Ep. 25: The Whitetail Rut and Calling Strategies with Chris Parish

it's fun. This is my first ever white tail hunt, so we we got to do our first sit this morning. So I'm a bona fide expert at these white tails already. But you know, now we want to cold here in Kansas. I don't think you can get much better conditions. It's been warm leading up to this. We're on the tail end of a full moon. Um cold snap moved in. It was fifteen degrees this morning, so I think yeah, wind chill was between ten and thirteen depending on where

you were. Uh. And the wind is always gonna blow in Kansas. That's one one thing guys have to remember here. It's always gonna blow. So no matter what, you're gonna deal with a ten to twelve mile hour wind all the time. So you need to bring clothes that accommodate that. Even if it's hot, the wind blows and you still get cool when the sun goes down. So it was a good, good first morning. Um, things are starting to get a heating up here. Um, you know as far

as the rut. So excited. But we're gonna start this off like the rest of the podcast. We're gonna we're gonna I'm gonna send you some questions here that that the users kind of send us UM and if you have questions of your own, please email us at ct D app phelps game calls dot com and will make sure to include your questions UM for either myself or experts. So the first question we have for you today, Chris is where do you determine where to set your stands?

What what information goes into that? And then um, you know, I think the easy ones always wind um or have multiple stands. But what she's looking for as far as terrain, vegetation feed, secondary feed, you know all those things that and and kind of how do you you know, put your plan together? And then this is where I stand needs to go on the X right, So you know that that's kind of a loaded question. Too, because it

all depends on the timing of the year. So I'll kind of stick to what we're looking at right now. You know, a dough is always the target when it comes to the rut because that's what he's looking for, and she's always going to be in and around food. Now when she comes into estrus, a lot of that goes out the wayside. He's gonna push her off somewhere and they're gonna spend twenty four to thirty six hours, and it's usually gonna be in and away from any

other deer. They neither want of them want to have other deer around him because he's trying to run other bucks off, and she doesn't want to be around other doughs and other deer. It's just, you know, kind of the little thing. So but I'm always looking for those transition areas that are leading from betting two feeding and that give me the best opportunity to pinch those deer down and get them inside a bow range. Now i'm gun hunting, I'll open that up a little bit, you know.

Obviously I'd still like to be in the woods at that point, but I'll open it up where I can shoot a little longer and have a little more sight to see. But when I'm bow hunting, I want to try to and you can't always pinch it down, but you can always pick the best inside corner or an hourglass type shape, or a shelf off of a ridge, or a little area where they're gonna cross this ditch line, and it's it's real common crossing. It's easy. You know,

there are lazy like people. They're gonna take the least the path of least resistance. So I'm looking for all those little things to connect the dots with and hang my stand, and I try to hang multiple stands to be honest with you. If I can for wind conditions, and sometimes they may be a quarter of a mile apart only because that quarter of a mile those are

the two best travel areas. But I can go in and hunt one from say, if I got a south wind, I can hunt the south side, and I try to set it where I can hunt either southwest or southeast. I can take advantage of all southerly winds. Same with a north wind. I want to be able to take advantage of all northerly winds. Those are magic. You don't always find that, but that's the kind of thing that

I look for. And then the other big key is just pick out your entrance and exits to those stands and be very cognizant that you can get in there and out of there as easy as possible without spooking deer. It's almost impossible when you're in the Midwest because deer everywhere we have a great population, whether it be Kansas, Missouri, all over the Midwest, you know, Iowa, Illinois. It's hard to get in and out of those places without bumping a few deer. But try to be cognizant of it,

especially walking in fields of the morning. They're gonna be feeding. You're probably gonna bust one. It's just gonna happen, But try to avoid it as much as possible. And then getting out of there and not going through your food plots at night. You know, if you can exit, stay in the woods, make a loop around. If it takes you an extra half mile to get in and out, it takes you an extra half mile to get in and out, but you'll you will benefit from it if

you will use those tactics. Gotcha, perfect, perfect answer on that one. Um. The second question, UM, what's your preferred weather to hunt, and we may be in it. I know we've been texting back and forth a little bit because you've been you know, bouncing back and forth hunting maybe the weekends, long weekends, and you know, you were getting excited because we're getting some rain last weekend, then getting some wind, and then we're getting a cold streak.

So if you had to pick kind of your weather or or kind of give us a rundown on what we can expect, you know, what are we gonna expect when it's warmer than average and and no real weather, you know, and can then kind of let us know what your favorite weather is the hunt. Okay, well, you know when it's warm out and you're speaking of the rut and let's just say you have temperatures that are above fifty, let's say sixty are better you It doesn't

slow the rut down. People always think, oh, Manda, deer just not gonna move. You know, they're not rutting because it's too hot. Known and all the rut comes around one time of year. Those are going to come into estras and they're going to get bread. And your funds come almost consistently around the same time every year. That means nine of your doughs or bread around the same time. It doesn't mean that there's not late does and doesn't mean they're not early doughs. There are, but there's a

consistent pattern there, so they're gonna breed. Warm weather subdues the daylight movement because a lot of it gets done at night that you know, are really early in the morning, real late in the evening, and they run all night long. Because let's just face it, you wouldn't want to go sit in a blind or on a tree stand with your winter coat on when it was seventy degrees and they're doing the same thing. But you know, on the other hand, it's the rut. You can't kill one if

you're sitting at the house. So you need to be out there because I've I've literally, I've actually filmed a friend of mine shoot one one morning. It was seventy three degrees and got up to eighty five and that buck came into snort wees and was on fire ready to go. So you and it was really early in the morning, but you gotta be there. So I always hunt regardless of the weather because you have to be there.

My preference is temperatures in the thirties of the morning and warming up to about the mid upper forties too, maybe fifty degrees in the daytime. Two reasons why one is pretty comfortable to set all day. I love to set all day this time of year because you could just as easily shoot one at one o'clock in the afternoon as you could at daylight or dark. And they're

gonna move all the time. And they're gonna move all the time in that weather, all day long, you're gonna see some movement, especially if you're in those little hidy holes in those little sanctuary areas where their bucks are pushing those doughs back in for for breeding purpose. Yeah, exactly. And and there's always you know, if you've got a good acorn crop, you're always gonna have some food in around there. And to a buck, food is not so

important that time of year. It's the breeding. But if there's food around along with security cover, those doughs are gonna be comfortable in there too. So that's my preferred weather as far as wind conditions go. You know one thing that you know, when I was telling you guys early on, the wind's gonna blow in Kansas it doesn't matter. It's gonna blow every day, and you wanted to blow a little bit. When you hunt Kansas and the wind is dead calm, you're likely not gonna see much go on.

