Ep. 641: Planning For Productive Over-The-Road Whitetail Hunts with Dan Johnson

update before another episode here with mister Tony Peterson. But wanted to remind you that this coming weekend, if you're listening in real time, on March twenty six, twenty twenty three, I'm kicking off my first event or the Working for Wildlife Tour, I'm going to be out on the ground outside of Massachusetts or outside of Boston, Massachusetts, working on a massive trash cleanup on the Martin Burns Wildlife Management Area.

If you're listening in time for this on Thursday, the day this podcast comes out, you can still register to participate in that event. You can get all the details over at the Mediator website. If you search for the Working for Wildlife Tour. You'll find the link there to register. We're giving away twenty five of these sweet new I

Work for Wildlife t shirts that I help design. I want to meet you, I want to shake your hand, I want to hear your stories, and I want to pick up a bunch of trash and clean this place up so that future generations can enjoy these places. Heck, so that current generations can enjoy this place. Next week, and we've got a whole bunch of these kinds of

events continuing throughout the year. The second one is on April twenty second up in Calcaska, Michigan, with collaboration from the Michigan United Conservation Clubs, and we're going to be doing some brushpile creation, some different cool stuff on the ground, improving that habitat. So all that said, there are some other great events happening this weekend that I wanted to bring to your attention in the back Country Hunters and

Anglers website. Over on the event page you can see that there's a whole bunch of stuff happening March twenty fifth. This coming Saturday is a WMA habitat improvement project in Fairfield Vermont. There is a tire cleanup going on on March twenty fifth in Perryville, Arkansas. There is a back Country Hunters and English Trash and Trout Day in Greenbrier Ranger District over in bartow West Virginia. That's all this coming weekend. There's all sorts of stuff like coming this

coming up. I want to mention another one April fifteenth. Down in Indiana, there's an event being put on by some of my buddies at BHA, going to do some other great habitat work in the southern part of Indiana. Point is, if you care about these places, if you care about wild critters, public lands, public waters, one of the best things we can do to get out there and help these places out is be on the ground

doing real things. It's one thing to worry about this stuff is one thing about sending an email place in a phone call. That's all good, it's all important. But I think sometimes actually getting your hands dirty and giving back to these places, seeing these places in person, I think is a great way to kind of refill the reservoir, kind of recharge you personally, get you connected to these places that we're trying to keep around and it does some real tangible good for the deer, for the turkeys,

for the fish, for the birds. Whatever it is, we can make a difference. That's what this Working for Wildlife Tour is all about. I really hope to see you at this event this coming weekend in Massachusetts or next month in Michigan, wherever it might be. Again, full details over at the meat Eater website. That's the meat eater dot com. Go to the search bar search for Working for Wildlife Tour. You get the full scoop. You can

sign up. I really hope to see you there. Welcome to the Wire to Hunt podcast, which is brought to you by First Light. You guessed it. This is not Mark Kenyon's voice, it's Tony Mark is. Well, let's be honest here. Mark is on vacation again. I don't even want to talk about it since I'm stuck here keeping the lights on while he's off eating caviar and fly fishing exotic species of South American fish while rubbing elbows with the Kardashians or something. Who knows what that lucky

fella is spending his book royalties on. This week, Anny Whoski, Today, I've got an old Wire to Hunt favorite on Dan Johnson. Dan is the host of the Nine Fingers Chronicles podcast, the owner of the Sportsman Empire network of outdoor podcasts, and a diehard white tail hunter. And even though he lives in Iowa, Dan travels every year out of state to hunt deer and other critters, which is what this

episode is all about. So we start out with kind of a doom and gloom festival on the future of hunting, but eventually get into the realities of planning an out of state hunt where we cover the logistics and what it really takes to have a great hunt no matter where you travel. And I'll say this, whether you travel to hunt or not, you're gonna want to give this one to listen because it's gonna be worth it. I promise you that. Dan. How are you doing, Buddy, I'm

doing good. Man yourself, I'm good. But we just we just off air here got into a little conversation that's not all rosy about the future of hunting. And you know, this episode I want to get you on to talk about, you know, planning hunts and you know, how do you decide where you're going to go on your white tail hunts?

And all that good stuff. But we got to talk about a few things that you know, proposed legislation out there in a few different states, and you were just telling me, Iowa has some stuff that might go through. That sounds pretty freaking wild. What's going on down there? Man. So for the first thing I want to do is pref for us this conversation that we are about to have, and I want to step into the shoes for a second of the Michigan hunter, of the Pennsylvania hunter, of

the New York hunter for a moment. Because in the in the nine Finger Chronicles podcast and when I used to host the co host the Wire to Hunt podcast, I had the ability to talk with hundreds, if not thousands by now of people all over the country about

their how they hunt. And so places like Michigan, nine guys probably out of every ten would say, dude, Michigan hunting sucks or Pennsylvania hunting sucks, or you know, it's so high pressure and there's so many deer that gets shot every year, and there's multiple tags, and the rifle season is during the rut, and and so all these negative things that I hear, and it's consistent and it has been consistent since two thou and fourteen when I

started doing all this stuff. And so there's a common theme here that star is starting to snowball into other states. And now I'll get into that Iowa topic, where there's everybody knows Iowa as the mecca of what like big mature whitetail hunting can be. And not only from just that. You know, we have the habitat in the southern half of the state. It's really the rules and regulations that

keep Iowa great. And now some of these proposed some of this proposed legislation is only going to take away from that, and really it's going to destroy everything that we currently have, that top age structure, All of these bills are designed to take away from what makes Iowa great. And it's it's all about money in politics, and it's unfortunate that those that's how the decisions are being made.

So you're painting a pretty bleak picture what's going on here. Yeah, okay, So first things first, and this is I'll start with one topic that has been is somewhat controversial. Actually two topics. The first one is at as of right now, nonresident landowners still have to go through the draw system like every other hunter. Right, just because you own land doesn't mean that you're and live in another state. Doesn't mean that you automatically get to get your archery tag every year.

You have to apply for it. You have to wait, you know, three four wherever you're whatever zone you're in, that zone has that zone has an amount of like preference points, so to speak, just like Wyoming does. And so certain states are certain zones, like in the southern half of the state that's a high commodity. So some guys are waiting four years to five years in order

to hunt. They're the farm that they own. And so there's a there's a a new it's not new because they try to do it every you know, almost every year, every other year, and it continues to get shot down. Is that and that law would be landowners get have the ability to hunt every year, right, And that sounds

like a good thing for landowner nonresident landowners. But because Iowa is only two percent public land, because like eighty percent to ninety percent of the cover and what I mean by cover is like CRP and UM and Timber is south of Interstate eighty. In Iowa, we have this gigantic flood of people coming into it, residents and nonresidents every year. And so you open that up, what that

is going to do. The state of Iowa is in a population decline anyway, So people are moving out of the state of Iowa, and that means that the current landowners will then sell that to a non resident hunter and it will one one bad thing is is that it will displace hunters. They have nowhere to go, and so then public becomes even more crowded than it already is. And I know a lot of people are listening to this and saying, hey, oh this, Oh woe is me.

Listen to Dan, who's an Iowa resident gets to hunt Iowa every year, complain about the situation that he has. I'm not complaining about the situation that i have. I'm complaining about the situation that will be if all of these land all of this passes. Talk to anybody in western Illinois in that Pike County who is a resident and ask them what hunting was like twenty years ago

when the big buck craze hit Western Illinois. And every piece of property in some of these counties is either outfitted it became least or a non resident that landowner purchased it and displaced all these all these other hunters. So, so explain this to me. Hold on a second. So I know that Iowa has historically limited non resident licenses to like six thousand a year, I think, right, and each zone is allotted, you know, some of the northern

zones without a lot of cover. You know, there might be like thirty five nonresident tags total or archery tags or whatever, and then the southern zones will be more. Are they are they proposing that that that six thousand cap is gonna That's that's different than these non resident tags.

