00:00:01 Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, home of the modern white tail hunter and now your host, Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm your host, Mark Kenyan, and today in the show, I'm joined by world champion archer and lifelong bow hunter Levin Morgan to discuss his techniques and practices for finding, scouting, and hunting white tails when time is short. All right, welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you by First Light. Today we're talking white tails on a quick turnaround time. We're talking white tails when time is of the essence. We're talking about how to find, scout and hunt deer when you gotta do it fast. Maybe you've got a quick weekend you can hunt. Maybe you're on a rutcation. You've got one week to find and hunt deer in a new place and that's all you have. Maybe you're just a really busy mom or dad with kids and a day job and you can only get out to hunt a few times here and there, and you just don't have a whole lot of time to squeeze in this hunting passion, whatever it is. I think all of us have found ourselves at one time or another trying to figure out, how can we turn up the speed dial on this whole figure and out the deer thing. That's ah, that's one of those wishes that I think most of us have. And our guest today is somebody who has had to live with these same time constraints, but with really high stakes because he's going out and hunting across the country in a lot of different situations on really short, quick trips, and he's got to get the job done. This is Levi Morgan. Of course, he is I think arguably, maybe not even arguably, maybe it's just obvious, the best, one of the very best tournament archers in the country. He's a world champion, multiple world champion, and all every single different title in the shooting arena he seemingly has won it. He is also a die hard, dedicated bow hunter. Levi is the host of Bowlife TV. He's been chasing white tails for for decades across the country and doing it very successfully and and also different types of situations. He's been in the the Midwest, he's been the West, Southeast, uh d i y by permission leases everything. I mean, he's done it all. So he's got a lot of experience and that's experience that he can pull from that we can all learn from. So today what I wanted to grill Levi about was how he does it so fast, how he finds deer quickly on new properties, how he figures out a new farm quickly, how he starts these short hunts knowing that he doesn't have a lot of time to get it done. So how do you start right? How do you end right? How do you know when to pivot? How do you know when to change up your strategy? How should you use trail cameras and scouting without messing things up since you only have a few days to get it done. All these questions and more are what we covered. We also get into some very interesting conversations around routines and mindset. That's something that Levi has perfected within his archery career, and it translates to hunting. I think it's something that for all of us on quick trips or quick weekend hunts, whatever it is, that kind of thing can make a difference to So this is a fun conversation in one that I really enjoyed and learned from. I know you will too, So I'm not gonna I'm not gonna do a long intro here. I think next week we're gonna try to get on and fill you in on what's been going on in my hunting season and some of the other guys on the team. But for today, we're to get right into the interview. I will just give you a quick reminder if you're not already subscribed to our Wired to Hunt weekly newsletter, make sure to go do that as soon as you're done listening to this, or maybe maybe hit pause and go subscribe right now. That's where you're gonna get all of our new articles were being published over Wired Hunt from our whole slate of people. We've got videos coming out from people like Levi Morgan, like Tony Peterson, like myself. We've got articles from folks like Tony Hansen, Andy may Beaumartinic uh John Eberhart. We've got, of course this podcast. We've got the Foundations podcast from Tony. We've got ret Fresh Radio coming out every Wednesday from Spencer. You'll get updates on all of that through the Wired Hunt Weekly newsletter. If you just go to the Meat Eater dot com slash wired, you'll get the pop up to sign up for that newsletter. Check it out. I send you an email every Monday, tell any what's up, what's new? High they recommend it. Finally, make sure you're following me on Instagram at Wired to Hunt to get the day by day hunt recaps. I'll be sharing updates on my Michigan hunts as I am recording this right now. I am about to head to Washington, d C. For an urban bow hunt and that's gonna be very very different kind of thing for me. So you want to get the updates on that too. I'll be share and it all over on the Wired and Instagram. So check that out. And I think that's it. I think that's all the updates I've got for you. Hope your hunting is going well so far. It's uh, it's crazy. October's here. It's only gonna get better. So enjoy this one with LEVI. Best of luck out there, and let's get to it all right with me on the line. Now, I've got Levi Morgan, Levi, thanks so much for being here. Yeah, man, thanks for having me. Thanks for having me. Yeah, I know you're busy guy, this time of year, all over the place. Uh So carving out this time is no small thing. I recognize that, and it's it's kind of exactly the topic I want to talk to you about, which is making use of the little amounts of time that we have. Whether you're, you know, someone in your position where you are traveling around the country hunting and you've got you know, a week here, a week there, or if you're just someone who's got a regular day job and you only have a week of vacation, or you only have weekends and you have to find deer fast. I think that's something that a lot of people have to deal with, and you seem to have particularly gotten good at it. Uh. I mean, she's just looking at what you've done so far this season. You've gotten on deer quick and figured him out and been able to fill a tag. So when you when you hear that, when you hear finding white tails fast, what's the first thing that comes to your mind? Like, what do you think is if you had to just quickly your gut instinct, what's the most important thing to find dear fast? What do you think that is? Cameras? Um? I think, yeah, that's been something I've had to do um and had to become good at if I wanted to be successful you know, and over the last twelve or thirteen years however long I've been doing that, but um, yeah, it's just honestly a lot of pre planning, a lot of getting cameras out in the summer and and letting those do a lot of the scouting for me. Um And in certain places like this past week in Ohio and I shot my biggest deer ever first day opening day, um, which that was kind of a different story because that's my family farm and I kind of know if like if I'm getting pictures of a buck in a certain area most year to year, the bucks, the big bucks will use that area the same. So past history is very important if you have history on a farm, and like really paying attention from one year, um, because normally even a different buck when he moves in, he's going to use that area very similarly to you know, maybe a buck you hunted there five years ago. So um, I knew when I started getting pictures of that deer on the farm and kind of he would only show up on one camera and I kind of knew where his core was and so um it made it a lot more simple to move in and and focus on him. And that's the thing that you know, I think I've learned to do better over the years is just simplify things instead of because you can like get spun out pretty quick when you got five days and you're on a new piece of property and you have no idea where to even start. And so if I like sometimes I don't have the ability to run cameras previously, maybe I get permission late in the year and we've done that before, like get permission and like the next day it's like November six, and we have no idea, but we're going in blind. And um, honestly, that's one of my favorite ways to hunt, is just off of aerial going in on Google Earth or or whatever, and and keeping the wind right and hunting my way into a property. So starting on the outsides and hunting in and learning as I go as far as watching the deer movement moving a little closer and just get more aggressive with each day. Um, it's kind of my strategy in most situations. Let's talk a little more on the trail camera front. Is that when you show up on a new spot, or you show up for a hunt and maybe it's the place that you have hunted in the past, but this is your your window to hunt it is now. Um, let's assume that you didn't get cameras out in the summer, and so now it's okay, I need to figure out what they're doing right now? Is is the trial camera thing the very first thing you do, like when you get there day one or you get there the night before day one? Is your first plan going to be okay tomorrow at some point I'm setting cameras. Uh. If that is the case, how specifically are usually doing that? Is it always four cameras spread out here? Is it twenty cameras? Or talk to me about like the specifics of what you usually do in that situation. Yeah, And that situation is going to be the least intrusive option, um, because like I'm not just gonna go, you know, strolling through the property hanging cameras, because then you just pretty much ruined it for the next three days. So what the cell cameras are really big for me? Um? Then so I don't have to continually go back and check my cards. Um, because every time I feel like, every time I walk into a place, it's just my chances of killing my target deer go down, you know, and So what I do in that situation is I'll have a backpack of camera, Like I'll keep four or five cameras in my pack that I hunt out of, and I hang them as I hunt. So I'll hunt an area, um, maybe I walk over a crazy good scrape line or see one going into a hanging hunt, and so I'll hang a camera there. And so I'm just always got my head on a swivel, like if I haven't been able to scout this property at all and I just get there. It's like using every bit of information that I