Those deer need to have a little bit of wind. They're used to it. They're used to fifty mile hour winds. They will move in it all day long. Provide them, provides them a little security exactly, and they're used to it. You know, they deal with it every day of their life. Here you get to Missouri and you get a twenty mile an hour wind, it's subduced a movement a little bit, and you don't see it. You don't see the deer out traveling long distances like you would normally. It's just

it's all about what they are used to in their environment. Um, So you're gonna deal with wind here in Kansas and you want to you you know, I like it. I like personally, uh, seven to ten mile an hour wind. That's steady because at least you know exactly what direction is coming out of you know where it's going. You know what that one spot that you're giving away, that's

my giveaway spot. Something gets down there no matter what I've done to be sent free, I'm probably gonna get there's a good chance unless I got high skies and high pressure and the thermals are rising, I'm gonna wind up getting busted. So you know, that's what I like.

Twenty mile winds. When you get gusty winds can be a problem no matter what, because you know you'll you'll hear it lay, it'll lay, and it won't hardly be any win, and all of a sudden there will be a big gust to win well that blows that scent in every direction, blows it down, blows it up, blows it everywhere, and you wind up getting busted a lot more in those heavy winds. But you're still you've gotta hunt.

You've got to be there. So don't let anything ever keep you out of the woods this time of year. And you hinted towards a little bit pressures um As me and Randy were walking to our stand this morning, you know, he had mentioned, oh we got high pressure, you know, clear skies, and then we saw a cloud start rolling in low pressure. Do you have a preference, it sounds like because of um sand and when you'd prefer high pressure system, if cold and high pressure. I

would rather have high pressure anyway. You get a pressure that is thirty point one, five, thirty point two and above, and you just wind up seeing more deer on their feet moving. It just it's just something about that high pressure that they move on really good. Deer and turkey both are a lot like by as you know, if you're a fisherman, uh, fish key in off of weather fronts, whether it be a coal front coming in, they may feed up heavy just prior to it and then they

go kind of dormant. Or if a warm fronts coming in, you know, they they changed with the pressure. And deer do the same thing. Say, for example, uh, you have a rainfront coming in. Looks like maybe Thursday we got a very small chance for rain. You get that rainfront coming in, you can guarantee twenty four hours ahead of that rainfront, you're gonna get deer on their feet. They're gonna be moving really heavy then and feeding up. It's just something that they do. And the same thing with

this high pressure system. Yesterday it was coming in and yesterday evening I got here before you guys did, and I hunted and the deer were on their feet moving at two o'clock in the afternoon, and that just goes to show as that pressure is changing those deer. And so, you know, guys that only get to hunt, and we're fortunate, we're blessed. We get to hunt a lot more than

most people do. The guys that only get to hunt. Uh, let's say two or three weekends, you know, and you can pick your weekends or you can pick your vacation. You know. Try to look at that future forecast and figure it out and key in on those key times. I love three days before a full moon and three days or five days after a full moon. Where we're you know, three to five days after a full moon now, so we're in great shape. And the reason why is it just seems like you get that peak activity, that

got peak roundness of how those deer moving. And with that full moon coming in November like it came in the eighth, you can always count on any time around that fourth, fift six, seventh, and eighth, you're gonna start kick off of estra cycle. Those does are gonna start kicking off estro cycle. So now you know you've got some dose coming in. You've got one coming in here,

one coming in there. And a lot of times you'll get that one hot dough in your area and all of a sudden, that first extracycle and you'll be five bucks on her and you get an opportunity at sometimes dear you don't even know exist showing up out of the woodworks before so and just touch on it. This

isn't aestion, is my own question. I'm assuming similar to Elk, those more mature does come in first, and then it kind of is that you know the oldest youngest, and then you know some of those you know young doughs won't come in until late November, middle of December. You know, I've seen in January. I've literally seen when we we used to have a dose season in January years ago in Missouri, and I have seen some of the biggest deer I've ever seen on their feet then because they're

still looking for that last remaining dough. And that's one

thing a lot of guys don't quite understand. They think the rifle season gets over with and everything's done, when in reality, if you've got a good food source, that late December hunting can be awesome because those big deer are still looking for some from some dose coming in and they're keying in on food too, So they're keying in on food and does and now you've got the best combinations kind of like early season where they're keying in on food and it's bed to feed, bed to feed,

and they're real predictable. They get much more predictable after the rut. The ruts phenomenal, but in reality, it's the toughest hunting there is because they can be anywhere at any time and come from anywhere at any time, and you don't they don't even know what they're doing, you know. But it's also the time that you go, oh, Lord, where that deer come from, you know, and you see that two inch and you're like, I didn't even know that deer existed. Well, he didn't. He was two miles

away yesterday and he followed this dough and he ran her. Yeah, and we we talked about that a little bit this morning. Um, you know, hunting during the rut, like you can have trail cams and pictures and bucks that show up routinely day after day, and you know, a big buck was killed in camp this morning, and you know there's always this question, like he's gone, he's gone, you know, because

it's a rug. But the same thing, you could have a picture of a buck that was, you know, at a spot yesterday, and he could be two miles away and you don't know, you know, And that's that's that gamble. You're just like hoping that your best information is leading into the best spot, but you don't know if that deer is now I ran three miles off chasing the dough somewhere, you know, exactly that, And and that's the hard part of the rut. But it's also the magical

time because it exposes more dear more frequently. And I think that's the part that I enjoy. I love to hear him grunt. I love to hear him, watch him chase, love to watch them do their thing. It's excuse me, It's kind of like a gobblin turkey, you know. I mean, if he gobblin spitt and drum, I don't really have to shoot him. I just want to watch. You got the experience just the opposite with deer. I want to