I mean, are they increasing proposing essentially? Yep? Essentially, if you're a landowner, you get your landowner's tag every year, you don't get your state tag because a resident landowner in Iowa can not only get there their landowners tag, but then they can also get their state wide archery tag. Yep. So this would just allow landowners to get a tag every single year. Okay in it. And then you said that they are there's the potential to sell those tags kind of like a I don't know, a New Mexico

ELK landowner voucher. That's that's in the proposal the proposal too. Yeah, so this was I just found this out two days ago.

There is some new legislation out there. So in Iowa, in order to get a landowner's tag, you only need four acres of ground and as of right now, there's some new proposals going out to where Iowa landowners maybe they don't hunt, but if you own that four acres and you qualify for a tag, then you will be able to get that tag and you will be able to sell it to anybody you want, any non resident,

any resident that you want to. So potentially this could mean hey, I could buy you know, they're going to go up for bid, right, and potentially a guy could buy a tag on four acres a guy could you know, a landowner could sell his Iowa tag for you know, three four five. How however, many thousands of dollars that the highest bidder wants to because there's definitely a commodity for it, um it would it would allow them to sell the tags to whoever they wanted to, and then

that person could come in and hunt. So who who does this come from? Because this I mean if you're sitting there at the Iowa DNR and You've got this kind of monopoly on these tags and these this you know, highly sought after trophy experience, and they've proven that they're going to raise prices and you know, kind of play that Western looking game a little bit with the with the resource. Why would they get why would the DNR be for this, Like, why would they want to devalue

that experience and dilute that pool of tags? Or does this come from somebody else? This isn't coming from the DNR. This is coming from the leg from This is legislation and politicians, got it that are proposing bills. Now the next one gets a little even more tricky, right, and this tells you how dirty everything is starting to get in this space and in this world. Right. So, now we have this natural resource that if these just imagine adding all of those people to the state of Iowa.

Whether you have four acres or whether you have four thousand acres, you're adding all these additional tags. Let's not get it twisted. Hunting in Iowa is easier than hunting in Michigan. I'll be the first to agree with that, right, especially with the rules and regulations where dude, you can rattle in a three year old Iowa like that, if you're patient and you're on the right farm, it's not hard to do right and so and so we have

this older age structure that is very sought after. Older age structure means bigger antlers, which makes them even more sought after you add all of these nonresident landowners. You add all of these nonresident tags, you're just going to So imagine a guy who has who gets an Iowa tag. He's comes from a state or a location where a one thirty class three year old would be a gigantic deal for him. So what are these people are gonna do. They're gonna go in, They're gonna go, oh my god,

this is the biggest buck I've ever seen. And I don't blame them, and they shoot it right. The next guy does the same thing. The next guy does the same thing. So all of a sudden, you have this the top tier age structure just completely wiped out in a full of years, and now we're no different than any of these other states. I think that that's possible. I think that it's it's easy to sort of, you know, pin this on. You know what I would have to

see to play Devil's advocate. Here is how many people? This is? How many tags? Is this? Because if you're talking about you know, if this goes through the way it could, and you're talking three, four or five thousand dollars nonresident tags, you're talking about somebody who's probably not necessarily hunting one thirties. But I guess it kind of depends how the market bears out and what the tags would cost, and how many people are actually involved in this.

And I say that, so this is this is like, this is just like a little warning and people listening to this goal. I was never gonna hunt away anyway, because I'm not going to spend seven hundred dollars on

a deer tag. That's not really the point. This is this is sort of an echo from other states and other strategies, And the gist of the whole thing is we're not really staring at a brighter future if you're a white tail hunter in an awful lot of situations and we so you might be thinking, you know, I know you like to hunt South Dakota. I've I've hunted South Dakota whole bunch. We were just talking, you know, before this, about how there's a proposal there from the

Game and Fish. I think it's from the Game and Fish to limit non resident any deer tags to twenty two hundred for the entire year, and there's going to be a lottery or that's that's built into the proposal anyway, which to me says, Okay, we're probably going to be playing the points game there, sort of like Wyoming. And it's another revenue generator and and you know, agree with it, disagree with it, whatever, it's it's another potential lost opportunity

for an awful lot of hunters. And that trend is happening all over the place, and so you know, we're we're going to talk. We'll get a little rosier here in a second. But if you're paying attention out there, you know in Nebraska just did this with limiting nonresident deer hunters and turkey hunters. This this stuff's coming to everybody, like it just is. And if you're if you're interested in going out and hunting across state lines, i'd start thinking about it now, because this is this is a

slippery slope type of thing. And you know, I get why, I get why people are forced some of these proposals, and I get why if you're a resident of a certain state, you don't want anybody else coming in. But at the same time, you're you're advocating the loss of hunting opportunities from your fellow hunters. And the more we do that, the worst this thing gets. And so it's not just a it's easy to be like, oh, hey, I don't want anybody coming here to hunt the public

land that I like to hunt on. It's like, yeah, obviously, but there's repercussions for that mentality, and we're all going to deal with them across the entire white tail world here. And I mean we already are right the thing, the thing that impacts Iowa, I feel the most compared to a state like South Dakota. I mean, you've been to South Dakota, and how much public land there is available

to hunt. I mean, it is ridiculous. You know, other things go into that equation, like grazing, and you know, just because it's public doesn't mean it holds deer, right, But in Iowa, there is less than two percent of the total surface area in Iowa is public hunting ground, and so there's nowhere really for it the locals to

go if they're displaced by some of these laws. So this is a great thing to talk about, and it's something you know, we see the whole fight between Matt Ronella and Steve and Matt doesn't want any more hunters out there, and a lot of people say, we don't need them out there because everything's too crowded already. And I look at it and I go, we don't have I feel like not recruiting is a bad idea, Like

I think we need people coming into our ranks. And so I look at that and I go, Okay, if you're Iowa, and I've said this about South Dakota, I said this about a lot of states. If you're Iowa and you're looking at something like that, and you're you're staring down the barrel of ninety eight percent of year land is private, how do we get more public? Then? We never we never talked about this. I mean, do you build in an extra ten bucks per preference point and use that as too fun to walk in program

or something like? We're facing this everywhere, right, and I think, I think, like the best thing we can do for so many of these situations in these states is figure out how to get more land open to everyone. Yeah, yep, yep. And that's that's that's hard to do, and especially in a state like Iowa, where the main focus is depending on where you're at, the main focus is not the natural resource. Right. Just look what happened with a pheasant poppylation in this state. They farmed up to the fences

on absolutely everything. They tore out buffer strips so they could farm an extra two rows of corn or you know, agg ground, right, and so the main focus in this state is still and always has been agriculture. And so unless you can get the current landowners on board, probably the only way you're going to do that is some

kind of financial reward. Then you know, then I like it will be very tough, especially when you could, you know, you can use that ground to plant more corn, or plant more you know, or have more cattle or put up a hog confinement or whatever whatever whatever people do to make money in the egg world. Yep. Well, I mean we've seen this in Minnesota has it. South Dakota has that, Kansas has it, Western states have it. There.

