Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to the Whitetail Woods, presented by First Light, creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on the show, I'm joined by Jeff Sturtus of Whitetail Habitat Solutions to discuss strategies for late season success for both private and public land. All right, welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you by First Light and
their Camel for Conservation initiative. If you're not familiar, it's pretty on a cool A portion of every sale of First Light's spector Whitetail Camel is given to the National Deer Association to help with their mission to do good things for deer and deer hunting, which I'm awfully thankful for.
So all that said, today's episode is all about the late season, and it can be a great season if you have the right plan in place and if you're willing to do the work, push through the cold temps, the long well not so long days, but a long season getting you up to that point and My guest today is a good friend, a great hunter, and a wealth of information. Jeff Sturgis. He is the founder of white Tail Habitat Solutions. He's written multiple books, he has
a tremendous YouTube channel. He just pumps out the videos there like I can't believe. And he brings an interesting perspective because I think a lot of people think of Jeff as a private land kind of habitat manager expert, and that is probably his not probably, It definitely is the thing he does the very most, but he also spends a lot of time hunting on public land too. He has experience hunting different places that I think can be relatable to any kind of deer hunter out there.
So we're going to talk about today is how to have success in the late season, yes on managed pieces or yes on private land with ag whatever might be. But also how to kill late season deer in the big woods, how to kill late season deer in areas where there's no management, where you're competing with other folks, all that kind of stuff. So I think this is going to be really valuable for a large number of you. I'm excited about it. I don't want to waste any
more of your time. I think we should just get right into it. But first one thing, I just want to take a second here to thank so many of you for reaching out, sending me messages and comments and emails and so many different notes of support and congratulations. After getting my shot at the WY nine last week, was very very thankful to have had that opportunity to close the deal on that deer and end that hunt
and get redemption after what happened in October. So very thankful for that, and very thankful for all of your support along the way, for you following the story over the years and sticking with me through through the episode of the Downs. So all that said, let's kick off this month of December in style with a great conversation here with mister Jeff Sturgison. All right, we are here now with one of my most frequent return guests on the podcast and one of my favorite guests on the
show and a good friend, mister Jeff Sturgis. Welcome back, Jeff.
Yeah, it's great to be here, say frequently spend over a long period of time.
Yeah, I mean, I think you were one of my first ten guests. Like I think you're in the first maybe even the first four episodes ever, So that's that's going back ten years at least. And I think we were, you know, working on some articles together and talking for a number of years before that too, So it's it's crazy how fast it all goes. Doesn't feel like it was.
That long ago, but it was back in the writing days or writing a whole bunch. Yeah, I'd written up to one hundred and seventy eighty articles in a year, and then when i'd watched those Google Google analytics, I'd see a notice come through from Wired to Hunt that they something I never knew what it meant, and then all of a sudden, I realized that you had this wired to Hunt thing, and you'd share articles that I'd written during the week in your Friday Friday Post or
whatever it was. Yeah, that's where that came from. And so I knew of the post going out before I think I even talked to you or met you at that time.
So yeah, cool, It's funny how that those things bring folks together. I'm sure glad that I don't remember if if you reached out to me or if I reached out to you, but however it happened I'm glad it happened.
It was over ten years ago.
Yeah, so so yeah, all that said, thank you for making the time. I know you're coming off of the trip, busy with hunts and all that. So the thought I had for today, Jeff, is to is to cover a topic we have not covered yet in detail. And I know in the past we've talked a lot about habitat, We've talked a lot about some of your thoughts around predicting timing of deer activity. We've talked about patterning deer. We've covered a lot of ground, but we've never done
a full episode like this talking specifically about the late season. Sure, and coming into December here, I thought this would be a perfect time to do that. So my first my first question for you, Jeff, is about how you feel at this time of year. So bear with me on
this when I explain what I'm thinking here. Sometimes some years, when I get to December, I start to get like antsy and nervous because if I've got a bunch of tags still in my pocket, I'll wake up in the morning just wedding like It'll just be like a little bit uneasy. How do you feel if you get to this time of year and you've got unfilled tags. Are you Are you starting to get worried that we're nearing the end or do you still have a lot of confidence.
I'm sure that uneasiness for you has gone away over the last couple of days.
Yes, things are feeling better now.
And I think I think that depends. And I've had a few twenty ten, twenty twenty. We're both bad years for different reasons. And missus wounded animal just it was it was a grind, and it really gets to this time of year. Most of the time, it's enjoyable. It's relaxing. I love going out. Jen's going out tonight, she's going to watch a food source and I went out last night.
And it's more even We're not getting up at four and driving fifty minutes to Wisconsin to go sit in a rut stand after walking forty minutes up the hill to get into a blind and stamp it's and sitting in a tree stand and having to be eighteen degrees. So there is such a contrast, and I think it does boil down to tags and it's not. And you know, you and I hunt similar in some ways as far as like you shot your target buck and you had
that that buck in mind. And I had a buck last year bow that I was after here in Minnesota, and I shot some nice bucks already, but it was I hunted till the last day I could hunt them last year. But I still had that sense of satisfaction that I shot something. And so when you don't have tags, it's it's more of a it's not even boy, I haven't shot something. It's more when when you have that pocket full of tags, it's more like, boy, just what could I have done different? What decisions could I have
made different? Never worried about a dead animal. It's more I just it's a quest and it's a journey. But when you had those tag fill I shot my target buck in Minnesota on my second one, and Wisconsin, and then we just went to Pennsylvania and shot a beautiful one on public land. It's kind of like, you know, you really can step back and enjoy this time of year, and it's more of a relaxing hunt. To me, it's more about numbers of sets, just when you can get
out there and enjoy. We sit in blinds more often this time of year, watching food sources still get some the perfect Rot stand Second Rot morning sets and so, but it's more at a leisurely pace, if that makes sense. Yeah, such a contrast from I feel personally right now. I feel pretty good. I feel I can relax this this time of year and have some tags that have been filled and have had some great memories too with family and friends. So it's a good time right now.
Now. Now, what do you think about just your chances to still have this Not specifically like you this year, but I mean if someone's listening and they're going into December and they have an unfilled tag and they're thinking to themselves, you know, should I be like, is the best what I'm getting at? Is the best behind me when I get into December? Or do you look at December as some people call it December and things actually
can be pretty darn good still moving forward? How do you feel about that?
I love the Second Rot, especially where we're up here in the Upper Midwest where we can plan on some scrapes being opened up first part of December and some bucks really moving acting like they did during the middle of the Rot. Also late season food sources. I wrote some on the back on the board just to help me with my memory. But really, when you're looking at clearcuts on public land and that diversity of habitat where highland meets lowland, old forest meet young forest, there's a
lot of opportunity for browsing deer during the daylight. And you look at box that have run ragged for three weeks straight and then all of a sudden, now they have to replenish that energy that's been lost, and so to me, there's a lot of opportunity this year. It's a lot different. Back in the late eighties nineties when I was hunting Thumb Area, Michigan, we're in ten years. During that time, there was one year where I saw probably twenty five twenty six different bucks leading up to
gun season. All those ten years combined, I saw three antler bucks. After gun season through the end of the year. Lots of deer, lops of dose, but we weren't in the areas that we had small little woodlots an acre here, five acres here, ten acres there, a corner of a field here, and all those box were back in high stem count areas, more remote locations. They've been pounded by hunters. So it's cool about public land. You can go out and find those areas you need to get away from
where you'd normally hunt potentially for a rout. But then at the same time, on private land, if you have the right conditions, you can build it. So either one can. We have some of our best hunts third day a gun season, fourth day, seventh day, ninth day, all the way out through Muzzli order in the first part of December. Some of our best hunts have been during those times where we see a good number of deer and we
still have an opportunity at what bucks are remaining. So I'm full hoped when we get into this time of year.