shoot the deer. Yeah. I think that's what drives us to you know, the same thing, the same reason I love l hunting, you know, with the boat, you get to call those things and interact, you know, the same reason we love turkey hunting in the spring, the same reason. Um, you know today I've got to sit half of a day out of a nine day hunting already, Like you know, watching them respond to deer calls, like that's that's the magical, the cool part, you know, hearing them make the sounds,

us making the sounds. You know, shoot, we we rattled and just had a deer you know, come running straight

into the ground. Just that being able to interact versus, like you know, rifle seasons and some stuff where you're just you know, you're you're kind of just you're you're on the sidelines, you know, hoping stuff walks into you where a lot of times you're hunting escape routes when your rifle hunting and you're hunting like Okay, Joe blows hunting over there, and Jimmy Bob is hunting over there, and I'm gonna be right here because everything they screw

up is gonna come. Yeah, it's a different, smarter, not harder. Yeah. Once again, if you have your own questions for us here at cutting the Distance, please email us or send us a message social media. Whatever, Um, get him over to us at ct D at Phelps game Calls dot com. Now we're gonna jump in to my discussion with you, Chris, and and uh yeah, I remember the first time we came out to Kansas. I think you swung by picked

me and Dirk up from the airport. We're gonna go turkey hunting, and um, you know, as we were driving to our place here in Kansas, you started to tell us a story of the Giant eight. And I got to I got to spend some time with you. Probably but five or six years ago, now I flew out to your house. I killed that deer, So yeah, it was probably came out to Chris's place here in Missouri and got to got to stay downstairs in your basement, and I got to walk by that deer every day.

And it was this just giant mainframe eight with a few little extras. And you know, you have a two hundred inchineer two hud plus sitting there next to it, and I'm like, this is where numbers don't make sense. Like not talking down on you, but again, but you set this giant eight next to this tund engineer and I'm like that Dear's bigger frame, bigger, you know, more massive everything. Um, So I'm gonna let you go ahead

and kind of retail that Kansas eight. And the thing that I like about this is it is a public land Kansas buck with lots of people around. And the way you can like give us some of the insight you know, I know you had. I want you to really touch on like your entrance to the stand, so you know, once again you're not trying to sent the area up, um, you know, getting away from everybody, and

it's a lot longer track. Um, go ahead and kind of give us the quick and dirty version of that Kansas buck and some of the things that that you did that that differentiated, you know, what you were doing on that piece of public land to be able to kill a buck like that and everyone else. Well, you know, it all started the year before that when I was hunting, actually I was hunting Missouri right a hunting Missouri. I had permission to hunt some places up here. Then we're

pretty close to Missouri border. If you go right over here, you're near Nevada, Missouri and some other places. And so I had Butler Missouri, and I had permission to hunt a couple of places there. So I'd come up and I was staying with a guy over near the La Sing area. UH, and I driving back and forth, I kept seeing these some big deer across the road out of this look like sanctuary area. I couldn't know what

it was. I'm not familiar with the area. So when I got back to camp on like the third day, and I was not seeing anything I wanted to shoot. I was seeing some decent deer, but now they were locked down pretty tight, and I just was not being patient like I should be, and I had a cameraman that was not you know how it can be anyway, Um, I went and I asked a friend of mine, Mike Osborne. I'm like, Mike, I said, what is this place over here? I said, I keep seeing some good deer come across

that road. And I said, it looks big, but it looks like it's a it's a sanctuary area or a waterfowl refuge. He goes it is water refuge. And I'm like, well, can you hunt it? And he goes, yeah, he goes, there's about seven thousand, seven hundred acres lazy in there you can hunt. He goes it attaches to another four thousand that you can draw into, which would make eleven thousand. And he said, then when you get across the river, he goes, there's acres over there that cannot and has

not ever been hunted. And I'm like, hmm, so I guess the people assume those deer never across the river, you know. And I'm like, that would be an easy assumption, but the wrong assumption, you know. So I started looking at maps, started studying maps, and was pretty intrigued by the place. And I thought, you know, if I if I draw a tag in Kansas next year, I'm going to just devote my time and hunt that. So I

did draw a tag. Uh, planned out a couple of places to look, and a couple of friends of mine and I just we all drew and we're all going to hunt together, but we're all gonna hunt different areas. Obviously it's big. Well, I had my little spot picked out that I really wanted to hunt, but I wanted to work my way into it. I want to figure

out kind of what was going on. Didn't realize as thick and heavy and nasty and gnarly as it was, and and and you could get really deep into it, you know, and I didn't realize how much distance there really was. So I came in October October the eighteenth. I really believe I saw this deer about a half a mile from where I wound up killing Hi Matt. Uh. It was dark, couldn't really tell big frame giant frame deer.

You don't see a lot of giant frame deer. Kind of thought he was a boot and croco deer, but wasn't sure, and uh put it back in my mind. I came back on November eight, got here on November the eight at eleven o'clock. By one o'clock, I had went back in there and had hung a set where two rivers and an oxbow lake came together and made a big pinch point and uh, long story short, Uh.

I ran into a fella on my way out that was pretty close to the edge, and he kind of stopped me, and he's like, hey, buddy, goes, I want to let you know. You go back in there. You're you're getting close to their bedding area. You're gonna push deer out. Well, I don't want to tell him that I want to be close to the bedding area. I want to be in it if I can, especially in the morning. You know, I want the deer to come filtering back in. He said, I appreciate it, if you

wouldn't come through here the next morning. Well he wasn't there because I went through there at about three o'clock in the morning. He probably had got out of bed yet. And I slipped in there and got in that stand. And how I would enter an exit it. You could walk along the river, and you can walk right down the edge of the river, and chances of you bumping a deer or or leaving any scent that's going to be a problem. Groundcent, especially if you're gonna hunt multiple days,

was very minimal. And then and I had the g GPS my way in there, because I would have never found the stand without a GPS. I just it would be too difficult, you know. So I was one point eight miles in from where I parked the truck, and I would trek in. Then I would just walk a straight line from when I got dead even from my GPS to the stand. I walk a straight line right straight to the stand and get in it. I got in it that morning. Long story short, I forgot my

range finder, forgot my binoculars. I forgot my uh, safety rope and safety vest. So but I said that safety rope. I had two safety ropes. I just didn't bring my safety vest. So I took one safety rope and put around my waist, and one safety rope and put around the tree and tied it to the tree. I thought, well, if I fall, I'm only gonna fall like a foot I'll be okay. I got just climb back on the stand and be okay. I get in the stand, and

