00:00:00
Speaker 1: Seth, what is going on? Welcome back to Refresh. This is Jake Koefer and we have an exciting episode because it’s October first. So if you’re one of the many states that have been sitting on the sidelines and have been watching some of these other earlier opening states, it is your time. This is October first, and the excitement and anticipation is going to build every single week. And we have a great episode with a variety of different guests here that have already killed some really great bucks, filled their dough tags, or one guest that has put together a game plan for October first after many many curve balls. So this week we’re gonna have Puint Coke from Missouri in Kansas he killed a Kansas giant, clay Murvar from North Carolina, Josh Telker from Indiana, and Connor Lokar from New Hampshire. So this is the start of the season. I hope you guys enjoyed this episode of Reughfresh. Here we go. We got Josh with before the echo on the line, what’s going on in your neck of the woods here, Josh.
00:01:03
Speaker 2: Oh, not a lot man. We had a nice little cool down come through. It’s gonna warm up again here before too long. But uh yeah, I kind of fighting off some EHD here in southern southern Indiana and uh getting ready for October deer season.
00:01:18
Speaker 1: Man, what’s here? This is when this goes live. This is October first, This is the kickoff of fall, and you know it’s gonna be hot. And I guess before we get into that and looking at the exact forecast and what your plan is for the next seven days, I think that unfortunately, a lot of people can resonate with, you know, EHD issues. Obviously, Ohio has been kind of the center focus of a lot of these issues. But you know, you’re in Indiana and you’re you’re experiencing some some issues. How how bad is it for you right now?
00:01:47
Speaker 2: Yeah? So I live in Jackson County, Indiana. It’s the second worst county right now in Indiana, at least last time I looked, it’s pretty bad. We we you know, it’s all each He’s always kind of control, you know, or localized to certain areas. But you know, I’ve found multiple dead Bucks and some of the properties I’ve hunted, and like someone came up to me the other day in the grocery store and asked me about how you found any dead bucks. I’m like, yeah, yeah, he saw like three kids walking down the road with a bunch of racks in their hands, you know, coming out of a creek. And a buddy of mine that lives in the county east of me he’s found twelve dead ones on his four hundred acre farm. So it’s pretty bad locally here, but there’s other other places around to hunt.
00:02:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, so how does that how does that change your game plan? Obviously, you know, leading up to the season, you’re like, Okay, this is tentatively my loose plans and then the rug gets pulled out underneath you, and are you in a stage of regrouping right now or what is your strategy as we get deeper into the season.
00:02:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, So, like the primary I hunt, like where you know, if all things were being equal, is the area I would be that that that’s the area that really got hit with with the HD pretty bad. I’ll give you an example. I got two cell cameras, it’s all I got out this year, and they’re on some private pieces that I can hunt, and they’re over a mineral site and I haven’t got a buck on that. Those cameras for like twelve days now at all, not a one single buck. So it’s you know, I have a pretty low standard over there, like I’m probably not gonna mess with it, just leave it alone. But now like I get on those you know, I got got on the Indy end as map of the EHD Outlook, and I mean you can tell where it is and where it isn’t you know, pretty pretty quickly on those maps, And luckily for me, some of them the surrounding counties. I’m pretty familiar with the public land in those counties too, and have some cameras running over there, and I just it’s just a matter of going and starting from scratch over there essentially. You know, I didn’t didn’t do any glassing over there this summer or scouting around this summer. I did in the spring though, So there’s a little bit of me that’s excited for this season just because I’m going to get into some some new stuff, probably do a lot of learning this year, and that’s always exciting and sometimes refreshing.
00:04:09
Speaker 1: Uh.
00:04:09
Speaker 2: You know, freshing part of hunting is learning and getting into some new territory.
00:04:14
Speaker 1: That’s a really positive outlook, uh, because I think it would be easy to follow in the you know, the trap of my season through and I’m happy about it, like I will no one would be right, like just being optimistic, right, like yeah, ideally I’d like to just go hunt they I know and know where there’s some big deer at. But yeah, other plans. I mean, that’s all you can do. I mean, that’s that’s out of everyone’s control and you just got to roll with the punches. And unfortunately there’s a lot of people that are in the same boat. So with warmer temperatures here for the kickoff of the season, do you plan on if you if you sneak out, what is kind of your game plan or what’s uh, what are you specifically going to try to key in on. You’re going to kind of what somewhat blind now because you’ve basically called an audible at the line, like we’re gonna a different play. So what does that look like for this first week?
00:05:03
Speaker 3: For me?
00:05:04
Speaker 2: I like to hunt in the first week of season. I find that I see more you know, daylight movement from mature deer and this is very centralized to where I hunt at and the hills in Indiana is like low areas where we have a uh. Now, and like an area where you’re gonna have some white oaks dropping, and those lower areas oftentimes have some water in them, which is something we’re lacking this time of year. Uh And that’s where I’ll probably focus on the first couple of weeks. Has hitting these little like thermal hub areas, and I mean I’ve had I’ve been successful early season in these areas. I’ve had buddies that had the same kind of scenario where you know, deer living down low in the cool and shaded areas where it’s for some oaks dropping.
00:05:52
Speaker 1: As far as are you gonna throw a morning hunt in the first week or your primarily evenings or what’s your what’s the strategy.
00:05:58
Speaker 2: I’m not opposed to hunting mornings at all for me, usually early season, so like I just it’s it’s kind of a time thing for me usually, like I can’t get out in the mornings a lot of times because I got something going on with whatever, kids or other other things going on in life where I can’t hunt in the mornings.