Yeah, you make you make a lot of good points there. And something you mentioned that being, you know, find this different kind of habitat on public land, like you can still have late season success on public land, where I think a lot of people assume it's a lot harder and assume, you know, the late season's kind of a private land food plot game. Sure, but you were just in Pennsylvania on public land and killed a really nice
buck in late November. It was that kind of a late season type set up in any kind of way or how did you pull that off? Because that feels kind of late to me.
It is, and that was shot quite a few bucks out there this time of year because it always opens up. The used to open up the Monday after Thanksgiving. Now it's the Saturday after Thanksgiving. I was there in twenty nineteen when it opened up the first Saturday ever, and then you had Sunday off, and then I shot my buck on Monday. Now they can hunt Sundays. But really
there's a combination of things going on. For one, we're looking for people pressure and people hot zones and trying to get in the middle of campgrounds, boat access along where we hunt, a reservoir, parking areas, main trail systems. And then you're looking for if it's big open woods, you might have a good hunt in the afternoon if they're coming up and hitting acorns, beach nuts or cherry, depending on what they're hitting. That time of year. Right
now is acorns everywhere. But we're looking for a high stem count. And so it's not that the bucks are on the sell facing slopes soaking up the warmth. It's the self facing slopes in a national forest are the ones that have a higher vegetation leve or a stem count per acre, and so we're gravitating to stem count per acre and then trying to put yourself in position with a lot of funnels, saddles, benches and points and draws that come together so that you can capture that
big X of movement if anyone pushes a deer. So this this bot came in by himself. He just came cruising through. He was actually on an old scrape line. He wasn't working scrapes or anything. He was just coming through. And where he was going was he was leading angling upwards. And we have a broad hilltop that just has a lot of self facing exposure with a lot of stem count, and it's it's not necessarily thick, it's thick for there, but it's higher stem count. So then he'd have brows
during the daylight during his betting hours. And he was five after eight to a shooting lighter on around quarter after seven or seven, So I think he was just heading up to bed. He might have been pushed, you know, from a long ways away, but he was kind of just easing on through. It's you for a nation, I think, And if it was a different weather, I'd be looking for different conditions too.
Or different. Yes, So then tell me that. I guess, So, how would you shift things at two fouls? How would you shift that up if it was different weather? And then secondly, if you were hunting out there public land, same kind of place out there in Pa, but you were doing this three weeks later now it's not that first few days of gun season. Now we're talking like December December, would you approach it differently then?
No, I'd be hunting similar locations. And the thing about out there, we used to have a cabin with family that I'd go out there, so we would actually literally cross country ski back in this federal land and see where the tracks were all winter long, a hike in the off season, so you got to have a good flavor of pretty good feel where the deer were most of the year. Right now you're hunting more of that
late season pattern. The difference is if it's really snowy, I would be down towards the bottoms where the hemlocks are, the hemlock line meets the hardwoods. I would have been. So if it was snowing this trip, we would have been down towards the bottoms. It was crunchy, cold and dry, so we were hunting more at the top where there's more food sources, So a lot of times they'll be down the bottoms more thermal protection, and then they'll go up to the tops to feed just in the afternoon.
And so even going out with this season, I mean right now, if it would have been snowy, we would have been depending on how much snow we would have been either in transition areas or more towards the bottom to get closer to that hemlock line.
Okay, what about mornings for that kind of setup. I know there's a lot of talk about you know, when you're hunting food sources in the late season, a lot of folks avoid the mornings. It's hard to get in or out. But when you're hunting big woods like that, are you are you hunting mornings still just the same or or how what does that look like in a late season public land, no ag kind of situation.
The morning or daybreak? You know, I'll side of opening day a gun seas were we were there for the first two days, so we're going to be out there in the morning, and but outside of that, if I was just going out to hunt Ran December December sixth if you can get into areas and it's pretty cool out in public land. It's so it's so different on
private because everything is concentrated. You know, you're looking at food sources, betting area, transition areas for all their daylight movement in a one hundred acre box or less or two hundred acres or forty whatever you have to work with. We're here, it's thousands of acres and so it's thousands of acres open timber, so that the betting areas, the food sources are very scattered and the movements in between.
What that means is if I want to go out, I wouldn't necessarily want to be in there right in a food source right at daybreak or around there, because I look at like deer might be bedding nearby. You might spook them going in the cold part of the days in the morning, are they feeding? Are they in their beds to conserve energy? But boy, when it gets to at nine o'clock, ten o'clock and you're on a flat, an oak flat where you've seen some indication of feeding.
We've had bears feeding out there. We went through bear sign on the way in on opening day, so the bears are feeding up on top. That would be an area that you could sneak in like eight nine o'clock and then sit for the rest of the day with the thought that you're coming in on a flat point. You're not expressing yourself over the sides and spooking deer
that might be down in the hollow. You're getting in the position and blowing your scent off to a non deer area, maybe further top up top or towards an open area, waiting for deer that possibly might want to feed mid morning because they were bedded down at daybreak when it was super cold. So I like that that approach good morning, and then I brought the spicy feed all day us.
Yeah, yeap, that makes sense. You brought the second rut a couple of times a question. I've got a couple questions related to that. But one thing that I've heard is that you will be more likely to see a second rut in places where there's a very healthy deer population and healthy dough fonds that will come into Maybe I'm maybe getting this backwards. I guess answer me this
before I go run in my mouth. Do you see a second rut more often on your highly managed private lands or on public lands or is it about the same either way, Like, is that just as likely to happen on that public land PA hunt for you or is it probably not?
We don't because because we're only hunting. So in the twenty one seasons I've hunted out there, I have averaged about two days on hunting, so I don't go back. I'm hunting for opening day the second day. True, I think eighty percent of those let's say sixty five to seventy percent of those days I shot my bucket opening day, so you're not really hunting much past that.
But it's.
Yeah, it's I know there's a second rut in those big public land areas and so and I think sometimes you look at it like maybe there's better sex ratios, But the bucks have to travel a lot far further between dough family groups. So to me, if there's not a lot of deer, you could almost say that little
dough groups could be missed for that first rought. No different than if you have an unmanaged herd that's really out of balance, then you have some leftover dos and fauns that box just couldn't take care of because they didn't have time they came out of estrus and they're coming back in a month later. So I don't I know, like a zoga up in the up of Michigan. He
had told me. I think it was around eighty percent of the does are bred in that first primary rut, but then there's about fifteen percent that are bred in that second rut. And that was kind of up Wi where they did their studies based on fetuses in ultrasounds for dose that they I think it was over two thousand doors they ultrasounded along the side of the road over a twenty five year period. Whatever it was, it
was pretty good on a data. So and we see it even where we have good sexual racials around here for whatever reason, versus Wisconsin where we have a little bit higher do't count there because of some neighborly things going up. Then we see second rut in both those places too. So I'm just trying to think of the different areas where I've hunted. We still see that that second rout pretty prevalent.
