunt the bad wind. You know, Fortunately, I am four and a half hours away, and many a time Brock and I probably talk on the phone every single day, and you know, hey, we got a front coming in, I'll take off work. I'm here. But Brock is fortunate because and Brock's a great hunter. I mean, we just do not hunt the bad wind. And he's fortunate. We may go a whole week, he may go a whole week not set on a stand because and it may have a big deer coming in there every day,
but bad wind not going to go. And as soon as he gets one. I've done Brock twenty years, and I'll bet you I know several of the big deer he's killed on one set.
Yep. First, you know it seems to be you know, the others do that as well. You know, they're they're just not gonna hit that stand on They're gonna make sure their approaches right, the wind's right, you know, for that deer to move. And then how much do you think, Brock or you know, on sets like that, is it is it just that wind and you just know that that buck's gonna show up? Or is it? Are you also seeing that buck on camera plus the right win, you know what I mean, like to get that deer
in the exact right spot. There's a little bit of patterning plus that.
Yeah, there's a little bit of homework that goes into it. A lot of times when I'm looking at trail cam picks, I'm not just seeing that that deer is in there. I wanting to see which way he's coming from. And then I'll I'll look to see which way the wind was blowing while he's doing that. So you're trying to look so okay, he's coming from that away, my my access to my stands, you know, from the opposite way,
I'm fine there. What wind is he using? He's playing it safe and then you just use all that information you gained and use it against him.
And so, you know, an elk hunting, you know, the same thing, same thing you guys do in White Tail. You know, give him the wind a little bit. That buck wants to think he's safe. How and your guys's experience, you know, when you're when you're you know, getting down to that real technical level that buck is he always got that wind right on his nose, or is he is he giving you forty five degrees ninety degrees, Like
how safe is to you know, you know what I mean? Like, is that buck gonna go with the wind straight at him? Or is he willing to risk it a little bit?
I think he risked some. I've got a deer behind my house right now, I'm hunting, and it seems like he's only coming in there on a west wind. You know, he'll he'll he'll mess up and and again they're rutting a little bit right now, so they're a little crazy. And uh, I just have to have a better wind for me to get in there, so it's not blowing toward I know which direction he's coming. We've got thousands trail cameras of him. He comes from the same direction
every time. I just can't hunt him unless I got a north wind, you know. So I've not hunted him, and so, uh, I think sometimes we probably a lot of people give deer a little bit more credit than they are. I mean, they're they're smart animals, they're they're you know, they're I don't think they're humans, but uh, this time of year, they got one thing on their mind. They're gonna mess up. We just gotta wait on them to mess up.
So they're not They're not only gonna feed with the wind in their face all times, so there's no chance you you know, like, oh, it seems like they feed, you know with the thermals. They're feeding with the prevailing wins. They're only moving that direction. They're gonna wait for the
thermals to switch move to bed. You know, they're they're almost always walking with that wind that their nose to some degree, and then you it's almost like you have to intercept them at a ninety degree, Like all right, if I give them ninety degrees, I'm pretty safe. But you know that that big buck may still walk by my stand. And you know, some of our sets this week once again because we had to be here, we're probably risking it more like we're like, well, if that
thing gets to this location, he's gonna win me. But I'm gonna shoot him before they get there, you know. And so you're playing that game. Well, that works out great until you got to do or something walk by and gets that and then she bugger's out. But that's just the game you have to play when you're when you just don't have that perfect win.
And I think too, if if you're not over hunting a place, you're going to a place deer relaxed, and they're they're let their senses down, just like like humans. They're like, Okay, i've been eating eating in here, I'm gonna go up this draw and go to this food plot, you know, and they kind of getting a routine, and and sometimes they'll do stuff when it's not in their advantage, and that's when you need to be there.
And I think you guys are in a tough spot sometimes because you guys are traveling. You got seven days to hunt, so we're gonna we're gonna hunt those seven days. I know, I was up here a couple of weeks ago and I came to hunt for a week. I never had to back. I knew I didn't have a good win looking at it. I went home after two and a half days. You know, we have that advantage to be able to do that where you guys come, you're here seven days, you're going home. You're not coming back.