00:06:15
Speaker 1: But no, I would come out.
00:06:16
Speaker 2: I would get in there in the mornings early season. I mean, you know, the more you talk to some of these guys that have, you know, way more experience than me deer hunting. It’s like, I mean a lot of guys like talk to John Eberhart the other day, and you know he’s killed a lot of deer in the morning early season, you know, So I yeah, that’s something that I’m not You’re not scared to do it, No, not at all, And that’s something I want to do more of. It’s just right now with young kids and hard to get out in the morning sometimes getting people into school and all that stuff.
00:06:46
Speaker 1: You know, Yeah, what is it? Let’s say you’re stuck to an afternoon hunt first week. You know, temperatures are elevated, You’re going to go hunt a bottom. You know, you’re going to try to find a white oak with some acorns and potentially you know, a thermal hub where sense pulling down. There’s likely adding nearby, and they’re going to come feed on some acorns and drink some water. What is that entry or access point? Look like? How slow are you going? And hopefully someone else might be able to key in on on your approach and might help them.
00:07:14
Speaker 2: So what I like to do, Like, ideally, if I could set up the perfect scenarios where I would be coming you know, in from the mouth of the hub, and you would have to either a you know, be really good with mapping where deer are going to bedding at, which isn’t always tried and true, but or be going in and scouting it in the spring to know a little bit about where maybe the bucks are going to betting up on the points. And then I would come into the mouth from the mouth of the hub ideally, and I will walk around no matter what, I do not want to come down any of those points. One of the huge disadvantages you have in hill country is the amount of you know, space that a deer can see see you coming from. It’s so hard to get close to deer, especially if you’re up top silhouetting yourself. I’ll do everything I can not to come down a point or come around the you know, the top of a ridge that goes in down into a hub, and I’ll a particular one I’m thinking of maybe I’ll go hunting if there’s any bucks in there. I have to literally walk down the opposite ridge, come back, you know, come back down the ridge, and back up into the the second ridge where the hub is. And it makes my walk essentially twice as far. But I can’t come up on top where you know, the ridge of those hubs, because more than likely something’s gonna see you, or you’re gonna jump, doze, or just something’s not gonna go right. And in an early season, I just feel like they’re they’re not you know, it’s not the rut. They don’t have like a whole lot of reason to get up and get going anyway, especially when it’s hot like it’s going to be, Like, anytime you can avoid tipping them off, you got to do it. So I’ll walk around and then I like when I come in, I like to try to if there’s a creek, I like to try to stay in that creek. You know, I’m not saying deer won’t, but a lot of times they’re not going to walk down one of those little hub creeks. I mean, there are a lot of times are rocky, and I think they’re I don’t know if it’s uncomfortable to them, but it’s just there’s layovers in them and everything else. But I try to stay in those to keep low, keep my scent down on that creek to where.
00:09:17
Speaker 4: You know they’re not going to be able.
00:09:18
Speaker 2: To cross across my cent trail and then I just get into, you know, as close as I can without feeling like I’m too close or getting in bad thermals or wind switches and all that kind of stuff, which is sometimes just unavoidable.
00:09:34
Speaker 4: I mean, thanks happening.
00:09:36
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, I think the key thing there is you’re not going from point A to point B. You’re going to point A A one, A two eight, three A four to get to B, you know. So I think that’s a really important thing is people, you know, map out their access if they’re going to go, uh, go out and enjoy it. Like uh, It’s always a challenge right where people are like, well it’s hot, I’m not going to go and next thing, you know, we’ll be doing rough fresh and we’ll be like, all right, it’s late season. This is your last dance. Like it’ll be that quick because it goes it goes by really fast every year. Yeah it does. So first week of October, little elevated temperatures on a scale one to ten, what do you think the deer activity is gonna be or you’re how excited are you? Ten? Being is? Man, I feel like I’m gonna kill the best dear of my life. I feel amazing. And one is basically like, dude, I don’t even want to go. Yeah it’s open, but I’m I’m just gonna buy time right now, all.
00:10:31
Speaker 2: Right, Listen, Like my desire to go is like at a ten because I’m ready to be buck hunting, Like I’m ready to be out in the woods deer hunting. Now, how likely I do I think I’m gonna kill a big one if it wasn’t an EHD year and I had and all this information that I had collected all spring and summer on these bucks that I knew were around, you know, if if that wasn’t the case, I would probably tell you, like the first few days of season, like an eight. I don’t really care how hot it is this year, me going into some areas that are probably gonna be blind. Like I’ll probably give you like a six this year on like confident levels. Yeah, fair enough, But as far as just going, I’m a ten right now, dude, I’m ready to be out there in the woods.
00:11:14
Speaker 1: I love it. Well, Josh, good luck the first week and good luck the rest of the season. And I wish you the very best. Thank you for hopping on here. Thanks Shake, have a good one man, all right. Next up on the line, we have kind of locar from New Hampshire and Connor. You’ve had some success, you’ve already notched a tag. But I’m gonna ask you this question about New Hampshire because when I think of white two honey, New Hampshire is not the first one that comes to mind, and probably not even the fifteenth state that comes to mind. How many archere deer do you think we’re shot in twenty twenty four in the state of New Hampshire archery deer archery only.
00:11:52
Speaker 4: I’m going to say four thousand.