possibly can um and being as unintrusive as possible, but still be aggressive. I don't even know if that makes sense, but like I'm trying to watch my success. I don't want to be blowing the deer i'm hunting out going in. And I might even hand cameras like if I can see like Nebraska, for example, Nebraska is an easy place to hang cameras on food because it's all agg in alfalfa and all the deer going back across the Platte River embedding in the cottonwoods and the cedars. So I'm not blowing them out trying to hang cameras on the field edge. So yeah, if I get to Nebraska, you know, the day before opener, I might drive my truck down that alfalfa edge, hand cameras on trails, uh, scrapes, whatever, and no, you know, no harm done. But southern Ohio big timber woods, um creek, bottom cedar, thickets, deer could be betted anywhere. I'm not going in there until I go to hunt. You know, I'm gonna go from an aerial hypercentage sit where I can maybe see and kind of gain intel with my eyes, and then hand camera as I hunt. So that's kind of how I would approach that, probably in two different scenarios. Yeah, Now what about the specific like camera setups? You mentioned a couple of different examples, maybe a scrape, maybe a trail. Can you just talk to me about I mean, you've you've ran cameras as as much as almost anyone probably you know, where do you stand these days as far as how far away from a scrape or where you think the deer is gonna be. Do you do you like them high in the camera so they're above eye level? Do you not care about that when you're actually putting them up? What are the specific details you're thinking about nowadays. Yeah, for sure. I think the more I run cameras and more, I realized that big mature deer know they're there, and big mature deer will avoid them if if you know. And and I've learned that certain deer don't care, and certain deer dude, because I think we run forty cameras just on our home farm, and I'll watch certain deer walk around them like they will. I hardly ever get a picture of some deer because they just they know. I don't know if they hear it going off, they smell the electronics, something they do not like about it. So what I've found is is if I can get it out of eye level, I like to hang especially if it's um like a betting area, scrape line something like that, I really like to hang it higher where they're not looking at this camera the whole time, and so um and I like to put like on scrapes or trails. I'll put it on like three shot burst every ten seconds, because you know, especially once we get later in the year, when you know a buck might be following a dough something like that on a trail, I don't want to miss those things. And I'm not leaving these cameras out for months at a time, so I'm not worried about batteries dying. I just want to make sure I'm not missing a piece of the puzzle, I guess, but I do like to hang them above eye level, pointed down. The deer just definitely don't get bothered as much. It is kind of um, it takes away from the quality da the picture because it's way more busy, like when you're trying to see what that animal is, like, his horns are going to blend into the sticks and leaves and all that stuff, And it's harder to really get a good solid picture of a buck when you hang it high, pointed down. But if if you can see like, okay, that's a definite shooter at that point. It really doesn't matter if you can score him, you know, over the phone or not, or count as stickers or whatever. But I just want to make sure I'm not running this deer out of his normal pattern. So I definitely like to hang cameras about my head height, um and pointed kind of down at whatever. You know, I've got it on want it's a scrape or a fence gap or something like that. Okay, And do you ever run traditional cameras anymore in a situation like that or is it all sell? No? I do. I run a lot of traditional cameras just because I don't have enough tell cameras. If I had enough, I definitely would not run traditional cameras anymore, But I don't, so so yeah, so I'm in the same boat. Uh in that case, then what's your take on checking those So you mentioned that you would either you'd hang them if it was easy access, like the Nebraska thing, but if not, you would only do that in and on the way to hunt. How on a short hunt like this, Like how often are you gonna check those cameras? And will you only check them when you're walking past hunt? Or in this case, will you get to day three and you're like, dang it, I gotta go and I gotta walk a special walk just to find out what's happening here? Yeah? Absolutely, I mean when you got five to seven days in day three you're not on anything, uh, and you got you know, four or five cameras soaking on the other side of the farm, Definitely, that's the time. Like, Okay, I'm hopefully gonna look and find the windiest part of the day middle of the day. Um, try to keep my wind right, you know, make sure I'm as sent conscious as possible and slip in their pull the cards. I'm probably gonna wear late text gloves because you know, everything you touch, I'm trying to touch as little as possible and I don't want these deer to know him there. But you've got to find one, you know. If you're not on one, then you need to go pull cars. I'm definitely going to do that. I mean, that's the time where you take chances. And uh, it's so funny because I hunt my home farm completely different than I hunt when I'm on the road because baby, that thing, you know, they don't even know they're being hunted. And when I get on the road, I'm like really aggressive. I'm like it's time to go, you know, and especially if I haven't found one and we've got three days left, like we're moving different areas every sit, you know, pulling cards and scrambling. So yeah. So so that that brings me a good question. So you mentioned what you're doing, you know, on the final days of the hunt, but day one of the hunt, you mentioned that usually you like to start somewhere some kind of observation hunt. Um. But I remember hearing you once talking about when you're moving in to to set up a new spot. You talked about the ports of scouting with your eyes and not necessarily walking all over new property to find that tree, but to actually glass or stop and look before you walk all over the place. So so when you're heading in for hunt number one on this new spot, can you just walk me through that process of scouting with your eyes before you actually pick your observation stand. Yeah, absolutely, So like hanging hunts, which is something we do probably of the time when we're you know, traveling hunting. Um, because I've just found it, I feel like that's my best I have my best success on like hanging hunt type deals. So, um, when I'm trying to pick a tree, even an observation said, I want somewhere that's safe but that I'm still in the game, um, where I'm not blowing deer out, but I still have a chance to kill one. But what I meant by that was, like, I guess when I was younger and a little more like I would, I guess I'm just as aggressive now, but in a way smarter way, I would just go right into the juice and like looking at trees like, oh, that looks like a decent tree. I'd walk over to it. Look, oh, no, it's crooked, or that fork comes off too weird, and Okay, that looks like a good one. Over there, go over there and looking. So now, instead of like leaving scent trails all over where I'm hunting, I'll stay back and like really pick these things apart and make my plan as far away from where I'm going to hang as possible, so I'm not wasting time in there and I'm not spreading my scent everywhere where I'm actually going to be hanging. So if I can look at this spot from a distance, me and my brother who's normally running camera for me, we'll sit there in brainstorm and try to have the tree picked front when we go in there, so we waste no time. We get there, we go up, we set up, we're in, and uh, instead of getting to the spot and then trying to plan while we're walking around, you know right where we want to be sitting. So yeah, it makes a lot sense to use your use your binoculars and those other tools to avoid spreading scent all over the place if you don't have to. I mean, there's no quicker way to educate the deer than than take a hike. Right, Yeah, it's unbelievable, man. And like just how many times you know, walking in and I always try to like walk in where I can shoot, like because I've had so many times for that deer's coming in, coming in and he cuts my trail. It doesn't matter how much you know, you take care of your scent. Sometimes they don't get you. Sometimes they do. But a lot of times when they cut your track, they'll stand there for a while. Not so much when they hit your windstream, that's the winds blowing. But when they cut your track, a lot of times they don't know. You know, they're still searching, like where did it go? They're curious, they're not sure, they're not a lot of times they don't just bolt, but they stand there and there they're on alert, and they stop. They freeze a lot of times. So I always try to walk right where in a place that I can shoot. So if that bucks in in bow range and he's coming in, and or he's walking by and he hits that trail, if he freezes, and I know that's it. I could shoot him because I had several times where you know, I slipped through the thick stuff all the way to the base of the tree. Well that buck hits my my track and freezes and he's in the thick stuff, and I got no shot, you know. And then he turns and goes back the way he came, and I'm like, dang it, Like I wish i'd have walked in tan yards to the left. I could have killed him right there, you know. So I learned that the hard way a few times. But yeah, I definitely can relate to that one. Ah. So scouting with your eyes, you know, from a distance, is one thing. But I also, of course, I know that even though you are trying to walk around as as minimal as possible, whenever you are, you're you're still scouting and trying to learn as you go. I think one of these same conversations I was listening to you were talking about how there's this temptation to pick a spot and say, okay, I just gotta get there, and then you're just kind of trudging along, just covering ground and looking at your boots. But