There are walk in access programs absolutely landowners, and I kind of feel like that format is something we really need to pay attention to because you know, so you think about that, you've got, you know, an egg heavy state like Iowa and a whole bunch of the flyover

states in the Midwest. There are a lot of farmers out there that where if you were like, hey, you know, three bucks an acre, five bucks an acre, whatever, and roll your farm, they're gonna do it like they're you know, they're gonna do it because they can still make their money on it. And you know, those those programs tend to have pretty good liability insurance and things like that, so the landowners off the hook if you go out there and blow your head off or whatever. I think

I think we need to get serious about that. And what you were talking about with Iowa and being able to sell landowner tags is the exact opposite, because that is going to lock up land in a way that is going to be really rough for everyone. And this this kind of stuff, it's, man, it scares me because it's just it's getting so difficult out there, and I what I worry about is sort of like I want to just get mine mentality and giving up on states

like I know I've got. I've hunted quite a few different states in my life, and some of them I just have a hard time caring about anymore because it's like there's no opportunity for me there. I don't it's hard for me to muster up a whole lot of you know, rah rah rah, let's fight for your hunting

opportunities when it doesn't matter to me. And I know that sound shitty, but it's like, I don't want to see that happen on a large scale where we're super apathetic and we don't care about our hunters who are across state lines because we've been screwed so many times by license prices and cuts and opportunities, and I just don't want to see us get more divided. And I can feel myself sort of just like I don't give a shit about some of this stuff anymore, and I don't.

I don't like that. Yeah, And I mentioned, man, that's where it gets muddy and it gets gross and like greedy, and it becomes you know, there's groups of people out there that are trying to treat our natural resources like commodities and not like the natural resource that needs to be delicately managed. Right, They're out there going, well, the land is going to produce more deer so you know, just like cattle prices are this, and the next thing, you know, they're going to have futures and on tag

sales and things like that. Well look, you know, I mean it can go whatever way you can imagine it. It could possibly go that way. And so like like right now, there's large groups of people in the state of Iowa who are rallying together to let politicians know, do not change this right, do not change these laws. We want them the same, keep them the same. We don't care if non residents come in, but put them

in line. Just like every state. And I'm going to say this, and I don't know if this is going to be controversial or not, but I really do feel like all states should manage their their natural resources with the residence in mind first and then worry about the non resident that I know that may seem unfavorable because it you know, there could be a potential law change

that could keep me out of a state. As much as I want to do, I feel like non residence in all situations have their you know, have their say in some of this, in some of this, but it's the people who are paying the taxes on an annual basis in their state should have a little bit more of a voice on rules and regulations than someone who doesn't even live here. So I looked into that because that's a very common argument to make. I looked into it into a woman because Wyoming pisses me off so

much sometimes. And if you look at and this is this is the case with Wyoming, not I'm not saying this is any other state. But if you look at the amount of federal tax that Wyoming contributes to the federal dowry and then how much they take out, the ratio isn't even close. They rank like forty nine, So they're they're putting in a little bit and taken out a lot. And so if I'm a federal taxpayer from some other state, which I am, where does that leave me? You know what I mean? So this is not it's

not so simple. I definitely think that I agree with that, because there's a lot of federal public land in states like Wyoming. But it's not But it's not about It's not about federal public land. It's about if you say, okay, we pay the taxes in this state, well, federal taxes are building roads for you. They're doing all kinds of programs. It's not just a natural resource thing. And I look at that and I go, I get it. I get the argument. But we're if you're traveling to hunt, you're

all paying enough taxes. Hey, we're all reaping the benefits of federal taxes and we're paying them. And it's not so cut and dry that it's just the state residents who are funding everything. And then you look at the non resident revenue that's coming in in some of those states and how much money they're generating off of that. It's it's not it's like not so simple, you know.

And I get the argument, right right, I just feel like, and maybe I'm a little jaded because I've been through this before where and you know, kudos to the family for making their money and you know, putting the land up for auction, but I've been I would say over my lifetime, I have lost permission hunting farms in or i've grown up. I would say probably four to five thousand total acres since I've started hunting that I've been

lost to nonresident landowners. And so then instantly that gets displaced. Everybody on those farms gets displaced, and now they have to go find another place to hunt, right, And typically even with a resident landowner coming in, unless they're from out of county. Let's say someone in a bigger like Des Moines buys a farm just to hunt, then typically

there's going to be some displacement there as well. But for the most part, if it's another local who's buying the land, then I will still have my hunting opportunities there not not a lot changes with that. That's just

that's just my examples that I've lived through. Well, I can tell you that's probably because you live in Iowa and I live in Minnesota, and I've lost plenty of hunting opportunities and they've all been to residents because nobody's paying to come in there to hunt, right, right, But in it doesn't matter, Okay, So that happens to you, and it's non residence happens to me, and it's residents

happens some dude in Pennsylvania who cares. The net result is fewer places to go rome like, fewer places to hunt, and we need to address that, and it sucks, but we still have some opportunities now, and you better take advantage of them. If you're listening to this and you're like, man, these guys are all doom and gloom and they're pissed off.

There's still opportunities out there, there's still places to go. Well, we still have some fight left in us, and you know, there's still some really really cool places to travel that are going to sell you a tag or you could play the points game for a little bit. And I don't want to discourage people from doing that because I still think that the experience is worth it and the opportunity, if it's there, you should take advantage of it. Now, you said you're going to Nebraska this year, I'm set

sure where I'm going. Ok. I know, I know I'm going to go to South Dakota given the rules and regulations don't change too much, all right, Like I love South Dakota. I also am gonna apply for Kansas. So my uncle he lives in Kansas, and he's probably gonna help me out finding a place to hunt down. And Kansas is the number one state for the least amount

of public ground in the entire country. I believe Iowa is second and Kansas is first, And so I might be hunting some public there, I might be hunting some private through my uncle. He lives down there, and so I'm going I'm gonna try to hunt Kansas. If I hunt Kansas, I'll probably take the extra miles and also hunt Oklahoma. And so just because of how close they are to each other, So Kansas in Oklahoma and Iowa.

If I don't draw Kansas, then what I'll do is I'll probably do um Iowa and South Dakota for sure. I had a pretty tough go of things in my September hunt in uh in Nebraska, So I don't know. I'm still I'm still debating on if I'm going to

go there. And that's you know that Oklahoma in Nebraska are both over the counter as it right now, Uh, if you go to hunt Kansas and you and you get on some land that your uncle's gonna put you on, or you're gonna make sure you don't displace any residence, and that's a that's a fair that's a that's a fair smart ass question. And I will say that I will not be displacing any I will they will just be adding a hunter to that to that form. Okay, I'm just giving you a shit, buddy, all right, So

I know you. I mean, that's pretty ambitious, right, But I guess that is the way that you describe the potential plans for your fall is sort of a good counterweight to all the bitch and we did for the first twenty minutes of this podcast saying loses an opportunities because you're going, Hey, if I draw South Dakota, a hunt there because I love it. If I might go to Nebraska, even though Nebraska can kick my ass sometimes

I still love it. And I know that I might draw Kansas and I'm gonna be able to buy it over the counter tag in Oklahoma. That's solid, Like it's yeah, it's good to hear that. Why why those states? Like let's start right up on the top of South Dakota. Why why start there? So the first time I ever went to South Dakota, I instantly fell in love with it. More less about the hunting and more about the landscape.

