E265: Everything Is Bigger In Texas (Tacos, Donkeys, Giant Bucks, And Mark Kenyon's Texas Hunting Experiance)

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Speaker 1: Hey, I'm Tyler and you're listening to the Element podcast tonight you my side, hold on to me? What has happened all you woods people? Man? I don't know if you're on woods is why or brown out there or what right now? But it is like sunshine where we're at no chance of snow. I know that some of y'all have been getting hounded with the winter weather, pounded pound. As a friend, Mark Kenyon would say, who's gonna be on this podcast? Uh? Mark came down to meet the challenge of hunting in Texas on some public ground. We're gonna talk all about that is a lot of fun. Uh, it was an intense hunt. Um. I had a lot of fun doing it, but that doesn't mean that it was fun really matter. The best part was eating Mexican food, man. Yeah, dude, I mean all the week long and just hammering huneo man, like it al radiates out of like the good Mexican food from Oklahoma trickles down into Texas, right and that kind of how Yeah, that's that's exactly what works. And Uh, those Oklahomas can make a mean theresa, they can. That was one of those trips where like tasty treats. Sure does make the hard work a little bit easier. I guess we got we gained some weight on the trip. I've been having it fast since I got back. Dude. We actually spent a lot of time and you'll hear Mark talk about this quite a bit. Um. We spent a ton of time mapping on this trip, and it's just one of those things where when you go to a new place and you don't really know your way around, it just you cannot beat having a map in your pocket on your phone like you do with on X, and then you can send and share way points and just strategize and and do your best for everybody to come up with a plan. Like, for instance, we all kind of ended up keing in on like these lower creaky areas that were between high points as being places that deer with cruise, but without having the ability to like show that on a map to someone else like while it's happening. Pretty much it'd be kind of hard to, uh, I guess a cross mediums there and understand what the other person is talking about. So on X was a super huge help. So it will be hard to navigate in the dark. Can you imagine dudes that like back Francisco, Cornado or whoever came across there looking for the Seven Cities of Cibola, you know, like and dudes didn't have a clue where they were going. Dude, and they just did it. Yeah we're weak, they thought that, Yeah we are. I thought about that last night, man. I thought that man on the right toilet paper at the house, you know what I mean, Like, those guys are literally they were doing it, Eric gentry S, you know what I mean, just straight up taking their neckgators and wasting thirty bucks of pop. We'll not waste, I guess. Yeah, it's true. I mean there is some waste if you get down to oh goodness, well, but white tails not over for us, So we're still gone. We're still going. We'll probably be hunting white tails as long as we can possibly make it work. Yeah, I mean if we can. If we can hunt white tails in March, I'm all about it, you know what I mean. Well, I just actually made a post on social talking about how uh the temail and they killed the August white tail this year, which is wild Hunter did that water Way to go Hunter? Greg film that one? It was pretty cool. Um, we're on social right now. We're actually kind of doing a recap of the year of twenty twenty two, which is kind of fun because we couldn't really fit it all in one post, so we're just posting stuff throughout the week. Um, y'all go relive that with us if you haven't. But uh, looking forward right now, we got another white tail Houn we're fixing to leave on right now. And uh, we never stopped hunting because it's what we love to do. So right after that, well, today I'm heading out to do some prep work for some pig hunting and we are coming up. Yeah, I'm gonna get a little corny today. I actually tend to stay in that state, but I'm gonna distribute some of that corniness. You know, jokes and you know how to tell when a joke is a bad joke? How is that when it's a parent that's pretty good? Works on multiple levels. Um, yeah, we're gonna do some some pig work. You know, there's a lot of different ways we'll be hunting pigs, but I am excited to be hunting. Um, ambush style is a fun way to hunt them. I can't really say I like any of it. Better than the other. But like there's nothing like when you're sitting there, uh in what I would be sitting in a cruiser saddle, um, and all of a sudden you hear like pigs just getting mad at each other, you know, in the woods. And then here about twenty minutes later, you see something black moving through the woods coming to you, and it's a whole group of pigs coming in And it's just a fun, exciting moment that's different than deer in a lot of ways, but not any less cool in a lot of instances. You know what the reason I like it and why it's different and cool. Every single one of them is a target, yeah, you know, like deer, like one out of every twenty is one that you're gonna try to shoot you. You know, it's an arbitrary number. But like with a pig, if that brown one with a stripe over there turns to where I don't have a good shot, Oh look that black one that's a little bit smaller, that's at fifteen yards, I'm gonna shoot that one instead. It's like just keep on rolling. So to talk a little bit, just real briefly, and we don't do a whole bunch of pig talk. But the to talk of a little bit of strategy. Here, UH one thing that's super helpful for us. Here's the thing, guys, we like to eat pigs. They are tasty, and so the more we can shoot them, the more happy we are. Pretty much a little mixing this year. By the way, I think I'm gonna ground grind some pig in dear together, dude. I was just thinking about this is the day because we I got poor added to some of my venison at the processor this year. It's so good, man, It's the way to go. But anyway, so the best way to the best way to to make sure that we're like in the pigs a lot is uh we run multi cell cameras and so Multimobile has the edge camera, which is our new camera that they're a new camera that basically will connect to any UH service provider, which everyone is the best strongest signal in that area. And we hunt pigs in some low lying no cell service areas and we're able to get pictures sent to our phones, and so we know a lot about these pigs daily and don't have to make honestly, like some of these places we hunt are not that far as the crow flies, but to get down into the bottoms and all that just takes forever. You gotta open gates, you gotta drive down this road and that road, and it's this one's you know, got a limb in the way or whatever. And so uh, not only do we are we able to just set the camera and kind of forget the camera, Um, we can tell a lot about where they're coming in in on the daily, and so that helps us, Like if we're gonna go hop in a saddle right like we're gonna we're gonna be able to hop in the saddle on the right wind in the right tree, right and not get caught by pigs coming in right. So yeah, it's pretty nice. And you know, we we sometimes don't give pigs enough credit for how they can see. It's not that they are blind as a bad of us, as I've heard people describe them, but they don't see as good as a deer by any means. But still, like we've been picked off on the ground a few times by pigs and it's you can stand there, I mean sit there like a stump and they won't do anything, but you gotta move and they're weird, but they're like they're bolder than deer, so like you're trying to draw your boat and then they just look at turn and look at you. Don't don't give you a shot, right, So still the elevation of a saddle helps you with that. You know. It's just kind of nice to be there participating in nature and not being an interference. And you get that when you're in the tree, for sure. You know what they call participating in nature? What? Uh? Yeah, So I'm pretty excited about the big thing I'm gonna. I got a new book for Christmas. My wife bought me called the Hog Book. You might recognize it from our friend Jesse Griffith's. Um. It's got all things hogs in it, and so it's got me super juiced up right now to do some process and and hunting, you know as well. So that's kind of that's the plan. Uh. I'm ready to take some pictures of my with my phone out of there and to steal some recipes. Yeah, bang, Jessie, that I think. Uh, you know, books are a community thing, right, sure, we can share it, I think, yeah, I mean in the public domain, right everything music too, Yeah, for sure. Well, I'll upgrade music to people steal. Mark thought he was in the public domain until he got off the airplane in San Antonio, and then he realized he was in a new country. Then. Uh so I think without further ado as to use a phrase that he says on his podcast sometimes really yeah, Mark likes those like I thought his saying was that being said? Oh, with that being said, he also says that that long story short a lot, which means be ready for a long ready to continue on. Yeah, Mark's got some takes and some thoughts as a guy who's never hunted Texas, who came down in hunted Texas, so that probably is you, uh, potentially not. I know some of our uh loyal listeners are definitely from our great home state, and we appreciate all y'all that are listening. But it's pretty cool to see kind of just how uh perceptions change a little bit, and uh maybe just how I don't know, everybody dreams about hunting some wild, crazy place growing up, and I know Mark was no different, you know, because you see Texas on TV a lot, and uh, it's just like us when we get to go somewhere else, like it's never what you thought it was gonna be. But at the same time time it's always pretty cool to go explore. But I'll stop putting words in Mark's mouth now, we'll let him talk about on the phone. We have got our now, good friend, guy, I've actually got to spend time with Tyler, you know already has like those relationships with with Mark. But we fished in