really you want to have your heads up, looking around, learning as you go along. What are the kind of things like what are the next level things Like I know when you're hiking in you're looking for scrapes and rubs like we all are. But what's the details that you're looking for when you're heading into a new property that you really want to zero in on. That that get Levi Morrigan spiky senses tingling and saying, Oh wow, this is this is what I need. This is I need to stop now. I'm not going to go any further. Uh, this is the thing that we're looking for. Can you give me like the nitty gritty Yeah, I can. Like I'll use an example. Um So, like it really revolves around like those sneaky food like like not obvious food like big bean filled or like whatever. It's like that one wide oak tree that this drop in in a rand spot that like the deer can eat and feel safe, or it's a honeysuckle thicket, or it's a per semme tree that I didn't know about. Um it's because those are the places that that big bucks coming to in the daylight, you know, and he's where he might not be getting to those big food plots. Or whatever in the daylight. Um, that's what I'm looking for when I'm coming in. Like it may be a scrape line, it may be a rub line, it may be a sneaky little ditch um that he's using to walk down, you know, because I've killed so many big deer just on because they don't like to walk in the open. They don't like to walk where they can be seen forever. So um, and they don't like to feed there either. So it's it's that acorn tree, that white oak tree that they're feeding on her. Even on years that a lot of the white oaks are falling for some reason, those deer pick one that they hit heavier those bucks are on. They like one tree they'll walk over, you know, two ours of white oaks to eat under one. So if I'm looking for that one that has the most acorns popped under it. And my dad told me this when I was really little, looking for the difference in an acorn it's eight by a squirrel and one that's eight by a deer, And the one that's ate by a deer will be cracked long ways in half and the squirrels will be chewed on. And um, So if you find acorn holes that are popped in half long ways, that's deer eating those and so um my dad told me that when I was really as young, and I've never forgot that, and so paying attention to little stuff like that where I'm like, holy cow, there's like there's like white oak holes everywhere right here, and then there's you know, deer droppings everywhere and scrapes all I'm like, holy smokes, Like this is a little sneaky spot that it's not obvious that I would have just walked through and just thought it's another acorn tree. But just those little things like that would be like a real good example of you know, what I'm looking for. And even so I'll use Mississippi as an example. Two years ago, we're we're driving a little area. It's a swamp and like, uh, just big timber thicket stuff. It's hard to hunt. And there's a little place we call the parkway on our on our lease, and we're driving down the road and we're like, look at the track crossing right here, like no reason like, but we're just paying attention and it's like, uh, a highway of deer tracks crossing this sandy road. So we step out and we walk seventy yards following these tracks and there's like two percentmetries that are like falling and it looks like a whole field of hogs had been in there, but it's white tail, and so we throw a camera on it and half our shooters are showing up on this persymmetry in the daylight. And it's just like those kind of things where you just pay attention and you don't you're not just powering through a spot just because it hasn't been good in the past. Maybe those pursuing trees haven't dropped in five years, you know, and you wouldn't have noticed it, But now they're dropping in every day within a half mile to coming to them. So yeah, ken in on that on those changes is so key. Another thing though, that I'm thinking about when I hear this is the the opposite. Well, let me take a step back. It's when you find something like that looks great you you you scout your way in, or you found something something on the map that looked good. Your head in there. You find this thing you want, you set up on night number one of this quick hunt you have and you're expecting the world, but then nothing shows like you're you don't see what you want to see, and this always leads me to one of the tougher things within a traveling hunt or a short term hunt, where you have it's it's really easy when you set up in a stand and you see something to work with, right you see you see a ton of deer in a couple of pretty nice bucks, but they're just out of range, and then you think, okay, well then I just gotta make a tweak. Or you see them five yards away and you realize, all right, I got into the general zone. Now you need to zero in. I realized I got to make a couple of hundred yards shift down and and then I'll be in the game. But what happens when you find a spot that you think should be pretty darn good and it just doesn't give you anything to work with. You don't see any deer or you see no bucks, And now it's this weird, this weird conundrum that at least I find myself and where I'm like, Okay, do I believe in this place so much that I need to stick it out even though I haven't seen anything that's told me that outside of the sign, Or do I move to another new random place and start from ground zero and try to learn a new spot. Um, how long will you give a spot or what are you thinking about when it comes to that, like moving on or sticking a spot out that that hasn't proven itself yet. Yeah, I think you just explained bow hunting very quickly, because that happens way more than like the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. But um, yeah, that's the hard part man. It's like, I think it's more based on time of year two, whether I'm I'm staying or I'm leaving. So if I think that they're they're like early season where they're close to bed and like where they're feeding, where they're betting, and they're doing generally the same thing every day, then I'm moving. Like if I sit there, like if I give it a good like everything's right, conditions are right, and I still don't see him see the one I want, I'm moving because they're generally doing very similarly the same thing every single day, and so he's probably gonna do whatever he did today tomorrow and that ain't coming here. So Um, However, like late October, they're starting to cruise more. You know, maybe they're checking scrapes every thread three or four days um, or even the rut where you know it's kind of wild card. You don't know what's coming or from where. Um, then I might stick it out. Like if it's a good pinch, it's a good like I know there's big to your clothes, and like it's a it's a spot. One's gonna come in the next three days. I just need to be here, Um, then I'll probably stick it out. UM. I think the rut it's when people jump around a little too much because they you know, they sit a spot that's good, they don't see the one they want. They're moving. Well, it's such a random thing in the rut. That big buck maybe tending a dough and he's gonna leave her tomorrow, you know, and he's gonna walk right through here when he does. You just gotta sit there from daylight till dark. And sometimes that sucks when you're not seeing anything. But I feel like those are the times where I'm more likely just to stick it out. Um. Where like if they're keying on food early and late and I'm not seeing the one I want in the daylight, I'm I'm bouncing trying to find where he's moving in in shooting hours. Yeah, that makes sense. Can you can you tell me about I think that you did something just like what you're describing on those early season hunts in Nebraska and Wyoming. Can you walk me through kind of how those two hunts looked and how you managed to pull off what I think you're describing. Yeah, so Nebraska, I only have one year under my belt on this place. It was last year, UM, and it was incredible with the number of deer, but it also makes it hard because it's hard to keep those spots fresh. And and so what I did there is we ran cameras this summer. We we sent a bunch of cameras out to the farmer and he scattered them up and down the alfalfa. But it's like two miles of alfalfa on the on the Platte River, so they can only tell us so much. And so we knew areas that had shooters we'd get a picture of every once in a while. So, okay, he's in that area. So what did um Trying to make a long story short, I got there two days before season and scouted and actually put my eyes on um three or four different solid shooters on the south Alpha from like a mile away. The problem was getting in there to hunt them without blowing everything out with the winds that we had. So I just kind of hunted my way in still like I I came in with a good wind, used the river for access, got in like on the edge of where I thought the furthest straggling deer might be on that first set. UM just just did not want to blow any deer out because it's like a domino effect when there's that many deer and you run one out and it runs over another, and then they both run over the rest of them, and then they just all ago, you know, So it's not spooking. You might not be running over top of all the deer, but if you run over one and then it runs over top of them, same difference. So I was trying to like be as safe as possible get in there because I couldn't see exactly what trails they were using in the river. I didn't have enough information to be that aggressive and just go in and blow in there and hang us thatt. I could just see the general area they were coming out of in the river from our point of view. So I got close enough that first day to kind of see. Then I knew, Okay, the bucks are using the same little ravine all the bucks used it. I saw it that first morning. They went back in, and I thought that evening, okay, maybe they're doing a little bit of a circle. I'm gonna I'm gonna give this tree one more sit. Well, that evening they came right back out of that ravine. I didn't get a shot. So I was like, Okay, now I've got them, pegg. I know right where they're coming out into this field. So the next day I moved in