00:11:55
Speaker 1: That’s an excellent guess. I did not give him even a range before we started recording five hundred and thirty deer work shot. Okay, yeah, with with archery equipment. Last year in twenty twenty four, twelve two hundred and seventy seven total dear harvested in the state of twenty in the year of twenty twenty four, there’s eighteen thousand bow hunters and fifty six thousand bow hunters. So when you look at that, there’s there’s not a lot of deer hunters in the in the state of New Hampshire, or maybe maybe you can tell me differently.
00:12:24
Speaker 5: No, I mean that’s you know, we’re not quite Michigan, are we with the you know, off the colded you know, half a million bow hunters or whatever it is. You know, you know, we’re a small state, and you know, we have a we have a great hunting culture. But I don’t know if it’s quite as pervasive as some of those Midwestern states.
00:12:38
Speaker 4: But I know the uh, you know, the bow hunters out here, they hold.
00:12:41
Speaker 5: Their spots pretty deer. So I think they’re all right with the lack of competition. And I’ll say I kind of not cheated. But we have some state bilegests that are really good about posting the total state harvest numbers, and I knew it was around that twelve thousand mark for twelve to fourteen.
00:12:54
Speaker 4: So I got to provide by you know three. That was my guess.
00:12:57
Speaker 1: So excellent, I guess awesome. Well, first off, congratulations on notching tag. You shot a dough very recently. That is often a debate of as the season kicks off, everyone’s really excited. They maybe want to get the dust off their bow and their arrow and go through a shot motion sequence replenish their Venison. What was your strategy to go ahead and get one down to kick off the year.
00:13:22
Speaker 5: Well, for me, it was you know, I basically have the same plan every year, which is chewed a doe as early as I can, and then folks on buck hunting. And for those not familiar, we get two archery tags here in New Hampshire won either sex and then one tag that’s for bucks only. Some of the southern units you can get supplemental dough only tags too, but I’m just north of that.
00:13:40
Speaker 4: So my plan every year.
00:13:41
Speaker 5: Is just on the either sex tag, get a dough, then hunt with for a buck with the rest of it, and it very rarely actually works out.
00:13:48
Speaker 4: For me as well as it did this year.
00:13:49
Speaker 5: But you know, I just went classic early season low impact field edge, you know what is what was left of my drought ravaged clover.
00:13:57
Speaker 4: Anyway, just waited for them to come out, had some pretty good game intel that they were doing that early. And it was the.
00:14:04
Speaker 5: First Saturday of the season, a few days after the opener, and she came out and didn’t go twenty as they say, so it uh, it was pretty uneventifal, but you know, kind of kind of followed the script, and so it was perfect because I was out. I’m out of venison from last year. I got like two packs left, so it’s well timed.
00:14:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, well that’s that’s how you want to start it. How did it feel? Because you know when this goes live, Illinois will it’s the opening day for Illinois, So I mean you’ve got a head start. You got to head start among many states throughout the Midwest. Give us, Give us how it was, because if I feel that a lot of people are probably out of venison and maybe they need to shoot a dough depending on their deer numbers and and go through the motions, be full draw, just tell us how it felt, because I bet it felt pretty good.
00:14:46
Speaker 4: Oh it felt so good.
00:14:47
Speaker 5: You know it’s uh, you know, just being out there even when the weather’s not ideal. You know, that was the first week of this season for us, so like that’s same weather condition like today two weeks later. I probably am not hunting, but you know that that first week you kind of you got to take your swings just just to scratch the itch if anything else. And you know, if it’s a low impact stand where you’re not going to screw too much. You know, it’s just being out there after nine months off.
00:15:07
Speaker 1: It’s it’s the best. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, So you know it’s October one, and it seems like temperatures are are somewhat elevated. What is your game plan strategy for the next week here when it comes you already have your dough down, so you’re focusing on a buck or or you know, potentially multiple target bucks. What do you what’s going through your mind right now?
00:15:33
Speaker 4: Well, you know, it’s so we have a September fifteenth opener.
00:15:37
Speaker 5: So I feel like looking at some of the local Facebook groups, you know, you know, I think a lot of guys are in there October well already, even though October is just barely getting started, you know, because my opinion is that that’s a pressure driven phenomena. So you know, I think a lot of guys have already done some sits, taken their swings, you know, maybe bump some deer, maybe scenting things up. So right on the first or second So we’ve been so dry all all here, you know, depending on the meteor, I’ll just you read like either the worst drought on record or close enough that it doesn’t really matter, Like as dry as i’ve ever seen it. And we finally got a pile of rain last week, and you know, Eastern New York at around X got.
00:16:14
Speaker 4: It, Vermont got it, we got it, Main got it, and we needed it so bad.
00:16:17
Speaker 5: But it’s brought humidity and heat, and my cams have been pretty much toast and acorns are dropping. So, you know, for the first and the second, we’ve got a cool from I’m not gonna call it cold front yet, but we’re you know, we’re like mid eighties humid right now, like I wouldn’t want to sit. But first and second we’re gonna get daytime highs in the sixties, lows back in the thirties. So I think you’ve got a real you know, even though that’s not technically our opener, but you’ve got a real couple of days if you can hunt midweek here. But then after that we’re going right back to high seventies, low eighties, hot, dry, So you know, grouse opens up on the first, ducks open for us on the fourth. You know, this might be a good weekend to you know, maybe hunt some other stuff. Maybe let yourself get dragged to the apple patch or you know, can patch of the apple orchard or whatever, and you know, maybe maybe bank some brownie points. But you know, after these quick cool days here, this week doesn’t look very good on the back side of it. So I now that I have the dough, and I don’t really have any compelling buck cam intel right now to tell me otherwise I’m probably waiting out that first good cold front, and I.