Idaho this year. Now I know Mark Kenyon personally as well. So Mark Kenyon and Wired Hunt. How are you today? Man? Man, I'm great. I'm really good. I'm enjoying a couple of days relaxation post Christmas and uh still coming off of the good time vibes spend some time with the guys down in Texas. So man, I couldn't. I couldn't be any better. Good Man, Did you get any weight while you're here? I don't. I've been afraid to wear myself, so I can't say officially, but it must have five pounds, did you really? Yeah? I don't. I don't know when the last time I weighed before that was, but I definitely weigh have been weighing heavy the last few days and weighed five pounds more than I than I did so before the trip at some point, I mean, we're we're eating two foot burritos almost can't you can't expect not to add a couple of notches to the belt. Is that how you do? Trout man? Just a little ad some inches there? I round up, I round up with everything good. Yeah. Yeah. If you don't know Mark and haven't seen like how he measures things, he definitely has like a specific hand motion for his measurement system that is very unique, like this like this, Yeah, well you home safe, man. I know there was like a blizzard and stuff that a lot of the North dealt with. We dealt with the bitter cold down here, but not the not the weather too much. Um, but it kind of was like a weird thing for our hunt because we're right on the cusp of like some really good hunting weather. But at the same time, it was right again up against Christmas and we had to part way. He's pretty quickly there right before so that everybody could make it home. So yeah, yeah, I was glad I got to move my flight up a little bit, you know, next to the morning hunt that day. But like I was telling you guys before we aired, and I rolled into my home just like minutes after the blizzard hit, and so if I had been six hours later, it probably would have been disastrous. Actually, the flight I was originally gonna be young got the late a time, so, um, I was fortunate that I made the move and snuck in just in time. And my wife was happy and miss Christmas and all was well. So it was a good move. And um, you know, I was hoping to get that last minute magic that morning, which we didn't get to do. But you know, it's all right, it's a good time. I can't wait to talk about it because it was a heck of a hun Yeah it was, um yeah, I started off really on a good, good note as well. We we actually picked you up at airport and uh made our way um into Mexican food Country, and we decided to stop at a food truck and this was your probably your favorite surprise of the whole trip, I would imagine, But we had some really cool shirts on that we surprised you with. And this is all gonna be on this is all video. This is gonna be a part of the buck truck series we've been talking about for the last however many months. Um, so this will be probably likely the last episode. Uh so we saved the best for last, mark Um, and we we revealed a new Wired to Hunt design for your T shirts for you. It's gonna think it's gonna stick. It's gonna do what. I won't reveal exactly what it is. You'll have to watch and see on the on YouTube. It'll be on Meat Eater channel. But pretty exciting. You got could kick out of that. We ate some good Mexican food and then we uh made our way to some public land, which you know in Texas it's kind of weird things sometimes. I had a lot of people reach out like, no way, you're not hunting public land down there. There's no public land. Where could this be? Had a lot of disbelief from folks. Was none. I'd just like to mislead people as much as we can. So, yeah, there's there's none. You sure you guys don't want to edit the last minute and a half out and rephrase what we just did. So we headed down for a private guided hunt on a ranch. Yeah, this is what happens. Hunting is like here and we didn't kill any How did that happen? Mark? As we get into that, I want to ask you a question yeah. So actually probably two questions because um, there's it's kind of this is multi fasted. But um, your guy who gets like jokes played on some and like people joke with a lot. Has it always been that way? Is it because you're really good at taking them? Or how why is that? I don't know if that's like something I would say, is like uh a thing yea, Um, but I would say I like to be part of good jokes. Like I enjoy laughing. I like my crap. I like, uh, I'm good at taking it and laughing about it, um and giving it right back. So so yeah, like I enjoyed sparring with you guys a little bit, practical jokes throughout the trip that were pretty fun. So yeah, thoroughly throwing enjoy those little ones. And you got the last laugh. I was bumming because I thought I had the last laugh on you, and I kept waiting for you be like, dangit, Mark, you got me, and instead I Pep of Michigan almost got Colgon Customs. So if you went just about a hundred miles north, they pulled you to the side. I was I was laying in bed about to go to sleep when you texted me and said, Hey, you trying your trying your shirt yet I'm like as soon as you said that, I was like, oh no, what do they do? That's not a normal question. So I got out of there like eleven o'clock at night, walked out to the suitcase, pulled it. I was like, yeah, we of course. UM went down and sampled the local fair and one of the things you get, uh when you go to different parts of the state is like better produce. So we bought a bunch of peppers serranos to be particular, at the grocery store, and UM actually didn't get to use them like I wanted to. But yeah, this stale came into good use because I put one of Mark's boot one day and uh then it ended up on my pillow and then it end up in mark shirt that end up in the suitcase that he didn't find until probably Christmas Day. So but we had a we had that buck truck prank going that you probably didn't know about. There's a there's a black banana um that had made its way into It was actually yellow when it made its way into the buck truck and then turning black over a few days, and uh, we would like to put that thing kind of in a weird, funny looking position in the seat, and so we would like try to hide it in each other's seat every day. You had to be careful about sitting in the buck truck. Nobody ever said on it, but there were some close calls. We hardly talked about it too. It's like, you know, it's an unspoken thing. It's pretty good. It's the best. You and I were riding the buck truck together down there, and we were talking about kinds of stuff and it was a good time. Actually. I appreciate, you know, getting to kind of have a drive. It's one of the things you have in Texas is drive time because it's such a big state. But we gotta talked about all kinds of stuff. But on the way, I spotted some black buck. Uh that we're out in the pasture and you just go, man, Texas is a weird place or something like that, and uh, which is funny because you could say weird to hunt. Yeah, one could say it's a weird place to hunt. Uh. But um, like that was funny to me because that's probably the most like tame, not taming, the sense of like pet the animal. But taming the sense of like not because normal kind of normal. Yeah, pretty normal thing to see in a good part of the state. And you know you were like kind of fiber flabbergasted at those. Um And I don't know what you've done if you saw like as eber So, Yeah, what was What were some of the things that kind of took you back when you were down here? Well, I mean just driving. I mean all the fences, I mean that's the thing, Like I was expecting that, but then when you see it, I guess I had two thou the fences, like number one, they're everywhere. Everything's look a ranch. Everything's got the big gates, you know, like the big tall kind of entry gate and the big swinging entrance and the fences everywhere. Um. And so that was like, okay, yeah, this is kind of what I expected. It looks very much like what I imagined like parts of Africa looking like or something, just kind of sprawling, brushy, shrubby country. Dry as I'll get out. Um. But you know, the fences weren't as high as I was expecting, Like they don't eight ft doesn't look as tall in person as you imagine it looking when you think about it. Um So, looking at it wasn't as visually disturbing, maybe as I was expecting. I'm not sure if that's the right way to describe it, but it didn't look that terribly different than just someone with a five wire barb wire fence running along the property. It was different, but not that different, you know. But the first person to see a five wire barb wire was like, oh my gosh, I can't believe they're fencing their place, you know, Like it's probably a pretty relative thing. Would you think that, um, like giant windmills on the landscape or the fence was a more obtrusive thing. I didn't even notice the windmills. Windmills. No, I'm just saying, like, when you think about like you're seeing stuff out in the wild, Yeah, I would say the windmills are more like obtrusive than the fence. The windmills are like alien spaceships come down everywhere. We've got those all over by by me though, And when they first came in, I hated them it. Yeah, I don't mean, you kind of get used to him, I guess after a while, but yeah, I don't. I mean, I'm a I'm a hippie dippies. So I'm all about that green energy. But I love killing all them migratory birds. But I don't. I don't. I don't love the I don't love the impact on the view shed or or the you know, displays habitat. Yeah, that's the views the thing for me. It's like you like, sometimes you want to be sitting in a deer stand and just feel like you're out away from everything, and when you got a big windmill it's making noise or just you know a bunch of them in your view, just feel like, oh, I'm not that far away from you know, human activity. So I mean Mark wrote a whole book about that. Yeah, yep, I actually wrote a whole article about this very thing on metiate website. You can check it out. It says it's something like can white tails and windmills co exist? Mark? What you plugs at the end, So if you can