a lot tighter, and then my buddy Andy showed up, and so we could kind of double team on on that river because two different groups of shooters were coming out in two places, and we had them pegged and so we had a different wind. And we went in and uh, actually me and my brother sat in a cornfield where they were kind of pinching down in between um like feed, which is like what farmers cut for silide. It looks like corn, but it's not. And then a cornfield and in the alfalfa kind of pinched down like a hundred yards between it. So we got the wind right sat in that corn and killed one of those big shooters at first or that second nine. So that was one of those deals where Okay, they're not they're not coming by this set. We got it. Now, We've got the intel we need removing, you know. And so we just kept bouncing closer and closer until we put ourselves in the game. Wyoming totally different. That was a pure guess on my part when I killed that deer, and um, it was like a five acre alfalfa pivot in the middle of nothing, so like Sage Hills you can imagine that, and then a bottom with an alf alpha pivot. And there was one group of car was on one side and then just canyons and goalies on the other side. And so we saw this deer from the interstate. Um, we saw some deer feed down the alfalfa, like eleven thirty in the afternoon. We're like, that looks like a buck. We pull over glass it like, oh my gosh, biggest deer I've ever seen in Wyoming. So it's like, okay, all focus goes to this deer now. So me and Mike had tried literally we laid flat in the south alpha field one night, um and we had every deer over two deer come out into the south Alpha field. We beat him all except for one though, that then ran over top of our big shooter and they ran out of the field. So that was awful. Like I thought it's over, because they went into the stage the next morning, gone, next evening, gone, next day. No show in the entire field. So we're like, okay, we were at him out for sure. You know, he's just not going to tolerate that. And so at that point, it was like, there's only one place I felt like that we couldn't see, and that was this cottonwood patch. It's like five six acres of like pond, old ponds, a little creek, like cattails, cottonwoods, just like somewhere he would go like when he got pressured, I felt like. And so we went in there and I knew he wasn't you know, he had changed. That's what I knew. I wasn't gonna be stubborn and just keep hammering this spot when he's not there. I can see for a mile, you know, he's not here. So we just took a guess and and me and Michael went in and hung us set and all the other bucks did not come and range. Like we were not hunting the group of deer anymore. We were hunting just one single deer. And we took a chance and moved instead of just doing the same thing with you know, where all the other deer were coming out. And I'll be danged if an hour before dark I didn't look up and he was walking right at us and thirty eight yards walked right by us and broad day light. So um, that was that was a little bit of luck. But it was again one of those things where it's like he's not here. He's like, this is opening weeks. He's just bad to food, that's it. Bad to food. And if he's not in this area, he's not I mean at least not in the daylight. There's no reason to keep keep coming back and trying to hunt him where he was two days ago. But he's gone, you know, so well, it just kind of started moving. It brings to mind, I mean, a really important part of any trip where it seems like, at least in my situation too, you're head into a hunt like this, you begin with a basic idea like all right, I think I want to start in this zone because of the what I saw in the map, or because of history or whatever it is. And you go in and you kind of observe and hunting your way in, and you hope that the scenario will play out kind of like it did in Nebraska for you, where you got eyes on one. Then you can make some adjustments move in and maybe do that a time or two or a couple of times, and you're able to close the distance and and make it all come together. But at some point on some of these trips, you get to the halfway point or something and that hasn't happened, and you're still kind of blind, and you don't have something zero in on, and you get to the last day or two or three, and um, I don't know, you've done this more times than I have, I'm sure, so maybe you don't have this little little whispers a panic in the back of your mind. But at least I get a little bit of that. Just man, you're only three days left now, only two days left now, and you you really have to control that concern and and make good decisions still, but it's it's harder when you don't have anything solid to work with except for the fact that you can cross this spot off the map and you can cross that spot off the map because you know it's not happening there. Um, you just gave me a really good example of of something that you do, which is sometimes go to the one place you haven't yet. But can you talk to me about anything else you're thinking about when you get to the back half of a short trip like that and you you still don't have them pegged? What are what are the things you're switching to now? Like what's your ace in the pocket that you jump to? When it's day four of a six day hunt or day five of a six day hunting, You're you're striking out so far? What are you doing? What are you thinking? Yeah, I mean there's always that little bit of panic, you know. Um, there's no way around it, because I mean, because you fail more than you succeed in bow hunting, you know, and so it's kind of hard not to have that little bit of panic in the back of your mind where you're like, dang, I don't I don't have anything to chase, and I've got two days left and I got nothing. You know, I feel like I've wasted the last four or five days and like, I have no intel, but at the same time, you've crossed out a lot, and that's kind of what I try to go to. At that point, I'm like, Okay, I don't have any good information, but I have a lot of places I know not to go, you know. I know that's like not the ticket. You know, they're the deer aren't using there. So at that point, I just start narrowing it down on like and and sometimes it just doesn't work, you know. Sometimes you just leave empty handed and you did everything you could and you made all the right decisions and he just didn't come by, you know, something happened. But I'm constantly at that point. Um, Like I said, if it's not the rut or something I'm I'm moving. And I feel like that keeps my spirits up to like, once I hunt a stand for two or three days and I see nothing, it's hard to keep your like morale high and your confidence. I'll be like, I feel like I've been to those sets where I'm just like, well, let's go back and get skunked again over here, you know, because that's what's gonna happen, you know, which is not a good place to be because you know, and I've been there a lot, and uh where I'm just like, I know, like it's not gonna happen here. But so I tried, like no matter what, if I go to a new set or a hanging hunt in an area I haven't been for some reason, my confidence is just up. And so because I'm like, it feels fresh. I don't know what's here. This could be money, you know, and most of the time it's not. But sometimes, you know, just like in Wyoming it was, but I don't really have like a like a secret sauce, you know. At that point, it's just grinding, you know, and hunting is hard the last day and the first day like never, you know, there's never like a lazy moment where I'm like, yeah, probably ain't gonna happen, and so like let's go out you know, a little later and and you know, not pay attention as much. Like I feel like I the harder it gets is the harder I hunt. And I feel like that's always been the key for us, is like we we almost get more mad, like as we're getting beat, like we're getting our bloods kicked, and it's like not that like, Okay, let's just give up. It's like you know what, like let's dig in and like let's let's figure these suckers out, like what are they doing? You know? And so we're constantly, like you we'll be sitting in a stand like looking at areals like where could he be? Like okay, we saw him, he here here, or you know, we got nothing like this is this side of the farm is just like ghost and so like we're constantly strategizing, which to me is the fun part of white till Like that's why I do it. I because there's so much strategy involved and they're so hard to kill, like a big mature white tie with a bow, like in five days. It's almost impossible, you know. I mean, like that's what's fun about it is it seems a little bit unattainable to show up and you're like no information, like okay, fine and kill a big mature deer in five days, Um, okay, Like let's dig in. Like there can't be any downtime, you know, you can't be like eating doughnuts back at camp at night thirty in the morning, because that's just you know, I mean, unless that's your like if you're cool with not killing anything or not being successful, and hunting is just a social thing for you, which it is for some people. You know. Don't make yourself uncomfortable, you know, enjoy yourself, but don't be mad at the end of the week when you have a tag in your pocket. For me, the fun part of it is the grind. It's showing up, getting my butt kicked. That was a bad decision. Okay, let's move on next, Like, okay, next, What's what's next? What's next? What's next? And so that's my mind is always like if this sit sucks, what are we doing in the morning, you know, And and then just keeping my head on a swivel. And I feel like there's really no secret to white to hunting other than that you just have to like hate losing so much that you won't give up. Pretty true, that's very true. You've you talked about, you know, just how your your aggress your aggression level has to change too throughout right, and you gotta keep on grinding. But when you get to that back half of a trip and you haven't gotten it figured out yet, what is aggressive when you say aggressive? Like, what does that mean? What does that look like for you? When you're down in the last couple of days and you're trying to figure out what's next. What are those