What's what's the window when you see that most often? Like if you had to put a date window on it in your area, what would the date window be and how how long do you usually see that as something like you're going to go into hunt planning to ki in on, Like is this like a few day window? Is this a week? Is this two weeks? What are we talking in which you're actually thinking, like the second rut is a legitimate part of my strategy and I'm hoping to plan for it.
It'd be about a week to ten days, and that'd be for us right around right now or it's end of November early December and we're not seeing any We have what's kind of nice in Wisconsin and Minnesota, and I know this is a luxury, and I know this number might be off putting to some people, but we have good partnerships with people in the industry, and we have right now close to sixty cell cameras in Minnesota and Wisconsin on our properties on and if you looked
at those, they're spread out over less than three hundred acres. So we have a lot of cell cameras out now, and the majority of those we're probably at eighty percent around mock scrapes, and so we get a really good view of what's going on with running activity. And I can say it's almost non existent right now, but I would guess, is it the twenty ninth today or is it the thirtieth?
Yeah, it says the twenty ninth.
Yep, yeah, I would say it's Wednesday. By this weekend we'll start seeing some activities picking up. It'll probably peak seventh or tenth of December, and then it'll go back downhill pretty quick. But I was hunting both season in
Wisconsin maybe four years ago. Had one of my target bucks come through in early January, just breaking brush, making scrapes, throwing snow all over the place, dirt on top of the snow, and he was following a dough, a small uh probably fondo, and she curved in front of me. He grunted, she spooked, and he ended up chasing her and she came right by me. He didn't. But we see a lot of that even in that that just
a short window in the early January. It's all about that that time where he just to me, it's see during the middle of the rout, you know, a buck could be coming off a dough any day, and another doe could be coming in. He might have to search for a while. It's a lot more random. But when you start at the beginning of the rut, it's like all the bucks are ready, they're just waiting for the doughs.
You have one or two doughs come in, there can be some malacious fights sometimes between some molder box then all of a sudden, the high percentage of dose start coming in and all these bucks are waiting. And to me, that's the time when they're they're all on dose pretty quick. It's the way I view it anyways, And that to me, if they're all on dose pretty quick and you have
a large percentage coming in, then they miss them. And then you just fast forward thirty days and twenty eight days whatever it is, and it's about that same time every year in December, and then you can do the same into January.
So when you get to that time period first week or ten days of December, are you hunting? Like if you're going to a hunt, is it always with the mindset like, hey, this is a second rut type hunt and I'm going hunt a location to take advantage of that. Or do you look at your data from cameras to tell you whether or not there is running activity and if there's not running activity, you hunt standard late season bed to food type pattern.
So if I was planning on hunting, let's just throw you know, like next Tuesday morning because it's second rut. Then I'm going to go in to some of my favorite morning rout funnel stands and go take a seat. And yeah, if I have celcam data to back it up, or I have open scrapes where I've walked into another stand and seeing there's open scrapes, then that might determine
an area of the property I go to. But just taking a total guess, I go in and hit my favorite rut stands in the morning and see what happens. And then it's different now because we have muscloder season. I like shooting deer with a bow. I hunt with my boat hearing gun season at times, but I also enjoy sitting over a food source with muzzleloader looking for
a bunch of does. And so this time of year, if I think it's second Rut, I don't want to hunt some out of the way spot where I think a buck might be feeding because it's near as betting area. I want to go to the source of the bottom of the funnel where a lot of dos are coming in to a food source. And it seems like when we start seeing that dough herd meaning seven eight ten doers that are out an hour before dark, then good
things happen. You're bucking around somewhere, which so we'd hunt with the boat during the rock because we're not hunting those big open food sources with we have food sources, we can't hundle the boat because if we go in and hunt, we're gonna spook the deer, So we kind of in the betting areas that go along with them the property too.
So so food that seems so much of what we do in the late season revolves around food. Can you can you tell me a little bit about the types of food sources that you like to key in on at this time of year, whether that be you know, how you plan like create food sources with that in mind, or just if you're hunting land. They don't necessarily have control over how you might approach that.
So, like, you know, even going back to Pennsylvania in that public land, I don't want to be out in the big open hardwoods unless I ask some indication that there's still acorns and that's where they're feeding, you know, tore up ground snow. I really want to be in the high stem count areas where you have lots of regeneration, lots of habitat coming in, think upland cover. If you can find it on public land, it's hard. But where you have shrubs, bushes, briars Harvard region, maybe on the
edge of a swamp, it's all coming together. Where there's a lot of different habitat groups coming in together, that means there's a lot of brows. And to me, as opposed to a wide open oak flat where deer been pressured, hunters have been out too, they might feed there more at night, it's safe, it's social, they can see predators for a long distance. I'd rather be tucked up against that high high stem count diversity and brows and public land.
And then when you go on to private if you're managing your own property, you want to definitely have a lot of younger timber coming in and diversity of habitat. But then you're looking at either high volume greens like braska if it's towards the north, or corn beans that are standing late if you can get that. But and then adjacent to that same type of cover where you
have really thick cover. So if I'm hunting in the morning, i want to be by that thick cover, high stem count, and then I might flip stands and go hunt a more food source stand related for the afternoon on private land, but on public land that might be all in the same. It might be your hunting on the edge of a very thick area that deer might transfer out of to go to an open food source like a big oak flat during the afternoon.
If you had to rank order late season food sources from, like what your very best would be down the list,
how would you do that? Because I'm imagining, like I've been in this situation where I've hunted agg country and I've got some grain food plots, and then there's a neighboring cornfield, and then there's another field next to this beans, and then there's you know, some cuttings on the neighbors and I know there's like some thick natural brows in there, and I'm trying to think where should I hunt tonight?
And I got all these different food sources to choose from, and I'm trying to think, Okay, what's going to be the absolute most attractive for this time of the year. If you're in if you have the luxury of that situation, how would you rank order what would potentially be most attractive? And then as a follow up, and I'm giving you making this even more tricky, but as a follow up,
would conditions change that order? So if I told you it was a forty degree December day versus a ten degree December day, how would you reorder things as well?