kid, Yes, guys, always be selling pitching your articles. Yeah no, we we actually you know, obligatory now, but we will link to that down below because it's probably pretty interesting. I think I might have read it. I don't, I don't. You know, things get a little convoluted after its think we promoted on the last episode of Refresh. You're welcome, Mark'll take that. Yeah, and the uh, you know, see what happens comments, So you were talking about the thing. Sorry, yeah, we're talking about the things that you noticed the most. And I think maybe you had another point there. Oh well, yeah, I mean talking about the fences. I was talking about this the college country looked and then of course, just like the possibility of seeing this wild stuff like that you're not used to seeing that you know shouldn't be there. Um so like seeing the black box seeing others. I'm trying to think whatever. I think we saw some access deer. I think we saw something else. She just wanted to looking around and being like, man, I don't know what I'm gonna see. I don't know what that thing is, but doesn't look familiar. Who knows what could be around the next quarter. And I just that's when I think I said, Man, this is a weird place, like you can see all these bizarre critters. Um was you know it was different? And uh, it's just Texas is one of the kindness sure seems like when it comes to wildlife. I mean, you guys just kind of you guys created your own path, and it was it was cool to get to see it. I'm glad I got to see it, and I'm really glad I got to experience like a totally different part of it that I really liked. Yeah, did uh did you know? This is something We travel a lot, all three of us, but you know, I end up in places a lot of times where I get off a plane and I'm like, man, this is just people look different than where I'm from. It was that, I mean that I think that kind of was something that you may have expressed what you just kind of you know, did you just feel immediately like you were in a you know, different country almost you know, Oh yeah, yeah for sure. I mean, you know, when you get to South Texas, it's very different than North US. Um, so you know culturally obviously, right, there's a lot more Hispanic influence down there, which is just like a noticeable thing with with everything around her. Um, which was which is cool different but cool. Um. Like, one thing I know is that people were really into the World Cup. And um, I don't think anyone knew what the World Cup was up in Michigan, but in Texas there was a lot of people really excited about, Like people were watching it live on the plane when I was flying and going nuts, um, and I'm thinking, like, what's going on? What are those people watching? And then I realized it's a soccer game? Um down here. You know. I actually was on a soccer team growing up for a while. We were really good locally at least, and uh, one of my teams was named the Flying Burritos. That was the name of the team that. Yeah, we were. We didn't lose a game until we went to Dallas and then of course, you know, we played a lot of people, but we were good that year. Man. That's awesome. Yeah, yeah, man. I'll tell you what, one or one cultural thing that was different that I really really really love was the food. And I remember just stepping out the airport right away thinking like, man, I need to break into one of these uh, get a burrito or something here real fast, because I love Mexican food. And that was one thing like ahead of a trip with you guys, like, guys, I don't care about the deer, I don't care about the company. I just want to make sure we Mexican food every day. And you guys have fulfilled that build that wish. How's your stomach and digestive system? After the donkeys that you ate, it's back to normal now good. But after that that first full donkey really like put me down for the cow. That was. I've never had a burrito hitting me across the face like that. So on the fronty and you do pretty good. I was surprised. I really thought that you were gonna, you know, have the northern like, oh, catch up, a spotsy type thing. But you do pretty good with the spots man. Yeah, it wasn't pretty. I like, I like this place. It was just too I just ate that was. That was a big burrito, you know, I was like too like, in all seriousness, what maybe ten inches each each half measurement? Man, Yeah, I trust you on that man, for sure. I think it was probably twenty burrito in all seriousness. Yeah, that was a lot. Um. It was really really, really good. Um, but it was a little bit too big. That's another Southern thing too. It's like we are portions I think tend to be bigger than other places. So um, at least in my travels, I've noticed that. You know, it's I could come home and just the amount of sides on a dinner that somebody will make is outrageous sometimes, you know. So I get the pile in place. Well, uh, at about that point, we actually start doing some hunting, which is nice, um because you said you didn't care about the deer, but we do. Mark Okay, so I'm kidding, but um so, Uh, Greg's not here, but he's hunted the area before. Um, he was on the trip with us, and uh, he kind of like you and him, I think, kind of did some collaboration as to what you were maybe wanting to experience or see and do, and like what was your intent with the hunting. Well, you know, I'm sorry you you remarked at how we intentionally mispronounced things sometimes, especially when it came to Spanish points. Uh. Yeah, you didn't know what an avocado was um or manga? Yeah? Um. But yeah, me and Greg got talking to that first night. He was kind of asked what I was looking for, what I was hoping to bill doing, you know, the thing I had envisioned. I didn't know it would be possible, but the thing I kind of imagined when you guys first loaded like some high level um, I guess some high level information about the area. I envisioned like walking and hiking around kind of hilly open country and rattling and classing and spotting and stalking on white tails and uh. And so when I mentioned to Greg, he said, well, this unit over here probably would be the best bet for you to get that kind of thing. Um And And basically that was what I had to go off. He said, like, hey, there's like a decent glassing knob kind of this kind of area right here. Gave me a pin for that glassing spot. It wasn't in the glass and spot was like a spot to wait until daylight and then from there you could find a glass and spot. Um. And that was basically what I had to go with, leading into leading in the day one and I you know, hyped down too this unit in the dark, having zero idea what it would look like. I mean, basically nothing other than looking at a couple of pictures on Google. I guess um, and just waited for sunrise. You had a pretty good hunt that morning, if I remember correctly. Yeah, do you want me to walk you through the I would love that, but slower pace because I can't keep up with your walking. This long strides applied to my mouth too. No, no, no, no, you actually have a very nice pace when it comes to the conversation. But literally you're walking pace is uh is probably top notch. I mean, I don't know if you've ever explored Olympic walking, but it is a sport. If there was ever a sport that I would you know, possibly have a chance of competing in, that would probably be the only one. So yeah, I can I can walk and I can go up high angled hillside. Those are my two things I'm good at. It's the thing of the mustache. I think we have another friend who has a mustache and he also is uh part billy goat, so that might be it. Yeah, the mustache comes in handy for a lot of things. It really has been a paradigm shift for me. Um its changed my love life, my hunting life, my career, it's all. It's really all went went up and not to too. So if you ever, if you ever need for that little level up, you know how to do it. Based off the video from Wired Hunt channel you showed me from like thirteen years ago, I mean, there was nothing but a level up or two to go. Yeah, I mean that's been one of the keys to my successes start really really really low, and any any progress is impressiment man, you know, you know. So so my hunt j that first that first day, like you know, I got to this spot and waited until I could see a little bit. And then once I could see, um, so there's a little bit of a high spot off to my left. So I thought, well, let's get up there, and then I could look down onto these different you know, points that descend down beneath me. And I noticed on my map two things that were interesting. Number One, I knew that these points we're going to be some kind of deer you're funneling feature in one way or another. And then I noticed that there was two saddles on two of these points, um that you know, might allow dear to cross from point to point more easily. So I almost went straight to those saddles, but as it got light, I realized, you know what, let's just see what this looks like because I don't know, you know, I don't know much about this water source, how high the water is, I don't know what, you know. I've got an idea in the map, but I want to see it. So I decided let's get to the high spot. So I get it to the high spot and I started glassing, me and Michael and um or spike as we call them, and you know, you could see a lot of country. It wasn't super high, um I don't know, maybe a couple hundred feet above the rest of the country, but it was enough that I could see, um, you know, a good bit of three different large points to have this thick brushy stuff there's but there were no trees at all within my view. So there was nothing, you know, nothing higher than probably my shoulders maybe except for some of the cactus. Um. So, Yeah, the first hour and a half or so was just standing up their glasses and I love that kind of stuff like this is probably one of my very favorite types of deer hunting is being in relatively open country where you can glass, observe and then make a move, either make a move on the ground and actually stock on them, or make a move later in the day with a tree stand or saddle or something like that. I