Ep. 559: What Would Grant Woods Do?

long series. Now. I hope you guys enjoyed shooting month back in July. I certainly did. Was what I needed. This year is all about shooting for me. I'm feeling good about it. These folks helped me out, and uh I am now and hopefully you are now ready to fully turn our attention to hunting, because guess what hunting season is just about here? I mean, jeez, guys, I mean for some of you, just a matter of weeks probably right. There's some August openers, some early September openers.

I think my first hunt of the year is going to be somewhere on mid September. But man, it's coming up fast, and uh, I'm excited. So from here on out through the rest of the fall, we're gonna be a focused on chatting with the best deer hunters in the world to get you and me and all the rest of us ready for our best season yet. It's gonna be some really good stuff and to get things going, my thought was to do a whole month of our what would you do episodes. We've done these over the

past couple of years. Uh so hopefully you're familiar, but if you're not. The basic gist of it is this, I get some great hunter on the line, and then I present them with a bunch of different, very scific, unique hunting scenarios. I'll tell basically a story like it's this day, it's this place, it's this kind of thing, and here's what's going on, and then I asked them to explain what they would do in that circumstance, why they would do it, how they would pull it off.

And you know what I found is this has ended up being one of the best ways to get new ideas and a new perspective from these really good deer hunters. And it's a lot of fun too, So I'm pretty stoked to do a full month of them. We've got a really, really good lineup schedule for you here and we're kicking it off today with a true legend. Dr. Grant Woods is one of the best in the world.

He's a long time wildlife biologist, he's a thought leader in the deer management world, and he's the founder and host of Growing Dear TV, which is you know, for jeez, well over a decade now, when it's been one of the best and most popular online hunting series that there is. He hunts and manages a great, big property down in southern Missouri, but he's also traveled and consulted and hunted

all over the country. So he's just this wide kind of wealth of experience and expertise, and I think it's the perfect person to help us kind of shift our preparations into the season into overdrive. So that's the plan for today. That's the podcast we've got. I just finished my podcast with Grant, just finished chatting with him, and I can tell you it lives up to the bailing. It really was a good one. So I'm excited for

you guys to hear the rest of this. But I do want to give you a quick update some housekeeping here. If you're listening to this on the day that this episode drops, which is Thursday, August four two, I gotta give your heads up that today is the last day of our season openers sale for meat Eater and our family brands. Right as you guys know Why're Hunt is part of the Meat Eater network, and this is basically our our biggest sale the entire year. Tay's the last

day over at first Light. They got off almost the entire inventory. It's off a bunch of our favorites from FHF in Phelps game calls up to fift off, and then there's a bunch of logo wear and some knife bundles and different things on sale at our Meat Eater store where we stock all sorts of different hunting gear now too. So it's a lot to keep straight, I realized. So to make things more simple, we actually just started

a new kind of curated gear page for me. And I know I mentioned last month I was gonna do some Wired Hunt monthly gear picks and I told you to go over to the Wired Dunt website. Well we kind of shifted things a little bit. We've actually got a new page now where I'm gonna be putting some of my favorite items for each phase of the year,

and you can see those recommendations right now. And so right now, a bunch of my selections for like the late summer scouting period and the early season hunting period. A bunch of that stuff's on sale today August four.

So what you gotta do if you're interested in checking out a few of these things, You go to store dot the meat Eater dot com, so that store Dot the meat Eater dot com slash mark, and there you're gonna see stuff like my favorite, uh the gear I'm wearing for early season hunting from first let you'll see the hoodie I wear, You'll see the pants I wear,

You'll see the face covering I wear. I also included this new cooler I've been using all summer, my new favorite cooler I recommended on there, and my top recommendation for super cheap, budget friendly binoculars. If you want to get a pretty decent set of glass for not a ton of money, there's a recommendation in there for you to So go to store dot the meat Eater dot com slash mark to see my recommendations. If you're listening on the fourth, you can still get those sale prices.

If not, still check out those recommendations if you're in the market for anything like that. Uh that's my little spiel and my update. And with that out of the way, it's time to get to our first episode of What Would You Do Month with the one and only doctor Grant Woods. Let's go all right back with me on the show is Mr Grant Woods. Grant, thank you so much for being here. Hey, mark us for having me.

It's been it's been too long. I think it's been a couple of years since we've had you on the show. And uh, every time we chat though, it's it's one of the best ever. So I'm glad we're getting back together. Yeah, you know, I enjoy our visits also, and this is kind of a unique one. I mean we've talked in the past on Whyed Hunt about general land management things. I know we did a podcast with the Druries a few years ago were wedove into stuff with e h

D and diseases and drought and stuff. But today I kind of want to run you through the gauntlet if you're if you're willing to go there with me, Grant, I want to I want to pitch a whole bunch of hypothetical hunting scenarios at you and and then just see how you would handle them, what you would do, what your thought process would be, what kinds of things you would be thinking about, um, anything along those lines.

We're gonna kind of go from land management stuff all the way through early season, mid season, late season, and kind of cover whole swath of different possible circumstances a hunter might find themselves. And so are you Are you game to go on that journey? Yeah? Yeah, that sounds fun. This is this is sounds awesome. Yeah, it actually is

pretty fun. I enjoy doing this. So I I say, rather than beating around the bush, we should just jump right into my first one, which is a slightly it's probably gonna be a concerning, depressing thing to think about, So forgive me to start here, Grant, But I want you to imagine this scenario. Imagine for some reason you had to sell the proving grounds, like right now, in the middle of the summer, last minute, or you wanted

to do it for for whatever reason. But the proving grounds, your home turf, your home farm you worked so hard on over the years, is now gone. And it's let's say August fifteen, let's le's hypothetically imagined. And now you have just picked up a new property to hunt this year. But it's just a lease. It's a smaller property. And this just you know, for this year, for the intro, we're just going to pick up a lease to get me through this year. We'll see what happens after that.

And on this lease you are allowed to do some minor habitat improvements. But there's a farmer on the property as well, and he just doesn't want you to mess with his fields. He doesn't want to mess with his crop fields. Everything else is fair game. Though you can mess with the timber a little bit. You can mess with any kind of openings. But here's the rub. You only have two available weekends in the summer to make

whatever changes you want. So you have two weekends of time to do something fast to get ready for this first hunting season on this new lease. So my question for you, Grant is this, with this very short amount time, very late in the year, on a new place, what would you do with those two weekends? What's the best bang for your buck and and most efficient impact you can make given those constraints. What would you do? What's your thought process? And that is a scary scenario there.

Uh And I think my first thing because I'm gonna be thinking about this like a lot of us, you know, while I'm working, or do it driving down the road, even though I have two weekends to have boots on the ground. So I'm gonna I'm gonna whip out my online map, which for me is huntsed in, and I'm gonna do just the opposite of a lot of people. I'm gonna look at my property, but just as importantly it's a small release, I'm gonna look at the neighborhood.

I want to try to find the best sources that you can detect from a satellite image of food covering water, because those resources are gonna impact how dear travel through or use my leaks. Of course, look at food we mentioned as a farmer probably doing a single rotation, so he's got corner beans, but he's not double cropping most likely, since that's rare. So I'm gonna try to learn what he's planting. And I can probably do that some extent by the you know, if I get it last year's

satellite view. Uh And it's corn. I can assume he went to beans this year with pretty good accuracy. But I want to see much food is in the neighborhood. Maybe see if there's any timber work around me, there some bedding areas and clear cups or something, because when I start any new project, I want to identify the best sources of food, cover and water, find the one that's the most limited, and and put that where I'm hunting. Yep, that that makes sense. So can you can you maybe

take it one step further them? So let's let's imagine we'll sorry, go ahead. Yeah, so I'll use my imagination a little bit. And I mean gonna say it's pretty homogenous habitat. I don't I don't see any fresh clear cups on the neighbors or a you know, a bedding area, and all the farmers seem to have the same practices in the neighborhood, and all the farmers are harvesting their crops.

Let's just say I don't know where we are north south, but let's say abou October one, there's still some hunting season out there when when the crops are standing, but they get gone pretty quick, and and combines are super efficient anymore. And this particular farmer is not using any cover crops, and so he said he didn't want me messing with his eels. But I'm gonna try to beg him to just let me broadcast. I'm not doing anything.

I'm not adding any chemicals. I'm just gonna broadcast some good food plot blend, and in the back corner were likely the deer may have done some damage to his agg crops anyway, And and see if I can't get you an eighth acre quarter acre back corner fields just makes some little high deal food plots. Those are easy. I don't have to worry about clearing trees or anything. I'm not disturbing the soil because it's gonna be bare

after harvest. I'm just broadcasting seed right before rain. Hope it rains on one or two weekends I have, or right after that, and then I'm gonna get boots on the ground. And that first day, man, I'm almost jogging through the woods. I'm just I've got limited time. I am on every trail and every side ridge and the elevator ridge, and I'm not gonna wear as much about the bottoms because i know the wind's gonna swirl down there, and I prefer to bow hunt early season, so it's

gonna be a little tough running the bottoms. I'm gonna put my eggs in the basket on the ridge tops where the wind and thermals are gonna be more predictive bowl and more consistent. And what I'm really looking for is white oaks, because deer like white oaks over red oaks during the early season. Potentially know the farm place maybe got a para tree or something by it that

would be an attraction during the early season. And just as importantly, I'm looking for any dry ponds or openings where some sun is reaching the soil and I can just take a rake or backpack blower and blow the leaves and duff out away and again broadcast some seed. And in that timber spot, I might go out a bag of tin, tin, tin or something and again make that attractive food source, because when all the farmers harvest,

deer coming to my little food clots. M I love it now, both in your little timber spot and in the corners of these fields where you're gonna broadcast after takeout, What specifically would you try broadcasting in that kind of situation. Okay, So just being really candid, I just designed the new blends for me, but I shared that recipe of the green cover so anyone could get it. But I maintained about ten or fifteen ton on your little high deal

of food plots. And I've just learned through the years that you know, there's no new magic being but oats and folks, there's you know, everyone's well I got big buck oats or yellows or whatever. There's there's you know, code taller notes and non cook code taller notes. But anyway, I'm gonna have oats and radishes and buck leats and a few little soybeans in there to just get there early. Those are really great early season attract its north to south.