You know, kind of it to back up just a little bit, you know, like you mentioned, it's you have all these available, what choice would you make? But a lot of times, especially if people are building it or planting, and on private land, you're not looking at what sebast
You're looking at what sebast that would be available. And so a lot of times someone could say ten degrees late December standing beans, pretty hard to beat degrees late December standing beans, I'd probably I'd rather shift to corner or greens. But then at the same time, even beans that ten degrees late December, someone has to have either fences or a large amount of acreage of beans to
make them last till that time. So I see people beat themselves like I love beans late like that, But if they're not there, then it doesn't really matter what your scale one to ten would be. And then also you have to look at what's the most unpressured. So let's say just someone could say, okay, mid December hunt let's just say December twelfth. There's a little bit of the rout left last, you know, upper midwest, upper third
of the country. And you have a choice of a bean field in a cornfield, but the bean field's been pressured and hunted heavily, then I'm gonna go pick the corn and you might even find there's a lot of dozen falls in the bean field because they can take lot more hunting pressure, human pressure. I'd rather cheat over towards that corner the brask that deer are still coming to and there's still does come into it. Obviously, if
dose aren't going to it, why would a buck. I mean, he wants some good food too, But unpressured should be the first, you know, the first requirement of a late season food source. And then you start looking at what's best, and you know, if it's forty degrees, it seems like
they really like greens. If it's warmer, so if they have high volume greens, even if they have steaming wheed a rye mixed with various greens, clover down in Kentucky, West Virginia, southern Illinois, southern Indiana where you might even get a little growth of clover in November because it
hit sixty seven degrees a few days. So that's a little bit different too, versus something you might want to do in central Michigan or focus on so heavy greens of some kind when it's a little warmer later and then certainly those grains, but again it has to be unpressured.
Yeah, yeah, that's a great point. And your point about it all being relative to what's the best available at that time really important to remember.
If one thing real quick, mark, consider that a mature buck, mature buck, the whole range of a mature buck probably has probably five times more in a doll family group. So always remember that that mature bock, he's willing to travel a long ways to go find that unpressured food source. And so to be very deceiving when you have a pile of dolls and fawns in the young box and you're thinking, you know, everything's doing really well, but if you've overpressured your land, those are the deer that can
take that pressure. That mature buck might be a mile and a half two miles away.
So on that point, it seems like there's a transition in where deer spend time to find that best available late season food. But how does betting change as we get into a late season in your view, how have you seen and maybe buck betting in particular, have you found that they start betting closer to the food themselves or are they pushing farther back because now there's less cover and there's been more pressure and it's harder for them to feel safe.
I think it depends on the food source and how much pressure's been there. You know, Eventually, if they get pushed too far away, do they even relate to that food source on a daily basis? So I think they still want to keep that window that's comfortable and they want to conserve energy getting to it. It's not like
they're betting ten yards away from the food source. And then that depends on if it's big open hardwoods next to the food source, they might be four hundred yards away just because that's how far they have to go back where they feel comfortable because it's so open. Where if it's super thick and that upland cover some conifer mixed in some high stem count briers. They might be one hundred and fifty yards back, and so it really
depends on habitat right there. And what I see something that's a lot different out here is where we have hills. And you can say that you know, half of all white tail areas have some type of elevation change. But you really notice those deers starting to not bet up on the tops and be exposed to the winds. And they'll bet on the north facing slope. If the high wind is coming from the south and it's twelve degrees, they have to get out of the wind and so
they can't be on the wind swept tops. We have a point I'm thinking in Wisconsin where we hunt, it's just beautiful. It's rimmed with some red seedar and on that point there's rubs all the time. You know, just a monster's up there in October, but he's not there in December, just totally exposed.
If you were and I don't know, maybe you've had people like this, but if you're someone who wants to set up a property or part of their property specifically for late season, like I don't know, maybe you own land in Iowa and you want to go there, for their gun season or something, or their muzzle over season
or whatever might be. There are certain states like that, if you were going to set up a place, you know, particularly or specifically for a December hunt, how would you do that, Like what would be your ideal design or way you would set up a food source with betting to make it like extra special for a December late season hunt.
You still want to have the same bedding cover. You still want high stem count cover. When deer in their beds, you know they're feeding five times in twenty four periods, so during their beds betting hours, that means twice every four or five hours, sometime in the morning, sometime in the early afternoon. So they have to have that stem count. They have to have food to eat and that browse, and so that browsey enjoy in February is the same brows that they would enjoy and enjoy in October. So
that aside, you still want food. So if it's private land, you want food that's available when deers start to look to their fall ranges we talk about that fall shift sometime late September to late October. We want to have that food that captures them at that time. So at that time, I let green clover, rye peas, brassicas those combinations depending on what works best in your area. And then if you can have the space for the grains, especially corn and then beans, then you'd want that for
late season. The key is, though I've heard people say, well I just plant beans because I'm just looking at December. Well, then you didn't attract deer in September, October, November as much. And if those deer an't attracted to your land, why are they all of a sudden going to show up in December. And let's say they do all of a sudden show up in December, you're getting the leftovers. So I'd rather set my land up where I have deer attracted in September, October, November and then they carry on
in December. It's almost like October November is more important than December, because if you don't have those deer attracted to the land, why are they going to be there all of a sudden. I've even had people say, well, I'm gonna plant this Braska crop over here on this one acre because it's an area I want to hunt here in the late late season. But if they've establish
or fall residency and pattern somewhere else. Why are they all of a sudden going to move over there a quarter mile and feed over in that location when that hasn't been a part of their fall pattern the entire season up to that point. That's like you're trying to establish a pattern of use, and that takes more resources because you can't just say on a plant OF's late
season food source and just let them come Eventually. They have to stage it so that there's pieces available, covers still the same, it's high stem count, you know, brows, they have to have that during the day anyways, either way, but you really want to establish that pattern.
Yeah, you mentioned with the grain, if you were going to get corner beans in there, you had to have enough space. What is that minimum size that you think you need to have to get a bean or cornfield to work and last to the late season.
I'll give you some like parameters. Where So I've been to a half acre quarter acre beanfield that was just getting pounded in January, no fence, but it was next to an eighty acre beanfield literally right next door, and so the deer didn't have any reason to hit it
during the summer. They had plenty of beans standing. If the beans weren't picked until sometime mid to late October, then they didn't even start coming over to that bean field, probably till it got really cold then in November December,
so there's no reason for them to be there. But you plant that same bean field in a big wooded section with no ag it probably doesn't make it to September and so like around here, for example, I'd want one to two acre bean fields times three or four spread out over two three hundred acres, along with complimentary food sources. And that's another thing too. If you don't have the other food sources, then they're going to put an unfair amount of pressure on that bean or corn.
Corn is the same thing. They start to hit our corn pretty good here mid to late November, but it's it's going to go pretty quick when you consider all the other critters that are hitting it too. So you have to have another complimentary food source. And then what's
on your neighbors. There's a big difference for how much food you need when you have either neighbors with food sources or food plots or ag land versus if you're in a wooded section even with fewer deer, because then your food is that it's only game in town, so you probably need two, three, four times more food. And some of those big wooded areas versus ag area where you have the compliment and support of other food sources
around you. It's hard to give a You can't really give a because you have to know deer numbers, what your neighbors are doing. What if your property is the only property without a lot of pressure, so de'er spending more of an unfair amount of time overall on your property, which is a good thing because you're doing well with it, but you're going to go through more food at that point too.