So we're trying to hang enough sets to get you on a good deer. Fortunately you got on a good deer. But uh so, you know we do have that advantage of hunting.
Yeah, yeah, well, well we'll run into that recap here. It's gonna be real short. Usually in Kansas, I'm the one that's stuck graining, and I think I've killed my deer. Last last year, I killed it on the very last sit. We finally got some high pressure after a low and some rain for four or five days. But finally in Kansas, I kicked the monkey off my shoulder. Pretty early, we knew we had some south winds. You guys weren't running a lot of cams on on your south piece of property, right,
and so we were. There was a little bit we had seen, like Randy showed me a picture night before, like you might want to look at this deer if he comes, and he was around there, and uh, you know, so I get in and it's funny. I gotta I'm gonna tell the story ahead. My two bucks died within about twenty feet of each other last year and this year, but I shot him at a different stands, But they both went to the same patch of timber to die, And I texted Randy, will never believe it. He died
twenty yards from rather one. He's like, don't you be getting any ideas or trying to think that you you own that that spot. Yeah, I'm trying to get Randy due to a property boundary adjustment so I can buy the end of this little uh set. But so we knew we had south winds and Andy, I remember looking at this stand the very first the very first day ever hunted your property. We went and sat here turkey hunting, and he told me about you know, did the deer
stand there? And why you had said it well, in the south wind, it's if you looked at it from an aerial and didn't know the topography. It's not a good set because you're blowing down to the river in the bend. But what it is, it's on what would you say, an eighty to one hundred foot shelf, right on two different directions. So we're able to sit that stand and blow out and then you know, to paint
the picture. There's there's a food plot that goes out on the point and I'm just inside the timber between a draw and then where that point would run off a ladder stand. It was always a ladder stand. And then like I say, I take I take zero credit for some of these deer I killed. Besides being able to shoot and sit in the stand. You know, Randy
is managing his property. Randy and his buddies. He went hunting an additional tree stand up there, so our camera guys had a spot and I literally just get to climb in a tree, put an arrow on my bow, and hunt. So I can't thank you guys enough for that. But get up in that stand. Right off the bat, you see the deer that that you don't want to you know, see what I always I want to kill
a big deer on your place. Don't get me wrong, but I also feel like by getting the invite out here, sometimes I feel like I should be helping you do some management too. And right off the bat, like I literally get my bow on the tree hook, I'm like, I'm gonna sit down for a little bit and just kind of watch the woods wake up. I can hear a deer coming to my right. I could see you
had a big old body on him. Then you get your binoculars out and you're like, ah, short, g two big o' eight point definitely better than a five year old deer. And you're like, do I even tell Randy I see this one? So you watch him walk through. He's got a small eight with him. Those two are running the same trail. They kind of feed through in front, and and and so from daylight until I shoot my buck. I had deer in front of me working the edge
of the field. I have a little we called him Elliott, a little one by two, you know, comes up and he feeds around us. And I have some does and fallens worked our way in front, and he's chasing He chases him out in the field. Once they come back. He chases him out in the field the second time, and he's off to the other side. I'm like, why is that spike not with the does anymore? You know,
he's right on them. Well I can. I catch a glimpse out of the corner of my eye and I see a big, you know, a rat coming in off of the field edge, you know, maybe maybe eighty yards. And we were in Kansas, so to paint the picture, it is what it is. There's a you guys have laid out a little poly of corn. You know, the doughs were swinging in those big bucks don't really care. They'll scent check it. And that buck came back to that dough he had, you know, he wasn't coming to
that corn. We've seen it a bunch of times. You know, he's more matured. You aren't coming to corn, but he's gonna come, you know, get behind that more mature dough. And fortunately it was seven to ten in the morning. I sat for what thirty minutes, forty minutes and killed a really good ten.