00:17:19
Speaker 4: Don’t want to do anything stupid on October fourth.
00:17:21
Speaker 5: That’s going to screw me up if we get a nice cold front on the t or twelfth, when those pre you know, itches start to tickle in.
00:17:27
Speaker 4: So I’m gonna keep it passive here in the short term.
00:17:31
Speaker 1: Now, if you magically could burn a vacation day on the first or second and pretend New Hampshire opened on the first rather than the fifteenth of September, you know, like the cool front first day, second day, and so this is more geared towards the state that is falling under these conditions. Would you burn a vacation day or jet out of the office or the job site early for the afternoon on the first or second.
00:17:56
Speaker 4: Absolutely, one hundred percent. You know, I ver’mont right next door.
00:17:58
Speaker 5: They’re in October first opener New York’s in October first opener, and they should be still holding onto the tail end.
00:18:03
Speaker 4: Of the cold front, at least for the first so one percent.
00:18:06
Speaker 5: I think, particularly if you’ve got unpressured deer to take that first shot, this is a you know, take an afternoon, take a day.
00:18:13
Speaker 4: I think you got it because I do. I think it’s going to be genuinely good conditions, because I think the.
00:18:17
Speaker 5: Deer are going to be pretty bottled up daylight activity wise, coming out of all this heat. So I think you’re gonna have a really good shot, whether you’re doing afternoon food sorcery and if you want to get kind of frisky and get close to those betting areas. I really think that this this weather’s is going to be worth it for a couple of days that we have.
00:18:33
Speaker 1: If you had to pick that food source in this hypothetical, what would you key in on specifically in Vermont or New Hampshire or New York or even go back to your roots in Michigan.
00:18:43
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, if if you ken, you know, soft Mass, We’ve got some apple trees right now that are dropping, and deer always have apples, but we’re so dry. I think that they are so keen in on that moisture content that I think they’re struggling to get from browse elsewhere. So if you have a lead on that or or betting close to it, you know, even if it’s up by somebody’s house, but you know, you know, if you can reverse engineer where they’re probably betting to get to that right after dark because like they’re they’re coming to ours by the road. Like again, we can’t get daylight shot opportunities, but they’re they’re coming every night.
00:19:14
Speaker 4: So i’d say soft mass.
00:19:15
Speaker 5: The storm knocked a lot of acorns down, and from what I understand, the white acorn crop actually looks kind of decent this year, which is always going to hit or miss for us. So if you can get on that or you know’t keep it simple, I mean I think for you know, for me, hunting a water source has never been something I considered because even in our dry years, there’s still generally water everywhere.
00:19:35
Speaker 4: But there’s just no water this year. I mean, it’s we’ve gotten a.
00:19:38
Speaker 5: Couple spots on our property, but it’s I helped to buddy track of dough opening night, and you know, we look for in a swamp that like in a normal year, you probably need hippoiters to go through. We could have been skipping through there with tennis shoes on. I mean, it’s I’ve never seen it like this, So so I think, you know, if you want to do some scouting and if if you just find an isolated water source and it’s all tracked up, I mean, like, you know, keep it simple, stupid, just set up on it, boil your wind where you think it’s least likely they’re coming from. But so, I actually think water source targeting is probably more viable this year in our area than I think it’s ever been, at least in recent years.
00:20:13
Speaker 1: Love it all right, Well, here’s the big question. On a scale one to ten for the next seven days, where are you following this to be in the power rankings from one being the worst week of hunting ever and ten being the absolute best of the season.
00:20:28
Speaker 5: For those two cold days to kind of start the week off, you’re October one two, Like I’d go hard.
00:20:32
Speaker 1: Seven.
00:20:33
Speaker 5: I think it’s going to be really pretty darn good early season opportunity. But I think it’s gonna be hard too about thirty six hours later. So it’s either you know, take your shot and the day off from work. If you got it otherwise, I’d I would not be going out of my way this weekend when the heat’s back to screw anything up, you know, go hunt something else, Go do something else, scout a new spot.
00:20:55
Speaker 4: But yeah, so I think you’ve got a small window here.
00:20:57
Speaker 5: Of some high numbers, but I think you’re gonna average out back into the week and next week pretty poor.
00:21:03
Speaker 1: Well wonderful. Yeah, well, good luck the rest of the season here, Connor. I appreciate you hopping on way to kick off the season. Make sure that you guys have venison on the table until hopefully you shall have abolutely, absolutely really really appreciating. Good luck the rest of season.
00:21:17
Speaker 4: Absolutely Jake, you too, good luck and thanks for having me on.
00:21:30
Speaker 1: All right. Next up we have Clay from North Carolina. Clay’s already had some success this fall, and so a fun little fact about the state of North Carolina. There was only twenty four thousand deer shot with the bow in the twenty twenty fourth season, and the state typical record is one hundred and eighty one and seven eight inches of shot in nineteen eighty seven. So, just to set the stage for the state of North Carolina. I want to make sure they’re represented here on Retfresh Clay go Man.
