Ep. 696: Don Higgins On Big Old Buck Personalities and Hunting Tactics

the biggest oldest bucks he's ever hunted. All right, Welcome to the Wire to Hunt podcast, brought to you by First Light and First Light's Cameell for Conservation initiative in which a portion of every sale of their Spector Camel pattern, which is their whitetail camera pattern, a portion of every one of those sales is going back to the National Dear Association to help them on their mission to make things better for deer and deer hunters, which is pretty

darn cool in my opinion, and I think today's podcast is gonna be pretty darn cool. Two folks, we've got Don Higgins on the show. I'm guessing you know Don. He's been on the show a handful of different times over the years, including famously a few years back, he came on this show and called his shot. He said, Hey, this coming season, I'm gonna kill a two hundreds buck from this specific blind and here's how'm gonna do it. And you know what he did. He went ahead and

did exactly that. So today he is a perfect guest for our series that we're in the midst of, which is all about big old bucks. It is about those oldest of old deer getting to behind the scenes look into the minds of how these mature, mature deer act, what they do, why they do it, how they do it, and what all that means for us as deer hunters. And I think there's the few other people in the world that have probably had as much experience with really old bucks as Don Higgins. Don has been a very

long time outdoor writer. He's written about deer and deer hunting for years and years and years across a bunch of the different popular publications. These days, you can find his work pretty frequently in North American whitetail. He has now developed a whole series of different content offerings of his own. He's got the Chasing Giants podcast, he has the whitetail Master Academy online video course. He's got a

website over there on Higgins outdoors dot com. He's got all sorts of stuff that is all framed around sharing his experiences hunting and studying and managing and improving habitat for big old whitetail deer. And that's the game plan today is to kind of get into all of the interesting lessons he's learned from those biggest, oldest bucks. So he's hunted over the years. What kind of habits have they had, what were their behaviors, what were their tendencies,

what kind of little personality traits has he noticed? And you know, how can we take advantage of all that? So that's what we're talking about today now. As I have mentioned on our previous podcast in this series, I want to make it abundantly clear that although today we are talking about big old deer and we are celebrating how cool they are and how much fun they are to try to understand and to chase and to hunt, and there's nothing wrong with that. There's also nothing wrong

with having different goals. There's nothing wrong with wanting to kill the first dear you see, or shoot a young buck, or shoot a bunch of two or three year olds. Whatever it is that lights your fire, whatever it is that makes this fun for you. Do that. Do not feel any pressure to, you know, chase the same goals that somebody else does. Do not feel any pressure to, you know, kill a big deer because everybody else seems to be doing it. Do your thing, hunt your own hunt,

and most important, do what is fun. Make sure it's legal, make sure it's ethical, make sure it's fun. And I'll give an example. I'm actually leaving tonight to go on a hunting trip and I'm gonna be hunting deer in Wisconsin on a brand new property I've never touched foot on before. I don't know what I'm doing out there, and I'm just gonna be focusing on having fun. I'm not gonna try to kill some big, giant buck. I'm

not trying to kill a five year old. Hey, if I see a deer like that and I get a chance, awesome. But I am just gonna be going out there to have fun. I want to kill a dough or two to help out the landowner, and otherwise I'm just gonna see what gets me excited. If there's a nice two or three year old buck that comes by, and the hunt has been going in such a way that this is an opportunity that I can't pass up on, then heck, yeah,

I'm gonna shoot that deer. I'm gonna be happy. Or maybe I'm gonna see a bunch of deer like that and I'm gonna say, Nope, that's not what I want to shoot right now. Just given where I'm at, what's going on, how I'm feeling, maybe I just want to pass.

Maybe I just want to watch those deer. I'm gonna see how the week goes, I'm gonna see how the days go, and we're just gonna feel it out, and when it comes right down to it, I just want this to be an enjoyable experience, getting the deer hunting season kicked off, spending some time with some good friends and enjoying ourselves and the outdoors and our company being out there chasing these critters, learning stuff, and maybe put a little vendis in the freezer along the way. So

I just want to make sure that's really clear. Even though we're focusing on these big old bucks, there's a lot bigger things here in the larger scheme of things. So that all said. If you do like Big Old Bucks, though, this is gonna be the podcast for you. Don has got a lot to share. We're gonna get right to that podcast here after a couple very quick updates. Update number one, make sure you're following one week in November over on YouTube. That's our new series on the Meat

Eater YouTube channel. I believe episode four came out this week, so you are getting to now see day one, two, three, and four of our seven day rut hunt that we had last year. And it's following my hunt in Nebraska and Ohio and then the hunts of my buddies Tony Peterson, Spencer Newhart, Klay Nukomb and Giannis Putellis. And I feel like day four was like this kind of day of not debauchery, but but debacles, I guess is maybe the right word. So if I remember this day right, we

just had to kind of laugh at ourselves. And so be sure to check that one out and all the rest that are come over these next couple of weeks. Another update, if you haven't yet, make sure you're tuning into Reut Fresh Radio, which comes out every Wednesday, in which we are checking in with four or five deer hunters from across different parts of the country to find out what's happening right now, how's the deer activity been, how are current conditions impacting deer movement, what kinds of

tactics they're working right now? You know, what are the deer doing, what are they feeding on, how are they relating to this weather or whatever it might be. You can learn a lot of really fresh hot intel that can help you on your upcoming hunts, so make sure you're tuning into that. And then finally, I think this is going to come out just before I head to Missouri or not Missouri, Mississippi for our fifth Working for