Like you know, our buddy Mark Kenyan talks about the West and he talks about the mountains like he's a mountain guy. He wants to be out in the mountain. Dude, I'm a prairie guy. I there's something about the bad lands, There's something about the wide open prairie where you can get on the point and see until you can't see anymore, until if everything fades away. Yep. I love that feeling. I love the feeling of feeling extremely small in a large area. And so that's why I go hunt in

South Dakota. And it gives me the opportunity to hunt multi species. My tag allows me to hunt mulder and or a white tail, and so those are the biggest contributing factors. Yeah, so that and so you mentioned multiple times everybody who listens to this knows you're an Iowa resident. You live in the best state to hunt white tails. And yet you're saying because this is this is something that happens a lot, and this is one of the

issues you guys are dealing with down there. And I was like, everybody wants to go there to kill a big buck, right, you know, I mean Kansas, same way Illinois was Buffalo County all that bullshit. But you're saying, and this is something that this is a point that we can't stress enough. Is Yeah, I live in Iowa, I have awesome hunting. I'm going to leave Iowa to

go hunt South Dakota. Not because I want to kill one set and these, But because I want to hunt in an environment that speaks to me, Yes, that that matters so much. We we frame these these traveling hunts so much around just the kill or the like the trophy potential. But when you start doing this, I feel the same way about the bad Lands, Like, man, I don't know what it is, but it's awesome. I don't

I don't know why. It's the same thing. And you know, like when I hunt western North Dakota, that environment is just special to me, like I just I want to spend time there. And when you start doing these hunts, it's easy to plan around, like, well, I want to go I want to draw my Kansas teay because Kansas has giants. It's like okay, sure sort of, But where do you want to go experience a hunt? What kind

of ground speaks to you? And that's such an important consideration that we kind of don't give a lot of weight to. Yeah, yeah, I mean just a successful day out. There's sitting at the top of the highest point and just spotting all day, like even if even if I make a stock or not, you know, going back sleeping in the back of my truck, kicking cooking all my food on my tailgate, or pitching a tent somewhere, you know, two miles in. It's just it's something that I just

can't get enough of. Yeah, it's a it's a it's really fun to get outside your comfort zone. Yes, you know, it's it's different. It's weird to travel to hunt the exact same stuff you can travel at home. You know. It's it's fun to have some variety, all right. So South Dakota is an easy one because South Dakota is cool. Man that that state offers so many interesting you know, just different regions of different kinds of habitats. You know, like you said, the meal deer, the white tail thing.

You can go pick up an antelope tag out there. It's pretty cool. What about Nebraska, Yeah, Nebraska, in the area of Nebraska that I hunt, it's a lot like it's a lot like uh, South Dakota. All right. So a lot of people drive through Nebraska and all they see is flat cattle pasture. Well, if you get into the northwest corner of Nebraska, there's a ton of terrain change, and I mean it can get pretty gnarly back in there.

I mean there's where I where I hunt in Nebraska, there is wintering elk in that in that same public that I hunt. So there's I mean, and the and even even further west. They have big horn sheep in Nebraska as well. And uh in South Dakota they have big horn sheep that I've seen in some of these spots, and so it's just it's just a continuation of South Dakota. I wanted more of it, and so I said, hey, might as well get a tag and uh go go

do western Nebraska too. Yeah, that Nebraska has some really really cool opportunities and things are getting a little tighter there, and I get it. You know, Uh, Nebraska for a while was like the biggest sleeper state and it got really busy. But you know, Nebraska also promoted the ship out of their non resident hunting opportunities and really pushed, pushed hard to compete with South Dakota and a couple

of other states. And now it's kind of, you know, there's a course correction going on there, but there's still some really badass opportunities out there. And I will say this that that western northwestern corner of Nebraska that everybody wants to head to is pretty bad ass. It's it's bad ass, but I will be the first to let you know there's a lot of other hunters out there there. Well, it's a it's yeah, it's a magnet for hunting pressure. And if you drive through Nebraska, you're driving by a

lot of pretty good hunting opportunities. To get to that corner of the state, I would say, don't be don't be afraid to check out some other parts of Nebraska. All right, So those are two options. And you said Kansas. Have you hunted Kansas before? I have not hunted Kansas. I've been in a tree stand in Kansas with my uncle, but never never hunted. I do want to add something here, though. I have been collecting preference points in Wyoming for eight

years now. So I at this July, when I purchased my preference point, I will have like eight preference points for elk, eight preference points for antelope, and like six preference points for deer, I believe. And so I'm while I'm doing these other things, I'm also planning and calculating for a like a really big once in a lifetime hunt where I'll probably try to schedule two weeks out there to go try to chase elk or some of these other species. So it's just one of these things.

And that's why I kind of like I kind of I personally kind of like the preference point system because you're waiting in line while you're also hunting other other places, and the more you wait in line, the It's not necessarily true this next statement isn't necessarily true all of the times, but most of the time, more preference points that you have, the better unit you can get into, has a little bit more access, has less hunters in it, and it just gives you an opportunity to do something

really special. Yeah, I'm I'm kind of agnostic on the preference point saying I've got the same deal going on in Wyoming, but I have quite a few more points than you do. Yeah, but I look at it as long as they don't change the rules halfway through, which which you see some states do that. So you've bought into the promise of this kind of system, and then when they change it and you're already you know, eight

points deep, that sucks. The The other thing I would say on that is anybody listening to this who's like, oh man, I'm gonna go buy Wyoming points, and then they're gonna get there and they're gonna go, oh my god, I could draw a big horn sheep or a moose tag or you know this premiere ELK unit. Do some research before you start buying in on preference points because people starting today and some of these really once in

a lifetime type animals you're never gonna draw. Like you, look at how many people are ahead of you, and look at what it takes to draw now if it's twenty or twenty two points or whatever it is, and they're given three tags a year in this unit. Like you, some of these situations you'll never get into, and so just pay attention to it. There are some opportunities out there to buy some points and get into some you know.

I mean you you're probably gonna need them for general units here, or you might already, I'm not sure, but just pay attention to that. I mean, that is one thing I like about Iowa is every May, I can buy my point and I can look at what it took to draw each zone in Iowa and I go, okay, I should theoretically be able to hunt here in two years or three years, And you can plan around that, and honestly, this is where everything's going, and it's not

going to just be a nonresident game. In ten years, twelve, fifteen years, people are going to be playing the Points game in their home state too. I think, like I think this is just coming. As you know, we have more people on the landscape and fewer places to hunt, So learning about it is not a bad thing. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, God forbid it ever gets to that. But I don't disagree that something like some big changes to some of these states are coming. Well, I mean it's it's coming.

I mean, these these state game agencies are going to have to generate revenue. And if you you know, I mean, we haven't really seen the price situation, even as crazy as it has gotten, we haven't seen that. You know, people go, I'm not I'm not going to I am I'm not going to play the game. But theoretically, you just think it would happen eventually, and you just you look at the resource management and I just think it's

coming at some point. I know a lot of people probably don't, but I think the face of this world is going to change a lot in the next ten years. And it's just it's not going to get easier for anyone, you know, I mean you think about you know, you look at Colorado right now you can go buy and over the counter ELK tag at least you could. You know, that's that's probably gonna change too, and the residents are

going to cheer that. But you know, wolves come in, CWD, hits hard, whatever, bad winners, and all of a sudden, your ELK herd is fifty percent of what it was, like like you that could happen, and then what you know, and then it's like, okay, well we're not going to let everybody go buy a license and go hunt these because this is a resource we have to manage. So now you're gonna have to play this game. And that's a pure hypothetical, but I just kind of think that's

coming to a lot of states eventually. Yeah, I agree. So all right, So Kansas, Kansas is an interesting one. I've only ever I've only hunted there one time, and I had arguably maybe the most amazing morning of my life with buck activity. It was pretty crazy. But Kansas is Kansas is a weird one for non residence to go to because I think some people kind of underestimate how like how prevalent baiting is on private land and

how that can affect things. And you know, like you mentioned, you know, it's not like a state that's overrun with public land. It's it's an interesting opportunity because there's big deer there, but it's not Sometimes I think it's not what people expect, right, I would I would say that my interest in Kansas is two things. One, my uncle lives there and he is somewhat responsible for me getting

into the outdoors. Right. He took me peasant hunting when I was a whipper snapper, you know, and so that that that's that's a big one. But second is how some people think of Iowa. I mean, I live in Iowa, so I get to see Iowa for its true beauty. But my day my daydream state, like some people daydream about Iowa, my daydream state is Kansas. And so when I when I think about, hey, an opportunity outside of Iowa to run into a big buck, that's probably that's

that's where my mind goes. Yeah, well understandably, So, Uh, Kansas, Kansas has plenty to offer. Uh what about what about Oklahoma? Why Oklahoma? So? Oklahoma? Um is one of those things where. Man. I really like, once you start saying something is a sleeper state or something is good. And I got a buddy on the network here that every time I say the word Oklahoma, I get a text from him and he's like, dude, shut up, just like stop talking about it, man.