And then I'm gonna have some blanched clover and a few things like that in there, just gonna come on, you know, a month into it or so until it gets really cold and then really light up next spring for the turkeys. Just gonna those things are just gonna blow out of ground that following spring. And then I'm have a little cereal ride because once you get if I'm fair enough north and it gives code and my oats might frost off or just really become dormant and

get eight to the ground. Sarah ye grows down to twenty eight degrees. So if it's twenty eight degrees and the mat checking about serial rise, it's say it's been zero for five weeks. Then it warms up the twenty eight degrees, it's gonna grow a little bit. Of course, that fresh photo synthesis fresh vegetation is gonna attract deer during the late season. So I'll have a blend. I always prefer blends over single species. If you like that blend,

it's called heidi Hoo. I call little food box hide Hoo. And that's exactly what I'm planting this year. Awesome now, you know, just as an aside to everyone listening, you know, you and I Grant, we did a we did a podcast like I mentioned a few years ago, all about your Buffalo method as you were calling it um, where you talked about the importance of diversity and blends and

everything like that. Highly recommend anyone who has a little bit more time than two weekends, but who really wants to rethink the way they do food plots in a more sustainable and soil friendly way. Highly recommend looking up the Buffalo method. Are you basically following the same program these days or has that changed dramatically in the last couple of years. Yeah, change little bit as we continue learning, and you know, just again there's no new magic being,

but just trying different combinations of species. We kind of refined our techniques. My soil is improving. You've been your market really rocky, tough place. Uh, my soul is making more gains now, and it's easier to make gains early on, right, Like it's you know, it's really easy to jump when you're starting at the bottom, but it's really tough to get that last. But just about stuff we've learned in timing and techniques, we're making faster gains now and so

much of a difference. We actually now call it the release process. I I kind of consider it releasing creations potential because I've just learned through the years that their soil, even degraded soil, if you treat it right, just within a year or two, it has so much potential. I haven't I haven't paid for any fertilizer set a little higheal if food plot or something in eight years now. I haven't bought any herbicide and a couple of years.

I'm just I spend and I like tractor time. But you know, I my technique, I spent a lot less time on a tractors gives me more time to go being a tree stand or hang a tree stand or something. Yeah. Well, I gotta tell you, Grant. Since that conversation where we dove into that, I have spent the last two years, you know, trying something you know, a poor man's version of what you're doing, and and have seen you know, pretty darn good success and have really enjoyed diving into

this different way of going about things. So so thank you again for for sharing what you've been doing and how you're doing it, because it's been helpful to me and I'm sure many many other people too. So it's cool to see that come together. Okay, so here's here's

another scenario. Well we'll say, well, let me take I guess we'll stick with the original property that we're talking about here, but let's let's give it a little bit more specificity and say it's forty acres, that's it, and it is a mixture of that timber and some of that agg like we talked about, it's surrounded by similar here's the problem, here's the thing you discover um for

the next year. Let's say you discover that you have a neighborhood around you of folks who are hovering on your property lines um in a big, big way, like to a point where it's dramatically impacting you. You're seeing them all the time, that bumping deer. Uh. It's become something that's been become a real challenge and in one way or another for you. So now you're entering your two how if at all, would you adjust your property

your plan and let me take I guess. Let me add one more thing, which is that you now own this forty acres, so you can now do whatever you want. You bought this for me. Now you can change things up, and you're trying to deal with these line hugging neighbors that have been a challenge. What do you do now? Yeah, in those situations, I like to make my cover round

the outside edge for cover reasons. I like it really thick, and not only so people can't see in, and a lot of them don't even want to walk through it. So I'm gonna I'm gonna purposely designed my bedding areas or my daytime cover areas on the edges of my property. Uh and and deer will bed on edge no problem. And then as part of that design, I have to think,

how can I locate the property? Is my only access to the south, or can I you know, pay the neighboring farmer a few bucks and come in from the east, or you know, how can I get there? And I'm gonna really intentionally design my little higdio food plots so I can approach hunt nexit with multiple wind directions without

a learning deer. And that may mean I'm just taking a backpack blower and making a walking trail around the whole outside of property because I only have one access point, and depending on the wind that day, I'm just going on the down wind side. I may go three quarters of the way around, just so I don't booger up the deer walking through the middle, and then cut in the hundred fi yards to my my scrape line and my food plot or whatever. And I'm and I'm gonna

have to hunt really strategically because there's always advantages. You can always make limon AIGs somehow, if the neighbors are kind of line huggers and probably careless hunters and putting a lot of pressure on deer. And I can create my property and hunted in a way that becomes a

de facto sanctuary, less pressure than the other properties. I'm still hunting it, but I'm thinking through how I approach hunt next that every time I go there, deer are gonna naturally want to be on my property even though it's forty acres. And they give a real quick perfect example that years ago at Situay, which is a twenty eight thousand research acre research property in southwest Georgia at the University of Georgia heads up lot of research, I was prostrat Tod got to work on a little bit.

Another colleague of mine built four eighty acre enclosures that were kyle proof couch a big problem down there, about a footing a half deep wire on the ground and four ft tall and had a bunch of GPS color does in the area. And the bottom line is when it comes fawning season, the majority of doze out of all that land in those areas went into the a d acre coyot proof enclosure to fawn because they knew it was safer. M and so you may not be able to reduce a Hunderson the pressure or certainly you

probably can't remove a hunbersond predators. But if you can reduce the pressure or predators lord in your neighbor, then you know, it's kind of like you and I being thrown in the middle of Ukraine right now or something. Man, we're going for cover, We're going We're never totally safe, but we won't be as safe as we can. Yeah, yeah, that makes that makes sense. One kind of follow up when it comes to, you know, paying extra attention to

your access. You know, there's more and more people these days it seems like, um, you know, kind of leaning towards wield access as a way to reduce the pressure. So whether with a bike or an e bike or a UTV or a buddy driving in with a truck. Uh, you know, where where have you fallen these days more recently on that side of things? Do you do you do that a lot? Still? Is that a part of your strand? And I do? I do Mi langel steep So I'm kind of chicken right an e bike up

down my heels. I'm afraid I'll take a face plant somewhere. But uh, buggies, four wheelers, your wife taking you to pick up if you're not lucky, whatever it is anywhere. I'm pretty blessed with a you know, pretty good sized property. But dear, here here vehicles, my place, neighbor's place, local highload ever every single day. And and so I have no problem getting dropped off three feet from my stand

in a vehicle at Tendle three in the afternoon. I would much rather do that than walking quarter mile in there and the wind's blowing across me that whole quarter mile and making a big old sense dream out there. So for years we've been big on getting dropped off

or you know, getting in there without walking. Yeah, And the last thing I want to say about that, you know, if you have a property it's pretty secluded and you haven't been there all year, and an opening day hunt season, you're buzzing every road with your UTV, you're probably you know, you're probably burning up the deer a little bit. But if you're you know, you're like me. You're checking truck cameras, you're working food plots, you're moving stands. They're just used to.

But it's it's not something that alerts Dear Yeah, it's all about, you know, maintaining consistency. And once they come to realize that wheels and vehicles are a consistent thing, it no longer is out of the norm and they can they can live with that, right. Yeah, that you may see one that bounces off in the woods fitty yards and watch as you go buy or something, but not like they smelled a big o ugly guy walking out through there. And so man, last time I smelled

Dad at thundered rolloud, Mama fell over dead. So I don't want to smell again. Yeah, for sure. All right, let's let's step away from that hypothetical and now kind of go back to your current situation. You're on the proving grounds and I don't know exactly when you plant your your fall release blend, but let's say you whenever that period comes and goes, you plant your fall you broadcast your fall blend into your spots in that late summer time period, and you're supposed to get great rain.

But let's say like the next day, the forecast completely changes and now there's nothing. And you mentioned to me earlier today that you're in the midst of a real gnarly drought. So Let's say this drought continues and you go a week without that rain, and then two weeks without that rain, and maybe three weeks without that rain. Now opening days is either here or almost here, and all that stuff staring you in your face, and you have this this dried up, almost non existent food plot.

What do you do in that situation to salvage your situation if at all? Yeah, great points A long back up. We're gonna plan about forty five to sixty days before the average first frost date in the fall here if there's slat of food that happens to be bout October fift so, you know, August fift on when the weather person says, we got a really good chance to rain and we're going to a spread seed and we've had

you know, eight chance for and it doesn't rain. I assure you, in a little small hunting pot or hidio plot, squirrels, cardinals, turkeys or whatever can wipe out a bunch of seed quick. And I don't know how to eat that much. You know, you at thirty parns out there and you see a few squirrels right now, you know it's a big deal. You know, next time you go after you got a boot and crockett squirrel running around and no seed german ating. Uh So that's a real pain and I'm always gonna

have four or five options. I like to monitor scrapes year around. You know, those bigger communal scrapes. They're probably not pawing the ground, but they're using the overhanging limb. I love bottlenecks. I mean, I'm a I like a good bottleneck as much as I do anything. So I'm going to create bottlenecks pinch points by whatever method I need to on that property is that's making a gap and you know, an inter your fence, or have a pond and surely dry or you know, whatever it is.

I'm looking for those bottlenecks because, dear, unless they're unless they've been disturbed there, they're gonna use bottlenecks every day, and you want to hunt them knowing that disturbance is a real no no. And one thing a good friend of mine from Wisconsin, I've always kind of tinkered with it,

but he's I think he's perfected it. He vic takes a stick or a piece of grape vine or something like that instead of making a full moss grape which I do every year, you know, driving my tea post and ground and wire a tree or a branch to it or whatever. And he just takes some peer record and hangs these sticks down out of the tree on a trail or a food plot or whatever, about four feet off the ground. And I don't know what it is that the deer. I hate to use the word playing.