I've killed some good deer on that stand, and that's kind of you know, what you have to do up here. I'm not a huge, huge rut hunter, to be honest with you. I like to kill my deer around Halloween when they're really looking, or I will hunt them in December when it gets so cold. You know, rut you may see a deer. That deer that you shot didn't have a picture of him, you know, he just showed up.
And but that standing that you were on, that's probably my favorite rut stand because it is a pinch point. They're going from one big set of woods to another set of woods. They got water there. I have a food plot in front. The woods are maybe eighty yards wide, and it's just they travel through there constantly, and and you talk about feeding. I put that corn out the day before and it really bucks aren't eating right now. I mean, we haven't seen any bucks on corn or anything.
I put it out there to get the doe's attention to smell, just so they'll hang in the area. I've not fed that. I normally never feed that area. And I just put that one bag of corn out there, you know, And I don't know if it's even corn or nut grub, but we do some nutgrub because it has such a smell to it. It really brings the deer totract it to it. And so yeah, they weren't coming in or to eat, they were coming in there to mass around.
Yeah, and it's a great spot, and we had other deer, you know. We sat that stand later, just you know, dough hunting and just observing. I love it. Well, I'm here might as well, taking advantage of sitting in a tree and watching the world wake up. And we could have killed some other deer in there that, you know, because by day two the corn was all gone. So I sat that stand later and there's still deer just
naturally using that. We've seen just as many deer, just not you know, there was a three and a half year old nine point that went through there. We could have killed him, you know, so it's just a natural point for him. But it you know, since we've been coming here, you know, you were very you know, you let me hunt that stand. So Randy the way, Randy's property, he's got some stuff only he hunts, and he had killed his buck that year and let me go hunt
some of his good stuff. And we we were, you know, talking on that one. A lot of these big bucks, they're smart enough, they know which way the wind's blowing. They just know the does are maybe checking out some of this food. They're just what eighty hundred yards down when they're trying to cover as much dough ground as they you know, lay lay sent to, you know, pick
up the scent of some does. So they're not even going through there, you unless there's a dough on there if they want to come check her out.
And I love about that set you're on. If you see him, you can normally shoot him if you can shoot your bow pretty decent, you know, if you can shoot out to fifteen sixty yards, if you see the buck, you can kill him from there. And that's what's nice.
Yeah, So let's go through my white tail setup. I just got a new dart and thirty five set up. I don't change my elk setup, so I'm the odd man out. I'm still shooting those iron roll one twenty five's and I had a pretty quartering away shot, probably forty five degrees, but the buck was, you know, still, and I was very confident in that shot, and I probably went in fifth or sixth red back and lodged the broadhead into his front shoulder and very good blood
trail for only one hole in them, you know. And I've been knock on wood on this table and we're sitting on mad I would. Fortunately, so far in Kansas, I've been able to watch all of my bucks, you know, die, And that buck was dead within ten seconds. Max ran off, and uh you know, I was able to wait for for Randy and Brock to come recover. It's always fun when you can do it as a group and take some good pictures. And uh yeah it was. It was my best Kansas buck so far, you know, not a
not a giant, but a mature old deer. And uh, I say, if you keep killing the big, too big a one too early, you're never going to kill better ones. So I'm just trying to slowly, slowly climb the ladder here and uh a good buck there.
Well, you know, anytime you kill a deer in the one fifties, which I brought your deer was, you got to be excited. I mean, growing up the way I did in Arkansas and I still live in Arkansas. I mean we're driving around, you know, a three point on the back of my truck and thinking that you know, a giant and now you know, Brock and I've been fortunate and we've hunted up here so long. We'll pass
one fifties if they're not mature. And I think, gosh, I wud have never done that, yeah, thirty years ago, but we do.
Oh, we're I know that I'm spoiled. Like you know, watch you you learn about whitetail hunting for me from out west on the on the outdoor Channel, and you're like, man, Randy's got you know, we're killing bucks bigger than most of that.
You know.