Wildlife Tour event. So I just want to send out a big thank you to everyone who's signed up for that. I can't wait to see you guys on the twenty third in Mississippi. We're gonna be volunteering down there to plant fruit trees, plant food plots, removing vasive species, and do a handful of other good things on public land down there to make it better for wildlife, to make it better for hunters and all sorts of critters out there. So it's gonna be a good time. It's gonna be

good work. I'm pumped about it. Thank you for being a part of it. Down there, all my Southern folks, whether it's Alabama, Mississippi, wherever you're coming from. Let's get to work. And now with that out of the way, we've got to get to something else, which is this really interesting podcast with mister Don Higgins. And I mentioned at the top he predicted a few years ago, he predicted that he would kill a two hundreds buck from a specific stand at a specific time when he was

on the show back in seventeen or eighteen. I'm gonna give you a little preview right now. I asked Don to call his shot again, so we do have a prediction. At the end of this podcast, Don will make his prediction for this season. It's very interesting and I'm excited to see whether or not he can prove this one to be true as well. Sure you stay tuned in all the way to the end this great conversation with

Don Higgins. Let's get to it all right here with me now on the line back again is mister Don Higgins. Thank you, Don for being here.

had a reunion here and talk through things. But when I was thinking back to those last conversations we had on here, I realized that we left things on like a really, really high note, because I think the last time we did one of our main shows together was when you were either discussing the outcome or when you were calling your shots on how you were going to say, Hey, I'm gonna kill a two hundred inch buck this year, I'm gonna shoot it from this blind's gonna happen like this,

And we might have done one after that when you actually did it. But the long story short of it is that you called it, you actually killed the buck you said you were gonna kill. So with all that being said, I feel there's a lot of pressure on you now today because you're back and we're all gonna be expecting whatever you tell us today to be exactly what happens this season. So are you ready for that kind of pressure? Done?

I shot him. Yeah, and I seen him for the first time ever and got a shot and killed him. So you brought me good luck last time. I hope you can do that again.

But you came to mind this month because we're doing this series all about the biggest oldest bucks, kind of getting behind the scenes and into the minds of those deer, of those super mature deer, of those old, gnarly kind of ghosts, and you're one of those guys who has perfected, I think, as close as you can the art of chasing that kind of deer. You know, those examples you just mentioned being perfect, perfect illustrations of that, you know, killing those two deer back in I guess what was

seventeen you said? And it seems like you're back on the same kind of path now again this year. Maybe. So my first question before you're done, before we kind of dive into the meat and potatoes of all this, is, uh, how do you feel about this season coming into it? We're just a couple of weeks away from opening day there in Illinois. I heard your recent Buck Forecast podcast. It sounds like you're a little bit maybe apprehensive, but

I want to hear it straight from you. How are you feeling going in this season as far as your situation specifically and maybe the larger you know, your larger take two?

was due to the drought. We had an extreme drought in May and June when those bucks, you know, are really set in the stage for that antler growth for the year, and I think that set them all back throughout much of the Midwest, because I've been hearing that from a lot of guys. But for me, individually, this buck that was mid one eighties last year, he's probably right there about the one eighty mark, with give or take an inch or two one hundred and eighty inches.

He's six years old. This year, he's We're going to get him shot. And I say we because I've got two young grandsons that are going to hunt in the U season and they'll be able to use a rifle, straight wall cartridge rifle and if one of the if he steps out in front of one of them boys, they're going to get the green light and go ahead and put the hammer down, you know. So what I'm really excited about is that I've got some young bucks. And when I say young, I'm talking four and younger

coming up on my property. That show at a world of potential, and I want to get these older bucks off the farm, get them shot, and allow these younger bucks to have the run of the place. Ideally, I would like to get these bucks shot in October. There's two in particular. There's also a big four by four that's probably one hundred and seventy inches. So those two bucks i'd like to get off the farm in October before the rut heats up. And I really don't even

care if I'm the one that shoots them. I'll have guests here, my grandsons. I'm going to keep everybody away until that youth season, which I think is about the seventh, eighth, ninth, or somewhere in there that weekend in October. But after that we're gonna be hitting it hard. If I can take a friend or somebody along with me, I will and allow them to shoot those bucks. To be honest, the whole deer management thing on the farm, I just feel like I've taken this farm to a level that

I never thought I ever could. And these young bucks that are coming up. I think, in all honesty, I think three of them have the potential to maybe be two hundred inches. Now I'm not saying they will, maybe none of them will, but I think they've got enough going on on their head that they could potentially get there with some age. And I want to do everything I can to keep those bucks alive. And you know, I just turned sixty years old about three weeks ago,

and I got a wall full of big deer. I don't need to pile on a bunch more deer on my wall. And if I can, you know, make someone season by allowing them to shoot some of these bucks, I get a big thrill out of that. I've never been a guy that to stack up numbers of deer. It's just not been my thing. And nothing against people that try to all over the country and you know, shoot three or four or five or however many big deer every year. That's great for them, if that's their thing.