That's what Disney is, but uh, they bumped those sticks around for twenty minutes at a time. It is shocking to me. And I'm not taking any credit. My buddy Vic does this and just had tremendous results. They spend time there, They turn a different angles so you get a get shot angle to the tree you made the moss scrape out. I was not blocking your view if they come in the wrong way. So I'm gonna have

some of those this year in various places. So it's it's just a piece of grape vine or branches hanging down off of some pear cord, basically as a licking branch, but a vertical kind of hanging a vertical licking branch. But it's got a lot of movement to it. You know, you may tie it five six ft above, or you know, why are the limb isn't that situation? And his trail camera videos, My goodness, those deer spent a lot of

time there. Interesting. Now, is there any planting option, like if you have that drought the last three more weeks, is there something that you would try to still go back out and broadcast, you know, into late September, or something that can get you a little extra anything, or is it out of the question at that point. Now, I'm gonna plant that same blend against seal rise, really drought resistant and colde herty. But I'm gonna wait for soil moisture. I'm I'm too old to waste money on

seed anymore. If there's just no moisture and no rain in the forecast, or the forecast doesn't pan out as you would anticipated, I'm gonna give some more seed. And at that time, you know I've missed the ideal planning window. Now on ten days before the first expected frost, now you know these are average frost days, so ours is October. I've seen it. Not a cross here until mid November.

So I'm gonna gamble. Okay, We're gonna get some more warm temperatures, members not just warm temperature, though you need a certain amount of sunshine for those plants to photosynthesize, and those days are getting shorter and shorter. But I'm not throwing out hopefully it terms green when food is you know this when food is short for deer in the dear world, Uh gosh, I think they probably a green pickup. So I want to turn it green if I can, and and and and also I love to

turkey up, so I want that green spot out. There's a strep zone in the spring. Also, is there like a cut off date? Is there any dates where you're like, okay, it's it's finally too late to try. I mean, if you're getting frost for for here, I kind of figure like November one is you know, I have failed. There's just no way to salvage this. And at that time, I'm not having much weed pressure or anything. I'm gonna wait in frost, seeds and clover as soon as I can.

In the spring. Let's shift away from property work now and and talk a little bit more on the hunting side. Let's say we're moving into opening day of hunting season, and to make this, you know, applicable to as many people as possible. Let's say that the property you're hunting is on the smaller side. It's it's it's not huge, it's kind of I don't know, let's say a hundred some acres give or take um. But there's a lot of people around it. There's a lot of folks the

hunt in the neighborhood. Let's you know, we'll put you up in northern Missouri, maybe more towards the you know, St. Louis area, So there's a lot of folks that get after it. Okay, And opening day is in the forecast. You're looking at it and you're thinking, man, I've had this game plan in place. There's a big shooter buck that's been you know, he's been showing up on camera. I've got, you know, everything lined up for this. I know that first day is is usually one of your

best chances because there haven't been people hunting. But here's the big issue. The weather forecast for opening day and the next few days after that is very hot, a subpar wind, muggy, just just kind of the worst case scenario as far as what you dream of for great deer hunting conditions. So the question is this grant, do you go and hunt opening day despite the lousy weather, because you know it's your only hunt pre hunting pressure

before other guys mess things up. Or do you say no matter what, I'm not hunting there until the perfect weather or the perfect wind, and you wait till four or five days into the year, risking the possibility that your neighbors might hunt all four of those days and booger everything up regardless. What would you do in that situation? Yeah, I am with the I do not like high humanity days. Your sin It's just whiff and everywhere. Uh So I'm not I'm certainly not hunting my prime areas. I usually

have what I call an observation stand. You know some people called the brother in law stand. You don't think you're gonna really see a shooter buck or maybe no dear there just because it's opening day and I've planned to be off work that day, I'm going hunting. But it's hot and muggy and the wind is still. I am not going to a good area. I'm just going on edge and probably got my binoculars at the ready morning do my bow. I'm just you know, looking three

ft of yards out. I had that kind of visibility and I'm not going to a good area even now. I mean, uh that here at my place, if if the conditions aren't right, I'll go set on a you know, a bluff on a ridge top and look over areas or something. I'm not going into a primary, those those primaries that you've worked, you know, maybe hanging stand and cut some lanes or playing a little food plot or whatever. Uh. Dr Carl Millery used to be in my roommate for

a little bit of University Georgia. Bryant guy has done some great research. And we know that deer have memory and it and I would rather give up five days. And my other thinking here is, if it's bad conditions, although the neighbors are probably getting busted and maybe a learning deer they've got a chance to bumping him in my land, they're probably not killing a lot of deer

because the conditions are so bad, certainly mature deer. So I'm gonna let them hunt, and I'm just gonna let him maybe push a couple bump up key bucks in there to my area and let them realize that's a safer part of your home range. And I'm just gonna do an observation ye, okay, I follow you. Here's another one. Let's and I think this is actually something that you'll be able to relate to. I think you had a somewhat similar experience um with a buck you called swoops.

But let's say you've got one buck on your property that you have been after for several years and he's been on your mind. He's been the one, and for whatever reason, he's always been one step ahead of you. You know, he's he there, only shows up in daylight when you're you know, on vacation, and then when you go hunt, he's shown up there you or he's in the standard hunting yesterday, and then you go back there and then he's where you were the day before, whatever

it was. He's always where you're not, and you're always close but not close enough. You've hunted him. Let's say, you know, we'll say not six or seven years like you did, but let's say you hunted him to previous years. Now you're into year three, your third year hunting this buck.

Now you have two really good years of history with What kinds of things would you focus on or change when it comes to your hunting strategy or setups or scouting and trail cameras, anything like that to dial in in now on year three, when you're saying, gosh, he's evade to me for so long, I have to make it work now and you decide to switch it up, what would those things be? Yeah, that is a great

scenario that I think a lot of the space. Um, I'm gonna I keep camera pictures of bucks that let's just say, you know, three years old or older year after year after year. You know, I'll give him a name or put him in a file or whatever. And the first thing I'm gonna do is really study. I'm gonna get a pencil, pencil on paper out and I'm gonna look at the dates and exactly where that camera was or where he was. I'm gonna I'm gonna plot

it out. I mean, because I have found it. Oftentimes the mature bucks, even more so as they reach older age classes, not only have the generic path of they may show up on the exact same day at a food plot of location of scrape that they did the year before. It is something it is really uncanny to me and how accurate that is. So I'm really going to look at the plast and say, Okay, early season.

He's using the south part of where I get the hunt and specifically this white Oak ridge or whatever it is. And then about two or three weeks into it, I don't get any more pictures him now, and they everybody start figuring some pictures the next ridge over. I'm gonna really point that data down, and then I'm gonna ask myself to be honest with myself and say, why have I not tagged that bug? Where is he busted me? What am I doing wrong? It's not the deer's fault, right,

He's just doing his thing. It's our fault. And I'm gonna really review my hunting techniques, my choices, my timing, because I need to change. I do not want to do the same thing I've been doing. And and I think those two things paired have helped me tag some bucks that have avoided me for multiple years, which is frustrating and fun at the same time. Right when that when that does come together, you know, a year or two or three later, whatever, guys want a reward. That

is so so so true. Well on the trail camera from this is something I'm always curious about different people's takes on this. When you're trying to zero in on one specific buck Uh, let's say maybe maybe do this with swoops and maybe not. But when you're trying to zero and note a deer, let's say you have just the one that you really want and you're trying to close the net around him in one form or another. What do you do with your cameras differently, if at all,

to help you fine tune that pattern? Do you start moving in the men tighter and tighter into one area, or do you put more out in his range? Or do you never change your trail camera strategy and always have a basic blanket approach year after year because you know you still want cameras in the north corner because

maybe a new buckles show up. What's your take on that? Yeah? Great, great thought again, Mark, I do change my choke camera placement pretty frequently based on m R i most recent information. And in that scenario, I'm I'm gonna work really hard not to crowd or alert the deer. Alerted deer is so much tougher to hunt. And and so if I you know he's back on the south FORDI again, he's back in there. I'm gonna just place cameras along roads or edge as a plot or somewhere I can get

mid day that there's almost zero champs. I'm gonna bumping. It's hot enough to sin is rising years rising. I'm probably going in with the sync control. Even know I'm not hunting, but I'm not penetrating, you know, a hundred and fifty yards in the timber to get to that wideoat tree or something. I'm just not gonna take a chance of busting that dear out there. So I may move some more cameras in the area, but they're gonna

be on the outskirts of the area. I just want to see if I can find him, and if he's coming and going. And I have done this and I'm always surprised at Okay, here's a spot on this road and see thirty yards. There's really no redeeming reason here. But I'm I'm just gonna put a camera because I'm not getting anything on this camera on the other side of rhim and you whip it out there, you know, call it gut instinct, call it whatever it is, but

you don't really see any reason put it there. And all of a sudden, at Bucks walking seven yards from the camera. So I'm gonna put my cameras in his area, but I'm not going very far off the road or where I can access real easily. Yeah, what about camera density? Um, you know how many cameras you'll put in a small area. I spent some time last fallow Tom Inderbo, and I was shocked by the way he uses cameras. He will in a in an acre area like an acre food

plot or a little acre betting knob. He'll have three, four or five different cameras in this little area pointed in every different direction, or two sides of the trail, or both sides of the water hole and two different trails that come into it. I mean, he very very thoroughly covered certain zones. Do you ever do anything like that, or or if not, what is the density you get so that you can, you know, get the full picture

or at least enough of the picture. I do that when I do suspect there's a certain buccan area that I or one of my guests or someone would like to tag. And Tom is a very skilled outdoorsman, so I'm certainly not going against Tom. But I do the same thing, but not just Willie Nilli. I mean, I know there's something going on in there. I can't quite

figure it out. And again I'm not going to way through the betting area to do this, but as close as I can get and feel I'm not disturbing to do all stack several an area I kind of look at like trapping if a if I've got to get the crossroads and there's a lot of coyuchsign there, I'm not gonna put one trap there. I'm gonna put three or four because of course, gyles often travel as smaller units.