00:22:01
Speaker 3: I’m doing great, off to a good start in the season. Things have been hot down here. I mean it’s been hot and dry. Seems like it’s been that way most of the country. Right now, we’re sitting at eighty five degrees here. But I still think if you got deers that are on a pattern, beans are still green in most parts, eight corns are starting to fall. So with that, if you got a deer that’s showing up, I think it’s a good time to be in the woods.
00:22:28
Speaker 1: Yeah. So, and you’ve already had some success this year, right I have.
00:22:32
Speaker 3: I was able to kill one on opening day off of our farm, deer that was coming in to beans, but he wasn’t getting there till a lot later, so I backed off and went in the timber and actually kind of tagged team that one with one of my buddies. He was bedding in a big cutover and there were beans on either side. I was about five hundred yards in on one side, he was about two hundred yards in on the other. And he came out early. I mean I shot him about seven pm. Back in the timber. Once again, not sitting on top of the beans when they’re not hitting those till last light.
00:23:07
Speaker 1: Interesting, So you dove in a little bit deeper, and do you think that is a key element to your success there to get them, you know, intercepted once he got about of his bed, and I do still within shooting.
00:23:20
Speaker 3: Light, I think it’s a lot easier to see a bunch of deer and maybe on camera get the deer you want to see over a bean field or over any kind of agg field right now. But I mean I was able to shoot the deer an hour and a half before last light being back in the timber, So I think that definitely played in and it was kind of a gamble, but our access was pretty good, little to no wind, and I was in an almost bulletproof spot for opening day, low pressure area. Not many bow hunters where we’re hunting, so we’re we’re very.
00:23:55
Speaker 6: Calculated down here.
00:23:57
Speaker 3: We’re not going to go just blow spots out. But if we think that we got an opportunity to go in to kill, we’re gonna take advantage of that when we could kill them.
00:24:06
Speaker 1: Absolutely, So you mentioned, you know, low pressure area and also a pretty calculated game plan. Everyone talks about access. Everyone’s very nervous to blow up spots at this time. You know, for a lot of people it’s October first, and there’s seasons just starting. So you had a little bit of a head start. Explain what your acxis looked like to have that successful hunt. Did you walk two hundred yards one hundred yards and just kind of paint that picture so everyone can understand.
00:24:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, so just kind of driving down the driveway a little bit further than normal, the beanfields right there as you come in, and that’s where these deer are getting to.
00:24:39
Speaker 6: But they’re not getting there till last light.
00:24:41
Speaker 3: I mean at this point now we’re sitting here September twenty sixth, they’re not hitting that until dark.
00:24:48
Speaker 6: So I was able to come in.
00:24:50
Speaker 3: I really only had to walk about two hundred yards from the truck down an open oak flat. Acorns at that point weren’t dropping yet, so I was able to get in there, didn’t bump any deer. And in a lot of these spots we’re hunting, because we’re back in the timber back past where these dough betting areas are, we’re only going to see one or two deer. But those deer that we’re gonna see are gonna be the deer that we’re gonna want to kill.
00:25:12
Speaker 6: So I’m not.
00:25:13
Speaker 3: I only saw two deer the night that I went out there, but the one was the one in it.
00:25:17
Speaker 6: I mean he came straight from a cutover.
00:25:20
Speaker 3: Like I said, we knew he was betted in that and he was either gonna come out and go right and go towards Nathan, or he’s gonna come out and go left. He came out game left and had a twenty five yard broadside shot.
00:25:32
Speaker 1: And so remind me, are you still able to hunt in North Carolina with an archery tag for another buck?
00:25:39
Speaker 3: Yes, we’re two bucks state. So I mean I’ll take a back seat. Now. I got a six year old with an itchy trigger fingers. Youth Day comes in tomorrow, so there’s gonna be a lot of kids hitting the woods. They’re allowed to use rifle for the one day deer on Youth Day. So I’ll let him go, maybe try to find another deer that we want to target.
00:26:00
Speaker 6: But yeah, we are a two bucks state.
00:26:02
Speaker 1: Down here, got it? And so for anyone that’s in your neck of the woods, October first, your guys, the season has already been kind of been rolling. If you had to tell someone what’s key in on or what to pay really close attention to from October first to October seventh, for example, what would you if there was one thing, what would you tell them to pay attention to for that period.
00:26:28
Speaker 3: So acorns and percimmons are dropping. I was walking through the woods earlier today. We had our first rain come through in the past probably fifty days.
00:26:36
Speaker 6: It’s been dry as can be. Food plots look horrible.
00:26:39
Speaker 3: So if you can get back and the acorns aren’t loaded this year, like last year, every single white oak in the woods was completely full. I actually prefer it like this year. The trees that have acorns, they’re loaded, but it’s it’s few and far between, at least where I’m at. So if you could find a good tree that’s dropping, or if you could find the per simmons, they were all in yesterday all over, that’s where the deer are going to be. If you can get there, kind of get back into the timber a little bit instead of on those field edges, and you got some type of a mass crop that’s fallen, I think that’s going to be the money for the next week and a.
00:27:13
Speaker 1: Half with the start of October first, it looks like, at least here in Illinois still going to be pretty warm. I assume that’s probably going to be the case for North Carolina. How aggressive would you potentially suggest someone to be knowing that the temperature is going to be somewhat elevated and maybe not as forgiving. I mean, there’s a lot of touch and go here at this point in the season, especially with a lot of people. With it just being there opening week here, everyone’s excited, they want to be out. So what’s your thoughts regarding that.