It's just never been mine. And uh, I think once I shoot a buck, the work starts, and you know, then you gotta process that there, get him out of the woods and everything else. You're putting pressure on your land, and then you gotta you gotta search for your next target buck, and I like find. After I've found that target buck, that's when I really start having fun. Is kind of putting the pieces together, you know, until it's actually time to go after him.

obsessing over and chasing after. Is there any possibility there's a deal like that out there still or does it seem like this gonna be a waiting game for these other bucks to get to next year?

a five by five. But the last two years and including that this year, be I guess the third year he's lost those G four's on both sides and just become a clean four by four. That buck needs shop. But he's really not one that's going to put too much pressure on these young bucks during the rut because he just isn't here during the rut. And then there's another buck that shows up late and the weather has

to be really bad or he doesn't show up. I mean, we need some snow and really cold temperatures, and then he'll show up for the food, and again he doesn't show up till late. So he's not one I'm real really too worried about. He's probably maybe one hundred and sixty inches and he's probably six seven years old. But the big four by four that I mentioned, it's one hundred and seventy inches. He's a five year old. But he's just never going to be more than what he

is right now. Yea, So time for him to go.

little bit. I know Bill Wink's wrote about that in the past, and I've heard others talk about it, and I agree one hundred percent that now it might not happen at six with every buck, but six seven, somewhere in there, their home range kind of shrinks down. They don't cover as much territory. They found their safe zone, their sanctuary, if you will, and they start moving within that area during daylight a little more than they did

the two years before. I think the toughest bucks to kill are probably four and five year olds.

They they're in that sw spot where they're not dumb teenagers anymore, but they're not old farts that just want to lay on the couch, right. Yeah.

detect danger. They're not moving in daylight everywhere, but within that small core area, they seem to move more in daylight.

going to disperse from their birth area. The more densely wooded or the more cover, the shorter the distance they're going to disperse from their birth area. But I think that when those yearling bucks disperse, some of those bucks are just lucky, and they happen to disperse to a property or a no hunting area or whatever where the hunting pressure is not as much and they survive to

the next age class one percent on luck. And what I've tried to do with the management of my property, and we kind of got into a little bit earlier when I talked about those young bucks, that I want to make it. What I've tried to do is make my property a place that attracts a lot of those young bucks. I want to give them the security so they're safe when they get here, they're not going to get shot. I want to give them all the food they want, a wide variety of food. Food diversity is huge.

I want to give them the security of freedom of human intrusion. I want to give them large blocks of sanctuary cover that's never going to have a human step foot in it. And I think once a young buck finds a place like that, he's got the food he's got to cover, and then obviously there's going to be does there. I think you can hold a lot more of those young bucks. And then from that point it's

kind of a matter of managing your buck herd. And you know, this is one of the things that one of the reasons I like doctor Strickland's doctor Bronson Strickland from the MSU Dear Lab his research so well is because his research absolutely backs up my approach to management. And so when we get these bucks staying here as yearlings and two year olds, and then once they hit three, you've got a pretty good idea of what that buck's

going to be later in life. I mean, the best yearling bucks as far as racks, are going to be the best two year olds. Most of the time they are going to be the best three year olds. So when they hit three, you got a pretty good idea of what that buck is going to be when he matures. And what I've tried to do is bring in guests and shoot a lot of three year olds that are at the lower end of their age class, the best bucks in each age class, I want to protect them,

and starting at three years old. Now there's a lot of those bucks that I mean, they're wild deer, and we can hunt them as hard as we want. That doesn't that's no guarantee we're going to kill them. But those bucks that are on the hit list as three year olds are the worst three year olds. And then we allow the best ones in each age class to move on up. And you know, that's been my approach to you know, having a farm that produces some top end bucks, how.

maybe you're shooting some dough sometimes too. If if you're trying to do that, do you worry about educating that top end three and a half here, Let's say they're out in the food source at the same time and you've got a dough and he want to shoot some does but also your your high potential three year olds out there, your high potential four year olds out there. Are you worried about shooting a deer while he's out there and spooking him off? Same thing with a big

bully buck, Like, is that in your mind? Is that making your shoot or don't shoot decisions in any way more complicated?

within the sanctuary. But I've got some stands on the edge of the sanctuary that I hunt with various wind directions, and there's various terrain features that pinch those deer up closer to the edge as they travel throughout that sanctuary. And I won't shoot a call buck if you will, And I hate to use that term management buck. I say, I won't shoot a management buck within the sanctuary that they've got to step out of the sanctuary to get shot.