And if I think I got a buck man he's crossing this rib somewhere, you know, going to this water source somewhere, Heck, yeah, I'm gonna put three or four cameras in there because I'm just guessing otherwise. So one more trail camera situation then for him, and this will kind of will zoom out to a slightly more generic situation. So let's let's not say we're trying to kill one specific buck, but instead this is just pay you know, let's go back to that forty acre property you mentioned earlier.

You've got this forty acre property, and now I want to just better understand how you what your what your typical starting point trail camera setup would be. So let's imagine I'll give you a little more detail on this property. Now, let's imagine this forty acres and you have two food plots. Those are your two food sources. The rest of the forty acres is tim or brush, that kind of stuff,

of which two really good betting thickets are within. So you've got two food plots, you've got two really great betting thickets. And let's say one of those thickets is in the valley, one of those thickets up on a bridge. Okay, there's your there's your property. You have four cameras at your disposal. Where and how would you place your four

cameras across this type of property. If it's early season and I don't believe deer dispersed and chasing acorns all up down the ridges, I'm gonna focus on those food plots. Assuming I've got a decent food plot crop in they're planning to establish one, And even if the deer getting near after dark, I'm gonna pay attention to, you know, what direction they came from where they exited, and once I get a hint of a pattern, then I'll chase them a little bit, you know, back up hundred yards

or yards or whatever. I myself stay out of bedding areas until the pre rut and then I try just out if I can. I just that's a real sensitive area deer. Having a lot of GPS collars on deer throughout my career. If you bump a deer from a bedding area, they tend to get a little bit more upset. And if you're bumping off a food source or something like that, and they expect to be bumped around food sources, right,

that's how they're created. They get this big old room, and I often try to share with people, and I usually get some odd faces. But a deer's number one predator defense mechanism is not its nose or size or his ear. It's it's belly. And in reason it's it's belly. You know you've watched ear. They especially to heavy pressure.

They come out where there's some sun hitting the ground or getting native native forbes or food plot or whatever, and they eat real quick, and then they go back into bushes and they regurgitate it and show it up more and swallowed again. If they had to eat like we do, they'd be standing in that food plot for an hour and be much more exposed to predation. So, uh, food is key to deer. They're gonna need it every day. Dey are gonna consume approximately lots of variables in here.

Don't send me hate mail, but about five of their body weight to day driveway. That's all the moisture. So you got lush clover. It could be seventy water. So now you're talking about eating a whole bunch of pounds every day to get that driveway. So they're gonna eat a lot and that's gonna be a daily routine. And if they're not coming to daylight, I still gained critical information of where they're coming from, when where they're going. And by the way, if I could add, truck cameras

are awesome. I'm a kind of truck camera for you can have too many. Um, don't tell my wife I admitted that. But if you go to the skin and ship your buddy kills a deer, and no one likes to do this, right because you get your hands and smelly whatever. But after you're done a vis rating, it go up the esophagus. If it's a bug, pullow it out you know you want in a cape or whatever.

But because what you find is that you know that your buddy harvested this deer forty five in the morning, and you got the esophagist, you're gonna get a pretty good idea where he was the previous hour, because food moves a little bit slow. And you say, oh, man, he's known in the neighbor's cornfield. There's some corn up there about six inches down from his throat or you know, whatever it is. That's your timetable. We call that scouting from the skinning ship, and it's a little bit more

accurate than looking in the room. And because once we get some room and it could sit there quite a while. It does sit through quite a while. Of course, they just start breaking down from the acids in there. But boy, and you can get the softish. You can just backtrack a cup hun her yards and know exactly where that deer was. That's a great idea. I like that a lot. So let's move the time forward. On that scenario you mentioned, you'd be focusing on the food plots in the early season.

With this, you know, forty acres, two plots, two thickets, one ridge. Once we get a little later in the year, when when would your trail camera placement shift if at all as you get later into the year. Yeah, if I noticed the browse pressure decreasing, I'm I'm always gonna have a utilization cage and all my plots for multiple reasons.

But one is during hunting season. You know it's foot tall inside your basket and eight inches tall outside, and now all of a sudden, there's only two inches difference. I know that the deer have left to go chase a corns or local agg field or something, and I need to be hunting somewhere else. And so you know our white oaks hit the ground. Guys at my house or you know, neighbor's house swears big white oak out the yard, and it's just raining. And that's five minutes

from where my hunt. I need to be chasing those white oaks. And I'm gonna go to the ridge top. Now, deer're gonna eat on the side ridges and the bottoms, but my chances of my wind staying in a constant direction is way higher on the ridge top. So I'm gonna just get on that ridge top. Bucks love the cruise that ridge top because it's easier, less calories to the cruise during the pre rutt and rut and find me some great, big old white oaks that are cruising

up there. You know this this is anything but scientific, But through the years I've seemed to notice, you know, it's it's like almost every property un list was clearer cut twenty years ago or something that could be that great, big old treat. It's twice as big as the other trees made. There's a fence halfway going through it or whatever. They couldn't cut it, and it's almost I Dear use those giant trees as road markers. Oh, we turned right

up here at the big tree. Yeah. I know it sounds so, you know, kind of quacky, but so many times when I you know, buddy ay Man, I know you're passing through once you come home on one afternoon and he doesn't have me to dance. How go you

got this race? Go down this ridge and hunt. I don't have you in tweet what I'm doing my default and net scenarios find the biggest tree on the ridge, because I believe, Dear use that as a road mark m I feel like, anecdotally, I've seen the same kind of thing too, and it fits into Dove's tails perfectly. To my next question, and maybe your answer will apply

to this too. But another situation similar to what you described that a lot of people dread is the band in her acorn year, like the year, and let's say they're in like a big timber area like you hunt, you know down there in southern Missouri, where there's acorns everywhere. How how do you narrow things down and approach your hunt when they can eat every darn place they turn? Okay, so we gotta think this, dude, there's acorns everywhere. That's

not a limiting factor. Um. You may know in the pass as certain trees for whatever reason, your preferred the acorns there first over other trees. But what else is there? So if acorns aren't working for me because they're everywhere, is there a redline? Is there a pinch point going in those acorns? Acorns are really dry. If you're eating a lot of acorns are going to water. That's a given. Acorns have low moisture content compared to lush plover soybeans

or something, so they're if they're really on acorns. People get all goofy about acorns, but what else they have to have? Every day? We'll have to have water. I still got you, Mark, yep, I still got you. Sorry. So water can be a big thing when deer heavy on acorns and water unless you got a you know, a lake or a big creek or something's gonna usually be a more limited factor. And by the way, again, you know, don't have data to prove this, but I've

seen it a lot. Do you prefer drinking out of a little pond, you know, a cow track something small that a big rushing river And if you think about when they're by that big rushing river, they don't have near as good predator fence that's making noise kind of reduces their hearing potential, and you know, and the a preador could trap them against the waterline, make them get in the water. So I love a little ten or

twenty ft pond h for deer hunting. Does your does your take on the big acorn near it all change from time of year? So does water really play into it earlier in the year but not so much during the run? Or is like that kind of thing the same, You're gonna run the same pro Graham in the heavy acorn years. No matter what which is find the limiting factor in this case maybe water or that pinch point and play that one. Yeah, pinch points are always awesome.

But water, of course, they're in your season. You would expect it's hotter, and deer don't have sweatguns, sweat glands, excuse me. They pant to get rid of water like a dog. So you're eating something really dry. It's hot

and dry outside. Water just becomes even more valuable at that early season, and then a little later during the pre rut, where the bucks aren't necessarily on a feeding pattern, they're eating that they're you know, the first five percent of dose are receptives, so they're bouncing around trying to get that limited date. Uh again, they're moving like they have to have water. They're like an athlete, they have to have water. Uh So, water I think is especially

in areas where waters are more limited. I mean water in South Florida is not a limiting factor. Don't try to hunt water. You probably get bit by a gator and be it's just everywhere you know, you just you're not there's no pitch point there. But if you're in ridge and valley type stuff, there's not a creek and never valley up. A little pond on a ridge stop can be a great place to hunt during those times.

The early early season, it's hot if it's hot and dry, and during the pre rut win deer just running a lot, covering a lot more yards per day and needs some watery Speaking of it being hot, then let's let's consider a new scenario that's the opposite of that. So let's say it's October, mid October and the first big cold

front of the year hits. It's dropping i don't know, twenty five degrees cooler than it was on the previous days high and you have some weird scheduling things of going on, and you are only available to hunt the next morning after the cold front hits, or that evening. So you get you can hunt the next day after the cold front. It's either the morning or the evening. You can only pick one. Which of those sits would

you choose to hunt? Why is that? And then you know, paint for me your perfect spot for that kind of hunt on that kind of day. I'm gonna throw in just a couple more variables. It's almost always easier for hunters to move into position in the afternoon when we would think dear or bedded up. Yeah, I love morning hunting. But unless you've got that special stand and when I call it backdoorsdy and you dear out in the beanfield and you're coming in totally opposite direction and it wins

right and you just let them come to you. Afternoon hunts are easier for hunters to get in position. So I'm gonna weigh that in and if everything's equal, I'm going with the afternoon hunt. Um. I love hunting the day after the front goes through. And if that front past midday night and hunt in the afternoon, that would be awesome. But weighing those odds of the first one, I might fudge a little bit towards the afternoon hunt. By the way, I like about a ten percent or

more greater temperature change. A lot of people get hung up on the actual degrees, but ten degrees between seventy and eighty and ten degrees between twenty and thirty there's a whole big difference there. So I'm looking for a percent change, and and I really like days that are ten percent or more change. That's favorable. So if it's warm in the fall and it's cooler tempercent cooler, I really like that. If it's been wicked code and the first day it warms up ten percent deer you're gonna