aggressive moves that you will pull out of the bag of tricks or the the places that you'll explore on day six or seven that you would never touch on day one or two. Yeah, it's absolutely, It's it's mainly the wind. So like I'm I'm so always like conscious of which way the winds blowing the deer that I'm blowing out whatever. So there's always the places where the majority of the deer like using those those intersections, those the money spots that are normally in the center of what you're trying to hunt, and like there's that's where you're most likely to get busted and you're always giving something up. So those are the places I'm going. I'm going in the betting areas. I'm getting close. I'm I'm moving into bow range of the the most well used you know, funnel on the farm and where i know I'm going to spook some deer, probably some are gonna get me, Like I'm giving it up, Like I'm giving those up and I'm just moving in to be as a as aggressive as possible. Um in those moments. So like in the rut, that's gonna be let's move into the bedroom. Let's get on that in that cedar thicket, like right on it, like in that creek bottom. If deer come behind us, they come behind us. But we got to get in there, um to try to get within bow range and kill one. Um early season, that's you know, let's move in on those four trails that are dumping out, you know. And I know we've got those three that some of the deer used sometimes that's gonna be down when, but it doesn't matter. We got to get in there, get right in the middle of them. Um. We got tonight and tomorrow left, Like what do we what do we got to lose? Like, there's no reason to sit back and hope one straggles by over here for the sake of not spooking those five doughs that are going to come out over here, you know. So that's the kind of thing that that will do. And um, you know a lot of times it's kind of in the rut. Andy my buddy called it finding them schooling because he's a bass fisherman and so he uses that term like when they're chasing. Does a lot of times we'll we'll have stands on her back and slipping through and because for some reason, they do in the same areas every year, and then we'll see them with their eyes. Um, there'll be four or five bucks and like on our place in Mississippi on a hot dough and they're just running her back and forth and running or run her all over the place. And then we wait till we see that to get up in a tree, because they're gonna be in that bottom. They're going to be on that ridge all day, back and forth. And so like we call it, you know, now after hunt with him a little bit down there, it's like, all right, we're gonna we're gonna walk until we see him schooling and then we're getting a tree. You got you gotta give me more details on this one because this is unconventional, so very so very talk to me, sorry, I was gonna say, talk to me about like when do you pull that one out? In what kind of places would that actually work? And then I need to know like, Okay, what time are you getting out there, what's the how are you using the wind to approach these places that you think they'll be schooling? And then when you find a bunch of them chasing a doll, how do you manage to get set up close enough without spooking any of them? So, so give me the whole rundown from the nutstables, right, Okay, So I'll just give you. Like so two years ago on our place down in Mississippi, Um, we had a deer. It was a six five biggest deer on the farm. It's an absolutely giant and so it's super hard to hunt because down there it's just just really just timber. I mean it's just thick, swampy timber. And so like you've got to be a very good woodsman to kill him down there. I mean there's a lot of bucks, but like to target one and go after it, you gotta be a good woodsman. So, like we had no intel, he hadn't shown up, so it's like all right, let's just let's just get in there. So this is like December four, which is peak Rutt and where we're at Mississippi. So this is like when they're on dough is hard, like that week out of the year that they're just chasing and like multiple bucks, Like a hot dough has multiple bucks with her um and it's just that so one mature buckle, I have her, and he'll be it's almost like he's fending off three year olds and two year olds left and right, and so that chaos when that happens. Those deer are so occupied with each other you can get away with a ton um and so it's almost like when two bowl elk are fighting and you can move in on them. Um, they're so focused on each other that you can walk right up to him and hit one in the head with a hammer. He's not going to know it. So that's what we're calling school. And like when those bucks are like that one big one's got the dough and he's just fending off bucks left and right, and so that's like a school of deer just like kind of migrating around in the woods, which is you don't find every day, but there's like a week out of the year where that's happening a lot. And so that's what we would do. We were like, we like, let's go, So we put stands on our back and we went into this place we call the Witches Dan, which is on our lease, and it's like sanctuary almost like we never go in there, you know, it's just hard to hunt, and there's really no way to hunt it safe. But this week out of the year, the deer just like running crazy in this because it's like they don't have pressure. It's like their home. So we just eased in, eased in, winding our face, winding her face, like I'm talking about, one step at a time, eyes peeled, one step at a time, and all of a sudden we see a buck and then a dough whether and then like all of a sudden, there's just bucks walking circles around them, and we're like two hundred yards away, and so he'll run one buck off. We move in a little closer, he comes back to his dough, he runs another buck off. We move in a little closer, and so we got as close as we felt like we could. We're probably five yards away, and but it's thick and and um in this bottom, and so we just go up a tree as quick and as quiet as possible while they're chasing back and forth. We got bucks running under us, but they're just not as sharp as they normally are during this week. They're just one thing on their mind, and um, it's a it's the most aggressive way that you can hunt, in my opinion, And we we got up in a tree and UM ended up killing that that big six by five. He uh, he ran a buck off and as he was coming back, I hit the horns together and he was just in one of those moods and he ran straight to the base of this tree and I killed him. So it was like just and that would never work in any other scenario, but like when they're running that hard, you can be really aggressive and just move right in on them. And I almost killed the buck the same week doing the same thing called crooked brow, and he was the next bagest here on the farm, which ended up killing last year. But we did the same thing. We moved into it. We found him with his dough and he was drowning bucks off and we got up in a tree and had him come by three times that night and never got a shot. So it's it's interesting because it sounds crazy, but you're not the only one who does that. I remember talking to Andrea Quisto about something like this, and he he talked about how they'll be these days, which I think any one of us who's hunted a lot during the ruck can think of. When you're sitting there and what you think should be a great place, and there's nothing happening right, it's it's dead. And days like that are days when they're schooling up somewhere else and every buck in the area is in this other draw a half a mile away or something, and and his recommendation is to get out of the tree, dummy, and go find where they're all at, because they're all somewhere umr. And like you said, they're out of their mind to a degree, so you can get away with bumping a deer or two when you find that concentration because they're in there for a reason and they're, like you said, not quite on their a game. Um So there's there's something to this. My question though, for you is outside of specifically when you're down there on this one property, when would you turn to that, Like what's the what's the queue or what's the point in a hunt? We're like, okay, it's time to find out where they're schooling. Is this uh, only the last day of the hunt? Or is it when you realize like, oh, they're all locked down because you happen to see it off in the distance when you're driving and like, okay, I gotta do that, Like what what it pushes you to do that because it seems like, like you said, very aggressive, You're covering a bunch of ground, you're walking around. It's high risk in a certain way, it is, and it's but it's the one week you can get away with it, you know. It's like I think it's not so much like, Okay, this is day five in my hunts as it is. Okay, today's when it's it's happening, like I only have five days of this, you know, and so um, it's it's kind of that more than it is anything where Okay, I'm driving there's a buck locked down with the dough, and and okay, there's a buck locked down with the dough or you know people in the area, and my buddies are like I've seen, you know, there's three bucks ten the doughs over here. You know. You know, just information tells me that that's happening. And when I'm sitting in good places like like you were just saying, and like it's crickets, there's only one reason that that could be, you know, and that's because there's eight bucks on the same dough somewhere, you know, And so that's what I'm looking for. You know. That's when I'm like, all right, you know it's time, like we gotta go find them. And so we're slipping, and I mean we're not just like trampling through the woods were very carefully being super stupid, I guess, but we're like walking slowly and like because they could all be betted. Normally, though there's there's several giveaways. There'll be young bucks standing before you'll see the big ones. There's normally like those little guys on the outskirts that are just circling, just walking circles, trying to get in there and steal this dough for a second, you know, And so when you see that, you better get your buy nose up and start searching, because that magical time when you see that there is a