00:27:43
Speaker 3: My thoughts, if it’s opening day and you got something out there, get in the woods. I mean, I’ve killed a lot of deer on days that weren’t good.
00:27:50
Speaker 6: And if you got.
00:27:51
Speaker 3: Something and you have the intel and you think you could get in and get out clean, I’d take take that advantage and I’d dive in there early bird, gets the worm it out there, and try to make it happen. Down here, we actually do have a little bit I say cold front, but it’s gonna go from about an eighty five degree high this weekend and by the end of middle of end of next week it’s gonna be down to about a sixty five degree high and lows in the lower fifties. So that’s a pretty good difference. If I could, i’d be out next to next week. I know, I got a I gotta look at the schedule. I pitch for coach, pitch for my son. I got a flag football team, so I’m busy. But I’m looking at those best days and those afternoons I’m gonna be in the woods. I’ll probably stay out the mornings, like I said, tomorrow with youth day, me and my son, we’ll go.
00:28:40
Speaker 6: We’ll go into spots.
00:28:41
Speaker 3: We’re gonna see a lot of deer, probably not good deer, but we’ll see a lot of doze or younger bucks. Maybe a couple of those management deer. But I would definitely take advantage of getting the woods near the later part of next week.
00:28:57
Speaker 1: What have you seen for just general intel for camera activity here this week with elevated temperatures, I mean, have you been seeing above average below average buck moving on cameras.
00:29:10
Speaker 6: Most stuff has been after legal shooting light.
00:29:13
Speaker 3: Now, I do have a couple of people that have killed this week, and it’s been the same thing. They are having pictures of that deer late in the morning, maybe seven or eight o’clock, and they’re able to kill them in that afternoon because they’re not traveling too far.
00:29:26
Speaker 6: If they’re on your.
00:29:26
Speaker 3: Cameras in daylight in the morning and you could get into that spot to hunt in the afternoon. I’ve got two buddies that have success on that same thing, and the morning that I killed it was the same.
00:29:38
Speaker 6: He was on two of.
00:29:39
Speaker 3: Our cameras late into the morning, eight on one, eight thirty on the other, so we knew this deer is not far eighty five degree heat, they’re not traveling too far, they’re staying in the shade. They’re running those creek bottoms. So if you have pretty good access and you got a deer that’s close by, I think it’s worth going into the woods.
00:29:59
Speaker 1: And trying to kick. That’s great advice, Honestly, that’s great advice for anyone to key in on now. On a scale one to ten, so October one to October seven, ten being you feel like you’re gonna kill the biggest deer of your life. One being you’re not sure if you even really want to go. Where do you anticipate, where do you predict next week’s movement to be man, I’ll give it.
00:30:24
Speaker 3: I’m going to be in the woods regardless. Like I said, I’m going out. I’m gonna give it a six. So it’s not great, but it’s not horrible. We’re right there in the middle. I’ll give it a six. With this little bit of cold coming in and the first bit of rain that we’ve had in fifty days, and we’re going to have probably three days of rain next week, so you’re going to be seeing some green up in the food plots, probably see some more acorns and percimmons hitting the ground. You’re going to see fifteen to twenty degree temp swing. So I think a six is pretty solid for October. First. I’d be out there if I had time of it. I wouldn’t take off from work. But if you’re available to get out there in the afternoon, I think it’s worth a shot.
00:31:07
Speaker 1: I love it well, Clay, congratulations on kicking off the season with success. Good luck to your son this weekend for U season, and good luck the rest of the season. I appreciate you hopping on here today. Yes, sir, thank you, Jack. I appreciate it.
00:31:19
Speaker 6: Guys.
00:31:19
Speaker 3: Here’s that one shot on opening day in North Carolina a little over a twenty inch spread, eight inch prow time, just over one hundred and forty inches.
00:31:29
Speaker 1: So, man, not much you can ask for to kick off the year in North Carolina. Man, there’s a lot of a lot of people that go the whole season and might not see one of those and you just started it off just like that.
00:31:41
Speaker 6: Yep, yep. We like I said, we were calculated.
00:31:43
Speaker 3: We’re going in there and we’re hunting when things are right, and we’re not being afraid to take a gamble.
00:31:48
Speaker 1: All right. Next up, we are calling from Missouri with my good friend Flint. He just killed his personal best buck Flint, how does it feel.
00:31:59
Speaker 7: It feels great. It took a long time, but probably got a real big one.
00:32:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, it starts with the two. Yeah, you know that’s yeah, that’s amazing.
00:32:09
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:32:09
Speaker 7: I rough scored him at two twenty seven. I was pretty shocked. But then last night I compared him to a buddy of mine so who killed at two sixteen, and he had a lot more trash, same frames, so it should be pretty close. It’s up there, way more than I expected. I was just hoping he’d break two hundred. Man, he definitely did that, I think, so.
00:32:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, well that’s where I felt bad when he texted me and I was like, that’s got to be like in the ballpark at two hundred and then I saw that you posted it was, you know, two twenty five plus, and I was like, oh yeah, just incredible, man, Well congratulations, tell us the story. What happened.