The sanctuary remains a sanctuary for the bucks that I want to raise or want to move on up. I want them to always feel safe there and never feel pressure there.

or really good mature bucks that you can stack on your piece. In addition to, you know, taking out some management up bucks to open up slots I guess we'll call them. Is there anything else with habitat or hunting that you're doing that allows that to possibly happen to get not just one big mature buck, but maybe you can get two or three or what's that max? Have you found two per one hundred acres or two hundred acres. I'm curious about that whole set of ideas well.

And I think that's one of the things that helps me anyway to target specific bucks is that as I watch these bucks grow up and I put the pieces of the puzzle together as they're growing up, by the time they're mature, I know what they're going to do and before they do it each fall, and that allows me to be a step ahead of that buck instead of a step behind him when I go to hunting. So it comes down to the individual personalities. There's some

bucks that absolutely they don't want to be here. I've got too many deer, too many bucks on my place, and I get bucks that come along that don't like it here, and so they will go to outlying areas. Now they will visit, they'll come through here and look for doze, and in the winter when food's tough to find, they'll show up. But they really don't like spending a lot of time around all these other deer. But there's

other individual bucks that don't mind it at all. And I'm talking a chair box four or five, six, seven years old. They'll walk out and it doesn't matter. It could be November and two or three of them will walk out together into a food plot to look for dose. They don't mind each other's company. And those are the ones that I think are a lot easier for me because I got a fairly small property. If I had

several hundred acres, it'd be different. And the other thing I've tried to do is, besides diversifying my food sources, I've really tried to diversify my bedding cover into you know, I've got the switch grass fields, I've got well, i got three different getting ready to plant next spring, I'll plant my fourth different field and switch grass. So you know I've got one place on the farm. It's in a Actually there's two that I can think of up the top of my head that are within these switch

grass fields. I've always got a good buck betted there. One of them is in a corner where two miscantis edges form a corner in the switchgrass, and there always seems to be a good buck betted there. Another one is there there's a kind of a warsh throughout the switchgrass field, and on one hillside there's a spot where

there always seems to be a good buck bed. And by breaking it up like that and really thick cover helps too, because you know, a buck is betted in that switch grass, he can't see, you know, ten feet in front of him, and yeah, he knows what's around him, and he can smell other deer and whatever, but he doesn't see him like he would in like an open

wooded type cover. So you know, diversity of betting cover helps, and then breaking it up, you know, into different sections of betting cover so that you know, one buck is betted into this switchgrass patch and then over there's another switchgrass patch with another buck. And I've I've learned a lot since starting to manage this farm thirty years ago or put it together, and it kind of blew out, blew away some of the ideas that people have in

regards to the management of bucks. And and that's one of the things is I'm holding way more bucks than I ever thought I could.

So I could actually have up to ten bucks four years old and older during the late season.

close as you get to a rule. I guess you mentioned one being like the tighter core area, But is there anything else that does stand out is pretty darn consistent with those deer?

manage a property. And you know, I know, Mark, we've talked before we started recording here that you just got on the Whitetail Master Academy, and we just released a video a day or two ago titled the Four Cornerstones of building a world class white tail Property, and that's exactly what we're talking about here. And I think one huge key is, and it's the number one on the video, just to give everybody a preview, is the layout of the property. And the layout of the property is something

that you can do nothing about. It's what you're given, its terrain features, it's how it connects to other properties around it, and that's huge. Every property has a ceiling. You know that the top end box that you're ever going to grow there is the ceiling. And some properties have a lot higher ceiling than others. And when I started, I never realized that my property the ceiling is two

hundred inches plus. I just didn't see that coming. Other properties in other areas of the country the top end maybe one hundred and twenty inches. And no matter what you do as a land manager, you're never going to get past that. And that's often due to the layout of the property, how it connects with what's around it. I mean, if you've got forty acres and you got

extreme hunting pressure on all sides of you. Guys that are shooting anything that walks, you're going to have a hard time, you know, getting box past about two years old. And you got to start. When you want to build a world class property, you got to start with a property that lays out good.

consistently stayed away from humans, they become comfortable there. I've wondered with that kind of deer that demands an absence of human pressure once they get to that age six, seven, eight years old, I'm curious if you've found them to be more or less impacted by pressure at that point, because part of me thinks, like, well, if a deer seven or eight and he's found his little bedding spot and his little sanctuary and he's been safe there over the years, it might be pretty hard to push that

deer out of there because he knows this place works for him, like it's worked for him for years and years. My assumption might be, like, man, if I did have to get aggressive, it'd probably take a lot in a consistent amount of pressure to finally push deer out of there or to blow them out, because the years have proven this to be safe for him. So that's one assumption. But maybe the flip side is true, which is man, they're so sensitive to it, that's the only reason why

they survived to this point. They're not going to tolerate anything. What's your experience been with how a really mature buck handles, you know, some kind of intrusion or an aggressive hunt into his sanctuary when he's seven, or you make a mistake and he smells you on the edge or something like that. What have you seen in those situations.