I wasn't seeing much of anything, to be honest with you. Uh, I saw a dough and a button buck, and all of a sudden, the button buck was betted down and the dough was gone, nowhere to be found. And I thought, she's she's coming in. She's left him, and you know, who knows what's gonna happen. And about ten thirty, UM, I was getting a little bit antsy, and I had a very hard upper respiratory cold, and I thought, man, I need to get somewhere and get some medicine and

get this thing knocked out of me. And uh, I'm thinking I'm gonna get down at eleven o'clock, I'm gonna go to town, and I'm gonna go buy somewhere and I'm gonna get me some medicine, and I'm gonna take a bunch of that medicine and come back in and climbing a stand. Well about ten thirty, I was looking, and all of a sudden I saw this formation of a big, giant body deer in front of me, about seventy yards, and I had a tree in my way, so I moved my head to left the tree, and

sure enough it was this deer. And when I first looked at him, I just in my mind went hundred and six pointer and I quit looking, got up at my stand. He comes in, he gets the twenty two yards, I hit a little bit of a limb. I uh, liver shot him straight through the liver, went completely through the liver all the way, cut it basically in half, if you will. And uh, the deer hind leg kicked, made a loop and and then ran out about sixty yards and stopped and then took off. And I thought, well,

that's his death run. And I wasn't quite sure he was liver shot, but I was pretty sure he's probably liver shot because I saw the arrow, especially the exit of the arrow and I text a buddy of mine and he had just text me, and I wish I still I wish I had to save that text because his text was, are you seeing anything? And I said, yeah, three hundred and thirty three million blackbirds because blackbirds were were migrating and it was just noisy, and uh, he goes,

I've got bucks running everywhere, chasing does and everything. And I'm like, and he's probably a half a mile three quarters of a mile from me, and I'm like, you know, it's funny how you can be just a little ways apart and and and all the actions over there. Because there's one hot dough. And this deer came in the morning of November the ninth by himself. He was he was looking, you know, he was he was cruising and

uh any rate, uh, long story short, um. We went back in that evening to try to find him and took blood for about two hundred yards and it was getting dark and I said, let's back out. I'm gonna come in tomorrow. I came in the next day, came in from from the from the creek side, and walked up the creek all the way, wound up. I knew he was gonna go to water. That's typical of a liver shot deer. You're gonna go to water. He gets a fever, he's gonna you know, he's not gonna go

or if you don't push him. And we probably weren't a hundred yards from that deer, uh when we when I found him, and uh, honestly, you don't have this very happened very often to you. But when I walked up to the deer, he grew immensely from and I thought, after thinking about it, he was maybe a Boot and Crockett type eight pointer. I had no idea it was a hundred eighty nine inches deer. He just he just grew.

You know, he's got forty two inches of mass. He's just a giant, really, absolutely a once in a lifetime mainframe eight pointer. And you just a guy'll go the rest of his life. I've never seen the center of that caliber. It just, you know, feel so blessed and so fortunate. And then, you know, my upper respiratory condition went completely away until I got home, and then I got really sick. I got a fever that night after I got home, and I'm like, well, now I'm really sick.

Evidently big bucks for the exactly that's that's a great story, you know, And and to ask an additional questions, So public ground, maybe you're getting a little more aggressive than you would Let's say, if it's private, you're you're getting tight to that betting or would you get that tight to betting even on private? Yeah, I do. I I like to get I like to be in that sanctuary of where, uh, those deer are moving comfortably and they

don't have to go far. A lot of times, you know, a deer will bed down and if he pushes the dough back in there, they'll bed down. And I've literally watched dear bed with a dough for six straight hours and never stand up. And if you're not in that wheelhouse, when they do get up and they do move, sometimes they don't make it a hundred yards. You're not gonna be in that zone you need to be in to

get that deer killed. However, you gotta know that you can't you can't hunt those places day in and day out. They've got to be key times of the year and key conditions, the right wind, and you go in and you hunt, and you go in, you hunt with the with the plan of being there excuse me all day long, because if you're not, you could miss out on that five minutes that everything happens, know, and and that's like

a little bit. Today, me and Randy elected to hunt more of the dark timber and we knew, you know, Randy, Randy was tell me, he said, we probably won't se as many deer as Chris, and you know, but it was a gamble. We're we're trying to hope that we're catching a big buck that's you know, peeling off or

and he said this. His idea was, we probably won't see a lot of deer until nine to eleven because those bucks are gonna gona be out in the feed with the does you know, checking on them, and then they're gonna break off or bring a dough back in here where he's like lurking. Uh. You know, Chris are gonna see probably more dear because they're out on the food to start with, but then after nine ten o'clock

they probably won't see as many. And so I was just kind of curious, how much pressure you know, I I guess with the right wind, that doesn't really matter how much pressure you put on that betting area, as long as they're not winding in and you know, making them, as long as you can get in and out there without leaving a lot of grounds cent. You know, you don't know what goes on at night when you're not there.

And the more grounds since you leave, you know, you get two or three days going in there and and and leaving some kind of ground cent. They're gonna pick up on it. But it doesn't mean that those deer frequenting it. You know, it's the rut that they're in there today, they're over here tomorrow, they're back in there today, you know. So I think the one thing that the biggest takeaway that I have from it, and I know that there's some science behind all of it. I get that.

But in my forty two years and the good fortune that I've had, the way the Good Lord's taking care of me. On deer, I think sometimes we get too worried about spooking, bumping, thinking we're gonna run that deer completely out of the country. Those deer lived there. Yeah, you might alter their route a little bit, you might screw things up a little bit, and all of a sudden they will disappear. They'll be gone well, Like, for example,

today Brian shoots a pushing one ninety deer today. That deer has not They have not gotten that deer on camera in two straight weeks, and they were getting him daily for two straight weeks. They hadn't got him on camera. That deer didn't leave the country. He's just off doing something, probably getting you know, there's a little bit of a low period prior to them really starting to travel hard and look for dose and try to find those first

Deesterus does. And when that happens, you know, sometimes those deer are gonna disappear. They're right there, they're not gone, and they're just not moving, Yeah, constantly in that same area.