It's it's a pretty special place. And uh, I'm extremely thankful to get to, you know, to hunt a place like this. But let's run into the patterning, which you know, you guys talked about maybe why you're you're in there October and then we've been talking about it a lot, like just rut specific stands, you know, setting your property up for that, you know, the observation. You know, we talked about it a little bit before the podcast. Randy
was sitting in a you know, a marginal wins. So Randy's being forced to he wants to hunt his big buck, but kind of you know, off of the the epicenter of where he is, so he's kind of just sitting in the fringes. But in your obs are you're seeing
tons of deer movement. You know, I think you had a twenty plus buck day, and you observe where all these deer wanting to go if you had to kill these deer, where you need to be and you you know, you two ended up setting this new stand up a couple of days ago and you know, moving to that stand, which to me, you know, it seems like we're hunting a lot of you know, historical stands, but you guys went set up a new stand and then hunted it the next day.
You know, Brock I will say that he has a couple of hundred acres that I would say is probably as good as deer hunting I've ever been on and I'm fortunate I touch him, so I'm pretty much around him there, and I did. I had an unbelievable day and I saw twenty five bucks in one morning, and I know people say, oh, that's I actually count them. So you know, I'm watching them with binoculars, and they seem to be coming out one piece of ground that I own. I'm setting on a piece between me and Brock,
right on the property line. And I watched these deer in there. They're all coming out of the same set of woods, which is the same set of woods my big deers in Uh. So we snuck in today before yesterday, and I know you guys wanted to go with us and Brocking our little you know, paranoid a little bit. We go in together, just me and him. We try to keep her sent down. We literally barely talk while.
We're in there, trying to be quite as anything together.
I joke Brocks my tree hanger. He can hang a tree stand in about thirty minutes and we got up there. I handed him everything. We set it up right where it was, but it was right where I'd been watching these deer, and Brock and I went straight over there, got up in the tree hung it, and the next morning, yesterday morning, I hunted it and had a great hunt. And every buck that I saw, and I saw several, I could have killed every one of them, and not
one of them winded me. Just just us analyzing that situation so.
Well, was pretty cool about that whole setup too. Is we got over there, he knew where he needed to be, and so we we eased in there and looked at some different trees. And I always liked going off a history too. And we're sitting there looking and it's like looking at an oak tree and like, well, that tree looks pretty good. I said, look, look there's railroad spikes in there. Somebody used to have already use it years ago. And it was the neighbor. Neighbor neighbor guy, his boy
put it up. Shoot, it had to be thirty plus years ago.
You know.
It's I'm like, well, this is probably going to be where you need to be. Looks like it'd be a good spot. So you know, you're we've talked.
Your property doesn't lend itself real well, like saddle type hunting, you know, or like instant tree climbing, So you got to go do a little bit bit of that prep work and you know, cut all your shooting lanes in and you know, it seems to be real brushy. If you were to climb a tree, you're probably not be able to shoot real great out of it unless you're on a field edge.
So well we take you know, a fortunately got us steal battery post saw and it doesn't make a lot of noise. And so you know, Brock got up there, hung it really quick and say hey cut this, cut this. So we trimmed everything up and and we don't cut a lot of stuff. I mean, it's kind of tough getting up in that tree because we left so much stuff.
Keep the cover in it, you keep the cover.
And uh, like I said, I saw numerous bucks yesterday morning. Never never got seen. And we wear first light clothes, you know, and I had a couple several dos right under me, and and uh so fortunate. I'm looking forward to getting back and hunting that stand a little bit. I think I think there's possibility a big deer to die there someday.