be everywhere, They're gonna be feed. So I look at as percent change versus an actual number, and I liked right after the front is past, if I can approach hunt next without alerting deer, Okay, I love it. So that first evening then is your chance. You've got the nice temperature drop. Can you paint for me a picture of what that location would be, Let's say, on on

your home farm. Can you imagine what you're you know, all of the things being equal with no obviously we have no m R. But if you could imagine a perfect situation for October fifteenth, you're waiting for the afternoon hunt. What kind of spot would be perfect for that day in your mind? Yeah, if we have a wide oak crop, they're going to white oaks here in most places, and we we have white oaks, but we have probably eight decent red oaks or a white oaks or kind of

pinch points, if you will. And so I'm probably gonna be in wide oaks, big mature white oaks, and I'm gonna be on a ridge top, not the deer again or eating on slopes. But my wind is gonna the wind direction is gonna stay much more consistent on the ridge topic. And I kind of explained that if you're a trout fisherman ever fishing good trout stream, there's eddies everywhere because it's hitting the rock or cutting a buy

ank or whatever. And then if you go to the big metro area and they got these concrete ditches for flood control, there's no eddies out there because the water is not hitting anything. And so that's so true for air movement. So I love hunting Western Kansas. I look like a really good hunter in Western Kansas because the wind comes off the rockies today, it did yesterday, did a hundred years ago. I'm just gonna do it the

next hundred years. So the wind direction is pretty dog on consistent unless there's a big front or storm going on and it comes off those rockies and just sweeps across that flat prairie out there. And so you know the wind direction and everything's in section line, so you can almost always get east of it. Wind's gonna be out to west something west and and get to your stand. And the same thing is true if you're if you own the property or if your Grandma's properly or whatever.

And you've done some habitat work, and you have done t sized timber standard provemtter. You know, you took out a bunch of lower quality trees and left the best. There's fewer eddies out there, there's more room for the wind to build up speed going tree to tree. When you're hunting in closed cannot be thick forest. There's gonna be eddies everywhere, and it's really tough not to get busted.

So I've been there. Um. Would your answer to that question on choosing the morning or the evening my original question, would that change if I fast forwarded the date from October up to November or would you still pick that evening? No, you know, in November I probably have to skip work, get in trouble and hunt. Both times. You gotta be out there. But I love mornings in November. I'm a morning person. I'm a morning hunter. But that time year, I feel we can get away with more entering our

stand because the bucks are not on a pattern. They're they're looking for a date and they're not on a pattern, or rarely are they on a pattern, and so you I'll risk more getting closer to betting areas or whatever. Take a more direct route, because the buck is liable to comfort about anywhere unless you got a really great pinch point. You know, it just narrows down, the river, narrows you down, whatever. And I'm gonna be hunting mornings that time of year, and it means if I can,

but if only one in the morning. Yeah, I like your idea, just paying the in the consequence of skipping work and making it happen. I got another one here. That's that's a little bit of a downer, another downer here for you. But let's say you hunted your evening of October and let's say it worked out great. You picked that perfect spot and the buck comes in and you get a shot at the deer. In your mind's

eye when you think back on this shot. Now, let's say you're not filming, so you can't actually look at the film, but in your mind you're thinking, man, I think I think it hit lungs, maybe like back of the lungs. And you decide to get on the blood trail within an hour hour and a half something like that, and the trail isn't as good as you're hoping for. It's kind of spotty and it takes you, you know, past two hundred yards. You're still on blood, but it's spotty,

and you have not found him. Now after about two fifty yards, it's been you know, two hours probably now since the shot. What would you do in that specific scenario? You think it's back of lungs, two hundred plus yard kind of spotty blood trail. Do you keep pushing a deer like that? Do you stop? Uh? And let's say this was an evening hunt, right, so it's after dark. Now, how would you handle this specific tracking scenario? Yeah, and unless there is a big rainfront moving in, I'm backing

out October fifteen. Most of the white tail's range. It's cool enough meat and take an awful lot without spoiling way more than I think most hunters realize. And I'm just backing out. I might have been tempted to back out a hundred yards. Now, I'm gonna try if I recover the raw to really studies smell, touch, how sticky as the blood, of course, what color it is. I'm trying to gain as much intail from the arrow and the spore on the ground as I can before I

ever get ting her yards down the trail. But if I'm tuner yards and the blood trail is not changing, it's just drip, drip, drip, I'm backing out for sure. Yeah, and back out all the way till the next morning, Is that right? Yeah? I'll be there sunrise about it next morning, not at in time. But the odds are really great. The deer has either passed or it's gonna survive, or it's gonna survive for five or six days until

the infection. Stepson, Well, I hope, I hope in that scenario when you wait the next morning, he's right there and you've got him. But we're gonna we're gonna pretend like you didn't, and we're gonna pretend that it is now the third week of October and you're hunting again. And here's a scenario that I've actually been in myself. This is this is pulled right out of my own history, and it's one I've had different. You know, I think a lot of us have had something similar to this. Um,

you're hunting this buck. You've gotten daylight trail camera pictures of him, a handful of evenings in daylight in a small heidy hoole food plot. You have hunted that spot two times in the month of October so far. So over the last twenty one days, you've one in twice after him. It's like you get a daylight picture, maybe in your cell camera, and you think, all right, I got the same conditions that go back in the next

night he's a no show. And then it happens again, like a week later, you get the daylight picture of my food. You try to hunt him there again. The next night, he's a no show. Each time you've done it, the same thing has happened. What do you do in that scenario if you're trying to get that buckets now the third week in October, you've had this thing happened a couple of times, what if anything would you do to try to fine tune moving in towards the you know,

pre rut into the rut. Yeah, probably gonna go back to an early conversation and reposition a few cameras in the area and not in true too much, but try to pick up some more intail and I would really consider my approach. Is this buck really that random? And it may be because my joke cameras will getting picture once a week, and no, those are the toughest bucks to hunt, or or am I lerning this dear somehow

getting there? And often we think, well, the truck camera picture shows him coming from pick a direction to west, He's better way down, not holler somewhere. But many, many times deer have a very secuitous or curby route getting to where they're going to feed or wherever they're going. And heck he maybe you know, he may be walking thirty yards from where I'm parking my vehicle or walking

in or whatever. And so I never count on until unless I really know my habitat, and I've maintained my habitat, I've done long improvements, and I'm kind of planning how dear are going to travel. We really never know how dear are getting there based on a still picture. I would add this though, Um, I have no problem hunting the same stand for many days in a row, if I'm very convinced I have not lerned, dear. If you're

not learning, dear, it doesn't matter. You know, people always ask me, hey, can you have to stand more than one one day? Can you hunt a two days? You know, in a hundred days. If you're not learning deer. May not be a good choice to hunt it that many days, but it's all about learning deer. Like I have a buddy here lives close by me and good mountain hunter.

He missed, you know, the buck of a lifetime here in Nilo's arts with the bow at twenty yards of a big oak tree and bucker Darrow hit the ground and you know, ran off. He just said, calls me up. Just just sit I said, Man, that deer just hurts some noise. I can go back. If the winds are saying tomorrow, I'd go back there, no problem. If he did not look at you, see you act like he smelled you. He just hurts some noise, and he probably

does not associate that with human danger. You know, a similar kind of offshoot of that we talked earlier about how how we both prefer you know, wield access or exit. What about that kind of situation like hunting the same place and every night to get out of you get picked up. Do you feel like it eventually has some kind of a cruel of negativity where you know, you hunt that stand six times in November throughout October and

you get picked up every night. Is eventually that going to start to kind of wear on things or you you feel like that's pretty bulletproof and you can get away with that over and over as long as the other things you mentioned are true. Yeah, as the other factors come into play, I don't worry about I think about golf courses or going down you know, any city highway. St. Louis, wherever, Atlanta. Uh, they're really conditioning those things as long as they don't

associate them with danger. Right. There's some great research where, uh, everyone sees people hunting over feeder in South Texas and you know, twenty bucks file in seventeen thousand doos it seems like or whatever, and you know day after day, Well, that's limited hunting pressure on those big ranches. If you go to the deep South where hunting is you know,

like going to school, you just do it every day. Um, those feeders get so much pressure do you become extremely nocturnal feeders and you'd be much better to hunt some rails. So it's got a little You need to take all

these I guess in context a little bit. And my big thing is that try to not alert deer because I think we'd all rather hunt a golf course deer than the middle of the public land there where the deer just got stand there and looking at you, and so I like to and golf courses at man, they got herbicide and fungicide and secticide and mowing and people and golf carts. Old lady who laying in the bush is looking for a golf ball, and the deer don't care.

They stand around right because there's no perceived danger. Or my favorite one is I used to have quite their work for DLD Department of Defense, you know that's been about timson or budget on environment or wildlife whatever. And and many times I've seen you know, a hundred and fifty of America's best in their practiced with automatic weapons and twenty deer feeding on the down wind side. And there's two major lessons there. The deer totally conditioned to it.

Of course our best. They're not shooting at them because they'd probably you know, have to go to the brig or something like that. And they're always gonna be in a predom it down the inside. Because gunpowder is a hypercent nitrogen. That's probably the most fertilized place on the base where all those gunshots should going. Verst blowing that gun smoke, and they will be our our trap ranges or anything else. You'll see a ton of deer on

the big shooting ranges, usually because it's super fertilized with nitrogen. Interesting, very interesting. I want to take one step back to the the original question that that food plot where you're getting the daylight pictures, but then every time you go in there the next day, he's not there, even though he was daylight the day before, and you mentioned, you know, you should do a little bit of oh, I don't know, kind of assess your access and think about, you know,

am I blowing him out? Am I learning him some way? I've sometimes thought about that and and just not known, and I've been mad. I don't know. I don't know if I am. I don't think I am. But I've sometimes thought, I'm just gonna throw a curveball. I'm just gonna take a completely different route than I ever have, and it may be way longer, way more pain in the butt. Maybe it will hurt me in other ways.