It's not my story to tells. Hopefully Brian and Randy don't get to two upset with me, but I kind of got to hear, you know, after Brian texting Randy killed the buck and we were kind of going back and forth, and Brian was hesitant to come up this week because his his camera wasn't you know, producing any pictures um and Randy's like, man, I think he's in there.

He just and come to find out, we got to hear the story from Brian this morning, that deer just wasn't he was no longer interested in walking in front of that camera. He was screting, you know, where where the does were, you know, the licks and whatnot. He was skirting that area. He was forty yards off. And you know that. Now it raises the question, has he

been there for the last two weeks? He just got to the point where he was gonna win check areas and he wasn't gonna go in front of that camera anymore. So has he been there the entire time? Him? And then and then it leads onto the question like how much you trust your cameras at some point, like you know that deers in the are you just keep going back. Um, And sometimes I don't care if it's a silent camera, I don't care what it is. You know you're in there.

Even if it's a cell camera. You know you've left excuse me, some kind of scent in the area. And the more you do that, the more they will avoid. I mean, they're not gonna avoid the area completely, they'll just avoid that particular little spot, you know. And many times, like I was telling you guys, maybe I was just telling Dirk actually today, uh, and I drove droving by where I was hunting last night, and I'm just off

of the wheel spot. I looked at it, and I don't know why I didn't recognize it when I first hung the set, And the reason why, as I hung it a little early, there was a bunch of scrapes in there on the edge, and I wanted to be able to shoot to the edge in case something came in there and check a scrape. Well, you can pretty much wipe the scrapes out. Now. They're not worried about that at all. They're they're checking does they're not They're

not worried about leaving sign. And so yesterday when I was in there, and I've watched several bucks walk this fringe, and I looked and I'm like, there's the tree right there. Literally, if I would have been in that tree, every deer walked within ten yards of that tree, you know, on the perfect wind side of it. I just didn't recognize that that's where I needed to be at the time.

And now if I go back in there and I tweak that, I'll promise you every deer traveling through what he's doing, he is sent checking that open pasture and CRP and using the woodline as his travel corridor, and he's sent checking that and that's why they're traveling, and people don't think about that, you know. Okay, yeah, he's left scrapes out here and and those frequent these areas, but he doesn't have to walk out there and take

a physical look. He can walk by that, he catches a little bit of the right over, and then he's going to go out there. We've seen the exact same thing this morning. You know, you talked earlier about ease of entrance and exit to your area. So the spot me and Randy hunted really easy to get into. Right, You're you come from an open field, You're not really you know, you're you're not intruding a whole lot into

their area. But we had multiple bucks cruise the fence line that we have to walk over because with the north wind that we had today, he's able to check that entire timber patch without ever going through it. He just walks that fence line, strong north wind, that entire you know whatever it is, twountered acres a timber in there. He can check that whole thing in one run and he's off, you know, checking for other does, and so

we got the same thing. You know, they're they've got that line and like Randy said, it's like, shoot, we should turn and shoot out the back of the blind the way it's it's running right now. But um, we did have a couple of good ones coming. But yeah, I was it was kind of you know, light bulb went off, like how a buck is being very efficient, you know, trying to find a dough in because he's like, you know, similar to your situation, run a line, check a big, big area at once, and then keep moving.

He can cover more ground and that and that just goes to show you too that guys their nose is what they live by and and in to fool one's nose is is like fool and pin and teller. I mean, it just doesn't happen very often. I mean they just don't miss much, you know. And you know you gotta, you gotta, you gotta take all that into account. Yeah. Um, so my next set of questions for you is what can you get away with? You know, I'm an arch

reol hunter. I always joke. My dad told me I was built for archio cunting because you're allowed to make noise You're allowed to be clumsy, You're allowed to break sticks. You know. I come from a family that rifle oil hunters where they hunting their white new balances so they can feel every stick under their foot. You know, these guys are woodsman, you know they're they're silent in the woods where it's like I was a little more clumsy.

So I always wonder like what I can get away with? Um. You know I've been able to hut mule deer out of a ground blind before. Um. You know, I've hunted meal deer and elk on the feet with rifles. And you start to learn like what you can get away with, what they're gonna pick off when they can see you. Um. It's just kind of as a new white Tai hunter, I just kind of had some of these own questions like what can you get away with as far as noise?

What you think like scent matters, movement um, and then kind of walking the trails into an area because a little bit different hunting, um than I'm used to. You're gonna go sit in one location, You're gonna use that wind um. So so in your opinion, what can you get away with on noise, scent, movement and your entrance and exit to an area, like what will they allow? What will they put up with? And then what can

you get away with? I guess on on all those fronts, it's always gonna be different, right, But give me kind of some generalities on the every every area has it's you know, and and the thing is is like when you're hunting public land, sometimes you really don't know exactly how the deer used the area. You kind of can look at the old sign and some of the fresh sign and go, well, I think they're using it like this.

This is logical common sense, if you will, But that doesn't mean, you know, this time of year, you can you mean, one could jump the fence right here by the house and walk right by us. In fact, I've pulled in the driveway and had a hundred and fifty in deer chasing dough and the side are out here, you know. I mean, they'll do whatever they're gonna do.

But in general, scent, particularly out of your stand, when a deer gets down wind of you, you can almost bet you're gonna get stid unless you have high pressure and it's midday or up up in the morning when the sun's up a lot of times if he's close enough, it'll go over the top of their head. Other than that, those thermal start dropping in the evening, you're gonna get busted. I mean, if you don't, you're just the good lords just telling you it's you're having a really good day

because it's just hard to do. And one thing, like me and Derek be you know, not knowing how you guys do it out here in the Midwest where you know, we're like, do we guys bring broadles? Like how are we gonna you know, go to the bathroom in the stand And then like one thing, I kind of amazed me and kind of opens my eyes. It's like you guys, oh we all just p out of our stand. Yeah, you know, it's like stuff like that where it doesn't necessarily make guys that'll that'll that'll look at that and

be like, oh, you're absolutely stupid, you're crazy. Well, you know what, coyotes are meat eaters, right, and coyotes pe in the woods all the time, and if it really bothered the deer that bad, well all of them would be in town. I mean, it's it's not now obviously, if you know you asparagus things don't smell right. Um, you know, if you're on medication, things don't smell right. Doesn't necessarily mean it smells like a human you're injuring,

but it smells different. You know, it's your human odor, and mostly your human odor honestly comes out the top of your head and your mouth, and and you know that's the thing that really gives it away. And then, um, you know, ground scent is another thing. You know, you can wear rubber boots. And I was a coon hunter for years. A buddy and I we used to coon hunt all the way through high school. And you know, a dog's got I don't know how many oh factories in a deer has quite a bit more than that.