Speaking of that pressure, pressure in the late season, so much I feel of late season is managing pressure, but then taking advantage of other people's pressure, right because at this point there's been all sorts of other hunters around, and any deer that are still alive in December have been through the ringer, and you know, in my experience, their heads are on a swivel, they are jumpy, and they are gravitating to those places, those pockets where they've
felt safe. So I've always approached the late season, maybe even more surgically than I approach other parts of the year, which I'm still pretty strategic with, but then when it comes to late season, I feel like you've got to be just right about how often you go in, When you go in, where you go in, because you have fewer chances than at any other point to make a mistake. That's a long win, a way of getting to scouting and figuring out like where to hunt, when to hunt,
what's the pattern? How do you figure out these deer that you're after in December without them catching on to you anything you're doing differently with your cameras, with any form of intel gathering that you're doing that allow you to have an informed hunt in December.
It's kind of like, you know, you're you're looking at the lowest hole in the bucket as far as you're taking out, you know, the top portions are the best food, the best cover. Like if you're looking on public land, the lowest hole in the bucket, you know. Pressure, So I'm looking at the major parking areas and major trails and major campgrounds and major boat access points. And even if you're throwing a beaver dam, you have to cross here and there. Well, you can look at it on
paper and say probably about a late season. If there's any bucks left or mature box, they're going to be in this area because they've been pushed from all sides and whittled down into the spot. And so you could make an educated guest without even knowing the lay of the land or the property. Public land, for example, we I hadn't been out to that public land spot in four years in that entire area. But you can make an educated gas based on the people movements and where
people are. They're hot zones where you can get into an area where you kind of have an area to yourself, and if that meets your habitat requirements of good stem count diversity, and it's hidden, then you're going to have a reasonable expectation there's going to be deer there, older bucks there, just because you're whittling it down to that and you don't even know anything about the land other
than what you see on an aerial photo. And then private land is different because if you set the table and you've left it alone, even if you have no cameras out and you have good food, good cover, there's a reasonable expectation that you go out there and have
a really good hunt. And what's a little bit different during the late season when you're not talking bull is that we can watch our food sources right now, and we can watch the same food source sometimes over and over again, because we're not spooking deer when you get
in and out, because we're using a muzzle over. So shooting a deer at a one hundred and ninety five yards two hundred and fifty five is another one that shout over the last four years with a muzzleoder, and those deer had no clue you're even there, and so you can get and watch them over and over again. Where with a bow, I had to stay off those food sources and I have to hunt transitions. So then
you're being careful. You know. It's like during the rut, you can afford to get in next to a betting area because what are the odds that he's there when you're going in in the morning, But if you go in during wintertime, not only is it crunch here, but they can see better the leaves are off the tree. So I have to stay further away from those betting areas and get more into transition areas between food and betting.
With a bowl or on a small food source on the way to a big food source, something like that. But you're almost looking at like, Okay, deer are going to go through this funnel, but they're probably not there, And I'm staying away from the food and the betting, getting in between that barbelle of movement so that I'm not spooking out either, because, like you said, once you spook them out late season, they're just going somewhere else.
Even if it's just that over buck you're after, he's going somewhere else.
So when you're hunting late season on your on your land, are you not chasing a pattern, not trying to really dial in a specific spot, a specific but you're more so like, Hey, I'm gonna volume hunt a food source that I know checks off the boxes he needs, and I'm gonna do it enough times because I can do it from afar and he won't know.
I'm looking at more. It's different on private land because we get to know what bucks are in which area, and so if I go out to our seventy seven acre personal it's all connected, but the seventy seven acres, then I'm I'm expecting to see Isaac Barry, Isaac and Barry would between I'm expecting to see Junior, but he's not one we're after this year. Isaac and Barry would be the two ones over there. So then I'm hunting
Isaac and Berry movement on that area. And I'm using my morning stands as if I would hear the second run, as if I would during the rut, going in with the expectations I might see Isaac or Berry, and I'm letting the wind determine which stand that I go to. And so I'm looking at like they should be there for these reasons. Either I have a troilcamp photo with them.
Scrapes are opened up. Even without trail cameras, you know that there's big track scrapes, there's no new rub, there's some shavings on top of the on top of the snow. And then you're going in there thinking I'm hunting this buck. But I'm hunting. I'm still chipping around. I'm not spooking out the food sources. I'm hunting this betting area in the morning, this betting area or this movement based on the wind and my access, and I'm trying to chip around a little bit. And it'd be the same on
public land. If I thought a buck was moving to this clear cut from this knoll or swamp edge in the distance, I might hit them from one side of the transition with one wind, and then I might circle around hit him another side another day. I might get closer to the food or closer to the bedding. And so you're still hunting that certain bock, but you're using multiple stands or access routes to make sure that you're limiting your pressure in or out. And it's a similar feature.
The only difference is when you get to this time of year is that there's areas that are devoided deer. You just see that there's snow, there's no deer using this corner, there's no food, the cover's not good, there's neighboring pressure that's keeping the deer away from there, and they've where it can be a little bit more. We have more stands available, let's put it that way, early to mid November than we do early to mid December.
Just because I don't feel comfortable with some of the things are company.
Yeah, is it true that sometimes you can have too many deer at this time of year. Yeah. In that so, so I'm imagining like the situations that I think a lot of people have where they're hunting land that they
don't get to manipulate themselves. So you're hunting permission or lease or whatever in which there's ag and there's stuff out there, but it's not set up ideally for hunting, right it's just big open cut cornfields or pick bean field or whatever, and there's a pile of deer out there, and you want to hunt them, but then you're thinking, how the heck do I get out of here? How do I get in? There's deer catching.
On, So it's one thing of your hunt with a muzzle order, because then you can come into some you know, if you feel comfortable shooting out to two hundred yards, then set up for one fifty one seventy five and get off to the side and a fence rol But a lot of people really push it. They see all those deer coming out into a certain corner, they feel they have to get in there with a bow and
try it. Where I'd rather go sit all day and sit on the back side of that bedding area or in the bedding area with my wind blowing to a safe area, get in there very early in the morning
and then just wait to see what happens. If I can get out at a lot or twelve because I don't see any deer and I have safe passages to get back the way I came and get out of there, that's fine, But I'd rather take my chances back in that thick area on an all day hunt, or at least sitting until late morning when I feel I can get out, then going and playing around with all those dozes and young bucks and all those eyes. I'd rather
get back in that bucks bedroom. And you're playing that, you're playing that game where it's a game of balance where you look at it like you I want to get in that movement, but I don't want to be so far in that I'm spooking the movement. And then
the other thought is too. It was a buck that used to watch a lot of hunting videos, and I want to say it was a KISSI outdoors one back in the day, and there's this buck that they had five or six years of sheds, So this buck was eight years old, and all these deer were coming in. They had a muzzle order into this big food source, and he just wasn't coming till an hour or two after dark. Well, they ended up shooting him like seven to eight hundred yards away out of this little corner
of the habitat where they thought he was betting. They shot him right at dark as he was slipping through, not going to get to the food source for another hour or two, and they went back into that buck area where it was well behind all the doves and young bucks and commotion, where he had lived and felt safe. And I still look at like they're like a grumpy old man. They just like getting away from everything else.
So if you think about that, either going in the morning or where you would potentially slip in in the afternoon, you're not hunting the huge numbers of deer. You're hunting that buck that compliments that movement of huge numbers of deer.