00:32:42
Speaker 7: I buy and so a lot of land. As you know, I probably flipped maybe fifteen farms a year. Some might buy and sell some My ten thirty one and a bigger pieces. So I’m always watching the market. And I got some counties in Kansas I love. I’ve sold probably six seven hundred acres in Missouri, I had a big piece and I’ve been buying up small pieces out there, just trying to get better. Hunting was his qualities just keeps going downhill. So I’ve been watching Missouri more, trying to buy stuff on the east side because that’s like it’s the best best not off his best area, but it’s the best appreciation it’s closest to us. So I’ve been watching a peace come on Mark. It was only seventy one acres, and I usually stay away from him. I’d like to buy eighties or one sixties for the landowner tag reasons and uh, it had one picture of one big shed on it and that was it. No dear history, and it’s just growed up cattle ground. And I’ve been buying a lot of grow up cattle ground and it’s it’s really good. Like I think it’s like the secret to Kansas right now. I bought several places the last couple of years. I’ve had a lot of bucks on it. They’re just grow up cattle ground, just locus cedar, trees, brush, that’s about it. So I seen it kind of blew it off. The price was pretty good, but I blew it off because it wasn’t an eighty. A few months went by and I’ve seen the listing again and I thought, well, I’m I was just calm. I was kind of looking for some deals. So I called her and she’s like, yeah, they don’t have any history. It’s just a couple that inherited it and they’re trying to sell it. And she’s like yeah, and I said, well, it’s to deal with the shed. You know, it looked like a pretty big one, and she’s like, yeah, I found it when I was taking pictures. You know, if you like shed hunting, there’s probably more in there. I was like okay, So I said, well, i’ll be down there next week. I’ll swing by and look at it. So I showed up, looked at it. It drained all night the night before. The grass was all wet. They just pulled the cows out there before, so it was all tall lespadissa and grass, and I was soaked, and I was like, yeah, that’s okay. You just really can’t tell much like that, you know, when there’s been cattle in there, you got cattle trails, and you can’t really tell what’s deer what’s not. So and we kind of I kind of shot her a price over the phone before I looked at it, and she’s like, yeah, they’ll be close to that. I said, well, before we make a deal, i’ll go look at it. So I looked at it. Didn’t really do much with it. And a couple weeks went by and she called. She’s like, hey, they’ll do your offer, your verbal offer, if you’re good. I said, honestly, I don’t know if I want it. I said, I’ll tell you what I said, I’d buy them for hunting. I said, why don’t you let me run a camera on it for a couple of weeks over corn, without even putting a contract on it. If if they’re fine, fat, you know, we’ll do that. Like I’ll do that, but I don’t really want to buy it and not know what’s there. And she’s like okay and back of mind, Like the only reason I was extremely interested was that shit. And I was like, well, if there’s a bunch of deer there, you know it’ll be a nice piece. So I ran out there, threw out a couple bags of corn, and like the second day I had that buck on there and it was early. He was just getting started, but he had like fifteen points already, just had the main beams and the kickers are ready. I was like, oh, he’s gonna be nice. So we got under contract. We kind of went back and forth again whenever they didn’t have all the mental rights they thought they did, went back and forth, and we end up just closing like early September, so it took all summer. Finally got it closed. And when we first made a deal, I said, you know, I’ll buy it, but I want to be able to run corn feeders and get a food plot going. And she’s like, yeah, that’s fine. You guys do whatever you want there, just want to get rid of it. So that’s why I did. And I had them all summer there, and it really isn’t that hard to kill a big one if you can just find a big one. So he was there and I just kept him, kept him fed, and I got a big food plot in there and for alized it good. And it’s had a bunch of rain and so the muzzlim season and my elk tag opened the same day, the fifteenth, I think. So I had to decide I was I going to go to South Dakota or go to Kansas. So I decided to go to South Dakota because I felt like I better kill a big bull there before they got killed out.
00:35:55
Speaker 1: So that’s why I did.
00:35:56
Speaker 7: Went there first morning, brought my bull and load the family up. The next day we dropped down to Kansas and hunted.
00:36:03
Speaker 2: That night.
00:36:03
Speaker 7: I took my son with me and we had probably twelve thirteen bucks come out to the feeder, and the big boy never showed. My son was about to have a fit. He’s six, and he’s like, Dad, if you’re not gonna shooting these nice bucks, let me do it. I said, no, we’re waiting for a big one. I said, I got plenty of one to twenties at the house already, you know, So we didn’t get him. The wind was gonna switch. And what I did, and it worked really good, is I put my blind about two hundred and fifty yards away from the food plotting feeder. This early season, the winds always swirled so bad. I always I feel like it burned me stands out, so I’m like, I’m just gonna back it up. I had a blind on a trailer, so I just backed it up and hunted it and didn’t see him but a lot of deer. So the wind was gonna be out of the west, which is dead wrong. So I came home for two days and then ran back out. The wind was kind of cheating it, but I kind of set it up to where he could hind of south or a north wind. I know he came out with a munch of other bucks. Much other bucks come out first. He’s kiming back. There’s actually three or four other bucks more mature than him pushing him off. He come across the food plot pretty quick, and then he come back out and it was probably like a two hundred and twenty five yard shot, and finally once the bucks kind of cleared out the way there fighting and feeding. Once they cleared out of the way, I shot and couldn’t tell really what happened to Smoke. I thought i’d seen him run across with his leg up, but didn’t know for sure. So I got down. It was about dark, look for blood, couldn’t find anything, went back, got a good light, never found a drop of blood. So I was talking to a buddy, mind Sam, and he’s like, I got a guy with a good dog. By the time I was talking to him on the phone, I found one speck of blood, and so I hung up to him and I found like three specks. And then there’s a deer. He only went like fifteen yards out of the food plot. But so it was it was pretty simple. It’s just find them. But the interesting part was how I kind of found the farm and found the deer before we even made a deal on it. Which I’ve seen some really good deer on the listings. You know, if you just watch in the summertime, not many other people really are, and you can find some really good farms early season like that I found.