And so I really do think from a from a public land standpoint, Oklahoma has a lot to offer that. I mean, shit, a couple of years ago, Oklahoma had the most two hundred inch deer come out of it in one year. That more than Nebraska, or more than Iowa, more than Illinois, more than Kansas. So we we have we have this opportunity not only for just good deer hunting,

but potentially great deer hunting in that state. And so why I'm interested in Oklahoma is because of the proximity to Kansas, and so it's an opportunity to just hit two places at one time. Yeah. Have you have you hunted Oklahoma? Not? Not yet? No, are you planning to hunt in public land? Yes? Um, I've hunted Oklahoma a couple of times. It's it's one of my favorite states as far as just high deer density. Like I've hunted a couple different regions in that state. They're pretty far apart,

and there's just a lot of deer down there. The public lands pretty decent, there's there. You know, one thing I will say about Oklahoma is it feels to me sort of like when I hunt Wisconsin, Like it's like, man, everybody hunts, you know what I mean, Like there's just like a high proportion of the of the state that hunts. But also, I've never had a bad interaction down there. Like every resident I've met down there that was out

hunting where we were hunting has been awesome. And I know that's like a really small sample size, but it's just a cool state. It's cool opportunities over the counter. For now, you get a whole bunch of tags. I think. I think there's talk of maybe limiting buck tags down there eventually, which you know kind of makes sense, but whatever,

But it's a cool opportunity. And and like you said, you can hunt you know, northern Oklahoma and be damn near hunting Kansas type deer in a different situation, or you can hunt out western Oklahoma. You know, that's where I hunted the first time, in kind of southwestern Oklahoma, And man, it was like it was almost like a Texas hunt kind of with the terrain and totally different. And then I hunted southern southern Oklahoma one time, real close to Texas, and it was like a pure Texas

hunt with fire ants and everything. So it's pretty wild down there. Yeah, and on top of Oklahoma, this is another another couple of things that I've really been thinking about lately, and it's just I don't know why it didn't hit me sooner, but I have Iowa. I lived in the eastern part of the state. I'm three hours from Minnesota, I'm an hour and a half from two hour and a half, two hours from Wisconsin, and I'm

forty five minutes to an hour from Illinois. And I've never taken the opportunity to hunt any of those states and they're right next door. And so I just have this feeling that if I go east, I just run into more and more people, you know what I mean. And so I just I'm going to start putting some as my kids get into more activities and as life just eventually gets busier and busier, I think I'm going to find myself looking into Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Illinois a

lot more. Yeah. Well, I mean a Missouri excuse me for Missouri as well. Yeah, one thing to consider there too, because this is you know again kind of back to we kind of start our planning or our daydreaming on this around where can we go kill a big one?

But just take if you take Iowa, for example, and you have your October one opener, so many states that are close to you will let you hunt for two weeks or more before that, right, And and that's something you know, like one of the main reasons I started traveling to hunt. You know, in Minnesota this year, our gun season starts on November fourth, So if I want to bow hunt the rut, I gotta leave, right And so it's like you sort of start planning around that too.

So if you have an October opener, you might be able to get somewhere and have a couple of weeks of hunting, or you know, when your state's gun season opens, you might be able to skip across the border and go bow hunt somewhere else. Like there's a lot of reasons to go. Or like you said, if you're taking your kids and you want them to experience a cool trip where you're camping and doing stuff. But you don't want to drive them, you know, twelve fourteen hours out west.

There's there's things to do, there's opportunities out there for the white tail hunter with a little bit of ambition. Who can afford it. Yeah, yep, it's it's the it's the white tail. But my have a I have a bucket list, and it's I have it written down that it's right here on my desk. And so I was looking into a couple of these hunts and I'm just like, I'm going to have to save a lot of money in order to even get close to some of these animals.

But elk and mule heer, Like, I still have not killed a mule deer, and I really want to kill a mule, to kill an elk, I want to kill a prong horn. I think those three animals are I feel like I'm going to be able to accomplish that fairly. I'm not gonna say easily, but I should be able to accomplish them from a financial standpoint, with not a lot of effort. And I'm not looking for giants, right, but I'm just looking for a cool opportunity those three animals.

I've two more animals that I want to kill one is a moose, and I want it to be a certain way, Like I want to get on a boat. I want to I want to take a plane into the middle of nowhere. I want to get on a boat and I want to float down a river and I want to stop. I want to call moose and I want that, you know, I want that that experience like I saw it on TV when I was a kid. I was like, I want that experience. That's a once in a lifetime deal. Right, then I want a caribout.

And really, if I kill those five animals, I'm going like, I'm going to be happy with my life as a hunter. All of my bucket lists animals and experience his at that point have been met. And then maybe from there I'll go on and do some some other different things.

But those last two are going to be expensive. And I don't mean from necessarily just if I could go into Alaska and go on public and go do that thing and do it cheap, but still from Iowa to Alaska is a big trip, right, There's no saying that going to Alaska and doing it is going to be cheap in any way exactly exactly, And so those two things have take a little bit more planning in preparation and a little bit more in the savings account, in the hunting account, I guess I'll say, and then just

realize that a couple of those trips are going to be once in a lifetime, so I want to make account. You know. Yeah, well, and I mean that's a good point too, right, Like if you if you're sitting there listening to this and you're like, oh, man, you know, it's it's hard for me to even conceive of making over the road whitetail trip happen, but you're sitting there

daydreaming about some of these Western critters. Man, the only way to to get there is just to start learning how to do this stuff, you know, I mean it goes. We talk a lot about, you know, figuring out how to get tags and played the points game and by the buy your license or whatever, but it's also how

how sharp are your e scouting skills? Like how comfortable are you driving quite a ways away from home and camping and hunting out of a camp if that's what you're gonna do those things, you know, once you start, you know, I started doing that with turkeys when I was in high school, just just cause you're like, you know, I mean that that was the thing that we could afford to go travel the hunt and you just realize

like how many holes you have in your game. But you also start building some confidence in that kind of thing. And it takes time. You know, like a lot of people go I'm gonna go do that elk hunt. First it's like, okay, great, but that's an expensive prop even for a DIY over the counter deal is not really

very cheap. And then you've got, you know, the added stress of like that's a big you know, like a big license to buy, and you tell everybody you're gonna go, and you got to get in shape, and then you get out there and you're like all your EA scouting is kind of like, oh I found some meadows, I found a water hole or watering hole, Like yeah, so did everybody else, now what you know, And it's running through this stuff and getting used to it a little

closer to home on like a little bit less stressful type of hunt, like a whitetail hunt is really beneficial and still a hell of a lot of fun. Yeah, yeah, Well, one thing about collecting information, you know, EA scouting is great when I here's what my first years, first two years, my first year in Nebraska, my first year in South Dakota, I drove or walked by everybody I saw. If I saw someone, I just kept moving. If there was somebody

on the road, I just kept moving. And you know, I didn't want to tell them what I was about. I didn't want to tell they didn't want to tell me what they're about. That's what I thought. Man, I couldn't have been more wrong. Now. I talked to absolutely everybody I see, because most of the time people will drop some kind of information. And so a perfect example of this is I ran out to some antelope hunters when I was in Nebraska, and I said, you know,

I just started talking with them. We sparked up a conversation, and they're out there for they're out there for antelope. I'm out there for deer. And I said, hey, man, I saw some antelope over here, and they're like, hey, dude, I saw some I saw a really big buck over here. And so we change we shared information, and it really didn't affect us, right. And so man, it's just one way to continue to gather information out there is to be friendly and talk to people. Man, I talked to landowners. Now.