Yep. And that was that was of specifically for these south wind you needed a way to push in a little tighter to your bucks core area. But you know, keep that keep that winning good. One thing I'm noticing around here. You know, we have a stand that dirt hunted a couple of times that you know, not that any stands here mind, I'm not getting the butt to stand down below. I hunted down where the two creeks meet. One thing we noticed there is the wind down. There's
a lot more swirly. Do you tend Do you guys tend to keep your stands up on ridges if possible? Or do you just have to play it where they're at? And because you know, coming from home, we get all these varying we get thermal plus, we get prevailing winds, plus we get you know, around home, if you're in a creek bottom, the wind almost always goes downstream because the cool weather is pulling it down. Are you guys trying to avoid that if possible? Or do you just
set ridges? Or what's the best way when you're putting a stand.
If you can stay out of the bottoms, it's it's the way to go, you know. And I know that the deer love to travel on the bottoms because it's to their advantage. The winds swirl and they can smell everything in the bottom. But if you can get up on the edge of kind of like where you killed
your deer. It's on a ridge, and you use that terrain to your advantage, and you take away the advantage the deer have think they have, you know, if you're on the I'm thinking of the spot where I like to hunt on my farm, and I actually had to move it a little bit some circumstances, and I moved my stand a little bit, and I'm now kind of more down towards not on the top of the ridge, but about halfway down. And it'll be the only year
that I'll have it there. As what I'll say, it's gonna be changed before next year because it just swirls too much. I mean, even on a especially in the evening time where the thermals are coming down. It's not optimum.
That double set you're talking about that he got down into. You know, a couple of years ago, you had a wonderful hunt down there. I actually killed a deer down there, but that morning it was really really cold, real cool. So you won't see me going in there very often unless it's real cold, and I normally go in there when it's rut. They don't seem to smell as well when they're rutting. But I'll rarely go in there when it's not just just the cold. I can't hardly stand it.
It's all rising up. But it's a great sit. You know, I got a food plot out there, and I know the two years ago when you killed your deer again. You have a tendency to shoot deer the first at the first thirty minutes you got on a deer stand. But you saw a lot of deer that morning in there. Yeah, that's a great hunt.
That setup is amazing because you're in the draw between two great ridgelines that the deer like the travel. You got a crp field back to your back corner. You got a big food plot. I think that you had beans in it, and then you have a big horseshoe bend in that creek that just like everything's perfect. It's just the wind in there is just like a soup sandwich.
It just will not sit still. But still some great hunts in there, and there's enough there's enough good wind in there that if the deer approached from the right way, you can kill it once again. It goes back to you. We have to be on a stand somewhere, so at least there you're you're maybe you know, only only giving them ninety degreas a wind and just hope a deer doesn't come from that way.
You know. Part of it is what we try to do. We have enough sits set it's out there that that's a perfect stand. When it's you get up a real frosty morning, it's real clear, there's not a lot of wind. Everything's going up, and man it can be. I've hunted it before and seen fifteen eighteen bucks in there and they're just going crazy. So it's but it's one of those I might only sit twice a year. You know.
It's all about again, Brock and I say this over and over, and I know a lot of people do weather. Trump's everything to us, and and so we just have to pay attention where we hunt.
Let's switch gears a little bit. You know, everybody seems like everybody's talking about Kansas, and I think everybody's heard about Kansas. Where you guys are talking that there's just you know, more hunting pressure here from outfitters, from neighboring property owners letting their buddies and their buddies hunt. Are you guys, is it. Do you guys think that's going to start to take a toll on age class? You know, these deer leaving. How's that going to affect like the
future of some Kansas. Do you hunting lease in this here? I know you guys, you know, got pretty tight wraps on some of the stuff between you, but your other piece down south and some of the other you know, leases that you have. It seems like there's a lot of people around. The edges or the fringes are just around.
