Ep. 757: Foundations - Activate Your Whitetail Goblin Mode

destined to be pretty sparse. I guess, you know, being motivated as a trait that a lot of hunters possessed too, But truthfully, that's just more of that discipline stuff. Curiosity is another one, and I don't think this one gets enough love, but it's pretty much an across the board trait for hunters who figure things out in a wide variety of environments and who tend to fill tags at a pace higher than the average hunter. That's what this podcast is mostly about, even though I'm going to take

an unlikely path to get there. I come from a long line of nut jobs, so I'm interested in all kinds of paranormal stuff and UFOs and strange Earth types of topics, and probably only really bog my brain down more than I should with stuff that doesn't matter. I can go pretty deep on topics about cryptids, although unfortunately I think the last of the sasquatch has died off a long time ago. One mythical creature that I really haven't thought about at all until recently is the good

old goblin. If you whind back the time clock nearly a thousand years, you can find references to goblins in French literature and medieval Latin writings. The Germans and the Greeks and the English all had references to goblins at some point a long long time ago as well. Multiple European cultures and their respective folklores featured goblins as small,

grotesque creatures that were always up to no good. They ranged from mischievous little tricksters to outright malicious beasts that apparently you wouldn't want to have encountered in a dark alley on your way home from grabbing a pine of ale or whatever they called the night of bar hopping in Europe in like the fourteenth century, it wasn't just

the Europeans that dealt with these mythical creatures. South Korea had their own version Bangladesh, South Africa, and it seems like some Middle Eastern cultures also had their own version of a goblin. No, then you had the spinoffs like hobgoblins, dwarves, brownies, gnomes in seleprechauns, and a few others. A lot of them supposedly lived in caves and would not treat you very well if you disturbed their peaceful lives communing with the bats and the bugs that shared their subterranean abodes.

Their legend lives on to this day, and goblins still find themselves in books and movies quite frequently. This has absolutely nothing to do with anything, really, but there is also a modern movement called goblin mode, which is one of those phrases that made it into our zeitgeist and ended up being the Oxford Word of the Year in twenty twenty two. Although to this writer Goblin mode sounds

a hell of a lot like two words. Anyway, Goblin mode, in a nutshell describes someone who has had enough a normal life, or who has rebelled against the bullshit disingenuous world that we see presented in social media all the time. I guess I can get behind that. But there's another thing related to goblins that I really want to talk about,

which is a goblin shelf. We all know about the bug eyed cave dweller in Lord of the Rings and how fascinated he was by shiny objects, which actually is not that different from humans if you think about it. We're pretty interested in oddities too, And if you're the kind of person who will pick up random things you find interesting, you know, while you're on the beach or in the woods wherever in nature, you might have yourself

a little goblin shelf. This is a spot in your office or living room, trophy room, wherever, where you just display the things you like. Now, I've never been to Spencer Newhart's house, but I promise you it's loaded with goblin shelves. I have been in Steve Vanella's house, and while it's pretty organized, it also gives off a strong goblin shelf vibe. That's probably no surprise to you listeners, because those guys are just curious by nature. One of my daughters is too, which is how I got onto

this whole goblin kick in the first place. I noticed, after helping her and her sister moved their fish tank from one bedroom to the other in I guess like a shared custody situation, that she had several shelves in her room that are just cluttered up with stuff she finds interesting. On one shelf, she had a small painted turtle shell that I found while blood trailing a deer in Oklahoma this past fall. I knew she'd like it, so I stuffed it in my pack and brought it

home to her. That turtle shell sits right next to a swamp rabbit skull, which was a strange gift from the world's greatest small game hunter, Kevin Murphy, when we did a live event for Meat Eater last year. My daughter has fossils and a small bird's nest, and spent shotgun shells from successful turkey hunts, and a host of other little trinkets that are, you know, truly one of a kind in some way, and if I'm being honest. I love that so much about her. I think that

curiosity is the key to a better life. I truly believe that if we stop learning, if we stop trying to find interesting things, I think we atrophy in ways that ripple through our lives in a lot of negative ways. My daughter's goblin shelves portend a life of looking for things that are interesting to her. And you know what, she'll find those things, probably wherever she's at, and she'll hopefully always keep looking for them. Now, what does this

have to do with deer hunting. Well, we've taken the curious element damn near out of it. For starters. The goal for so many hunters is to lock up a hunting spot, you know, where the questions are already answered, and the formula for success is damn near written stone. This is also, I might add, a movement that actively convinces us to not hunt until the timing is just right, so we can slip in, execute our plan and leave