wants to react. Is he wanted to just put his head down to the ground and let you pass by. Does he want to you know, skip away, you know, keep his head low to the ground and trot into the brush. What's he want to do? And as long as he escapes that encounter, he feels confident in his method that if he lays tight and lets you pass, he feels he just gains confidence in that approach to danger. And as time goes on, as the years roll by, he becomes more and more likely to lay tight and

let danger pass. If he flees, then he's ben. He lives because he fleed, he becomes more likely to flee. And I think it's a lot of times these bucks are they've got a memory, you know, they remember where they encounter danger. For example, they remember where they smelled that guy in his tree stand, or they seen that guy climbing a tree or whatever, and they file that away for later use. And I think to some degree, we can turn that around against them. We can condition

them to certain human activities on a property. And it's actually putting no pressure whatsoever. For example, working food plots, they hear the guy coming on the tractor and they know he's in this one little area for a while and then he leaves. You know, they get used to that. So I think we can we condition these bucks as they're younger and growing up to react in certain ways to different forms of pressure.

I want to go in silently. I don't want somebody dropping me off on a tract or anything like that. I want to get in as silent as possible and undisturb or and have undisturbed deer you know around me.

of the mountain. I want to talk about what that buck's life looks like, and how he chooses a bed, and when he gets up and moves off to feed, and how he travels to a food source, how he chooses what food source he wants to go to in a given day. Can you walk me through a hypothetical of what you've seen or learned about how a deer

like that might operate in a day like that? And I guess and one qualifier sorry don specifically king in on like how the choices he makes are things he does are different than that three year old or four year old buck.

can't see three feet in front of his face. But he wants to be someplace where he knows the likelihood of him encountering danger is very low. And the other thing he wants is he wants an opportunity of danger does come along to be able to escape that danger, so he's got a direction he can flee. I know a lot of in more heavily wooded areas, bucks like to bed out on ridge points and sit and laying

up on that ridge point. You know, they can survey all the terrain around them, and danger comes from one direction, they just bail off the ridge the opposite direction. You know, he's covering all his bases and that that's the area

where he wants to bed. He also when it comes to getting up from that bed and heading towards food, you know, that's where these older bocks become easier to kill because I think if they've never encountered danger on their route from their bed to their food, they're more likely to take a chance with the wind. And not that they do it very often, but you know, maybe one day out of the month they'll give up the wind to hit that food source. Now, if there's pressure,

they're never going to give it up. Partly, and when he goes to that food he either wants a lot of times if there's heavy cover on one side of that food source, he will run the down wind edge of that food source in the cover, send it as the scent blows out of the food source back towards him to make sure it's safe. And then at some point he'll turn and go right into the wind as he hits that food source. But he wants to use

the wind as much as he can. Know, my favorite setup for hunting a buck is, you know, I want to kill him on purpose. I mean, there's a lot of big bucks to get killed by blind luck every year. But I want to negate the luck factor as much as possible, and I want to I want him to. I want to try to figure what he's going to do,

because that puts the odds in my favor. And if you've got a food source, and you've got a known food source where you suspect he's going to go that afternoon, and you've got a place where you suspect he's bedded that day, he's going to move from from point A to point B, and he wants to have the wind well, instead of giving him the wind straight in his nose as he makes that journey from the bed to the food, if he's got a quartering wind, so it's not straight

in his nose, but it's hitting his nose at an angle. Well, that allows me to get off to the side just enough where my scent is blowing in his direction, but it's blowing off to the side of his direction. So he's actually doing everything that a big buck should to stay alive. But the wind is just enough in your favor that you can be on the right side of the trail and him not sent you. Now, if you was on the other side of the trail, he would

catch it for sure. Yeah, but that quartering nose wind is the ideal situation for killing a mature bog.

because there's just too many deer around. Have you found there to be a certain wind speed that you need to make that work? Do you want it to be pretty high and consistent? Do you avoid really low winds or does any of that matter when choosing a day that you're in a hunt like that? And if that's not the thing, is there anything else you've done to negate the threat? I'm talking about the risk of getting buggered by a dell before your big guy comes in.

time you as you get into the evening. That really becomes a factor, you know, because as things start cooling down, that your sense starts dropping and makes it you know, a lot more likely than anything down wind is going to smell you. But having that your scent going into an area with a low likelihood of a deer encountering it is huge whether it be an open field, and

deer can come out in open fields. But you know, if you've got a prime food source past you, they're they're more likely to go hit that prime food source. And you got to have an idea where the deer coming from and where they're going, a really good idea. But as far as sin elimination products, I think they probably most of them work to some degree, but I don't trust them at all. It's one percent the wind for me. If if a deer, if there's a good wind and the deer's not down wind to me, he's

not gonna smell you. I don't care if you worked in a hog barn all day, if he just it's not gonna happen.