mature deer with a dough somewhere right there. Like if you see young bucks just not leaving an area and you're like, well, they don't have a dough, No they don't, but I guarantee you within a hundred yards there's a hot dough and there's a big buck. So like that's what that's what we're looking for now, I know, Mississippi is unique with the timing of the rut in certain places, but across most of the country, when you're in Pennsylvania or Iowa or something like that, what would you say the best window for this kind of thing is, I'd say the tent through the twentie of November, um normally is when that's going to go down. A lot of times, that first week in November is a lot of young bucks, a lot of so you'll see big bucks cruise into but you're I think it's one peak Estra's or those first few doughs really are hitting. And like when I've seen that the most is like, yeah, second we to third week in November where they're really um concentrated on. I guess it's not when most of the dose are in heat. Um. I mean, and it could be too. I guess it's just situational. But I'd say I've seen that happen more than like in the Midwest, that uh tent through of November, And I'm sure that could happen on the first of November in the right situation, you get the right dough, when that first dough comes into heat, I'd say that that's happening somewhere Um, but you just may not know it because if it's you know, you might still be seeing bucks because there's only one dough in heat, you know, But if she comes in there's there's definitely gonna be bucks on her like that. And so I just think I see it more that because there's more does in heat, And so you see that happening more visibly on the side of the road. You see it kind of everywhere. So, um, if you're paying attention, you'll know when when that's happening. Yeah, Well, what do you typically do? Leave when you're up in a tree and you spot a shooter like the buck or one that definitely catches your eye and he's locked on a dough and it's just the two of them and they're just kind of working away from you, or you see them bedded down, you know, a hundred and twenty yards away or something. Are you are you ever going to get out of your tree and make a move on him or are you always gonna wait? Or do you ever call? What's your what's your move? When you see that? Yeah? If I see a buck with a dough, like a big deer with a dough and it's just them too, like and that's why, Like that's after I think that schooling like we've been talking about happens, like when he like finally finds them all off, and then he's taken her somewhere that is off the beaten path, away from a high concentration and deer out in the middle of a c rp out in a little hedgerow somewhere. Um, I don't call to him at all, because that's what he's trying to avoid. And and um, when I see that, I just let him be and try to find where they bead. Um. Because if it's out in the hedgerow, like in Illinois where we hunted for years, like they used hedgerows a lot, big Bucks. You you'd watch them walk a dough a half mile out on a little brushy hedgerow and they'd keep her there. Um. So what we would do is set up that afternoon or the next sit on you know, on that hedgerow, like for when he either left her or like he pushed her back down that hedgerow, Like normally they're gonna come back down at some point, right, So we would try to get between where we thought that dough might want to go or where he might go whenever he left her, um or we would try to make a play on him, like a spot in stock deal, you know, if the terrain would allow it. Um Or maybe it's the last day and I see that, you know, and i gotta leave when I'm getting down and I'm I'm going, I'm getting the wind right and I'm gonna make a play like let's go, you know. So that's tough. I do not normally ever call to him, because I've watched that push him. He would just take her and push her further and further away, just to get her, get her away from that. Um. Now, if there's alright, but like if he runs a buck off, if he if that schooling's happened, calling and calling still works for sure, because he's still like very aggressively running bucks away. Um And so like that buck in Mississippi, he literally locked up and plowed this other buck like just sent him through the freaking woods like cartwheeled him. And like he was like and he like had that cocky attitude and every deer's got a different attitude. You could just see it. Like he was like I'm the man, you know, Like and as soon as he did that, I like snort, weez and hit the horns together and he was like what you know, like and he just barreled right into the tree. But we were in that bubble. You know. You can't do that from five yards away and have it work. You gotta be like on him and like he's got to think like you're a threat to take his dough and then it then it would work, Um for sure. But like if he's got her by himself, I've very maybe never have called the deer off a hot dough that was just alone with her. You know, it just doesn't work. You that's a tough nut to crack. Yeah, if you figure that out, let me know. I've never been able to get him to leave that dope for anything. So one thing on their mind talking about all the different aggressive things that you're trying on these hunts, one thing we haven't really touched on would be like decoy. Is there anything like that? Is that ever anything you ever pull out for certain situations like this? Yeah, very rarely. But I did kill a deer last year just and um, he didn't come as a decoy, But the decoy is the only reason I killed him. So I did everything we talked about his first sit in Illinois. Um, I was like, I know there's some shooters. There's a farm we call the South Farm, but I never killed a deer on it, and I'd really only hunted it maybe once or twice in my life. It was just a property that we had permission to hunt. And it's a big open switch grass farm on a river bottom, like very little woods, just patches of trees. And so I was like, you know what, I'm gonna go in an observation tree. Like I was literally a hundred fifty yards off a grawl road, but I could see the whole farm from this spot. And I was like, I'm gonna get in a tree. I'm gonna put a decoy out, and if a big bucks, you know, cruising or something, maybe I'll kill him. You know, I still want to be in the game, but I want to get eyes on a big shooter and try to find one. And so first morning and um, we're sitting there and literally had me and Mica had like yet he's full of coffee. Like we're just like enjoying the morning, right, We're just up there drinking coffee, washing little bucks cruise the bottom like and then all of a sudden, this big shooter opts out like nine o'clock with a dough and he's like fending bucks off, fending bucks off. And then all of a sudden he starts pushing her right to us, and I'm like, holy cow, dude, like this might work, you know. Well, he pushes her under us like fifty yards and this these briars that are like eight ft high. So I only know he's there because I can see these briars when they move, I can see where he's going. Well, my decoy is out to the left. He still hadn't seen it. Well, all of a sudden, like she gets tired of his business or whatever. After they've been there for like an hour, she darts right by my decoy across the field and into the switch grass. Well he's out on her like big hundred six deer, like big deer, and and as he blazes by, he locks up his brakes on my decoy and just like bristles up for like three seconds, and I shoot him. And like so he didn't come to the decoy, But when he busted out in the open and seen that buck standing there, he like just fro like he just locked on him, and he wasn't going to hit my decoy. He was like walking by it, like to go get the dough, but he like stopped him long enough for me to get an arrow in him. And it was the coolest time. Like, holy cow, it was one of the few times I ever killed a deer on a decoy, and it was just slowed him down enough like to kill it, you know. So it was a it was a cool hunt. But that was an observation sit that just worked, you know. But it only worked because of the decoy, I guess. Is that is that something that you employ often on observation hunts like that, because that's something I never thought about, But it does make a lot of sense. If you're in a place that's not high deer traffic but good visibility, why not throw out that decoy just in case? Yeah, I do that. That's mainly when I use a decoy. If I'm going somewhere where I can see a long ways or a deer can see where I'm at from a long ways, I'll take a decoy set it out because I'm like at work, I'm not going to run deer off with it, you know, And that's always my fear. But like if a giant buck is two hundre yards away and I snort, we is at him, he looks and sees a buck standing over there, He's way more likely to come over, you know. So that's kind of when I use a decoy. I normally like, if I'm on a big buck, I hardly probably never am going to take a decoy in there, you know, um, because I just like to put a little attention on my area as possible. But wow, what's your what's your decoy set up? Like? How do you like to position it in relation to where you are? How far away all that? Yeah? I um, I put it about thirty yards away normally if I can and face it at me kind of at an angle, um, because what I've seen is most dear like to come at him from the side. They don't come head on. They'll come at him to try to hit him from the side, and so and and I'll put it where the wind is blowing from the decoy straight to me, because they always a lot of times those bucks will circle and try to come on the down wind side to smell what dear it is, or you know, maybe it's a buck that you beat them in the past. Or something. I don't know what they're checking for, but a lot of times those bucks are trying to smell what deer that is, so like they I guess they don't recognize it maybe or something, and they're trying to circle down win. So that normally puts them like top pin like right there, you know, So I try to face it at me and then because they come like at the like broadside on the decoy at the headside, normally, um, when they're going to hit it. So yeah, obviously that's not a guarantee, but that's what I've seen