just really love where you can see what deer doing and just do it and make a play. So to make the day speed up a little bit, as we joke. Long story short, UM, I I eventually think an hour and a half in or so had seen I've seen a few does, but finally saw a buck and right away, that's a nice bucking. That's a shooter buck um. And my goal coming down was like basically any decent deer, any decent buck, I was gonna take a crack. And in my eyes, like a decent buck was anything bigger than a year and a half old. What I thought a year and a half old buck was so you know, like a little light pointer or something like that. This bucks chian er bucks. No, although some some Michiganders would um, but but this buck was like a definite shooter, like a nice ten point buck. Um as I was a dang, like that's a good one. And uh so I watched him and he's kind of, you know, walking like he's you could just you know that look where there seems like a buck's with a doll. He's kind of walking with a purpose, not cruising, but kind of like standing over something and kind of walking over towards where you think another buck might be. He's doing that kind of thing. And then I saw another two little bucks kind of circling. So right away I'm like, all right, well this buck's with a doll. There's a hot doll in the area, and that guy disappears down like this deep canyon hole there, and thirty seconds a minute later, I see another buck come out of there, and the first thing, it's the same one, but as I look at it more, I'm realizing that's a totally different big buck. This is like a wider, dark horn buck. Um. Also at ten point, we're probably bigger. So I'm really excited at this point. And uh, we end up watching that deer kind of cruise all over the place, moving around, kind of pushing off other little deer um, and end up watching him work down one of these points. At this point, I'm thinking he's checking dose or following dose, but but then he just was doing his own thing. And uh, I'm just at this at this time, trying to think about, Okay, where's he going and when can I make some kind of move to to get ahead of him or intercept him. Um. At one point it looked like he might come our way, and I made a small shift down and got ready to possibly try rattling to him, but then he turned and headed off down the point again. So this whole period last and maybe I don't know, fifteen minutes of watching him and just trying to see, you know, at what point I could could have just he just was in kind of relatively open stuff about two d two fifty yards away maybe, and there's no way I could really move without him spotting me. But eventually he drops down into this this coolie or this draw and that was my opportunity. So as soon as he dipped out of site, I thought I should have some time. If he's down there were that other big buck had gone, Um there's probably a doe down there. I'd bet you he's gonna gonna be in there for a minute. So me and Mike took off on a sprint. Yeah what I call, I don't I don't know who that is. Um So basically sprinted to trying to get down wind and around behind where they had gone in um So, trying to get down the other side of point so that no deer could see me that had been on that side of the mountain, out side of the hill, and then get down wind of where they were, which required me to make like a really big j hook. Um you know, almost had to go from like men basically from twelve to six is what I had to get to. Um, but really almost more like twelve to seven or eight really by the time was all said and done on the face of the clock, if you can imagine that laying down the ground, and uh so this high tail that run through there, and me and Spike both just got tore up with cactus spikes and spines and prickers and pokers and thorns and all that kind of stuff. But we were able to cover that ground. It probably took us, I don't know, fifteen twenty minutes or something. It took us quite a while once we we ran for ways, and then once we got into the zone of you know, concern, we're seeing like I might be getting close enough, that could be dear getting close by. We we slowed down to a sneak, but we're able to finally get into that little draw where these deer dropped in too, and pretty quickly spotted a little buck and another little buck, and then all of a sudden, there's times the big boy was just across the canyon from us, so maybe maybe around a hundred yards away, but on the other side of this deep draw. Let me stop you quick. You're talking distance here, um, and you you kind of have a thing going on that that I think that it would be good to learn if people maybe don't have this naturally, and some people do, but there's a hunter's instinct of like understanding the cushion or the radius that a deer can kind of tolerate before they start like really alerting. You know, like, how did you decide at that point, like when it's time to slow down? Who are you looking at your map and kind of thinking about where they were? Was it a field thing or kind of explained that a little bit. Yeah, that's a good question. Um, so it was. It was based on a couple of things. It was, you know, when I when I was on the other side of a piece of terrain and you know, several hundred yards away, I felt really comfortable being loud and moving fast. Um, So I had marked on my map where they were at, so as I was I had a kind of a general sense of things from my glassing, but that I was also referencing the map on my phone as I was going along to make sure like what I thought was the right point was also the correct point on the map because it was still a new country to me, And so when I had like a big hill or several canyons in between me and where those deer were. I felt comfortable just cruising fast and not worried about it. But when I got to the point where either a I could be visible by where those deer had been, or be where I thought expected that I could possibly be heard by them, you know, that's when I really turned things down. And so that was you know, when I was within a hundred and fifty hundred yards or so someone that hundred fifty yard probably circle. And when I had crested one of these points to the point where now there's there's no big hills, there's no canyons or anything blocking me from them. At that point I was like, Okay, now it's just straight air between me and where those deer probably are. Um. Now I need to be really careful about my sounds and my movement because they can hear or see me quite likely. Um. And then I had already encountered for the wind because I circled way down wind, so now my wind would be blowing from them to me, while it was the opposite when I started. UM. So now I had moved to full blown creep mode. I'm creeping and crawling. I'm hunkered down as low as I could get, sneaking in um, you know, beneath the level of those bushes. And uh, like I said, end up seeing those bucks. And are you guys laughing at me? Yeah? No, you ever left? I thought maybe I pronounced something weird. No, I just thought it was funny that. Do you think that you're out of creep mode? Ever? Fair point? So the basic gist of what happened here is that I end up spotting that big ten point, the first big bucket I saw again, and he seems like he's like standing with the doll. You can't see her, but he's doing the thing where every time a little buck comes up, he runs them off. He goes back to where he was, and little spike comes back, he runs them off. So I'm thinking, all right, we've got this big deer across the coolie from a hundred hundred ten yards something like that. Um, but you know nothing but the air between us, and it feels like you're close. Um. So I'm sitting there thinking about how we're gonna make a move, or when we're gonna make a move to try to get closer to him, and then all of a sudden, there's a doll like right in front of me, seven yards away. Um, there's there's a brush in between us, but you know I can see her. Well. She walks right across in front of us, goes back behind me, bounces off. I turned around with a spike and like, jeez, And next thing I'm thinking, it's like, all right, is there buck behind there? Some I'm watching them, listening and watching listening. It was so weird that we never heard her. I mean, she came so close to us, um, but nothing. And it's it's dry country out there, so I would have thought you could hear something from a mile away. But this happened a lot. Like there's a lot of deer that we couldn't hear until they were right on the top. And the only thing I can figure that they're just such small bodied deer that they're very light footed. Um, so they're just not they're not crushing stuff as much. They're kind of lightly daintily walking through this dirt. Um. And unless they knock some rocks, which does happen, um, you almost don't hear anything. That was the only thing we ever heard would be like rocks and pebbles being shifted. That's what we end up listening for. Um. But I'm confer a buck listening for buck. Nothing. Nothing. So I remember glancing back towards the big deer across the canyon, looking at him again to see if he's still there. And then the next thing I know, there's a buck right in front of me, seven yards away, right where that deal had been. Um. And it's the the other big ten pointer from earlier that morning. And he's behind brush still, but there he is. So I started, you know, trying to get my bowl ready, and I'm slowly moving and Spike was, you know, slowly moving behind me, and you know, something either us just being there or the slow movements from one or the two of us, something caught his eye and he spun around and bound stuff right away. UM. So that was it was. It wasn't even disappointed though, for whatever reason, because the other deer was across the way, and it was just like shock and were just like laugh like, oh my gosh, that was nuts. Um. And so now my attention turned back to the one across the way. He ends up um bedding down and beds in such way that he's facing us. But there's a bush kind of in between us, Like I can still see him for the bush. But um, I thought, you know, maybe if we just belly