many times on morning hunts. It usually happens right at daylight with a mature buck, and like I said, a lot of times it happens before the sun's even up. We don't even see it happen. But yeah, they will

run the down wind edge that betting cover. And that's one of those deals, you know, where I see and hear stories or whatever occasionally where a guy says, well, I've found where my target buck is betting, So I'm going to go in about three in the morning and I'm gonna get in my stand about three in the morning and beat him to his bed and I'll go

and be waiting there for him. Well that's fine and dandy until he runs the down wind edge in the dark, scent checktion finds you and then vacates the area with that you ever knowing it even happened.

as active, maybe they're a little less daylight active. But then when you reach that other side of the curve six seven eight, now they've gotten overconfident. They've found their safe area. You mentioned that maybe those deer become easier to hunt in a certain way because you know them, you've got years of history, you've developed an understanding of their personality traits. How do you go about keeping track of all that stuff with one of these deer? Is

it all just in your head? Or do you take notes? Do you have a journal? Do you track data and pictures and observations and a spreadsheet or anything like? How do you make sure this stuff isn't just one ear and one out the other.

maybe he was at four and five. But that as that bell curve starts to slope off on the other side, it's gonna it's not gonna be a sharp drop or boom all of a sudden he becomes easy.

whenever it is where you do this whole. I don't know what it looks like for you. For me, it's kind of like those detective movies or threo's, like a thousand pictures on the wall and strings between all the pictures and the guy in the back like pulling his hair out trying to figure it out. What's that look like for you?

I target that buck. And even like a year or two before I'm going to target that buck, I know where my best chance is to kill himr Like I'll know that I've got two or three stands on my farm where my very best odds that killing that deer are and I will wait for the perfect conditions for those stands and slip in and do it, and maybe maybe it's a certain time of the year, you know, Like I know once the bucks first week in November, the bucks are starting to you know, scrape and move

a little bit more. I know I can count on this buck to be at this particular location. And that's he goes back to what I was saying earlier about their certain stands. I just won't shoot a management buck from because I don't want to booger them up for you know, a primary target buck, and so I know where I'm going to kill him, that's the big thing. And then I just wait for the conditions to be

perfect for that location. And there may be two or three of those locations that take totally different conditions to be prime. But whatever it is, I wait for the prime, the prime opportunity and the prime location, and I get in and get it done.

going for here. So if you've got an example you're willing to share, I'd love to hear, like the very specific details like how you're getting in, how you're getting out, what it's set up, why he should come through there, when he should come through there, and what makes that kind of place unique compared to your average run of the mail setup.

stand into a great stand. And sometimes that's using a terrain feature or down trees or whatever to push that buck a little bit closer to the edge, you know, where it's going to push him up to the edge where I can slip in and have a stand and slip in undetected and hunt that stand. And there's pretty high odds that he's going to come within range. Well, in this particular location, I've planted a small grove of

fruit trees in a little opening. It within the sanctuary, and it's close to the edge and on the edge of the sanctuary. I created a sanctuary twenty five thirty years ago, planted pine trees on the edge. There's two rows of pine trees which screens his view out to the open agfields. And i will walk across the open agfield with the wind right in my face. Just as soon as i get to that first row of pines, I'm going right up the ladder into the blind that's

situated between those two rows of pines. And then right in front of that is a handful of pair and apple trees. Probably I'm gonna guess maybe seven or eight trees, but they do produce fruit now they're big enough. And then beyond that, surrounding that little grove of fruit trees is thick prime bedding cover. Well, in previous years, I'll keep a trail camera on that grove of fruit trees.

In previous years, Babe has been there in October in daylight quite frequently, eating pairs and apples before he heads out to the other food plots or agfields to feed after dark. So it's just a prime location where I could not I mean, it's a place where you could sit and see eight or ten bucks in one afternoon. But he's shown me that he's not afraid to come in and feed there in daylight an hour before dark, especially the pairs. He seems to really like those pear trees,

as do a lot of deer. But those there's two bigger pear trees that are right in front of that blind, probably twenty yards, and there is a great opportunity, and he's already moved into that area. I'm getting his pictures right now around that betting area nice and there's a very very good chance that he could be shot right

there out of that mine. But I need a south wind and a fairly steady wind so that if I happen to make a little noise climbing up in that blind, I mean, he's going to be betted within one hundred yards of that blind, in that thick stuff. But a steady south wind will allow me to do that.

he did it the year before. And one of the things I'm debating a lot is trying to understand did he do this because of the date on the calendar, so is this like a time of year thing, or did he do this because of a other variable like a weather condition, wind direction, something like that. And So what I've found sometimes is I'll be looking at a hunt coming up and I'm like, man, this buck daylighted

for two days during this first week of December. Let's say, so I see like a possible annual pattern kind of thing. He moved back in this area in December, so there's an opportunity there. But what if the weather doesn't match or is not that good, or what if the wind is very different than what it was last year during that period? Is it worth trying the right time of year to catch the pattern even if the conditions don't match up, or if the conditions are a little bit

risky or something like that. That what's your take on that?