the woods with a dead buck. Look, if that's what you're into and what you're looking for out of your hunting, great chase that dream and I hope you catch it. I truly do. But a lot of people who get that aren't really all that happy. It often leads to way less time hunting, which sucks, even if it helps

you kill more big deer. Sitting in a tree watching nature do its thing is a gift, and while there are a lot of times you could do that with very little chance to kill a big buck, is it still not worth it for the act in and of itself. That's up for you to answer, but I know what

my personal answer is. The strategy of locking up a spot and staying out often leads to a single minded focus on the best way to kill a big one, which is a great way to get frustrated and disappointed in any activity that should provides you with the opposite feelings.

You know, when the neighbor shoots your target buck, it doesn't make hunting more fun, But it's not his fault for taking a good opportunity anymore than it's your fault for pinning your season on the fate of a wild animal with a brain and four legs that can carry it to wherever it wants to go. Can also lead to a worse scenario, which is something you hear often enough to know it's a real thing. Which is where someone will say, you know, I don't have any bucks

to hunt this season. Imagine that for a second. We come up with an age class or antler size that's our standard, and if you know they aren't out there according to our trail cameras, We're not going to hunt until something worthwhile shows up again, you do you? But on paper, that sounds pretty dismal to me. I've talked to quite a few people who have good spots to hunt who seem allergic to the idea of setting foot

on public land. I mean, after all, why go chase one hundred and twenty inch year when you can wait out a one point fifty. You know, in some ways that's pretty hard to argue against. But there is a challenge out there that can't be had with certain hunting spots. And there is the reality that some people feel being in the woods is damn near medicine and taking it as often as possible only does the body and mind

good count me in that camp. I guess now there is an intersection here that will allow me to stop shitting on certain styles of white tail hunting while glorifying others totally on an arbitrary basis. I might add, this is where the desire to kill more and bigger deer meets the reality of not having a great spot to do that on. This is the gray area world that

most hunters probably live in. The desire to fill those tags is real high, but the reality on the ground they hunt is that consistent success won't be easy and it won't follow the path you're being sold by a lot of hunting hunting, this is where a goblin shelf comes into play. As crazy as that might sound, but a relatable way to think about this as how many of you shed hunt? Most of you, at some point,

I would guess, go out. But why shed hunting is a strategy for actually killing more bucks come fall is connected by a pretty weak thread. You know, there's no doubt that finding sheds can help you confirm proof of life obviously and show you where bucks spend at least some of their time in the winter. Neither of those are bad things. But we also just like sheds because we want to possess them and put them in our

man cave and look at them, admire them. They represent a curiosity to us, a one of a kind find

that is our own little precious. If you will. I think we all have a little goblin in us, the task of going out into the woods to find something that you can bring home with you, to deepen your connection to the outdoors and remind you of the things you love while you're in your house getting yelled at by your wife, you know, because you took the dogs out to do some retrieves and they got wet and muddy, and then before you can wipe them off, one of them jumped up on the couch where your wife was

watching Netflix. And honestly, she can feel free to work the dogs anytime, but no, it's always your job and you're just supposed to magically keep them clean in a Minnesota winter. Anyway, Sorry about that tangent. Ask yourself why you like chad antlers. It's pretty hard to put into words.

They are the representation of something that's a little beyond an easy explanation, just like a dried out turtleshell that comes home with you from Oklahoma, or a shark's tooth scrounge up on the beach in Florida while you're on a family vacation. So am I encouraging you to start a goblin shelf of your own, No, I am not. It wouldn't be a pere pursuit if you specifically set out to find interesting things in nature to display in

your house. It's not a shopping trip. That would be like, I don't know, kind of like high fenced deer hunting. I guess. Sure, you can have an impressive shoulder mount on your wall, but what's the story already behind the deer? For most of us, that's what matters the most. What I'm arguing for instead is to try to stay curious

about what the outdoors can provide for you. We tend to focus on the big picture stuff like finding that match set from your target buck, or you know, locating that patch of sumac that has just rubbed up to no end and shows you pretty clearly where some bucks spent some real time staging in late October. That stuff's great, but the singularity of focus there keeps us from a

lot of things. Now, maybe this is a bad example, I don't know, but the first buck I ever shot that I mounted was a two and a half year old that came in during a mid October hunt when I was I think twenty or twenty one, A long time ago. Either way, that deer was moving on a night that was hot and buggy, and when he betted down facing me at thirty yards, I nearly lost my mind from the no sums and the mosquitoes that I couldn't swat, and the uncertainty of what was going to