But I have sometimes thought, like, hey, just try something completely different than you always do because something's not quite working in that way. UM, do you ever consider that, do you ever do something like that. I do, but I will admit it's usually out of frustration and often not the best choice. I mean, if you've got a planned route, you're pretty confident it's not learning dear, your

your buddies dropping you off. You're walking down the road or whatever, versus going through the bushes and brush and making a lot of noise and leaving a lot of scent on stuff you're wiping on getting there. Probably not the best I'm not saying it hasn't worked for people, but probably not the best idea. I would probably be more likely to if I had an extra stand. I need to pull that stand just moving if I if I have truck in or pictures in. The buck again

always comes in from the west. I'm gonna move down in the in the timber fifty yards and see if the staging out there out of view of me. Yeah, yeah, that makes a lot of sense, uh, speaking of bucks out of are kind of out of range, but maybe in view. I've got another scenario here that speaks to her that, you know, I think we can speak to what to do in a situation where there's that buck that's out of range. Let's say, continuing down the calendar.

Late October, We're sitting in a tree stand somewhere and we see a mature buck that you're interested in shooting. But he's about a hundred yards away, and he is on a path that if he were to continue about another one hundred yards, he'll eventually pass through your wind. So, in this scenario, late October, hundred yard away shooter buck, but heading towards your wind eventually, what's your go to move?

Are you gonna aggressively call? Are you gonna not call at all because you're worried he'll eventually circle down wind? What's your take? How do you handle that? Yeah, that's a great question mark, And and one of the most important things about calling or running is considering to win and the buck's likely path. I think that's more important than the actual call you're using. Um So, if he's a hundred yards from hitting my wind, I'm probably gonna

grunt because I'm gonna gamble. He's gonna turn. He's not coming straight to me, but he's gonna turn and get shooting range before he cuts my wind. If he's third yards from hit my win, his arc is probably gonna take him into my win and I'm just I'm not gonna add I'm not gonna let him pinpoint me by calling, and I'm just gonna let him hit my win and and wish he had. Yeah. So I I used to

grunt call launch, one of my favorite tools. I don't blind grunt much because unless I'm just in a stand, are you on my backs to a river or highway or something, They're just not getting behind me, very likely blind calling. I had a really good friend, Selver, really good friend Mickey Helixon, did a bunch of work with jeep or radio collars and rattling on a large ranch in Texas, really high dollar research when we were both were in grad school many years ago. And I don't

remember his acting numbers, just like thirty years ago. But I think as many bucks circle around him, he they would have observers up in these thirty ft tall stands, and he'd be on the ground rattling, and he only saw like remember bucks, because the rest come in from behind him and winning him. So but the bucks he saw where bucks he had to see out in front of him with a positive win and rattled, and they

did come in and he saw them. So I'm a little selective when I use my grunt, but I have no problem throwing it out there as long as I think the bucks natural path is going to get to me before at least in shot range, before he cuts my wind? Is there? And I know it's just you probably don't have a hard line, But is there any kind of if you had to put a number on it about what distance is that that that buck needs to be away from hitting your wind where you'll feel comfortable.

You mentioned that thirty yards will be too close, but is there a maximum? Like? Is it sixty? Is it? Is it? What would that never be? No? I think it kind of depends on the lay of land. You can kind of look up there in envision. Wear's a buck most likely to travel? You know? Is there a bunch of rocks or a fence or something that's gonna turn him towards you a little sooner? I think that's

a side by side. I will tell you one time, Uh, I was hunting on a property where we really needed to remove a lot of females and a female six month old deer come in and you know, Landard just said, hey, Grant, and you're shooting buck you want? But I really need

to shooting. Never know, you can in the States really liberal seasons, and still sure enough, you know, thirty four minutes for a dark, this young of the year female comes in, gets about seven yards away, and I said, well that's what the you know, my my host told me to do. So I launched a narrow and it it dies seven yards behind me. They're like, okay, one one tag down, think about and it's just, you know, it's prime. Now we're twenty minutes from dark and food

pot behind me, acorns in front of me. I'm it's it's a good setup, sitting there, setting there and fair enough. I look over in a a very mature DearS easing up to ridge. He's down there by eight yards and he's kind of coming a direction that's gonna bring him behind me to that faun and stood in my shooting lane, and I'm going, oh my goodness, this is horrible. I mean,

it's you know, it's a four day hunt. Here comes a nice buck, but it looks like he's gonna miss my shooting lane and over that fun and that's exactly what happens. And it's important, member, dear, do not associate dead animals land around like we might associate find a dead person in the woods while we're hunting or something at all. So he walks up and this is way preru reil, early season. I can't get a shot to

the back of the tree brush. I didn't trim me limbs out the back, and he's smelling the fawn and you know, doing the normal buck thing like oh my gosh, this is just you know, so close but so far away and um. Then he walked over and smelled my arrow, which he wasn't expecting, and that kind of alert him a little bit, and he kind of just started cut and half circle, and when the half circle hit my range,

I poked one through the boiler room. So in that case, in that particular case, being patient work, but I didn't grunt because I thought the grunt was out of season. It's early season, and the smell of that female on the ground was too much of a combination and it

just worked out right. And and by the way, I'd like to share here that about twenty of the mature bucks I've tagged since I've been on enough to keep records have been tagged out of that same standard blind that I had already harvested a dough that hunt, not a week before, not the day before that same hunt, like an hour before or thirty minutes before. And I've never had a big buck come in and bust out there because there was a dead dough laying on the ground.

I just hope if I'm firing hunting, I double shoulder shoot and try to drop him right there. It within range. I don't want him running over the hill. And in my mind, that is the best attractant I've ever used, was a dough harvested during that same hunt. Do you ever get him? I guess, I mean, I guess that example you just shared. Have you ever had other situations where the buck smells that dough and comes right into arrange to that spot and stops me? Oh? Many times

we have many episodes showing down. Yeah, I mean every it seems like every year here, one of me or one of my guests, whatever has that scenario right here on the proving grounds every year. Because we try to harvest a lot of dos and my neighbors try to harvest a lot of bucks, you kind of find that

balanced in there. And uh, I mean it's happened that my daughters and Daniel and myself multiple times and these are you tend to be often pretty mature bucks, and they're walked right in there, especially during the rut Missouri's farm seasons during the rut, and they're poked her antlers inner and try to get her stand up. They do not associate death like we do. I find it dead human out there in the you know, in the timber. I'm freaking out and you know, calling the cops or something.

But beer just do not have that response up it all. Yeah, yeah, it's a good reminder. What about this one? This is this is kind of a different iteration of that shot example I mentioned earlier. You know, I talked about you get the shot that's not necessarily as great a hit as you wanted. YadA, YadA, YadA. What about a situation? Will say, it's early November, it's a morning hunt. You get a shot of deer and you just miss completely.

You blank on this buck. The buck runs off. What do you do in the hours following that, Let's say the misses like nine am. What do you do from nine am through the rest of that day. Do you just keep on hunting or do you back out and go home and shoot? Do you do anything to check what's going on? What would you be thinking about or considering or doing after a misslike that on the I am early November. Yeah, so I think most of us, if we're honest with ourselves, we know we shut our

eyes or punched the trigger. You know, we did something and then they heated a battle. It's a little tougher to uh sort that out. But if I whipped the shot I missed, I'm the blame, not the bow, not decide I missed. I'm right there in the tree, and I do a lot talking to myself about my confidence because my confidence is the the most the worst part of my shooting skill at that time. If if I turned around to the cameraman or just think myself, Manna,

the pin was solid, it was just setting there. How did I miss that thing? Then I'm probably getting down it and probably what I would do. I didn't have a squirrel. I'm a hillbilly, so I didn't have a squirrel al like Wuever. I don't know if you know a squirrel areas something. It's dumb or something, But it's gonna be tuned. I take tuning very serious, and it's gonna fly like my broad heads and I'm gonna back out.

Are she right from the tree there? You know, I'm gonna find a rotten stump or something and I'm gonna whip it. And if I hit, then I go, well, I did just miss. And if I also miss a foot or two or ten ft or whatever it was, and I'm going home and tune them. What about that self talking you mentioned, like, if your confidence is shot, you're gonna kind of talk to yourself, like what goes on in the head of grant Woods after a whiff? How do you psych yourself up? How do you shake

yourself out of it? What does that look like? Mark? I'm sixty one and I've had two kidney transplants. I'm in great health, as you know. Uh, but I'm too old and had laid during the bed too many times waiting for it to go beep them next time to make excuses in my life anymore so for me personally, I'm gonna own my heirs. That's just something I lived by and so I'm gonna admit but and usually I whipped it. Here as a bow hunter, here's my thing. I I have pretty good warm after all these years,

and you know, I shoot decent them. I can make it happen. When I air, I shut my eyes target panting. After all these years, it didn't matter if I'm shooting at a target or a deer or a hog or whatever. When I missed, it's like nine, it's never the bow's fault, almost because I have my bow to and I'm I'm gonna know my equipment. I shut my eyes, and it's amazing how far that pen can move between when you you tell your brain release and when you actually release

if you shut your eyes. So for me, just personally me again, I'm gonna with the squirrel area arrow and I'm gonna tell myself, you keep your eyes open. If you know some people tape on their bow, pick a spot or some of those saying like that. Mine is keep your eyes open. And if I keep my eyes open, it's it's probably gonna work out just fine. I mean, you always, you know, you can drop your bow, booging up your sides. But if I dropped my bow, heaven

forbid going into a stand. I'm gonna shoot with my phone light or something. For I ever get up mass stand. I'm not gonna set there and worry on morning, because I'm not gonna be a good hunter. Yeah. Yeah, I've been through those situations myself too, and uh and yeah it's no fun, but she's gotta push through it and own it and get better. Right. I think for all of us this is maybe a little off target here, and no pun intended that if we own our mistakes,

life just goes a lot easier. So true. One of the most important things I feel like my dad ever taught me was just accept responsibility for stuff. There's no better way to deal with something than accept it, take responsibility, and do something about them. Let's take I'm gonna I'm on your dime here, but I'm gonna take this one step further, please do uh. I have a counselor, not a counselor, but a wise person that teaches me a lot, and his statement is your lack of responsibility becomes someone

else's responsibility. And I think when it's framed like that, at least to me, I'm I'm gonna be better accepting my own responsibility. Yeah, out of out of almost the guilt of forcing that obligation on someone else. Yeah. Yeah, you know, take a simple thing, Okay, I my wife's been take care of her dad, and I leave a mess in a scenk and she's had a long day and she comes home, she's got clean it up. That's the way off subject. But you know, hecky, I'll take

five minutes clean it up. Take care of your own responsibility. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we'd be We've all been in a much better place, I think if we could always live that way. Right. It's one of those sometimes easier saidly done things. But man, absolutely a lot of truth to that. Okay, I got a few more of these for you, Grant, and then