He's going to be in that location. Now, whether he's going to be on his feet, whether you just mentioned may you know cause him to remain betted, but he's going to be close to there, and typically you know, he's not just coming through for a day or two. When he moves into a different part of his range,

it's for a period of time. So I know that in the situation I just describe, if he shows up on November fifth, I know that, you know, around November fifth, give or take a few days either side, I've got a really good chance to kill that buck really close to where I got his picture. It doesn't have to be right there at that exact spot, but real close, and the day doesn't have to be the exact day, but real close to that date.

like that. So knowing that you've got a few days on either side that he's going to be in the zone, does that mean typically, let's say November fifth is the day last year, So now you're looking at a couple days on either side of November fifth, Would it just be that you are now looking for when is the day or the two days within that six day window when I've got the right wind and I've got a slightly more advantageous weather system something like that.

I've kept track of him since he was two. He's not five, and I'm looking at what he did last year, and I'm looking at what he did as a three year old. I'm thinking to myself, well, what he did last year is probably value in a lot of ways, because he was four last year. He's five. Now he's you know, was kind of mature last year, so that kind of behavior patterns are probably similar. On the flip side, it's a cornier this year, and it was a corner when he was a three and a half year old.

So do I give more weight to what he did as a three year old, even though he was a crazy three year old, but at the same time that was the year I had corn, Or do I pay attention more to what he did last year because he was a four year old. He's smarter, but it was beans. What would you think about that situation?

around me. If I was in a different type of terrain, then it would probably have a much bigger impact. And that's one thing I've really noticed about that there's some you know, a lot of deer hunters I really respect, big name deer hunters, that their opinions on certain things

differ from my own. And as I've really looked at that, because I know these guys are killing giants too, and they're doing it consistently, and but but yet their opinions on certain things are like one hundred and eighty degrees different than mine. And I think doctor Strickland really opened my eyes on this because he comes from the South.

You know, his region is totally different than mine, and he opened my eyes to the I think it's a fact even that deer habits changed from region to region and works for me in the Midwest and the heavy agriculture region, you know, it might not work near as well for say someone like Dan Infault, who's holding who I have a lot of respect for. I read his stuff, and I mean, you can just tell when you get to a certain point and another deer hunter puts something out.

There's a certain point where you just know this guy is the real deal. Dan Infault is the real deal, but he hunts a totally different type of terrain than I do, and so while his opinion on in mine on certain things may vary, I think it's regional. I don't think it's one of us is right and one of us is wrong. I think it's the difference, is the difference in regions or the type of terrain that

we're hunting. And I just see that with a lot of different guys that I respect that are dropping giants, but yet we don't align one hundred percent on some certain things. And I think it's regional differences. And I think as hunters anybody listen to this podcast, you need to really take that into consideration and not think that this guy is wrong or this guy's right. It's that this guy is right for his region. This guy is right for his region.

that they hunt are a certain way. You know, there's just so many different circumstantial factors that can make one thing work in a certain spot and not work in the other, or personality traits in the hunter themselves. So that's a great point to bring up that a lot of this has to be kind of passed through a filter of what's right for your area, what's right for you, what's right for your personal goals, what's right for your available time, all that kind of stuff.

sitting out on the edge. Bobby's in the cover and you can't argue with his success. So yeah, there's a lot of good hunters approaching things from different angles, but they're they're the big thing is they're hunting different regions of the country. I mean, I think southern Iowa, you know, the hotbed if you will, of giant white tails. The approach that those guys are using there is totally different than my management approach where I'm at in central Illinois, where it's not heavily managed.

a half year olds. When we look at things like temperature, wind speed, barometric pressure, anything related to the moon, cold fronts, precipitation, anything like that, is there any one of those things that stands out to you as really making a difference

for those old old bucks? Like, what is there anything that in your mind truly does make a difference when you're hunting a six or seven year old buck that when you see that coming in the forecast or whatever it is, you think to yourself, Okay, yeah, this is one of those special opportunities.

right to some degree. But in the late season, if you can get brutal cold weather conditions, snow helps, but it needs to be cold. There's no such thing as a nocturnal buck. When it gets zero. Those bucks have to consume a lot of calories to stay alive. And they're going to be on their feet in daylight every afternoon.