Where I was hunting in South Dakota was a like the worst experiences I've ever had in talking with people in South in certain parts of South Dakota. But in Nebraska, Man, I was talking every guy I ran into landowner cattle operation, you know, other hunters. Man. Everybody is willing to share information, and I think that's really a cool thing about about

hunting out of state. A lot of people who are like, Hey, I want to go to Oklahoma and hunt public land too, or I want to go somewhere in the Midwest because I live out east and I want to go hunt those dumb cornfed deer. They'll they'll jump on a forum, you know, bow site or rock slide or whatever, and hey, I'm thinking about going to north or you know, North Dakota or Nebraska or whatever, and I want to hunt public land. Anybody have any suggestions, You're gonna get the worst,

most bullshit information. So often do it because you know, first off, there are a lot of people who don't want you there, so they're gonna just lie to you whatever. These are strangers, they don't care about you. Secondly, they might not have a clue what they're talking about. Again, And the same thing happens if you talk to people in person sometimes where it you have to you have to just think, like what does this person actually know?

You know, I mean, I can't I can't tell you how many times I've seen something on a forum where it's like, you know, don't come to Nebraska because our gun seasons in the middle of the rut, and the rifle hunters shoot all of the deer when they're two and a half. You're never going to kill a big

one on public land. And it's like, okay, like you you have places where there's ninety thousand acres of public land in one spot, there aren't any big bucks in there, like you don't think so like, and so I just say take it with a grain of salt and understand just like generally what you're getting into to go to a spot, you know, like not not not necessarily maybe trophy quality, but like the deer density situation to some extent, the pressure situation to some extent, and just understand, like

you can forge your own path and most of the people if you're if you're willing to go travel and hunt and do the work. You're probably going to out hunt most of the people you could get information from.

That's just generally true. So just kind of you kind of got to go like Ford, your own path and really not listen to or not not pay attention to a lot of the information you might be able to kind of gather up because it might not mean anything to you and it might actually hurt you, know, mentally to take that in and go, oh, man, what if these guys are right about the deer quality or you know, HD killed them all here or whatever. Like, Man, there's a lot of bs out there right right, and you

got to use your best judgment to weed that out. Yep, yep. Well, and you got to think, too, this is partially, like we said, to just go experience a new place, right right, Like it's just it's just partially to go have and experience somewhere else. And so if you're placing a little bit too much value on whether there's one hundred and forty inches all over, you're kind of missing the point.

And if you're traveling to hunt like that, and especially if you're going to go hunt in public land, you there's there's probably deer there that you'd be really happy with, like generally, no matter where you're going to go. And I know people say, oh, yeah, come to my state and hunt the public land. I'm like, there's there's good deer in a lot of places. Now I'm not talking one seventies, but I'm talking deer that if you're on a five day public land hunt and it walks by,

you're going to shoot it and be real happy. And so you kind I'm not expecting, yeah, I'm sorry. I'm not expecting to shoot Iowa quality deer when I go to western Nebraska or when I go to uh maybe Oklahoma. I'm not expecting that there's a sliding scale with everywhere I go. And I'll be honest, I haven't shot a lot of deer out of state yet. And so the deer that I did shoot in South Dakota, man, I look at it every day and I'm so jacked about

that hunt. I relive it every day. And so it's less about quality of deer and and just keep coming back to the word experience. Man yep, well yeah, and I mean this is this is something I don't I don't know if people actually listen to me on it or not. But you know, like you talked about how you still want to go. You want to get an elk, you want to get a meal door, you want to get an antelope, and you know, I look at those opportunities the same way look at traveling for white tails.

In most situations. I'm like, man, low standards are your friend. Like if you go if you go hunt, uh, you know, Oklahoma white tails and you you grew up in Michigan or you grew up in Ohio or whatever, that's a different world, a different thing, you know, I mean, judging those deers so different. There's there're a lot smaller, and especially in certain parts of it's just you're into it for a whole different experience. And if you bring your home standards to odd of state hunts, it's sort of

a recipe for disaster most of the time. And this is true on white tails. This is really true. If you start to go hunt elk and meal deer and antelope, and if you're in you're pounding away on public land on easy to get tags. Listen, like it is it is not easy if you're a tree standing hunter to go out in spot and stock antelope. Trust me, Like, if you if you go and you're like, well, it's got to be seventy inches plus a good luck, Like

you're gonna eat that tag? Like you just you just probably are, whether even if you're sitting in a blind on a water hole all day, which looks real easy on TV. It's it's just a different kind of deal. And you got to understand that you're you're getting into this for different reasons. Yeah, that's a fact. That's a fact, my friend. All Right, So let's let's run through this hypothetical here. All of your plans fall through and you're like, I guess I gotta go hunt Oklahoma public land. Where

where do you start? Then? Wait, like it's like hunt timing wise? What do you factor in there? What do you start you know, doing e scouting wise? Like how do you how do you build the foundation of that hunt? All right? So the foundation of that hunt is is this first things. First, I'm looking at when the rifle season starts up in that state, and I think Oklahoma starts on like the tenth in November or something like that. And so that tells me I don't want to be in a I don't want to be in a bow

hunting scenario. When a gun season's going around, I want to be as close to the rut as humanly possible, knowing that I have Iowa to hunt as well, and I want to be there for you know, the best time in Iowa. And so I also have to know that from a family standpoint, I can't just be gone for one month straight throughout the year, going from South Dakota to Nebraska to Iowa to Oklahoma. Right, So if I'm going to probably go in a pre timeframe, I'll

probably stay as a late into October as possible. And and so that's my timeframe, okay. And so outside of that, then it just becomes e scouting on huntstand or whatever other like on x or whatever other app you use, Google Maps, Google Earth. I'm looking at everything, and I'm scouring everything. I get my leads just like other people do.

I talk with buddies and I say, hey, man, you know, talk to me a little bit about what you've felt about this area, or I just gather information that way and that could potentially lead me into at least a starting point. And at that starting point, then I'm looking for access routes. Then I'm looking for edge, Then I'm looking for cover. Then I'm looking at satellite imagery, I'm looking at topo, I'm looking at water, I'm looking for

potential food sources. All the things that I do here, but I'm just doing it on an app or computer there, and so that really is the foundation. And then that way I have a starting point and then from there, if that starting point sucks, then I start to get real mobile, and then I go figure out stuff on

the fly. Well, I want to talk about that because and I'll use Oklahoma as an example again here it's just to just to further piss off your buddy on the network U when I when I hunted down there the first time I hunted on on their October one opener. So I was down there for six seven days camping on the opener. And my plan going into that, I go, I'm going to southwest Oklahoma on October one. It's going

to be a million degrees. I'm gonna find every pond I can that's tucked as far back in as I can, and I'm going to build an entire plan around water. And then I drive fourteen hours out there and it rains for six days, miserable and immediately negates ninety nine percent of the East scouting I did because I got married to an idea and I got too cocky. And

that happens a lot. And so when you when you think about this, like what you're talking about is like, I'm looking for this feature, that feature, these features, all of this stuff. What you're doing is saying, I'm building plan A through Z because I don't know what's coming

for me when I get there, right. And so when you're when you're listening to this, think about that for your East coating, You're like, Oh, I'm gonna go during the rut to this state, so I'm only going to find, you know, the best most badass looking terrain traps and funnels and whatever out there. And then you get there and it's one of those ruts where it's eighty degrees in the day and you know, the NonStop chasing that you were counting on isn't happening. What's what's your fallback?

Right right? Like? Or the other thing that I would say on this note is, you know, let's say, you know, you talked about how you want to plan your timing around being home for the best hunting during the rut in Iowa. Absolutely makes sense. Right now. What if I draw Iowa and I go, Man, I can't wait to go hunt that Iowa Rut. But I'm on public land in a place where there isn't very much public land.