I'll let you let you off the hook. Let's talk through one thing that happens every I don't know, three or four or five years, it seems across the country, and people always bemoan it, which is we get to, you know, the peak of the when it's spoke us to be the best part of the hunting season, you know, that first week or two in November. Let's say, for this scenario, will say November seven, right, And a lot of people like to say that's maybe the best day

of the year. Sure, I've heard of luck. Yeah, but here's the catch. Conditions are poor. We've got the hot, muggy, nasty November that when people get it, they're just so bummed because they sunk their week of vacation time into it. Let's say November seven through the twelfth and thirteen is going to be in the you know, whatever it is for your area. Let's say it's gonna be the sixties

or seventies, which is too hot. Will you dramatically change the way you hunt that week out of the usual because of the temperatures, or you can hunt your usual primo red spots despite it. No, I probably will. And

it's not that the deer aren't moving. You know. I was involved in a research project many years ago, university stuff, and several of US researchers around America put together about fourteen thousand fetal date So humans go to the doctor and they take an ultrasound and mas your crown to rump of a fetus and tell you your baby's gonna be born. Ex you can also back date to the point of conception. And so for deer, we we really know where they breed in most areas. Some states don't

take very specific data. But that's not a mystery. You don't have to print a new calendar every year. We know what's going on and so you're gonna know the peak or to rain angel whatever. But if it's just really hot and you know, deer got fat on and they're you know, they're in really good shape. No one likes running a sprint when there's you know, got a big down code on. So they're probably gonna move a little bit more at night, but they're still moving. It's

the prom You're going to the prom um. But I'm gonna hunt areas where because it's warm and muggy, my sense is gonna be really tough to control. And maybe on code days, I got some areas where the thermals are sinking down and I can slide in there in the colde morning, do good. I'm gonna avoid those areas. My number one thing year round or what during hunting season is not to alert deer because there's alway almost always another day, right unless it's the last day of season,

there's another day. But if you're alerted deer and book rug this pattern for a week or two, it's really tough, honey. So I'm going to hunt that that week that time. I'm in the Midwest also, so you know, Halloween to November, I'm gonna be out there somewhere and and in the conditions are rough, I'm still gonna be out there, but I'm gonna be really picky about where I put my

stand so dere can get within range. M Are there any other types of areas that you would think would be more attractive at that time of you're like, I mean some people would say hunting more towards water on those hotter right days, anything like that. Yeah, I think there's there's goodie that. I mean. I like to put all the odds in my favor. So water in a bottleneck that's just uh down with in of a bedding area, So a bucks cruising through there looking for a receptive

dough and you can get a drink loaned away. Uh you know, I'm gonna put two or three things together, not just one thing. Yeah. Yeah, I don't remember who said this, but I remember hearing from someone once where they said that they will never sit a stand or a tree or blind or anything unless there's three really really good reasons to be there. There's got to be at least three travel corridors or three you know, motivations for a deer to be in that exact spot. And

that's always helped me really fine tune things. It shouldn't be just like oh there's one trail. It's gotta be this and this and this all lined up right, you know. And so there's there's so many more factors, like, you know, you're in southern Ireland, there's food everywhere early season. Food may not be the big play, right and you're in the smoky mountains and there's not much food anywhere. Food is a huge play on the exact same day, same conditions.

So we really need to do some consideration of multiple factors when we oft how we're gonna hunt, the techniques we're gonna use that day. Yeah, yeah, so true. I want to ask you about something that once caused you to get hate mail from what I hear. Um. Let's say you're out, it's later in the year. Now it's gun season, which in Missouri, what that opens somewhere in mid mid November, right November to Thanksgiving. Yeah, yeah, so

it's guns season and you're hunting a spot. It's kind of you can see down to a brushy kind of opening, and your big shooter buck you've been after, steps out in that brush stuff and it's a mixture of grass and some you know, some woody, browsy kind of stuff. That buck is within the shooting range. He stopped, he's broadside, but his vitals are covered with some of that grass and brush. You can see through it. You can even see his shoulder, but there is stuff in and around it.

And you would have to punch through some of that grass, some of that rush with your fire room. Would you take that shot? And why or why not? Yeah? So I did have that ZAC scenario, as you know, and I did not, and man I got loaded up with hay mill hold. I didn't know. There is that many ways to call a biologist to it, but the TASTI um. But here's the thing. We used to teach some deer hunting schools and we would take and this isn't exactly

like grass, it's pretty dog on clothes. We would take eighth inch doll rods, so real flimsy doll rods, a little wooden rods, and drill holes in the tubah fours and just dack these little doll rods in there. So a thirty caliber bullet just couldn't get you. Either hit it in the middle because I'm not that great a shot, or hit it on the edge. You were not passing a bullet through two ft of these doll rods without hitting one. You may barely wing it, you may center

punch it. And we put it out there to hundred yards, and then we put a you know, great big old targets paper moving paper actually at one meter and three meters or one yard and three yards behind it, and at one yard behind it. We used to hit the paper, but not where we're raiming. You hit the deer in the bud or the nose or something like that. Go above and boat blowing at three meters. We usually didn't cut paper. That bullet was turning sideways so fast wore

three O thirty six. So a lot of that hate mail had to do with I was choosing the three O eight and I you know, a lot of words with a few uh agities. Not included was you're not shooting a bow, shoot through the grass. You're not shooting a bb guns shoot through the grass. You know, if you're if the three O eight won't do it, take you a three d wind mag And I will say, only way a hundred senty pounds. I'm not shooting a three hunder wind maag in a white tilt here um.

But the bottom line is bullets or you know, picking number. They're moving two or three thousand feet a second, depending on how you're loaded, what you're shooting, and you think about anything moving that fast. It doesn't have to hit hardly anything to change its course. And the bullet is a long cylindril shape. So if it just gets just ever so slightly out of straight straight towards the target,

all of a sudden, it's it's creating an eddy. It gets a lot of wind on one side, the direction is going, and it's creating an eddy on the off side. Like if you have a canoe, if you're fisherman or kayak or whatever, and you want to cross a pretty fast stream, just go straight across it. You put your canoe or kayaking there at forty five degrees. You don't have to paddle. It is just shoots you straight across because it's pushing on one side and making the eddy

on the other, and it just takes you straight across. Well, that's exactly what happens with a bullet quickly, within inches. So I passed that deer. I ended up harvesting him last year years later with a bow, which was much more thrilling because he was so odious and a smaller rack. But gosh, I have chased that deer for many, many years, and for me and just the responsibility I personally accept as a hunter, I'm not gonna risk wounding the deer

versus harvesting the deer. So I did give that deer pass, and I hope I would do the same thing again, um with no matter what caliber I'm shooting. And and I just realized through personal experience and through talking with the engineers at various AMMO plants, that bullets deflect easily. There's not really a brush gun. So I'm like, well, I got dad, he's oh forty five seventy here. I just shoot through whatever you know I shoot. I hear

stort a time. I got this email a bunch. Well, I've shot through a bunch of three inch saplings and killed deer. Man, you can't keep from hitting a three inch sapling. You better go to rain some more. But anyway, for me, in my level of respect for the creators what I want to do in life, I'm not gonna take that shot. Yeah. I think very often the best shot taken is is none. And uh, respect to you a lot for doing that. It's always one of those

things that's easier said than done. And in that moment when something you want so badly is right there, it's it's really hard to have that self control. But but you're right, you can't you can't ever get a bullet back and you don't want to go south. So yeah, and when I was young, and I took some a few shots and didn't recover, dear, So I've learned that lesson. I'm not I am not perfect. And you know, when I was young, I was like every other hill Bill

and yours arts. I had my lever action thirty thirty, thinking we were gonna do a man drive on National Force when there was no brakes, no openings, no nothing. You know, that's just how we hunted it. So I've had the advantage to learn him some of those lessons through time and and and the victory the you know, the glory of the victory to me is not equal to the pain of defeat. So I just don't want to wound an animal if I can avoid it, if

I can put the odds of my favor to avoid it. Yeah, so true, all right, Uh, this one's not really a hypothetical scenario. But I gotta ask you about it anyways, because it's so intriguing to me. Um, I've heard you talk about hunting like a bobcat. Could you could you explain to me what what you mean by that? What does it mean to hunt like a bobcat? How do you do that? And like what's the situation when you would actually take that approach? Love hunting like a bobcat.

So bobcats, you know, they may have a DN. They don't go to same den every day, or usually don't. They got two or three places, been on wind direction or coyote scenario, whatever, but they you get them on your choking. If you're in bobcat country, you get pictures of bobcast just walking logging roads all time. They're just they're just moving down the road and never they get

in their hunting areas. Not one area they bobcats. Based on GPS scholars, when I tend to hunt here today and there tomorrow during Mar's like, they know, while I've been through there, I I swooped the game. I need to hunt a different area next day. And I'm not saying that's what they do, but that's what the data seems to show. And so they're just cruising until they get to their hunting place and then when they're hunting up most hunters have seen this in a standard blind man.

It's it's not take ten steps in the next and stop, it's step stop, step stop, set down, look, stop stop. They spend more time still than they do moving. So we call this and we call it spot and stock. But bobcat hunting is actually stalking trying to spot. We're stalking trying to spot, and with the boat, it's a real thrill when you get when you walk up within thirty yards of a bed of deer feeding deer. My goodness, you just had about a hundred fifty inches to that rat.