It just seems so incredibly risky to try to do that in the late season when there's so little cover on the trees now, the deer are so on pins and needles. It just seems like everything's loud in the woods in December. Sound carries forever. I'd be so worried to try to slip deep into the cover. How do you how do you deal with that? How do you count for that what needs to be done to make sure that those things I'm worried about don't run hunt.
And that really depends on your terrain, you know. Like around here, we're sneaking up on the backside of ridges a lot, so we're not cresting over a ridge and pronouncing ourselves all the way. Even wore we went in for Pennsylvania, we were very careful. There's a point I like going up, and we go up the point on the backside from where you expect to see deer on the other side of the point or in the draw.
And then when we walk across the top, we're being very careful to walk right in the middle of the top so that we're not projecting our sound and presence over the sides as far as possible, so we're staying on that flat and then we're going in slow or avoiding breaking sticks. I like walking, like when we're out there, when you're starting to the closer you get to your your blind or we were just sitting in chairs in the forest against a tree, but the closer you get
to that point, you're almost stalking your spot. And I like walking heel the toe to where you're setting your foot down in front before your back foots off the grounds. It's almost like a continuous just movement. But we're very careful in those cases where and then in some cases it's kind of like if you if it's so loud that you can't get into a stand without spooking out of betting area. It's just that balance of knowing or not.
If it's risky, I don't do it. And so then I I'm looking at like, if I think I can get into one hundred yards away from where he's betting because of the lay of the land, because there's soft snow out because it's damp, and the leaves are damp, they're not crunchy, then I'll I'll do that. But if I think I need to be two hundred yards away from that spot, then I'll find that where I think I'm pretty sure if I go in, I'm not spooking
him out of there. And that's really the question you have to ask yourself, is you're backing up to the point where you think you might not have a chance at him, but you know it's safe to go in. I'd rather do that hunt them get five or six sits out of that and hunt with the wind in the right location, rather than going in one time and spooking it before you start your even begins. So yeah, I trying to assail.
Yeah, how late into the year would you do that morning sit like you described pushing in there like that? Is that just during the second rut time period or would you keep trying that even like when we're beyond you know, or any real chance of second rut? Like would you do that in January? I know you mentioned that once you saw that, but no.
We've seen it. I've seen that a lot, and I've seen it in February on a client property that was the latest ever saw it, where literally there's fresh scrapes and peelings on top of the snow. That was a very high dough density area and so lots of deer. But but I'm looking at when I think the scrapes are open, I'm using my running tactics, rout tactics for
going in. But then also there's also that tactic of a lot of deer when it's super cold will feed mid morning because the warmth is starting to come up, that's sunny, whereas if they're moving it might be let's say it's eight degrees at daybreak, but by eleven o'clock it's twenty one and it's going to warm up to thirty two. Then they're going to move to me. I
find they move more mid morning late morning. In that condition where it's a little bit warmer, they can feed and can serve energy at the same time, and that can be ideal for going in even after daybreak where you're lighting the deer settle down. You're going in because
you know they're not betting in this open woods. You know you can walk to this line of swamp where there's a lot of conifer and you can get on the edge of that or just poke in a little bit to a movement, or you're walking in on the backside of a ridge. You're walking across an open field where they're not at at daybreak, and you're getting into a funnel between woodlots. But you're utilizing that axis. And then you're going down, sitting mid morning and seeing what
happens till early afternoon. And it might be a spot because of where they're moving in the evening that you're actually sitting there until dark and you're going in at nine. So definitely some ways to sneak in and still hunt the morning or all day. That might be favorable, more favorable than going in three hours before dark. You're starting to move and feed a little bit.
Yeah, that's a really good point. So what about this scenario. Imagine you have got permission on a mixed timber and egg property. Let's call it one hundred acres to make it simple, and we'll say fifty of it is a harvested cornfield. Fifty of it is mixed mature timber and swampy brushy stuff. So there's some bedding in there, and then there's a big open food source, and there's a bunch of deer that are coming and feeding in that
cornfield every night. You're bow hunting mid December, and your only available access is through the field, so the only road access is from the field side, so all the cover is in the interior of the property. You can't
get to that without crossing that field. How would you do what you just described and hunt mornings but go in after daylight when the field is cleared, and just poke into the cover then and then you know, bail for the evening because you know you can't get out of it without spooking deer, or would you try to hunt in the evenings and have some other way to get out of that thing, knowing that you have to get across that cornfield somehow after dark? Like, how would
you do something like that? Because I know, like I have places like that. I know so many friends who hunt places like this where they just don't have a strong option to get out because there's fields in the way of where they want to hunt and where they have to park. What do you do?
I definitely would wait till after daybreak to go in, make sure the field is cleared so I can at least get to the woods. Hopefully there's a thick area of the woods or some conifer, maybe a little bit a little bit of elevation change where I can get
in and not spook the deer in the woods. And then I'm going to sit and blow my scent to one side of the field or the other where I think it's less likely the deer going to be, and push that balance of how close can I get to their movement in the afternoon evening, and then you at least get a fresh set and you just have to
hunt that way. And it's one of those things where if you spook deer getting out, even if you're cheating to the side of the field that you see as fewer deer and you spook a bunch of deer and it's the only way you can hunt. But I wouldn't ruin my hunt by walking in before daybreak just for the thought that why I have to get in there an hour before daylight and then be there when it
wakes up. I'd rather at least get to my stand and have a reasonable chance that I haven't spooked deer for an afternoon hunt, then ruin it before it even gets daylight and so, and then you're just hoping you can get out after or hopen you shoot something actually
and then it doesn't matter if you get out. Yeah, But bottom line is, I'd rather at least have one good hunt and then maybe you you wait four or five days and go try it again, because if you keep gitting it and spooking deer after dark, even if you have to get out, what it's just, it's going to turn into a dud property pretty quick.
Yeah. What's your take on wheeled access? So using a e bike or golf cart or something like that to clear the field on your way out knowing that, like, hey, I'm gonna bust a bunch of deer when I come out of here, but at least I'm doing it on a vehicle some kind versus walking out on two feet.
Well, if I didn't have a choice, I'd rather take an electric vehicle out to smoke deer if that was my only option. Obviously, I'm not going there with the ATV in that condition because it's probably spooking out the woods before I even get off the ATV. But at least something electric would be And we've to be honest, we've done that out here a couple of times. But it does, It does affect the hunt. I even had.
I have a neighbor out here that has one of the new players evs, and I didn't know we had one. And so when I was sitting nearby, I heard him go back go by. It dark. I sit till a shooting light, you know, till end of shooting light where he got out a little bit early. But I heard him go by, and it sound I told Jen, it sounded like a It sounded to me like a golf cart with loose golf clubs driving by. What happened in it, but you could hear it was like a rattle and
a whirr, if that makes sense. And he went by probably two hundred and fifty yards away across the open field. I didn't see him, but it was it was fairly dark, and I'm not sure that would have been you look at it, like if he was walking, he would have been dead quiet, and if something was close, something had
been close to spook it. But we went by with that machine and that clicking and cleaning, and even though there's in a little whirr in that case his machine, it's and I found out later it was that the new player CV. But it would have spooked here three hundred yards away, So I guess it depends on the machine. You know, a lot of those electric golf carts are pretty just a hunterized golf cart with locking red differential
knobby tires. You know, they can be pretty quiet. Yeah, unless you have a bunch of loose golf clubs.