crawl out of here, we could get out of sight of him, dropped down to the other side of the point and make a circling, you know, stalk on him and try to get to his side or get close enough to him that maybe a grunt would be enough to get him stand up and come our way. And he'd just kind of scared off a whole lot of dos and not does bucks other bucks, Like every time a little buck came within like fifty yards of him, he would stand up and go chase him off. So I thought, you know, if we can get in close to him and grunt, he might come twenty thirty yards our way and give us a shot. And I realized, I'm talking way too much. I'm sorry, I'm gonna trust people do this way too much. So what was like an hour and a half stock belly crawl moved down this canyon. He eventually stands up, he runs off another buck, and in that moment and he stands up, I'm now all the way down to almost to the bottom of the canyon, just beneath him, but on the other side still, and I couldn't make that move while he was betted. But he stands up to chase off this buck, and I'm like, all right, this is our chance. We gotta go. So we sprinted across the bottom of the canyon and what would have been plaine set of where he was fifteen seconds earlier. And I didn't know how soon he would turn around come back to his bed, So we just ran, sprinted across the canyon, got to his side, underneath him, got over a little lip, crawled up the opposite side, circled all the way above him with a wind kind of just blowing off the corner of where he was. And as I'm stalking in towards where he had been, you know, I'm within now I don't know, sixty yards maybe of where I thought he had been bedded, and you know, within that zone of where he probably was that could push him that buck off. I just see times on the other side of the hill and he's walking just over the rise from us I arranged him. He's a forty five yards. I start walking trying to get enough of the rise, you know, beneath me, so I could see vitals. But as I started that, he turns and he's gonna walk right at me. So now he's facing me at fort yards, walking straight at me. So I'm thinking, all right, this is my chance. I gotta get down and not be seen. So I dropped down my arrows knocked him already getting ready to draw back, hoping he comes over the rise and gives me a shop. But now he turns and then start paralleling me again, and I'm just seeing the top of his antlers or top of his ears kind of. At this point, I tried a couple of grunts, wait, wait, nothing, and so after I don't, I waited a little while, maybe fairy seconds, and made at something and uh, he's still I can't. I can't see him. Um, I stand up. I still can't see him. So then I started like stalking towards where he had last been seen, and he's gone. Like we kept walking around looking around glass and like he just disappeared from the world. Never saw him again. I don't know what happened. Never heard him smook, never saw him spook. But he was gone. And and that was that was that first day. We did some more, um the same kind of thing. That night I saw some little Bucks and does um. But that was it was my very long winded way of telling you about that first it was one of the better encounters I feel like, out of all of this on the trip, probably you know, the one of the better mornings or or I guess hunts you know, from between mornings and evenings, and it's definitely worth talking about. Um, what what would you have done different? You know? The only thing I guess I felt really good about the play I made on that ten pointer that was across the way. You know, the only other thing that could have maybe made that one work out, Like it was an aggressive move to make the big swooping jhok the first time. It was an aggressive move to charge down the cannon, get across on his side, and get all the way behind him. All that stuff, you know, worked out and I got to within forty five yards. The only thing I guess I wish I had done is um, rather than dropping down to my knees and waiting for him to come over the hill towards me first shot, I guess what. The only other thing I could have done that maybe would have led to a shot is if I would have stayed standing and when he turned to kind of walk parallel to me, maybe wait until he stepped behind a bush, and then, you know, I have walked five yards further to crest more of the hill to be able to see his vitals, and then maybe I could have got shot. Um, you know, because I got down to my knees counting on him coming towards me the next you know, five or seven yards, and instead he didn't do that. So um, you know, in that case, it got about as close as you could possibly get in that kind of situation, and it was it was cool that it came that close. Um. The only other thing would have been with that first book, the one that came to seven yards. You know, if if I had one thing I could have done different there. If I had immediately got my bowl ready and stood up after that dope passed through and like repositioned myself after that dope passed through, maybe I could have gotten myself into a different position so that maybe I could have slipped an arrow through that brush somewhere. Um, you know, because I was anticipating in a buck coming, but when he didn't show up for the first you know, thirty seconds or a minute, I then turned my attention back to the other buck. Um, if I had instead just said, okay, position yourself in case the buck still comes in the next five minutes, you know, maybe I could have slipped a shot somehow if I had, if I had prepared for that. But you just never know. When you're in the moment, You're just you're just figuring stuff out as you go. And you know, in that case, I had another shooter over the other way. Yeah, that's what I turned my attention to. I mean, I tell you to. One of the weird things that I'm noticing the more a hunt is that if you have deer in that lockdown situation, which outside of like you know, prime rut dates in like very specific Midwest top country, you can end up with a lockdown situation in a good portion of deer season, right. And it's a great time to have a good encounter with a deer, especially on the ground, because you can make moves. But Tyler and I find ourselves in this situation where like we try to make a stalk on a buck in lockdown in like something goes wrong. It's almost all the time, and the scenarios are so like individually specific that you you end up being retrospective after and you talk about like, oh I could have done this, could in this, you know, next time in that situation will do this, and that same situation will never present itself in that sense. It's so strange, like the lockdown, which is what you're talking about here. It's not like lockdown proper like people talk about, you know, oh November twelve or the eighteenth, but it's like a lockdown scenario where the buck is with a dough. It's such a fun and like a thrilling experience, but it's actually really difficult to like loose an arrow in that situation. And dude, and this is exactly, this is where I was wanting to go with. This is you know, for you, Mark and for us, um, we've been we decided to start putting our uh hunting experiences either in audio form here on the podcast stuff or or in video form on YouTube you know, years ago, Um you years before us. I mean, yeah, y'all go back and check that out anyway. Uh So, but but you're you're going to fail more often than you're gonna I mean, despite what the guys on the forums might say about themselves you're gonna fail more than you're gonna succeed in this, and that's what keeps it fun. But at the same time, um, there's there's this there's this thing about hunting and it's a it's a macho man, egotistical, um uh atmosphere that we often find ourselves in or reading you know, some some were involved some way, whether we're reading about it or we're actually in an argument with somebody or whatever. Right and online people you know, as we know it can be pretty uh antagonistic towards each other and attacking. And I guess my my thought here is that, um, I can think of a specific time when I started to when when dealing with mean people for lack of a better word, was uh was something that I struggle with and then kind of when I was able to just like brush that off and and not pay too much attention to it. Um. But but there is this thing that's gonna always happen when you put your your deer hunting, you know, out there for the public eye, and it's going to be the fact that you fail a lot, and everybody else has those retrospective ideas about what you should have done despite what your retrospect is so I guess to kind of ask a question here, you know, how do you, like, do you remember a time when you started to be able to deal with that better or a time when it was hard for you prior to that? And and then you know, how do we how do we kind of make sense of of you know, what we should what how we should approach that stuff? Going for award and like, you know, essentially competition. You know, I just want to hear this from you because you've been doing it for so long and you're one of the I guess kind of younger generation guys that has been also dealing with this stuff for a long time, Like how do you put that aside? How do you deal with that stuff? And uh, you know, how do you process everything that goes along with it? Yeah, I mean it's definitely something I've dealt with UM. And I don't know if there's like any any silver bullet, but I think everyone has to at some point just come to terms with UM. You gotta you gotta learn to shut out the outside noise and become comfortable with who you are and what you do, and UM, stop valuing yourself or your accomplishments. Or your the way you do things by way of other people's opinions. So for a lot of years that was something that didn't come naturally to me. Like I grew up as a kid who was a people pleaser. I loved, you know, I was. I was always the the kid that did everything right. Um. And so I cared a lot about what my parents thought of my teacher's thought and my friends thought him all that. So I guess I was naturally and I think maybe