And you could drop out, you know, you could get a brand new pair of rubber boots, wash them down and make sure they were clean. The rubber smell was gone, and you could drop your dog out and go make a loop and never have to call for your dog. And pretty soon your dog will be walking your your your your foot track back when you're smelling. Because and if a dog can do that, a deer can do that real easy. Now, you know, I spray my boots down, I keep my hunting boots clean. I don't worry about

whether they're rubber. I don't worry about whether their leather. I worry about keeping them clean and keeping them as scent free as I can possibly keep them. But you're not gonna eliminate it. So that's why entry and exit is really critical, trying to keep your ground sent away from where most of the deer travel is. So your example, walking trails, I try not to walk a trail, especially a trail that's getting in and close and maybe getting

used close to where my hunting areas. Now, if I'm five yards off, I may walk it for a little ways and then veer off of it, but I try not to get somewhere we're a lot of deer are gonna now. You get in and around your stand, deer gonna frequent it. You're gonna leave ground scent. It's just hard to get by without it. If it's moist out,

get more deer gonna smell. If it's really dry, like it was a couple of weeks ago, you watch those deer, they'd be they'd be feeding on the acorns you just walk through, and they can't smell anything because it's dry. A dog doesn't smell good when it's dry, you know, I mean, you go, that's a good quail hunter. He don't want dry conditions. He wants moist conditions. His dog can smell those. Or you want the absolute best cat dogs, you go down to the dry land. You know those

dogs that contract rye. It's like those are the best noses exactly. So the ideal situation would be to approach not on a trail, and then downwind of your stand location for the wind that day. So let's say we have a north wind, your trail should go directly from the south into your stand and then that's like your best approach and then ideally not be on a trail.

But there are situations where you're just gonna win, yeah, or you just just you know, I mean, there are situations where maybe you don't have access to the property any other way for your stand location, you just kind of you do the best you can um get in there is sent free, but you're There's a lot of stands that I have that you can't access from the down wind side, and one of them is particularly behind my house. It is a south wind and type hunting area.

I do have north wind sets hung. So what I do, excuse me, is I walk straight in the least amount of traveled spot. And I don't have very many acres there, but it's the least amount of traveled spot, and I walk straight in and get into the tree on a north wind with a wind blowing at my back, and I have ultimately my very best hunts on a northerly wind in that place behind my house that I ever

have with a south wind. And I think it's because those deer can scent check when they come through there everything that is coming from the crop fields, and it's it's easy for them to do that. I have way more travel on a north wind than I do a south wind, And no matter what the conditions are, no matter whether it's a rut, no matter whether it's early season, it doesn't matter. I always have so I risk it. And I think that there's certain times that you need

to risk it. If you know a deer is there, and you know there's a chance, a very minor been it's a minor chance that you can get by with it and get in there and possibly get a shot at that deer. Take that chance and go to it. It's worth not being in there at all exactly, you know, using elk hunter, and I'm I'm a p on elk hunter compared to you and Dirk. I mean, I've killed some bulls and they've all been on public land, but

you know, I didn't understand how to. I was always stand offish, didn't want to get aggressive, didn't want to get aggressive, didn't want to get aggressive. And then when I started getting aggressive, I started killing l and I started killing decent bulls. And that's when I realized that, you know what, I'm gonna apply the same tactics to elk that I do to turkey and that I do to deer. And Dallas Miller a good friend of mine.

Who is he is? If people knew him and knew of him, he has killed some a lot of big deer in his life, I mean astronomical amount of big deer within his life with bow an gunn. But he told me one time he goes. The reason why you're killing so many up per indeer, you know Boone and Crockett type deer. He goes because you're not scared to spook him, and I'm not because I only get so many days a year to hunt. And when you only

have so many days a year to hunt. You need to hunt, and I'm not gonna do stupid stuff, but I will take that chance just to see if I can get by with it. And so many times it's worked out, and so you know, again, don't be ignorant about it, but but take that chance, because you know, sometimes taking that one chance, you get up hundred seventy inch deer on the ground or a hundred fifty or the biggest deer you've ever shot in your life. It

was worth every big And I'm a firm believer. Like, there are times where the right decision is to be a little more conservative and and play it safe. But um, you know, as cliche as it sounds, it's like the

high risk high reward. Um, you know, if if you don't take a little bit of risk and gamble a little bit, and if you always play it safe, then you're never gonna kill anything versus like, yeah, it might not always pencil out, but but the you know, there's a there's a good likely hood it will, and so you take that risk, um, with a little bit, you know, and and a lot of times it does pens off. But then there are some times you're also accepting the

fact that it might not pensil out. You know, if you tell and you have to know that in your mind. You know, it's kind of like investing money, right, you know, it's kind of like starting a business. It's like, well, you know I can do this. I might not win, but you know I might win too, so or I won't have any regrets. Like the other thing is like the guy that doesn't never do anything. It doesn't kind anything like, man, should I have went in there and

tried it all? At least the way we hunt, You're probably not gonna second because you're gonna And I explained that the other night when Randy said, no, we're gonna hunt. We're gonna hunt. We're gonna be hunting on stands. You know when when he was talking, you were talking about if I see when kind of spot and stalk it.