Now my plan might look a lot different than yours, because you you might be going into a situation where you're like, I'm not dealing with public land pressure, but I could be if I planned it around that. So I show up, not only is it me and every other nonresident there who wants that Iowa rut, but all the residents are like, hell, yeah, we're getting onto the woods now. So you have to think about that stuff

when you're looking at this. It's not just like how can I how can I preserve my best hunting at home while still having this cool experience over the road, Like what are you going to deal with? And you mentioned, you know, the gun seasons or something like that, Like when you when you plan this stuff, man, you know there's youth seasons out there. There's there's early antlerless seasons that you know you don't you won't have them in

your state the same way. And then you travel somewhere and it's like, okay, now you got to wear blaze orange, or now you can't shoot bucks for four days, or now you can't hunt state owned public land. All of that research. You got to do that stuff ahead of

time so you don't get surprised when you get out there. Yeah, or there's antelope hunters or pheasant hunters or small game hunters or coyote hunters doing this exact same thing that you're trying to do, but they're they're doing it louder, and they're doing you know what I mean, like yep. I can just remember when I got bit by that dog. I had put all this time into this one particular piece scouting it, and I go, dude, I'm gonna get it. I'm gonna get back there. It's gonna be money. And

it was. It was good. But the first sit, I'm sitting there with a spotting scope waiting for all these deer to come off off private back down into the bedding, and that morning here comes this cocker spaniel or whatever. He was just jumping into the weeds and busting pheasants out, busting deer out left and right. And it took a day or two for that proper, you know, for that area to recover. And so That's one thing that you

got to think about too. It's like, Okay, I'm traveling, is there any other seasons for any other game open as well, because that can have an impact as well. Big ten, that's a good point. And that's a special concerning if you travel to a state like South Dakota, where the pheasant opener is like a religious experience, like

it's a it's a different level. And you know, I mean, or you can see this, you know, we we dealt with this in North Dakota a lot where the archery opener would coincide with the resident once in a lifetime elk hunt or or or some people could draw that tag. So what you ended up with was people who are only going to draw that tag once in their lifetime.

And everybody's uncle and brother and cousin comes along to help them scout and glass, and they're pushing and it's a it's even though you're like, oh, it shouldn't be that busy because they're only selling this many tags to hunters like me. If you don't know what else is going on there, you can be in for a real surprise.

And and I would say on top of that, one of the things you know, like when you're talking about you know you you're like, this is my spot, I'm watching it, or the deer here, this is going to happen, and then something like that happens where a thousand hunter comes through or whatever. If you don't have that backup built into your plan ahead of time, there's lost time right there. Like there's a mental aspect of it that sucks, and there's just a logistical aspect of like now what

do I do? And I've told this on here a whole bunch of times, but I'll tell it again quick. The last time I went to Oklahoma, I put all my money on red Man. I was like, this spot I'm going to is several thousand acres. It's gonna be all I need. And I drove all the way down there with a buddy of mine and we set up camp and started looking for deer. And it was a

ghost town. I mean, it was brutal, and I didn't have a backup, and so I'm sitting there in this kind of like isolated region going We're not this isn't gonna happen here, and We're halfway through our hunt, and so we just we started looking for new places to go and called an audible and drove four hours to a totally different area and we got lucky. We ended up killing some deer there and it ended up being

pretty good. But that was lucky. You know, like you don't you don't want to get into a situation where you're like, this is this is it. I'm camping here, I'm hunting here. This is all I'm gonna do without at least considering where would you go if that place sucks for some reason. And there's one more trend I really want to mention here is a lot of people try to hit openers. So South Dakota has the nonresident

opener or um. Certain states have the like the hunter the residents can hunt before that, but non residents can't hunt until a certain date on a couple of these states. And so what we do then is we go in there and I just wait for that mass. The first year I went, it was okay, but I was running

into a lot of other hunters. You let that, you let some of those dates slide a week, or you go before a certain holiday or after a certain holiday, then it opens up because everybody what hunters are almost like animals. We trend. We tend to do the same thing over and over again. Humans do that as well, and so if you can find your niche outside of the trends that other hunters are using, I feel that just gives you a one up compared to everybody else

big time. That's that's a really good point. I mean, we saw that with a couple of the you know, the Dakotas and a couple of western states in Kentucky when the velvet thing got really hot and everybody wanted their velvet buck. And you go hunt those states on the opener, you know, which is typically going to be like a September one deal and it's like overrun with people. But you go back three weeks later or four weeks later, and you can have the place to yourself. And that's

that's something. You know, I mentioned that with Iowa and the planning down there, and you know, I'm looking at I'm gonna apply again down there now because I have enough points where I might be able to get into that unit I hunted the last time, and I'll probably go in mid October for the majority of my hunt because I'm hunting public land and I know the opener will have a bunch of people out just because it will, and I know the rut will have a bunch of

people out. And if I want to catch deer and kind of work against the deer and not have to worry about tons of competition, there's going to be a window there in October where people just kind of they take their foot off the gas a little bit. And you see that. I see that in northern Wisconsin, where I hunt a lot too. My best hunts on public land there are always during the lull, just because people

aren't out there. So you gotta I know, it sucks to plan a kind of an expensive hunt that you gotta take some PTO four and whatever and then be like, man, I don't really want to go hunt the second week October. But it's like, yeah, well, I mean you gotta, like you kind of got to make an educated guess what

you're going to get into. Pressure wise. Yeah, And so I can I can say this for many and I know for archers or bow hunters, you're you're up against your state's gun season, right, and sometimes that comes in early November, and sometimes, luckily for Iowa, doesn't even happen until December. So but one thing that I've noticed is people will blow their load real easy, real fast, and then they'll leave. Okay, so November first hits in Iowa.

The next five to seven days are crazy. Everybody. Everybody comes the first week, everybody, even the resident hunters. First week. Dude, if people are more patient, they let that, they let some of this slide. Let everybody else blow their load. Then you come in and and and I feel like you you'll have the woods would be empty on certain certain times. Yep. And that's that's a good point too.

And I'm starting to I don't know, maybe this is just because I've spent so much time on public land, but I'm starting to think the second and third week in November generally are maybe a better time to kill a big one than that first week. Absolutely, and I'll say this trail camera data for me proves that. Now. I'm also in this category where I want to hop in and I want to I want to strike while the iron is hot on a local, local deer. And this is this is when I have tons of information available.

But one thing that I've noticed in some of these these closer to home whitetail states that I've hunted is once you get past peak breeding, then things open up, and then shell camera camera data indicates tons of deer that I've never seen before cruising through. And that is when I have my trail camera pictures of my biggest bucks. Yep, yeah, I've I've noticed that up in Wisconsin where I hunt too. If I leave a camera up one of my properties,

it's wild. It's not like a ton of consistent movement, but the deer that show up are real interesting to me, right, And it's you know, it's not like it's not even up there. It's not even one a day for sure, but in those that week or two, it'll be a couple where you're just like, man, I wish I had been there, like enough to get you to go spend all day sits there on the off chance that today is the day, right right? Absolutely? Yeah, all right? What else? Uh?