most people are like that, but naturally, you know. As I started sharing my experiences and stories online, I fed a lot off of you know, outside feedback. And I really loved the positive feedback and I really love the fact people enjoyed the stories and that I was helping people are inspiring people are encouraging people or whatever. Um. But yeah, like the negative stuff definitely impacted me. Um. And I think with age and maturity and just kind of being around the block, you you just have to learn to shut out the outside noise. And what I have come to realize that, you know, paying too much attention to either the good feedback or the bad feedback is not healthy. UM. So I tried to not too high a boy, anything I try to get too low by anything like you did a good job, right, It's like okay, sure, right, Um, most of that stuff's best if you just let it go in one ear and go out the other and just do the best you can do and do things the right way as best as you know how, and you know whether it's your career like it is for for the three of us, or if it's just passion, this pastime that you love. Um Man, there's no reason why we should be letting other people's negative attitudes bring us down. Um So these days, um you know, you know, when you post something online, there's gonna be a whole bunch of keyboard warriors out there who are gonna pick it apart or say something so one. I just don't look at comments very much anymore because I just don't need to, you know, wallow in that kind of filth where there's going to be like one thing I have realized that I didn't. I didn't see as much growing up as a just in regular life. But there are are just people out there who are just nasty, unhappy. I want to bring other people down, like I. I live my life in such a way that I want to help other people, and I want other people to be happy, healthy people, And I would never say something to someone to make them feel worse. I would never do something to someone to bring them down. Um. But there are other people that are different, apparently, and especially when it comes to the online medium, there's some there's some category folks out there who just like to crap all all over other people, talk, smack, beat people up, whatever. And my biggest um antidute, I guess to that has been now when I see something like that, I just think, gosh, like, what is wrong with this person? How unhappy must this person be? What must be going on in this person's life that he or she is so miserable that they're choosing to spend their time like trolling other people's you know, lives or work or whatever, just to talk about about it, just to trash someone's appearance for what they're trying to do. Um. So I feel bad for these people now, and I focused on my own happiness or satisfaction with what I'm doing and trying to do good work and do good stuff. And you know, when it comes to just hunting in general, I think we all just gotta get better hunting our own hunt, Like, do your own thing, do what you enjoy, have on, do it for whatever the right reasons are for you, and turn out the noise. I think we've all become too sensitive and worried about the outside perspective because social media makes it so easy to hear from these people. These people don't know us. These people don't know our lives or our backstories or what we're going through. So why are we letting their words impact us? So I just want to interject real quick, because um, they're like this, this is something that I want like the listener to understand. It's not just some you know, I guess quote unquote hunting celebrities sitting here talking about how people are talking noise. This has been on my heart this season because I have friends that are not uh in the public eye, that may peruse Instagram and think that everybody out there is putting great shots on deer and killing them and they're big, and it's like it makes them feel like a loser. And so I think, like even passively, you know, we we have to kind of understand that, like we can even be passively maybe uh boastful or something like that. And you know, just think about other people when it comes to how we present all this stuff, even just as like a normal dude that's out there, uh hunting or whatever. You just gotta be careful, um because you know, even like I mean, I'm telling you, even decent people will uh every once in a while slip up and crack on somebody you know about it when it's probably not really an appropriate thing to do. And uh, you know, we all have a bad day, man, seeople of failure, right. That's why you gotta be able to let stuff roll off. You know. It's like one of the things that Toddler and I, you know, we have such a close relationship and around each other so much that like you know, I might be real snappy one day or or whatever, and I just have to rely on Tyler's grace to understand that, Hey man, I actually love you and I'm not trying to uh you want to hold right now or like a question because you know, but like in general, like you know, as the receiver of that kind of stuff, it's probably pretty healthy just give people a benefit of a doubt, you know, because it's just like you know, yeah, people can be crappy, but they don't always mean it that way. Yeah, And I just I just I just want, I guess that one just this to be an encouragement for people who are listening to be to know that like these are things that um, you know, Mark has dealt with for a long time. We've dealt with um that are you know, some just straight up people just being very grouchy and and saying some mean stuff and attacking your appearance and all this other stuff. And really this the hunting, the deer hunting thing that we do and we're talking about, is it shouldn't really be a competition, you know, it should be just fun man. And that's what it was, you know when we hunted together this past week or so whenever. That was right before Christmas. So, you know, I just I want I've been thinking about this a lot, like I said, because I have guys that have reached out to me, like, man, I just feel like I'm such a terrible hunter. It's like, man, who cares? You know, like who you don't have to be a good hunter. You don't have to, uh, you don't have to listen to all these clowns tell you how they can set up you know, within thirty yards of a buck bad and not be heard or seen and kill the deer when he stands up in his bed. And I mean that's cool. I think it's cool. But at the same time, like if you don't do that, it doesn't make your experience any less valuable, you know what I mean? What you what you do is as go out there and have fun. That's what you need to do. And I think you were kind of getting to that at the end there, Marking. I just kind of want to you know, I just wanted to see from a guy who's dealt with it for a while now. Um, I mean, certainly thirteen years ago that video you were getting some hate. I'm sure, what do we talk about, right? Uh So on that note, um, no hate. But I seriously was in some like fomo mode that morning because Tyler and I decided to kind of like lay up. We were gonna drive around and scout a little bit that morning because it's kind of a newer area for us as well, and Mark's going out there just going crazy seeing dear everywhere, and we're like, dad, gum it this Yankees da him on our beer over here? What's going on? So like we quickly were you know, rushing to make plans to get out that evening. Um, and we all um had some nice hunts that evening, Tyler and I were around deer. Um, you kind of switched to a more ambush style set up, I think for the evening, right, Like, how did you take what you learned that morning to uh kind of lead you in the right direction there? Well, it's the it's your little off that I can tell that before. I shifted to a different glass and knob for that evening because I wanted one more night to to see in a new zone. And then I thought, Okay, if I have to morning the evening to watch two kind of Jason zones, I'll have a good sense of what's happening and then I can set up for an ambush tomorrow. Um. So I didn't see much that night, Um, a few little bucks in the joe. The next morning I did the ambush. Do you want me to tell you the very second version of that. Yeah. So basically, after not seeing much the night before, I decided that the majority of the deer I had seen had been cruising in and out of these deep draws. They were going either up and down the points or across from point to point. And if you remember, like the very first day on my map, I saw these saddles in the points and I thought, man, they might be traveling from point to point through these saddles, and that ended up being true. So for day two, I thought I would set up down in the bottom of these draws where these saddles converged with the low points of the draw itself. So imagine like a like a t You've got a long vertical line that is your low spot, you know, separating two points. That's your draw stupper in the two points, and then there's a cross ways low spot that are these saddles going across the two draws, going across the two points. So I set up down there where a lot of that buck activity had been the day before. I was able to find a cool spot with the wind where it suck it down kind of into like this water source behind me, and it was it was a great set up and ended up having a nice buck come down one of those draws and would have came right down the pipe to me. He stopped at about forty three forty four yards and like made kind of like scent smell on the looking branch and then instead of coming down the rest of the way to me where I was at, like the convergence of three of these draws. Um, he instead hopped the point and went up and across the point on the high ground, you know, at fifty yards or something like that. Um. And that was my That was my best encounter that morning. Came really close to doing the thing I wanted. I didn't want to take a fourty three yard shop. Um, you know, buck, that's uphill of me. You guys kept talking about how small these deer our body wise, and UM, I'm just I'm not interested in wounding a deer missing it. So I didn't take that