You know I have. I have made the mistake by not taking the chance with a giant bedded with a dough and getting down and slipping in, knowing, knowing full and well, I could get by with it and never get busted and could have killed big deer that way, but talked myself out of it. And I should have taken the risk, because at least I I would have known. Now I go, I think I could have You know, I think I could have. Well, I don't know that, but I should have taken the chance. Yeah, yeah, all

good points there. Um, Now that we're in the middle of the we're the rut start, I would say middle, we're kind of getting into the beginning stages of the beginning of the Yeah, yeah, what's your focus right now? As far as food? Are you looking if there's food plots in the area, are you looking at that secondary food kind of how are you going to use that food dear advantage? Because obviously we've mentioned we've established like Bucks have one thing on their mind right now. They're

real dumb and they're just looking for dose. They're trying to breed as many dose as possible. With that in mind, how are you focusing on food? Are you sitting on primary food sources, secondary food sources, and and how do you use those dear advantage? You know, a big deer will follow a doe down I seventy and you'll see see a lot of them did on it now if you drive down through there. But I don't I don't particularly during the rut. Like to be right on the

food source. I like to be just off the food store. Now, if you have a lot of acorns, you're gonna be in the middle of the food source, so to speak, all the time, you know, and they can get up and walk five feet and feed. But let's say there's a primary food source. Say there's a ten acre food plot or a cut bean field, a cut corn field, whatever,

that's what I would consider primary food source. That's where most of the deer are going to go feed at some point in time, whether they're there early in the morning, or they're there in the evening, or they slip out in the middle of the day and they go back whatever.

I like to be in that transition and those funnels or those pinch points leading from the core betting cover and let's say betting meaning I don't know if that buck is really betting in there, he's got a dope pushed in there, what, but it is a betting area leading to that maybe fifty sevre yards off of the main food I just like that because I catch more movement and I feel like, again I can catch those deer transitioning and scent checking and probably have a better

chance of getting him killed than waiting for him to make a mistake and follow a dough out into that food source. So I would rather be there, then I would be right on the food. Now, some people don't like to They like to be on the food because they like to see more, and they like to see

a lot more deer. But I'm hunting for one or two or three particular type of deer, or maybe I am hunting for one particular deer that I know exists, and I know he's in the area, and I know I've got a better chance of getting him killed there than I do on the edge and atinge point where he's got an entire twenty acres of act to deal with your like, all right, he's got a he's got a specific path he's gonna come. So you can narrow

that down, especially with a bow. I mean, you know, with a bow, you're talking a short range a short range weapon. You know, honestly, thirty yards is really probably your your key thirty yards and it is your key. And at that point, you know, you've got to get a deer in a position where you can get that

kind of a shot. You get on the edge of a field A lot of times, you know, he comes out, misses your seventy yards, starts running a dough around what You just gotta hope and pray that that dough decides she's gonna run right by you, you know, and sometimes it works. Now, if I'm sitting there with a rifle, not problem, come out yards away and we're probably gonna

have a little tap days going on. But you know, with a bow, I try to narrow it down and give myself the best opportunity to get that close and

personal shot. And you know, I was thinking the other day, out of all the deer that I've harvested over the years, probably on a buck, the longest shot that I've ever made thirty four yards, and of them are killed anywhere from seven steps to eighteen steps, you know, And that's what you're looking at, and you're not shooting those Most of those shots aren't being taken in an open field situation.

They have been taken into woods where he's got to walk by you are in that transition area to get there. And that's what I like. I like that up close and personal action. I like to see his eyelashes. Yeah, Um, that makes a lot of sense versus you know, being out in that open agg versus, like I said, really trying to pinch him down and and get tied on them. So right on the front end of the peak of the rut, let's talk calling whitetail deer strategy. Um, you

know we've got our brand new line of calls out. Um. You know, it seems like all the research I've did, all the you know, I've talked to you, I talked to Randy, I've talked to hundreds of callers, Like what do you guys prefer? What sounds you know, it sounds like the majority of you guys use grunts, but kind of walked through you know, how you rattle, when you grant, when not to grant, you know, when not to make calls, and kind of just your approach to interacting with these deer,

you know during the RUTA. Well, you know, I'm always going to have a grunt call. And and as you stated, you guys came out with your your line of deer calls, and I think it absolutely knocked it out of the park. I mean I've I've been using deer calls for the last forty some years of my deer hunting and and uh. I've called in a lot of deer over the years, and it is it is key to know when to

call when not to call. I'm not much of a blind caller, um, especially in situations where deer can get down wind of you pretty easy, because a lot of times you'll you'll grunt and you'll you'll put a scenario together. Let's say you grunt a little bit, you snort, weeze, like two deer came together. You rattle a deer two yards down the halla hears you, he decides he's gonna come, but he's gonna make a big loop and come in and get behind you. He's gonna, he's gonna he wants

to send check what he can't see. Well, at that point, unless every all the stars line up, you're gonna get busted. Right. So, I don't like the blind call a lot unless I'm in a position where it's almost impossible for a deer to get down wind, you know, or he's gonna if he gets down wind, he's had to walk by me to get there, you know. So only in those situations

will I do that. Now, if you're in a blind situation where you've got everything closed up, and even if the wind is wrong and you do circle down wind, a lot of times you're not gonna smell you through

that blind so you can kind of get by with it. Um. I also like to compass that with a deer decoy a lot of times because in an open area, you know, like I've got a place just off of a power line, Well, they can come out on that power line two yards away, and even if they wanted to circle down, when they get a look at that decoy, okay, that changes everything, right that that whole perspective. Now they've got a visual of what they thought they just heard, just like a

turkey looking at a decoy in the field. Then they come up there and they hit on it, you know, and it makes it a little bit easier. But a deer that you're say, you've got a deer that's missing you, that that comes out and they're gonna miss you by seventy yards, that's where that deer call will absolutely pay

dividends a lot of times. If he's by himself and he's looking and he comes out and you get a visual on him and they're gonna miss you, and they're in a position where they have to almost cut the corner and walk down dead down dead, or buy you to get down wind of you. I'm wanna grunt at him, uh, But a lot of times I'll wait too and let

them get in position. So let's say you got a north south wind like today, and the winds coming straight out of the north, and you've got a deer that's basically cross wind of you, so he's straight east of walking to the west, walking to the west. If I think he's gonna obviously get to me, I'm not gonna

do anything. But if he's let's say he starts vering south, I'm not gonna grunt to him, because if he starts vering south and I grunt to him, I'm just gonna him getting behind me and getting down wind of me.