You you sleep in your truck a lot when you go on these trips. Why Number one? Uh? Money? Right? I mean a hotel room even even off season in some of these states are they're they're pretty cheap. But my truck is zero dollars a night, and so I have just found a real comfortable air mattress I've found a comfortable you know, pads and and I can get really comfortable in the back of my truck. I got

a really good sleeping bag this year. I upgraded my sleeping bag and it was crazy expensive, but still it's cheaper than sleeping in a hotel room. You know how expensive that my I bought a Western mountaineering bag made in America. I think it was six eighty five, so real expensive for a sleeping bag. Yeah, but that replaced the caught that that prevented me from having to get

a hotel room. Very comfortable in the back of my bed, and I'm spending less on gas money because I'm sleeping on the road or on some of these states, you can park on the pub look and you can stay there overnight, and so that's what I'm doing. And it

just it's it's less travel. I get more sleep because I'm not driving too and from a hotel room and I pop up all my stuff's ready, get and go and then come back, eats upp or go to bed, and so I'm getting a ton of I'm getting more sleep, I'm spending less energy, I'm spending less on gas, I'm spending less on hotel rooms and I pack a cooler full of all my food and I'm good to go. And I mean I can get out there for seven

days if I wanted to. Yeah, there's a good way to look at that or these trips is the more money you can spend before you go, the more you'll save when you do go, because if you plan your food out and you know, the lodging is a huge one and staying in a hotel. I'm so biased against that for bow hunts or big game hunts. I just not only because it is expensive, but it's just a pain in the ass, like getting you know, drive into wherever you're gonna hunt, like you're talking about, as opposed

to being set up there. There's a lot of reasons

that camping is better. And on top of that, a lot of the places you want a deer hunt, there's not going to be a place to stay all that close, you know, and so that might influence you know, where you go and just getting you know, so I know people are going to listen to that and go, it's crazy that you spent that much money on a sleeping bag, and it's like, yeah, that's a lot of money, but that's a buy once cry want situation that you'll use out west and you'll use it for years, and or

you could take six hundred and eighty five bucks or whatever it is and buy like I'm I'm using a wall tent. It's kind of like a I guess I don't know how many people it's supposed to hold, but it's a white duck outdoors wall tent. And that thing was I think it was seven hundred bucks. So like

similar in price to that sleeping bag. But I can set it up by myself, have an entire cook station, have an awesome place to sleep, dry out my clothes, everything, and it's built like a freaking tank, like it's not it's gonna last me years. And so you think about that and go, yeah, okay, Well, seven hundred bucks to drop on a piece of camping equipment is a lot. Man. You can spend seven hundred dollars at hotels real fast and then drive in to the burger joint or wherever

to get your food. All of that stuff adds up so much compared to eating some sandwiches or whatever back at camp. And so a lot of times when people say, you know, like I could never afford to do this like I don't know, maybe right, maybe, like everybody's situation is different, but there are ways where you can do some of this stuff. And you don't need a seven hundred dollars sleeping bag, but having good camping gear is

real freaking nice for this stuff. And so there's certain pieces that really seem to matter and certain some that just don't. But overall, you know, like you're kind of making an investment into a whole bunch of good experiences and you're saving money other ways, and so it's it's worth it to plan that stuff out and understand what you're gonna ge into. Yeah, and don't get me wrong,

even this year. So to piggyback off what you just said from a cost standpoint, that's that six hundred and eighty five dollars sleeping bag allowed me to save I want to say, a thousand to a fifteen hundred dollars over Nebraska and South Dakota on hotel rooms. And when I was in South Dakota, I only stayed in a hotel room one night because the temperature dropped to like five And I'm just like, I'm closer to a hope.

I'll put in the thirty minutes drive in the morning, just so I can shower, just so I'm not like fridgid cold, and I just refreshed. And that was the last that last day of a hunt on my way back to Iowa. I also like to use hotels as backups. We got caught in a rainstorm in Nebraska to two years ago, I think it was two years ago, and it came out of nowhere. We weren't prepared. We got drenched.

So we went to a hotel and we we took a shower, we dried all of our clothes out, and and it was it was good to have that as a backup, because from a convenient standpoint, trying to air dry wet clothes sucks if you don't have a dryer, right and so, But on top of that, man, it's one of those things like I just love the silence. I love looking up at the stars. I love everything about that. That minimalistic approach to an not a state

hunt me too. And I honestly think, I mean, this might sound crazy, but I honestly feel like I sleep better and have a better hunt when i'm you know, because you get back and whatever time it's dark, you know. Six thirty seven o'clock, you make some food, and then it's like there's nothing to do. It's not like you're in a hotel watching TV and BS and with your buddies or whatever. It's like, well, I might as well go to bed because I got to get up at

you know, four thirty two more morning or whatever. And I feel like you get into it's a little bit easier to just like get into the rhythm of the hunt when you're already there and you're in camp and your packs next to you, and you get it ready that night and you wake up in the morning and make your coffee and oatmeal whatever, and you go and it's just like fewer things to go wrong, fewer things to distract you. Just it's it's a really good move.

And I know people. I know people are interested in camping on these hunts, and it just takes a lot of planning. Like I just say that, like you gotta know where you can camp, Like is there a campground close by or I on that public that you can just dump a tent down and go. Understand that before

you go. Again, the work ahead of time pays off once you get out there, because then it's just like, I know what's legal, I know what to do, I know where I'm going, and if this doesn't work out, I know I can pull up my camp quick and go forty miles down the road and restart the process. And the more the more that you just handle those details ahead of time, the better these trips go. Yep. Absolutely, Man, It's actually making me really want to go gamp and

hunt right now. And I I kind of have been not like super stoked for that over the last few years because I did it so much for so long. But when you have your system down and you've got some good plans in place to go hunt here or there, it gets pretty exciting. And I mean, I think we should maybe wrap up on this. That's one of the things like we don't talk about. I just uh, you know. Back in the end of January, two buddies and I

went down to Florida for four days and fished. We've never done never done a fish and trip like that. You know, we we you know, drive here and fish whatever, but never like we're going to a destination. We're gonna fish saltwater. And one of the things that was so fun about it was just planning it and like talking about what what are we gonna buy for lures? What are we gonna bring there? You bring a cast net? What are we doing? And that aspect of a trip.

It's like way underrated. It's just fun to have something to look forward to. And that's that's why the timing of this podcast is good, because when you're stuck in March and it sucks and we're still getting snowstorms and all this bs, it's fun to start thinking like, man, I'm gonna make this hunt happen in six months or seven months whatever, and start it now. It gives you something to do toward the process, which is pretty fulfilling and can help you kill deer, you know, half a

year away. Yeah, I agree, Tony. I'm looking forward to it as well. What are we going to go on a hunt together? Well, maybe I'll go to Oklahoma with you. You need somebody to go along, let's do it. I don't care. I mean, I'm literally right on the way for you to come down, right are you? You're southwest Minnesota though? Right? No? No, no, I'm up north of the City's okay anyway, you just take the same highway.

We'll meet in Demoine and then and then we'll just go. Yeah, I can get to Demin in about three hours, three and a half hours, and I'm here pretty familiar with that route of getting down there. Um yeah, man, that would be a blast. Dan, This is this is always so much fun to talk to you. Let everybody who's listening know where they can find your podcast and the seventeen thousand other podcasts that you're involved in. My name

is Dan Johnson. I was born in nineteen eighty uh No, nine finger Chronicles, man, just look it up, nine finger Chronicles podcast on the Sportsman's Empire podcast network and we have, like like Tony said, man, my podcast, The Hunting Gear podcast I also host is one of twenty three different RSS feeds on the Sportsman's Empire podcast network, all outdoor related, all hunting related, fishing, trapping. You know, you, if you're an outdoorsman, you're gonna love the content that we put out.

Man ton of podcasts there under the network. And we should say this, if you don't mind listening to me talk and you like listening to Dan talk, we do podcasts together fairly often over there. And the wonderful thing about Dan's podcast is I can say a lot of other things on there that I can't say here because

I don't want to get fired. So if you if you want to hear a little bit more of an uncensored version of these kind of podcasts along with mostly zero talk about actual deer hunting and talk about Nintendo and nineties bands and all kinds of stuff, Dan's podcast is the way to go. Dan, thanks again, man, It's always a pleasure, buddy. Appreciate it, Tony. That's it for this week, folks. Be sure to tune in next week

for some more whitetail goodness. This has been the Wired to Hunt podcast, and I'm your guest host, Tony Peterson. As I always, thank you so much for listening. And if you're looking for more white tail content, be sure to check out the mediator dot com slash wired to see a pile of new articles each week by Mark my self and a whole slew of white tail addicts, or head on over to the wire da Hunt YouTube channel to view the weekly content we put up