shot. I'd like to be fourty or in even on bucks in the Midwest, So forty three on a little Texas buck didn't seem like a good idea to me. So that was my morning, and m Ambush set up in a different place in the evening, I saw nothing. So that was my day two. Man. Yeah, that's it's weird how that happened on this hunt A lot where it's like you think you're building towards something and then you have a zero. You're like, what is going on? So um, so as to leave a little intrigue for the viewer. Uh. I think that we should let them catch the rest of this thing. Uh you know, like the minute by minute on the buck Truck episode that comes out next year. But I would like to kind of talk takeaways a little bit because you know, this is uh hunting that's a little bit similar to what um I grew up doing. And you know what is our home state? Uh for you, you've traveled some and hunted some stuff kind of like it, but I know it's a little bit different. Like what, what's a big takeaway that you had from hunting this area or from just this trip. Man. Uh, there weren't any okay good, Uh no there is. There wasn't like a big lesson learned as far as like how to hunt deer. It was more so just like deer or dear or deer. I think that might be a thing. Like I've now been able to hunt deer from as far south, hunt of white tails as far south about as you can get them, about as far north as you can get them in the United States outside of Canada, um, and east to west, you know, hun on as far west as Idaho and east as far as Maine, and there are a lot of things that they do the same from place to place and you can count on it. At the same time, there's there's regional and terrain differences across each one. But if you if you learn the basics of deer behavior in biology and survival, you can hunt. You can hunt them anywhere these places, any one of these places. It's just a matter of kind of adjusting per of the region and per like the set of circumstances you have. And I love that because you you need to understand the basics, but then you have to be like quickly flexible to the place and situation you're at. And so in this case, you know, coming into this area, I had no idea what Texas would be like or what the deer would be like. I show up day one, don't know what it's gonna look like until sunrise is then right away. Okay, here's the situation. I've got open country, I've got some hills, I've got some topography and theam here's some deer, and I'm seeing behaviors that I recognize. Okay, is probably a buck with a doll. I think these things are cruising. He's acting like there's a dough in there. I've seen that before. I know it goes on during lockdow, during lockdown in Michigan or Iowa or wherever. So I'm going to make a move using the terrain which is now my kind of my advantage here, and I'm gonna do a thing that I've done in the past and use the set of circumstances I have here. And you know, that was basically how I approached the rest of the hunt, and you know, very nearly worked a couple of times. So I think the big takeaway is that it's really fun and hunting places dearer deer everywhere, but there's these fun regional flares that I love learning and I love, you know, attacking and kind of studying and trying to figure out and I think all these things make you a better hunter. So I'm just I'm really thankful for the opportunity to hunt deer in a lot of different places. And maybe my biggest takeaway is that white tails are just really really cool and I love chasing them, watching them, studying them, and eating them. That's been eating quite a bit of it here lately. It's nice to restock the old deep freezes this time of year. That way, you got plenty of deer meat. But uh, you know, it's kind of like a weird conundrum that we end up in as hunters and fishermen just outdoor people where um like Tyler talk about this a lot where we go to a really cool place and then we're like, man, I'd like to go back there, but there's so many other cool places out there that you just hardly ever make it back to some of this stuff, you know, and it's almost like it's just a fond memory and that's what it's always gonna be. Do you foresee yourself wanting to go back and do a hunt like this in a in a similar area or do you think you had your feel and kind of want to go just try more new stuff. No, you know what, this is what I would go and do again. Yeah, I would go and do this again. Like, this is my kind of deer hunting where you you can see a lot of it. We saw a good number of deer um, and I really like seeing deer um. I love just watching animals. I could be happy just watching them most of the time. So, you know, this is a kind of hunt that I got to kick out of there's a lot of visibility, there's action, there's the opportunity to make something happen. Um, So yes, I would do this again for sure. So I guess at this point, you know, you're probably I know, fishing is on your mind, but you still have maybe some opportunities, um in the deer woods. And this is the time a lot of people are not They are not, you know, out in the woods doing the deer thing anymore. They're kind of starting to move on to and there's this there's this period for us, it's it feels long, but uh, for Michiganders, I imagine it feels extremely long, where like deer season is kind of over and fishing doesn't start for a while. Um, what are you doing this time of year? You know, we've got Casey and I have some deer hunting left to do, so it's not over for us, but you know, for those who may be kind of done, tagged out or whatever, what do you like to do this time of year before fishing starts? You know, I kind of like this three month period to kind of reset. I don't mind hibernating a little bit during this time period, kind of into food. So you'd be pack on some extra layers. Um, but yeah, I'll pack on, not pack on. I'll dig into new projects. This time of year, I like to do a lot of my writing. I read a lot this time of year. This is why I do some you know, I really dig into a bunch of books and sit by the fire and do that kind of thing. But but as far as outside, um, you know, I'll be doing some scouting and some habitat work here over the next couple of months. On the white tail side, um, I'm as I'm as re energized for white tails and not burned out by the end of the season as I've been in like a decade like I've got I'm still stoked on white tails right now, where a lot of years by the time Christmas hits, I'm like, I need a freaking break. What do you attribute to you know, I think we've talked about it here, maybe in a it was rough fresh episodes probably, But you know, one of my my biggest goal from a hunting perspective this year was to just get back to the fun kind of like what we talked about earlier, Um, just doing things for what I care about, what would be fun for me, you know, hunting for my own reasons, in my own way and for my own satisfaction, and not caring about what other people think or what other people think I should do, or if I need to worry about how many big bucks I kill or how big a buck I kill, and is this big enough or is this cool enough, or is this content good enough? This year, I said, screw all that. Just get back to why you fell in love with hunting in the first place. When you're making decisions about what you want to do, choose the thing that would bring a joy. And that's what I did this year. And uh, you know, I just have had a lot of fun. I didn't travel. I still travel a good bit, but not a crazy amount. And that allowed me to be home more. That allowed me to do more hunting and spending time in my family. I got to hunt my dad or deer camp, got to take my four year old son out for like eight or nine hunts this here, which is awesome. We had something really cool encounters. We've almost killed those a couple of times. We almost killed a big buck a couple of times. Um. I got to go hunt places that I wanted to hunt just because they're fun places to hunt, not because I thought it was my best chance to kill boon and craft or something like that. Um. And it just has energized me, has kept me ketch me having fun with it, because that's cool. It's all about the next season. I'm pumped for you, man. I hope the postseason scouting and all that goes really well for you and you find what you're looking for there. But you know you did mention that you like to read and write a little bit. Um, this is the portion of the episode finally where you can do plugs and you you are an author, talk about that a little bit. Oh yeah, you know my my last book, the most recent book would be That Wild Country. Whichever one should go buy five copies of give them to all your parents, friends and family. Yeah post Christmas. Yeah there you go use your gift cards as you got from Santa. But yeah, that book is you know, it's about the history and future of our public lands here in America. Um, kind of details how we got these places and and what we need to do to keep them around. And uh, I explore that subject by sharing a bunch of stories of myself out there fishing, hunting, camping, fim and all that kind of fun stuff. So it's a fun book, I think for people like the outdoors. And I'm currently working on some new ideas for what book number two will be and excited about that. So I can't wait for you to write about me. Man, you very likely will be in one of these upcoming books, my friend, because were memorable trip. How about that? Yeah, I wonder we gotta pin any chand dude, just hand and on the boat. That's a Toronto mark. You gotta get your pepper truck progress. But dude, we are very thankful to get to have you come down do some hunting with you and get to hang out. And uh, I can't wait to uh, well, you know now we're co workers, man, we uh we're all part of the Meteor crew and we're gonna do some more hunting together. So uh, you know, probably won't let the general public into our plans here, so maybe when we get off the phone, we can kind of make plans. And one of the best things about this time of year, uh, as we're kind of finishing up some hunts and doing some things, it's like just getting a dream a little bit about