In general, neighbors are key. You know. Brock and I've been together for a long time, so we have pieces here. Rodney, a good friend of ours, cross Road, has a lot of land. We fortunately have a lot of land in the South area, several thousand acres down south. Fortunate that four hundred acres that you guys are hunting. I have a great neighbor to the east that owns about a thousand acres in there. We have great neighbor to the south that owns about ten thousand acres and they don't
really hunt a lot. But yeah, you know up here, I remember starting to hunt. You could draw every year. Now I'm a non resident landowner, so I get a tag, but we have a couple of other buddies a hunt with us. That used to you got to tag every year, and now it's every couple of years, every once every you know, you won't draw once every four years. I hear that it's going to get a lot tougher, you know,
Iowa is one of those. You know, I think a lot of us would live and out if we could just to be a resident because it's such good deer hunting. But what hurts us here? I think and Rock I think you'll agree. You can only kill one deer and one buck. One buck, Yeah, you can kill one buck, and of course you kill a few doughs, and people don't like to shoot dose. We try to. Rock is
not a dole killer, but I joke with him. But you know, you come up here and the thing you're trying to do, and you mentioned it earlier, Jason, is you're trying to kill that big deer. And everybody wants to kill that big deer. When a five and a half six and a half year old eight point walks by you, and we've talked about that first deer that walk by you, nobody wants to shoot that deer because they're all worried about I want to shoot a one seventy when shooting a six and a half year old
eight point is that's something special? Now that deer you think about has lived six and a half years and he didn't get there being done. And and so you have guys coming in here wanting to kill that one big deer and we're getting overrun with eight points nine points that are five and six and a half years old. Where but because you can only kill one buck deer, you know, so brock and eye between as we have several cameras running, we're looking at so many deer going, man,
that deer needs to be shot. That deer needs to be shot.
You know, it's crazy the mentality. We talked about it a little bit. You know, somebody, you'd rather come down here and shoot a two and a half year old ten point than the six and a half year old eight point. And it's just, you know, we we fight
it out west you're hunting. It's like, why am I looking for the perfect little four point that may only be three and a half years old when I should be shooting the six and a half year old you know, four x three that has crab cloth forks, like that's that's the trophy, and uh, it's not doing anything for your genetics. Let's roll into you guys like that south piece. I don't know how many you know, dirks out all week.
I don't know how many mature aids he saw. Do you guys feel that that's affecting like genetic potential down the road at some point, like all these aids and then you know you're shooting every ten off of the off of the place.
Yeah, I think it's affecting the genetics long term.
I mean, you're.
You're letting to say that like that six year old five and a half, six year old eight point, he's running off. You're you're good and mature or I say mature three and a half year old. That's ten or twelve points. He's not being able to breathe the doze there because at eight points, just calling like a like a bully buck, like he's just a tank, like well, he's close to three hundred pounds and just running everything off, just having a heyday because nothing's gonna push him around.
I mean, and and Dirk, Dirk did not shoot one of those bucks. And you know we give him a little hard time. I love Dirk's to death, but now I did have a couple of hit bucks in there, I would have loved to see him shoot. And I think if the weather would have, you know, been right, he would have killed one of those. The stand that he hunted most of the time is an unbelievable stand, and he saw a lot of good mature eights, and I hope he comes back later in the year, and
if he, hopefully he'll kill one of those. But here in this piece, Brock and I have several good ten points and we watch them. Unfortunately we don't shoot them until they get mature. But we also have a ton of big eights back here, and Brock and I both we've not killed a deer this year. We don't get too worried about it because we got till December. We'll
both kill one. But the good thing about Brock and I both, if we don't kill hit buck that I've got and I've got a one hundred and seventy inch buck, and so does he. If we don't before Christmas, we'll kill him mature eight apiece and be happy with it. You know, you look around the wall here and you see a bunch of one sixties and one seventies. But I'm as thrilled to kill a six and a half year old eight you know that weighs three hundred pounds. I'll shoot him all day long if it gets down to it.
Well, even like last year, going back to the buck that I shot last year, he wasn't as good as buck as the buck that was right underneath me. And I would venture to say nine out of ten guys would have shot though it was a wide ten point
frame was good. And I'm like, man, he looks like he's a four and a half year old deer and this other deer is you know, it had to be wed sent his teeth then we haven't got the results back yet, but it had to be six seven years old, you know, And so I'm going to shoot the older deer. I mean, who knows what this four and a half year old could could grow into next year? You know sometimes at backfires, I haven't seen him this year. I know he made it through rifle season and through the season,
but I haven't seen him. Maybe he picked up, moved on, or something happened to him, but you definitely won't see him if he shoot him as a four and a half year old, you know, so he.