But if he starts very north, I'm gonna let him get a little or start starts very north, I'm gonna let him get out north just far enough that when he does want to come and circle down wind, he's got to cut that corner, if you will, as a figure of speech, and he's gonna get too close before he gets down we want to get a shot, or waiting long enough, like if he stays on his perfectly

east to west line. You wouldn't want to call it early because that now it gives him enough time to get behind you, versus if you wait and let him, you know, maybe let's say fifty yards is the right number. He's now out in front of you far enough at least now if you blow a call, he's gonna the angle he's gonna take, he'd have to walk back, you know, rack track to get back behind her. So you exactly wait until the right time. Exactly things are critical like that,

you know. And I'll give you a little example. I shot an eight and a half year old six point was actually a little bump of a seventh point that made him legal. But I killed this deer, I don't know, four or five years ago, and I'd hunted him for a long time, and and I shot him on October on a kind of a drizzly day, fifty degrees. And that goes to show you, fifty degrees with a northeast wind about fifteen mile an hour, we'll freeze you. I didn't wear enough clothes that day, kind of like you

guys didn't. We didn't wear enough today. So this deer came out followed it he chased the dough and then the dough left him, which pretty common October twenty two. He came out and started making a scrape. Well, I

let him get pretty into that. Now he's nowhere near being able to get down wind because he's the winds coming this way, coming out of the northeast, and he is north and a little bit west of me, not far west, but but definitely straight north of me, about a hundred and twenty yards, and he's making this scrape,

throwing dirt everywhere. I'll let him get in the middle of making that scrape, and I just one loud, just grunted hard at him, and he wheeled around and looked and then turned around and just started ripping that scrape apart. And I'm like, okay, he's aggravated. So I grunted again, and he just started bawling up and stiff legged and starts walking and starts walking like he's gonna walk this half circle, and I'm like, he's gonna have to get all the way over there. So at that point, instead

of waiting, I didn't elect to grunt again. I snort weezed at him to get a little more aggressive. Now we're in CRP. I'm up in a tree, so I can see in the CRP. Good you get on the ground, you can't can't see, you can't see. So I snort. We's at him, and he pins his ear back and just comes straight at me, and I shot him at twelve yards. You know, But that was perfect timing of the calling, knowing I can't let him get any further now because if I do, it's just gonna entice. He's

gonna get down wind to me. But if I do it now and he does react, he's gonna cut that corner and I'm gonna get him shot before he gets to a point where he and he literally he read the script. Now, that's an eight and a half year old deer that nothing in the woods in North America. Isn't he smarter? He has seen it all, done it all, been there and avoided getting shot for eight years of

his life. That is saying something, you know, with especially thinking about the eight seasons a gun season he went through in Missouri where you had the Orange Army. You know that to me, although that deer wasn't no big high scoring deer, he was old, he was a beautiful deer. He's a great deer for a six pointer, but in a big body deer. But to beat a deer on his own terms like that. To me, it's just that that's what that's hunting deer is all about, you know,

it's not always about the size of the deer. Yeah, it's cool to kill those hundred deer. They're are awesome, you know, it's great. We all want to do it every year, But in realists, realistically, only a small percentage of those deer ever live long enough or have the genetics to get to that caliber. You know, you've got three hundred deer on your property and one ever makes it there, Well, what kind of gives you an idea

of how many actually get there? Yeah, and then you're we talked about a little bit and and we've even kind of alluded to it. This time is the times we won't call, the times we won't hit that grunt or snort wheezes when that buck is locked down on a hot though you're not. He's already got what he wants, he's visually got He's not going to leave her to come find some buck that's eight hundred fifty yards off

of her. Um. So that's kind of that or if the woods are just if the actions they're already, you'll just kind of stay quiet. But if you know, it's like turkey hunting, you know, if if you don't have to call, there's no reason to call, you know, and there's a good time to do it and not a good time to do it. And there's also I mean same with elk Sam with turkey, there's times where you don't want the critters to know your location. You don't want them to look your way and draw any more attention.

So when we see that this morning, there was there were times the call and then when you know, stuff was moving, we knew we didn't want to draw any more attention or you know, screw up the wind. So that's that's a good point on you know what I I this morning, I grunted at that deer that was following that dough and he was a shooter buck if he would not been broke up. He was definitely a big, mature five and a half year old deer. I mean, biggest body of deers I probably ever laid eyes on.

He was a giant of a deer and a deer that needed to be taken out as a big main frame eight pointer. That's broke up. But the cool thing was he was following that dough, and I knew what kind of reaction I was going to get, but he was a hundred yards a hundred twenty yards away, and I had deer in front of me, but I had everything closed up except for one window because I was

sitting in that redneck a Randy's, you know. And uh, I'm not good about setting in blind simply because I can't see her here like I want to, you know. But I caught this deer and I thought, well, I'm gonna grunt and see what his reaction is, just as I thought, because I wasn't gonna hurt anything, you know. And he was following that dough and he was about thirty yards behind her, and I grunted, and he wheeled around and looked, and he turned and started following her again.

And when I grunted at him the second time, he never even he never even checked up. He just kept walking. And I'm like, that is ninety nine point nine percent of the time. What's gonna happen when you have a buck with a dough. His interest level is on what's in front of him. Obviously, she was getting close, and he wasn't gonna let her get far enough away that he couldn't check up lockdown mode. There exactly, there's nothing besides a bigger buck that's walked by him walking out.

I mean, honestly, he could have been betted down in some of that thick stuff. And you know they'll let you walk right by him as long as she doesn't get up. He's not getting up. Well, no, I'm I'm super excited. Um. Like I said, I've never never claimed to be a white doe, but I think I'm gonna like this. Um. It's it's off to a good start already. So we're here in Kansas. We will definitely give you

guys an update on the on the next episode. But I can't thank you enough Chris for jumping on here kind of sharing you know what you know about white A very very small sliver you know what we had. We only had an hour to cover, but you know, give us a little insight into you know, your white telln knowledge. Um, And I'm excited to spend the next week here and in Kansas with things just heating up. So thanks for coming on the show, and uh, good

luck on the on this Hunt. I think we're gonna end up with some decent bucks here in camp, all right, Thanks Chris, you bet you, thank you,