most most of the time. Yeah, I want to make a I want to make a hard pivot here, and and kind of wrap it up with one final theme. I guess, um, I'm gonna make an assumption, and I know the assumptions, right, I just don't know exactly how it manifests itself. But given just given how successful you've been on the archery circuit, and then of course in hunting to you must you must have your men until game just dialed like, you must have an unbelievable mental fitness level. And and I'm guessing that you work on that in some way or that you think about that or that that's important to you in some way or another. Um, I guess he is that Is that true? Is that something that you think about? Yeah? I think, Um, I've been forced to with with the tournament side of things, just to really figure out how to exhale and and beat people with with strategy and and um my mental approach. Yeah. So I mean that's a huge part of everything I do, and I don't even mean for it to be anymore. Yeah, that's and then maybe that's why you've gotten to the point you've gotten to. It's its second nature. UM. I'm curious about your routines. I imagine, like before before a tournament, you have some kind of routines before the tournament to get your mind right. I imagine that you've got some kind of routine maybe before you settle in for every single shot. I imagine you've got something like that. Maybe even after a tournament when you're kind of winding down and trying to think about what went right, what went wrong? What can you learn from that something like that. Um. If that's If that's the case, I'm curious if you have anything similar when it comes to your hunting life. Are there any routines that you have to help you get get ready for a hunt or when you're struggling on a hunt or anything like that. Yeah. Um, I think it's all both down to where I'm focused on from from the first, from from go, and that is the process. So even in a tournament, like I learned a long time ago, if I focus on end result, it never works out good. If I'm focused on this is a world championship. If I screw up all the things that are at stake, um, you know, I'm running out of targets, Like, none of that ever works. That mental approach is not gonna work. I have to stay focused on the steps it's gonna take to get me to my end goal. So that's like, first, what's my goal here? Okay, that's the buck I want or I want a mature dear, whatever that is. I want to win this world championship. Okay, what's the steps is gonna take to give me that? Okay? And then I never think about the end result again and never think about that goal again. I'm literally focused on step number one to step number two, the process, the journey, the strategy that's gonna lead to my end goal because it does mean no good to look at what's at steak? You know, okay, that could be the biggest typical ever shot. You know, okay, what does me no good to think about that anymore? How do I get how do I get in on it? So like then hunting, I'm not worked up on what's at steak when he's coming in. You know, I'm not thinking about anything other than the process, which is you know, from so shooting it's I have a complete process from the time I step up to the steak um where I'm keep my mind busy because if you let your mind just kind of sit there, it automatically goes to worst case scenario. What's this ache, don't screw up, don't miss, don't punch the trigger, you know, all those things, and when you think those, you automatically do them. Like your mind is incredibly powerful, and if it's not working for you, then you are screwed most of the time. So that's the same thing I think I take into hunting that I don't even intentionally do it, but I find myself, like the other day in Ohio, when the biggest buck of my life is standing there at thirty five yards making a scrape I'm not even thinking about it, and it was so weird. After it all happened, I was just like, that was maybe the calmest I've ever been. And I was self filming eight in Typical that I hadn't had a daylight picture of since September five. You know, It's like I felt like I was just like, oh, cool, look at that. It's a giant, you know. But like I never even the thought never came into my mind what was at stake, and I didn't realize it until after it was over. I wasn't panicking like if I don't get this done right here, I'm never going to see him again, which is probably the truth, and like I just didn't let my mind go there. I just, I guess have I've shot tournaments since I was six, compiledly competitive on my whole life, and so I'm almost numb to some of those Like as soon as those thoughts come into my mind, I think I just block them out so far that like they don't even register. I guess, I don't know. It's hard to explain, but it's like I don't know. I think it's really kept me grounded, and it doesn't mean I don't get nervous or don't don't love it, or get super excited, because I do. Like if you watch me win a tournament or they're compete against me, you know, like I'm shaking, I'm nervous, I'm like pumped hunting, like I get jacked, but like I don't crumble. I guess it's a difference. I don't panic. It's more of an excitement. And um, it's not anxiety. It's excitement, you know, like, oh this is cool, you know, like this is happening. You know, like Okay, let's make sure like we got a good range. Like and that's the main thing with me, honey. I'm constantly ranging, and it keeps my mind focused on how far he is rather than everything else that could go wrong. So my range finders in my hand non stop. So I'm clicking him every time he moves. I'm like okay, forty one, okay, thirty eight, okay, Like it's constant, and so when he turns broadside, my mind is only on how far he is. So then as I knock up, it's only on what pen to use and where to put it, and so I'm at full draw. Breathe take a breath, forty yard pin bottom of him, squeeze, boom, It's over. You know. So it's like then I get nervous because I'm like, Holy Day was the biggest deer in my life. He could have turned at any second, you know, Like none of that stuff went through my head until it was over. You know. So I think the main thing is just focusing on the steps in the process instead of just looking at the rack and focusing on what you could screw up and what's at steak when that big one coming in, and even the whole week. You know, you're just so focused on you know, the steps and the process and the strategy that you're never really letting your mind go to a you know, a bad place where like you think you don't have a chance. I guess, yeah, and that's that's kind of where I was gonna go next, because that's it's it's hard to do. It's hard not to let your mind go to a bad place, at least for me, because of what you just said, Like there's this temptation to always be looking at the end results and how your chances are slipping away, or how opportunities were past or all these different things. You know, it can be being a goal oriented person, like like I'm a very goal or a very competitive person, and so it's very hard not to do that. But what you're saying, like trying to focus on the process has been like the the one thing that I keep on trying to actively do and get better at, and that does help. Is whenever you start feeling that way, just just banish that and try to remember just what's the next step, what's the next thing I can do? Um. I know it was a year or two ago for you. I think you you went to Iowa for the first time, I think it was, and you had like eight or nine days that just could not get it done. And I think that was unbelievably frustrating for you. Uh. Is there anything else? I mean, is there anything else you're doing too actively? I mean you, I know you mentioned that sometimes you don't even have those thoughts anymore because you're self process oriented. But do you ever get that whisper and then you have Is there a mental tool or is there just like a word or a phrase or anything that you're like snap you out of it? Um? I don't know, Yeah, I mean I still definitely they creep in for sure. Like, um, yeah, that Iowa trip was a brutal trip, man. I mean I waited my like five years to draw that tag and it was just like jeez, like this is the sucks. There's not a booner behind every trip? What going on here? Um? No? Like yeah, So like this year, like I constantly have to keep myself in check, like in tournaments and hunting. It's not as bad because I think it's not. Tournaments are high stress from target one because like if you make a mistake, like it's pretty much most of the time it's over. Those guys are so good, So it's like it's way harder to keep those negative thoughts out in tournaments and so and I do that literally from January to August. So by the time hunting gets here, I've I've I'm pretty I guess um good at blocking those negative thoughts out for hunting season. And I just look forward to it so much that it's like the negative thoughts I have in hunting or don't even compare to the one that come into my mind when I'm shooting. Like I guess I'd be a world this year. Like I had a great year, but I had got my butt kicked on a few times by the same guys year, um, and so like I'd be a world. We were battling it out for the World Championship and going into the final day for the final ten targets, he having by three points when and he doesn't make mistakes very often, and it was like, dang, you know, my mind started to go to that place for like you lost, like it's over, Like give up, dude, Like stop putting yourself through this, because I'm like, I'm the type of person that hates losing so much in every scenario that like I will torture myself and think I have a chance to win when I don't, you know, like I that's my fault is I'm too dumb to quit, That's what I say, because I'm like, I can still do this, you know, Like and so I'd be a world. I probably should have given up, honestly, because it's like he's not gonna make a big enough mistake for me to get this back in tin targets. But I was like, no, like we can still do it. You know. It's the same old, same old, same old. And I'll be thanking if he didn't. And um, I come back and won the iby of worlds, and it was like wow, Like if my mental if I had just like let my mind go there, I would not have been at the