happen next. Well, he got up and I eventually livershot that buck while he drank from a tiny knot hole at the base of a tree that I didn't know was there until I went to look for my arrow and found blood splattered the whole way down the trunk, that little tiny drinking fountain at the base of the tree that produced my first buck that wasn't a one

and a half year old anyway. It made me realize how much of the whitetails world was barely accessible to me, and that there are little features of the landscape out there like that all over that will never find or probably never understand. I think that's one of the coolest things about deer hunting. I also think keeping your eyes open for interesting things while you're in the woods it just kind of puts you in a special place as a hunter, developing and fostering a real level of curiosity

about nature. Leads to hunting on easy mode, at least to some extent, because you never have to talk yourself into going out. That's a bigger deal than most of us realize, I would guess. So think about it this way. Do you know a single weekend warrior or a hunter who just spends a few days at the deer shack who also spends a lot of time just being in nature.

Probably not. Most deer hunters go into the woods with the explicit task of learning something that might help them kill deer, or actively engaging in the act of trying to kill a deer. They don't do a lot of watering in march to maybe scoop up a shed antler or find a fossil or whatever. They aren't going to find that tiny knot filled with water at the base of the tree that some buck might drink out of someday after he gets a little thirsty from eating some acorns.

They aren't going to get distracted by all the exposed rock and some ravine that might offer up a few fossils from a time when the earth looked a lot different from what it does today, and that ravine might offer up something cool for the goblin shelf, or it might get you to a spot where the deer cross it simply to go from one side to the other

in the easiest route possible. Look, I know this is a hard strategy to sell because it's so random, but I'll give you another example before I sign off on this. One last year, while setting up some blinds in the summer in northern Wisconsin, my daughters and I walked out of a property that I own, and we just took a route that I often don't walk. This property was farmed at one point a long time ago, and one of the remnants of that activity is a big old

rock pile. I never pay much attention to it because it really doesn't mean anything to me. But while crossing it with my girls, I spotted a garter snake sunning itself, so we try to catch it, which is what we

do with snakes and frogs and most little critters. He was too fast, though, but we did find a rock with a shed snake skin stuck to it, so that ended up on my daughter's goblin shelf as well, and since we were on a snake pattern, got a little distracted, we checked the entire rock pile over to see if we could catch a different one. During that process, I realized that, well, it wasn't a heavy traffic trail. There was a deer trail going right around that rock pile.

I guess deer don't like walking on loose rock, which makes sense now. That trail was just interesting enough to get me to put a camera on it, and I got pictures of bucks last summer there that I just never knew existed, and I got to peek into a world of deer travel that I had totally overlooked. In that little process, I also found an apple tree I never knew existed, and discovered a tiny bird nest that

my daughter also wanted for a goblin shelf. I guess this is the real message I'm trying to drive home with this one, And even though I've said it before, I want to say it again. I have to find reasons to be in the woods that go beyond the idea of winter scouting or checking a cam or just trying to find a shed outner. It's important for us to be in nature for a lot of reasons that go far beyond killing deer with more frequency. But that

is a welcome side benefit. Not only is it generally a good practice to stop looking at your phone and start looking at nature. But staying curious and keeping an open mind while you're out there will get you to go places you wouldn't normally go if you had, you know, different goals about deer. It'll get you into the micro environment instead of staying stuck in the macro, and that is as important as anything if you want to learn about what deer do and what a hell of a

lot of other critters do. This goes for just a short walk with the family on your deer lease, you know. It goes for deciding to go troutfish a stream you've always ignored for whatever reason, maybe taking a few hours to walk some public land you have no intention of hunting, but you also have nothing better to do because it's March. Whatever. Find the reasons you need to go where the deer

live and some time with them. Fill up that goblin shelf, go hardcore goblin mode, throw a pair of middle fingers up to what you're supposed to do, and have some fun with this stuff. And come back next week because I'm going to talk about the logistics of traveling to scout while not going broke. Doing the whole process. That's it for this week. I'm Tony Peterson. This has been the Wire to Hunt Foundation's podcast, which is brought to

you by First Light. As always, thank you so much for listening, and thank you for all of your support. Everybody here at meat Eater we truly appreciate it. Without you, guys,

we have nothing, so thank you for that. Now, if you're real bored and you got some time to kill, you want to head over to the medeater dot com and you're going to find tons of articles, tons of podcasts, video series dropping all the time, more than enough entertainment to get you through until we can start catching a few more trout and maybe call in a turkey