Yeah, make sure put those in the garage before you take off for the hunt.
We do that a lot. We use our bikes around here because we have top level access in Minnesota, and we have areas where it's an eight minute bike ride a full wide open to get to uh to get to a spot where we're even going to stage and put the bike before we walk in a couple hundred yards to get to a spot.
YEP. And they they're definitely more forgiving of that, right.
I would say they're more forgiving unless you're sound from the machine is pushing across two or three hundred yards, So it's kind of like if it's if it's a noisy, so you have to be really careful. We even have like our quiet cats, we have fenders on them, and if you don't use the fender, not with rubber washer, they'll bounce up and down and vibrate and I just can't stand it. I was halfway across the field we
had fenders on. I almost stopped to cut the fender off because I didn't like that chat or going across. And what we did is we just zip tide them and just made it so they But you really just have to be careful with that because some little noise that it's almost like have a friend stand one hundred yards away, one hundred and fifty and just see if you know what they're back to you, and see if they can hear you go by, and if they can, it's probably you're probably better off walking.
Yeah, it's such an interesting balancing act.
Well, you're just in anything you do, you're trying not to spook the deer. So it's like every decision you make, and it is it's kind of like we were looking over some of the ridges in Pennsylvania and it's just so I say it all the time. It sounds kind of goofy, But would you look over that ridge down onto a bench that's one hundred yards away if a deer had a gun and if you walked loudly across the top and you didn't care, if you walk to a big tree and you just silhouetted yourself and look down,
you'd be dead. So think about walking across that top and looking over, or getting to a stand where you're accessing through a field. Can you access through there without a deer knowing you're going by and shooting back if they had guns? Obviously I probably wouldn't hunt if they had guns.
But the whole, the whole New Ballow acts, that's for sure.
But anyway, it's always that balancing act of.
Yeah, speaking of the balancing act, then another one of the things, and we we kind of danced around this a little bit, But it seems like in the late season there's a lot of talk and a lot of thought around when to hunt, like what are the right days to hunt? And I know you're really big on picking these high you know, high odds days you have you know, contributed your your thoughts to the algorithm for the hunt. Oh gosh, I'm having a brain fart. Jeff, what's the app? Hunt cast? Hunt?
Yeah cast?
Okay, Yeah, So you've got that predictive algorithm you helped develop to pick the right days to hunt. When it comes to the late season, are there any particular conditions, any particular variables that are more important at this time of year than any other, Like, what are the things you're really really keying in on for a December or January hunt? What are you looking for?
It seems like during the rut, you can have a fifteen mile an hour win, twenty mile hour win. That's something that's above moderate, not extreme, like thirty five mile hour wins or thirty. But you can have something that's moderate during the rut that doesn't have as much effect as when it's fifteen degrees in December and you have that same wind. It seems wind because there's no running activity or very little unless it's the second rot, they're
just food source movements. It really seems like wind can shut down movement quite a bit. At the same time, I've been out in some super calm conditions where they just don't seem to move. It's so still, it doesn't seem like much moving. So you know, a little bit of wind seems like it's always good, but not not
a lot of wind. I really like when there's a I can think of some really good wet snow times where we have what snow coming down to the point where there's an inch or two a fluff on your body after an hour and a half of sitting in a stand. But I've had some really good movement times during snow and I don't and I think deer or sometimes moving. It's like if it's snow and it's cold, they're moving to get out of the wind, they're moving on the least side of the ridges, they're moving to
more stands of conifer. And so I think sometimes when it's snowing, and obviously that's usually not happening in September October, for the most part that that really I love hunting
those snow conditions. And then I'm always being mindful too that if it's super cold, how like we had eight degrees this morning, ten degrees something like that, and we hardly had any movement on our cameras at daybreak, and then all of a sudden, you see a little bit of movement mid morning, and then we'll see a lot if the conditions are decent, not too windy, this afternoon,
we'll see a lot more. We're at daybreak, you can count on if it's extreme cold, which might be eighteen degrees and you know, northern Kentucky might be eight degrees here, whatever, but they're they're really not moving to conserve energy.
Speaking of that, I've heard some people say that they see a bump in activity on warm trends, Like a lot of us want to see the big cold front in the late season, right, I'm looking for that eight degrees and snow. But then I've heard other people mention like, hey, yeah, that's great, but then also when it bumps up to forty five after a bunch of that cold, or they all of a sudden feel more comfortable moving. Again, have you seen anything like that, is that something you subscribe to something.
I think I touched on this in my book, you know, all other white Tails. But it was when the snow was soft, and so those same conditions when it hasn't been snowing. Obviously, if it's just forty all the time, forty five all the time, it's just kind of boring warm this time of year. But if you just had snow and there's snow on the ground, obviously got down to the twenties, low thirties at the warmest. So then all of a sudden, when it's warm, snow out and
it's softer conditions. Boy, it seems like I can remember a lot of really nice times either tracking deer that would shot in the snow or hunting in the soft snow meaning it's getting packy. It's a really good, really good condition too. So I think it's relative to what happened before those temperatures.
Yep, that makes sense. Okay, So to put a bow on all this, what do you think is the biggest mistake folks make when it comes to late season? Like, are what are we getting wrong? What's the average hunter doing wrong at this time of the year, Because I think We've covered a lot of stuff that will help you do it right. But what's that thing where you hear a lot of folks are missing.
The same thing that we fail as hunters all the time is we just do the same thing. And so that spot where you saw that monster and end of October early November might be a quarter mile from where you should be hunting in the late season, and so
late season deer heard up. There's not a lot of food sources, there's not a lot of safe food sources, and there's not a lot of good and safe betting areas, and so they tend to congregate a lot more and to me, a much smaller percentage of the habitat, whether it's on public or private land, actually hold and have
the potential to hold decent bucks. So if you do what you did in October November, meaning you like I mentioned earlier, we have a much higher percentage of stands that are in play end of October November than we do end of November and December, just because of dead areas and the habitat, wind swept areas, food sources that are not available, food sources that have been pressured, neighboring betting areas that have been pressured heavily during gun season,
and so I really need to make sure you follow the deer. And the cool thing about the late season is whether it's fresh rumps with a lot of shavings on top of leaves, or snow fresh scrapes, so you can actually you can actually see those are pretty easy to see, let alone lots of fresh pellets and betting activity.
It stands out pretty good. And so I can remember even the thumb area in the nineties, where we would want to hunt a certain wood lot, we just had to do a half mile loop around the wood lot a lot of times on the road just even see if there's tracks going that way. If there weren't, we went to the wood lot where their tracks going to it, it might be completely three quarters of a mile difference from
where we thought we'd be hunting in the afternoon. So I think, you know, following the deer, being mindful that there's a much smaller percentage of the habitat that's actually going to hold deer the deer grouped up. If you just do that, following the deer and then being careful going in, a lot of people look at it like kind of like we were talking about in the beginning. We are anxious, we were stressed. We want to get it,
we want to fill it. If we have a tag this time of year, and you tend on mistakes and you tend to push things a little bit more so, if you can identify those deer hot spots this time of year that are always shrinking, and if you can be careful and measured how you go on and approach. To me, that's where the hope and the potential comes
for this time of year. It's really really high if you don't spook the deer and you don't get trapped into doing what you did in September, October and maybe during the rut November.