what next season holds and Uh, I'm excited to do some of that. Tyler and I are about to do some road tripping together, and I bet you we're gonna be doing some some dream and then something, and we already been doing some of it this morning. So let's, uh, let's find a way to involve each other in that a little bit more man and do some hunting together. Sounds good to me. Happen? Well, dude, we really appreciate you coming down, appreciate your thoughts on on Texas hunting, and uh, um, I hope you don't freeze death up there in Michigan. I'll be all right up here. Thank you guys again for the invite me down. You guys a great host. Blast appreciate it. And with that, we kicked Mark Kennyan out of Texas. He's no longer hit a bit allowed to be here, but that's all. No longer allowed to be here. Maybe we might let him back one day. I don't know, um, but if you do want to hear kind of more of our story in our take about the whole season. Really, the most recent Wired to Hunt podcast is, or one of the most recent ones, is going to have uh, Tyler and I on there. We appreciate you going listening given given Mark some support. We we kind of give him a hard time, but he is a nice guy, a friend of ours, so we were thankful to get for him to come down and hang out and do some hunting. Uh, Tyler, looking back, we haven't done this. That's good looking back to what was the coolest part of twenty two? Oh, my goodness, it has to be an element memory? No, um, then you're gonna have to make me given obligatory answer if you do something like that. Okay, let's keep it to elements. Coolest element moments or hunting moment. How about that hunting moment me experiencing a hunt or me just on a hunt, could be anybody else's experience. Um Man, that's a tough question. One that comes to mind as being one of the top moments, is um right? Right? Yeah? That was good hunter Dick and shooting a big old buck in South Dakota. I didn't think he was going to find it, and uh we found it. Yeah, that was a good moment. That was about there like a football huddle getting ready to go out and just that's pretty people. How's a good one. It's it's a hard thing to do to kind of describe that, like what a top moment would be, because everything is pretty special. But like you know me, I think about humor a lot, and funny things are big for me. So the time that me, you and Clay all ended up in the same spot trying to hunt after we all this first, it really is like up there for like things that are really funny and that I will think about for a long time, Like that's a that's a memory right there, because I can just remember Clay's face, like what are you doing here? It was pretty good, dude, you're a mile FORDEO spot. That was good. That was good. I think another highlight for me was Eric's first buck. That was a good moment um being able to find that buck really easily. Um and just like the whole morning was a good, good deal. We got to finally celebrate Eric buck in a buck you know in you know, East Texas, which we have really done a lot of um So that was fun. Um Man. Honestly, I've been thinking about this a little bit. I shot, I got I got to I killed two bucks this year. I had kind of a tough year overall, which I'm still going We're about to go kill some more bucks, but is over. I killed two bucks, and um, both of them were like weird celebration moments for me, Like they were kind of short lived because, uh, you and I hopped on the phone immediately after I shot in Nebraska because you heard me shoot and uh, and so like it was kind of, uh, it was a weird deal where like I basically just like from there, I was like, oh, I gotta get out of the stand and go meet k C. Instead of like having the freak out moment, you know, in the stand, it was just like really fast paced. And then in Kansas it's kind of a similar thing where like, uh, it happened real suddenly, there was no lead up. The deer was literally at fifteen yards when I first saw him, and then I was pretty sure I watched him fall but not acent. So that made things kind of like what should I do now? And you get to thinking logistically, especially with us, because we have five dudes traveling around, like who helps here, who does what? Who brings the lights, who brings the cameras. It's like it kind of you know, I'm not even trying to complain at all. I'm just saying it's different, and it kind of made my celebrations weird and different. So some of my best moments were actually not my favorite moments were actually not really my moments. But honestly I didn't. I keep forgetting about this, but I did shoot a big old mule deer and that was a really good moment. That was an intense uh deal there because you know all the reasons that I've talked about in that podcast. If you haven't heard about that, you should go listen to that podcast. After that, it was like early September when I shut that deer, just since you're busted up about to bust out the episode number, it was like, no way do you know this? Yeah, I don't know. I used to know the episode numbers because I uploaded them, but I don't upload them very much anymore. So the um he had a pretty good hunt with your fam recently too. We haven't talked about that. Yeah, that was a good and that was the last last time of two did some duck hunting with Jet and uh we we had a good time. Man, We shot some We shot some birds. I was picking drakes it was, and he shot really well. It surprised me because he doesn't like shooting guns, and um, I got these um like there a sound suppressing headphone. But they're like go in your your canals. They're not like the Walker big you know, their low profile. They worked really good. Man's cool and so neither. I didn't have a headache. I shot like, you know, a box of shells and didn't have a headache. I usually do when I shoot duckloads, especially um and then he he didn't have he like had a good time the first time he's ever had a good time, which he shot really well too, Like he was shooting birds out of the air and stuff, which was surprising because he just hasn't shot ski very much. But you know, just kind of a it's one of those things where, um, you know Levi is pretty good at shooting a bow. He's probably pretty good a shooting other things too. Or he probably can throw a football pretty well and lead a guy pretty well. You know. It's kind of like that, just that instinct and the intuition carries over. You know, you have different instincts that kind of maybe like athletic versus not and like jets out there being the quarterback at recess every day, you know, so you know, you learn how to lead things, you know, that way. Obviously different speeds and stuff. But it just surprised me. Man. I was like super happy with the way he shot and just bragging on him a lot. So it's good. It's fun, man, I got to do that and have fun with that. I I think that celebrations had just changed a lot with the way we do stuff now. Um And this is a little insight maybe that y'all don't care to hear, but like production kind of effects celebrations some kind of stinks. But in the long run, it's really cool to have the video of how things go and be able to look back on that. We're just talking about this off air will go so like I don't mind it, but like I can just remember, like uh, say, like the I killed in Kansas, where it was just pretty much me, your dad and Drew and then you came up shortly thereafter. It's just a lot different than well, the way we do stuff, you know, and that was that's like it makes that stuff really special to you to think back about that kind of stuff too well. And we've we also forgot the steals camera in Kansas, so I mean, like thirty five minutes to go get a steals camera and so like all that is just kind of a logistical mind processing thing that kind of takes you out of the moment and put you in this whole like, well, I got some work to do, you know, And uh, I don't know. I think maybe in the future or coming up this year, I'll kind of process that a lot more and think about like how I can un or something, you know what I mean, Man, that would be a great idea. Oh gosh, he's sitting over here. Y'all know Eric, he's really good at what he does, but we had to give him a hard time sometimes, especially Casey. Anyways, the first joke cracked on Eric of twenty two. That's not true at all. Actually, I'm sure there's been more. Man, Hey, what was THEO. I don't know first to twenty two. Uh, it's probably telling Eric that we could pay him. Probably what a joke. Oh man, Well, I hope you'll have plenty of jokes going already for this year. It's time to start some new ones. Be thinking about it, be strategizing about that, and maybe think about strategizicing about white tails as well, because if you're like us, you don't ever really stop. I've been man, you had a liver king moment right there. Dude, that was pretty impressive, but you were all natty. That's only good. Well you think this way, bro about to have them Abulette number six and eight up there on top. But oh man, sorry I took that away. Okay, it was good. I was gonna say that casting catch out. I haven't. I haven't, uh not. I've been on the maps a lot. It's like looking at places that are eleven months out, you know what I mean. That's good, man, it means you you're living in it, dude. But if he doesn't pay off, we're real mad. So we have to work hard to actually make it worth it. Okay, we usually do. We usually do. Yeah, But I mean, just because you're looking trying to shoot a deer in Utah doesn't mean it's gonna happen, you know, That's right, that's right. Well, guys, it's good to drink, good to think about that stuff. The next year. Season could still be going for you right now, but a lot of people are looking forward to the next year, and uh it is never a bad time to be thinking about white tails. Get out there, do that postseason scouting stuff. We might be talking about that some once our postseason starts here and then uh after that, it's time to have fun, shoot pig and eat a lot of Mexican food. Yeah, that's for sure. I'm gonna be thinking about that and remember that this is my element and you should live in