00:37:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, how were you nervous when you okay, So you have a two hundred and sum inch deer in your plot, the plans coming together finally, and it’s like it’s been a dream of yours obviously. I mean, that’s why you’ve worked so hard to put yourself in a position for this opportunity. And you got other mature bucks hanging out in there. Were you just cool as a cucumber, Because that’s kind of the impression I’m getting is i’d be shaking like a leaf properly.
00:38:16
Speaker 7: I wasn’t. I wasn’t as shooked up as you would think, you know, Like I was a kid, you know, you always dream of this giant buck coming out, and that’s what you hunt your whole life for. I was like every buck would come out, I could see legs and then antlers, and I was shook up on if that was him? You know, every time a buck would come out, I was like, is this him as him? And finally he did come out, so I was more shook up on waiting for which deer is gonna come out? But once he got out, you know, like when I got you know what from my hand. Usually when not a ready shoot, I get pretty Yeah, pretty cold and can just pull a shot off, not too many problems.
00:38:44
Speaker 1: You know, it was okay, give it, give it. Give a piece of advice for someone for staying calm in the moment. Is that repetition from over the years or do you have a thought process or are you just like suck it up and focus?
00:38:55
Speaker 7: Yeah? Pretty much a lot of killing a lot of deer probably.
00:38:59
Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:39:00
Speaker 7: So I made a lot of bad shots when I was younger with the bow by being too shook up, but just time lessly, I guess time.
00:39:06
Speaker 1: Okay, how what were the conditions like the night it all came together? You had mentioned, you know, the setup worked for like a north and the south. You were somewhat cheating the wind. But where the was that somewhat of a cold front or was it just hey, I’m gonna be here because the wind’s right and he may come out in time.
00:39:20
Speaker 7: Yeah, he’d been coming out like every other night. And the day before the night we hunted him, he didn’t show up, and the next night he did, and the day before that he did it. But it was about a ten degree drop and it had been like low eighties, high seventies, and it was down to like low seventies that day and Lorraine that morning, so everything seemed perfect like he should show up, man, you know.
00:39:39
Speaker 1: But that’s that is that is incredible. Shot a shot, a bowl and two hundred in the same league. Man, that is that is completely incredible. And obviously I’ve got to know your story more since we’ve been connected and record, you know, some episodes of the Lab podcast. So it’s so cool to see all this come to fruition with a lot of a lot of hard work to put yourself in this opportunity and have that chance. So October one is the opening season, opening day for a lot of states across the Midwest. Looking from October one to October seventh, what would you suggest someone to pay close attention to or what have you been able to pick up over the years. Are you going to be hunting to Missouri? What do you have in the pipeline here now?
00:40:21
Speaker 7: I’m around to South Dakota this week and chase mul deer Missouri. There’ve been deer be hitting the beans pretty well right now, but they’re starting to disappear pretty quick back into acorns. So if the weather had a good cold front come through, uh, definitely get after him. But I don’t think i’d burn anything out if the weather’s not good, Like right here, we’re getting up hi eighties again, so I think i’d be pretty careful getting back out there for the white tails. So I decided to go out through mule deer. They’re pretty easy to find. Them move every morning and evening, so I’ve going to chase them around a little bit.
00:40:51
Speaker 1: I like it, okay, So scale one to ten. What do you anticipate October one to October seventh for deer activity mature buck activity? Ten being you shoot your first two hundred, which you already did, or one being it’s gonna be really slow. I would think it’s gonna be pretty slow.
00:41:08
Speaker 7: Here, it’s gonna be pretty hot. Uh that first week of like the middle of September, the first week of season from Missouri canvas, that’s always pretty good. Like that first week it usually the bucks are moving well still. For me, it always seems like, you know, early October is pretty slow. Uh, the deer just back on a acorn so bad in Missouri?
00:41:24
Speaker 2: Here?
00:41:25
Speaker 1: Do you do you? Have you hunted that first week of October? Have you hunted mornings very often? Are you typically hunting primarily evenings.
00:41:33
Speaker 6: If you’ve got one.
00:41:34
Speaker 7: No, I’m just all evenings. I mean I’ve got, you know, like everybody nowadays, twenty cell cameras, and they’re just not on camera in the mornings, you know, And I don’t want to push it in deep and blow them out, so I always just hunt the evenings. September and October, I feel.
00:41:46
Speaker 1: Like I like it. Well, f went Congratulations on just like the start of a dream season. And hopefully you shoot a mule deer and keep on rocket man. I really appreciate it. Congratulations once again, Thanks Jake.
00:41:59
Speaker 7: Have a good luck this season.
00:42:00
Speaker 1: There you guys have it. Hope you enjoyed this week’s episode of ret Fresh. Get out there and enjoy it. It’s the season always goes by really fast, so you heard it from Connor. If you’re able to hunt that initial cold front on the first or second, it could be really good. And if you aren’t quite ready or you need to get organized, take this time to get all your stuff together, make sure you’re ready to rock when the first cold front rolls in. Go out there or and maybe just sit and enjoy it and maybe try to fill a dough tag. It is here. It’s October first, I hope you guys have a great first week of season if you’re one of the many states that just opened, and we will see you next week.
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