place to capitalize on that. And that's the same thing in hunting, like if you let yourself and we all have. I've been sitting there with my bottom lip stuck out in a tree stand on day five and that's when I turn and look and there he is. And I'm so unprepared for that moment. Did I screw it up? You know? And so I think that's the main thing. It's just being in a good enough mental place and focused enough that when that opportunity does come, you can capitalize on it. And so I think that's more what I've gotten better at over the years than anything is. Even when it's been four days of crickets and I think the chances of seeing a big buck are like one per cent. I try to steal keep myself in a good enough mental place that if he does step out, I'm ready. I know how far that tree is, I know what I'm gonna do if he comes in over here. I know where I need to stop him in that window. So I'm constantly trying to think of the things that are going to give me an advantage if this dear comes in And yeah, I can still be in a bad mood, I can still think it probably ain't gonna happen. But I'm normally mentally prepared enough to capitalize if I'm giving that opportunity. And that's I totally learned that from tournaments. But it carries over into hunting so so much. Yeah, so what about when you do fail, when when you you stayed ready and you were ready for it and you miss or you wounded deer, or you are shooting in a tournament and you're so close but you you shank the shot and you missus by a little bit, whatever it is, how do you handle that failure in the moment, How do you recover from it? How do you get back on the saddle. Well, in tournaments, I say, I give myself one day to celebrate or to be mad at myself, because we got to prepare for the next one. So that's what I say, because I've I've you know, you lose more than you win, and that's just the way it is. Um in hunting in a tournament, so um and hunting, you know, it's it's brutal, I guess, because it's more of jeezus not who knows when the next chance is going to be, you know, in tournaments, I'm like, oh, the next tournaments next weekend, I'm gonna win that one, you know, like I'm gonna I'm gonna regroup and win that one. But with a giant deer or an animal you're after, you don't even know if there is going to be another opportunity. So it's a lot harder to recover for me when I blow that than a tournament, I guess. So like the main thing I do is just regroup. I'm like I have to, Like, obviously you're gonna be down, like you're bombed, especially like wound in a big buck is like the worst, you know, like it's like pretty final, like you know, he might die, he might not and he might never show up again. Um, and so it's like I didn't you know That's that's probably the worst feeling as a bowl hunter that you could feel, is sticking up you know, an animal and then like not recovering it and not knowing like is he still alive? Is he dead somewhere? You know? What's going on? I don't know and so um, that's hard to recover from. But you also have to realize that's gonna happen, and that's part of it, and it's easier said than done, but at some point you gotta be able to be like, okay, like that's just part of it. It's a sucky part of bow hunting, and um, you've got to do everything you can to make decisions to try not let it happen again, but it probably will if you're hunt enough and shoot enough. And um, you know a lot of times I've found that when you don't if you really put in the effort to recover a deer and you don't recover him, most of the time it's because he's still alive. And I found that out so much. You know, you shoot it here like last year, I'll just be straight honest. I shot a deer in Nebraska. Looked like I hit him absolutely perfect, and um, he wheeled as the arrow hit him and it went in right in the crease, but it came out like in front of the same shoulders. While we found out later like your eyes see one thing, like no I smoked him or what actually happened is something totally different, and so We actually tracked that deer for fift yards and jumped him, and I'm like, holy cow, I this is the next day, still alive. And then a rifle hunter kills him two months later. It's like what, you know, like I would have met everything in the world. That deer was dead, you know, and it was just brutally, like mentally draining. So I mean, I guess you just have to put in every effort to recover them, every effort to do it right. Um. But then if you don't, you have to be able to, you know, move on or or I guess don't. I guess that's your call. But I tend to be on the more like I hate losing side, and I'm gonna try to never let that happen again. And you know, missing and is normally because of bad decisions at some point. For me, you know, it's not taking the time to get a perfect range or not, you know, seeing that overhanging lamb or or whatever it may be rushing myself. So um, I try to think about what I did wrong, what I could have done different, and then um learn from it and move on. But you know, failure is definitely a part of bow hunting. Um, a big part of it that you're gonna have to deal with and uh some form. Yeah, it's it's it doesn't sound very good to say, but getting good at failing is actually a very important part of bow hunting. It. Yeah, there's something that I got mad. That's what I told somebody the other day that somebody that we were talking about I won't say who was just always in a bad mood. And Camp like always like something's going wrong, you know, like at the end of the world, like all the time, everybody's probably got that guy. They know it's like the negative Nancy. Nothing's going right. And if dang it, if I wanted something to be mad about hunting Camp, I could find it at any given time, Like if I just wanted so, like there's always things that are frustrating or like that just get on your nerves hunting. It's like, gosh, something's not working out right. But you can't you can't have that attitude. It's it's more about I mean, I don't even want to say it, but it's like we're lucky, you know, to just get to be out here, you know, hunting and chasing these critters, and like sometimes I just have to remind myself of that because I get so worked up, like chasing an animal, but like I got blinders on, you know, and like I feel like God sometimes brains me back in and it's like, hey, you know what, Like is that really what it's all about? You know, So I gotta really refocus and go, you know what, if it works, it works, I'm gonna give her heck. But I gotta be thankful for just being able to be out here, you know, doing it could be way worse. It could be way worse, and I'm the exact same way. And the thing that has helped me the most, I think just in the last three and a half years is when I find myself in that mental state where I missed a deer or stuff's not going right or whatever, and I'm in the pits there for that evening said or that moment when I'm driving home in the truck or whatever, if I just remember, like remember your kids, Like I just think about my kids, like I'm so lucky to have these two awesome little boys. You're so You're so blessed, and and that little perspective shift can always like help get me out of there quick, like yeah, yeah, the hunt's not going right, or yeah, you screwed up, you made a mistake, But gosh, in the big scheme of things, this matters so little compared to those really important things in life. But like you said, we can get so worked up and all of a sudden it feels like it's life or death. But really we're just out there like idiots run around with a stick and string, and uh. In the big scheme of things, there's there's a whole lot more important things to worry about. Absolutely, man, that read that exact. It has got me through so many like tournaments and and situations that were like high pressure, like because it's like it'll crush you with sometimes that pressure will if you let it. And it's just like, you know what, in the big scheme of things, just really ain't that important. You know. It's like my kids are healthy, I got a lot to be thankful for. Like let's just enjoy it and move on. You know. So that's hard, easier said than done. And it's not like I am in a great mood after I miss a giant animal. It's not it. I'm still very upset, but it's like, Okay, I'll get over it. You know life will go on. That's right. Well leave, I we gotta we gotta wrap this one up. But great, great insight. I really appreciate you sharing this, and it's it's I know you don't feel good about this is what I'm gonna say next. But I think it is probably reassuring for a lot of people listening to know that even you miss dear every once in a while, because if that's the case, then everyone should feel like they're not alone. I guess out the best shoot of the world is doing it too, so we're we're a good company. I've missed sheep, olt beer, you name it, I miss so it's part of it. Well where can where can people go LEVI to to watch the show or keep up with you and what you guys are up to these days. Yeah, the show is on the Outdoor Channel and we uh we air four times a week. It's called Bowlife. I'm our main airings or Tuesday night, Thursday night, I think Thursday night, like seven seven thirty something like that. I don't watch my show because I'm normally hunting. But anyways, Tuesday nights and Thursday nights on the Outdoor Channel and then pretty much can keep up with everything I'm doing on Instagram, which is bowlife Levi on Instagram. So other than that, yeah, we're just uh this time of year full till hunting, so yeah, I gotta love it. Well, uh, you're already off to a great start, but I hope this success continues for Levi. I appreciate you taking time, Chap, same to you, man, I appreciate it all right, And that's it. Thanks for listening to Hope you enjoyed this conversation with Levi Morrigan. Make sure to check him out in all those places he mentioned, And as I said at the top of the show, subscribe to that Wired Dunt weekly newsletter. You'll get all the updates from us and we'll keep you posted on the crazy amount of new white tail content we're putting out there hoping to help you have the best hunting season of your life. So best to luck out there, enjoy, Thank you for listening, and stay wired to Hunk