They're getting up and they're headed to food somewhere. And if you happen to be on the right food source, on the right path leading to the food source, you're going to see deer and the mature buck is going to be coming along right with the rest of them. That, in my opinion, the very very best time to kill a mature buck on purpose is during the late season

during a brutal cold spell. And if you look at Iowa, look at that late Mussloder season they have at Iowa, and how many giants are killed over soybean fields or whatever in that late Mussloder season. Those bucks are not no longer nocturnal. They have to be on their feet feeding and that's when they become the most vulnerable.

he forgets about the rut. Last year he's nine and a half years old. And at nine and a half years old, he's running around like a three year old, chasing does grunting, working scrapes. And I could have killed him two or three times, real easy.

avoided the rest of the deer herd. He would bed by himself, he would feed by himself, and then boom, at nine years old, here he comes, you know, acting like a teenager again. And wow, I guess it's like the old men, you know, my age, in their sixties and they go out and they buy a new corvette and they start chasing young girls or something. But yeah, it's a great I've never seen that before.

the late season, he's still chasing those around. And if other buck, if there happens to be a doe fawn coming in heat or whatever and bucks are chasing around, he'll join right in the chase. So I think it's individual. The nine and a half year old I described earlier. That's a very unique situation. I've never seen anything like that before, you know, with an older buck.

develop personalities. They all have those unique traits. So probably the best thing we can do if we're at the point where we want to hunt a deer like that is just pay super close to attention to all those unique factors with each unique buck, Like, figure out that personality, do your homework, do your studying, think about it right.

before dark. But if I hunt that, if I hunt that blind every time, the conditions are good for me to slip in undetected and slip out undetected. Ah, I'm going to get a crack at him there.

But is there one that stands out for you as having really drove home something really really important for you? And if so, can you share with us that story and what that lesson was?

show up here, there, and everywhere. And if you got his picture here one day, you was not getting his picture there the next day or the day after. He was here. He was there, He was there, and it was just one hundred percent random. And the year I shot him, he was seven and a half years old. And the day I shot him was the first time I ever laid eyes on that deer. Wow, I'd only

seen him in trail camera pictures. And what he taught me was that I totally had to change my approach that deer, because as his rack blew up the year before, so I started really I was trying to shoot him the year before, actually, and I was expanding my range where I could hunt by gaining access or permission to hunt properties where I thought he might be. And I was putting trail cameras in places I'd never had him before.

And yeah, I'd get his trail camera on this property and that property and this property, all random and as well as the place where i'd originally got his picture. And boys, I'm sitting there that summer trying to think of how am I going to get Trump. I've never lit eyes on this buck yet, and most of the bucks I shoot, I've seen him before when they were younger, but Trump is one I'd never seen, you know, firsthand before, and typically I had to totally change my approach to

hunt that buck. And I think that's the lesson here, is to be open to, you know, throwing everything out the window and doing something that you would never typically do. And that's what I did with him, is I hunted.

I looked at all those properties where I had his pictures, and I thought, well, I could hunt him here and I could hunt him there, and I had stands on all those properties, and I thought, if I jump around from one property to the next, I'm just going to be one step behind that bock, because I'm going to be there today and then two days later, I'm going to get his picture there. And I never get his picture anywhere two days in a row. So I thought, my best bet for this buck do something I never do.

I'm just going to camp out. I had one property where I had three tree stands. It was a small property. I had three tree stands there for three different wind directions, and I thought, I'm going to camp out on this property until I kill him those three stands based on wind. And that's what I did. And I ended up shooting him on the tenth hunt. And he was the first that I seen. On all ten hunts. The first nine hunts,

I did not see a single deer. But I kept at it because I knew he's there, He's coming through here. If I start jumping around, he's gonna show up here. I just need to stay here until he does show up here. Ye, And I've never done that with another buck, but uh, you know, his random personality just being everywhere with no pattern whatsoever, I knew I just better camp in one spot and just wait him out. And like I say, that's the only buck that I've ever hunted that way, and it ended up paying off.

And number three would be that annual pattern. They've got an annual pattern. So find their sanctuary, play the wind, put together that annual pattern.

But he'll be killed on an afternoon hunt in October from either the blind in front of the fruit trees or another pinch point stand about one hundred and fifty yards away from that fruit tree stand.

We try to feature one property a month. Tree stand videos, my actual tree stands. We go there with my videographer and we film some videos there, but just a lot of different types of videos on that I got. The Chasing Giants podcasts, it basically is a little bit different than a lot of the other podcasts. Instead of having guests, we have the listeners submit questions and we read those questions and answer them on that podcast. Boy, what else

the consulting that I mentioned. If you go to Higginsoutdoors dot com you can find just about everything there that I've got going. So that's probably easier than me sitting here for the next thirty minutes rattling on one thing after another.

things out. I've really enjoyed that just getting to see these little like three four or five minute updates on Hey, today I'm doing this, or today I'm going to go out and try to get video of Babe or today, I'm setting this thing up or planting this food plot and getting to see that three hundred and sixty five kind of day process leading up to the season has been really fun, and I think it'll be extra fun when you make your prediction come true here in a

matter of weeks. So that's definitely something to take a look at. So they're chasing two hundred series on there, I think is what you're calling it, and I got to kick out of that. It's pretty cool.

you're having fun. I hope you're being safe. I hope you are taking the lessons you've learned over the years on this podcast and applying them to make your hunt it's more successful and enjoyable. And finally, I hope you will stay wired to hunt.