Yeah. So I think some of the things you just mentioned will fall into this, but I want to have you reframe or prioritize a little bit. If you had to have a stone tablet in front of you and you were going to carve into it your three commandments for late season success, this is going to be Jeff Stur just as late season success. It's going to be here for eternity. Everyone's going to see this when they wake up in the morning on December twenty seventh and
they're going to go out for the hunts. The first thing they see, what would be the three things you would carve on that stone tablet for late season success.
Well, that's tough. I know. The first one would be fine the deer, and that seems to be just overly obvious, but it's not considering that only a small percentage of the habitat holds the majority of the deer, and so
again not getting trapped into that. You know, hunting the same place as you always have, be mindful of that deer are going to congregate, there's going to be a lot of sign where they're at, and really need to gravitate your hunting, even if that means quickly changing where your stand locations are, maybe even sitting in new, brand new stand locations. That would be step one. And then doing everything you can to protect your hunt, meaning don't
spook the deer. And again that's an overly obvious one, but again we rush things this time of the year, and it's a lot easier as we talked about, to spook here this time of year. So if you can find the deer, preserve the movement, and then always be mindful that although the afternoon food source movement is king this time of year. Bucks are replenishing themselves, doze or congregated,
They're aating these major food sources. There should be lots of tracks, lots of sign the second rut is real and it opens up a whole new morning opportunity to hunt like you would deer in the rut, being mindful of where the deer are located this time of year, so you're really looking at the potential for morning stands and afternoon stands, hunting that food source movement, making sure you don't spook out the deer herds that you do find, and then always look for those deer and expect them
to be in a lot smaller percentage of the habitat. And if you're finding those areas consistently, you're going to be on the mature box because they'll move a long ways out of the way to find those conditions.
Yeah, okay, Well, I do still have one Michigan tag left for the late seasons, so I'm going to see if I can get that transcribed and printed on a poster that I can put in my bedroom so that I remember those three commandments for the next three four weeks. Of hunting here because I think.
That's general, but it's it's fun this time of year when you can locate those herds of deer, the bigger deer numbers, find all that sign I remember going back to when I was a kid. It's it's a whole lot of fun. We have a lot of used to hunt till early January every single season in Michigan. It could only help the weekends and hunted most of them, so a lot of fond memories this time of year.
It's a great time. I really do. You mentioned it earlier, the fact that it's slightly more relaxed. Actually, if you don't feel that pressure that you have to get another tag field, if you can kind of go into this and enjoy it in a little bit different way. Man, it's a lot of fun. So I think there's a lot. There's a lot we can learn from this one. Jeff. I appreciate you sharing all this and re igniting the fire for me to continue the rest of these final weeks in what's in strong form.
I'll tell you real quick on that that more relaxed time. When it was the rout, I couldn't even consider bringing my twenty month old Jackson out into the woods. It just didn't seem like a realistic opportunity. We're here to go into a food source that's starting seventy five yards away, keeping the window of the blind shot, bringing a bunch of snacks, throwing him on a big old camping chair
with a blanket and the heater. It just I mean, the reason I'm doing that is because it's relaxed, because you can it's not there is a potential spooking something. But we're sitting more at long distance with the muzzleoders and and so. But that doesn't mean I wouldn't go out in the woods if I didn't think there was opportunity. So yeah, it doesn't mean you don't have great opportunity. At the same time.
Yeah, I'm gonna be doing the same thing with my two boys over this coming weeks. And I'm excited. Great, Yeah, they are, They're very excited. So Jeff, real quick, where can folks find your latest content these days? Is there anything in particular you would say that they should check out in particular this time of year or anything you want to highlight.
No, We're I'm pretty methodical on both YouTube and Instagram. Under White toil Habitat Solutions. And the one thing different with YouTube is I think since early October, I've probably uploaded maybe eighteen shorts, so I've been hitting the shorts more often that shows. Actually will have a hunt coming out about my Pennsylvania hunt, but I put that out
on Monday right away. It's just so easy to put a minute video out kind of a recap, and then try to be pretty active on Instagram with the reels, and then also getting into the off season, whether it's building betting areas or scouting, there's a lot of quick tips that I try to do and try to put out, whether it's the short videos or Instagram reels. Put out those more often the pictures, and we're very very strict
on that. And we still haven't missed four videos per week pace of our longer videos since the summer of twenty nineteen, so we keep a really strict pace on that. And so we put out two hundred and eight a year on that, and we'll priape on out right now about that pace about one hundred YouTube shorts a year
or two, but we'll see how that goes. So between all of that and I try to put out fresh content In fact, if I create a video for YouTube, I don't put it down in Instagram advice versa's try to get fresh stuff out and fresh ideas and kind of just follow what's going on in the white tail strategy world. Three sixty five. So we know through our website we have our lot Seed Company now it's all on white to apitat solutions dot com. We have a
couple other products you might be launching this year. We're in the discussions of those, so we'll see in the future on that too. But we're just trying to eat the needs of our audience and what they're looking for.
So if you were going to recommend one of your blends from your food Plot Seed Company for late season, what would be the thing you'd plant if you were looking for lates and success?
Oh boy, Well, Ourbraska blend is built to be a balance of blends where it's not all hard bulbs like purple top, turnop, green Globe, and it's not all radish, which is more of an early blend, and it's not all leaf, so it's kind of a blend of in between. Some of the blends are more slanted towards the big bulbs purple tops green globe that are usually more late season, so we want something that again establishing that pattern of
use early like what the radish is. But then we have our fall Power greens, which is more a workhorse. We top with Rye more month later after planting Bolt as your plant in early August, Rye about a month later on the fall Power greens. So that's more of a kind of a do it all what someone would play it in the north and uh, and then we actually have a Northernbraska blend we're coming out with, like a non agg blend that we're coming out with going
into this next season. So some of those green blends, a couple of different ones would be I recommend them as great.
Well, you are a busy man, Jeff. You you are a content machine. So I watch him afar in amazement and admire your work because it's it's always good, it's always helpful, and your cadence is crazy. So good for you for pumping it out. I can't pump out as much stuff as you do, so thank you.
It helps to have a good editor in Dylan, so he I just I just talk and build them. He just he edits everything, puts it together.
So's Yeah, Dylan is Dylan's great? Dylan? Yeah, awesome. Well, thanks you, thank you for this, Jeff. I really enjoyed it as always, and I'm sure a lot of folks will today.
Well, I appreciate it. Thank you.
All right, Thank you everyone for tuning in. Hopefully enjoy that as much as I did. Lots to learn from Jeff as always, So get out there, enjoy this late season, put some of his ideas into action, and I truly believe you can still fill some tags here in these final weeks of the season. So that all said, thanks for being here, have fun out there, and stay wired to hunt.