Knows a great thing about that. Brock Scott over on his place. A beautiful deer that's got a third main being, but he's got an older ten point that's probably not gonna score as well. But he's big, heavy, mature, and you know, Brock, a couple of days ago it was like, I think I'm gonna shoot the big ten instead of the other deer that might be five and a half, but he may be four and a half. You know, those are kind of things to us. That's fun because we get to see as he coming back next.
Year yeap, you know, yeah, we I got to sit in a stand with Randy. He let me go sitting a stand with him to try to kill his big deer one day when we had a decent wind and we had kind of a surprise buck show up. And this is where you guys keeping tabs and picture and everything, you had to buck show up with a bunch of extra points. When I first spotted him, I'm like, ah, we got a little buck coming, and I just bought
him with my naked eyes. Well, Rand, he had already thrown his binos up He's like Jason, that deer's got a lot of extra points, like that might be a good one. Well, I put my binokas up. Well at that time, you know, his his fall coat. Aging him it was tough across the way. And I think we would have, you know, if you would have came all the way in, we would have been able to age
him really well. But you know, we're already flipping through pictures as he's coming in, and you're like, that's that old deer, and you brock out a picture of him down in his place, you know, one picture at night. I think you said, didn't look that old. But then you get a daytime picture of him. He's like white faced, you know, sunken neck, and you're like, that dear is ancient,
you know. And and when then we had a conversation in the blind, you're like, I might have shot that deer and seen what my mid one seventies buck turned into next year. So it's this game you're playing, like do you shoot your one seventies buck this year or could he turn into that one ninety or two hundred. And you guys are always trying to play that game when you have it so good and so many options that you're like, you shoot the one seventies that.
Deer come into sixty yards And I told you I was gonna I grab, I got my bow. I was going to shoot that deer. He's got uh double G threes spl G two, split G two's split G three's everything, and and uh, you know that's what's fun. It's texting Brock as he was coming up the field. Hey, you know the deer with all the split G send me a picture of him. And you know we're sitting here having a talk while the deer's walking up the field.
You know that deer's ancient. And uh yeah, I was gonna shoot that deer if he came in and we had a little marginal wind and and he didn't run off or anything. He's in there. So uh if he if he comes in before my big deer comes in, I will kill him. And see what the other one does.
You know I would I would be I'd be an anxious ball. I would just I would be a mess because he's like, do you want to shoot one seventies bucks? Is he's gonna leave next year? Is he gonna come back bigger? Is he going to die? Is you know, it's like what what decisions do you make? But at some point you you just roll the dice and you guys have so many up and comers, you know, on the same piece he said, you have another you know, Grete ten that's an up and comers. So there's it's
always going to reload. But it's like, man to get to that. You know, if you got a buck that's put together the right genetics, is your one seventy's going to turn into that one ninety next year and you know what level you're trying to get him to or you just looking at age class like let's go those five's to seven's and leave it at that.
Yeah, we're we're a h class in big time. But this steer is one hundred and sixty inch steer that's probably seven and a half years old that I'm hoping has done a lot of breeding with all the split splits he's got, and uh he's been honest pretty much this this year. But they didn't have a picture of him until this year, and he's lived on us. You know.
Well, uh so we're the rut's going to kind of wind down here over the next what ten days, twelve days.
That Thanksgiving it'll be over.
I think so you guys will transition. I mean, Brock kind of hunts the same stands right or not right? Do you have some standing? But are you guys going to switch more back into that patterning, you know, back to the cameras, trying to figure how do you guys move your hunt, you know, from here on to the end of the year.