Because there's gonna be an awesome experience. I mean that that hundred inch deear it comes at two fifty every day of a month um and and I love doing this in habitat. That's quite enough to let you do it.

I mean, you know, a bone dry day in October with six inches of oakley as you're not gonna do it very well with the boat, but get some moisture or down south, you know they thin about every fifth rold pines very commonly, and I love getting on the end of that pine stand where you know, where the winds in my face and just creeping up and barely peeking around the corner and you know, maybe see a deer too, fall are dear, you don't want to harvest, and you slide through there and go to the next

row and you finally find a deer you want the harvest. Then you back up one row and you know, cut that distance and then just barely quietly stock within range. That's just a thrilling for me. Way to hunt, just thrilling. You're not sitting to you're not looking at your phone, you're kind of you know, your predator mode every second. And and years ago, many years ago, I was something with a buddy on public land and western Kansas, one of the first years they allowed non resident hunters a

hunt out there. And we were just setting in a big old public area of native grass. It was too tall for me to see over it. Setting down. I remember sclearly, and I'm kind of a tall guy, and I stood out like a sore thumb if I stood up, So I was crouching all morning. It's very uncomfortable crouch and looking crouching looking and about nine thirty or so there was some bagg fields down the bottom and this public land on top. And we saw this to me

really good leaving point bud just giant shoulders. End up playing about three hundre pounds come up in this c r P and um bed down and in CRP in one night there is a tree or a landmark. He just beds down about six dred yards away. We're looking across the valley we were hunting for this purpose, sitting on one side looking into the other side. They were like, oh my gosh, it really happened. And so we're all

exided and and we can't go straight to him. So we drive around a section line, get the wind right, and you can't see anything, and the bedded buck and you know, five ft tall Swiss grass, you can't see anythings. So we're crawling and peeking over and looking, and about eighty yards out my buddy sees something not moving and it ended up being a time to this buck, and we crawl on up there and we get up there. It's just such a cool hunt. Get about I don't know,

fifty yards away. I happened to be hunting with a recurve at a time, and uh, spot a cock feasant between us and the buck. We're afraid to flush that peasants. We just lay there until he feeds on through. My buddy stays back and I'm you know, elbows and knees, barely pushing and pushing my bow in front of me. And he's laying and this is so typical for big bucks. Right below an old terrace, so she's to be nagg

Field years ago and highly erosion prone soils. There's a big terrace and he's laying night blow it and I get to the top side and this, this is a large deer, and I'm just like, for three minutes, I'm just an awe. I've never been that close to a wild, free ranging big buck. I'm just I'm sure my buddy's thinking, why is wrong the woods? Why is this shop? And and finally I realized I was under with a sixty inch black widow recurve. And when I'm laying on the ground,

I can't pull the thing back right. I mean, it's just too much grass and away and stuff. So he's awake. He's kind of like they do head up too, and this could and he's got this hell to his back and he's just moving his head about thirty degrees watching the front. And finally I just said, okay, when he gets to the farthest one side, start swinging back on my stand up and shooting one motion. Of course, with a recurve. I'm an instinctive shooter. He just pull it

back and launch right. And so that's what I did, and I pegged this big old buck and it was such a super high stimulation hunt that that's when I started trying to hunt like a Bobcap. And again, you know, if I don't think it's any deer in the area, I'm getting to where some deer in the area, and I'm slowing the way down, and I do more looking than I do walking, and not if the wind changes, I changed my direction. I got my little puffer bottle

or whatever, going leaves whatever. I just keep the wind in my face and maybe a big acorn flat and I think, well, I think deer passed through here about eight thirty nine and morning being acorns and I cam feder Roe Street or going through. I love hunting like a Bobcap. And even with the bow folks being shipped thirty yards and I would say the number one thing is wind direction. The number two things patients, all my buddies want to go too fast. Well, Grant, I don't

see any deer and hunter yards ahead of us. Let's just walk the next on the yards. Are you making so much noise? I mean I'm going step of time and I actually see as many deer to my side as I do in front of me. Or just come into yoursel. You just get a tree, betune you and then let them walk by. M Yeah, I can see the appeal. I've I've gotten more and more willing to try things on the ground like that, and it continues to prove to be a lot of fun and surprisingly effective.

So I love it. You know, so few people hunt like that anymore. It's almost like their guard is down on that, right. I mean, yeah, I really enjoy it. I highly recommend if you you know anyone, to at least give it a try, just once and see if you don't really like it. Yeah, yeah, I agree. Alright, Grant, I got a final set of rapid fire questions, just looking for like a like a one word or couple word answer. We'll bounce through these really quick, and then

you will have made it through with the gauntlet. Okay, so here's here's the final rundown. You're ready, Yes, sir, okay? Does the moon matter to dear movement? Yes? Or no? No? Would you take a fifty yard shot at a white tail with your bow? No? If you could only have one of these tools for the rest of your hunts for the rest of your life, would you select Rattley, Antler's or grunt tube to expandable or fixed blade broadheads? I'll go through it. I currently use fixed blade. Yeah.

Should you stop a moving buck with some kind of sound before shooting with a bow? Yes? M Which state has better hunters? Missouri or Georgia? Oh lord, I'm gonna get individual. All right, here's the last thing. Let's imagine for a second that I have control of the world. I rule the world, I have a magic on and I am going to revoke You're hunting privileges grant for the next twenty years unless you kill a mature buck in one single day this coming season. So you get

one day. I need you to pick the date on the calendar. What day are you gonna pick for this hunt? And then please give me details of the one specific location that you're gonna pick for this very high stakes hunt November five, Western Kansas, where it's wide open and the travel corridors are probably obvious for Mars love it. I love it? What kind of what kind of like paint for me? Like the tree stand location more more detailed, might be a ground bind. There's not a lot of

trees in western Kansas. Um And again, I'm gonna want three things. I'm gonna want a couple of trails merging into maybe a fence gap. And and typically my hunt's out there will have a CRP field that I think dear betting in and the bean ralph alpha field where I think they're feeding. And I'm gonna be in between in the smallest gap I can find on the satellite image. I'm not gonna walk. Typically this is a creek bottom.

I'm not gonna walk the whole thing. I'm gonna find the narrowest gap so the buck is unlikely to pass out of range. That's also favorable for the wind. And I love those Western creep bombs because they tend to not be straight but wind a lot, So somewhere in that bottom the wind is gonna be perfect for the wind that day Yeah, man, that sounds like a good spot. I have confidence in your choice. I think you'll get it done. Grant, that is it. That is the the

what would you do gauntlet? You you pass with flying colors. Oh you're kind, You're kind. Thank you for being patient with my rambling. Oh no, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Uh for folks that want to follow along with with all the cool stuff you're doing, can you can you feel us in on anything new to look forward to this fall or where we should go to see all your great content? Mark? How about I share something to you

I haven't shared with the rest of the public. So my life case now, I've been very blessed and through the years, not all at once, through twenty plus years, we have accumulated a pretty big piece of land here in the Ozark Mountains, all timbered roughs, deep, rocky. This is not you know, high dollar Iowa land. And we have sold the northern fift hundred acres to close here in about a couple of weeks, where I've spent the vast majority of twenty years working and are moving our office.

You've been here, Mark, and our house, all our chill cameras are hunting equipment to the southern nine hundred acres where there's nothing, just a couple little food plots, not all the t s. I not all the burning because I love a new project. And you know I mentioned ROM sixty one. I gotta know a good project or two in me, I believe Lord Willing, and so I'm really excited about starting over and sharing the Because the techniques I used fifteen years ago I may not use anymore.

I've refined, or I've learned a quicker way or a cheaper way or whatever. So I am so excited to start over. And I will tell you, and you get this, because you're a producer. You don't do something that significant just to get new content. You don't. This is my true heart, to really refine. My northern property is not perfect, but you know we're we're in the ose Arts and we harvest dog on large bucks for the oz Arts, and we figured out how to hunt it and we

kind of not the situation. And I'm just looking forward to the new challenge and and starting over. You know, there's all kind of low grade hardwoods that need to be improved, and cedars to be cut, and more fire, more prescribed fire and I probably get done and trails to make and little higdeo food plots to make. So I'm super excited about that. Man, I totally get. It's that, it's the puzzle, it's the mystery, is trying to figure it all out. That's that's what does it. It's it's

the shot. The trigger pulls just a tiny, tiny little bit of it. And I'm excited for you. Yeah, and I'm I'm still looking forward to it awesome. So I'm sure we'll be able to see all that I'm growing dear this coming fall and next year. You keep working on it. Yeah, you know, Mark as we uh you know, we make a new show every week and so we don't have a production calendar like a lot of people do that. That's great. I'm glad they do. We're just

filming every week, so we're filming whatever we're doing. So, yeah, we I have ideas for about ten hideo food plots. We're gonna restart them because we'll be planting about a month and that means we're you know, killing some saplings or having a little prescribed fires to make a seed bed. We're just just come along and see what we do. It sounds like a heck of an interesting thing to fall along with. Well, Grant, thank you, thank you, thank you. I knew this is gonna be great. It proved to

be so. And I really appreciate your sharing this with us. Mark. I appreciate your friendship and I look forward to seeing you again soon. Let's get together soon. It'd be great to catch up more in person. I love too, all right, and that is a app thank you for listening. That was good, wasn't it. That was fun? It's got me uh,

got me ready? I mean, I am so ready. If any of you guys have listened this year on the podcast, you know that last season was a challenging one for me, kind of burn out by the end of the year. Took a little bit of time away this winter, and I am fully recharged. I am fully jacked to get back after it and uh and this one really helped continue that momentum. So be sure to go following with Grant stuff. Like I mentioned already, Growing Dear is a

terrific YouTube show. Everything he puts out is just top notch. There's lots and lots to learn from Graham, so be sure to subscribe follow along with his stories Until next time my friends, thank you and stay wired.