Reny and I kind of talked earlier. It's like, you know, we both love the rutt, getting out seeing what's happening, what's moving, But if you've got a target buck or two, the rut is nerve racking because you're like, man, I hope he doesn't run over to the neighbors that aren't on the same game plan and he gets you know, smoked over on the neighbors. So a lot of times, you know, we'd like to have him shot before the rut so that we don't have to worry about that.
But then you're kind of nervous through the whole rut and I hope he doesn't get wonder too far from home base here. And then then after the rut, you know, they've become more patternable again, coming back into food sources, and so it just changes things up. But yeah, the rut can be. It's it used to be more fun when I was a kid and didn't have Target Bucks and just go and have fun. When you've got a Target Bucks and running cameras, it's like, man, it's just
so nerve racking. You know, you're waking up seeing if he was in there at night or still around, you know, and not shot or flew the coop to the neighbor's doze.
You know what's funny as too, is my big deer. I hadn't had a hadn't had a picture of him about three days. And you know, I know they're up with dose. But Brock went looked at a camera yesterday and my big deer's on Brock right now, which is good. That's where I want him to be. He's either on me. And what's funny is Brock won't go shoot him, you know. And if his deer shows up on me, it's sad. I tell him yesterday, well, if he walks under me, I won't shoot him. I'll take a picture. I mean,
that's good friendship there. Now, we both have a couple buddies that would shoot that deer, but we won't. But you know, you dirks, last year missed a big deer down on what we call the killing Tree. And it's got the name killing tree for a reason. And it's a four acre food plot that's half in clover and this year it's half in turnips and some other stuff.
And after this rain it looks great. And I've got a fifteen foot redneck sitting there, and uh, when it gets really cold, Uh, that place will fill up and I'll get to see most of the hit bucks and just you know, see what's left. And and I'll probably be honest with you, I'll probably kill my deer right there later in the season, come.
Back to more patable, more food sources.
They got to eat after this rut that weight back on.
Well where do we what else do you guys got anything else on the on the agenda, just finishing out white? So you got one thing you guys have to do here. I'm not I'm not uh preaching to you guys, but man, you guys have more coyotes than anywhere I get. I get the fortune to hunt all over the place. You guys are loaded up with kyote.
You know I was talking to Steve. You know your boss Ranell and and uh, he's a huge trapper. You know, I've kind of read about him a little bit, you know, he's been here a couple of times, and and I didn't realize how good a trapper he is. And and I've been telling you, man, you need to come and spend twenty days here and just trap Brock is kyote machine over here.
He not enough, you know, not enough.
But you know, critters, coons, you know, I grew up coon hunting as a kid growing up, and we've got way too many coons because we're big turkey hunters, as you know. You know, you guys have a great call group there, and y'all been down to your turkey hunting and we've just got to kill a lot of coons and coyotes and stuff and bobcats. We're just overrun. I watched MoMA and three Kittens the other day, you know,
out not far from one of my stands. And Brock and I we like to kill our deer because then we get serious about calling Kyle's Brock's a great caller with a colt area, so we'll get after him pretty soon.
Oh no, I was joking, it'd be fun to come out here maybe February and just bring a call and a gun.
And in February you can have thermals too. So I just built that twenty two arc. I've got a daytime scope on it right now, making sure it's gonna shoot the way I want it to and uh and then it then it will have the thermal on it come then into December. So I'm ready for January one.
One will be fun. Well, like I say, uh, I'm no exaggeration when this white tail hunt has turned into one of my favorites. You know, the group of guys, we get to hang out with the land. You know, we get to get to hunt and just the camaraderie is awesome. We we can't thank you guys enough. You know, God willing will draw again, and uh, you'll be able to come back out next year if.
We can get the right rain in the next couple of years. I'm excited about our our young deer crop that I've seen. I sat on the stand last night and saw a beautiful ten point. You know that's neats a couple of years. But I think Brock and I've got some great deer and see what happens. So you guys come out.
Really appreciate your Andi and Brock. You guys take care and I'm I'm sure you guys will fill your TA some giants before this year is over, Alright, Thanks you guys, Thank you. M m m m m